Seekers of Nazar

PROLOGUE

"The Ages of Man."

‒ an excerpt from The Collected Histories of Andaria, Vol. 1. written by Ferran Bren, Historian to the Kings' Court.

In the time known as the Blood Age, the northern kings of Andaria waged wars that lasted centuries. Alliances were formed, friendships betrayed, nations made and unmade on the whims of men mad with power.

Kings fought for the gold and iron locked in the Ridgestone Mountains. Many tried to conquer the brittle terrain; many fell to their deaths. The King of Tellaria drove his people into the rock through caves and tunnels. They tamed the mountains by carving homes into the heart of the stone giant.

In the plains below, kings raided each other for farmland. Their soldiers set fire to crops, contaminated rivers and wells, and killed livestock by the hundreds. Famine and disease set in, killing everyone until only the strong survived. Eventually, a new nation emerged from the rubble, united by the King of Wyndem.

Even the islands to the east tempted the kings with vast resources. The ocean floor was a watery grave to thousands of armed sailors.

And so, the wars continued everywhere on the continent except in the arid land of the far south. The Aster Mountains had no lumber, fertile soil, or minerals. Lacking the riches of the North, settlements were ignored by the kings and left to fend for themselves.

The Blood Age lasted until an enemy greater than all the kings arose. This enemy had no ruler to overthrow, no army to fight, and no land to conquer. It was nowhere, and yet it was everywhere. The enemy was the rise of magic, and those that wielded it were called Weavers.

Weavers were not confined to the laws of nature, and the world feared their powers. Twelve kings put down their weapons against each other and united to fight the new enemy. They called themselves the Kings' Court of Andaria. It was the greatest and strongest alliance the world had ever seen. No other kingdom rivaled the Twelve Kings, and they ruled Andaria with a heavy fist.

Thus, a new age was started. It was called the Golden Age, and the Twelve Kings ruled in a strained but lasting truce.

The first decree of the Kings' Court outlawed magic. They created the Kings' Army to eliminate Weavers from the world. Soldiers who once battled each other joined together against a common enemy. For the next 100 years, the Kings' Army swept the land from one city to another, eradicating Weavers. The kings spared no one, not even the mother whose only power was to grow fruit in winter. Even those without magic were put to death if they resisted the crusade.

The Golden Age lasted until the King of Tellaria's son was born as a gifted Weaver. King Druon could not kill his son, but he could not hide the secret from his fellow kings either. He was a clever man who waged wars of politics better than his ancestors waged wars of blades.

Druon authored a powerful decree. It created a protected class of Weavers and established a city for them on an island far to the south called Nazar. From Nazar, a High Priestess controlled magic by any means necessary. Weavers, who came under the protection of Nazar, swore their loyalty to the kings. The High Priestess used them to irradicate unsanctioned magic from the land. The decree also created an elite group called the Seekers, whose job was to seek out magical disturbances and eliminate them. Legend says that King Druon met with each king in secret. On the day of the vote, the decree passed unanimously.

This decree shepherded in the current age, one of peace known as the Age of Nazar.