This is the story of the now abandoned Iron wastelands, and how they got that way.
Iron, hard and strong and the foundation for all things created on many worlds. Here on Rhydin in the far western reaches of the world lay a vast and awesome kingdom of pure steel. It is a jagged place, a desert of Iron. No man living knows where it came from or how it came to be this way, but all agree it is a death land for any and all who come here. It was not always this way though.
The Iron lands were a place known for its vast wealth, and advanced technology. The Ironmancers were unbeatable here, but their laws against others controlling the magic forces were strict. Anybody caught using magic of any kind was sentenced to death almost immediately. The place, besides their strict rules was one of peace, until that one black day when they came.
Something happened, and strange beings began to appear in the iron lands, mystical creatures that seemed to be seriously out of place. The local people who had seen them, did not know what to think of these strange beings. Time passed and the rumors grew, they even gained a name. They were called elementals, beings of pure magic.
The Ironmancers decided to investigate the rumors and sent fifteen of their members out into the area where they have been reported. Three days went by and none of them were ever seen again. Fear took hold of the people, and the Ironmancers declared martial law. There was one Iron mancer, however, a powerful one that insisted that there was no other choice but to destroy the elementals, to go to war. His name was Hui. He was very powerful and nobody knew where he came from either, nobody asked.
Hui got his way. The Ironmancers prepared to destroy the so called elementals, their very existence was forbidden to their rules and their powers challenged their own. The people were afraid of foreign powers and fully supported the battle to come. War was looming in the future.
Four days later the Ironmancers marched into the Iron plains searching for the the elementals, eventually they found them, and they found them completely off guard. The strange creatures seemed to be scared as the swarm of attackers came from nowhere, but the elementals were far too powerful and easily defeated the attackers and sent them packing, bloody and beaten, they never stood a chance.
Hui expected this defeat. Secretly he wanted the power for himself, but he had created a weapon, a horrible weapon just for himself to make him the savior. The Iron Tentacle was forged out of the land itself, and infused with some mysterious energy that was said to come from some hellish place. When the elementals had enough, they attacked the city where the people lived, they came and even though the powers they had were great, Hui's weapon murdered them one by one, each time an elemental died their essence displaced the balance of the land. The Iron Tentacle was a whip unlike any other and proved to be very effective weapon.
It became the symbol of power for the Iron lands and the mancers of the land decided to make Hui their leader and gave to him the mandate of the spirit, declaring him the leader. Hui then revealed his true identity. He was not even from the Iron lands but a dark and unholy place called Destron. Hui, with his ultimate weapon was not unstoppable. His true arrogance came when he declared himself to be the one who summoned the elementals to the land, it was he who was controlling them with his will alone.
The Iron lands became a hellish place as forges for weapons sprang up all across the land. Hui was planning an invasion of the entire planet with his infinite resource of metal and power, but there was one thing the black wizard had not counted on.
In his hasty gathering of power, the dark one never figured that the land itself would rebel against him. The Iron lands came to life and from spires of metal came the golems of infinite strength, natural defenders of the land, not the people. The bloodshed was horrible and the stains of the people can still be seen today if you can venture that far into the wastelands. Hui was destroyed with his own weapon, torn to pieces with the weapon he created with his dark magic.
Nobody knows when people lived in the Iron wastelands, and the existence of the land Destron seems to have been lost to history, as this is the only legend that even mentions it. It is true that Golems of Iron wander around the Wastelands endlessly and kill any and all intruders they find, it is also true no elementals travel to this place for any reason, but asking an elemental a question about it's history is like pulling teeth so the reason can only be guessed for now. It is estimated that this legend took place in the fifth age of Rhydin.
No traces of the Iron Civilization has ever been found, or actually even looked for. The wasteland is a horrible place now and almost nobody comes back from it alive. They say a giant robot marches through the land and late at night strange metallic sounds can be heard coming from deep in the wastelands.
I hope you found this legend educational and learned something from it. Details are sketchy at best, but this is all that is known about the mysterious Iron people of the past.
Until Next Time.
Theron.
The Green Wanderer.
