Gren... Do you hear my voice? I have watched you but briefly and yet already... I am impressed. You are diseased. Sick enough that most others would be dead or at least weakened. Yet you are not weakened and you are certainly not dead. To most your situation would appear a curse and yet you bear it like a gift. Your strength is profound but still... with my help you could be so much more.
Time passed strangely in the Father's Halls. Gren spent centuries there, the sands of his life stilled as he worked and lived among them, cut off from the world outside. It was thus only after many decades, when he emerged to take stock of the land, that he heard the call of the swarm - echoing strangely from the past. Knowing not precisely how to respond, he tried to pray to it as he had the gods in the past.
"I know not who or what you are, spirit, but it seems I have been sequestered from the world for generations. My - my affliction has been treated since you called upon me, contained by those whose grace accepted me among their kith. Though I am not truly cured, nor do I suspect I will ever truly be.
"Your offer shows a kindness and concern I will repay, spirit. My name is Gren Garnsson, of Spireright and the Halls. Pray tell me of yourself and we will parley."
Time passed strangely in the Father's Halls. Although he was aware that centuries had passed, Gren felt as if it had all been a single, long day. Time seemed only to pass properly during his forays back onto the surface of Despair, and the changes in the world cut him to the core.
Eversummer began to bloom again. Fish returned to the seas. The skies cleared and year by year the sands were held tight by grass and shrub and green returned to the Fifth Continent. It could only be the work of the divine, but who? The answer was simple.
Corvus. Of all the gods Gren had ever known, Corvus alone had spoken kindly and shown concern for all mortals. Udil's pride, Vanidia's wrath, Feros' callousness all set them apart. Gren had sworn a pact to the crow-god, to defeat the monstrosity that plagued the heavens and even now still whispered to him in his dreams. In return, Corvus had promised to heal the world, and healed indeed it was.
The knowledge that Gren had not yet held up his part of the bargain weighed heavily on the dwarf's soul, but he had little choice to view it as a long-term problem. He had not then possessed the strength to face the abomination, so he had made a pact with the Sons of Thaneos to find it. Just as his pact with Corvus, the pact with the giants bound and weighed upon Gren. He found himself obliged by honour and care to assist them in their fight. They had taken the designs he had produced for homunculi and through their power extended it ten thousand-fold.
It had taken untold years to perfect the first design, then to make the necessary trips to the surface to mine and process the materials. Decades had past before the Great Homunculus was ready, and a terrible and beautiful thing it was to behold. Drawing life from the souls of a thousand giant-spawn, the Homunculus had taken the form of the mythical beast Nelkathar, the dragon that had reigned in terror during the days of Gren's youth. Not three days after the Great Homunculus had been revealed in its splendour and glory had the Fire Wyrms been spotted approaching the ruins of Spireright, over which the Halls loomed in threat.
Some instinct powered Nelkathar's doppelganger as if it had been a dragon true-born. It took to the skies, greater by far than any of the wyrms, and supported by the dead men who guarded the Halls it laid waste in a war of extermination that took decades more of the strange non-time in the Halls. When at last the remaining crazed wyrms became impossible to find, the giants declared a victory and set to work building the second Great Homunculus. A dozen would be built in total, the limit of what the population of the life giant kin could sustain.
Not that lesser homunculi were ignored. Although not generally used in combat, they were employed as servants and assistants, especially in the creation of their great brethren. Gren had built three for himself, the limit of what his spirit could sustain without being noticeably drained. All three were fashioned of bronze and copper, their joints given freedom by gear and axle. The first took the form of a crow, out of honour to Gren's benefactor, and could fly far and speak the tongues of men. The second took the form of a monkey, with flexible joints and hands to do fine work. The third took the form of a tiny whipdragon, a meagre bodyguard and pet to watch Gren's back. Both second and third were mute, as most homunculi were.
It was in the second or third century that Gren returned to take stock of the crumbling city below. What could be saved from the Corvite temple had long been taken aboard the Halls; the rest of the city of Spireright grew verdant with weeds. None lived there now, save the occasional giant on shore leave. Even so, the city felt
real to Gren in a way that the Halls did not, perhaps because he felt as if he was part of the flow of the world there, not removed from it and Time alike. He and his homunculi cleared one of the few surviving houses in the city and he began to take an interest in the world again, sending Crow out into the world to report to him on how things had changed.
The fifth continent continued to regrow, dominated now by petty kingdoms of karas, but encircled on the shores by clans of the very shapeshifters that had laid waste to Spireright, though their madness seemed long cured. With an awkwardness Gren discovered that some of the diseases he had spread among the bull-folk were still endemic in places even now. His hands would burn with pain and shame at the costs he had levied upon their ancestors for their generosity. With Vanidia's action, no humans save her own diseased priestesses had survived the plagues he had spread on Eversummer, though doubtless a few of the mad women still stalked the land. Last of all, a race of giants had returned recently to Eversummer, akin to the Council of Three in power but possessed of the strength and uncontrollable nature of fire.
Beyond the shores, life seemed to regrow as expected. Gren could make little sense of Crow's reports from most of the other continents, save that one had suffered even greater destruction than the site of the divine battle that slew Thaneos had and still was burned and blackened even today - the homunculi had felt the connection to Gren begin to wither and fled immediately. Back on Desolate, the hill dwarves had developed a culture independent from that of Udilsbor. Strange half-men had risen from the seat o settle on their shores, and even now began to trade among the dwarven outposts.
Gren would sit upon the lone remaining tower shell in Spireright (the Halls had crushed most of the city and levelled the temple; a single spire of the many that had given the city's name survived) and look out upon the horizon, waiting for the news his Crow would bring. It was in such times of solitude, away from the forges and gardens of the Halls, that plans began to crystallise in Gren's head.
Gren needed the power of the Fortress and the Homunculi to reach and defeat the beast he had sworn to slay. He had sworn also to defend and assist the giants in their war with Vanidia, a war not yet over in their eyes or hers. He had a debt to repay and a need to honour the god whom he saw responsible for saving the world. He gathered his belongings, provisions and a handful of those willing to follow and set out across Eversummer. It was time to gather support.
Before Gren sets out from the Halls, he moves the remains of the Corvite library down to Spireright's ruins and entrusts them to a few loyal giants to care for in his absence and make available to those who come to research there. He finds what scrolls he can that deal with medical or surgical concerns and copies them afresh for his journey.
Gren sets out across Eversummer, treating with Shattered clans and Karas, urging them to come to the verdant lands near Spireright and settle there. To those who choose to follow, he has them work on rebuilding the city and restoring the temple of Corvus, preaching the Crow-God as being responsible for saving the world in exchange for Gren's pact of service. He teaches them what he can of how to build their own homunculi and tie them to their own life-force to act as builders and servants.
Gren seeks out the fire giants to treat with them also, offering them a place at Spireright and the Father's Halls. He tells them of the war of the Sons of Thaneos against Vanidia and their crusade to earn peace from the gods who have sworn to wipe them from the face of Despair. He tells them of the Great Homunculi and the protection they can offer as well as the need of the giants to safeguard the future of both their kinds.
Gren sends Crow to the hill dwarves of Desolate, preaching that the founder of their peoples has survived even these many centuries past. Those that build ships and come to the continent of Eversummer will find it restored and ready for inhabitation, should they wish to stand apart from Udil, and a place will be made for them at Spireright.
Throughout all this, Gren tries to heal the sick and save the wounded at every turn. Guided by the knowledge of the Corvite library and the extensive familiarity with sickness he has acquired from centuries of causing it, Gren begins systematically recording and documenting sickness and its cures. If he attracts any followers, he teaches them what he knows and tries to train them as healers-errant in their own right, spreading them as far as they will go to spread the word of a place for the despairing, for those seeking refuge from disaster and divinity, at Spireright.
When Gren returns at last to Spireright, hopefully some of his actions having borne fruit, he contacts the Council of Three with his plan - to make known to Vanidia and her minions of the strength they have gathered and diplomatically declare their independence from the gods, demanding she withdraw her vendetta against their kind and accept peace. Otherwise, a war of vengeance might stretch out for centuries to come.
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