For centuries before the war, Aeraesar was known as a land of light and beauty. Their people were a strong and righteous caste - formidable in most respects, and benevolent. Located in the eastern regions of Falwood, the nation was home to several great cities as well as a marvelous port on the eastern coast.

The time before the war is regarded, now, as the end of the Sharyrdian Order's golden age. It was in these times when the Swords of the Order were most numerous throughout Arethil, taking part in the world's affairs in whatever benevolent way they could. It was also in these times when the Aerai as a people saw the most growth they had experienced in an age. In the decades leading up to the war's beginning, Aeraesar was by far the most beautiful it had ever been. Their cities had expanded and grown to reach the sky, their forests were alight with colour and magic, and their people knew comforts and joys that many only ever dreamed of.

The onset of the war is something that to this day is shrouded in mystery. It is far from clear where the creature known as Arkhivom came from, but it is without doubt this entity's arrival that marked the beginning. It is not known how, but the creature was able to enter into Sharyrdaes' great temple undetected. There, he successfully slew many of the Sharyrdian Order's ruling conclave, and subsequently attempted to corrupt the collective telepathy of the Aerai people.

The deaths of the Conclave and his attack on the collective proved only partially successful, but it was still enough for him to acquire a number of servants to his will, and throw the Aerai into disarray. This confusion allowed Arkhivom the opportunity to escape the capital after causing great damage to it.

In the months following this, having managed to amass a sizeable force of unspeakably horrible monsters, Arkhivom carried out a sinister campaign of destruction.

In those days, Aeraesar was still a land of light and beauty, and life was abundant in their forests and through their meadows. Through an as of yet not understood means, wherever Arkhivom managed to stake his claim he also cursed the land with a dreadful plague. It rendered the soil as if it were dead, and caused a terrible mist to rise into the sky and blot out the sun, moon, and stars behind rolling black clouds.

In the first six months of the conflict, nearly a quarter of Aeraesar was taken by this dreadful dark...

Throughout the first two years of the war, the Sharyrdian Order experienced one crushing defeat after another. By the third year, over half of Aeraesar had been conquered and cursed by Arkhivom and his dark monsters. It was in this time and for many months following that the Aerai managed to fortify their positions well enough for prolonged conflicts where they fought over small patches of territory for what seemed, to those present, like an eternity,

With lines having been well established for those many, long months, those who survived and were there in those days still speak of their time in that divided place. They speak of an ominous dark cloud that hung low in the sky just across from them in the distance; turning, roiling and terrible, yet stationary. It waited over the lines of their enemies, as though barred by some unseen force from casting over them. Meanwhile over them, the sun and moon still rose and fell as it always had.

But they also speak of a time when this changed, and as they fought in desperation the cloud rolled overhead...

The fall of Nórë Sérë, Aeraesar's most defensible city aside from Sharyrdaes, marked the beginning of the war's end. This allowed Arkhivom's dark host to claim the northwestern pass and the fortress Qárele. With the mountain range to the north and east of them which Sharyrdaes was nestled against, the Aerai were essentially trapped in their own land, and all around them the dark shadow grew.

They fought valiantly against the tide, but as time went on it seemed more and more inevitable as to what their fate was to be. In desperation, all who survived of their Order retreated behind the great walls of Sharyrdaes, and there they held.

And held.

Until finally, like the sounds of the first birdsong after a long and terrible storm, there came silence. Arkhivoms hordes were exhausted, and what remained of his dark minions scattered throughout their cursed land. And though they had outlasted, and survived this great calamity, it was far from a victory.

They had been utterly defeated.

Though the war had seemingly ended and Arkhivom's armies no longer moved against their final bastion, the darkness around them remained. The land withered and died, and the rolling black clouds spanned perpetually overhead, casting all of Aeraesar in shadow.

In the years following the war, the Order found itself in a situation it had never before faced. Their ruling council had nearly all perished in the war, and numbers untold of their kind had fallen. Many of their greatest champions and most powerful sorcerers had died valiantly in battle, and many of their most innocent had been slain so horribly and terribly unjustly. Those who remained were now battle hardened, and wizened, and clung deeply to their faith in the gods and their people.

Though, despite their collective telepathy, they could not truly fathom the extent of their loss. As they were all joined in thought and emotion, they were all joined in their loss. Great deals of wisdom and knowledge that had not yet been fully imparted into the Shoraes were now lost, and the influence of those great ones now gone. With these oldest and most experienced of their kind now largely departed save for a few, the Order faces a great deal more uncertainty than ever before.

Though the war had seemingly ended, such was never truly considered to be the case. No closure ever came about. No foe was vanquished, or conquered. No treaties or agreements were made. For over a century the quiet Eventide has persisted, until now.

With the re-emergence of an assembled host set against them, the Aerai once again find themselves in the midst of a terrible conflict.