Azulia

Azulia is the name of the planet upon which the story takes place.

Creation of Azulia
Azulia's original creation is chronicled in many Azulian religions. Most agree that Azulia's original creation was by the elder god Romulus. The world lay rocky, mountainous, and bare for many milennia.

Eventually, it came under the nose of the God of the Oceans who found it a particular suitable vessel for his oceans. The goddess of nature came to admire the beauty of planet, creating most of the plants and fauna populating the world today. The god of the oceans seeing this, also created the fish and plants inhabiting the ocean.

Creation of Sentient Races
Things were peaceful and quiet in Azulia for many years before the planet came to the attention of the god of war. In his eternal struggle against the goddess of nature, he created the savage and bloodthirsty orcs to destroy and feed upon the creatures of the planet. Noting this and resolved to protect her children, the goddess of nature created a strong and sentient race of beings in her own image to protect Azulia. She named them the elves.The elves fought graceful and superior to the orcs, driving most of them to hiding.

This had all occurred under the watchful eye of Romulus who noting the interest, had also endeavered to maintain a foothold on his creation. Thusly, beneath the surface he created the short, subterranean race of dwarves in his image and a manegerie of subterranean creatures and plants to sustain them. The dwarves long maintained a silent presence beneath the ground, content to live away from the elves and orcs.

Meanwhile, the god of war, scorned, collaborated with the God of disease to gain domion of Azulia. The god of war created the races of giants and placed them around Azulia. The god of disease looked to the creatures of Azulia to mutate into his own visage. First, the god of disease created the filthy race of trolls to spread his destruction around Azulia. Unsatisfied, he looked to the existing creatures of the world. He found the lizards and rats, mutating them into the dreadful and sention lizardfolk and ratpeople races and planted them in many corners of the world.

The Great War
These evil races quickly overcame the once dominant elves. The elves were pushed back into the corners of the world struggling to maintain last final defensive positions. This fighting sparked the interest of the dwarves, perhaps more to maintain their own security than of a fondness for the elves, they joined forces with the elves to combat the forces of evil.

Despite great initial gains, the god of death and disease quickly took to stopping the dwarves. He introduced diseases into the world and used them to pervert the races he was fighting against into a twisted mirror image. From the elves and dwarves, he created the dark elves and dark dwarves to supplant the dwarves as rulers of below.

The chaos had not gone unnoticed by other gods. Soon, more and more gods seeking to strengthen themselves and their alliances and weaken their enemies began to wage proxy war on Azulia. Many races were created, altered, and wiped out during this period. This great war continued for over a thousand years.

A Turning Point
Only several thousand years ago were humans first birthed. The god of valor sought to create a protectorate of his colleagues children. He thusly created a race of beings pure and great in size and strength. This original race was known as the Valari. They quickly turned the tides of battle achieving great victories throughout the theaters. In final bids to damage their outnumbering adversaries the god of war corrupted the Valari, creating the ogres. The god of disease then unleashed plagues upon the Valari weakening them and absolving them of their purity, leading many to evil.

With the evil forces largely defeated and strewn asunder, the alliances quickly withered. The majority of races withdrew from one another. Humans populating much of the land quickly took to creating kingdoms and warring with one another.