A History of Struggle & Strife

Long ago during the early ages of the Roman Empire, one of their legions vanished. This legion included some five thousand men along with their camp followers. Where they went no one on Earth knew, but they somehow ended up on another world. This world, Carna, was considerably different from the world they knew, and they fought for their very lives against innumerable foes. But, there was something in the veins of these lost men and women, a hint of a magical power. As the years passed, this lost legion strove for territory on the continent they called Alera. As bloods mingled and intermingled that trace of magical power grew stronger and stronger, culminating in the art known as Furycrafting.

This newfound power saved them and allowed them to take more territory, eventually becoming the dominant species on Alera. These descendants of Rome built their own culture, and as their population expanded, they adopted the military prowess of Rome and mixed into those arts the powers they were gaining over the elements. Discipline and Furycrafting enabled them to triumph over the hostile world, and they took the continent of Alera as their own.

The culture they created was reminiscent of Old Rome, with an Emperor, a Senate, and the Great Houses which ruled territory in the Emperor’s name and gave fealty to the Emperor. Styling themselves the First Lords, these Emperors ruled in an unbroken line from the shakiest founding of Alera Imperia, through the rise of the Aleran Capitol, and down to the time when the High Lords and the First Lord combined their potent gifts and were able to finally return to the Earth they had lost. Members from all of the Great Houses, the Senate, and even the family of the First Lord were dispatched to Earth in order to investigate how likely it was that they could return to their homeland. To their astonishment they learned that although almost two millennia had elapsed for them while their forebears struggled on Alera, only a scant two centuries had passed on Earth. History made mention of the lost legion, but no one knew its fate.

Attempting to return to Alera, the Alerans duplicated the feats that had brought them back to their homeland, but to not avail; the ripple, portal, or rift did not open. Stranded once again in a strange place, under the guidance of the First Lord and the Senate, the stranded Alerans decided that the furies of Earth were too weak to empower their way home. Using the furies, they brought with them from Alera, they resolved to scatter themselves to the winds, and to use their furies in order to empower and awaken the furies of Earth.

The Alerans spent the next thousand and more years waking the elemental spirits of the Earth and empowering them with the nonnative furies they brought them from Alera.