The Hengeykai, or eastern changing breeds, see the tellurian as being divided into twelve ages. The First Age was a time of perfect harmony, when spirit and matter where one. Some great catastraphe happened that led to the Second Age, this was when reality as we know it came into existence. The Third Age is the age of legends. Lost in pre-history, this is the time of fabled Atlantis. The Fourth Age is where our earliest remembered history began. Men becamed civilized and farming communities sprang up across the globe. What follows is mostly White Wolf's World of Darkness 101, with a little tweeking for my story.

Early man shared his world with many strange and dangerous beings. The creatures that made the most impact on him where the changing breeds, the vampires, the fae, and the wise-the magi.
When mankind began gathering in large cities, the garou instigated the Imperium. They began viscously culling the population. When the other changing breeds objected, the garou attacked them so savagely that they were forced into hiding, so much so that the garou thought they had wiped most of them out. The garou continued with the Imperium until about two thousand years ago, finally figuring out that this was perhaps not the best way to handle the "monkey" problem. But the damage had already been done. Humanity developed a callous view towards nature, a mad urge to tame the wilderness. They also became subject to the Delirium, a racial fear of werewolves-preventing any chance of the enlightened garou ever directly helping humanity.
The vampires where a double edged sword. On one hand humans were the vampires prey. On the other, the vampires had every reason to want to see humanities cities thrive. The vampires protected the cities as best as they could from the wolves.
The fae, always a capricous lot, sometimes aided man and sometimes terrorized him. For the most part they kept to there Trods. They sometimes helped inspire mortal artwork, or joined in their celebrations.
The mages usually aided mankind. They were scholars and healers, the spiritual leaders and inventors of tools. Different traditions seldom met, but when they did they usually united to help the unenlighted.
This was the ancient world. It wasn't until the Inquisition(around 1205a.d.) that life was dramatically altered. But before we can cover that we must look at the history of Tremere.

Tremere was born sometime in Pepin the Shorts reign, and served as a knight to his succesor, Charlemagne. As his king's efforts to supress the Saxons became more and more savage, Tremere began to question that he was truly doing god's will. When Charlemagne ordered the execution or four thousand five hundred hostages, Tremere protested and was run through with a sword. Left to die with the rest of the heathens, he was saved by a mage from the Hermetic Order. The mage could tell that Tremere had the gift. A few hundred years later(around 985) Tremere was an accomplished Master. He was head of his own order, House Tremere. Yet inside Tremere was fighting a war. At times he felt he should try to rule the world to save it, other times he felt humanity was a greedy, evil blight on an otherwise beautiful place.
House Tremere was located in the Transylvanian mountains, and competition between it and the Ventrue and Tzimicie vampire clans was fierce. This led the House to extensively study the undead. This culminated in the events that took place in 1022: Tremere and seven of his highest ranking mages became vampires. In the years that followed, they began secretely embracing other mages.
Clan Tremere could not keep it's secret for long. Even though it's blend of magic and vampiric disciplines was strong, it could not stand against the Hermetic Order. They went into hiding, dropping out of mage society and fully embracing the world of the undead. Tremere knew his clan could only gain respect from the other clans if they were on equal footing. Their blood was too thin. Clan Tremere searched for the lair of an antideluvian. They eventually discovered the hiding place of the progenitor of clan Salubri, Saulot.
In 1133, Tremere diablerized the sleeping antideluvian, becoming more powerful-closer to the blood of Caine. But this had an unexpected effect, Tremere began slipping in and out of topor. During his periods of sleep, he charged the seven to guard him and shape the clan into a powerful, cohesive organization.
Clan Tremere kept to the shadows, perhaps sensing the turbulence about to be unleashed by the Inquisition.

Early in the thirteenth century, the older vampires enjoyed much power and wealth. There only fear was the prophesy of Gehenna: the antideluvians would arise from thier long sleep and, unable to live off the blood of humans, devour thier children. Most vampires paid little attention to this prophecy. They lorded over their own children as much as they did the humans in their territories. While the vampires didn't exactly reveal what they were, most citizens knew who to fear and serve. This all changed when the Roman Catholic Church began it's pogrom.
During the Inquisition, the older vampires began to know real fear. Many young vampires chose this time to revolt against their sires. This was known as the Anarch movement. Until this time, most vampire clans had very little contact. Now facing both the threat of the masses and the anarchs, vampiric xenophobia was set aside. Old enemnitys were forgotten for the sake of survival.
There was also a gathering of forces in the mage societies. The Order of Reason began gathering like-minded mages. They preferred a rational reality, one that could benifit the common man. Though this was a far cry from the pseudo-theocracy of the time, the Order was able to use the Inquisition to help route out the wyld, "devil-worshipping" traditions.
By 1450, the Order of Reason was winnig the ascenscion war. They had strengthened the Guantlet(the barrier between the spirit and material world), forcing out many realms. Arcadia could no longer be reached, and many fae were stranded here on earth. In response to this, mages being persecuted by the Order began to band together. This led to the Council of the Seven Traditions.
Also in 1450, the first steps towards what would be known as the Camarilla were taken. For the most part, the narchs had been defeated. The vampires knew that they would have to stay together to survive further attacks from the church. In 1486, the largest assembly of vampires ever known conveened in Spain. Most of there own free will, but there were also quite a few anarch prisoners. When the Elders started to debate their punishment, a sixth generation malkavian named Vantessa addressed the assembly. She said that most of the anarchs had revolted because of abuse from the Elders. She said that an act of mercy now would be repaid in full, but an act of cruelty would also be repaid. The Elders scoffed and continued their debate. Vantessa and several like minded vampires freed the rebels. The Sabbat was born.
The Elders began the Camarilla, it's rulership based on age-it's philosophy to cherish what was left of their humanity. The Sabbat's leadership was based on ability and it's philosophy was to test the limits of the beast. Through generations the Camarilla dismissed Gehenna as a myth, while the Sabbat made it it's mission to prepare for it. The two sects warred constantly. They only agreed on the masquerade, they had to hide lest another Inquisition befall them. Unaware of the ascension war, their masquerade helped the Order of Reason put an end to the childish notions of creatures of the night.
Durring this time the Garou fought to preserve the Wyld, but the Weaver and the Wyrm were growing stronger every year. The humans were developing stronger and stronger weapons. Wolves were being hunted en mass.

And in Vienna, Tremere awoke from a long dream. Finally he knew what he was born to do.

The Apocalypse was beginning.