The Chronicle of the Sundered World

Being a Primer upon the History of Norrath, as Set Down for the Edification of All Who Would Walk Beneath the Banner of the Norrath Secret Society

Hearken, seeker, and attend. Before thou canst serve this ancient order, thou must first know the world upon whose broken bones we stand. I shall tell it plainly, as the archives permit.

Of the Elder Ages

In ages beyond counting, the gods shaped Norrath and peopled it with their children. Tunare breathed life into the elves, Brell Serilis carved the dwarves and gnomes from the deep stone, Innoruuk twisted the fair Teir'Dal in his hatred, and Rallos Zek forged giants, ogres, and orcs for war. Mortals rose, warred, built empires, and cast them down again. The dragons of Veeshan, first among all creatures, watched from their frozen thrones. So passed the Age of Scale, the Age of Monuments, the Age of Blood, and the Age of Enlightenment, each leaving its ruins and its lessons.

Of the Departure of the Gods

Then came a wound stranger than any war. The gods, who had long meddled in the affairs of their children, withdrew from the world entire. Their temples fell silent. Their priests prayed into emptiness. No mortal chronicle records their reasons with certainty, though the wise whisper that mortal hands had trespassed too far into divine realms, even unto the slaying of gods. Thus began the Age of Turmoil, when Norrath stood orphaned beneath an indifferent sky.

Of the Rending

Without the gods to steady it, the world itself began to break. The earth shook and split. Seas boiled and swallowed coastlines whole. The great continents of Antonica, Faydwer, Odus, and Kunark were torn asunder, and Antonica shattered into a scattering of islands that men now name the Shattered Lands. Kingdoms drowned. Whole peoples vanished from the rolls of history. This calamity the chroniclers name the Rending, and no family in Norrath was left unmarked by it.

Of the Shattering of Luclin

Yet the cruelest blow was still to fall. The pale moon Luclin, which had hung over Norrath since the first night, burst apart in the heavens. Her fragments rained down as fire upon the wounded world, and her broken remnant hangs in the sky to this day, a shattered lantern and a warning. This the histories call the Shattering, and from it we reckon the calamities that ended the old world.

Of Qeynos and Freeport

From the wreckage, two great city-states endured, and to them the desperate survivors of every race came flooding.

In the west stands Qeynos, ruled by Antonia Bayle, a queen of grace and iron resolve. Qeynos raised its banners as a haven of order, honor, and light, gathering the good peoples behind its white walls: humans, high elves, wood elves, dwarves, halflings, frogloks, and others who would swear to its ideals.

In the east broods Freeport, the City of Opportunity, held in the mailed fist of the Overlord Lucan D'Lere, a deathless tyrant who was once a knight and is now something far darker. Freeport offers strength to those who will seize it: the Teir'Dal, ogres, trolls, iksar, ratonga, and all who prize power above mercy.

Between these two cities lies an enmity old and cold, and every soul in the Shattered Lands must reckon with it.

Of the Age of Destiny

Now the seas, long deemed impassable, have opened once more. Ships sail again from the Isles of Refuge. Lost lands emerge from the mists: the burning sands of Ro, the fastness of Faydwer, the drowned secrets of the deep. Adventurers of every race and calling set forth to reclaim what the Rending stole. This is the Age of Destiny, and it is ours.

The gods themselves have begun to stir, returning one by one to a world that learned to endure without them. Whether they come as saviors or as reckoners, none can yet say.

Of Our Place in This Tale

Know this, seeker. The Norrath Secret Society was founded in this very age, upon the server of Antonia Bayle, and we have endured where countless banners have fallen. We do not race heedless through the wonders of a broken world. We walk its roads deliberately, tier by tier, mystery by mystery, for a world so dearly rebuilt deserves to be truly seen.

If this history stirs something in thy breast, then perhaps thy road leads to our hall.

Seek. Discover. Endure.

Mordven Nocturnis, Lorekeeper of the Veil, Norrath Secret Society, Antonia Bayle