I made this world years ago for a D&D campaign. It's inspired by Near - Eastern Mythology, BS Zachariah Sitchin made up about Near - Eastern Mythology, and the book of Genesis.
It's much darker than I normally like, I prefer making up places I could enjoy living in. But Elden Ring had just come out, and we wanted dark fantasy. If you want to set your own campaign in this setting, feel free! I had some other material which I've lost, but you can fill in the gaps yourself. I'm not totally happy with it, but I think it's pretty good considering I wrote it in high school.
Caladron
Long ages ago, there was no sun nor moon nor stars. There was no grass nor tree; no beasts which breathe nor vermin which creep upon the ground. Neither were there men nor orcs nor elves. All of Caladron was dark and murky, covered by the waters of the Great Deep.
High above in the heavens sat Rummani, the king of the gods. He gazed down upon the deep and beheld the riches of the earth. So he called together his sons and said unto them:
"Behold Caladron, so rich with silver and gold. Let us take her for our own, and thereby make ourselves richer than any in the heavens above or the waters below."
So, above the earth they raised a great dome of crystal, and they named it the firmament. It kept back the Waters, and dry land appeared. They began to work the land themselves, setting at it with picks and spades. But Rummani's people were proud and unused to hard labor. So they said among themselves:
"Come, let us fashion mortals, and let us make them toil on the earth for us."
So they fashioned the mortal races out of clay and breathed the breath of life into their nostrils. To feed them, they made the plants and beasts which draw breath. And they made lights in the dome of the sky, to illuminate the earth and serve as signs of changing seasons.
Rummani ruled over the mortals ruthlessly, making them toil without ceasing until they grew too old or weak. His sons saw that the daughters of men were beautiful, so they took them as wives and concubines. And soon they bore children: elves, demigods, giants.
Far off sat Lotan, the Leviathan, the lord of the deep. He saw how Rummani's sons had built the firmament and dried Caladron, and he grew furious. So he made war upon Rummani's people, endeavoring to bring the waters back to Caladron once more.
He coiled around the earth like a great constrictor: he prepared to crush the sky into dust. The world shook, people screamed, stars fell from the heavens. But, Rummani was roused to wrath, and he set upon Lotan. They battled long and hard, perhaps for a hundred years. But, as it seemed all was lost, Rummani wrought a great enchantment--perhaps the most great and terrible in all the history of the world. He cast Lotan into a deep sleep, so deep that he almost seemed dead. This curse he bound to five great rubies. So long as they remained intact, Lotan would remain dormant. One he hid in the West, one in the East, one in the North, and one in the South. The last he buried deep within the earth, in the caves of Motandar, where dead men go.
For eons uncountable, Rummani kept his tyrannical rule over Caladron. Yet, as millennia passed, gold grew rarer and rarer. For awhile, Rummani worked his slaves even harder, all in a foolish effort to sate his greed. But, slowly, he admitted to himself that Caladron had been emptied of riches.
And when he did, that was the day the gods abandoned us.
The world at first collapsed into bloody anarchy. But that was soon to pass. The West fell under the rule of an ambitious and paranoid Witch. In the South rose a mad cannibal cannibal king. The East is ruled by the Necromancer, whose face no living man has seen. And the North is ruled by a frost giant with delusions of godhood.
For the last six thousand years, they have fought a pointless total war. Cities have been razed, their ruins left to rot forever. Multitudes die in battle; the halls of Motandar grow fuller by the day. Once - green fields have been turned murky and fallow by magical weapons. The woods are cursed and haunted by phantoms.
Men desperately pray for the gods' return. Dwarves dig deep in an attempt to find gold and lure back the gods, but they only waken demons of the underworld.
It seems as though all of Caladron is winding down. In ancient days, men could live a thousand years. Now, they live but a few decades. Every day, the night grows longer; every year, the Summer's shorter. Most ominously, a small cult has begun a quest to awaken Lotan and destroy the world. Already, they have one of Rummani's Rubies, and the serpent has grown restless. Sometimes he tosses and turns in his sleep, making the world quiver like a cornered animal. He has already rent some small cracks in the sky, flooding low - lying towns with dark waters. Sometimes he groans or sighs, making men cover their ears and children scream.
The fate of the world is uncertain. If no one stops them, the cult with crush the rubies and drown the world. Or perhaps they will be foiled, and Caladron will endure a little while longer. As it stands, none can say.
This is a map of Caladron I made at the time. I'm afraid it contains my handwriting (and, even worse, my handwriting from High School). But, I guess you can't have everything ¯_(ツ)_/¯