Pleven

The name for the elven city and the forests east of Lowland. Now populated by Orcs.

The area was comprised of three separate regions: Wisewood (the forests along the Wisewood River populated mostly by Wood Elves), Pleven (the self-proclaimed “capital city” of all Elves and populated mostly by High Elves), and Larinday (a hybrid Elven community that served as a buffer to protect Elfland from the Orc city of Kinander and the Fell creatures in the Wood of the Lost Souls). (Ringhals, the home of Halflings, is often considered the fourth region of Elfland – but since they relied on the Elves for their defense, most historians consider them no more than a footnote).

After the fall of the human kingdoms of Lowland and Backbone (in 1092 and 1098 respectively), the unified Orc armies invaded the kingdom of Pleven in 1099. As the Dark Mage's storm cloud had engulfed the kingdom at this point, the Elves were easily pushed back and forced to retreat to their capital city.

On July 24, after only a two-week siege, the Orcs broke through and took the city. However, they were shocked to see the place was defended by a tiny fraction of soldiers. Well over 99% of the population had simply vanished!

All elves who remained were slaughtered by the invaders, so the only first-hand accounts of this event are told from the Orc perspective. Because of this, there is much mystery as to what exactly happened. It is assumed that the spellcasters managed to open some kind of portal and flee through it. However, nobody has been able to make contact with any of those who disappeared and none have ever come back. The most common theory is that something went horribly wrong and the portal took them somewhere fatal.

Pleven is still populated by Orcs. After their victory in 1099, hundreds of tribes made the trek from the mountains down into the forests. After thousands of years in the hills, though, they found that they didn't care much for the forests. Then, with the defeat of the Dark Mage, they had no controlling force nor any common enemies to bind them together. This level of peace was unknown to most orcs, so they chose to fight each other. What followed have been perhaps the bloodiest years the orcs have seen in some time.

While the population was drastically reduced by this fighting, the remaining tribes have evolved into a (mostly) functional society. Once the portals opened up, they even began regular peaceful trade with the neighboring kingdom of Cherai.