[CaptainSarathai]

As promised, I paid careful attention to your fluff as you were my first brave customer. It ran a little long, but it explains your army quite well, from their pride to their choice of skinks rather than saurus, and their stealthiness. It seems a little epic, which can be a bad thing in a back story- kinda like saying that you defeated abaddon, but I think it's still very believable. If you notice, I named your temple city Temo'plai, a play on Thermopylae. The whole story is based somewhat on the 300, as it chronicles the fall of a proud and intelligent warrior city.

The Lament of Temo'plai
In southern Lustria stands a lonesome, shaded temple. It’s once gilded walls are overrun with vines and jungle plants, and its towers have been torn down. Within its dusty corridors, the footfalls of dozens of small feet can be heard skittering through the wreckage and on the darkest of nights, a dim glow of eldritch magic can still be seen atop the battered ziggurat. The temple city of Temo’plai is now a blasted waste, and a visible scar from the great battle against Chaos.

The denizens of Temo’plai had been children of Chotec, the most fleet footed and impetuous of all the Old Ones. Their skinks served as speedy messengers across the length of the Lizardman Empire. Their saurus served as elite fighters in the ranks of the Old One’s armies. Their close proximity to the southern pole meant that they were less affected by the relative cold, and oft beset by daemonic raiders and skirmishers. Gifted by Chotec with bright and arrogant hides of red and orange, the hosts of Temo’plai were a fearsome sight on the battlefield.

When the Great Incursion of Chaos came up from the South, the war that was eventually ended by the sacrifice of the great Lord Kroak, Temo’plai found itself standing as the first line of defense. They sent many of their saurus warriors and cohorts of skinks out into the jungles, taking upon themselves to fight the holding action against the waves and waves of Daemons who attacked their sacred lands. The Slann of Tempo’plai was confident that the undefeated warriors of his city would be enough to buy time for the city’s fastest runners to carry word to the other temples scattered under the broad jungle canopy. The daemon incursion had made communication through the webs of magic difficult. Throughout Lustria, slann dropped dead or were driven into madness as the taint of Chaos infected their communication network like poison in the bloodstream of a gecko.

After fourteen days of brutal fighting, it became apparent that even the vast army of Temo’plai had been overrun. Packs of Fleshhounds and wicked monstrosities from the realm of Daemons began appearing outside the city walls. No aid had come from the other temples, but the citizens of Temo’plai were not ready to accept defeat. The remaining skinks of the city took up arms and joined the last few of the Saurus at the walls of the city. Once again, a bloody battle raged between the daemons and the lizard host. The Daemons used fell magic, calling upon storms of flesh-altering lightning, or plagues of flies and spiders to spread sickness among the defenders. Temo’plai had seen this all before however, and it was used to doing battle against scourges of Chaos. The bodies of Daemons began piling against the walls, and their legion was held for a time. Both armies were too overcome with pride; the Daemon Princes demanded that the temple city be crushed utterly, as an example to the rest of the continent. The slann, great Tennu of the first generation, refused to surrender his prized temple city.

As casualties mounted, it seemed that the battle might be won. Runners had returned bearing news of a great army forming to the north, preparing to repel the incursion. But just as Tennu felt the taste of victory, a battered Saurus atop an equally wounded Carnosaur came crashing through the Daemon host like a thunderbolt. Reigning the enormous beast in in front of his master, he exclaimed that even the great host of Temo’plai was doomed if they did not retreat. He had seen the battle in the jungle, and the army outside the walls was but a fraction of the power that the Daemons had summoned to the world. He told Tennu that the foot soldiers of the Ruinous ones were beyond number. He demanded that Tennu retreat from the city with his Temple Guards, and leave a handful of defenders behind to try to hold the city. Tennu initially refused, but almost as punctuation to the brave warrior’s statements, a wave of Daemons that stretched to the very coasts themselves were spotted from the towers along the walls. Tennu reluctantly left his temple city, spirited away with his guard. The defense fell to the bold Saurus Warrior, Karnag. Karnag asked for volunteers to stay with the city. Even the resolute Saurus was moved when every remaining warrior in the city bellowed it’s oath to defend the temple to their last breath. Karnag was a great warrior, but an even better general. He held no illusions that any of them would survive against the coming onslaught, and he ordered several skinks and a detachment of the Saurus to leave the city, so that they could join with the great northern host and fight later to avenge their city.

As they left, Karnag mounted his Carnosaur Garak-gar, and prepared for battle. He ordered his skinks to retreat to the streets and alleys, and to conceal themselves as best they could amongst the stones of their temple.
When the Daemons descended upon the temple city, and broke through the tiny force left at the walls, they found the streets deserted and empty. They poured into the city and suddenly Karnag launched his trap. Skinks with blowpipes and javelins rained missiles down from the tops of buildings, and brave skinks hidden below sprung up to attack the daemons with fierce clubs and bone-knives. Packed into the city as they were, the Daemons had no room to retreat, and stumbled over themselves to retaliate. As the remaining saurus, led by Karnag and Garak-gar, descended the ziggurat steps and charged into the melee, the Daemons were routed and driven from the city. After the first day without Tennu, the battle was in the hands of the Lizardmen.

At the next morning, troops of fast moving Daemonettes of Slaanesh attacked the city. They stalked through the streets, and a running battle between the hunting skinks and the deft troops of the Prince of Pleasure broke out across Temo’plai. As night fell, the war cries of the skinks could be heard outside the walls, while the bodies of the Daemonettes scattered to the winds. The next day, the great Tzeentch took his turn. Houses burned and the streets turned to molten slag as the warriors of Tzeentch clashed with Temo’plai’s proud defenders. Skink Priests met the magical onslaught and after a ferocious battle of wills, Tzeentch’s forces were expelled from the city. Nurgle waited three whole days before he attacked, sending three great plagues and infectious disease to harass the defenders before lumbering mountains of filth and corruption broke through the walls. The beasts toppled the great towers of Temo’plai, and their sickly roots spread along the streets, killing all they touched. A desperate battle to defend the spawning pools began, but Nurgle claimed a small measure of victory as one of his lumbering beasts fell into one of the sacred ponds and tainted it with filth that would last for a thousand years. Garak-gar and packs of lumbering Kroxigors finally brought the foul beasts low, and Nurgle found his armies thwarted.

The king of Daemons, Khorne, loosed his armies against the exhausted defenders. He did not wait at all, attacking in the night. The city burned, and the raging inferno gave light enough for the battle. In the streets, waves of Bloodletters cut down all they came across while the skinks fired volleys of arrows and darts at the frenzied mobs. The fierce warriors were outsmarted by the scattered defenders, and the priests once again came to the rescue and banished many of the fell daemons back to the ether.

As the sun rose, Karnag saw his city a smoldering ruin, the spawning pools of the Saurus a steaming mire of corruption, and the warriors of Temo’plai exhausted and battered. Outside the walls, Khorne had sent a greater Daemon of his own, and rallied the entire of menagerie of the four powers to crush the city finally. Karnag brought his warriors together at the top of the Ziggurat to make their final stand.

The Daemon horde surged up the steps of the massive temple, the skinks firing volley after volley of missiles into the packs, sending waves of daemons tumbling down the slopes like an avalanche. It did little to halt the will of the Chaos Gods however, and battle was met with a fierce war cry nearly drowned out by the din of weapons. At the pinnacle of the ziggurat, Karnag and Garak-gar battled against the BloodThirster of Khorne.

The fighting went back and forth from dawn until dusk. The two champions had exchanged terrible blows, while the armies and wreaked destruction of an immense scale below them. Mustering all of his strength, Karnag struck the Greater Daemon a telling blow, splitting the creature’s skull to the shoulders, before slumping lifeless in Garak-gar’s saddle. Just as it had in the first battle in the jungle, the loyal beast fought its way free of the Daemon horde and fled into the jungles of Lustria, heading north. A few of the warriors of Temo’plai manage to also escape through the path Garak-Gar carved through the daemons, though the rest perished atop the massive Ziggurat.

Garak-Gar carried his master 270miles to the nearest temple city, the remaining survivors of Temo’plai running alongside him nonstop all the way. When they arrived, many were only barely alive enough to spread word of the city’s fate to the amassing army of the North. Tennu was enraged and defeated- his city had been the first to fall. In a small victory, Karnag slowly regained his strength under the light of the equatorial sun. He too was overcome with rage that he had not died amongst the defenders at Temo’plai, but he was prepared to fight in the coming war to free the rest of the continent from Chaos.

Years later, when Lustria was cleansed of Chaos, Tennu and Karnag returned to find their home ruined. Amazingly, a tiny force of skinks had held out amidst the ruins, fighting the same guerilla war which Karnag had begun so long ago. They had defended the remaining spawning pools, and Tennu saw that the city could be rebuilt. Exhausted from the fighting however, he retired to his ziggurat, and was rarely seen again. The spawning pits of the saurus were destroyed however. The few surviving Warriors and Temple Guard would be the last of Temo’plai. Karnag knew that the weight of the defense would fall to the skinks, which had proven their worth against the forces of Chaos an hundred times over. The army of Temo’plai became an army of secrecy and shadows. They were experts of hit-and-run attacks. They lost none of the ferocity of Chotec; indeed, they had gained more respect for his idolatry of pursuing the enemy, after they vowed to never leave a daemon alive in battle, even if it meant the extinction of their city. Karnag had become a veteran and a legend himself, and his constant exposure to the arcane storm of the war seemed to prolong both his and Garak-gar’s life indefinitely. He has been seen at the head of the armies of Temo’plai wherever they gather in force.