Historical Highlights of Maidh
by ViktorD20Here's some snippets from the timeline. It was a lot of snakes before the 1000 year hiatus.
BC 2400: Wild elves settle in a peninsula in the region that would be known as Tangor Bay on the new, some hundreds of years old, continent of Skothar.
The elves drive the native beastmen underground and into the thick jungles of the peninsula. They encounter the giants known as Fomorians who begin a war with them.
The elves are assisted by local human tribes in driving back the Fomorians who retreat into the jungles, where they come across the beastmen and begin a war against one another.
The elves and humans of the Tasexi tribes befriend one another and begin sharing goods and knowledge, with the elves teaching the humans about agriculture, trade, architecture, and metallurgy. The Tasesci are soon organized into a proper nation led by a potentate.
BC 2200: The Tasexi are approached by an entity known only as the Serpent. This is in fact Atzanteotl, who begins sowing distrust and hate among the Tasexi who believe him to be a great redeemer. The potentate tries to banish the Serpent’s cult, but his own son kills him on his very throne and is crowned the next potentate.
BC 1995: The elves are invaded by a horde of serpent-men leading a legion of magically half-bred serpentine warriors and slaves, who quickly destroy most border towns and forts with only the small, fortified town of Aldruu holding the line against the serpents.
BC 1500: Potentate Versidu summons the most powerful sorcerers in the Tasexi court to exact his vengeance on the wild elves and their allies.
The Tasexi fleet surrounds the elven cities, and a series of naval battles takes place as the serpent-men attempt to invade. As the invasion is pushed back, the Tasexi sorcerers summon swarms of meteors to destroy the elven fleets at the cost of much of the Tasexi fleet. The pure Fomorians are butchered by the Tasexi legion and the Aswang are slaughtered with survivors either forced to flee or enslaved.
The wild elven cities are burned to the ground and elves are slaughtered in the thousands. The genocide ends the war as the last of the wild elves sail north, where they meet the Rakasta of the Pyang Dynasty, modern day Myang Dynasty, and later die out after some generations.
The Tasexi victory is short lived as massive storms destroy most of the fleet, and the orcs overrun the stranded survivors. The peninsula is abandoned for a millennium as the serpent-men fight the humanoids and the Rakasta.
In the following millennium human tribes known as the Aeta, Negrito and Ati, who were guided by their Immortals, settle the land, though they do not have much in terms of power over the area yet. However, these three tribes would one day be the foundations of the land of Maidh.
In the time that the peninsula is abandoned the Bungisngis become bigger and more violent, though still afraid of sunlight, the beastmen driven underground reemerge as the kobold-like Sigbin, and the Aswang lose their ability to control their shapeshifting, reverting to a savage race of shapeshifting monsters that blend in with people and devour them at night.
BC 500: A new tribe of humans arrives from the north of the peninsula on long boats. These are the Aklanon tribe, and they are only the first to arrive to the lands of the Aeta, Negrito and Ati.
Over the next year, more tribes arrive in the form of the Boholano, the Visayans, Karay-a, the Waray, the Bagobo and the Takakaolo. The tribes do not interact with each other much, only occasionally sharing their crop or bounty from hunts.
BC 490: The Tasexi take notice of the new human tribes, and potentate Versidu is quick to amass an army to march down and enslave the people of the peninsula.
The Immortals see the plans of the serpent-men and warn one of the tribe leaders, known in legend as Bathala, who quickly gathers his warriors with the intention to unite the tribes against the coming attack.
Bathala visits all the tribal courts, winning the chiefs over with diplomacy, force, and wit alike. The army is great, but it will not be enough to stop the potentate who aims to claim the lands that he was denied a thousand years before.
Bathala chooses a chief named Lapu-Lapu as the leader of the army, though he acts as the face of the force. The training period is ruthless, but most pull through, and the great tribal army is formed.
BC 485: After a long period of war, Bathala and Lapu-Lapu decide it’s time to meet the serpent-men in the open. Kasha-Rifik gathers her forces near the coast where a fresh wave of reinforcements arrives to aid her war effort.
The tribes are approached by humanoids in the form of the Rakasta from the northern Purrang Dynasty, who offer them their aid and weapons. The tribes accept the offer, and Lapu-Lapu commissions the first Kampilan sword.
As the Tasexi are gathering on the beaches, Bathala and Lapu-Lapu appear over the hills, where they blow horns to inform the serpent-men and their kin of their presence. Behind them stand thousands of warriors, both human and Rakasta eager to slaughter the serpents where they stand.
The battle on the beaches is truly a legendary one. Though the tribes are outnumbered, three thousand against ten thousand, the serpent-men are too disorganized to be able to overpower their enemy. Bathala leads one front while Lapu-Lapu leads another, and the heroes cry praises to the Immortals and curses to the Tasexi invaders.
The battle lasts for over a day, but at the end, a dying Bathala leaps over the Tasexi honor guard and lunges his spear through the heart of Kasha-Rifik, ending her life there and then. The mighty warrior ascends to Immortality right in front of the tribes and their allies as well as the horrified Tasexi army.
The leaderless and severely depleted Tasexi army routs. Only a handful make it home as the storms sink most of the fleet.
AC 0: Gat Lontok is made the Rajah, and he begins his reign by renovating the shrines of the various Immortals. He tasks various warriors with keeping the lands safe at night from Manananggal and Aswang that would harm the people.
A colossal Bungisngis attacks one of the villages, killing the warriors and eating many of the elder folk. Lontok and his sons hunt it down and kill it, though at the cost of Lontok’s life.
AC 150: A powerful sorcerer known as Calunod embarks on a quest for Immortality. He travels across the bay to challenge the finest magicians of the northern Rakasta. He fails and never returns.
AC 500: The bitter son of Gat Kalamayin of Waray slays his father and begins a war on all other tribes. His uprising is held at bay, but not snuffed out entirely.
The last loyal warrior of his datu, the personal bodyguard of Kalamayin, Palaba, slays his mad new chief and takes the place of the datu of Waray. Waray’s reputation among other tribes suffers greatly.
AC 650: The warrior cult of Lapu-Lapu is founded in the lands of the Visaya, where he is believed to have lived ages ago.
AC 1000: Present day.
This is by no means the full timeline. The full timeline is 6 pages long, complicated, detailed and convoluted, as all Mystaran timelines should be.
And to wrap this up again for now, Bathala's final victory before Immortality. A popular wood carving.
