Chapter Text
1500 BCE (The Human-Monster War, The Twilight War): Out of anger for human souls being used to power their magic and general animosity & paranoia the most powerful human kingdoms of the day declared war on the various Monster kingdoms. For thousands of years the Monsters looked down on humanity seeing them as weak short-lived intruders & invaders. Their natural strengths, long lifespans, and monopoly over the magical arts had kept them above humanity.
Unfortunately for them humanity had become numerically superior to the longer lived monster races over the millennia. Even the monster's mastery over the magical arts became less of an advantage as humanity increased its understanding of the art.
The greatest human powers of the day from Atlantis to Mu to Shangri-la all participated in grand offensives to sweep the various Monster kingdoms from the face of the Earth. Both sides had victories & defeats. Both sides also committed great atrocities against one another believing themselves justified. Eventually the monsters were pushed back by the tide of humans.
Some Monsters would flee to hidden places like the isle of Avalon, the Boiling Isles, and Gensokyo where they could maintain some level of their civilization far from any human. A few would attempt to integrate with humans with varying success. Others would retreat to the forests, mountains, and other remote places intent on either carving out their own secret communities or waging a guerrilla war against humanity. A majority however would be sealed beneath Mount Ebott in what would later be called North America by a powerful barrier.
The barrier's creation would come at a cost. The magic needed to permanently seal away such magically powerful beings was high. Higher than what humanity had the proper knowledge to sufficiently provide. The magical backblast would send the Kingdom of Mu to parts unknown. Half of New Hakkor which called North America home would be destroyed. Dust & debris would be blasted into the atmosphere leaving the world with proper sun for almost a year.
This 'Year Without Summer' would cause the once allied human powers to begin tearing each other apart. New Hakkor and Atlantis would be in a death struggle after both kingdoms experienced particularly bad harvests made worse by monster guerillas. Atlantis would be forced to use its secret weapon which would backfire immensely.
Not only was all of New Hakkor destroyed which included the granaries which they had hoped to claim but the blast caused a massive tsunami which swallowed up their island civilization sending it far beneath the waves. Humanity had succeeded in banishing the monsters but in the end lost their civilizations and with them the last knowledge of their true history…
Knowledge that humanity would now need more than ever. Because while they may have lost this round to many monsters the war was far from over. For as long as humanity drew breath, darkness would cover the Earth.
1474 BCE (The Curse of Pandora): Humanity would unknowingly be struck with the Curse of Pandora at this time. Pandora was a semi-competent elvish mage from a small kingdom in what is now called Greece. Her home was gone. Destroyed and ransacked by humans. What was left of her people had fled to the hills and forests to be hunted down. All that Pandora felt was hate. Hate towards humans. She spent twenty years devising a way to make humanity pay.
Pandora didn't feel any pain as her blood dripped upon the runes. While she was quite skilled in other magical arts her rune work wasn't that good but she didn't care. Anything to get back at the humans who had killed her family! Destroyed her people! Twenty long years of gathering knowledge from scrolls before burning them to deny them to the humans. All to create the curse to end all curses…
While it wasn't as strict as Alchemy magic was still somewhat of a give and take system. If you couldn't give what was required there would be consequences. The rumors of what happened to New Hakkor was proof of that much to her joy. In order to curse humanity she needed to give something in exchange and her own lifeforce wasn't going to be enough. She had been prevented from going through with her plan for years until she got the idea to use the energy of the planet itself to power this curse. She had in a bit of irony got the idea from humans in the Far East experimenting with something called Alkahestry.
With all this power at her disposal she could not only do her curse but make it impossible to remove. Darkness, fear, terror, and war will now always plague humanity. Her curse had also greatly lessened humanity's already meager ability to use magic. Now even in their defeated state her people the true owners of Earth would have an advantage.
Her curse set Pandora would wander the Earth bringing misery and strife to any humans she encountered. She would later form a group of other like minded elves. These elves would become known by humans as Witches. Over time humanity would forget their non-human origins and consider any evil spell casting woman to be a Witch. The 'True' Witches would remain a somewhat small group kept alive only by their unaging nature. The group would eventually splinter into several others with differing goals.
The Coven Witches were those who didn't completely hate humans. They would frequently recruit like minded human witches into their ranks forming sometimes very large covens. These human witches would become consumed by dark magic turning into hags & hagravens.
The Dark Witches were the most extreme in their hatred treating anything even remotely human as evil. Humans that ran afoul of them would pray for death for any fate a Dark Witch had for them would be worse than even the most gruesome of deaths.
Hill Witches typically lived in the hills and forests far from human civilization. They would set their roots down in a single spot and defend it from any and all human influence. Hill Witches could be quite zealous when protecting their homes with the Witch of Blair, Maryland being a notable example.
As humanity expanded and time marched on this would lead to the rise of the so-called 'New' Witch. New Witches were cowards first and foremost. Hating yet fearing humanity they would instead strike at the most vulnerable that being human children. Despite their cowardly tactics and the low opinion their fellow witches had of them the New Witches would ironically strike the biggest blows against humanity. They would be responsible for the Silver Shamrock Incident, the Great Mousing of Dorset, and the 2017 Chicago Incident. The last incident would be the final straw with New Witches and other hostiles being hunted to extinction shortly after.
Pandora was… she didn't know what she was. When her witch coven broke into several different groups she took to wandering again. She no longer hated humans as much as she once did. It seemed time could heal a wound as deep as that one. She would occasionally find a place to settle down. Make friends. Even get close to finding love a couple of times. But every time that happened she always ran away.
It wasn't because humanity didn't accept her. On the contrary as time went on she didn't even need to hide her elvish nature with magic anymore. Humanity accepted her anyway.
No. What made her run was shame. As much as it shocked her, humanity had… changed. She was no longer looked at like a thing or beast. They treated her like she was one of them. To think humans could actually be so accepting. It wasn't just elves either. While there weren't many left you could occasionally find a monster in a human town or city living in peace with their human neighbors. At times she thought she could finally settle down and be happy.
But then the darkness would come. Whether it was another nonhuman who couldn't let go of their hate. Or the humans in the next kingdom would invade for seemingly little reason though she knew it was her own curse influencing them. So whenever she got close to being happy she would always leave to avoid seeing her own magic eventually destroy what she had come to care for.
She had tried to remove the curse several times but she couldn't. In her sloppiness and inexperience she had botched many of the runes. It was a veritable Gordian Knot of runic spells put together to be unbreakable… by someone who never once thought that one day it may need to be undone. It was far beyond her ability to undo so humanity would be cursed for all eternity.
Pandora would exile herself, changing both her name and appearance. The guilt had motivated her to make her new appearance as ugly as she felt. She would roam the Earth performing good deeds and leaving before she could ever become truly happy.
1000 BCE (Magic Rediscovered): In places such as Egypt, Xing, and Xerxes magic is being rediscovered by humanity. Centuries ago humanity had suddenly lost the ability to perform magic. Now after tireless research and experimentation humans are able to use magic again though significantly weaker than it was in the past. While wand construction & use would be perpetrated by those descended from the great mages & court wizards of humanity's past most nations would be known for a single kind of magic.
Egypt would become the masters in runic spells using complex hieroglyphic incantations to guard their tombs and be responsible for their more powerful spells & artifacts.
Xing would focus on the art of Alkahestry which they were the creators of. Even as their empire collapsed into many competing warlords you could still find universities & monasteries teaching and improving the art. Even when elemental manipulation known as 'Bending' started to appear among select members of the population and foreign forms of magic started to make their way into the land you could still find at least one Alkahestry practitioner in every village no matter how remote.
Xerxes, the jewel of the middle east, was the center of all information on the use of Alchemy. Alchemists were seen as important parts of society second only to the king. Chimeras made up their army's heavy shock troops. Experiments in the creation of artificial humans to serve as slaves were being started. Xerxes was also rumored to have created an artifact known as the Philosopher's Stone which allowed its user to ignore the rules of Alchemy. The method to create such an artifact remains a closely guarded secret.
1290 BCE (Death Is Only The Beginning): High Priest Imhotep is caught by the Pharaoh having an affair with his mistress Anck-su-namun. The two of them kill the Pharaoh. When the Pharaoh's bodyguards, the Medjai, arrive Anck-su-namun commits suicide. Imhotep takes her body to the Hamunaptra, the City of the Dead, in the hopes of resurrecting her but are interrupted by the Medjai. For this crime Imhotep's fellow priests are mummified alive while Imhotep himself becomes the only person subjected to the Hom-Dai, the worst of all egyptian curses.
Imhotep would be mummified alive with flesh eating scarabs poured into his sarcophagus. His soul would be torn asunder leaving him a barely sentient wisp in the underworld only capable of reliving this pain over & over for all eternity. A curse that would ensure whoever was subject to it would suffer until the end of time. But the Hom-Dai had a price for its cruelty. If by chance the one who had been subjected to it was revived. They would be given command over the sands, the strength of ages, and the glory of immortality. They would also bring forth the 12 Plagues which had devastated Egypt thousands of years before.
After sealing away Imhotep the Medjai realize the terrible mistake they had made. Imhotep, unlike most, had the magical knowledge to turn his curse into an advantage. He was fluent in many Heka spells and had extensive knowledge of hieroglyphic runes. The most powerful spells were seldom used by spellcasters since they used their caster's lifeforce to power them. Now the Medjai had foolishly taken such a handicap away. If he were ever revived Imhotep would be the most powerful mage on the planet…
So the Medjai would maintain a silent watch on Hamunaptra in order to prevent Imhotep from ever returning. [The Mummy]
990 AD (Never Tickle A Sleeping Dragon): The Hogwarts School of Witchcraft & Wizardry is founded in Scotland though quickly comes to service the whole of the British Isles. Hogwarts would accept all who showed a talent in magic no matter what their actual skill level was. This went against the wishes of one Salazar Slytherin who wanted the school to be restricted to those of the highest magical power which were typically those from families of longtime magic practitioners. His colleagues were able to convince him to ease up on his stance. [Harry Potter]
994 AD (Stone By Day): Castle Wyvern once again repels an invasion by Vikings. This is thanks in no small part to the clan of Gargoyles who live in the castle. In return for watching over them when they turn to stone in the day they protect the castle from invaders at night. This alliance between man and gargoyle remains at best an uneasy one. Despite owing their lives to the Gargoyles many times over, the humans of Castle Wyvern do not trust them.
What little tolerance that had grown after the Twilight War had died out due to the actions of what Monsters remained. The Fae who called Scotland home were more than willing to curse a wayward human for little to no reason stoking non-human hatred in the local population. The feeling turned out to be very much mutual with many Gargoyles beginning to resent the humans they protect, seeing them as ungrateful.
One female Gargoyle conspires with the Vikings to leave Castle Wyvern defenseless. After the Vikings had taken what they wanted they would leave the castle for the Gargoyles to rule over. Unfortunately for this traitor the Vikings go back on the deal and smash many of the Gargoyles while they are in stone sleep.
The refugees from Castle Wyvern take their anger upon several Gargoyles who were away at the time of the attack. Chief of whom is the Castle's Court Mage who blames the death of the Castle's Princess & ruler Katharine who the Mage had long harbored affections for. The Magus curses the Gargoyles to remain in stone sleep until the 'castle rose above the clouds' which was an impossibility for even the strongest of magic.
A short while after the Gargoyles are cursed their leader Goliath returns with Princess Katharine who he had rescued from the Viking camp. The Magus is horrified upon learning he had wrongfully cursed the Gargoyles. Goliath places his stone clan upon the abandoned Castle Wyvern and asks the Magus to cast his spell one more time. The Magus and Princess Katharine, full of remorse, vow to watch over the clan's eggs. Having nowhere else to go the Magus takes them to the hidden isle of Avalon which he knows is largely abandoned by the Fae. After a short confrontation with the Weird Sisters, servants of Lord Oberon, the Magus, Katharine, and Tom (a young boy who was a friend of the Gargoyles) enter Avalon. [Gargoyles]