Garden Gathering Most of the plants that grew in the Royal Gardens are now very rare but specimens can still be found out in the wild. Duke's Daffodil.

by Steve Seigh. Blades of vengeance map. 07 March 2019.

Until 20+ years ago, the 'Guardians' and 'Defiants' were not a thing.The Timeline link describes well how the factions came to be.King Aedraxis opens the Ward enough that the Vigil are able to send their own power down to create Ascended. These Ascended 'Guardians' (mostly Mathosians/Elves/Dwarves) also fought the 'defiant heretics' (just Eth and Bahmi at the time) who allied with Aedraxis with the deal of getting a new homeland in return (which was a lie), and all the room to experiment with magitech they'd ever want (for Orphiel). At this point, the Defiants were still not a faction.Later on, in the aftermath of defeating Aedraxis, the Ward is weakened and Rifts become FAR more common. So eventually, everyone has to retreat to the last major protection - Port Scion (the 2nd largest Mathosian territory). Zareph welcomes the Guardians, but also enrages them by allowing magitech wardstones to protect the city, and letting Orphiel live and help (likely partially due to his attachment to Asha Catari). During this time, the Ascended plus Eth/Bahmi helpers try to save as much of the land as possible, with limited effect.While they're away helping Stonefield, Alsbeth betrays everyone and opens Death upon Port Scion. She sabotages the magitech there to instead welcome the Death Plane in, killing many and Zareph barely contains the situation before also dying.So then the lines are drawn.

The Guardians then feel they have a holy mission to oppose the magitech heretics that keep causing problems for the world, and they move to the already-being-setup fortress of Sanctum.The Defiants, even lacking Ascended (except Asha who could be considered Semi-Ascended in ways), however manage to retake the library of Meridian from the Abyssal cult, and use it as their base of operations as they attempt to make themselves known as a true force on Telara, not just 'troublesome defiers'.Around this time, the Kelari arrive. Their islands have been wrecked over time by the weakening of the Ward, allowing Akylios to greater affect their sea, and Maelforge to greater affect their land.

The survivors barely make it through an exodus to Freemarch, and are welcomed by the Defiant.In the 'normal' timeline, the Guardians take their Ascended, push through Defiant lines, and sack Meridian. The survivors of that then hide away and try to make their own Ascended. Both factions gradually/eventually fall to the Dragons and Regulos himself, and 20 years in the future, at the moment when the Defiants finally crack the code of Ascension, the world is ending. It's this that is the Terminus starting zone, as we take a time travel failsafe (mysteriously set up by Orphiel) to go to the 'present day' and bolster the Defiant forces, stopping the end of the world that the Guardians couldn't stop alone.At this time as well, the Vigil appears to have awoken the masses of Ascended (aside from the Guardian leaders) that went to 'sleep' after stopping Aedraxis. Laser league rc artillery. Whatever plan they have is still vague, but the Guardians trust in it.Sooo yeah:-during Lv 5-35ish questing, the factions are hugely at odds, trying to secure their core regions, while snapping at each other whenever possible.-in more Lv 35-50 questing, this somewhat changes.

The factions take a more diplomatic tone, negotiating with each other whenever necessary, and trying to get neutral factions across Mathosia to help their respective causes.