There were three star-gods; Atargatis, Sagittae, and Eras. In their eternal dance, the Twin Suns dance around one another while Eras, the bloated, red overseer, skirted their duet with jealousy. So great was his jealousy that he sacrificed just a fraction of his bulk to create a dancing partner of his own, whom he named Gaia.Compared to the Twin Stars and especially Eras, Gaia was a miniscule goddess, beholden to Eras in every way. Whereas the Twins revolved in tandem, Gaia was forced to twirl around Eras’ heaving bulk on her own. The Dance continued in this manner for untold millennia, with the jealous Eras adding more companions and accessories to Gaia in form of her Tassels (moons) and Girdle (Rings).
But still, his forced dance with the tiny Gaia did not hold the same, pure beauty that the Twins’ Dance held, and so he threw his anger upon Gaia, since she could bear no more celestial adornments, though she herself had grown beautiful in ways that not even Eras had designed. For unlike the Twin Stars or Eras, Gaia had cooled and grown, coming eventually to harbor life, which she cherished. It was nothing grand, nor complex, but it was hers and hers alone, and she loved all of it. Eras knew this, and so began his designs to forever tarnish her beauty. For Eras’s anger was shapeless and uncontrolled, and though in that time his power and light was greater than that of Atargatis or Sagittae, even combined, he had neither their restraint nor their divine mindset to direct it outside of his own sphere of influence.
Now, in that time, the first peoples of Gaia were beginning to come into their first minds, and learn how to work the gifts of The Mother to their needs. Many shapes they came in, and though Alneh, Elf, and Dwarf kind generally assert themselves as the first of Gaia’s Children, all thinking peoples of Gaia emerged at approximately the same point in history. This ignition of mindfulness, and meetings of the First Kings, marks the technical start of Gaia's recorded history. The first empires of the Children were great, and stretched across the globe from Ellaria to Siv’en. To that end, so too went the Servants of Gaia, known in the oldest tongues as the Ithquent. Their wisdom was of the star-gods', and their magic was primal. It is said that they could also take the shapes of the firstborn of Gaia, and would sometimes walk the land under the guise of wisemen and sages. The Ithquent organized the first teachings of magic to mortal kind, and the people of Gaia entered into a short golden age.
Then, Eras, seeing that Gaia was growing strong with the bounty of her Gift of Life, grew jealous that her beauty might even surpass his. In retribution, he committed the Rape of Gaia, and bade the Great Colossi to rise from the surface of the planet herself. The deep wells of the seas and the thunderheads of the skies shuddered and convulsed in anguish as the Destroyers arose. Seven there were, mightier and greater in size than could be glimpsed by either man or Precursor.
Doubtless, nearly everything that the Children of Gaia had wrought before the Rape of Gaia was utterly destroyed, and the history of the world until that point was lost along with those works. Only those few scattered tribes remained, each led by one of the Ithquent to protect them with their limited sorceries.
It was not within the power of the Ithquent, who later came to be called The Precursors, to destroy the Colossi themselves. They did, however, know that it was by Eras' hand that the Colossi walked, and so they besought the succor of his siblings, Atargatis and Sagittae, to put an end to the wanton destruction.
There was a limit to what the Twin Star Gods could do directly, for Gaia was of Eras's divine making and body, and thus beholden to him. They could, however, confront Eras himself. Three times the Twins commanded Eras to cease the abuse of his Daughter, and three times Eras refused. Then the twins took long council, for nearly 100 years, causing great distress amongst the Ithquent. Atargatis and Sagittae had compassion and pity for the Children of Gaia, but they also loved their brother Eras, in spite of his vile ways. Finally, just when the Children were on the brink of destruction, the Twin Star Gods acted.
All souls of Gaia looked in astonishment as the day of the Sundering of Eras came. Eras, who had until that time been a great, red blight in the soft skies of Gaia, was shattered to pieces by two rays of brilliant retribution from Atargatis and Sagittae. The brilliance of Eras diminished and disippated into the aether of the Gaia system, and drifted for a short time before the Twins enacted their second Miracle. Upon holding audience with the greatest of the Precursors, the Twins channeled the drifting power of of Eras into their bodies, instilling them with might and power so great that it could scarcely be contained in mortal form. Under the diminished red light of Eras, the Ithquent known as Syros and Sol pledged to undo the Colossi at any and all costs, save the extinction of the people they sought to protect.
To that end, the Twin Gods enacted their final Miracle, and sent the Gaia Stones to the besieged planet, borne by the first and only lifeforms created by Atargatis and Sagittae themselves; dragonkind. These legendary wyrms, larger and more terrible than tales can tell, would be fitting allies against the Colossi, and the Stones they brought with them would serve to ensnare the seething, enraged minds of the Eras’ Children.
For indeed, though the Ithquent had become mighty in absorbing the shredded power of Eras, it was no small feat to slice through a mountain, or slay the very sea itself. In this, the Colossi had one weakness; their minds. The Slayer, Syros, created a spear from the very essence of the Dark Star within himself; a fell weapon that could not only slice through any stone or darkness, but also tear out the minds of its victims. The battles, then, were epic in scale and cannot be recounted here.
Slowly but surely, the minds of the Colossi were torn from their immense bodies and stuffed hastily into the confines of the seven Gaia stones. At their removal, the titanic remains of the Colossi, though still living, became still and heedless. Though many have become hidden and shrouded by the eons, the Exalted Mountains on Siv’en mark the remains of Ni’Thorne, and it is said that a great desert of raw ice still blooms forth from the body of Hoargraskr, who was slain at the very crown of Gaia.
Then, the Star Dragons helped the Ithquent construct the The Crystal Tower, placing therein the seven Gaia Stones to be guarded for all time. Syros, weary at his battles, diminished from the world, leaving Sol the Gatekeeper to watch over the Tower and guard it with a lake of acid, so that Gaia need never suffer again the torture of The Destroyers.
Now it was that the Children of Gaia began to count their days again, and once again scattered to the far reaches of The Mother. The Precursors and Star Dragons scattered with them, mating and proliferating in their own ways, but never wholly forgetting the times of Eras’ evil. Nor was the power of the Colossi completely vanquished, but by sheer serendipity it would not reemerge for many an age.