The Legend of Gaia
Thousand Kingdoms
For many thousands of years Humankind and the Ancients lived in peace, seperated on opposite sides of the great world of Gaia. The humans thrived and prospered in the lush and fertile land of the Thousand Kingdoms to the east, and the Ancients kept their sacred ways and mystic arts strong on the Sacred Isle to the west. Monster attacks were infrequent. It was a golden era.
As the human civilisation grew, so too did their mastery of the mind as their spirits evolved. These humans developed the ability to shape relaities around them through mastery of their mind. They called this gift "psionics". However, not all humans were born with the blessings of psionics and those that had no special gifts instead advanced the causes of technological evolution; becoming scientists, engineers, and eventually augmenting their own bodies with machine parts in order to compete with the powers of the Gifted.
The Great War
The Gifted, believing that those humans that enhanced themselves with cybernetics were abominations, declared that all machines were to be destroyed to protect the purity of the human mind. So began the Great War of the Thousand Kindgoms. The War raged on for many years, and destroyed much of the once proud cradle of human civilisation. Though the powers of the Gifted were great, the Cyborgs were clever and invented many ways to defend themselves as well as strike back with deadly weapons of mass destruction.
As human civilisation weakened, old alliances split into many factions. Civil wars soon followed. Monsters returned once again and roamed the lands of Gaia. It was no longer safe to venture far from cities and towns. The golden era was over.
Because they were so evenly matched both the Cyborgs and the Gifted appealed to the Ancients for aid in their battles. The Ancients, having seen the rise and fall of many human cultures over the centuries, knew that becoming involved in the wars of beings so short-lived would result only in the destruction and war coming to their Sacred Isle, and so they denied aid to either side. This was possibly their greatest folly, and a mistake they would later regret.
Birth of Maael
After two decades of bloodshed and war, the tides of battle finally shifted in favor of the Cyborgs, and so the Gifted hatched a desperate plan to save themselves. Gathering in the heart of the Thousand Kingdoms the great Psi Masters began a ritual to fuse their minds and powers into one great entity capable of purging the land of all enemies of the Gifted. This entity would become the strongest god that Gaia had ever known. Learning of what the Gifted were planning, the Cyborgs launched a desperate attack against the Psi Masters. Though they fought against the Gifted valiantly the Cyborgs were anable to stop the Fusing, and as the life was drained from the great Psi Masters the entity Maael was born into the world. Maael was a being of pure energy, and since It was born during times of suffering and strife, those dark emotions were all It knew. Maael did indeed begin purging the land of its enemies, however, Maael saw all life as its enemy and thus It laid waste to all around It. Realizing that they had made a great mistake and fearing for their lives, the remaining Gifted fled to the continent that seperated the lands of Humankind from the Ancient's Sacred Isle. Having no defenses against the great and terrible powers of Maael, the Cyborgs fled to the icy north and founded the land of Mecha. This lead to an useasy ceasefire and an end to the Great War.
Though Maael's powers were great and horrible, It soon learned that It could not venture outside of the lands from which It was spawned, for without the twisted energies of a land scarred by war and hatred It's powers quickly drained away. So Maael summoned forth the many twsited souls that had died and suffered during the Great War. It gave them bodies of dead flesh and commanded them to spread their darkness across the land. Thus opening the way for Maael to manifest itself further and further across the face of Gaia. And so the Undead race was born.
Future of Gaia
Although the Great War has ended, the human and cyborg factions still fight amongst themselves for control of Gaia. There is no longer a central government. The Cyborg factions are isolated in the north. Undead and monster attacks are becoming more frequent and the cradle of a once mighty civlisation is all but lost. Many are beginning to wonder what the future of Gaia will become.