“Do not let them take the city, defend it with your li…” Cut short by a blighted creature’s foul claw the warden fell into a pool of blackened blood some of the creatures stopping to tear at his armor and get at the meat inside it, while others continued trampling anything or anyone in their way.

“The captain is dead fall back to the keep abandon the Square, abandon the Square.” Those that could break from combat rushed to the keep some trying to save their comrades other cut down from behind as they tried to flee. In thus the finial hours of the battle the city was about to fall to the blighted monstrosities that now swarmed its streets like rats. So many dead or lost, the Market district set a flame, and its gates sealed to prevent more of these creatures swarming the central square. Atop the keeps walls stood the Wardens their gray silver armor glinting in the light of the burning city the blue cloth draped over their right shoulders and a half kilt over the left leg from the waist to ankle, the blue cloth over their left shoulder barred the emblem of a gray griffon and the cloth draped over their left leg was decorated with three gray chevrons embroidered into it, their armor was a mix of metal and leather with the arms covered in a blue undershirt with a metal chest and black plate, from the shoulder to wrist was covered by a leather guard that covered the outer side of the arm with metal vambraces covering the forearm, thick leather gloves and boots covered with plates of metal. Their great helms with the visors down protecting the whole head and a chainmail coif to protect the neck.

“Archers loose!” A hundred arrows rained down on the fast-approaching horde of grotesque monsters which seemed to stop at nothing those that fell became food for other blighted creatures as the horde continued to chase the retreating wardens. As the retreating wardens passed under the archway one man stood ushering them behind him, he too wore the armor of a warden but carried a long wooden staff with an iridescent crystal atop it he tapped the staff bass against the cobblestone and began to chant in an ancient tongue.

“ge fete sarl fmsadie ay tsaff ovur xiyie cvaypaysc su gamair xiye ieriedoarac su saloy.” As he spoke the last word flames shot from both his staff and off hand burning any unluck creature to be caught in the wave of fire. As the portcullis dropped from the gatehouse above keeping the creatures from advancing wardens with pikes took up behind it ramming them through the openings to kill as many of the creatures as they could the horrifying growls and screams of the monsters echoing as they tried to grab any one through the gaps of the portcullis.

As the man who cast the spell removed his great helm it was revealed that his ears where long and pointed, his bald head glistened with sweat as he whipped his brow, his jaw was neatly cut and shaped as the beauty of his high elf blood afford him. Another Warden approached him giving him a quick salute.

“Higher Keeper Warden Thalorian, thank the gods you happened to be in the city.”

“Warden where is your sergeant.”

“Dead sir along with most of my squad only me and two others made it here.”

The high elf clenched his jaw slamming the base of his staff against the cobblestone. He had been casting spells since this battle started and the symptoms of mana withdrawal were showing in his face. He needed to find a way to kill these blighted creatures and save the city or at the least find a way to get the other Wardens and the civilians out alive, the problem was he was a High Keeper of his order a scholar not a warrior it had been many decades since he had fought with a sword or cast this many spells in one day.

“Dammit by the old gods and new we only had a hundred or so wardens in the city to begin with we never expected the blight to reach this far east they said it was contained to the northwest and some parts of the flatlands.” His rage was more at himself than the order as a High Keeper of the Wardens and someone who had been around for two hundred plus years, he knew better than anyone the blight could spread wide and fast in just a few days all you’d have to do is blink and there it was.

The Blight an ancient and corrupted magic that poisoned and twisted anything it touched those who weren’t lucky enough to be killed by it became monstrous grotesque beings with a never ending hungry, a hungry that drive them mad to the point they attack any living thing. The origins of the Blight trace back over 800 years during the creation of the dwarven underground highway, a massive expanse of tunnels that were built under the entire continent starting in the dwarven kingdom of Thrumdar named so because most of its cities lay under the Thrumdar mountains. A group of miners building the first of the underground highways stumbled upon an ancient chamber in witch the members found an ancient and corrupt artifact that twisted their minds and bodies becoming the first of the creatures known now as the blighted during that dark time the world was almost destroyed until the order of the Wardens was formed and pushed back the blight sadly those four that had fallen to the blight first as well as the artifact that caused it all were never found and since then about every hundred and fifty years a new blight would start. In this year 704 the Age of Vigilance the sixth blight had now begun and with it the fall of its first city.

None would forget this story of the Wardens fight to defend the people the fall of one of the east greatest cities the last stand of High Keeper Warden Thalorian and his brave Wardens that held the keep so the citizens could flee. It has now been fifty years since those events, as the sixth blight nearly destroyed the east and plunged many into darkness. Fifty years since the order of the wardens pushed back the corruption once again and began to purify the land. Many heroes fell and somewhere just simply never seen again. But this is not where our story begins.