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that the Peace of UL should abide forever, but it was not so, for lo,
the younger Gods quarreled over a stone that one had made, and in
their quarrel was the earth broken asunder and the seas did come in.
And the earth was maddened by reason of her wounding. And
behold, the creatures which had dwelt in peace with the people of
UL-GO were maddened also by the wounding of the earth, and rose
they up against the fellowship of UL and cast down their cities and
slew the people, and few only escaped.
And these were the years of the troubling. The creatures which
had been the friends of the people of UL-GO hunted them and slew
them, and the people fled even unto Prolgu, the holy place, there
they durst not come for fear of the wrath of UL. And loud were the
cries and the lamentations of the people unto UL. And the Spirit of
UL was troubled by reason of their sufferings, and behold, he
revealed unto them the caves that lay under Prolgu, the holy place,
and went the people then into the sacred caves of UL and dwelt
there.
And the people of the other Gods came because their lands had
THE HOLY BOOKS
been broken by the war of the Gods, and they took lands and called
them by strange names. But held the people of UL to the caverns and
galleries beneath the holy place at Prolgu and had no dealings with
them. And UL protected his people and hid them from the strangers,
and the strangers knew not that the people were there.
And behold, the unseemly creatures which had broken the peace of
UL by reason of their maddening fed upon the flesh of the strangers,
and the strangers feared the mountains of UL and shunned them.
But the people of UL abode and were safe.
- The manuscript breaks off here.
NOTE-Excerpted from A History of the Twelve Kingdoms of the West
Being an account of their past their development, their geography,
their principal commerce and the character of their people. Compiled by
the Imperial Historical Society at the command of his Imperial Majesty,
Ran Borune >0<III.
-X NOTE ON DATING: By general consensus of the Council of
Tol Vordue, the eight kingdoms agreed to make the Alorn
mode of dating the standard for trade, commerce, diplomacy and all
other dealings among themselves. It was generally agreed that this
mode provided a more coherent and continuous numbering system
than the Tolnedran mode which numbers the years of a Tolnedran
Dynasty or the Arendish mode which starts over again with each
new king (a system made trebly confusing by the fact that there
have, on occasion, been as many as three self-proclaimed Kings of
Arendia), or the Mode of the Ulgos who do not number years at all
but name them.
Thus the Tolnedran year 347 was the Arendish year 5 (or 9, or 3)
and was in turn the Ulgo year Marag. The Alorn year 3480 was more
to the liking of merchants and traders, since it was a more stable
form.
The reckoning of Alorn years dates back to some mythic event in
the Alorn past - apparently some catastrophe which they