The Divergent Branches – Ellindale and Serenmarsh

 

Foreword:

 

I hold this to be true: the world we know is not the sole, defining timeline. As Xynthin demonstrated to us, possibilities have a world of their own. What can be, is, and has a life as true and as vibrant as our own. And though the barriers between worlds are mighty, they are not insurmountable. The divergent branches of possibility may converge upon one another and interact, each changing the other forever.

 

-Thul of the Fog

 

--+--

 

The fall of the Celestine Empire is a difficult period for historians, due to the lack of primary sources, or more accurately, the lack of reliable primary sources. Only brief communications remain from Hallifax and Gaudiguch, and the Ackleberry and Serenwilde communes vanished entirely, leaving most information on the period to come from Magnagora. Even Magnagoran scholars concede, however, that the spirit of Emperor Ladantine’s testimony is an incomplete recount of events, while New Celestian critics have written volumes painting his version of history as self-serving propaganda.

 

What is known for certain is that shortly after the event that sundered Hallifax and Gaudiguch from reality, Ackleberry enacted a ritual to separate itself from existence, and Serenwilde followed soon after. Survivors of the war and refugees from the lost powers regrouped where they could, many in the nearly-deserted northern Basin. It was during this time that the survivors of Celest established their holding on the edge of the Inner Sea, and the remaining citizens of the Serenwilde established the village of Ellindale on the stripped banks of the Moon River. For many years after the Fall, the north rebuilt, Celest attempting to reconnect with its lost plains, and Ellindale simply trying to replant the whole of a lost forest.

 

--+--

 

The coming of Estarra, and subsequently Terentia, Auseklis, and Fain, would rebuild Celest but doom the rest of the north to destruction. Between Terentia’s martial dogma, Fain’s expansionist influence and the renewed power of both New Celest’s and Magnagora’s nexuses, all-out war was inevitable. Celest, empowered by the Plane of Water, chose a largely maritime assault, while Magnagora moved its mighty machines across the northern plains. The focus of the war shifted strictly to land, however, as Magnagora recovered the Horn of Urlach from the Isle of Light and raised a fleet of nigh invincible undead sailors, forcing Celest to withdraw its fleet and put up powerful wards to safeguard its own docks.

 

After this embarrassing setback, the Celestian forces fortified their next best defensive position on land, at the village of Ellindale along the Moon River. The residents protested, worrying that the war would undo the work they’d put in to growing the forest anew, but appeals to Celest were ignored. In desperation, Miakoda of the Shrine appealed to Auseklis to save their village, but the Elder God declined, choosing instead to focus His efforts on the reclamation and reconstruction of the Gloriana, which could possibly provide a nexus. When pressed, the Wanderer stated bluntly that there was nothing in His power that could stop Celest and Magnagora from killing each other. With Magnagoran war machines on the horizon, the people of Ellindale saw no choice but to flee the oncoming battle.

 

So it was, that on 23 Dioni of 100 CE, the Battle of Ellindale began. Fueled with forces strengthened by the Portal of Fate, the battle would see occasional lulls, but would not truly end for a full year. Geomantic earthworks and poison-belching war machines secured the eastern bank of the Moon River for Magnagora, but were not enough to cross the river itself, which Celest’s Aquamancers animated into a roiling current of death as they shored up the western bank. The city forces would alternately try to dam and flood the battlefield, raise or destroy earthworks, and poison the land or scour it of all impurities. Cartographers would need to remap the course of the river no less than five times over the course of the battle, and the damage to the recovering landscape was immeasurable.

 

In the end, a team of Celestian adventurers, with the help of a rogue undead monstrosity known as the Lollywight, managed to wrest the Horn of Urlach from the ghost of Ladantine, enabling Celest’s navy to sail once again. Most of the Magnagoran forces at Ellindale were suddenly crushed, as they found themselves caught between the western bank forces and a flanking assault from the rear. Celest celebrated its victory, but did not remain long, as with their navy back in play, they sought to take more ground. They left Ellindale behind them, a churned, partially flooded wasteland. When Miakoda and her people returned, they could only recognize the area from the mountains around them.

 

--+--

 

The next years would continue to be unkind to the people of Ellindale. After centuries of trying to build the forest back from a barren waste, they would have to start over again, this time with more mud and the complication of Taint. About half of the plants grown from the battlefield came out normally, while the others bore signs of mild to severe corruption.

 

Several new and dangerous species came from the regrowth, including the strangling pondweed, the black razor oaks, and most notably the carnivorous ghosthart trees, which spread to other woodlands and still present a hazard to lumberjacks everywhere. It would take many years before any animal would venture into the newly christened Serenmarsh, but many of those that did would soon exhibit odd mutations as well, most often in the form of gills. Furious at the entirety of the Basin for the pollution of their homeland, Ellindale sealed themselves off from the world as best they could for many years, being just shy of openly hostile to city-dwellers.

 

It would not be until Auseklis’s successful cleansing of Gloriana in 8 Kiani, 114 CE that the people of Ellindale would speak with outsiders, and even then only with the newly formed commune. Miakoda again begged Auseklis, and this time Viravain and Nocht, for their help. Again, Miakoda was refused. The ritual to cleanse Glomdoring of its taint, heavily contested by Magnagora and an independent movement known as the Disciples of Crow, had been risky, and there was no telling what would happen if it were tried again. Only the Master Ravenwood, Auseklis said, had made it worth the risk, or even possible. Miakoda returned to the Serenmarsh, furious, but not quite without resources. She left the encounter with two names: Lisaera and Charune, two Elder Gods who might be able to restore the Serenmarsh to its former glory.

 

--+--

 

It would take almost two hundred years for Miakoda to beckon both Elders back to the First World. It was in 2 Juliary, 208 CE that she led a group of adventurers through the Rite of Painting the Moon, calling forth the indignant goddess Lisaera from the Void. Lisaera was of the circle of Awakeners, responsible for bringing the Moon to sentience, and Her annoyance soon turned to horror as She realized that while the moon itself remained in the sky, Moon, the spirit, was gone. Lisaera would aid Miakoda in the coming years, trying to both recall Mother Moon and the Serenwilde from wherever it had disappeared, and to locate Charune, the Elder who had created White Hart, the other patron spirit of the forest. It would be another hundred years before they would succeed, after the embittered Miakoda reluctantly agreed to enlist Brother Raven’s assistance.

 

With two Elder Gods firmly devoted to reclaiming the Serenwilde and the assistance of a largely elfen group of devotees, all Ellindale has left to do is actually bring their forest back. After over three hundred years, in which both Hallifax and Gaudiguch returned and rose to prominence, Miakoda and her people finally seem to be on the verge of their own success story. Despite Their power, the Elders alone cannot call Serenwilde back from nothing on Their own, but They theorize that the power of the Seal of Nature might aid Them if They just borrow its powers. We gather here, this 7 Estar, 344 CE, to bear witness to Their attempt.

 

-Minister Thul Goldfeather, Chronicler