Ghrea was once known as Maleri, which was the homeland of the atia. In the ancient past, at the end of the first Era of Tyania, the atia meddled in dark magics that brought demons to the world. This led to a cataclysmic battle which caused The Sundering.
As a result of The Sundering, the lands of Maleri were corrupted and blackened, and those that dwelt there were similarly affected. The atia of Maleri were transformed into the ghreal, and their homeland became Ghrea.
Author's Note
While the information on this page is largely correct, it needs bringing up to date on the newest canon of Iiosia. This is mostly concerned about the background to the country's formation, and several of the locations within it.
Ghrea is inhabited by the ghreal, a war-like, skeletal race devolved from the atia. Amongst their cities, they keep many thousands of slaves which are predominantly humans from Oun, but there are also atia, dwarf, and ferians amongst them.
The wilderness outside the cities is bleak and desolate, holding little life of note. In the forests, ormadons are hunted for sport as well as capture for use as mounts. Maloundai, griffins, harpies, and ogres can be found towards the mountains, where even the ghreal tend to give a wide berth to.
Ghrea is a low-lying country made of up hundreds of islands, most of which are uninhabited. It is upon the largest island that the majority of the ghreal settlements have been constructed, and where the majority of the ghreal live.
It is a good thing that the ghreal require little in the way of nourishment, as most of their homeland is barren, dusty planes where only dry, poisonous shrubs can grow. In other areas, vile forests can sprout from the blackened soil.
The forests are a twisted mass of deformed branches, and within their depths wild horrors lurk. Ormadons are as much a threat to the ghreal as they are an asset, and lumbering maloundai settle in the mountains that dot the otherwise barren landscape.
The ghreal are a terrible people. twisted and wicked. Their culture, society, and architecture match their nature by being much of the same. They have several large cities on the coasts of their homeland.
The greatest of these is Sarikious (Sar-eek-ee-us), the ghreal capital. It sits upon a plateau which gives it extensive views of the surrounding, desolate wastes. It is a great, towering city, full of suffering and cruelty. It is dominated by the Rafus Dominum – the mighty tower of The Emperor/Empress. It is also the main hub of Ghrea's military strength. Sarikious boasts the largest unnatural harbour upon Iiosia, as well as some of the most extensive sea defences. It is from here that Ghrea sends out its raiding ships to harass the shores of other countries, and to intercept trading ships
Arlik (Arr-lick) Known as the Tomb-city, Arlik is made up of several large and imposing structures which house the tombs of the ghreal's most honoured dead. These include warriors fallen in battle, great mages, and other notable individuals. It is said that, in the ghreal's hour of greatest need, the Goddess of Death, Fext, will cause the dead within the tombs to rise up and defeat the ghreal's enemies.
Deavloch (Di-av-lok) This place is also known as The Wailing City. It sits at the seaward edge of The Howling – a vast tear in the land through which the wind rushes and makes eerie sounds as it blows through the rocks. This is only half the reason that it is named so, for it is also a great mining city, and the mines are manned not by the ghreal, but by slaves captured from other shores. It is said that, even from a distance, one can hear the cries of the slaves above the howls of the canyon.
Drumacus (Drum-a-kus) The spiritual centre of ghreal society where the temples have been built to their gods and where their greatest warriors are buried in their tombs. Every ghreal warrior must make three pilgrimages to the temple of Fext, Goddess of Death and the Afterlife, in their lifetime. Because of this, Drumacus is always a busy city, despite the fact that of all the cities of the ghreal, Drumacus is the most sparsely populated and remote.
Ichithies (Itch-lith-ees) Situated on a large island south of the main landmass of ghreal, Ishlthies is a centre of study for sorceries and magic. The smallest of all of ghreal's major settlements, only the magically inclined come to dwell here. Ichithies has very few permanent inhabitants as those who come here come to either teach or be taught the nefarious Black arcs of magic.
The Wound, and surrounding Desolation, is the site where The Sundering took place. Once upon a time, the magical city of Ci’Til’Re’A stood here. It was home to the tar’chii of old – not the corrupt and hateful dangers that lurk in the caves and caverns of Iiosia. The tar’tchii were hated by the demons that corrupted the atia, and so they led a mighty assault on the city, which ended in an earth-shattering explosion of magic. Since that time, the place has been known simple as The Wound. Any who venture there are quickly driven off by the sheer power of magic that resonates there; any but the hardiest of minds would be driven mad by the pressures invoked by them. As such, whatever treasures and secrets the ruins of Ci’Til’Re’A hold are still lying undiscovered.
Runic Year -300 to 0: The Evolution of the Ghreal
After the Sundering, Black magic seeped into the land – into the very soil – and corrupted it and everything which grew upon it. It did not take long for changes to begin to occur, warping the plant and animal life and causing weird and bizarre mutations to occur. The atia that chose to remain in their homeland swiftlybegan to alter, generation by generation.
They farmed tainted and dead lands with corrupted plants and animals, and as generations passed changes among those people began to take hold. They changed from the curious, frail atia into a more aggressive, war like race. Altering their nature and their physiology, becoming gaunt and skeletal, but still possessing great strength within their thin limbs. Males became much stronger and more physically powerful; mighty warriors who were more than a match for most other races. For females, the changes became quite different, and they became more attuned to the magics surrounding them and began to become better able to form them into spells and sorceries.
Their hair grew long and straight and was white or black. Their sunken eyes deadly red. Their skin cracked and grey. They became as much of a race of demons as those that spawn in Khralos
The ghreal race rapidly expanded across their desolate land, building cities and creating a network of roads with which to connect them. They generally stayed along the costs, fearing to go inland to the terrible woods and even worse things they found inhabiting them.
Their architecture and technologies were vastly in advance in comparison to the humans of the time. By the Runic year 0, the ghreal had developed a great empire on the shores of their land.
Year -3 to 0: The Invasion of Rune
(A more detailed summary of these events can be found on the Histories of Rune).
It did not take long for the ghreal to seek to expand their empire, and they first eyed the budding realms of men which lay to the north east of their borders, over the Jagged Teeth mountains. Having just repelled an invasion from the curious race of the gilth, the ghreal felt that the aftermath of this was the perfect time to stike.
Initially, all went well, and their armies sent the scattered humans scuttling northwards. Great swathes of land were taken, and thousands of slaves were taken back to Ghrea or put to work in the newly constructed settlement of Ghorn.
The army set about besieging the strongest bastion of petty human resistance, the settlement of Núin (later named Braithor), and inexorably wore down their resolve. Even when a secondary force of humans attacked the ghreal army in the flank, it looked like victory would be assured.
Yet disaster struck, when the settlement of Ghorn was attacked and destroyed by a vicious winged beast. Ghorn was intrinsic to the supply chain to the army, and with it supplies to the ghreal forces dwindled and, with that, so too did their chance of victory.
The ghreal forces were forced to make a fighting retreat across the lands back to their homeland.
Runic Year 225 to 227: The Destruction of The Islands
In the Runish year of 225, the ghreal empror, Jyaxyl the Conqueror, sent a huge army across the Lost Ocean Its mission was quite simply the complete annihilation of the people that lived on the shores of the islands there, and the extermination and slavery of its population.
The Islands (a name used for them since no other can be remembered), were a fragmented colony of small fishing towns, and were in no condition to fight of a determined ghreal invasion. Nevertheless, they proved to be a more determined foe than Rheyf had expected, and it took the invasion several weeks to sack the largest settlement there and load whatever population hadn’t been killed onto slave ships back to Ghrea.
After this, it was not long before the others fell to the might of the ghreal military, and all but a scattered few hamlets were taken back to Ghrea.
Runic Year 635 to 640: The Victory Over Oun
After centuries of skirmishes and small battles with the northern realm of Oun had dragged on with little sign of a victory, the emperor of the Ghrea felt that a new tactic was needed.
Just months after her coronation, Lythia the Cunning set in motion a plot against Oun that would finally break the stalemate of the conflict.
Martial prowess was not the only tool in the ghrea’s arsenal; so to was their cunning, and their potent abilities with the dark arcs of magic. Lythia begrudgingly acknowledged that Oun was a match for them militarily, so guile and subterfuge was their other tool to break the deadlock.
Lythia ordered the greatest of ghreal’s mages to conjure a mighty, yet subtle, spell, that seeped into the mind of the leader of Oun’s forces. At that time, Oun was led by a man named Tasius Vehal. Tasius had been Weaponsmaster of Oun for almost three decades, and while his abilities at combat and leadership were second-to-none, his advancing years were beginning to show.
The invocation that the gheal mages, chanting in their dozens, brought about whispered elements of doubt into Tasius’ mind. Where before he knew where to re-deploy troops, which advisor to listen to, and which course of action to take, he suddenly became indecisive. Too late was the garrison of the outlying fort reenforced before it was overrun. Too few were the scouts sent to an area, and failed to see the encroaching raiding party.
This was a slow process, and took many months. During that time, the ghrea mages chanted and many paid the price for the exertions the spell took. Yet it was worth it, for on the battlefield the Ounish forces were tactically outmanoeuvred, and time and time again victories were won against forces that had held against them for years prior.
Too slow did the leutentants of Oun take action. Too slow did they see the change in their commander, and even later did they remove Tasius from his duties, locking him in a tower within their mountain fortress Pinnacle, raving as a mad man as the forces of Ghrea advanced.
Pinnacle fell weeks later. It was a mighty prize for the ghreal, who slaughtered all within, Tasius among them, and raised it from the mountain top. From there, they destroyed the city of Melas Lonoth and fortress of Harrow Gate. They would have advanced further, if not for events within Ghrea which forced them to retreat back home.
Nevertheless, the schemes of Lythia the Cunning left Oun a shattered shell of its former glory.
Runic Year 640 to 648: Ba'thory’s Plot, and the Ghreal Civil War
Lythia, the ghreal emperess, had not been born an only child. She had a twin sister, Ba'thory, who had been born seconds after she had. Since it had been Lythia who was the eldest, it was she who had to rule ghreal as empress.
Ba’thory had always been jealous of her sister’s dominance as she had been robbed of the throne by a few mere moments.
She saw the distraction of the war with Oun the perfect diversion to do away with her sister and instil herself upon the throne of Ghrea.
Her diabolical plan was to kill her sister, and then fake her own death, using her sister’s body as though it was hers. Thus, she could then take on the guise of her sister, forsaking her own name and becoming Lythia, ruler of ghreal.
Ba'thory successfully lured Lythia into her private chambers on some false guise. Unsuspecting of Ba'thory's deceitful intentions, she enabled herself to be drugged via a drink her sister offered her.
Once she had fallen unconscious, Ba'thory swiftly changed clothes with her sister. She then wrapped a noose around Lythia's neck and threw her body out of the window where her neck snapped, killing her.
Adopting Lythia's name, Ba'thory wailed from the window in false grief of her dead, suicidal sister. The guards suspected nothing, thinking Ba'thory had actually killed herself.
Ba'thory ruled Ghrea under the guise of Lythia for only half a day.
She had underestimated her sister, however, and hours after Lythia had been cut down and whilst her body lay in the morgue, awaiting burial, she arose.
The ghreal had access to some of the finest Dark Arc mages upon the whole of Iiosia. Lythia had ordered them, in secret, to cast a spell upon her which would let her cheat death and arise if she was ever slain.
This was the beginning of the civil war of the ghreal. When two Lythias appeared and both claimed to be empress, divisions were split between the ghreal as to which was real and which was actually Ba'thory.
With no way to provide real proof, the land degenerated into civil war over which of the twins was the real empress.
The ghreal civil war lasted for almost a decade, and it did more damage to the empire than any other war could have done. The invasion of Oun ended, with the ghrea pulled back to fight with, or against, their brothers and sisters. Blood ran in the streets of the cities as the ghreal battled each other, each fighting for which sister they, their family, or their commanding officer felt was the true empress.
The two twins were forced into a confrontation eight years later, when both realised that the war was becoming too costly for the ghreal to the point where it may never recover if it were to continue. The ghreal had almost made themselves extinct.
The two met atop the Rafus Dominum and duelled for the right to rule Ghrea unopposed. The duel was as mighty a fight as any that has ever been seen, and lasted for almost a day as foul magics flew across the top of the tower as the two fought one another.
When all fell silent, one of the sisters descended the tower and was announced empress. She claimed that she was Lythia, but there is still doubt as who which sister it actually was which triumphed. Ultimately, it mattered not, as the ghreal had an empress and the civil war had ended.
Lythia took a husband soon after, and bore child swiftly. It was a good thing, since she died just years after the end of the war. She, like the ghreal themselves, was irreparably damaged by its events.
Since then, the ghreal began to slowly rebuild their empire. Many cities were left abandoned after the civil war since they simply did not have enough people alive within them to keep them going. Over the next few decades, the ghreal focused on reclaiming their homeland from the ravages they themselves had inflicted.
Year 688: Present Day
Having all but wiped themselves out, the ghreal have been slowly repopulating and strengthening their empire. Though their former strength is lost and the ghreal still no longer have forces capable of invading and destroying whole countries in just a few years, the ghreal are still a potent and dangerous threat.
The ghreal themselves are widely feared throughout the other lands of Iiosia, and are thought of as devils and demons, with the very mention of their name sending shudders down many a man's spine.
The ghreal continue to harass Oun and Rune; their strong naval presence and often disrupting shipping within The Whitewater Sea and Lost ocean. It is believed to have a large naval base hidden along the northern fringes of Reekwind Swamp, in Oun, though nothing has been found. Yet.
