In the beginning, there was War; The Chaos War, named as ever by the victors about the vanquished. This was the great conflict between the Chaos Lords, masters of the Elements, creative and destructive by whim, and the Powers, beings of light and dark, good and evil, but overall all else Arbiters of Law. They fought for no less a prize than Creation itself, and war raged for eons across the far flung reaches of the multiverse, spawning and destroying worlds and stars and races.
On the world of Tolrendor, KaragTar, Lord of Fire and Earth, raised the mighty fortress of Karagthal, a continent-spanning Elemental bastion. From here he enslaved whole populations of the primitive peoples to work the mighty forges and armouries. Beneath the surface, they delved incessantly, searching out the treasures and minerals of the nascent world. Here also were titans of fire and rock and ice and their giant war bands, hosts of elemental archons, flights of dragons, gathering in numbers uncountable before setting forth to assault the astral forces across many worlds.
Eventually, the tide of war turned against Chaos, and an innumerable host, lead by Bane the Black himself, High General of the forces of Law, laid endless siege to Karagthal. Long was it fruitless, as legions of devas broke against the impenetrable walls of the fortress in attack after attack. Finally, Bane provoked KaragTar into meeting him in single combat outside the Gates of Malor. For three years the combat raged day and night, as the two mighty powers struck at each other with such mighty blows the very earth shook, and volcanoes erupted and the rivers boiled. The end came when Bane managed to trap the flaming sword of KaragTar in his massive gauntleted fist, and drove his black spear into the eye of his opponent, casting him down in ruin.
The impact of the Lord of Fire and Earth’s fall was so great that the Gates themselves broke asunder, and the victorious Bane swept through followed by his legions. Forth poured the titans and giants and archons from their caves and castles, hurling rock and fire and ice before them, and the astral armies fell upon them in a storm of lightning spears and coldfire blades. As the countless hosts clashed, the very fabric of the world was threatened. At this juncture, Nairere the Earth Mother herself stepped into the fray, calling upon the primal strength of Tolrendor itself. The earth itself rebelled and the fortress heaved and buckled, and toppled into a great rift. Wherever the earth cracked, fire and lava belched forth and consumed all in its path. Finally the very ocean swept in to quench the fires of war, drowning the remnants of Karagthal in a massive tidal wave.
Overwhelmed and leaderless, the hosts of KaragTar fled back to the realms of Chaos from whence they came. However, the victorious armies of Bane were also caught in the maelstrom, and were forced to retreat in disarray. Bane himself, weakened and spent from his labours, was struck down by the wave and his physical form destroyed. Although his essence was safely borne back to his own fortress realm by his Black Guard, he has long nursed his resentment in not being able to conquer the world of Tolrendor.
Eventually the earth settled and the ocean subsided, but the world was changed. Although Karagthal was destroyed, and the other-worldly hosts had fled, in their wake was destruction: many lands had been swallowed forever by the waves, and across much of the remnants were great scars where the earth had thrust up to create new mountains, or split into wide and deep rifts. Nearest the epicentre of the maelstrom, where the great central keep had toppled, became known as the Scar of Karag, where the very fabric of the world is weak and prone to cracking, swallowing lands and people without warning.
Beneath the surface the pits and dungeons of the stronghold were broken and collapsed, trapping many slaves deep within the earth, but also releasing other fell creatures from their pens and out into the world. They were soon joined by broken remnants of the Chaos hosts that did not escape Tolrendor, but continued to ravage the lands and surviving peoples.
Many terrible tales are told of this time, passed down as myth and legend, as this was long years before the beginnings of any recorded history, but all scholars agree that with the breaking of Karagthal, and the world, came the end of the Age of Strife
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