The Iron Temple

Considered by many travelers to be one of the few Yrūn-made Wonders of the World, Kyrm Oryroð is an awesome sight to behold. Standing above the City of Oð like a brick and iron volcano, the High Temple rises from a broken landscape of pitched black roofs and labyrinthine avenues. The giant pyramidal structure crouches in the western half the city’s great Temple Square. Kyrm Oryroð is crowned by a forest of towering chimneys that belch inky smoke into the Oðári sky, blotting out the sun in a noxious wheel of oppressive gloom. This monstrous structure is the masterpiece of Roðyr craftsmanship, spawned from the mind of a nameless vældyrim, now personified in Cult iconography as the Cowled Architect.

Hall of Sentinels

Deep within the labyrinthine halls of Kyrm Oryroð lies the Hall of Sentinels. Early records indicate that the chamber was originally used to forge the Temple’s Ormári guardians. The tools and devices used for this purpose were removed to another location in the Iron Temple sometime in the 9th century HK, but have not been seen since. Today the chamber is used to store a number of the constructs upon three galleries. Although the Sentinels appear inactive it is believed that the Ormári army will animate should the Temple be threatened.
Iron Colonnade

Rising from the flagstones of the Temple Square are six rows of giant metal pillars which flank those that approach Kyrm Oryroð. The pillars are very old. Some believe that the pillars were erected before construction on the Temple was begun. The truth is hard to know for the earliest records that mention the colonnade imply that the pillars were old at that time. Each of the iron columns is six strides tall and inscribed with minute characters thought to be composed in the language of Tyrn-Orð Aside from the prolifically incised pillars, only a handful of examples for the language remain. Not only is the writing obscure, but it seems resistant to magics which might reveal it meaning. Given the age of the Iron Colonnade, there is a wide belief that the pillars contain wisdom (e.g., mysteries of faith, secrets of Orm) handed down by Roð when he walked among the Tyrn-Orð in the 3rd century HK. During the Acèntyri-Eylfāri Occupation of Oð in the 1st century DR, the Colonnade was subjected to ceaseless batteries of divination and alchemical tests to uncover their secrets.

Iron Library

Within the dark Kyrm Oryroð is housed a sprawling library. The largest repository in the northern world, the Iron Library is an invaluable resource for scholars (rf. Hall of Kirùid).

The creation of the library was begun following the Departure of 46 DR as a means of collecting Yrūn knowledge, lost after the war. Following the war, the Eylfāri and Acèntyri occupants collected all Dekàli books and scrolls, burning them in guildhouse-sized piles within Oð’s Temple Square. Many scholars and magicians trying to leave the city were captured and killed on the roads leading from Oð; their books and manuscripts were also destroyed. Very few escaped into the Tor’n Evalshat, believed at the time to be the only harbor against the Eylfāe. Most of those who escaped into the mountains were found and killed by the Ortor. In this way, the history of the people was erased.

Following the Departure and the subsequent extermination of remaining Acèntyri settlers (46-55 DR), Hardrok the Wise, a Pryn Roð and Dekàlyn theologian, was given permission to begin a library and the funds to collect those few documents that remained in the city, or that became available on the market. The library soon was brimming with materials, and was moved to a larger building in the Temple Ward. By 112 DR, the Priesthood commissioned a hall built for the library near Temple Square (now the Weavers Guild) where the collection was kept until 142 DR when fire swept through the ward and some of the collection was lost.

In 146 DR, the Priesthood was persuaded to move the remaining collection into Kyrm Oryroð and merge it with the temple’s own small collection which had survived the war. Since then the library has grown, and every several decades more of the temple’s interior is devoted to it. Fortunately, the Iron Temple will not run out of room in the foreseeable future, as most of the temple has remained abandoned since its construction.

The Machine

Construction of the Machine is believed to have begun during the Eylfāri Occupation, sometime between 1 and 55 DR. The plans for the Machine are believed to have been divinely granted to a priest named Nazèrus, in an event reminiscent of the Tyrn-Orð leap into the Iron Age. The Machine is believed to have been operational by 28 DR as evidenced by the appearance of the Wheel in that same year. The composition, location, and purpose of the Machine had been long debated by the lay people of Oð, none of which have ever laid eyes upon the thing. The most evident byproduct of the Machine is the thick black pall which slowly rotates above Kyrm Oryroð, known as the Wheel. The Wheel has been tolerated by the inhabitants of the City for centuries because it is credited with driving the Eylfāe from the city walls. Since that time, the Wheel has blocked the daytime sun and fouled the rain with oil and soot. It is assumed that whatever purpose the Machine may hold, it is the will of Roð and the burden of his followers that it be allowed to moan, rumble, grind, and belch noxious smoke whenever it must.

History

Most Cults attempt to inspire their followers by building temples that are both beautiful and majestic. The Cult of Roð did not have these characteristics in mind when Kyrm Oryroð was designed. It is not entirely clear who or what designed the Temple at all. There are no illustrations or written accounts remaining to describe the first Temples built by the Tyrn-Orð of the Iron Coast. What is known is that the First Temple was wood and it burned to the ground. The Second Temple was stone, and while still incomplete in 244 HK, it was destroyed by earthquake. At this point there was a sudden and dramatic change among the Tyrn-Orð. By all accounts of contemporary travelers to the region, the Tyrn-Orð were a bronze age people up until the collapse of the Second Temple. In 245 HK, the forests surrounding the razed Second Temple were cleared by fire and a foundation was excavated on a scale unlike anything attempted in the region since the Dwürden Halls of Tolrün.

Within a year’s passing, the Tyrn-Orð had committed to a great industrial effort. Traders who had visited the region a year earlier were amazed to find a chain of blast furnaces operating along the Morén Nōdrul as well as wide swaths of the Nar Drūden stripped for the production of charcoal. Before the fall of the Second Temple, the Tyrn-Orð had traded only in natural or bronze goods. This leap into the Iron Age was unprecedented, unless there had been help. When the traders reported their discoveries to the neighboring kingdom of Glor Dün, they were assured that the Dwürden had no hand in this. In fact, the Dwürden were alarmed by the advances and suspected the interference of enemy races (e.g., Eylfāe). The natives credited Gōlôm the Black with the metal’s discovery, but the Dwürden were unconvinced. Agents of Glor Dün seized examples of the Tyrn-Orð metal and were dismayed to find that the iron could not be heated or reshaped upon their forges. Many missions were sent into the region but they could not uncover a reason for metal’s remarkable qualities, or understand how the Yrūn were able to work the metal at all. In the Spring of 247 HK, an Yrūn caravan of iron ore was attacked and diverted into Dwürdèni tunnels, but the Immortal race could find no reason or method for creating the Roðári iron, which the Yrūn named Orm.

Construction of the Iron Temple continued for another 150 years, employing every hand not committed to fishing or growing crops. Tales of the great Iron Mountain had spread far and wide attracting the attention of the expanding Dekàli Empire. The historian Dorom the Elder described the Temple in his Skorū Dyázan as follows:

“The iron mountain stands at the center of this north city, dwarfing all buildings scattered at its base. The people of the city work tirelessly on its construction, hauling massive iron sheets and beams up the long wooden ramps with the aid of large oxen. Each piece is set in place with a prayer. The roads leading from the surrounding hills are lined with ore-laden wagons carrying an endless supply of materials to the builders of this wonder. It is my guess that they will level every hill before their mountain is half-built.”

The representatives of Dekàlas were so impressed with the people and their work that they were offered a place within the Empire. The High Priest of the Temple refused, for the Cult did not wish to transfer power to a secular Crown (i.e., High Lord). History does not mention any consideration of compromise on this issue, despite recent exceptions made for the Kyrm Or’Amra. What is recorded is that the ambassadors left the region and returned with an army. The people of the region were defeated and their priests slaughtered at the place now known as the Dagger Peninsula. Those who accepted the new structure applied their God-given knowledge to the creation of weapons and ships of war, as dictated by the Dragul Throne. It was not until almost a generation later (i.e., circa 432 HK) that work on the Iron Temple could be resumed. It should be noted that Orm was not used for Dekàli purposes until after the Temple was completed.

Kyrm Oryroð was completed in 745 HK, 500 years after building commenced along the Kre Dùlnar.