	Under the rule of Prince Alexus Thanatos, the County of Azha had
prospered, but had become so evil and corrupt that the citizens had
become frightened. At the center of this fear were the terrible fits
of insanity that the Prince was known to fall into.  Although usually
a competent and wise ruler, these fits would turn him into a raging
psychopath with lust for blood and destruction. It was believed that
the Prince had struck a bargin with a powerful evil wizard to secure
magical powers for himself.  However, the Prince had failed to pay
the wizard in full and he was placed under a powerful curse. 
Whatever the cause, the Prince's fits became more and more common,
and he would not be satisfied with the mass executions of Azha's many
criminals.  The old and defenseless were kidnapped and slaughtered in
the dungeon of Azha Castle's imposing Dark Tower.
		Soon, it became all too obvious to the citizens of Azha what was
happening, and some delegates of the people escaped the Prince's
agents and crossed the border into Tsarven, in search of assistance. 
These agents followed the escapees into the Empire, and managed to
kill all but one, Michael Paleologus.  Paleologus was rescued by
Governor Samis al-Hazen of Sindh and brought to the Emperor in
Tsarven.  After hearing the description of the atrocities to the
north, The Emperor ordered al-Hazen to march on Azha and free the
province.  Upon hearing of this, the Prince became furious, and the
rumors of his magical powers became fact, as he began to raise
legions of soldiers from among the dead (including those he had
recently slaughtered).  Soon, this march had become a full scale war,
and the Emperor himself, surrounded by his Imperial Guard of
paladins, moved into Azha.  Soon, the tide turned and with the aid of
the gold dragon, Elias, the citadel of Azha was breached. Cornered in
the Dark Tower, Thanatos went completely insane and lit captives on
fire and threw them down to the horrified Imperial Guardsmen outside.
Prince al-Hazen came up with a desperate plan, and with a dozen of the
Guardsmen, dug below the tower and breached into the dungeon.  The horrors
they witnessed in that place were enough to turn the Tsarvani prince's 
hair storm grey.  No one knows what they saw for sure, but they emerged
from the hole with 100 captives and the severed head of Thanatos in a bag.
The war had ended, after 5 years and thousands of dead, mostly the victims
of the brutal massacres.  The Emperor ordered the once great city of Azha
razed to the ground and left a small garrison to reopen trade from the 
north.  The Dark Tower remained, however in the ruins of the once proud
Azha Citadel, as no one ever dared enter it again.  The hole was blocked
in and forgotten and life went on.  
	In the aftermath of all of this, chroniclers report that all 12 of the
paladins who entered the Tower met strange and terrible ends, and tales
of a curse spread.  Samis al-Hazen of Sindh, the leader of that group
of 13, was found in the Imperial Palace in Tsarven, his throat sliced open
and the knife in hand.  Chroniclers report a look of sheer terror on the 
face of the corpse that couldn't be explained.  Although it was investigated,
no one could ever prove it was anything more than a suicide and the book was
closed on this terrible epoch.
