Iregaul
Iregaul is the only city in all of the MARCH OF ZEITZ. High walls with towers interspersed along its whole length make the city look the part of an impregnable fortress. Its history, well known to the locals in legend and song, only adds to the mystique, but the truth is different. The walls are old and cracked in many places. The once impenetrable gates are gone as are many of the towers. Though the cobbles remain, many of the streets have been torn up. Stone buildings great and small lay in ruin, though some still sport shingled roofs. The city is a wrecked ruin, a shadow of its former self. Though, as many have recently learned, it is not uninhabitable.
Many strange creatures call Iergaul home. Even as HAVEN serves the pilgrims of ORE-TSAR so does Iergaul serve those who pay homage to the Horned God (Unklar. Wizard and Priests of the Paths of Umbra live in the long halls where they plot to bring their long banished master back to the world.
For a time, Iregaul lorded over the region. Internecine war consumed the towns and settlements of the surrounding March making it a chaotic place, dangerous to all as men and ungern battled for survival.
The greatest of these battles took place in the early years following the banishment of Unklar. In the latter part of 1129 the lords of Iergaul, seeking to enjoin themselves to the victories of the KING OF PUNJ sent great waves of orc and ungern south and west into Eisenheim. There, they overwhelmed the Northmen settlers, driving all before them into Aachen and the Detmold. All of this brought the Val Tulmiph DALADON to the northern wastes. He brought with him a
host of rangers mounted on griffins and WOOD ELVES from the ELDWOOD.
Together they joined Queen Ephremere of Kingdom of Aachen in a campaign against the orcs of Iergaul. For almost the whole year of 1131 Daladon remained in the north. He fought two great battles against the orcs, one at the ROT-TOR RIVER and the other at the fortress of UTUAL. Daladon was hard pressed to keep the forces of the queen together. But he met the warrior cleric FJORGYN, the Vin-Gotha sister of King THEODOHAD from the KINGDOM OF EISENHEIM, who joined his armies with a host of fresh warriors. With these to strengthen him, Daladon and Ephremere were able to push the orcs back and by the spring of 1132, they lay siege to Utual again. But they could not break its walls and after many months of futile combat they quit the field. Utual survived the siege.
Early the following year the orcs again raided into the south, reaching Aachen where they burned farmsteads and small villages. Daladon rejoined Ephremere in a campaign to destroy them. They fought a series of battles that mimicked the previous years. They fought the bloody SECOND BATTLE OF THE ROT-TOR RIVER, where the dead piled so thick, that they clogged the river. The SECOND SEIGE OF UTUAL came soon thereafter as Daladon was full of the wrath of his people. At this second battle the fortress was overwhelmed and its garrison put to death. The ruins of Utual remains a wrecked ruin, haunted by the ghosts of the dead.
Ephremere’s forces came at last to Iergaul and lay siege to it. The siege lasted many months and the ranger-god and his Watchers fell upon the orcs time and again, but they could not break the walls.,The orcs taunted them so that Daladon became mad with a lust to destroy the city and all who dwelt therein.
To this end he attacked Iergaul time and again. Thrice more he brought armies to the north, battering its walls. In 1140 King Theodahad of Eisenheim stormed the gates of the great fortress, but made it no further, and died there a hero’s death. It would not yield, for that mighty place bore great magic, and the ice of the Winter Dark lay in its very stones. At last in 1143, Daladon rousted out the long disbanded COUNCIL OF LIGHT. ST. LUTHER called a crusade against Iergaul and many knights and adventurers came to the far north to lay waste to the March and break Iergaul at last. With the armies came Queen Fjörgyn and troops of Eisenheim and Augsberg. Dwarves also came, and they brought diverse instruments of war with them. Many elves of FONTENOUQ joined the siege, girded in strange armaments. The great host gathered upon the green hills before Iergaul and called for those lords to step down and quit that place.
The orc warlord USTUF stood forth, laughing and taunting the knights and gods before him. “Do not think you are greater than you are. Curs you are, one and all. By trickery you slew our dread Lord Unklar while he slept in his great halls, but we do not sleep! We are vigilant and have no have fear of the likes of you. For 20 years you have battered at these walls, to no avail. For 20 years we have carted off your people to our slave pits without fear of you. So get you from this place; return to your chattel houses in the south and await us like good slaves. We are your dread foe!”
Daladon returned, “Ustuf! Beware, for I have brought a new battering ram.” Then the wizard and archmagi ARISTOBULUS came forth. Clouded in cloaks, he was steeped in eldritch sorcery. He rode a gold-hued charger and from its back called down the powers that only he and NULAK could command. A great howling wind thundered from the skies, battering the gates, even as Aristobulus hurled waves of fire and acid into the cacophony of magic. The doors, rent from their moorings, flew back, crushing many an orc, and the walls cracked, great pieces of them falling away. Daladon led the army forward then, filling the breech with iron and steel, blood, bone, and flesh. He slew Ustuf upon the walls and many more besides. All day and night the battle raged until at last the town lay in ruin, a burning wreck of what it once had been. The southern lords left it thus, after slaying all its inhabitants.
In 1142 an ungern lord, MITHRICK, arrived in the city. With him came several hundred of his own folk. He claimed to rule the whole city, styling himself “Lord Under Unklar,” but he no more rules the whole place than does the Horned God himself. He did however, rebuild those sections of the city he controlled.
Mithruck and his successors have continued to improve the old hold and grow in size and power. They have not ventured into war since there return. They have frequently participated in the activities of others as mercenaries or freelance looters. They often join in with adventures of the other scattered bands of Unklar's adherents.
Many adventurers are lured to the city, for within its halls are reputed to be many lost treasure troves, hidden away in secret where the crusaders of years past could not find them. Too, there is glory to be had, for slaying the folk of Unklar is always a credit to one’s name. And it is a place to hide.
Still the old city is firmly in the hands of foul creatures and under their current leader Bazur they are starting to again take a place in the path of Zeitz.
Demographics
The population of Iregaul is predominantly Ungern, but does have some Orcs and Humans in residence.
Government
Military Autocracy
Founding Date
173
Type
Military, Base
Location under
Owner/Ruler
Ruling/Owning Rank
Owning Organization
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