Chapter VI · Timeline and Events

Timeline

Eldriloch counts its history in catastrophes. Scholars argue over exact years, but everyone agrees on the order things broke: first the runekar, then the world, then the peace, and now, perhaps, everything else.

The Age of the Runekar

1. Before the Sunder

   The Runekar Ascendant

   The runekar, born able to see the aether web, lead the world in engineering, the protection of nature and academic study. They regard every other people as lesser.

2. A dark period

   The Purge and the Malumtene

   A small group of runekar tries to wipe out every other species to "purify" the world. Runekar who practice destructive magic are shunned, and their dark rituals twist them into the malumtene.

3. Before the Sunder

   Humans Receive Flux

   According to the Celestial Covenant, the gods choose humans alone to receive flux. All the major teachings about flux appear at about the same time, which some scholars find odd.

The Sundering

1. The turning of the age

   The Dark Sunder

   The runekar test an instant-travel network near the site of Ashborne. The portal opens onto the shattered reality of the exspiratis instead. The Fiend's Chasm forms, fibrolite appears in the world, and the exspiratis can reach Eldriloch for the first time.

2. After the Sunder

   The First Ashen

   In Ashborne, the first humans let exspiratis into their bodies. The ashen alone can work the Chasm's fibrolite mines, and the age of autonomation begins.

3. After the Sunder

   Using Aether and Flux Together Is Banned

   Combining the two powers, as forge-grafting does, is outlawed after the Sunder.

4. After the Sunder

   The Runekar Rail

   As an apology for the Sunder, the runekar build a floating railway connecting every major city on the continent. Many runekar die building it. They mean it to be free to everyone, to bring the continent's peoples together. Trade flourishes for a time, until the nations claim the stations, the Sovereigni buy the routes, and the fares and papers begin.

5. After the Sunder

   Mechanoids

   Engineers learn to store aetheric patterns in fibrolite. Mechanoids spread through wealthy nations to take over menial work.

The War of Souls

1. War begins

   Ethon Against Adryae

   Ethon, strengthened by its exspiratis allies, makes war on Adryae. The trains are converted to carry troops. The runekar refuse to do any more work on the rail.

2. During the war

   The Rail Is Cut

   Ethon deliberately destroys the rail through the Dryarwood Forest, between Sherfield and Ashborne, cutting Adryae off from Ethon and Staerhiel. Adryae invents the airship to haul alloys from Staerhiel, and privateers soon follow.

3. During the war

   The Ashen Conscripted

   Ethon conscripts every ashen who keeps their sanity. They destroy Adryae's mechanoid war machines and Adryae nearly falls.

4. During the war

   The Usmon Treaty

   Usmon gives Adryae a powerful artifact. In exchange, Adryae keeps war machines out of Usmon and defends it beyond its borders.

5. During the war

   Caerdydd and Murkwell Ceded

   In a secret bargain for steel, Ethon hands Caerdydd and Murkwell to Staerhiel. The border moves north above Murkwell. Their people believe they were conquered.

6. The final years

   The Souldriven

   Mirakis and Oloven of the Tinkerer Guild create the first souldriven. Oloven dies in the attempt. Each must be raised and trained from an infant's soul, so only a small number reach the front, but they prove devastatingly effective against the ashen. The war ends soon after.

7. War's end

   Ethon Turns on the Exspiratis

   Ethon realizes the exspiratis are taking over the nation. United under a watchful king, it drives them back into the Fiend's Chasm. During the attack, a Staerhielian emperor seizes Ethonian land and the alliance breaks.

See the maps in Before and After the War for the rail and the land that changed hands.

The Uneasy Peace (The Present)

1. After the war

   Privateers of the Gulf

   Privateers prey on the airship trade between Adryae and Staerhiel and found cities near the Tepor Islands. Escorts become standard for valuable cargo.

2. After the war

   Gilirak's Ambition

   Regnant Sovereigni Gilirak of Staerhiel turns his eyes on Ethon. He taxes annexed towns into starvation to clear them as staging grounds.

3. Recent years

   The Veil

   Hunted after trying to expose the truth about the souldriven, Zinrie flees to Luton and founds the Veil. The resistance in eastern Staerhiel gains focus, and civil war begins.

4. Recent years

   The Battle of Luton

   The Sons of the Throneless and the Gutter Kings defeat Gilirak's attempt to retake Luton. The Sons are branded criminals.

5. Recent years

   The Chromatic Orb Goes Into Hiding

   The Arcanum Order claims the Chromatic Orb's artifacts, and the Orb vanishes from public view.

6. The present

   An Uneasy Peace

   Usmon trains the continent's best warriors at Runswick and keeps its artifacts locked in Peltragow. Staerhiel slides toward civil war. Ethon guards the Fiend's Chasm and rebuilds. Airships, privateers and the Veil fill the gulf between them. Nobody expects the next war to come from beyond the Eldritch Mountains.