Epool River

The Epool River runs through the south of Bahrl, an island province of Ionia. It remains an active feature of the region, but it is remembered above all for a slaughter carried out along its banks during the Noxian invasion of the First Lands, an event that bound together the fates of two figures central to the Order of Shadow. Following the disastrous battle at the Placidium of Navori, Noxus deliberately reformulated its invasion into a protracted war of attrition. Striking against the province of Bahrl, Noxian forces landed at the mouth of the Epool River and pushed inland, meeting only disorganized bands of locals defending their home from the returning invaders. Among the attackers was a reluctant vanguard of conscripted child soldiers, a cruel practice used by only the most devious commanders in Boram Darkwill's empire, sent forward because Ionian warriors would hesitate to strike down a supposed innocent. One of those children was Shieda Kayn, whose first day in battle was expected to be his last. As his young comrades were cut down or fled, Kayn showed no fear, dropping the heavy sword he could barely lift and snatching up a fallen farmer's sickle just as the Noxian regulars swept in from the flank. The carnage that followed was staggering: farmers, hunters, and even a handful of vastaya were butchered without ceremony along the river. Two days later, after word of the killing had spread through the southern provinces, the Order of Shadow came upon the grisly scene. Their leader, Zed, understood that the area held no tactical value and that the massacre had been staged as a message that Noxus would show no mercy. Amid the mud he found a boy of no more than ten still leveling his broken sickle at him, eyes burning with a fury that could not be taught. In that abandoned Noxian survivor Zed saw a weapon to be turned against those who had sent him, and he took Kayn as his personal student.