Xryrava, the lost continent

[Greggar]

*Under construction, I'll update it each time I can*
Well as some of you may know or not know..I'm working on a story i've been fantasising about for more than 4 years. As it's not even near being finished. I do have some stuff I'm almost certain about.
It's not in dialogue or anything but just enough to see what it is about.
So let me start with a timeline based part of it.

*What's new?*
- part 5 added
- part 6 added

*What I could use some help with*
-Worldmap
-Culture of races
-Describtions appearance/personality of characters.
-Sentance correction and improving.
-War/battle tactics and defence systems.
-And more

*related art*
- Thunderkeep wall: http://zyter.deviantart.com/art/Thunderkeep-Wall-76722321
-Wallpaper something..
http://zyter.deviantart.com/art/Unfinished-The-legend-awakes-79547764
- Orc capital
http://zyter.deviantart.com/art/Orc-Capital-84615396
-Therren
http://zyter.deviantart.com/art/Therren-84713957

Do not hesitate to suggest stuff or ask things.

Here is the first part.
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Xryrava is a continent stuck in the eye of a dangerous and destructive storm that does not move but keep still on it's place.
For now, the storm was there as long people can remember. According to books,inscribtions and legends.

Xryrava itself is a strong massive continent which contains an ancient race, the Djinnorium.
These creatures were worshipping dragons that also lived on the continent.
From dragons they learned that the four elements: earth,fire,water and air. Are very important to keep in balance, as the worlds supports on them. And they build huge temples for either dragons and for each type of element.

The leader of the dragons they worship is called Drenazarq, a dragon which controls both light as dark magic, also known as The dragon of balance.
for many centuries, peace was between the inhabitans of Xryrava, untill for a mysterious reason the storm they were stuck in, became restless and started consuming the continent in it's power.
In order to protect the ancient land and it's inhabitans, Drenazarq was casting a ward of light and darkness combined. Light in the left claw and darkness in it's right. Only the strongest creatures are able to do this. But before the spell was complete, the dragon got struck by a massive lightning right in it's heart, killing the dragon instantly by splitting it in two.
But the dragon did not die. Instead two other dragons were formed, a dragon of light, Drenerak. And a dragon of darkness, Azarax.

With their leader split in two, the djinnorium did not know who to follow, and as the dragon they got split in two parts.
The two parts could not live with eachother and war raged between them for centuries. Over time..The ones following Azarax were mutating into half dragon like creatures called the Zyraw. The ones following Drenerak received great wisdom and became the Djinraw.

At a certain moment, both races were desperate to get ridd of the other and even infilitrated the temples of the four elements. Abusing the four artifacts with contains the wonders of it's element, or the deadly and crushing powers it possesses.
Before they even realised, the continent was already out of balance, using the four elements to fight eachother will only end into chaos,destruction and seperation.
Pieces of earth started to crumble and break as earthquakes roared the land and floating masses of earth infiltrated the skies. Lava pouring from the core of the planet, Forests and plains under flame and even meteors trying to break the sky and ground. The sea trying to consume the land by raising it's level..Using tidal waves and blizzards to secure it's control on the continent. But also the air was furious, Hurricanes even flattening the sharpest peeks, Tornados capturing flames,earth and water and lightning strikes even faster than the eye can catch.

In only less than a day the continent suffered from great damage. And even how hard the two races hated eachother, they could not risk their own death and the ones of their dragons. So they sealed away the artifacts to calm the Elemental Storm and put a curse on the place where the elements were used against eachother. 'May a curse lift on this ground, whenever the blood of a dragon is spilled..That justice will devour the soul of the Punished one.'

For Centuries the two races were silent and unseen. Djinraw hiding on their sun shaped island and Zyraw keeping hold of their lizard like shaped island.
This peace remained untill youngher races which of humans,elves,dwarves,trolls,orcs and even Truhan were pulled into the storm, forcing them to live on the ancient continent.
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Part two:

With the youngher races seperated from their homelands, they were ill prepared for the dangers of this continent so they had no choice to seek new allies.
First the Djinraw and Zyraw were not fond of these new races and saw them as a threat to their culture and sanctuaries.
When the djinraw marched out to vanguish the intruders, they held their attack when they heared about their situation.
But the Zyraw only saw this for another reason to drink blood and went out on warfare. The first race they encountered were the orcs, and would be slain in no time. But the Zyraw saw the fierce lust for battle the orcs had. And suggested a duel between their leaders. It was a long and bloody fight, but the leader of the orcs won by throwing the Zyraw commander in the sharp peaks of the arena. From this moment the zyraw stopped their warfare and greeted their new allies.
But not long after, the orcish leader died from flesh wounds and blood loss from the Zyraw commander's claws and teeth. So the leadership was passed to his son, Urk'vhar.

The relations between the races went quite well. humans, elves, dwarves and even the djinraw could quite get along with eachother.
The same was with the Orcs,Trolls,Truhan and Zyraw.

With the two groups as one whole. The Djinraw and Zyraw saw this as a second chance to get ridd of the other. The other youngh races did not see the use of why fighting the others just because of some old hatred between two ancient races.
The Djinraw changed their mind and agreed on this. And so the 7 races, apart from the Zyraw, United under one banner and built a Stronghold called Thunderkeep on mount Thunder. Their goal is to survive on this continent and keep peace between the races as they try to find a way out to their homelands.

Years passed and some were uncomfortable with the races united under one banner, living in one stronghold. So some started their own villages and outposts across Xryrava and ultimately their own Capitals.

The Zyraw did not like this at all and went to seek out the Orcish leader again. Luckely for them, himself wasn't comfortable with it as well and rather saw the humans slain under his axes. This was the perfect chance for the Zyraw and told the orcish leader about the old dragon Drenazarq and the legend about his soul, still wandering the continent.
The legend speaks of the mighty dragon's soul in need of a perfect avatar in order to restore balance.
Azarax and it's council already found out the avatar would be a human. Urk'vhar still did not see what use it had for him and so the Zyraw told him about an ancient blade, The dragon slayer's blade. A blade that could absorb the soul of a dragon and the power it posses so it could be used by the wielder. A perfect chance to whipe out the humans and their allies, and to escape from this continent.

Urk'vhar was convinced and started gathering other orcs and others willing to whipe out the other races. This campaign of most of the orcs will be the start of many consequences and events that will change fate of Xryrava and it's inhabitans forever.
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Part 3:

A year went by and Urk'vhar already conquered the southern part of Xryrava and even smaller parts of the northern half.(Where the humans,dwarves and elves were settled.)
Not far from the coast in the vally of Greenvale, there was a human village called Gryphondale. There lived a youngh lad called Therren Gryphondale with the age of 18 and son of the founders of this village.
Therren was out in the woods, containing loafs and oaks, gathering herbs for his mother Eyana, a priestess of Thunderkeep. When Therren returned home he saw that the village was abondened. He ran home and found a letter telling that soldiers of Thunderkeep evacuated the village as Urk'vhar's army was heading towards Greenvale. The boy packed his stuff,grabbed the dragon amulet that was guarded by his family and left the house.When he came outside he heared drums.Wardrums..

He looked around and saw various smokes on the horizon of burning villages. Suddenly he heared an orc yelling: FIRE!!! and saw various Burning rocks flying towards the village. The boy tried to run outside the village but quickly hid behind a wall as he noticed an army of orcs was charging at the village. Therren started to panick and hid himself, watching the village burn and being raided. Therren shaked his head and sneaked his way out of the village. Relieved as he was he ran away, looking behind him and then suddenly hit something and fill on the ground. In front of him was standing an orc..But not just a normal orc..Before him was Urk'vhar. Urk'vhar started laughing evily,picked Therren up and thruw him against a statue in the middle of the village with full strenght, making him unconscious. Urk'vhar grabbed his axes,grinned and swinged them towards Therren. But right before they hit Therren, a big flash of black and white light filled the village and pushed Urk'vhar right against the wall of a building, making it collapse. Urk'vhar crawled out of the durt and commanded the others to shoot Therren down.
But every attack reflected near Therren with a flash of a light. Then suddenly Therren opened his eyes shining bright but dark at the same time, stood up slowly and with a big dragon like roar the entire area was covered in a dark but bright light after the sound of a lightning strike hitting the ground. Screams were heared and the burning sound of flames filled the area.
Urk'vhar looked around when the light faded and held his breath as the entire raiding party lies dead and burned on the ground.

He quickly took his axes and charged right at Therren. Therren pointed at Urk'vhar,said something in Dragontongue and before Urk'vhar knuw it he was blasted away with a force push and trapped in a field of dark and bright light, unable to move and only watch.
Then suddenly a shape became to appear around Therren, it was the spirit of Drenazarq surrounding Therren. Urk'vhar couldn't believe his eyes and saw the dragon making the final blow at him.

Soon, the rumble of thunder was heared miles away and the ground shaked. A blinding light filling Greenvale and then dissapeared. The dragon was gone and so was Therren.
The next morning Urk'vhar woke up mortally wound but alive. He took out a hilt of a blade where only the bottom of the blade was still on it. The blade was shining brightly as it consumed the energy of the attack. The dragonslayer's blade was now charged.
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Part 4:
In the meanwhile, Therren was found not far away from Greenvale by patrolling Thunderkeep Guards and took him to Thunderkeep with the other refugees.
There he found his family again and stayed in an inn. Later that night he had a vision about 4 titans taunting him, with the elemental artifacts behind each one of them. A ticking sound against the window woke him up. He looked outside and saw a dragon floating in front of the window. The dragon told Therren he meant no harm and needed to take him to the Dragon temple.

During the flight the dragon explained the vision and told Therren about the soul of Drenazarq resting in him. When they arrive at the Dragon temple, the spirit of Drenazarq appeared and told Therren his task to unite the two Dragons, Azarax and Drenerak again so he could balance the continent again.
But before he could do that he must understand the world and so master it's elements, Fire,earth,water and air. But as a human it's not possible to do that before knowing the arts of magic itself.

To help Therren with task, Drenazarq gave Therren a blade forged by dragons and ancient materials. It adapted to the wielder's strenght so it wasn't too heavy. But that wasn't all, the blade could also carry elemental magic. But in order to do that he needed to reinforce it with the materials in the Sacred temples of each element.
But before Therren was send back, Drenazarq told the dragon to stay with him and aid him with the task, the dragon nodded and dissapeared in Therren.

The next morning, Therren woke up back in his bed and had to join the Magister's school, where also his brother was, to learn the arts of Arcana(or Arcane). As it's the base of all magic.
Therren only stayed a year on the school with only the basics of Arcane arts, good enough to support other types of magic on it.

But before Therren left, a Djinraw approached him and said he knuw that Therren was Drenazarq's avatar and swore to help him.
During their journey, they met several new allies, having their own reasons to visit the temples. Before they reached the Village of Häven on the east coast of the northern part of Xryrava, they were already with 4. Therren as a Dragonknight, Djenzho a Djinraw Balance warrior, Ellianna as an elfen druid and Targak as a dwarven paladin.

With this group they took the boat to Water temple on an island near the Storm. There they fought hard to defeat the Water titan and it's terryfying use of water, making the chambers drown, Freeze everything and summoned dozens of water elementals.
The first artifact was retrieved and the blade was reinforced with it's energies.
But during their journey to the Earthern temple they did not knuw, Urk'vhar has gathered a group of elite fighters as well to take the artifacts and succesfully conquered the Fire artifact.
Urk'vhar as a blademaster. Zyter as an Zyraw drakefighter, Öhren as a Truhan shaman and Tulrak as a troll hunter.

After their second succes in the Earth and Air temples they had to cross to the other side of the continent for the other parts. but they did not knuw of eachother and surprisingly crossed eachother in some ruins of a Djinnorium city at Greatfall canyons. A green landscape having dozens of water falls and the ground split apart like a river through a landscape.

There they faced eachother with both two artifacts. In need for all of them. A battle, that one of them has to lose.
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Part 5

The fight ended after one hour. Both groups were exhausted, apart from Urk'vhar. Because he is a spirit warrior, his spirit and bodyis strong and barely gets tired. Therren knuw that if they would stay... They would lose. Even if they hadn't got the other artifacts, it's better to stay alive and come back than dying, Therren thought.

Taking a look around, Therren noticed the ruins further down along the river in the canyon. And decided to escape through there.
Then he quickly send out multiple boulders towards Urk'vhar and his group, send out a strong wind blow so the area was cloaked by a sandcloud so they could escape.

Because of the boulders, Urk'vhar had to dodge them first before he could chase them. And because of the sandcloud he didn't see where they ran to.

They escaped succesfully and retreated to Thunderkeep. There Therren found out that his blade was still missing the other two artifact's power to enforce it. So he had no choice but to contact Drenazarq at the Dragon temple and set off the next day.

In the meanwhile at the Grohnmor, the orc capital, Urk'vhar was planning an attack on Thunderkeep. Crazed orc! They yelled.. Untill Urk'vhar showed the two Elemental artifacts, the one of fire and air. Even though they were weakened of the massive Elemental Storm. It still contained destructive powers that could easely break through Thunderkeep's defences. And the fact that their army excisted of Orcs, Zyraw, Trolls and Truhan. But in order to attack Thunderkeep, they had to get ridd of one of Thunderkeep's bases in the western part of southern Xryrava.

The next week right before Urk'vhar would attack the base in the west, they received a message that the base in the west was fallen by a civil war under the leadership of someone called Vryan Gryphondale. Urk'vhar travelled there with a small army to see the human destroying his own base.

When they arrived there, Urk'vhar noticed that Vryan wasn't a human like any other..His skin was half burned on the left, the left hand in shape of a huge black claw. A black wizard. He was mad and wanted to see Thunderkeep fall as well. Vryan hadn't got much to offer but his demonic and dark magic, along with several minions he 'created' during the attack.

The Truhan did not like these new allies and didn't like the idea of attacking Thunderkeep in the first place. And they left the army.
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[Kozgugore]

Read it before already, but it still sounds pretty interesting. Sounds like you still have a lot of work to do though, so good luck on that. ;>

[Claws]

To many good writers here makes me look sick. 

Real good stuff Greg.

[Halnok]

Very nais story! As borat would've said it.

[Ugluhk]

ok, you wrote that you want some help, and you will get it! I will just gather enough willpower and time to read it all that means that I will have a look at it tommorow.

[Greggar]

Character history!

I'm gonna post some character history here

Scrying Urk’vhar’s life.

Urk’vhar Bloodrage, the son of Rhän Bloodrage wasn’t always the cruel and brute orc as many see him now. You may say that Xryrava cursed the bloodline with bloodlust and angre.

Before the orcs got struck in the storm, Urk’vhar was still a youngh whelp, living at Fanghill village in the orc lands of Ruth’han.
Urk’vhar looked up to his father as Rhän was a great warrior and even the leader of the Bloodfang clan. Youngh Urk’vhar trained alot and teached the ways of pain, enduring, honour and pride. His mother Fryha Ahran Wolffang was a shaman and teached Urk’vhar about balance of mind and body. Told him stories about warriors and shamanistic tales. Youngh Urk’vhar was fond of wolfs and respected boars as companions and food.

He didn’t mind others calling him a boar as for him, boar means you’re a strong creature rushing through it’s enemies. Also he saw boars as important creatures. Without them, many orcs wouldn’t live because there was no food.
So calling him a boar is only a compliment.

Because he liked boars didn’t mean he didn’t had wolf pups as friends. Instead of playing with other orc whelps he rather played and even brawled with the worgen pups.
Some even think he’s half worg.

One of the important memories of him are the times his parents teached him to smell and sniff around instead of hearing or looking. Oh how many times he walked around the village sniffing almost everything..Yes almost everything. And later at the evening walkign with bandages around as worgs and boars attacked him for sniffing at some unwanted places, as only trusted worgs can do that.

And don’t forget the training he had with his mother. Being blindfold and trust on your instincts and sense the danger.
As years were passing by, Urk’vhar already developed quite some skills with axes and blades. Being a warrior alone wasn’t enough for him..He wanted to be something..More..A bit like a boar..Something that can rush through almost any obstacle and endure even the most painfull attacks. A wild and free spirit, not obeying the enviroment’s obstacles.

Fryha smiled at him and told him that it isn’t as hard as he might thought it would be.
‘Focus on the enemy and only that..Let the spirit of the animal you choose guide your mind and body.’
With the help of shamanisme, Urk’vhar was the first Spiritwarrior ever. A warrior blessed with a mark of the animal and use it to defeat his enemies.

*more comming*

[Greggar]

The Story line part. Post 2
Seems I reached the maximum lenght of characters on my first post

Part 6: The Siege of Thunderkeep

In the meanwhile, Therren arrived at the Dragon Temple to ask Drenazarq what to do now he's missing two artifacts to reinforce his blade. There he had to face an army of elemental spawns of the type of element he needed to enforce his blade.

During the fight against the swarming elemental spawns, Urk'vhar had planned the attack on Thunderkeep all out. First they needed to cross the open field towards the outer wall with the Magi towers. Then through the thick and dangrous Thunder woods with traps and hidden outposts. After that up the mountain with the only passage the Great wall of Thunderkeep. But it won't end there, betrayers of Thunderkeep mentioned the bridge towards Thunderkeep is a defence mechanisme itself. The giant statues on the bridge will be revived and ordered to attack, while the towers and ranged attackers will launch all attacks on the bridge when you try to cross.

Urk'vhar planned to send a main force through the open field, and other groups will attack the outer wall on it's sides through the sea.
Special trained units and build catapults will intercept the magic bolts of the magi towers. Then Vryan and his minions will infiltrate the magi towers and exterminate the wizards in there.

The woods will be the first problem, as they will take alot of time to go through. So the plan will be the stand hold at the outer wall's bases and destroy the outposts in the woods. And even use the thick woods against reinforcements.

When that is accomplished the Great Wall and it's traps, towers and siege weapons remains. There is where we will use the Fire artifact.  To rain destruction and put the entire place on fire. Then there is the bridge...The trickiest part of all. A long and small bridge, surrounded by magical enchanted statues and surrounded by walls and guard towers. There we will use the Air artifact. The strong winds should disable all the projectiles and ranged attackers.

The plan is settled and the fall of Thunderkeep is planned. It's time to set off and claim the soul of Drenazarq to escape the continent and use it's powers for their own will.

Back on the Dragon Temple, Therren succeeded in defeating the elemental swarms and reinforced his blade with the 2 last elements.
It now contained the power of the four elements and even makes it possile to combine them all four in one superiour elemental attack.
If it wasn't of Zyraw and it's leader Azarax The Black Flame, once a part of Drenazarq, Drenazarq wouldn't have sensed the attack comming and so he warned Therren about it. He summoned his own Dragon companion and headed off to Thunderkeep.

The next day's evening. Therren was almost at Thunderkeep, and saw the smokes of fire and red colour in the dark clouds wandering above the capital. Urk'vhar's army already reached the bridge and the famous wall was torn apart and were about to cross the bridge.
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