Freedom. Hope. Road.
Life is joy.
Death is nuisance.
Happiness is freedom.
The League is a stronghold.
The Empire is a misunderstanding.
The Astral is the Road.
How and why the Cataclysm happened – the Ghibberlings never truly knew. They had no Great Mages of their own, and contact with the civilized world was minimal. “The sky cracked, the world split, the Ísúlfur devoured the sun. The great JOKK had come.” That’s how they saw it – and for them, it was true. The Cataclysm doomed the Ghibberling race to extinction. The advancing Astral slowly but surely devoured Ýsa – their homeland. There was nowhere to flee – ships couldn’t yet sail through the Astral. Even the few scattered colonies of Ghibberlings were doomed to become victims of a world driven mad, teetering on the brink of destruction.
Only one colony survived…
A colony on the northern coast of Júl, founded several hundred years prior. Geographically, it was isolated from Kanian lands, separated by a high mountain range from the fertile plains. After the Cataclysm, a massive chunk of this mountain ridge broke off from the mainland and began a slow drift through the Astral.
Why the Astral didn’t consume this island – the Ghibberlings didn’t know. They barely understood the reasons behind the Cataclysm or the new rules of existence. They had no idea that, elsewhere, Great Mages were feverishly seeking ways to keep lands from being consumed by the Astral. The Gibberling island wasn’t consumed – and to its inhabitants, that seemed perfectly normal. In fact, they believed the entire world had perished, and that they alone remained, adrift on a massive stone ship sailing through a strange, deadly, shimmering sea.
For many years, the Ghibberlings were deprived of the one thing they craved above all: the call to adventure. There was nothing left to explore but the mountains. The loss of Ýsa and their Great Tree weighed heavily – new generations were born with no chance to stand the Winter Watch and become adults. Only their native optimism and lighthearted spirit kept the Ghibberlings from becoming sullen, broken savages crushed by life.