Contraterrene Petrichor

The planes of existence are thought to be stagnant throughout history. Each home to a subset of children of the gods that learned how to exist in similar space and yet not equal space. However, each of these planes were only discovered and not created by these powerful children of the gods. Even the gods worshipped throughout the planes know little of how each one came to be. Maybe it had to do with the ley lines full of magical flowing energy in veins across all these planes of existence like rivers, connecting one to another in an intricate pattern. Connected as they may be with these common ley lines, each has existed separately for as long as the gods of times past have existed.     Mages in multiple planes began to experiment with the arcane, and different magicks were discovered, one spell proving that these planes were interconnected and moved throughout existence simply called Plane Shift by the arcanist, where with an object tuned to a different plane the casting arcanist could allow a small group of people to travel between the different places in existence. This encouraged the gaining of knowledge and led to spying on other peoples throughout existence. Many arcanists who worked in the shadows discovered in this period of spying that the planes were more fluid than initially thought and could easily have infections of arcane and technologies from others, ultimately impacting those on each plane’s way of life.     A skilled arcanist, one who took time to learn from the other magic users in different planes—even though it was from afar—managed to bring some of the other magicks back with them when they returned to their home, and used this knowledge to rise above the others, becoming a leader in the study of arcane knowledge, directing the flow of research from the shadows. This master puppeted those helping research how to get more of these strange powers, to draw them into this one plane. Ultimately, the goal was to siphon all the innate magical power into their plane for them to use. The master’s name has since been lost to time, the title of God-Pharoah replacing what it once was.     A series of devices were constructed to attempt this feat, and one daring group of individuals, who worked directly under this master were successful in siphoning natural magic from these ley lines. However, as it is with nature magic and those who protect the sanctity of nature magic, many people were sent to destroy this machine. There was only one successful group, but the lasting effect of this siphoning will be seen for ages to come. In the act of siphoning the magic, the planes were effectively being merged into one, the boundary between them growing thin in places, allowing for things not always desirable to slip into other realms. This also caused the boundary between all the betrayer gods and prime dieties to thin in places that could be discovered, allowing for the gods to find their way back into the plane with their creations. Some time has passed since the initial defeat and discovery of some of these thin curtains, but maybe only the gods know what will become of the planes of existence because of this as the worlds continue to progress.                 For more information about the other material planes of existence used here, refer to the documentation on the Magic the Gathering Plane Shift lore.   For more information about Exandria and the world of Critical Role, visit ; read The Explorer's Guide to Wildemount and Call of the Netherdeep ; and check out the official Tal'Dorei campaign setting, including the Reborn edition. Neither the DM nor the party claim any rights to Exandria or her lore; indeed, we are grateful to the cast of Critical Role for being so generous with the world they have created. We greatly enjoy playing in it and look forward to whatever shenanigans come next. *Much of the content here comes from EGW, Critical Role: Tal'Dorei Campaign Setting Reborn, and Critical Role: Call of the Netherdeep, so if anything presents a copyright issue please let us know and we will take down or re-word any articles that cause a problem.