The Midwinter Fulmination

Era beginning/end

For nearly a year after the Midwinter Fulmination, the skies themselves were ash and the ground was fire. It took but nine months for Emir to shine His light on the peoples again, but the constancy of their creations had little purchase. Their empires fell quickly, and civilizations evaporated soon afterwards. The survivors had to begin again from nothing.

Volcanoes erupted in a concert never recorded before or since. Cael was forever changed in a year of constant lava flows, but worse was the smoke, and ash, and... the cold darkness. Winter had become summer, and by summer it was winter again, the skies having no sun to grant warmth and light.

Few trustworthy written accounts remain from this time period, as it was a time of survival or death. Penning ink to paper did not fill empty stomachs.

Many claim that Emir Himself drew the fires out of Cael to punish those who had grown fat, cruel and stagnant with the fiery rage of the earth. Others say He ordered it done to reforge His mortal subjects, to scrape away the slag and to harden His true faithful with passion and might. A few souls even claim that the people did this to themselves, as if any mortal could dream to bend fire and earth to that degree.

Whatever the true source of the calamity, Emir has not abandoned the world for so long since. Perhaps the fires truly burned out. One should hope.