Long before songs were set to parchment, before treaties were sealed in blood or starlight, the world existed as it was meant to be: vast, layered, and alive with secrets.
At its heart lies Eldarín, the elven realm—a land where golden forests breathe with ancient magic, rivers run silver under twin moons, and cities rise not from stone alone, but from living wood, moon-carved marble, and the quiet will of those who remember.
But Eldarín is not the whole world. Beyond its borders stretch lands both known and whispered of—some allied, some wild, and some so distant they exist only in cautionary tales.
🌆 The Five Great Cities
Five cities anchor elven civilization, each shaped by its land, its climate, and the soul of its people.
Lyothara, the capital, rests in the gentle heartlands where spring never truly fades. Here, beneath the boughs of the Great Tree—whose light pulses like a slow, golden heartbeat—the royal family rules, poets compose epics, and the High Council debates the fate of nations.
To the north, cradled in glaciers and wind-scoured peaks, stands Frosthaven. Its towers are carved into ice-caves that glitter with inner fire; its warriors train in silence, mastering frost-weaving and mountain stealth. Nothing grows here but resolve—and it grows deep.
In the south, Silvira blooms in emerald rainforests where vines hum with healing energy and flowers glow softly in the dark. The air is thick with mist and memory. Here, life is sacred, and death is sung—not mourned.
On the eastern edge, where the earth turns to dust and the wind cuts like glass, lies Orion's Gate. Built on high plateaus overlooking endless steppes, it is the kingdom's watchful eye—ever alert, ever shadowed. Few outsiders enter. None leave without being seen.
And in the west, perched on sea-cliffs wrapped in eternal fog, Elmara guards the past. Its libraries are hewn into living rock, its scholars fluent in tongues no living throat has spoken in centuries. To walk its halls is to walk through time itself.
🏜️ The Marabi Wastes – Land of the Free Cities
Far to the southeast, beyond the last elven outpost, the green fades into red.
The Marabi Wastes stretch endlessly—a desert of crimson sands, salt flats that crack like bone, and mountains split by ancient quakes. Rain falls once a decade. Water is worth more than gold. Trust, even less.
Here, no king reigns. Only Free Cities—fierce, proud, and fiercely independent.
Three dominate the wastes:
Marabia, the Golden City, built around a bottomless well said to tap the River of Roots. Its merchants trade in secrets, star-glass, and slaves of forgotten bloodlines.
The Black Angle, a fortress-oasis ruled by a council of retired assassins who turned blades into law. Justice here is swift, silent, and final.
The Silent Vale, a city buried beneath the dunes, accessible only to those who speak their true name at the gate. Liars are entombed alive in its walls.
These cities do not ally. They compete—for wells, for caravans, for relics buried beneath the sands. Yet they share one unbroken rule: No foreign crown may claim the Wastes. What is settled by steel in Marabi stays in Marabi.
❄️ The Farthest Ice – The Land Beyond Memory
Beyond Frosthaven, past the frozen lakes where even wolves fear to tread, lies the Farthest Ice.
This is not a land of war or trade. It is a place forgotten by time itself.
No wind blows here. No snow falls. Only an endless expanse of ivory-white ice that swallows sound, light, and thought. Travelers say that if you walk too long in its silence, you begin to hear voices from your childhood—then forget your own name—and then… simply vanish, as though you were never born.
No one lives there.
No one visits by choice.
And those who have tried to cross it?
They never return.
⚔️ The Fourteen Houses
Elven society is guided by the High Council of Fourteen: the Royal Seat, the Crown Prince, four Martial Houses, and eight Noble Houses of peace.
The Martial Houses are the kingdom's shield:
House Valtharis – Keepers of ancestral oaths, trainers of generals, bloodline tied to the oldest legends.
House Cyreth – Masters of frost and silence, guardians of the northern passes.
House Morindel – Healers who command root and vine, protectors of life in all its forms.
House Darkuan – Eyes in the shadows, watchers of borders, speakers of truths no one else dares voice.
The Noble Houses build the world in quieter ways: historians, merchants, judges, artisans, healers, diplomats, farmers, and singers—each shaping elven life through knowledge, craft, and care.
🌊 The Edge of All Maps: The Isle of No Return
And then… there is the place no map names.
Far beyond the Shattered Sea, where waves break on black reefs that shift with the tides, lies an island shrouded in storm and silence.
It has many names:
The elves call it Mor-Dûn—"The Land That Eats Names."
The dwarves name it Khaz-Gul—"The Maw Beneath the Waves."
Sailors simply cross it out and whisper prayers.
Its shores are black basalt. Its forests are petrified trees that weep shadow. Time stutters there. The sun does not rise—only a bruised twilight lingers, cold and watchful.
No ship that sails toward it returns.
No raven sent skyward comes back.
No foot that touches its soil has ever left.
Not with body.
Not with soul.
Not even with a name.
On every elven chart, at the very edge of the known world, a single line is inscribed:
"Here ends the world. Do not seek what sleeps."
This is the world as it stands—whole, complex, and breathing.
It is not perfect.
But it is home.
And every home, no matter how beautiful,
has corners untouched by light…
and doors no one dares to open.
This guide does not prophesy.
It remembers.
— From the Archives of Elmara