| In ancient times when the nearby mountain was home to a tribe of dwarves this city was home to a kingdom of men who traded throughout the region and had vast farmlands and pastures for their horses and herds. The great swamp was much smaller then and there were few barrows. As they grew powerful they built ever more complex structures and great works to show their power and glory. At the height of their power their wizards and wise men discovered a way to turn flesh to stone and stone to flesh and also bind wandering spirits and the essenses of creatures into stoney flesh bodies. Using ingredients such as dragon blood and medusa venom, they created the gargoyle race and made them subservient. They made them guards and sentries because they could need no food and can sit for endless periods. This proved to be their undoing and resulted in the war of the gargoyles and the uprising of the lizard men. A group of their best wizards became corrupted, some say by dark forces and evil spirits they lost control of, some say it was just corruption by lust for power. In either case a great struggle for control arose and at it's height vast elemental forces were unleashed. The earth was even split wide open to great depths to cover the city in lava in one attack, yet the remaining wizards loyal to the kingdom were able to use great spells of their own and covered the city in a dome of force that kept most of the city intact as the lava covered the dome. Trapped within this dome of solid rock the citizens knew they were doomed for the most part. Fighting the gargoyles in the city and the lizard men outside the city, their armies and most of their wizards could do little to help. Eventually the battle turned in their favor and the corrupted wizards were defeated, but the city that was the center of their kingdom and power had already been lost. To save themselves in the only way they had available to them, many of those still in the city, faced with no air, water and food, chose to become living statues themselves. Little remains of this once great and growing civilization but sad memories and occasional artifacts. The gargoyles posess this city under a dome of rock now. Sketches and other detail will be added as the design of the facility advances. |
