Every single troll, whether they know it or not, has an ANCESTOR of shared blood and sigil.
Lineage records used to be kept quite laboriously throughout this planet's history — though most of them have been lost to the sands of time by now, due to the general structural decline this society experienced in its waning sweeps.
It used to be so easy to know where you came from. Any troll who wished to find out about their ancestry could do so without much effort. Now, knowledge on the subject is scarce at best, morsels of information pieced together through cross-analysis between fictionalized historical art pieces and word of mouth.
In the past, it was a commonly held belief that a descendant was fated to either follow in their ancestor's footsteps or subvert their legacies entirely. Some of these figures were heralded as champions of virtue or condemned as ruthless villains, and as such, many fables have since been crafted regarding the nature of particularly remarkable lives — figures that broke the mold of importance in one way or another, their actions crystallizing into fantastical epics and permanently etched into the cultural consciousness.
But no good story ever comes from a place of complete fiction.
Our twelve main actors's progenitors stand as special cases in history — as their descendants will also be, provided everything goes according to plan. These ancestors all had a significant hand in crafting the new era their world was ushered into after their passing, as much as they had a hand in destroying it. Key pieces set to push certain events into motion, as tragic as they were regretfully necessary.
Their tale is one that is commonly referenced, but never truly grasped in its entirety. An unfortunate consequence of technical inaccuracies tinged by personal bias, and the loss of reliable information on the subject.
Do not worry. This story will also be pieced together as we go along.
It does feel as if I'm forcing too much information on you right from the start, doesn't it? I apologize. A measure of exposition is quite necessary here, however. There are a number of things that would not make much sense, had you not been given the courtesy of a slight pre-briefing — even if some of the broached topics feel all too familiar.
Oh? I can tell you're curious. Hm... Allow me to give you a small hint, then. You might remember these words from earlier. Take them as a sign of things to come and a nod at what has already been.
It all has something to do with a curse by blood.
Now, let us pick up from where we left off.