History

The Missing

Abeth was originally inhabited by mysterious peoples now referred to as The Missing. Little is known about them, although they seem to have been quite an advanced civilization. They left behind ruins of cities and other complex construction, as well as magical artifacts and entities; Demons and Holothour are said to have been their servants. The Missing became extinct some time before the arrival of the Tribes of Humanity. Ruins can still be found here and there, such as the forest of columns at Sweet Mercy Convent, but most now lie beneath the ice. Some people living near the Ice-Margins, risk exploring tunnels to raid these underground ruins for artifacts.

The Original Tribes

According to the founding myth of the people who now populate Abeth, thousands of years ago, the original tribes of men (humans, elves, dwarves, etc.) came from the stars. There remain a number of artifacts from this journey, such as the three known Arks and a number of Shiphearts. Even further back in the mists of history, the tribes supposedly descended from one god-like being known as the Ancestor.

The Ice

Abeth was a harsh world even before the sun around Abeth began dying. The original tribes had to intermix their bloodlines in order to breed a people capable of living there. The special traits of these tribes are seen only rarely in the current population, and are greatly prized.

With the dying of the sun, the planet began to slowly freeze. In order to forestall catastrophe, an artificial Moon, a giant focusing mirror, was placed in the sky long ago. It keeps the Corridor around the equator free of ice by focusing the sun's rays into it each night; a nightly event known as the Focus Moon. Almost all knowledge of how the Moon works has since been lost.

Today the evidence that the Moon is failing is plain for all to see, as the ice advances with the Corridor now a mere sixty miles from the northern ice to the southern ice. Five hundred years ago, it was over 200 miles wide.  The realms of the Corridor exist in a state of perpetual hostility, with their northern and southern borders continually squeezed, and their neighbors providing the only opportunity for expansion.