The Downfall

The scholars of the elves describe the Downfall, the events surrounding the fall of Hkar and the wars against the spawn of the Three Despairs, thusly:

The Third Age of Taelgar ended in fire and cataclysmic, as the allies, servants, and slaves of the Three Despairs burst into the world in conflict and war. Although this war touched all the land of Taelgar, the greatest fighting was on the central coasts of the western shore, in the land that was southern heart of the great Elven kingdom of Alcarinquë, and further south to the northern edges of Tinwerquë. A great host sailed for Hkar, striking at the heart of the human world, where they overwhelmed the defenses of the Hkarans. As last, desperate act, Arha and Malik sank the land of Hkar, and great destruction followed. Many humans died, but so too did many more hobgoblins, Orcs, and horrors of the deeps. While this war was not a total victory for the humans, elves, and their allies, it was not a defeat, and despite enormous loss, the spawn of the Despairs were diminished, never to recover completely to their former strength.

With the sinking of Hkar, the land changed: mountains arose from the plains, hills turned into seas, desserts blossomed and forests withered. Even the land itself was shattered. New oceans cut through what had once been fertile land in the south, breaking the continent in two. In the chaos, little of the south survived, and the great elven kingdom of Tinwerquë sank beneath the waves. Old oceans also retreated, and the great swamps of the lizardfolk on the shores of the Green Sea dried up as the plains turned to desert and the water retreated. While some settled in fragmented remains of the great wetlands of old, others fled to seek a new home. What became of them is not recorded in the north. Even the Dwarven Kingdoms were not spared, despite their fortifications. The horrors of the underdark claimed many deep halls, and many dwarfs retreated to the surface, living in aboveground cities.

Among the humans, the destruction was greatest on Hkar. Many refugees from Hkar, buoyed by the Eight Divines, landed in the war-torn remnants of the dying elven kingdom of Alcarinquë. Whether others survived the long journey south, beyond the destruction, to some far distant land, is not known by modern scholars. But those living on the mainland were not spared the ravages of war. The cities and civilizations of the south, once the most powerful kingdoms outside of Drankor, fell, and were swallowed by the changing land. Only those humans who had lived on the margins of the world, in the far north, or on the shores of the Green Sea, escaped largely unscathed, although not untouched by war.

Thus, at the end of the Third Age all was changed, the elder races diminished, and the time of the humans at hand.