“After two years of a long drought that caused widespread famine, the world was then struck by a strange and unfamiliar disease. With the population being weak and malnourished, hardly anything could be done. This time, tragedy had no mercy on anyone; the homes of the wealthy and the poor alike suffered the loss of their loved ones. The noble families who had political and economic control, maintaining order and security for the rest of the population, dissolved in internal fights to maintain power. The social equilibrium eventually broke down. Society fell into an era of darkness. Cities once ruled by the wealthy class became dangerous places full of crime; the security forces maintained by the nobility disappeared. Hundreds fled for safety to the countryside, trying to settle down and rebuild their lives, but they soon found themselves confronted by the criminal gangs running rampant throughout the world.

With no government protecting the people, everyone started to take care of their own security. Groups dedicated to providing security for new and old settlements began to appear; their services were well paid and in demand. For a while, these new forms of protection worked. The use of private guards became widespread among the small towns, and order seemed to be slowly returning.

Over time, the criminal groups became more organized and sophisticated. They grouped into guilds as the defenses of the once unprotected cities improved, and they stopped loitering around the settlements looking for an opportunity to commit a crime. They formed small, organized groups of mercenaries who offered their criminal services to the highest bidder. They were hired by other underworld bosses and even leaders of other cities to get rid of enemies or just loot a town. The authorities of some towns and cities decided to go a step further to improve the defenses of their homes. If a new problem with small mercenary armies arose, then the solution was to personally hunt down the members of these organized groups. It wasn’t long before the world entered a new stage of violence and barbarism. When civilization seemed to be emerging again among the world’s inhabitants, chaos took over every corner.

This peculiar war, where everyone seemed to be fighting against everyone else, brought a level of savagery rarely seen among the kingdoms. It seemed that the once respected and revered gods had abandoned those lands or had become indifferent to suffering and prayers. Anyone could have said that the deities had become deaf, but it wouldn’t be entirely true. There were those who observed from a distant place, far from the reach of the inhabitants of this world. They weren’t the gods to whom men pray, but they were curious about the evil that those little mortal beings were causing each other.”

All the frenzy that the senseless war of men provoked in those beings who wished to establish their evil in any living being susceptible to corruption was, in some way, also perceived in this world. Some shaman leaders of the orc clans sensed that the spiritual world was in turmoil. An inevitable unbalancing of the established order was about to occur and would soon burst into the material realm.” […]

Lineagedos Lore