Ascendance of the Elves

The history of the world begins on the large continent of Pallis. Many different lifeforms evolved and populated the land. The first race to assert their dominance over the lesser beings of the world were the elves. For the first few centuries, the elves cleared out areas for themselves and warred against lesser beasts in the wilds. They mined out mountains and leveled forests to craft their magnificent cities that towered over the uncivilized world. After a few millennia, the elves had spread across great swathes of the land and brought many savage beasts under their heel.

It was around this time that they learned to siphon the powers of magic from the other planes of existence. This magical dabbling attracted the attention of the deity Keyldynan, ruler of the Fertility Plane. Keyldynan was intrigued by the power of the elves, but he also abhorred their short-sighted destruction of nature. The deity made himself known to the elves by personally visiting them in physical form. He gathered the greatest leaders among the Elven kingdoms by performing startling miracles for them. They bowed to his power and quickly offered themselves up as loyal believers by shunning their primitive gods based on the cardinal elements.

Keyldynan was impressed by the loyalty of the elves. He offered them eternal life if they would protect their world and all the races that inhabited it. Most of the elves happily agreed to the bargain, and even those who did not eventually bowed to Keyldynan's awesome power. Thus, the elves were granted immortality and lost their ability to reproduce. Keyldynan also bestowed his blessing upon the elves, which increased their magical powers. The elves used their new-found power to begin protecting the world and its inhabitants. They ceased to pillage the land for building materials and instead used magic to shape rock and wood to become their new cities.

The dwarves were the first race that the elves aimed to civilize. After watching them for centuries, the elves showed the primitive tunnelers how to live at peace with the land. They also taught the dwarves how to control the forces of magic, but they kept their divine blessing to themselves. Dwarven strongholds sprang up throughout the mountains and hills as the industrious people began creating sprawling kingdoms with their new knowledge. The elves chastised the dwarves for being short-sighted, but the dwarves proved too stubborn and suspicious of the elves.

The elves gradually began influencing the Dwarven leadership with bribes and gifts of divine power. Dwarven kings ordered the smiths and miners to stop work so as to live in balance with nature. The Dwarven populace grew restless with their lack of progress and rebelled against their leaders. Bloody wars were fought across the Dwarven lands as each dwarf was forced to choose a side. The elves rallied to the aid of their Dwarven puppet rulers and began quashing the rebellions swiftly and with deadly force.

Keyldynan once again returned to the world and stopped the hostilities. He told the elves to give up on the dwarves as they were a lost cause due to their innate stubbornness. The elves happily agreed since every death was a major blow to them. The Dwarven kingdoms were left to their own designs as the elves turned towards the other races.

With increased experience in dealing with fledgling races, the elves approached the halflings much differently. They taught them how to live with the land from the very beginning. The elves scored an immense victory with the halflings. The short creatures lived in cottages carved into the earth itself and foraged for food. A few halflings were taught by Elven missionaries to help bring knowledge to the rest of the world, but most halflings were too lazy and prone to trickery to be trusted.

Keyldynan's actions with the elves stirred the interest of other deities who swooped down to rear their own children. Dalkus Roban, deity from the Plane of Invention, kickstarted the evolution of the gnomes who became intensely smart and curious beings. He found their thirst for knowledge entrancing and bestowed them with powerful magics to help them carve out their own kingdoms. Gnomish cities were built with technology that not even the elves could comprehend. Dalkus Roban's gift gave the gnomes a great advantage over the other races, which inevitably led to conflict.

Just as the gnomes were progressing in sophistication, so were the orcs. Kraggok, deity of the Plane of War, bestowed the orcs with an insatiable love of war that pushed them to conflict with the surrounding creatures and even the other races. Orcs clear cut forests to erect huge fortresses as they brought goblins, gnolls, and other lesser creatures under their control. However, this was not simple bloodlust. Kraggok believed that his creatures would strengthen all of creation. The elves began preparing their armies in order to keep the orcs in check. At this point, every major deity wanted to have their own pets on this small world. Keyldynan was disgusted with his brethren and called a meeting between the many gods.

As the gods met with each other, humans developed civilization by themselves with amazing speed. They evolved faster than all the other races, even without divine intervention. Even though they began to settle villages and make the transition from nomads into sedentary farmers, the other races took notice. The orcs began brutalizing the humans, taking them as slaves and sacking their villages. A few humans who survived being raped gave birth to half-orcs who were immediately reviled by humans. Many half-orcs did not make it beyond birth, as they were generally killed by irate villagers. However, some survived and created their own settlements far from either orcs or humans. The one thing that held the half-orc community together was a burning hatred for orcs. Sir Talsden made himself known to the humans at this point, and he imparted upon them a love of civilization. The ideals of honor and nobility flourished within the human lands, and these new ways of life helped them weather the savage storm of the orcs.

Some elves became enthralled by the tenacity of the humans, and thus half-elves were born. Though they were beautiful and generally even tempered, half-elf children were not allowed into elven cities. The elves saw them as a corrupting influence, as they bore the mortality of their human parents. Some elves kept their half-blood offspring, but many were forced to live with the humans.

Raltazan, deity of the fire plane, bestowed vast intelligence to the dragons. His children became the envy of all the deities, and soon many scrambled to own their own dragon offspring, bestowing them with wildly varying powers. Roosting areas for dragons became scarce in their native lands and great wars between the dragons broke out, terrifying the rest of the races. The dragons began claiming their own expanses of territory, wiping out whole cities of the lesser races. It was then that the deities were forced to take the powers from their most powerful creations, lest they rend the world in two. It is rumored that the dragons toyed with creating their own pets too, which resulted in several monstrous creatures. However, the history of dragons is too enigmatic to be certain.

During this time of war and destruction, the immortal elves retreated to the hidden continent of Faerstice. The worried for the future of the other races, but they could not put their own futures at risk. They spent millennia in hiding, safely away from the gaze of the lesser races.

As the world was developing at an astonishing rate, the council of deities made a pact to stop meddling with the world of the elves. At this point hundreds of races had been reared by lesser deities, and the world was on the brink of destruction. The minor deities bowed to the knowledge of the major powers and cut ties with their children. Keyldynan led talks with the other gods to determine what was to be done. Whatever the reason, that meeting resulted in the Humbling.