History of the Nations of War
The 1st Age: The Seven Tribes
Daioth, The Great Maker, spoke the seven tribes into being. Daioth made each tribe unique: He taught them their own methods of gathering food, making music, building houses and speaking. Each tribe was given it's own culture, and each had a favorite quality of Daioth: Compassion, Power, Knowledge, Justice, Courage, Excellence and Wisdom. This was how the tribes were distinguished; they became the tribe of Compassion, the tribe of Justice, etc. The seven tribes were placed close together in an area in the centre of the Mainland.
This was, initially, a great age of prosperity for the tribes, as they exchanged produce and shared understanding. Bridges were built over The River and trade routes were established, many going through the tribe of Wisdom, who developed the first marketplace.
And each tribe prospered while they had conversations with Daioth. The land reaped large harvests of fruits and vegetables, the streams and the Great Lake was alive with fish and the surrounding forests provided animals for hunting and strong timber for houses, towers and bridges. There was music, dancing and feasts held to the glory of Daioth.
However, as the tribes grew in size and strength, some of the tribes turned from Daioth and made their own way to pursue their ideals. At some point in time, the Unnamed One began secret conversations with the tribal chiefs of the tribe of Power. He prompted them to question why the Tribe of Power did not rule over the other tribes. He even went as far as promising them great power if they began sacrificing their people to him.
The Tribe of Power separated themselves from the other tribes and performed human sacrifices to the Unnamed One in the night. Great fires burnt around their perverse shrine during the evenings, and even the Tribe of Justice in the far north could see the foul smoke. Trade relations between the other tribes and the Tribe of Power became uneasy.
When the other tribes finally stopped trading their supplies, the Tribe of Power began training their discontented population for war, under direction of the Unnamed One. Daioth wept for the Tribe of Power, who had stopped conversing with Him and had chose rebellion. But Daioth knew if He did not help the other tribes to defeat the Tribe of Power, they would be destroyed.
Daioth held council with the other tribal chiefs to counter this threat. Battle plans were made to keep the Tribe of Power on the west side of The River, and the other tribes trained up their own armies.
In that First War, the weak armies of the Tribe of Power could not gain the upper hand in battles and never gained access to the lands of the east. Armies from the tribes of Excellence, Justice and Courage drove the Tribe of Power into the desserts in the west. The tribal chiefs of Power became increasingly evil, and were later known as the Dark Lords. Relations between the other tribes were temporarily strong in this time as they worked together.
But when the son of the Tribal chief of Wisdom was responsible for murder, the other Tribes held a great meeting to decide the boy's fate. The Tribe of Justice demanded that the boy be killed for the sake of fairness. The tribe of Knowledge recommended he be sent away from the other tribes. The Tribe of Compassion suggested that the boy be locked in a special house and released when he learned the wrong of his actions. The Tribe of Wisdom hardened his heart and would not let any action be taken against his son, and defied the other members of the Meeting. The tribal Chief of Wisdom began to contemplate war against the other tribes. Although many of the tribe of Wisdom had diverse views on the issue, they followed their tribal chief to the Second War.
But the tribe of Wisdom was located in the very midst of the other tribes. This war was drawn on all sides of that tribe; defeat was inevitable. When the tribal chief was eventually killed in battle, his brother stopped the madness and the people of the Tribe of Wisdom submitted to the decisions of the other tribes.
The other tribes held a great deliberation to decide the future of the Tribe of Wisdom. The tribe of Justice wanted the tribe culled, for they saw this tribe the same as the Tribe of Power. The Tribe of Compassion put forward the notion of sending the Tribe of Wisdom to an island only recently discovered to the north of the Mainland. This was the more popular option, thus it was done. The Tribe of Wisdom was exiled to the Island until the sentence of exile was broken; if anyone was caught breaking their sentence, they were to be killed.
The Tribe of Excellence, now quite skilled sea-fearers, built the large boats and the Tribe of Compassion gave the Tribe of Wisdom provisions for the journey.
It was a stormy day as the Tribe of Wisdom boarded the large ships and sailed north, along The River, guarded by a convoy of ship of the Tribe of Excellence. As the ships left The River and sailed over the sea to the Island of Exile, one of the ships was ripped apart by the storm, and many of its occupants swam back to the shore of the Mainland; the Tribe of Justice killed all of those that did so.
The Tribe of Wisdom stayed on the Island of Exile until much later in the First Age, but Daioth was with them, and taught them much about Wisdom and how foolish their previous actions had been. In this time the Tribe of Wisdom became much closer to what Daioth had intended them to be.
When the Tribe of Justice killed the survivors of the ship that was wrecked, the bonds between the other tribes finally collapsed. Some tribes argued that it was not the fault of the survivors that the sentence of exile was broken and another ship should have been built, but other tribes agued the law of the sentence of Exile. The tribes migrated away from their original place in the Mainland. The tribe of Justice was the first to leave, disappearing through a mountain pass to the north. The Tribe of Knowledge, thinking their understanding made them superior than the other tribes was next to leave, purchasing ships from the Tribe of Excellence and sailing south, past the Great Lake, fading into legend.
At this point the Tribe of Excellence fell into civil war. That tribe chased after quality possessions at a cost to their integrity. Stealing and deception ran rampant through the tribe until it all fell apart. In the end, the people separated to get away from the bloodshed. The Tribe of Excellence became little more than small bands of traveling bandits, trusting no one and adhering to no laws.
It is currently unknown what happened to the Tribe of Courage, it is assumed they took a southwesterly route. However the Tribe of Compassion did not move far from their original place in the Mainland, and became very prosperous over time.
Towards the end of the First Age, the descendants of the Tribe of Power returned. These were the Dark Lords, of the lineage of their tribal chiefs. The armies that they had amassed in this time were immense; not only did they have arena-hardened warriors, but the Unnamed One had taught them the dark arts of necromancy. Throngs of dead bodies marched east to wage war on the other tribes.
But only the Tribe of Compassion was near the original location of the tribes. Though this tribe was prosperous, they had a minimal army. With no other tribes around to help them, they sent a messenger to the Island of Exile to call back the Tribe of Wisdom. Thus the Tribe of Wisdom returned to the Mainland.
With a favorable breeze, the Tribe of Wisdom sailed back to the Mainland and Aithos, their first Grandmaster Sage, began organizing troops for war. However, they were too late to save two of the three cities of the Tribe of Compassion from death.
The First Age concluded with a great battle outside the last city of the Tribe of Compassion. The Tribe of Wisdom landed troops to the north and the southeast of the dead legions, and obliterated the hosts from the west. The Tribe of Wisdom rebuilt to the north of the Mainland, whereas the Tribe of Compassion migrated to the plains of the other side of the Great Lake.