Introduction

Kélas is a separate continent located on a planet the size of our Earth with an as yet undetermined number of other continents. The planet has two natural satellites, the relatively small moons Kastorix and Aflorix, and orbits its Sun-sized star at roughly the same distance as Earth. The entire planetary system is not yet well thought out, but in any case it consists of a maximum of four planets. Kélas lies in the northern hemisphere and extends to all climate zones except the tropical, where only the South Islands are located. It is inhabited in its entirety except for the northernmost lands near the North Pole, where the terrain is made inaccessible by the Gray Mountains and a layer of glaciers.

As far as the period is concerned, we are (at the beginning of Shadows of the Past) in the year 857 of the New Era, from our point of view roughly in the High Middle Ages, but there are a lot of more modern inventions given that this is a fantasy after all (for example, glass windows are relatively widespread, even among the poorer classes of the population, and pistols and rifles make use of the flintlock mechanism, a variation of which also finds use in pocket lighters). There are four states, large federative kingdoms, that have gradually formed over the past eight hundred years or so, both through wars and alliances between regions. You'll definitely find a bit of so-called "medieval stasis" here, considering that Kélas hasn't changed as much as our world has in these almost thousand years.

The largest portion of the population is represented by humans, among whom you can find people with the ability to manipulate the world around them – wizards. However, they have been hunted and killed for millennia by non-wizards who see them as either a threat or someone they would like to be themselves. Currently, people with magical abilities are only safe in the northernmost kingdom of Kélas.

More than seven hundred years ago, you could also commonly come across so-called shapeshifters, originally two-legged dragons (technically wyverns, but I prefer to call them dragons), who in ancient times found a way to change their scaly form into human form (and vice versa) without restriction. However, in the year 111 of the New Era, they suddenly lost the ability to shapeshift without explanation and got stuck in the form they resided in in that very moment. While those in human form merged with humans, those in dragon form lost their sanity along with the hope of shapeshifting and took refuge in places far from civilization, perhaps so that the sight of human faces would not remind them of the part of themselves that they had lost forever. Some took quite the opposite approach and in blinding rage, grief and despair began to attack towns and villages in a futile attempt to exact revenge on the unknown culprit they saw in humans.

The third race inhabiting Kélas are harpies. Similar to shapeshifters, they have two forms – the original human form and a bird form (most reminiscent of a mix of the harpy eagle and the Eurasian goshawk, but much larger). There are only women among their ranks and they live on the highest peaks of the Löar Mountains. In ancient times, they inhabited other mountain ranges as well, but human migration and mutual intolerance between the two races either exterminated them in human hunts for harpies, or forced them to move.

Where to next?

>>> Geography and people – About political entities as well as nations, peoples and their culture. So far you can only access the page about Sorka.

What's to come

>>> Characters

>>> Magic system – About the magic and how it works, wizards, magical creatures (dragons and harpies) and more.

>>> Religion

>>> Organizations – Various groups, leagues, alliances, military orders of knights and so on.

>>> History – Spanning from the ancient history to the present day, info about former independent states.

>>> Miscellaneous – Stuff that didn't fit anywhere else; mostly short articles about various occurrences, interesting things, amenities and so on.