The Bedlam universe is an alternate timeline from our own. Throughout it's history, Magic as ebbed and flowed, surging every few thousand years, before falling off to near nonexistence. The last cycle saw the last thousand years of humanity develop very much like our own history, with no known magic users. (There's some belief, however, that some events, like the Salem Witch Trials might have actually been magic related, but that's still hotly debated.)
This document follows the historical ages as outlined here.
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The Middle Ages were a time of very low magic. The Enclave was at it's lowest in recorded history; a mere twenty members. The Grand High Association of Wizards was down to as few as five. No new magic users were born during this time; those that survived were the few immortal or near-immortal individuals from the last magical age.
In the late 1930s, reports of people with magical abilities started to increase. The Nazis were one of the first groups to start taking these claims seriously, leveraging fledgling magic users in many of their campaigns. Hitler started a special corps of magic users, the Wurdiz, which secretly trained in both elemental and dark magic.
On D-Day, the Wurdiz made their first public appearance, completely crushing the first several waves of the allied invasion. Operation Overlord might have been a total disaster if an unknown group of ancient Magic users had not arrived to salvage the invasion and for the Wurdiz to retreat. This group, the Enclave, already had members in many world governments and quickly signed treaties with the Allies to provide assistance and support of the war effort.
Over the course of the war, the Wurdiz and the Enclave clashed in numerous battles. It quickly became clear that Hitler no longer controlled the Wurdiz, and they were vying for their own world domination. At the end of the war, many of the remaining German forces turned on the Wurdiz, aiding the allies in the invasion of Berlin. However, the Wurdiz did not take the prospect of defeat well, and they burned Berlin to the ground. Over a million people died. This was the highest magic-related death toll in the modern age.
Without Berlin as a focal point, tensions between Russian and the US rose much sharper. East and West Germany were still created, however Berlin was left a wasteland. Western Germany's capital was instead the city of Bonn. After cooperation broke down and Eastern Germany was added to the Eastern Bloc, the United States signed the Treaty of Bonn, declaring the Soviet occupation of Eastern Germany an illegal foreign invasion. This declaration lead to open hostilities in German, and the Five Days War.
The Five Days War (which actually lasted closer to seven) began on August 4th, 1989. It was the only open hostilities between the US and the USSR. It was brief, but very bloody. It was only stopped by the Council of Mages and the Enclave, who jointly hosted treaties between the Soviets and the US. During these talks the collapse of the USSR occurred, allowing the US to more directly influence the formation of the Russian Federation.
In the aftermath, relations with Russia were greatly improved, and Russia is now one of the US's closest allies. China, on the other hand, sees the United States and Russia as threats; the only thing prevents a new Cold War is the economic dependence China and the US have, thanks to the rise of cheap Chinese manufacturing, especially of electronics.
In November 2001, riots against magic users took place in Washington DC. The September 11th attacks had happened a few months prior, and it had been revealed that one of the terrorists was a low level magic user (P2A). The idea of magic users as terrorists rocked the nation and hastily laws were enacted to require the mass registration of all magic users, or 'magically influenced individuals'. These laws, added to the Patriot Act, have been challenged and upheld by the Supreme Court. Their final culmination was to amend the Constitution to bar a magic user from becoming President, or holding federal office.
Thanks to massive lobbying by The Enclave, The International Association of Magic, and The Grand High Association of Wizards, the laws against magic users have been reduced and improved, but there's still a very anti-magic sentiment in may places across the country. Recent public opinion has been swaying, however, as Enclave members or magic users on police forces have been saving lives, or stopping natural disasters.
Since the DC Riots, however, there have been an increased in the amount of crime committed by magic users. Some are likening them to Super Villains from comic books; and a few have patterned themselves as such. The Enclave had recently been given full disclosure in the handling of such individuals.
TODO: Update this with an alternative version of Donald Trump's presidency, MAGA, George Floyd, etc.