By Roarin Bilmfrickten

Chapter One - The Early Years.

The cavern of Dunwarren had been home to a population of Svirfneblin likely since the days when the Lord of Deepearth first led gnomekind from the surface to the depths of the Underdark. They existed much as svirfneblin elsewhere did - Large communal societies with a sophisticated culture of communal property, social altruism, enforced xenophobia, and an industry almost entirely centered around the mining, faceting and production of raw and cut gems, particularly rubies, from the lava tubes in the near environs of Dunwarren.

Despite the emphasis placed on community within the deep gnome culture, there existed several factions that were known to work at odds with each other, each striving for more then its own share of the overall bounty of Dunwarren's labours. To date, evidence has been discovered that either proves, or strongly suggests that there existed factions divided along theological or political divides, as well as several castes within the populace as well. The factions known or suspected to have once existed include the Urdlenites. The Deep Brothers, the Miners, the Cutters, the Naturalists, and the Phantasmists.

For years, each of the factions was incapable of gaining more then a temporary advantage over any of the others. Each catered to a distinct section of the populace, providing them the answers they needed to many of life's riddles and each had it's own powerbase and following within Dunwarren.

Unbeknownst to the deep gnomes, events were soon to transpire that would shatter the fragile balance of power within their society, and begin a chain of events that would ultimately lead to their fall.

Chapter Two - The Discovery. (~900 DR)

Because the svirfneblin relied upon a non-renewable resource for their livelihood, there was a great deal of pressure on the society as a whole to ensure that new veins of gems were constantly being discovered. Whole teams of miners would cautiously and deliberately explore the passages that periodically opened up due to seismic activity in hopes of finding the next large vein of diamonds or rubies, thus ensuring the prosperity of the community as a whole.

It was on one such expedition that a group of delvers opened a previously unexplored passage, breaking through into a chamber the likes of which they had never before encountered. Heiroglyphics within the ruined temple of Callarduran Smoothhands in the ruins tell us that they were confronted with a gigantic elemental of earth; that they battled it, finally defeating it at the cost of many lives; and finally that the elemental was a guardian, protecting with it's might a large stone seeped with power.

Whether the stone found was indeed magical, or perhaps possessed of an as-yet undiscovered energy is unknown. It is entirely possible that the marks that are interpreted on the heiroglyph as power are merely an allegorical representation of knowledge that was somehow scribed upon it.

The final of the four heiroglyphs that tell the tale of the discovery shows the deep gnomes constructing a large device. Possibly the first mention of the Machine to be found anywhere in Dunwarren. That the discovery of the stone led to the creation of the Machine is indisputable.

Chapter Three - The Rise of the Mechanists. (~930 DR)

The first gnome to fully comprehend the mysteries of the tablet is assumed to have been Mechanist 1, although no formal record of his ever having lived has ever been discovered. This assumptive hypothesis is based upon the presence of tombs in a recently discovered Mechanists mausoleum in the areas known collectively as New Dunwarren, as well as the collected writings of Blim Frindlespick in which he refers to himself as "Mechanist 107". It would be illogical to assume that they would not start at 1; it was after all the dawning of a new age of Dunwarren.

Slowly at first, then with greater rapidity, the emphasis within the society shifted from gems as the mainstay industry of the population, to mechanistry. Although the svirfneblin would never entirely lose their love of the cut and faceted treasures of the earth, more and more they would become a luxury, rather than a necessity.

Evidence also exists that the science of Mechanistry was spreading throughout all of the previous boundaries within the gnomish culture, as evidenced by the writings of Poirdon Lumn in his magnum opus titled simply "Urdlen". The book was credited as being written by "Machinist Poirdon Lumn", yet which evoked a great deal more religious zeal then one would expect from someone who was neatly confined to a single faction. Clearly, the movement of Mechanistry would not stop to ask whom a particular gnome worshipped, or which caste they were in.

The influence of the Mechanists, and Mechanist 1 became more widespread with each new discovery, and each new invention. As the movement absorbed more of the workforce, advancements came faster and faster. Quality of life improved daily, with the introduction of such innovations as pumped water and sewage at first, and later on, the first of the maintenance animatrons that would release many gnomes from the chains of menial labor.

As the demand for gnomes in worker functions decreased, the number of svirfneblin that found themselves turning to mechanistry for livelihood and purpose inversely increased. The cycle was self-perpetuating, and didnt show signs of ever ceasing.

Chapter Four - Civil War. (~950 DR)

Of all of the factions that once held power in Dunwarren, only the Naturalists were seemingly resistant to the Mechanist movement. They had long championed the cause of attempting to live alongside the natural order of the world. Feeling that these new innovations were at odds with the life that they felt gnomes were meant to lead, they began to organize and plan methods by which they could best cripple the Mechanists, finally seizing upon the plan they best thought would accomplish the goal.

The Mechanists by this time had long conducted most of their invention and testing in vaults hidden away in remote locations of Dunwarren. One such vault - the Vault of the Master Machinist (perhaps Mechanist 1) was reputed to contain all of the greatest creations of Dunwarren. There was only a single key to this treasure, and circumstantial evidence suggests it may have even been fabricated from the stone that started the whole movement. They would steal away this key and destroy it, in doing so denying the Mechanists their greatest acheivements for all time.

Learning of this plot, the Mechanists themselves took the key and sundered it into 4 parts, scattering them to the four corners of the Dark Lake. They then drove the remaining Naturalists from Dunwarren so that they could continue their works unrestricted. The naturalists would not return until 1374 DR, when the fragments of the key began to once again resurface.

Chapter Five - The Coming of the Appetite. (~1000 DR)

The Appetite, a Beholder with a terrible hunger unlike any before it had found Dunwarren. It is unknown why it left its home in Chazbash; perhaps it was driven out for what it was going to try to do. Above all things, it feared death and had learned that there were ways that a cunning wizard could put off death for a time, perhaps even for eternity.

Two things stood in its way. The central eye that it possessed prevented it from ever truly weilding the types of magics that it would need to use to acheive lichdom, and it would need a large population of slaves, both to assuage its own terrible hunger, and for sacrifice in dark rituals. In Dunwarren, it believed it had found both.

It came like an earthquake. The svirfneblin and their meagre maintenance animatrons could do little to stop it. It still possessed its anit-magic eye, and their strongest illusions fell away before it. The small maintenance animatrons they sent against it fell to pieces before its disintigration beams. The soldiers that tried to battle it fell by the score.

In the remnants of the Udlenites, the Appetite found the beginnings of its new followers. Its Chosen. Some within the cult had contracted a rare form of Lycanthropy which had been held in check by the efforts of the Mechanists against them. With this new danger now attacking Dunwarren, the Chosen began to spread their disease at will, each new infected gnome in turn swelling the ranks of the Appetite's followers.

The Mechanists began producing larger and larger combat model animatrons to fight them, but by this time, it was largely too late. The war was really over before it began. Svirfneblin society began to break down in the face of unrelenting attacks against it both from within and without. The cult of the Chosen grew until there were more lychanthropes in Dunwarren then uninfected svirfneblin.

The Appetite had won. It subjugated the remainder of the population beneath its rule, and began to move its other plans forward.

Chapter Six - War with Traensyr. (~1050 DR)

The Appetite could not wipe out the population of Dunwarren; it needed them for rituals and for sating its unceasing hunger. Still, it realised that it would never truly be able to conquer them sufficiently to prevent continuing attacks against it. It knew that the remaining Mechanists were building something that they believed would defeat it. It needed to win the remaining population to its side, and distract them so that it could continue to work towards lichdom unmolested.

Through a series of intermediaries, perhaps in Fort Mur or the Pyrimo, the Appetite learnt of Traensyr, the powerful drow city on the far side of the lake. It conceived of a plan whereby a war with the drow might provide a unifying force within the svirfneblin population, distracting them from the true agenda and keeping the deep gnomes' minds occupied with survival, rather then sedition against the rule of the Appetite.

It is unknown how it provoked this war. Perhaps it sent an attack of svirfneblin thralls against them. Perhaps it merely leaked the location of Dunwarren to Traensyr and let the darker ambitions of the drow do the rest. What is known as fact is that the drow came.

The gnomes had long feared an invasion by drow. They were weakened by the Appetite and the Chosen, but a great number of their defences had been created specifically for stemming off a large scale drow invasion. They were dug in, whereas the drow had to maintain an impossibly long supply line from Dunwarren to Traensyr. The Traensyr drow would not admit defeat, nor would the remaining population of Dunwarren. The two sides were stalemated, as the Appetite had hoped.

Chapter Seven - The Fall of Dunwarren. (~1100 DR)

For years the war dragged on, and the Appetite grew in power. Finally the time came that it felt it had what it required for the rituals.

The Chosen disseminated information among the populace of Dunwarren that a final attack was soon to be mounted, and that the city could not stand any longer against Traensyr. The population were told that the only hope was that they retreat further into Dunwarren, and hide. Let the drow pillage all that they could and leave. Dunwarren and the svirfneblin, and most importantly the Appetite would survive.

So it was that the deep gnomes began to retreat from the homes they had held for so long. In large numbers they moved to the deepest, darkest areas of Dunwarren. Places that had been carved out by the Chosen for the rituals necessary for its transformation.

The deep gnomes were driven into a huge chamber, far below Dunwarren where they beheld a terrible sight. The Appetite, now long since having lost it's central eye, atop a massive pillar of black basalt. Surrounding it on the floor were the bones of the hundreds of gnomes that had been sacrificed to it over the years of occupation. The Appetite's moment was at hand.

A horrible ritual ensued that stole away the life of all of the survivors of Dunwarren in one terrible moment of blood and magic. The energies converged on the Appetite, and stripped from it all that which would be considered "life", leaving a new Appetite, eternal in lichdom.

It is said that no butterfly emerges from a cocoon that does not need to sun on a leaf afterwards before first taking flight. So it was for the Appetite. The transformation to lichdom had been terrible and taxing. It left orders to the Chosen, and it slept.

Chapter Eight - The Founding of Sanctuary. (1222 DR)

The first escaped slaves that arrived in Dunwarren found a mystery. A city that appeared to have been abandoned for years, where animatrons still tended to their assigned duties as though the creators had never left. No signs of war, and no evidence of the tragedy that had befallen the svirfneblin that once dwelled here. None could explain it.

That the mystery of Dunwarren has so long gone undiscovered can be blamed fully on one thing. The animatrons. They were programmed by the svirfneblin to do all manner of tasks, from cleaning, to building, to even repairing other animatrons. The entire system was so cunningly designed, that a hundred years could pass and Dunwarren could look as though the gnomes had simply "packed up and moved away". All evidence of the war was swept away, and damage from the pillaging drow troops was repaired.

The greatest invention of the svirfneblin - the animatrons, were all that remained of the once great culture, simultaneously protecting the past, and providing one of the only remaining clues to it.

Completed.