Already fifteen hundred years have passed since the great Desolation, when all gods and devils fought across this mortal earth. Who can count the scars our world now bears from that war—great caverns opened by the piercing of blades, while our crops now grow out of the blood of the land. But most severe must be the wide Ocean Sejunctio which has now ripped our continent in twain. Fifteen hundred years ago there was naught between us, and all folk might walk between the kingdoms. Then for centuries we were made to live apart. Some strong ships could cross still that ocean, but who would volunteer to spend the full year at sea to sail between? And so we grew distant, and while our western empire broke into these petty feudal states, a mighty kingdom rose in the desert across the sea.
Deshrehtar.
For centuries our lords have put each other down, ganging up on each other to ensure that no one can grow. There has been no progress allowed. Yet what wonders did we hear tales of from those few ships who crossed the Ocean Sejunctio! Mechanical scribes, cobbled wings upon men's backs, buildings that walk on magic legs. And of course, there is gunpowder, and all the artilleries which follow therefrom. Notions which we have never even dreamed of, their philosophies have brought to reality, as students from the pyramid city of Nwit'eshkeyj show our wisest scholars to be fools.
But no longer need these wonders be for us distant fables. Only fifty some years ago was a ship invented that could sail through time, so that what once took twelve months could be crossed in twelve days. The merchants of Grimhaven have brought the wonders of Deshrehtar to our shores, forever altering the trajectory of our nations. Already our old political systems bend under the weight of these new technologies; who is to say how long before they break?
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