We're excited to continue Coast to Coast Casual (CCC), a blog series written by East2West, published on MTG Cardsmith.
Phase 3 (Mirran Invasion)
Almost done with the backstory stuff I promise, if you made it this far you are a true legend. To be clear all original Phyrexians are dead by the point we even see Mirrodin for the first time. Despite this Phyrexia has been a massive influence over Mirrodin for eons. Mirrodin (Originally known as Argentum) was created by Karn using the Mirari (an ancient and extremely powerful artifact), at this point it was mostly metallic and mostly barren. To govern Argentum Karn created Memnarch, a spider like golem. Karn unknowingly tracked Phyrexian oils on the plane causing Memnarch to become corrupted. Memnarch now started having thoughts not dictated by Karn and soon he decided he wanted to become a planeswalker just like Karn. Memnarch then began the process of changing Argentum into Mirrodin. Memnarch kidnapped sentient beings from other planes and artificially enhanced their progress in an effort to cultivate their planeswalker sparks.
After some time due the Phyrexian oil caused Mycosynth began to form on the plane. Mycosynth is a sort of metallic fungus that can turn metal into living flesh and cause flesh to turn to living metal. Mycosynth accelerated the evolution and emergence of sentients. Also from this process Blinkmoths were born and Blinkmoth serum began to be created. Blinkmoth serum when ingested causes one to experience a higher level of thinking for a short amount of time. It's highly addictive and it wasn't long before Memnarch became dependant, wearing down his already frayed sanity. Karn witnessing this tried to step in but Memnarch locked him from Mirrodin.
The band of heroes Slobad, Glissa, and Geth managed to defeat Memnarch and thus peace was restored to Mirrodin. This was not the end of Phyrexia on this plane, Memnarch was simply an omen. If you recall many original Phyrexians had been implanted with metal and the Phyresis process had adapted, this made the metallic world of Mirrodin the perfect place for it to spread. At first it was quite, spreading slowly, but than it ramped up to 11 with the rise of the Praetors. Now their actual origin is debated upon, some say they were formed in the core of mirrodin by a mixture of the oils and the colored mana flowing down there, others say they are the Bringers of Dawn corrupted by the oils, either way their rise is what signaled the true beginning of the war. In the Dominarian invasion Phyrexia only had access to colorless and black mana but now all five colors were infected. I don't want to drag this on any longer than it already is so if you want to read about them here's a link: Read More
After a long war the Mirran resistance was defeated, most of its heroes converted to Phyrexia, and what remnants were left had to retreat. With nowhere else to go the Mirrans ended up in the domain of the red praetor Urabrask. Lucky for the Mirrans red turns out to be the most resistant color to the Phyrexian infection. Many red aligned Phyrexians show some amount of compassion and rebellion, not a large amount but some nonetheless. Urabrask decided to help the Mirrans. Allowing them to live unimpeded in his domain. We end our story with what little is left of the Mirrans hiding in the domain of a praetor that could turn on them at any time as the other four praetors bear down upon them.
Back to Part 1: Birth of Phyrexia
To be continued in Part 4: Exhibits
East2West is an aspiring writer from NJ currently seeking fame and fortune on the internet. She's been playing Magic since Zendikar block (the original one) and is a commander player with one deck for each two color pair and one for each single color. The only non EDH deck she plays is her own personal Pauper brew, Pauper Eggs. Follow her on her newly created and probably soon to be underused twitter @East2WestMTG.
