THE WORLD OF STEEL & BLOOD

THE FORGOTTEN ONES

As no other Scholar in the realm would dare speak of the Forgotten Ones, I take my pen in hand to do so, myself.

Without a doubt, the most least known peoples in this realm were the practitioners of ancient and forsaken blood magic or mystical arts.

Their home was a great stronghold along the border between the Summerlands and the Deadlands. 

Mystic's Point they called it.

Many Scholars agree that it beats Blackmoor as being the oldest castle ever built in the realm.

Many Scholars do agree that the mystics may very well have been living in Dragos long before the First Settlers crossed the Kraken's Sea and landed on the Western Shores; possibly in the final years of the Age of Dragons.

Grand Scholar Cordell postulated that these "Forgotten Ones" may have come to Dragos from every corner of the Known World; from such countries as Rygiel, Dainio, Korath and perhaps Argos, when it was still at the pinnacle of its advancing civilization, before its downfall by religious extremists. It was also believed that the Forgotten Ones may have come to Dragos to escape all sorts of persecution from their homelands.

If they truly were here in the final years of the Age of Dragons, it would make sense that it would be the Forgotten Ones who hid those Dragon eggs in the Grotto below the surface of what would be the location of Dragon Hall.

Of course, we can only go off of assumptions.

However, we do know this....

After centuries of tolerating the existence of the Forgotten Ones, the Kaliso tribes decided that they had to rid the land of these people and so in 429 B. D., the Kaliso chieftain led his armies to Mystic's Port, to begin a "Great Cleansing".

In the eyes of the Kaliso, the Forgotten Ones were not meant to practice such magic, as it belonged to only the gods.

Before the invasion of Mystic's Point, the Kaliso invaders first laid waste to Night Shroud and the House of Hornsby, as they were in fact practitioners of blood magic, just like the Forgotten Ones. The family home was believed to be constructed centuries after the Tai'Aharans landed on southern shores, in order to seek asylum from persecution in their old homeland.

Men and women did not survive the invasion and not a single child was spared either.

Many men and women were slaughtered in the invasion, while the remaining ones abandoned the castle and fled across the Summerlands to any safe haven that they could.

Instead of leaving them in peace, the Kaliso Chieftain led a great invasion army to the upper reaches of the Summerlands, where Mystic's Point stood. The Forgotten Ones were outnumbered and much of their numbers had already abandoned the castle, when word came of the Kaliso's invasion.

The High Mistress of Mystic's Point was captured and beheaded by the Chieftain of the Kaliso himself. All of these events were later documented by Grand Scholar Kelvyn in his controversial textbook entitled Forgotten: The Invasion of Mystic's Point and the Mass Slaughter of the Forgotten Ones and published in 340 BD.

When word came to all of the realm that Mystic's Point fell, no one would even bat an eye, but overzealous men and women scoured every corner of the realm in search of these Forgotten Ones, for no reasons other than ridicule them for their practices of blood magic and conversing with false gods.

Where had these individuals gone to? No one knows. But theories are few.

One rumor insists that they may have migrated to the Forsaken Lands beyond the Crimson Mountains in the North.

But while some believed that rumor, another rumor arose in 29 A.D. (After the Destroyer); that the Forgotten Ones crossed the Kraken's Sea and established a new colony on the supposed "lost continent" of Arathos, with a mighty Kraken protecting the shorelines from any invaders who dare cross and wish harm on the Forgotten Ones. This rumor had no evidence to back it up, therefore no such persons even dared to cross the Kraken's Sea to ascertain this claim.

In 89 A.D., a small group of Scholars, including myself took it upon ourselves to make the journey into the Summerlands and begin researching the surrounding region of Mystic's Point and the castle itself.

In the bowels of the castle, a treasure trove of gold, painting and supposed scrolls of magic was discovered. This proved to be an incredible discovery.

I, myself, had the task of scribing the words of a certain scroll that had a tale to tell.

According to this scroll, a doom had befallen the Dragons, resulting in the mass decimation of many. Sadly, the scroll isn't very specific as to what this so-called "doom" was, but it eventually spread through the entire realm, killing all Dragon in its wake.

But while this unseen plague continued to ravage the Dragons to the brink of extinction, the Forgotten Ones gathered as many Dragons eggs as they could save and they were taken to a undisclosed location, somewhere in the Winterlands. Despite saving many eggs, nothing could be done to save the Dragon population.

With this new information, we can now deduce that it may have been a disease that consumed the first Dragon population and that it killed them off until there was no other Dragon left, but Khalar the Fiery One, who would eventually see his end at Siren's Bay when the First Settlers landed on the Western Shores. According to legend, the Captain of the Siren spoke of the Dragon having blood pouring out from its eyes and nostrils, as it was lying in the sand dying.

As for the Dragon eggs that were salvaged and the location of this hiding place, it is safe to say that the Forgotten Ones hid them in the underground caverns below the site of where the Daemons would eventually build Dragon Hall. 

The Dragon skeletons that were found on the site may very well have been Dragons that died protecting the sealed entrance to the caverns below, which Daemon the Bard and Kristobal Daemon failed to see when the foundation of Dragon Hall was built.

Did the Forgotten Ones hide those Dragon eggs in the caves below Dragon Hall to ensure the survival of the Dragon population? Some believe so, whilst other believe in another and more foreboding reason.

The Dragons that hatched from those collected eggs would begin repopulating the realm, forcing man and Dragon to co-exist on the same continent. Man would not do well with such a change that they would try to kill them all, which would prove to be more foolish than ever before. If man is not careful in these dangerous times, then Dragons will continue to thrive long after man is gone.

With Dragons now flying across Dragos after thousands of years, we can only assume that this may very well be the revenge of the Forgotten Ones against their fellow Dragosi, after centuries of being chastised and rejected, to the point of being driven out of their homeland and finding a new place to call home.

Perhaps we deserve this fate: living in a realm where we are forced to co-exist with fiery monster.