An Introduction to the Shattered World
(Loosely based on the book, "The Shattered World" (C) 1984 by Michael Reaves, published by Pocket Books)
The legend states that two millennium ago the world was shattered by the last of the great Necromancers. Necromancy, a now out-lawed art, used the strength and power of the dead to cast spells. The Last Necromancer, whose real name has been lost, cast a spell that would have allowed him to harness the power of all the dead that ever existed. His goal was to become a god. The resulting surge of pure power caused the greatest explosion ever known, shattering the world.
The mages and clerics of old received a warning from the gods of the world's upcoming destruction. Through a combined effort they created the Earthstones; a means of providing gravity for what was left of the world. The Earthstones were created just before the shattering and were scattered about the lands in an effort to save them.
The world now exists as fragments, floating in an abyss of air. The Earthstones cause them to orbit in a semi-regular pattern around and through the abyss. Some fragments are quite small, only a few miles across. A small few are large continents, bearing several kingdoms and countries.
What was left of the world's population survived on these fragments and have developed new cultures and civilizations. Some kingdoms reformed. Others fell into discord. Travel between the fragments is accomplished with dragon ships. The ships are manufactured from the bones and skin of dragons. Each ship is equipped with a Dragonstone. The Dragonstone is similar to an Earthstone in function, but no where near as powerful.
Because dragons are rare, dragons ships are even more so. Travel and trade between fragments is rare and expensive. Communications is infrequent. Some fragments have even totally lost touch with other beings. The denizens there believe themselves to be the only survivors of the shattering.
Magical teleportation between fragments is nearly impossible. In this world teleporting from one moving object to another requires precise calculations. The orbit of the fragments is irregular and cannot be calculated closer than 500 miles. But, since the fragments float in an abyss of air, missing the target is not fatal. In some cases one can "hop" closer and closer to the target, providing you can see it while floating in the abyss.
A specialized form of teleportation is rumored to have been created by a few select mages. Supposedly it is possible to teleport from one moving fragment to another by creating a magical pattern or "anchor" at the location to focus on. This, of course, requires knowledge of the pattern. If this is true, then travel between fragments will become easier. But it will require a mage to travel there first by conventional means to create the anchor.
For over 2000 years the fragments had maintained their orbits without any collisions or even near misses. Now that has changed. In the last 100 years three smaller fragments have left their orbits, their Earthstones apparently exhausted and powerless, to collide with a larger fragment. The population of the smaller fragments all died, whereas the larger fragments, depending on their size, either suffered little damage or none at all.
In the last 100 years there have been 14 near misses, usually in smaller fragments. The orbits have been becoming slightly more random, indicating that the Earthstones are losing power.
The councils of mages of the seven major fragments have begun looking into all the old records to discover anything about how the Earthstones were created. Very few records exist from the old times. The mages and clerics were far too busy in their spell casting to keep detailed records. The knowledge of creating or even recharging the Earthstones is apparently lost. Unless the knowledge is found it will only be a matter of time before the destruction began by the Necromancer 2,000 years ago is finally complete.
There are over 500 known fragments which make up the Shattered World. The seven largest fragments seem to make up the largest part of the civilization. They float near each other ("near" meaning within a few ten thousand miles of each other) and the majority of all trade exists between them and a few smaller fragments.
The seven major fragments are: Rhynne, Salakh, Calamchor, Toul, Twilan, Kulareem, Pandor.
Rhynne is the largest. It has the last ocean, Ythan, and 20 empires. It is the home of the three Holy Nations, Uland, Althizar and Quy. The nation of Galic, also known as the dread lands, is in constant battle with the Holy Nations.
One important fragment to note is Xoth. Xoth is the fragment of Fiends. The cosmic balance was upset when the gods of good took such an active role in helping save the world at the time of the Shattering. To bring things back into balance the gods of evil were allowed to gate in about 500 fiends and place them on Xoth. These Fiends are part of the prime material plane, and therefore cannot be dispelled, except back to Xoth. Killing one also only sends it back to Xoth, where it must remain a year before it may be summoned again.
Summoning one is quite easy in the Shattered World. So easy, in fact, that a mere pesant could do it if he had the proper instructions. No magic is required. It is for that reason that demonology and related lore is very restricted by the mage guilds.