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In a time before time, far to the north, in a frost-covered valley ringed on three sides by jagged, rocky mountains, there was a strange rift in the ground. In this rift a pool of molten rock bubbled and seethed. This pool was so hot that the ice and snow turned to steam for a hundred yards around it.From this pool emerged a large figure. It was tall, taller than the tallest man in our village by half a head or more. It had a broad, muscular, red chest. On its back were two red, bat-like wings, folded. Its powerful legs became hairy and coarse and ended in cloven feet like those of the antelope that leap through our plains. It had a broken visage that looked like somewhat like the big apes that live down by the river. Its mouth and teeth were like those of the powerful hyena that can snap bones and chew through our hardest woods. Its eyes were yellow and reflected light in the darkness like those of the great cats that prowl the savannah in the next valley. Starting at its brow and stretching from a thick bush to small line down his back, it sported a black, coarse mane of hair like those of the horses we ride on the hunt.
It stood at the edge of the pool of molten, bubbling rock and surveyed the icy valley. Coming to a decision, it reached for the large, twisted horn that hung from a simple silver chain stretching over its shoulder and down to its waist. Putting the horn to its thick, black lips it blew one long, discordant note and then let the horn fall to hang once more at its side.
It raised its thickly muscular arms to its chest and crossed them, keeping a massive, coal-black, spiked mace in its hand even as he did. It stood and waited.
Soon, a baying could be heard. From all parts of the cold northern lands figures approached the valley. First to arrive were the fleetest of foot and the closest. The Gresh, the great wolves of the north, with their oversized feet and jaws and grayish fur arrived, howling. The goblins were next, creeping down from the rocks with their gray-white skin, hooked noses, and blood-red mouths and eyes glinting. Next, in a sparkle of magic, arrived the Svartheim elves. Their cotton-white flesh and ice blue eyes seemed perfectly in tune with the snowfields of the north. They approached the figure and bowed. The powerful trolls arrived next. Their misshapen limbs belied their strength. The trolls could be found in nearly every color. Some carried massive oaken branches as clubs while others had thick metal gauntlets with which to rend their prey. Many of the sturdy half-men who live under the ground heeded the horn’s call as well, arriving with tributes of gold and cold-iron weapons that they laid at the cloven-hoofed feet of their new lord. Still others came to the call; the wicked wyverns, distant cousins to the noble dragons, the marsh hags of the east braved the cold and brought their cunning ways to aid this new power, and those we call the Night Horrors from the west glided to the north to lend their craft to this dark master. All those who have a devious nature or an evil heart felt that call and went to their new master, even some from our world, the world of Men heeded that fateful call.
As the valley filled, the winged figure looked on with pleasure. Soon it uncrossed its arms, reached for the massive black and green horn at its hip and once more and raised the horn to its lips. It blew another discordant note that caused the Gresh to howl and the trolls to gnash their teeth in pain.
As the tone ceased ringing through the valley, the half-men and the goblins immediately set to work. Tools were produced and construction began on a great wall around the bubbling pool. The trolls, goblins, and men began quarrying the basalt and granite, the wyverns and Gresh were harnessed to drag the stones to the work site, and the half-men cut and laid them with expert precision. The Hags and the Svartheim elves whispered and chanted near the center of the circle formed by the quickly erected wall. Blue and green sparks and fires issued forth from these powerful mages. The pool of magma writhed and seethed and bubbled all the more. Soon, tendrils of the fiery rock started to rise from the pool. The Gyre had been cast and the liquid fire poured out where the Svartheim directed. A tower started to take shape from the cooling rock.
For three days and three nights, through the worst snows that the north had to offer, those in the valley worked on the wall and the tower. On the morning of the fourth day each group completed their assigned tasks. Within the plain of the valley now stood a perfectly circular wall 75 feet high and 35 feet thick. Facing the southern entrance to the valley stood the gate, flanked by two smaller towers. The gate was also made from stone and only the combined strength of four of the biggest types of trolls, those we call Ogres, could open either one of them. The tower stood in the exact center of the circle formed by the wall and the mountains around the valley. The tower looked like the spiraled horn of the beautiful unicorn, only the molten rock had cooled into a glass-like, black sheen. Seen from above, the tower looked like the black pupil to the eye formed by the mountains and the wall. The hole in which the magma burned and bubbled had been elongated and wrapped around the tower’s base, forming a moat of molten rock.
A stone ramp and draw bridge were added to allow egress into the tower’s main entrance, some thirty feet about the floor of the valley.
For the first time since rising from the molten pool, the figure spoke. Its voice sounded deep, resonate, and clear.
“It is good.”
It then strode up the ramp, its cloven hooves sparking on the spell-hardened obsidian of his newly created keep, and entered its throne room.
And thus evil invaded our world.
But evil did not stay still. This dark lord of the north had plans for this world. With its army of followers, it bent its will toward the conquest of the world. It used foul magic to strengthen the winter and extend its influence farther south.
Thus started the time we call the Long Winter of a thousand years ago, wherein the Dark Lord stretched its influence as far as it could and all good people of the world had to ban together to repel its advance and send it back to its tower in the north.
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