Lore of the Thousand Worlds

The Plenary Prime:

In the beginning, only two, spinning in constant motion, unaware, unseen, unknown.
Positive, Negative.

Motion continues. Positions achieved, angles established.
Dark, Light.

Hints of pattern emerge.
Distance, speed.

Momentum generates equalization.
Time, Weight.

The circuit tilts, shifts.
Repeat. Solidify.

A field emerges, spherical, complete.

Whole.

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The planes of existence are different realities with interwoven connections. Except for rare linking points, each plane is effectively its own universe, with its own natural laws. The planes break down into a number of general types: the Material Plane, the transitive planes, the Inner Planes, the Outer Planes, and the demiplanes.

Material Plane: The Material Plane is the most Earthlike of all the planes, and usually operates under the same set of natural laws that our own world does. Within the Plenary Prime, there are 1,000 Material Planes.

Transitive Planes: These three planes have one important common characteristic: each is used to get from one place to another. The Astral Plane (although technically an Outer Plane) is a conduit to all other planes, while the Ethereal Plane and the Shadow Plane both serve as means of transportation within the Material Plane, which they're connected to. These planes have the strongest regular interaction with the Material Plane and can be accessed using various spells. They have native inhabitants as well.

Inner Planes: These six planes are manifestations of the basic building blocks of the universe. Each is made up of a single type of energy or element that overwhelms all others. The natives of a particular Inner Plane are made of the same energy or element as the plane itself. The Negative Energy Plane, the Positive Energy Plane, the Plane of Air, the Plane of Earth, the Plane of Fire, and the Plane of Water are all Inner Planes.

Outer Planes: The deities live on the Outer Planes, as do creatures such as celestials, fiends, and other outsiders. Each of the Outer Planes has an alignment representing a particular moral or ethical outlook, and the natives of each plane tend to behave in agreement with that plane's alignment. The Outer Planes are also the final resting place of souls from the Material Plane, whether that final rest takes the form of calm introspection or eternal damnation. Abaddon, the Abyss, Elysium, Heaven, Hell, Limbo, Nirvana, Purgatory, and Utopia are all Outer Planes.

Demiplanes: This catch-all category covers all extradimensional spaces that function like planes but have measurable size and limited access. Other kinds of planes are theoretically infinite in size, but a demiplane might be only a few hundred feet across.

The Nascent Creation:

As the Plenary Prime became progressively more complex, it began to develop characteristics of sentience. As this awareness coalesced, it became resident in the Prime's first living beings, the Titans.

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The Titans were creatures born of the primordial chaos from which they had sprung. Capricious, fickle, without restraint, they wielded magic, power and creation as whims. Dangerous even at the happiest, their fury when angered leveled mountains and boiled seas.

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In a desire to rule and meddle, they created beings to serve them. The "Finest", they called them. The Fey. For Aeons, the Fey lived and died as playthings of their masters. Civilizations were built and torn apart as cruel wars and savage holocausts were inflicted upon them purely for the Titan's entertainment and sport.

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The Thousand Worlds seethed with chaos, malice, and suffering under the savage yoke of of their Titanic tyrants.

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The Masters Remanded:

Slowly, secretly, the Fey began to plot the downfall of their Masters. Mighty spells and fell devices were forged and sown throughout the Thousand Worlds. In the gardens of the Fey, weapons grew and were given life. Raised in hidden places, shielded from the sight of the Titans, the Dragons gathered power, and prepared for their grim duty.

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"The Bloody Dawn" arrived, and the Fey revolt begun. The Liberation War raged across the Thousand Worlds, and the Planes that connected them; nowhere in the Plenary Prime escaped the grips of the terrible struggle.

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Untold masses fell before the Masters, but the Fey and their living weapons drove their foes further and further into retreat, and finally, in an act of deepest magic, the Titans were evicted, body and spirit, beyond the outer planes and into the nothingness outside of the Plenary Prime itself.

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The Liberation War was won, but at a terrible cost. The Thousand Worlds lay in Ruin, the Fey decimated and scattered.

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The Gardens of Summer:

The Prime settled into its new found freedom. Those few Fey who survived the Liberation War spread out among the Thousand Worlds and began to rebuild, their allies and weapons wandering away to pursue their own will.

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The healing worlds began to team with life as the Fey nurtured them. Races and peoples sprang forth to populate the lands of their birth, taking the Fey as their Gods. The Thousand Worlds grew, prospered, and thrived.

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Fault:

For ages upon ages, the Thousand Worlds played host to an ever increasing amount of peoples and cultures. While most lived unaware of the other Worlds, there were some cultures whose temperaments and abilities allowed them to live a nomadic life by moving between the worlds. Many of these peoples were benign, traveling to explore and observe neighboring Worlds, but many of them were not.

Among the most terrifying of these warlike nomads were the Gu'Dak'Sul, a thundering herd of Centaur clans who numbered in the millions. To them, raids and invasions were the foundation of all culture. Each new invasion was a test to determine which clans would dominate in the social order. The most successful clan, having seized the mightiest magics and most treasures, held the power to name the Khan, the leader of the entire herd, and the honor of planing and leading the next invasion. An endless cycle of invasion and war, drifting slowly through the Thousand Worlds and crushing all within its path...

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The Gu'Duk'Sul hordes descend upon an unremarkable world, where a burgeoning empire seats its capital in a peninsular city named Throne. Hopelessly outnumbered and facing certain annihilation, they gathered their wisest priests and most learned wizards. Desperate and unaware of the true nature of the power they are harnessing, they forge an artifact driven by energies unseen since the dawn of the The Liberation War.

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The Machine springs to life as they Gu'Duk'Sul surround the city. It consumes, produces, and deploys. Dawn rises to reveal a vast host of clockwork warriors arrayed before the walls of Throne.

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The Iron Legions stand fast, break the assault, and send the Centaur clans to flight.

As the celebrations wind down, the victorious Imperials realize a disturbing fact of their savior machine. It CANNOT be turned off. It MUST consume. It MUST produce. It MUST deploy. With the clockwork army of the Iron Legions at the lead, the Empire expands quickly. The keepers of the Machine cannot stop it, but they learn to direct its production to create far more than warriors. Buildings, roads, ships, and mills, the Machine of Throne generates at a startling pace.

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But this advancement comes with a price. The machine MUST consume. Soon, The Empire of Throne is straining at the borders of it's World. Using portal opening artifacts captured from the nomadic Gu'Duk'Sul, they conduct the first "Rite of Annexation". A short, sharp war follows, and the Empire of Throne now spans two worlds. Then three...four...ten. Nearly one third of The Thousand Worlds fall under the Empire of Throne's Annexation.

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Blight:

The expansion of Imperial Throne continues unchecked for nearly a millennium, but the discovery of the 272nd world reveals a unique development - An entire civilization ruled by the Undead - a Necrocracy.



At its head, an ancient Lich Necromancer named Vex, who is served by a Cabal of 13 honored Undead ministers. The Cabal is in turn served by a select body of 13 regional overlords.

Both the living and the Undead coexist in the same civilization. A tradition known as "Contracting" allows the living to purchase the existence they will maintain after death.

Depending on the contracts they made while alive, the dead provide the labor that supports day to day life. The poorest among them walk the world as nearly mindless skeletons and zombies, while the rich and powerful use their resources to secure a Lich's phylactery.



With no resistance and an uncanny enthusiasm, The Vexian Necrocracy eagerly submits to Imperial Throne. It is not long before Vexian Temples and Contract Barristers appear in Throne itself, and begin trickling out across the many Imperial Annexes. Soon the Vexian culture expands into an Imperium wide presence.

Fearing the growing power of Vexian influence, Imperial Throne outlaws Vexian contracting and orders all undead confined to world #272. The contracted converts rally around their Vexian overlords. They raid graveyards, burial grounds, and mausoleums, wake the dead they find there, and quickly raise massive hosts.







War rages across the the Throne Imperium, even through the streets of the capital itself. As the living fall, they are taken as thrall to the Vexian forces, but this advantage proves insufficient. The Machine of Throne once again manufactures warriors to defend Throne, and cut off from a supply of living opponents to convert, the Vexian forces are slowly surrounded and hard pressed.





Desperate and bitter, the Uber-Lich devises a mighty spell of corruption, and sends forth his most trusted and deadly servant, Venomous Shayd.



Venomous Shayd infiltrates the capital, and poisons the Machine of Throne, corrupting the God-Seed that drives it. Not even Vex could have foreseen the horror this would create.

The Machine begins to produce terrible, insane engines of destruction - The Nemesis Constructs.



The Nemesis Constructs integrated everything they destroyed - absorbing the slain, the mechanical, the undead, and each other, evolving into larger and larger amalgamations as they consumed Imperial and Vexian forces alike. No weapons could stop them, and they possessed no mind with which to bargain.

Soon, Throne lay in ruins, and the Nemesis Constructs began expanding towards the portals that lead to Imperial Throne's annexed worlds. Fearing the worst, the last surviving masters of the Arcanite Enginerium removed the Machine of Throne's failsafe protection, and turned off the device.



The supernatural mechanism smashed itself to pieces. Instantly, the world where Throne once perched was incinerated in a blast of light and fire. Dozens of annexed worlds evaporated in the shock wave, and in those that survived, continents were crushed, mountains leveled, and seas emptied. Very few of the annexed worlds escaped the destruction.

Rally the Champions:

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