Over several human generations, the Elder Folk pursued their long-term plan for the salvation of the Great Lands.

In the east, the three Elder-folk enclaves remained small and compact, independent cities that were within but not of the local Common-folk realms. They built alliances with the Kavrian matriarchs, the Nesali petty kings, and the Dahari city-states. They helped extend the local technological base, teaching improvements to agriculture, metal-working, and social organization. Over time, they fostered the growth of armies that would one day be set against the Renounced Ones in the north.

In the west, the enclaves had less to work with. The Zari peoples were well-meaning, but technologically backward, poorly organized, and not very militant. There, the Elder Folk extended direct control outward from their central enclaves, establishing three lordships. The Zari peoples were not subjugated by force, but over time they came to accept Elder guidance. They received bronze-working technology for the first time, and as in the east they improved their manner of life in ways that made sense to them.

This map drops the limit of bronze-working technology, since the efforts of the Elder Folk had spread it throughout the known world. Only the Muri peoples, most of them isolated beyond the southern deserts, remained at a Neolithic level of development until the arrival of iron-working centuries later.

By about 1,900 years before Krava’s era, the Elder Folk and their human allies were ready. Over the course of eight years, the forces of the Renounced Gods were suddenly met with fiercely armed resistance. Four great battles were fought: the Battles of the High Pass and the Silver Lake in Zari territory, and the Battles of the Black Hills and Karatahlma along the northern margins of Mahra lands.

The Mahra had suffered greatly during the last few generations. The eastern Mahra, despite many stubborn hit-and-run campaigns, had been forced almost entirely off the central grasslands. The western Mahra had retained more of their territory, but even they had been forced to retreat southward. A significant branch of the western Mahra – the Athani tribal coalition – pressed southward into the mountain highlands, absorbing or pushing aside the Zari herdsmen of the region. From this desperate migration would come all the glories of the Pallaseni civilization of later centuries.

Now the Mahra, supported by the Elder Folk and the civilizations around the Sailor’s Sea, met the armies of the Renounced Ones in pitched battle. The Battle of Karatahlma was the greatest military engagement the world had ever seen, fought over three full days and involving over ten thousand warriors. In later eras, the battle would loom even larger in the mythology of the Chariot People, framed as a glorious victory over the gods and demons of primordial chaos.

In sober fact, Karatahlma was no more than a strategic stalemate. The Renounced Ones were halted in their advance for a few years, but no force the allies could muster could possibly defeat them. Simply reaching the core of their power, the sanctuary on Mount Akyat, was flatly impossible.

Fortunately, the Elder Folk had something more subtle in mind.

In each of the great battles, allied forces had captured warriors of the Renounced Ones. Now they persuaded their captives, appealing to their fierce pride, pointing out the manner in which the Renounced Gods were exploiting them. Then, after receiving generous gifts, the captives were released.

In the Great Lands, how does one slay a god? Gods are simply spirits, members of a common form of life in that world, grown fat and powerful upon human attention and love. Deprive a god of that attention and love, and its power declines until it returns to its existence as a petty spirit.

The Renounced Gods had used fear (“obey us or die”) and flattery (“you are superior to all other peoples of the world”) to bend the humans of the far north to their will. Now the “fierce men” of their armies awakened to how they had been used . . . and they could reach Mount Akyat.

Thousands of years later, the skatoi encountered by Krava in her journeys would still remember the great revolt of their ancestors, in which they tore down the Renounced Ones and drove them into exile once more. Never again would they pay heed to spirits, or revere any gods. “We slew our gods,” they would say, “and we will slay yours, if they come within reach of our blades.”

As with many myths, that one was not entirely accurate. Twenty years after the Battle of Karatahlma, the last of the Renounced Ones fled into exile, carrying what power they had left back into the southern lands where they had first arisen. There, at the ancient ritual site of Tar-Kuran, they tried once more to depose their fellow gods and reign supreme. The Elder Folk and their allies were ready, and in a great battle – fought on the spiritual as much as on the physical plane – the Renounced Ones were destroyed at last. Afterward, Tar-Kuran was deliberately buried deep and its location expunged from every record, so that no one would ever find it again.

While these events took place, the more mundane history of the Great Lands also continued.

Most of the Dahari city-states were conquered by an expansionist empire, centered on the city of Shuppar. A few, along the coast of the Sailor’s Sea, maintained a league of independent cities with the support of the Elder Folk. The Empire of Shuppar was aggressive and militant, but it maintained its alliance with the Elder Folk and took part in the final battle at Tar-Karun.

The Kavrian Matriarchy reached its greatest territorial extent under its Sixth Dynasty, consolidating almost all the islands of the eastern Sailor’s Sea.

In the east, the Mereti Kingdom expanded as far as the eastern ocean, under its own (very long-lived and stable) Sixth Dynasty. The Mereti created vast tombs for their god-kings in this era, creating a monument that would last for thousands of years. Unfortunately, the expense bled the kingdom dry, and the last few kings of the Sixth Dynasty saw their realm slide into anarchy and chaos.

The Tamiri city-states of the east continued to grow, and a related Nandu Kingdom arose further east along the coastline. Relatively untouched by the wars against the Renounced Ones, the Tamir-Nandu peoples continued to develop a peaceful and highly sophisticated culture.

With the Renounced Gods defeated, many believed the world would enter a Golden Age of peace and prosperity. Unfortunately – as the Elder Folk had always known – such hopes were in vain . . .

Here’s a link to the DeviantArt page for this map.