The Founding

The most widely accepted tale of the world’s origins is the myth of the Founding. This is the interpretation held and embraced within most of Wildemount, as well as the vast lands of Exandria as a whole.

Long ago, this world was one of tumultuous and chaotic forces, naught but unbridled fires and churning, jagged rock. Through the ashen skies of Creation Primordial, the gods came from beyond the ether, new and formless. Looking on this roiling realm, they saw potential for great beauty, great strength, and the chance to learn their own place in creation.
Thus, divine hands birthed the First Children, the elves, who embodied beauty and grace, to walk the verdant Green and know the music of the Blue. A second creation was wrought: the dwarves, a hearty people intent on taming the land, filled with the craft and invention of the divinity beyond the ashen void. A third people were given life: the humans, endowed with hearts of passion that burned as brightly as their spans of life were short, and infused with the need to celebrate and laugh.
Other creations followed as the many races of Exandria were given form from the boundless inspiration the of the protean gods. These Children of Creation walked the land and, as their knowledge grew, attempted to build on it. But the land was fierce and treacherous, and the children were dashed on the rocks and consumed by the elements. Sorrow filled the hearts of the gods as these first races struggled against a land that did not want them, and the children looked to their creators for guidance and protection. Thus, the gods gave to them gifts, lending their own power to their children to create and shape the world around them; these were the first divine magics.
With these magics, the various peoples learned to bend the angry earth to their will: to temper the flames that burst through the ground, to tame the floods that threatened their abundance, and to turn seedling into fruit and beast into meal. Language became commonplace, culture was born, and governance replaced anarchy. The protean creators, the divinity beyond the ashen skies, saw progress and saw that it was good, yet fragile and in need of guardians.
Thus were born the First Protectors: the Dragons Metallic of Exandria, who safeguarded the gentler races. The realm grew quieter, the people multiplied, and new beings were given form and life. As culture grew, and the people further understood the world around them, they also looked up to their creators and gave them worship, gave them form, gave them title and purpose.
But this realm did not wish to be tamed. Quaking cliffs roared in defiance. Seas swelled and swallowed. Flames erupted from the land. Beneath the elements, unknown to the Creators beyond the ashen skies, lived ancient beings who had already claimed this world as their home: the Primordials. These great elemental titans that once dwelt deep within the world now rose from their unseen domain to sunder the land once more. The gods watched as their children, their joy, were flung against the broken rocks or fed to formless terrors unleashed by the destruction. Demonic entities spilled from the umbra of the Abyss to feast on the carnage, called forth by the violence and released to pick the carrion clean.
Some gods were so full of grief and anger that they wished to leave this world behind and start anew. They tried to convince their divine kindred to join with the Primordials, allowing chaos to reclaim the realm. Other gods wished to remain and subdue the Primordials, to tame the land for the sake of their creations. Thus was created a divide among the gods. Celestial sentinels once dedicated to battling the chaotic forces of the Abyss now fell to hate and tyranny, forging new hells under a fallen angel now claiming lordship over all the realms of sulfur and brimstone.
The Creators that remained, wishing to salvage their home, their creations, and their realized selves, were forced to take up arms and learn to protect that which they valued most. They organized their followers and taught them how to draw from the powers of creation on their own: to build, to change, and to destroy, all without the aid of divine power. Mortals learned to defend themselves through practices such as alchemy or by bending the very fabrics of existence, though on a smaller scale than that of their creators.
This gift was the knowledge of arcane magic, which the good children used to drive away their traitorous kin, banish the turned Creators to their own prison-like planes, and ultimately destroy the Primordials, scattering the chaotic elements to their own planes of existence. The world was at peace for the first time since its creation, and the first real civilization took root and grew into a grand city called Vasselheim. The Cradle of Creation. The Dawn City.
Culture developed anew, the races ventured forth to discover and explore their own lands, and great music filled the air to give a name to this world once and for all: Exandria.