What the two brothers saw was a lifetime of events about a man named Maximus Ignarl. He lived in Rome in the year 212. He was a 35-year-old war general with the gift of 'Fissure,' every swing of his great axe split the earth and leveled armies. However, he would be betrayed by his very own son who sought to steal his glory in war. As he was ambushed, fighting for his life, the ensuing battle left him at death's door at the bottom of a ravine. Trying to survive, he crawled his way to a strange pond in middle a large opening within a cavern he used to hide.
A tree was in the middle of the pond and as he drank its waters, it glowed brightly and literally pulled him in. What he saw when next he opened his eyes, as grasslands as far as the eyes can see, in an unknown land. Collapsing from fatigue, he would then be saved by a local farmer and brought to their village. At first, he wasn’t able to understand the language, nor was he adept at a receiving the farmer’s grace, for all he knew was war and betrayal.
However, as time passed and his relationship with the village people grew, tragedy struck as they were attacked by bandits. Maximus who was working the field heard something he wished that he would never hear again, the cries of agony and desperation as the villagers were slaughtered and routed. Enraged, he rushed to the people’s aid, annihilating the majority forces of the bandits including their leader, forcing the rest to escape. However, the damage was done. Fields were left in ruined, many dead and many more injured. Maximus cursed his powerlessness, he cursed his weakness, and most of all, he cursed the fact that the kind and gentle villagers had to be exposed to the horrors of war. How foolish he was that he believed his bliss could be granted so freely. He then made a decision that would set his course in life, he rallied the remaining population, training their men in the arts of war using the spoils left behind by the attackers.
To secure a path of survival through the winter with all their crops destroyed, he led them to a neighboring village and told them of the horrors the bandits had committed. He negotiated the merger between the two peoples in order to strengthen them as a whole to repel any future attacks. Maximus’s suspicions were right, a year later the bandits would come again, with more forces seeking revenge for their previous losses. But this time, he was ready. Leading the men and woman of the village, they destroyed the bandits’ forces once and for all. Losses were many but alas, they were victorious.
From there, hearing of Maximus’s exploits from wandering traders and the like, many people began to migrate to his village seeking protection and safe haven. The village population grew exponentially within months and within the next five years when he was 42 years old, his territory had grown to that of a large city with a population of 10,000. He became aware that this was not his world when scholars started to make residence in his domain. He learned of a world scarred by monsters and demons blessed with the power of mana, born able to use them as tools to hunt humans. Where they are located, far West on the vast continent known as Yggdrasil, home to the Tree of Life. The northern peak of the continent contained a divide to a different continent. Niflheim, the land of demons.
Maximus learned that once in the past the two continents were connected, however as the demon’s lust for the consumption of mana grew, they invaded southward towards the Tree of Life, wishing to claim its blessed grounds for themselves. The gods could not allow their massacre and disregard for life continue, so they pushed them back and split the lands apart. However, the human population who had been living in peace until that point became devastated. The tainted mana left behind by the demons killed thousands and infected animals, turning them into monsters. They gathered in big forests whose roots were said to be connected to the Tree, thus filling the land with rich mana. Growing in population and equipped the natural born instincts to use mana as their weapons, they pushed humans to the brink of destruction, forcing them to live in desolate planes where the lands are not blessed by the richness of the Tree of Life’s mana. So continued for hundreds and hundreds of years until now.
Maximus was shocked to learn of this tale. However, he would soon discover something that would spread hope to the entire human species. Curious as to the effects of mana are and to examine the threats of monsters, he led an advance force towards one of the great forests on the continent, Wayland Woods. As he made his way through the forest, slaying goblins, ogres, and greater dire wolves with his gift, he found a small village in the forest. They were filled with people of the race known as elves.
Maximus found that they spoke the same language as humans and after trading and befriending them, he learned of their origins as passed down by word of mouth for generations. The originators of the elves were actually human. After living in harmony with the mana-rich forest for thousands of years, their bodies slowly became changed by the power of the mana. One person, in particular, was blessed with huge life force and was said to have lived for hundreds of years before receiving a blessing from the Tree of Life, and ascending to godhood, the Elven god Corellon Larethian. Though whether this is true remains is actually unknown, many believe it to be fact and live their lives holding onto that faith. Normal elves only live slightly longer lives than humans, about 1.5x as much.
The most important fact to Maximus was the fact that humans can also absorb and use mana. From what he understood about human history, people have always been powerless prey to the monsters and demons that commanded mana as their weapons. However, if what the elves say is true, humans also should be able to use mana as well, Maximus thought. Along with this he also had another realization, that he was living proof of this. He could feel his power grow as he slew monsters and lived on the mana-rich lands. He concluded that his gifts as the people from Earth called them are actually made possible due to mana, that Earth had its own Tree of Life that had affected certain people, bestowing them with these “gifts.”
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Maximus would spend the next ten years studying mana and establishing a trade route between his city and the village of the elves. The elves could command mana to affect their surroundings, creating fire, wind, moving earth and water, he named this phenomenon “Magic.” Empowered with human capital and farming technology, the elves grew in population and territory. Copulation between elves and humans curiously resulted in either just normal elves rather or ordinary humans than a mixed race. Conception rate between elves was low but humans were fertile which solved their problem. Maximus himself took a female elven warrior as his partner in life. Maximus also found that like the elves, he began to age slower as he lived off the bountiful land and researched magic and mana, rather than aging he felt as if he was getting younger as the years grew.
By the time Maximus was 55 years old he held the appearance of when was 35, the same as when he first arrived in this world. However, no matter how much he tried, he could not learn to use the magic of the elves, to this he was deeply disheartened. But his work was enjoyed by his people, as more and more humans became able to use magic. A few were born able to wield special abilities like Maximus, the children with “gifts.” He finally dawned on the truth, he was able to figure out the secrets of his own body through the birth of these children, who he called a “Child of the Tree.”
These special children, himself included, were born with something he called a magic core. Normal people do not have such a thing but through consuming mana filled produce, living off the land, they would developed something Maximus called the “Mana Vein.” People who develop the mana vein could learn to use magic and command mana. The reason Maximus himself could not use magic, or rather, the magic of the elves that is, is because all of the mana he absorbs are taken into his magic core, so he could not develop a mana vein. In return, his own fissure ability grew and his body is strengthened as he absorbed mana.
At this point, Maximus’s domain grown into a large kingdom with a population of a million. He spread his influence far and wide and invited all the join him, promising safe haven and a good life. Maximus made due on those promises, along with his trusted comrades that he made throughout the years, they built the largest kingdom humans had ever seen until this point. As Maximus was an accomplished magical scholar and known for his prolific spreading of magical know-how, the country was named the Magnus Kingdom. Glory and power were given based on meritorious service to the kingdom and its people, which held order and gave rise to powerful and righteous leaders. Policies were put in place to prevent monopoly of power and people, power was passed down to family members, however, if they do not prove themselves to be righteous and conduct meritorious services like their predecessors, their power could be stripped and given to someone the king designates as deserving.
This peace, however, would not last forever.
The Second Great War. The first great war was the invasion of the demons tens of millennia ago. The demons found a way to make their way to Yggdrasil from Niflheim, the method unknown but they sent an army of one hundred thousand to assault the continent. At this point, Maximus discovered a shocking fact. Demons had a similar body structure to humans, although their skin was hardened and purple, with distinct features such as horns and wings, they looked human. A hard fought war ensued for many years, casualties in the hundreds of thousands until the demons retreated. Maximus never did get a chance to communicate with any member of the demons, as they spoke an unknown language, was hyper-aggressive, and uncompromising. Maximus despaired the horrors of war however he knew it was necessary to secure the future of humans and elves.
For the rest of his life, Maximus worked towards rebuilding the land, reclaiming territory from monsters and developing the races. More settlements of elves were found in the four other great forests and Maximus himself served as an ambassador of peace. One settlement of elves, in particular, residing in the Gwydyr Forest to the south introduced him to a new race of people, the Dwarves. Their history wasn’t as conclusive as of the elves but Maximus theorized that their evolutionary base was also from humans, living in the mountain caves, absorbing mana from the ore that existed there adapted their bodies to be strong, although stout.
The story continues uneventfully for decades as Maximus spent most of his time after his travels in bureaucracy and peacebuilding policies. He would father seven kids, three of which were born as elves from his Queen Celestel, and the other four, humans. His oldest human son grew to be a kind and strong leader, he was a child of the tree wielding the magic ability of sound, specifically, he could immensely increase the sound of his voice, a powerful ability for a general.
He retired as the king when he was a century old, handing it over to his oldest human son who was at the tender age of 28. He spent the remaining decades of his life studying magic, specifically the magic that brought him to this world. He developed a ritual using a branch of the Tree of Life to summon people from Earth to this land he named Runegard. However, he could not figure out how to return. Because of the powerful mana in the land of Runegard due to its vibrant and large Tree of Life, it had the power to affect other worlds, but the Tree of Life on earth was comparatively small and weak. It would be impossible to open a way back, the ritual proved so. It involves opening a hole in the fabric between spaces using the power of the branch, which begins a power struggle between the two connected Tree of Life. The large force would start siphoning out mana which is how someone from Earth can be brought to Runegard, they become ensnared in the pulling force and appear on the other side. For the weak Tree on Earth, it could never pull someone back.
In his final moments, he created an adamantite orb and started recording specific memories for his successors and for anyone else that would be in his situation, "a gift from a man born on Earth who wandered onto an amazing world."
***
Back in the real world, the two brothers held their head in pain as they finished viewing the memories of the first king of Magnus. Shocked by the sudden revelations, they stood silently until one of the brothers started to speak.