The Lensmoor and Antrippa conflict
The adversarial atmosphere between the two continents dates back to a time beyond all contemporary record-keeping systems, however countless conflicting stories abound as to its origin. Historians and Scholars alike have settled on two possibilities as the most likely candidates. These unsubstantiated stories speak of a mythical time when the two continents were one whole land, a unified world only to be split in half by a god or multiple gods. The other story speaks of a time when the citizenry of both lands consisted of both sets of races, and they were separated. The stories all seem to carry with them a common theme; a great conflict arose between gods and mortals alike, and it was settled through division. Because so many versions of the story have appeared over the generations, no one can say which one is in fact real.
There was a time when the hostilities died down, contact between the two lands ceased, and each side began to regard the other as nothing more than a faerie tale. Both lands turned inward, and began to address their own issues. For Lensmoor it was war and strife between its own kingdoms and for Antrippa it was a series of short droughts and lack of fertile farmland.
Shortly after humans began to truly sweep the ancient lands of the Lensmoor Continent and form their independent nations all across the land, a streak of lawlessness and villainy struck Lensmoor. Countless humans and many of other races heard the call of the Immortal Demon Kithanor, and his call drove them from the good and just, to steal and murder, burn and plunder. For the first time in recorded history, outlaws blatantly stood out and faulted their unholy strength, and for that their leader was struck down by the other immortals. However, like cutting the head off of a hydra, two grow back in its place, and so it was with the brigands, who went into hiding, with the promise to grow back even stronger than before.
In the wake of the diminished resources, the races of Antrippa, which had until recently remained separate began to vie for power. With the water, went the trees, and wood too became a resource fought over. At first it was petty skirmishes among villages, but toward the end of that decade it became all out war.
In time, many peoples of Antrippa migrated westward, toward the sea, where many built settlements. As they moved further south they encountered the humans they had been separated from for so long. The entire southwestern shoreline of Antrippa had been colonized by a malevolent group of Humans, Sidhe, Selkies, and Gnomes known as the Kanor; the surviving followers of Kithanor who had made their escape from Lensmoor so long ago.
The evil-hearted Lensmoorian settlers, tainted by their time worshiping the evil Immortal, saw the Antrippan people as nothing more than potential slaves; and that is what they sent their forces to doing. They gathered up all the Antrippan peoples they could find and put them to work in the ever expanding deserts for one purpose; the acquisition of gems. Antrippa itself was merely a gateway to avarice. As the first few boatloads of Gems made it back to the mainland, the population of Lensmoor heard nothing about slaves or any such atrocities; all they heard was the riches to be had across the sea. And so, guided by the evil-hearted Lensmoorians, many more Lensmoorians came.
Enraged by the capture and enslavement of their own, the Antrippan cities, ripe from their recent wars, sent their armies to attack the Lensmoorians and set their peoples free; the attack was repelled and soon Lensmoorians were invading deeper into the mainland of Antrippa. It was a war of attrition that the Antrippans, due to their diminished resources could not win.
Whether it was the hand of the gods, or fate itself no one knows; however, a great storm came to Antrippa and eliminated the entirety of the Lensmoorian fleet. This storm caused the Sea of Winds to spill over upon the land, wiping out the Lensmoorian settlements, and destroying their fortifications from the rear flank. The storm left as mysteriously as it came, turning the vast majority of Antrippa into a permanent desert overnight.
Freed, the Antrippan slaves became masters themselves, and enslaved the remaining Lensmoorians. This started a trend that would continue to this day, for the story of the soft Lensmoorians who sought to become wealthy off the labor of the Antrippan slaves would never be forgotten.
The areas affected by the storm were changed forever, and from that point onward nothing grew in it; forever to remain barren sands. The remaining nations of Antrippa realized after their victory against Lensmoor, they had no idea how to live in the desert sands that now surrounded them; figuring out how took time and effort, too much time for many of the nations and they grew weak.
"Kyritis is insane, that ambition must be stopped; If we don’t make a stand here, then the advance of art and science will fall into the dark ages and burn with Antrippa in the fires of war; this expansionist hunger can only lead Antrippa to ruin."
-- Log of Darno,
Commander,
Lystraia Third Division
It was in that weakness that the Kyritis Army launched its attack. With the blessings of the Goddess of War, Kyritis struck down the rival Louryl Nation of Lystraia with little difficulty. Vowing to unite the Antrippan forces in the name of War, Kyritis conquered much of the land and proclaimed it the Kyritis Empire.
Many peoples sought to escape the ever expanding reach of Kyritis, who now conscripted able-bodied Antrippans into his army in preparation for revenge against Lensmoor. A great Orcish Warchief named Dhuk-i gathered his people and sailed across the sea to a new land away from The Kyritis Empire. His descendant now leads the Orcs of the Birch Forest on Lensmoor. Many more individuals smuggled themselves away on ships and made their way across the sea, trying to escape the ever growing militarized lands.
Lensmoor was entirely untouched by the great storm and the expeditions to Antrippa were not sanctioned by the nations of Lensmoor nor the immortals that watched over it, Lensmoor had no reckoning of what had occurred at all. To the best of their knowledge: the gems stopped flowing and became rare again, and that was all. The entirety of the Lensmoorian vs Antrippan war had been fought with Lensmoorian mercenaries, beholden to no one but the coin of the Kanor, and so they were forgotten. Lensmoor moved into a new age, the warring human nations finally united under a single banner and proclaimed their new capital city simply, Lensmoor.
The storm left in its wake a series of hazardous currents, and sea creatures risen from the deeps. It was an ocean not fit to sail upon; therefore, there were no return trips to Antrippa for that generation, as a new generation of daring frontiersmen, learned to navigate the treacherous waters. Although Lensmoorian Masters of Divination suggest that the change in the ocean currents may have been caused by the goddess Irriane, the Antrippan War-fleets blamed it squarely as some sort of magical gambit by the ill-reputed Druids of Lensmoor and their control over the weather.
The united Kingdom of Lensmoor grew complacent in its power and although the King of Lensmoor had considered bolstering the severely lacking navy, those close to him advised against it, as it had become common knowledge that no one sails the sea and lives.
The Antrippan people, however, have never and will never forget the atrocities committed by Lensmoorians. With a fervor, never seen before in recent history, they sent their fleets out to raid the Lensmoor mainland. Although countless ships were lost, they learned to navigate the sea through process of elimination and trial by death. Even though the Antrippan war-fleet was only a quarter of what it was when it began its journey, it was still enough to dwarf the insignificant Lensmoor navy.
The Antrippan forces were free to take their retribution out upon the unsuspecting land. Per the orders of Kyritis, the invaders sought out Lensmoor’s heart and attempted to pluck it out. Although they failed to kill the King of Lensmoor, they did succeed in stealing his children. Without a strong navy to contest them, Lensmoor was powerless to stop the forces fleeing with the King’s children. Countless soldiers commandeered fishing ships and took to the turbulent seas, however all the effort in the world did not see the safe return of the children; the line of the Lensmoor royal family was broken forever.
"The vale of ignorance was lifted, if only sightly by the horrors of war thrust down upon us. Once by land, and twice by air. So many... creatures on the horizon... we could not tell what was as a hill shrub and what was an orc... that is until they started advancing..."
-- From the Tales of Arnshar, Knight of Old Lensmoor
The effort shown by the Lensmoor soldiers was not wasted; however, as it bore fruit in the form of the Lensmoorians finally understanding how to navigate the newly reformed seas. Although the Kyritis fleets showed superior guile on the open seas, with Lensmoor’s superior resources natural resources, Lensmoor produced a battle fleet so large it could take the early losses and continue to fight without a hitch. With both lands taking to the seas a widespread conflict called The Pirate Wars occurred and one of the many results of this time period was the sacking of Verlynia by a xorrtee raiding party.
The conflict raged on and many eastern towns on both sides were devastated and vanished into the Wilderness forever. Tandanu, the city of the Sidhe took the brunt of the early Antrippan onslaughts and it is said Antrippans are entrenched there to this very day. Even though Old Lensmoor is gone, with it the unified Lensmoorian rule, the older races pulled together alongside the humans and created a New Lensmoor and with it a united stand against the Antrippan invasions.
In time, the gods themselves picked sides in the conflict; some moved by the heroism of mortals, others bearing an attachment to the land of their worshipers, and some by random chance. It was the immortals themselves sanctifying the conflict that truly lit the furnaces of war once and for all.
Not discouraged in the least by their failures to capture large holdings on Lensmoor, the Antrippan forces, blessed by the goddess of war and fueled by will of Kyritis continue their attacks to this very day in the hopes of taking final revenge upon the weak Lensmoorians. Entirely unaware of why Antrippa would attack Lensmoor, all Lensmoorians could conclude is that Antrippans are all nasty savages who only hunger for destruction. Blessed by the goddess of prosperity, the Lensmoorians fight on to protect their homes and strike back at the attackers.
To Lensmoor, Antrippa is evil through and through, “There can be no reasoning with those mindless, evil savages. We will protect our land and take the fight back to them.”
To Antrippa, “We will have our revenge against the greedy, corrupt scrum, squandering their resources while trying to exploit ours. We will take their land from them, and never give an inch of ours to them ever again.”
