Dark Thonian Science: a history of the Machine of Lum the Mad and Talon Isle
by RipvanwormerLegends and histories of the so-called Blackmoor Era are contradictory on the subject of the final defeat of the Egg of Coot. Some record that it was vanquished in the reign of Uther I, while others claim the Egg was a major foe of Blackmoor during the First Beastman Crusade in 3,480-20 BC or even the Dragon Wars in 3,150-3,135 BC. Other historians claim, controversially, that the Egg was never defeated, instead hiding itself within false identities and shell corporations to steer Blackmoorian society from behind the scenes.
Regardless, by 3,120 BC, the land once known as the Realm of Coot was a mere suburb of Blackmoor City, a grim industrial district full of run-down factories and prisons. Hidden in the center of this, behind an anonymous facade, was the Institute of Dark Science, where researchers worked in secret to reverse engineer the Egg's eldritch technology and exploit it for their own gain. From this beginning, rogue researchers continued their research in other lands, gravitating toward various unscrupulous patrons until in 3,100 BC one gained the patronage of the Thonian emperor Korin II.
Once the greatest empire in Skothar, Thonia had long languished in Blackmoor's shadow. Korin II aimed to change that through research in blasphemous technological arts that would equal Blackmoor's, though based on very different principles. In 3,086 BC, his successor Nial II believed they were ready, and the so-called Last War began.
The war devastated both sides, with the Empire of Thonia facing Blackmoorian technologies that had never before been deployed in battle, leaving many of its cities reduced to rubble by Blackmoorian aerial bombardment. Meanwhile, the weird science of the Thonians left regions of warped reality in its wake, populated by mutants and people with shattered minds. But Thonia's eldritch technology was too untested, too uncontrollable, while Blackmoor had been honing its craft for centuries. In the end, Thonia was defeated, paving the way for Blackmoor's unquestioned domination of Skothar for the remainder of the century.
The device known as the Machine of Nial the Mad was perhaps meant as a doomsday device in the event of Thonia's loss. If so, it was not as successful as the emperor hoped, for it only devastated the capital city of Mohacs, leaving it a glowing, bleeding rift in space and time and sparing the lands of Blackmoor completely. Some opine that it was not a doomsday device, but instead the last remains of the Egg of Coot, its spirit reduced to a ghost in a machine after the destruction of its physical form, but if so, its power backfired in the face of Blackmoor's bombs, devastating Mohacs with eldritch power.
Mohacs was abandoned in the aftermath of the war, the capital of Thonia relocated to the southern city of Kalstrand for the remaining decades of the era. After the Great Rain of Fire, when Blackmoor City itself became a smoking hole in the fabric of reality, some of the Thonian refugees managed to venture into the weird ruins of Mohacs and retrieve some artifacts they hoped would aid them in their new home, the Machine of Nial among them. From the ruins of Mohacs the Machine was brought to Talon Isle north of the Esterhold Peninsula, where the Thonian refugees hoped they could build an impregnable fortress that would protect them from the Kurgans and other roving, post-apocalyptic hordes. With no knowledge of how to operate the Machine, however, they were soon made the victim of its seemingly random effects, and Talon Isle became notorious as a cursed place.
Yet there are those who are drawn to rumors of danger like a moth to flame, and numerous other inhabitants have tried their hand at controlling the Machine. The most notorious of these was Lum, a Thonian mercenary during the period of Alphatian conquest about 20 years after Landfall. Though of Thonian birth, the ambitious Lum had a sufficient talent for magic that when he betrayed his people to fight for the Alphatians, they rewarded him with magical training and a title of baron until he betrayed them as well. After conquering Talon Isle in the name of Alphatia, he repaired its fortifications and claimed it for himself, using it as the base for further conquest of ever-enlarging regions of both Alphatia and Thonia. As he began mastering the intricacies of the Machine his power grew greater still, and bolstered with dark science, none could stand against his armies.
Records of the time offer little insight into Baron Lum's sudden disappearance. Some theorize the power of the Machine overwhelmed him, or that one of his lieutenants turned against him with Thonian or Blackmoorian artifacts of their own, but all that history records is that after a decade and a half of a feared, expanding empire, Lum vanished and, with no clear successors to his throne, his empire collapsed.
A variety of pirates and bandit lords claimed Talon Isle in the centuries to follow. Some managed to make some use of the Machine, but none mastered it as Lum had, and its madness soon claimed them.
More recently, from 918-950 AC, the island was the stronghold of the Thothian assassin Turgan Jethlarh (Book of Wondrous Inventions, pages 31-32), known as the Eel, who took advantage of the island's reputation to make himself a relatively secure stronghold, protecting it with traps of his own devising. While the Eel and his assistants spent time studying the Machine, they were wise enough not to utilize it recklessly.
The Machine and the ancient fortress housing it laid unclaimed after the Eel's hasty departure until 963 AC, when Oskar Wyrdsson (Book of Wondrous Inventions, pages 31-32), an Alphatian-trained mage born in Norwold, cleared it of the savage monsters who were the island's primary residents. Wyrdsson ruled the island until 989 AC, growing increasingly deranged but somehow physically unharmed by the Machine's powers. He finally abandoned it of his own free will in order to pursue Immortality on the path of the Paragon.
Since then, Talon Isle is again unclaimed by any major power, though it's said to be protected by traps left behind by both Wyrdsson and the Eel, as well as various inhuman beings thought to have been summoned by the Machine from other planes of existence.