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Across the Amaranthine Ocean, to the East, the water narrows into what becomes the Ozmit Sea, on the coast of the continent of Tal’dorei. Farther back than anyone can really remember, during a century nobody can quite place precisely in the records (it varies depending on which historian you ask), explorers from Tal’dorei ventured West to find what they could. The ships made land to find another world, already inhabited and thriving at much the same rate they were. Thedas.
History tells of the various trades, the battles and wars fought for land and resources and control and governments. The history of any world that anyone knows. It tells of peoples meeting, intertwining, moving from one continent to the other until the peoples native to one land inhabited the other in equal measure.
In terms of trade, Tal’dorei brought to Thedas enchantment techniques and applications the likes of which they had never seen. Items that could contain spells, magical energy, and far more items than could be expected to fit in such a small space. Weapons with properties to drain lives, to activate to an element at a word. Thedas, for its part, supplied an element never before seen on the soils of Tal’dorei: Lyrium. The substance proved to be invaluable to spellcasters and sorcerers, enhancing their casting abilities to a degree they had not thought possible in previous years. This, in turn, enhanced the abilities of enchanters. Magical items became more and more common in Thedas as the lyrium trade into Tal’dorei flourished.
Of course, with the good trade, there will always be negative elements making their way from land to land. The largest issues, far and away, came in the forms of living creatures. Underground parties soon found there was coin to be made in shipping and selling and showing off the more dangerous specimens that each land had to offer. Nagas, basilisks, orc, rashasa, and many more all made their way, somehow, to the shores of Thedas. It is even rumored that, somewhere far in the deep roads, lurks a colony of Beholders. Thedas, however, gave as good as it got. Darkspawn, previously unknown to Tal’dorei, spread their blight to the eastern lands in the time of the Third Blight, causing factions of Grey Wardens to crop up there as well. Sylvans, wraiths, deepstalkers, ghasts, and of course the blighted variations of creatures all spread across Tal’dorei.
Societies, as they always have, still differed. In Tal’dorei, elves rose not only to face the challenges put before them but to rise far above them in some places. Some gave up the ways of the nomad, others kept it. Those that abandoned it rose in rank and society until their cities, their lives, rivaled the strongest of human societies. Those that chose to remain nomadic became the druidic societies that guard where the plains bleed together. In Thedas, the elves did not fare so well. Many a war –political, personal, national- had been flared because of the Thedosian views of elves being forced upon elves native to Tal’dorei. For now, there is peace and an understanding kindled by ambassadors from Tal’dorei to the land of Thedas.
On the whole, Tal’dorei’s nations keep to themselves in terms of the issues facing the nations of Thedas. Unless asked to help, the governments of this continent to not interfere with the affairs of the land across the waters from it. Only recently have the nations of Thedas begun to reach out for advice from these neighboring nations in an attempt to settle the unease that rocks their lands. This outreach was accepted, and was soon returned by a reaching out from Tal’dorei: a plea for aid to recovering cities and nations after a devastating attack by a group of dragons that declared themselves the Chroma Conclave. With some of Thedas’ nations –Ferelan, Orlais, and the Free Marches among them- promising to send coin and people alike to aid in the recovery efforts in the largest cities, Tal’dorei sent representatives from Emon, Westrunn, Kraghammer to discuss potential solutions to Thedas’ magical troubles.
As it stands at present, magic users also find themselves leading very different lives on the continents. Thedas finds itself divided on what those with magic should and should not be permitted to do, with the country of Tevinter standing as the cautionary tale of what happens if mages have too much power. However, recent events in the Free Marches have shown what trying to keep a tight leash on magic can result in, and the continent is presently rocked by a rebellion. Tal’dorei, however, has never restricted those gifted in the arcane. There have been attempts for talks between powerful groups of magic users from Tal’dorei and the representatives of Templars and Circles of Thedas. However, these talks are only in their infancy, and who can tell where they will lead?
It is in this world, with many nations across two continents becoming closer out of necessity, that the heroes of Emon, the team dubbed Vox Machina, find themselves in the middle of yet another global crisis. The threat of the Chroma Conclave having been put to rest, it was suggested that the group take a vacation. Impulse guided the band, as it so often did, and this time it directed them to the land of Thedas. They found themselves settled down in Val Royeaux to seemingly enjoy themselves. Not a week had passed since their arrival before the sky above them split and demons rained down.
The interests of the party to provide for themselves and to keep people save met in the middle when it was proposed they offer their skills to ridding the area surrounding the capital city of the demons. In on such scuffle, they were joined by another small party of individuals, one of whom they’d heard was being praised as some sort of Herald, leading an Inquisition with the goal of closing the hole in the sky.
Through the combined efforts of Vex’ahlia and Scanlan, the group managed to convince the Herald, a towering qunari mage, and her party that they were a small mercenary band who would be willing to offer services to this Inquisition. Not entirely an untruth, and it would enable them to aid their homeland from afar in addition to offering them lodgings.
This is the way the world stands. Falling apart, a hole in the sky, and Vox Machina smack in the middle of it all under the leadership of one Kerah Adaar, supposed Herald of Andraste and who the world seems to have placed their faith in.