The Awakening, Act II: A Brief History I
Title: A Brief History I
Author: Chamberlain Kasha
A Brief History of the
Lore Council and the
Matriarchs - The Plans
of Tarathas
And so it came to pass that the great Lore Council of the Meer was the governing body of the lands of Ishpuria, our home. It was during this time that a group came to power who concealed their intentions and hid them from our populace and our Matriarchs, whom were to oversee the Lore Council's decisions and actions. One Meer, an Elder who went by the name of Tarathas of Ishpur, was a particularly ambitious lot and had taken his time in consolidating a power base for himself and in finding a specific relic of our world, the so called Crystal Lattice of Anjur. With this artifact he then divined the locations of the nexus's of power within Ishpuria and sought to control them, utilizing forbidden and sealed magic that should never have been available to any but the Matriarchs. Despite the Matriarchs wisdom, it is often seen that they had grown inactive and passive at the time, which is speculated as to the reason that none of this was found out until a chance encounter with a Jukan scoutinng team occurred.
An incursion force of Jukans had been devastated in a battle, and the few survivors were severely wounded. The Jukans prepared to fight the scout they had encountered but the scout, a low ranking soldier by the name of Shedana, challenged the ranking Jukan officer, Sikuth, to a White Duel. Shedana says that the terms of the White Duel were that if the Jukans were to win, they would be taken to their clan with no questions asked and any mortal wounds treated, while if Shedana were to win they would offer their information and go along quietly as prisoners. Sikuth faced off against Shedana, and despite Sikuth's wounds purportedly fought Shedana to a near standstill before the scout managed to defeat the Jukan. Sikuth then related to Shedana that they had been passing through Meer lands to attempt to retrieve an Adept of the Way who had been captured some weeks before when they stumbled upon a group of Ishpurian Mages at a glade, whose leader was none other than Councilman Tarathas of Ishpur. After a fierce battle in which the Jukans slew many of Tarathas' companions, Tarathas managed to drive them off into retreat. Sikuth said that as they fled they were aware of a huge release of magical power from the location of the glade that Tarathas had driven them away from.
It is at this point that
speculation rises once
more, as it's difficult to
tell whether this was the
second or the first of
the three nexus points
that Tarathas had
secured, and if the
answer could be found a
great deal of blame could
be laid to rest. The
majority of scholars
believe that this was his
first nexus captured, and
had the Matriarchs come
to the decision to act
more swiftly that they
could have stopped him at
the forgotten swamps.
Unfortunately it's
difficult to tell if this is
a legitimate accusation
due to insufficient
evidence. What we do
know is that with his
ploy discovered, the
Matriarchs immediately
had the other members
of the Lore Council held
in custody while they
sent their agents to
attempt to track down
Tarathas. The agents of
the Matriarchs were
baffled and left clutching
straws by their cunning
adversary, however, and
by the time they had
arrived at the nexus
point of the glade and
the nexus point of the
forgotten swamps, both
had already been
corrupted and drained of
their powers. The final
nexus point was unknown
to the Matriarchs but
they were able to follow
Tarathas' own
investigative techniques to
realize that it lay
beneath the great
abandoned city of Anjur.
Using the power at their
command, the Matriarchs
traveled to the city with
a large force of mages,
scouts, and hunters to
deal with whatever forces
that Tarathas could
muster. Now was the
time to take Tarathas to
task for what he had
planned, and prevent
catastrophe.
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