The Fall of the First Empire

From the Annals of the Broken Empire

Set down by Saleen Kel Tath, Bard of the Third Circle and Loremaster of the Secret Court

Let it be known that the fall of the First Empire was not the work of a single blade, nor the failure of a single crown, but the slow unmaking of an age. What follows is drawn from witness accounts, surviving military rolls, songs carried by refugees, and fragments of imperial record salvaged from ash and ruin. Where certainty fails, I have marked silence rather than invention.

The beginning of the end is most properly traced to the formation of the Confederation of the United Southern Nations of Vestar, and its conclusion to the final battle of Ellenvord against the Arch Lich, after which no throne remained unbroken.

The Confederation of the United Southern Nations

After twenty years of unrelieved disaster, the southern nations of Vestar abandoned the pretense of sovereign command. Loss followed loss, and pride proved more costly than any enemy blade. Thus was formed the Confederation of the United Southern Nations, known more commonly as the Southern Confederacy, a union of arms governed by a single command and bound by necessity rather than trust.

The Confederation found its first true success under the paladin Telemvor. By all surviving accounts, Telemvor possessed both tactical clarity and a singular presence that steadied broken ranks. Under this command, the undead were driven northward, granting the southern lands a brief reprieve. Among the common folk, gratitude hardened into reverence, and reverence into devotion. Though the Church of Telemvor would not yet exist, its roots were laid in these early campaigns.

North of the Confederation’s reach stood the fortress of Mare. From the opening year of the war, Mare endured siege without relief, sustained only by the Dwarven Way beneath its keep. Records note Mare repeatedly as “expected to fall.” It did not. That it survived at all is testament to dwarven engineering and a garrison long resigned to death.

On the Northern and Eastern Campaigns

While the south consolidated, the northeastern front was shaped by Ellenvord, a human commander whose methods ran contrary to imperial doctrine. Rather than massed hosts, Ellenvord relied upon small, fast‑moving forces drawn from many peoples: Walushi, Hill Dwarves of the Blood Stones, Dwimmer detachments, refugees of Velat, and humans of the Hill Tribes and River Cities.

These forces struck quickly and vanished, winning every battle placed before them. Yet victory did not bring progress. Thanaz, lich lord and favored lieutenant of the Arch Lich, countered Ellenvord’s successes with relentless reinforcements drawn from the imperial heartlands. Mounted upon the dracolich Night, Thanaz pursued Ellenvord for years, denying rest and forcing constant retreat. Thus the paradox of Ellenvord’s war is recorded: undefeated, yet losing.

At last, believing Ellenvord cornered, Thanaz committed to a decisive engagement. Instead, the lich lord was drawn into an ambush. In that battle, the dracolich Night was destroyed, crushed beneath blows delivered by Ellenvord wielding the warhammer of the fallen King of the Hill Dwarves. Ellenvord’s own sword was destroyed by a lightning spell cast by Thanaz, though the force of the magic was absorbed by his shield. Taking advantage of the moment, Ellenvord broke westward, beyond Thanaz’s immediate reach.

The Founding of Nestor

Ellenvord reached the shores of the Sea of Bones and there made a decision that would shape the remainder of the war. In cooperation with the Earth Wizards of the Dwim and the Spellweavers of Velat, the land itself was shaped into stone and wall. From bare ground rose the Old Keep and Old Walls of the city that would be named Nestor.

Thanaz’s armies arrived expecting pursuit and instead found a fortress. The undead assaulted Nestor repeatedly and failed.

Ellenvord held Nestor for nearly ten years. Following the example of Mare, his forces carved a deep tunnel connecting the city to the Hill Dwarves of the Blood Stones, ensuring a line of supply that defied siegecraft. Nestor became a fixed wound in the side of the Empire. Thanaz himself was forced to command the siege for much of the remaining war, denying the imperial forces their most capable field commander elsewhere.

The Push Northward

With Thanaz bound at Nestor, Telemvor’s armies achieved momentum. The Southern Confederacy reclaimed lost territories and at last relieved the siege of Mare, an event once considered impossible.

Telemvor then led extended campaigns deep into imperial lands, disrupting supply lines, liberating enslaved cities, and breaking the chains of the surviving peoples of Velat. These actions are poorly recorded in imperial archives, but well preserved in the songs of the freed.

The War Below

In the eleventh year of the siege of Nestor, the war changed again. During a rare personal assault, Thanaz observed soldiers within the city whom he had previously encountered far to the east. Recognizing that no surface route could explain their presence, and suspecting a hidden supply, Thanaz ordered his wights to dig.

Weeks passed before the resupply tunnel was breached. The undead poured into the depths and overwhelmed the dwarves guarding it. Thanaz committed the Nogrodian Iron Legion and personally led the descent, intent on destroying Ellenvord entirely.

What followed beneath the earth was a war of ambush and attrition. Ellenvord and the Dwimmer fought a prolonged guerrilla campaign, but their position worsened. Cut off from all support, Ellenvord and Maktalkar, King of the Dwim, fled deeper underground with a small band of dwarves and spellweavers, Thanaz in pursuit.

What occurred thereafter is uncertain. Six weeks later, Thanaz emerged alone, stripped of crown and legion, fleeing. Soon after came Ellenvord, bearing the Vordblade newly forged; Maktalkar, clad in adamantite armor that would become the first Royal Armor of the Dwimmer and wielding the great maul Glitterslam; Jurtanz, Champion of the Dwim and bearer of the Dwimhammer; and Elkalarian, last of the Velat Spellweavers.

What was discovered or forged in the deep places is unknown. That it altered the balance of the war is beyond dispute.

A Final Campaign

With the undead weakened beyond any point since the rise of the First Empire, the peoples of the land rallied around Ellenvord. A host was raised rivaling any since the destruction of Mekk, and it marched west into the imperial heartlands.

Ellenvord and Maktalkar persuaded the dragons Menanaz and Algarazz to unite their forces. The two Dragon Armies were merged under a single command, an event without precedent. The combined host shattered the first undead defenses it encountered.

At last, the Arch Lich took the field personally, commanding an immense force of elite undead. As battle was joined, a second undead army struck from the north, severing retreat and supply. With no path remaining, Ellenvord committed to a direct assault against the center.

With Sorrow at his side, and Menanaz and Algarazz holding the flanks, Ellenvord advanced upon the Arch Lich. What occurred upon the hilltop cannot be fully recorded. All present were destroyed in the final conflagration. Ellenvord, the Arch Lich, and Menanaz left behind scarcely even fragments of flesh. Sorrow is said to have departed immediately thereafter, purpose fulfilled.

The Aftermath

Those who had served with Ellenvord had lived within Nestor for so many years that they no longer distinguished between garrison and citizen. After the war, they remained. The city grew at a pace unmatched in recorded history.

One year after the final battle, the surviving powers convened in Nestor. There they signed the Nestor Accords, establishing justice and freedoms for all peoples within the territories of the signatories. With this act, the old calendar was abandoned, and the nations adopted a new reckoning, thereafter known as the Nestor Reckoning.

Thus ended the First Empire, not with silence, but with memories of terror, of pain, of a legacy that will never be forgotten.