An historical theory on the probable cause of the collapse of the Hadran Empire.
by T. Plato Anaximander, Trabasso, 997 H.E.

The Empire of Hadran fell nearly overnight. How could this have happened? It is well known that the magical catastrophe known as Hadran's Disaster destroyed the capital of the empire and its immediate surroundings, but surely the rest of the empire was left at least directly unaffected. We will endeavor to show, therefore, in what way chaos spread from the actions of one individual to result in the almost total disappearance of an advanced civilization spanning hundreds of miles of territory and numbering several millions of citizens.

The origins and causes of Hadran's Disaster are not entirely known, but we speculate that it was motivated by the court intrigues of the day, perhaps in connection with, or in opposition to, a plot to usurp the Imperial purple. Certainly such plots were quite common, almost everyday occurrences in the later imperial period. We do know that the attempt released celestial energies on a scale unparalleled before or since. The city the first Emperor Hadran had founded 680 years before was completely destroyed, as well as much of the surrounding countryside for a dozen miles around. The Disaster also caused widespread earthquakes and floods, and changed the course of the river Hadran (which is why today the ruins of the capital are several miles from the riverbank).

Consider the turmoil created as the news spread through the empire. Hadran, the fount of political, social, and economic power had dried up, leaving political appointees in the provinces without a power base, causing turmoil in families as younger sons were suddenly thrust into positions of family authority because their fathers and brothers were dead, subject populations taking the golden opportunity to raise revolts and attempt to regain their recently or not so recently lost independence. The core of the empire, along the Hadran and Languedon rivers, which depended directly on the capital economically and politically, was of course the hardest hit. More distant lands, which were historically accustomed to regard the capital as a real but distant center of authority, adjusted more smoothly. While the Disaster's physical effects were limited mostly to an area about a dozen miles in radius around Hadran, the magical effects were felt as far away as the Royal College of Astronomers in Evendarr. Most celestial mages who were not close enough to be killed by the blast were driven quite mad by the levels of celestial energy. Earth casters, felt a great disturbance in the balance of the planes, as they had shifted violently.

This disturbance was also felt deep in the trackless wastes to the north and east, by the shamans of hundreds of separate barbarian tribes. A few months after the Disaster, while the economy and infrastructure of the imperial core was still operating on an emergency basis at best, the barbarians began to arrive. No defense was even attempted at first - the barbarians were simply let through, to camp near the still smoking ruins. Out of this congregation of various tribes there rose by the necessity of the moment a leader - the fabled Gurtha Khan - and a mission: seek out and destroy any and all remaining celestial casters.

The time of the Sphere Wars is interesting historically in that from the very beginning it was a guerrilla conflict. The barbarians were already in and among the imperial towns and farms. While they did not in any real sense conquer, or attempt to conquer, the former empire, they did live very well indeed, extracting tribute from the local authorities wherever there remained any, and pillaging anywhere else. They demanded, and were granted, the right to enter any house, search any person, at any time, for evidence that they practiced celestial magic; offenders were summarily executed, and often, if ater the proud people of Hadran would recover from the loss of their capital enough to begin to resist the invaders, one man was largely responsible for what form that resistance took. He was Phineas Exos, a charismatic personality and gifted celestial mage, although perhaps a tad mentally unstable due to aftereffects of the Disaster. Phineas decided that Earth magic was responsible for the Empire's downfall, and began a campaign of terrorism aimed at the barbarian earth casters. This led to bitter reprisals by the barbarians, often against helpless townsfolk and noncombatants. Many imperial citizens who had not already fled the imperial core before this now began to flow in streams of refugees towards places like Xandria and the southern provinces.

At first, those imperial troops and officials who remained generally supported Phineas's efforts, albeit covertly. However, as he gained a following, Phineas began targeting earth casters who were imperial citizens as well. By this point, however, the resistance movement was masterfully organized and fanatically loyal: disloyalty was suppressed with threats of extraordinarily harsh tortures, including forcing the miscreant to spend a night among the ruins of Hadran city.

Eventually the Sphere Wars broke down old imperial loyalties, replacing them with two simple factions: earth and celestial. Phineas began launching concerted attacks to destroy permanent Earth circles. Gurtha Khan, noting that the barbarians' ability to resurrect casualties would soon be severely limited, began responding by destroying Imperial resurrection circles, sometimes attempting to frame Phineas's terrorists for these acts. Several Hadrani healers joined with the barbarians.

The Sphere Wars petered out for the simple reason that neither side could resurrect their dead any longer. What had been the core of the empire was now largely a wasteland. The barbarians dwindled in numbers, and eventually just left. Phineas's resistance movement collapsed with no external enemy. Phineas Exos himself disappeared, no one knows where. The only imperial citizens that remained were those too poor or too old to flee. It would take many generations to rebuild a lasting civilization in these lands.