Three thousand years of history have been spent converting a once-habitable continent into a frozen wasteland. The tree of life is gone. The god of destruction called Vrtra's Flame took or destroyed it. The population has migrated south toward warmth. Cities that cannot sustain themselves are being buried in sand. Contact between surviving communities is growing rarer. Industrial skills are disappearing with the craftspeople who carried them. The continent is moving slowly but unmistakably toward extinction, and the game takes place in the period before that process becomes irreversible.