Tamiyo/Tamiyo's Stories

Tamiyo traveled through the Multiverse collecting stories on scrolls. She used these stories as catalysts for her magic. After her death, her son Nashi took possession of the scrolls, carrying on her legacy.

Iron-Bound Scrolls

Among these stories, three are kept in iron bands. She promised to never open them again. One of these stories describes the destruction of Serra's Realm. Another of these stories is the story of New Phyrexia, from Urza's creation of Karn, who created Argentum and Memnarch, and the plane's corruption. The third was her failsafe if she was to die. The story would live on with her personality and some memories. One of these stories was later warped by Emrakul to allow her to be sealed in Innistrad's Moon.

Story of New Phyrexia

While compleated and leading New Phyrexia's Invasion of the Multiverse on Kamigawa, Tamiyo corrupted one of the bound scrolls into the following story:

Many eons ago there was a great wizard by the name of Urza. So wise was he that all the mages of the Multiverse flocked to him for advice; so powerful was he that only his brother Mishra stood as a potential rival. But Mishra hated him bitterly, and soon a war began.

The war spanned decades and took untold lives. Worse, it allowed evil without compare to blossom. An awful affliction spread through Mishra's armies—a black oil that changed everything in its path.

The wizard Urza creates an heir from pure, unvarnished metal. He names him Karn. The same spark of creation that birthed him burns brightly in his breast. Karn, too, must create. As a sculptor chipping at marble, he shapes his world. When it is done—the creatures named and granted boons, the climate carefully crafted, the earth shaped and polished—he appoints his own successor, Memnarch, to oversee it.

Memnarch, the heir's heir, is a copy of a copy—a faded image of Urza himself. It longs for the power its grandfather wielded as easily as a poet wields a brush. It longs for its parents' ability to create. It longs to see more. Over years it plucks life from this plane and that, settling them all within this garden, waiting for the flowers to come. And they do, but they aren't the flowers Memnarch expects: these bloom in black oil. Their choking roots wrap around that which is alive and whole. Soon, the whole garden drowns beneath the oil. The heir returns to discover his home has been torn asunder.

This story, however, ended on a more positive note, referencing Elspeth Tirel and the end of the invasion on New Phyrexia:

Once upon a time there was a great evil, one that threatened to swallow the planes of the Multiverse whole. Unfeeling and uncaring, it infected the hearts of those it encountered.

There was someone who fought against it.

There was a protector in white.

Other Stories

• He Who Frightens the Sun - A story about greed. Origin: Kamigawa
• Original - From the creation of the autonomous Myr. Origin: Mirrodin
• Winter's Howl - About a woman losing her husband to the cold. Origin: Dominaria during the Ice Age
• Before her compleation, Tamiyo stored all of her memories within a scroll, to be animated after her death.
• The story of a plant sprouting to life from a single particle of sand, each tendril growing to impossible heights, controlled by the will of its creator. A weapon born from the earth.
• The story of a thief disappearing under a veil of invisibility to escape.
• The story of the Fomori empire and Loot.

Tamiyo's Journal

Tamiyo's journal was a bound collection of research notes originally written by the planeswalker during her investigation of Innistrad. She passed the journal on to Jenrik, after whose death it was discovered by Jace Beleren. At least 14 entries include the phrase "there's more to Avacyn's madness." All known entries are listed below.

References