Disclaimer: Descendants is owned completely by disney and I do not own any of it. The only things I own is an idea.
Once upon a time, The worlds of the magical and the mortal were kept separate. Mortals feared magical beings due to their power and magical beings saw mortals as selfish creatures who only knew how to take. That changed when the young fairy Maleficent found a friend in a human peasant. The two grew up together and as the years passed Maleficent's friendship grew into love. But the peasant didn't feel the same way. His heart belonged to the princess of the land but felt she would not notice someone so poor. One day while together under the shade of a tree Maleficent admitted her feelings to the young man. But he spurred her advances. Heartbroken, she ran into the night. Unbeknownst to either of them, the peasant had been followed by two men, members of the army of the king, who feared Maleficent for her immense power. Caught with her, the peasant lied and said he had been trying to lure her with him but she'd found out the truth. Believing him, the two went after her and, using weapons of iron, struck down Maleficent with what they believed to be a killing blow. Then, they took her wings as a trophy of their victory.
But what they had not realized was that Maleficent was far more resilient then they thought. While painfully wounded, she was still alive. She tried returning home to the other fairies, but they treated her with scorn and disdain for having fallen in love with a human and banished her. Hurt, humiliated and angry at the world, Maleficent swore vengeance on all who had wronged her.
Since it was thought that he had helped slay Maleficent, the peasant was granted any one wish from the king. The peasant asked for the chance to court his daughter and the king agreed. The peasant and the princess fell in love and eventually bore a daughter named Aurora. They were so filled with joy, they invited all, Fairies and humans to the child's christening.
When Maleficent heard of the news she was furious. Not only was she angry that the person who betrayed her was now so happy but she felt a sliver of pain at the fact he had fallen in love and bore a child with another. She crashed the child's christening and placed a curse upon her to die on her sixteenth birthday by pricking her finger on a spinning wheel.
After that, the stories well known. Aurora was saved from her curse by a handsome prince and he slew Maleficent and all was well.
But that was only the beginning.
Once she had died, Maleficent's spirit descended into the underworld where it was found by the lord of the dead, Hades. Maleficent could see that Hades despised his life trapped in the gloom and darkness. Like her, he had been wronged by one he had once trusted and had committed despicable actions because of it. And the one who had done so was now a ruler with a proud child.
Disgusted at the unfairness of the world, Maleficent came up with a plan. She decided that the so-called kings and queens were nothing more than hypocrites who wore noble faces and that they must be done away with.
But she could not do so alone, so she made a deal with hades. He would give her the most powerful souls of those who may follow her and give her command of the worst monsters of Tartarus. In return, once she had overthrown the nobility, he would with temples and sacrifices all in his honor like the other gods of Olympus. Intrigued by the offer, Hades agreed.
Maleficent went and resurrected the souls of the vilest villains of the world. The evil queen Grimhilde, the sorcerer Jafar, the ruthless Cruella de vill, and many others. While she loathed some of them for their actions, she saw they could be of use to her and asked for their allegiance. In exchange for granting their greatest desires.
She also searched among the living for soldiers. Recruiting the downtrodden, the poor, and the underclass, who all bore hatred for the royals they felt had done nothing while they starved and died.
Some however, refused Maleficent's offer. Judge Frollo, after his time being punished in the underworld wished to repent his sins and went into the world hoping to redeem himself. Prince Hans of the southern isles simply wanted freedom from his disturbed family.
Soon, Maleficent's army swelled with warriors from all around the world. They made their base in the first country they liberated, a poor place that once had an evil and corrupt king living there. They then started moving forward and gaining new land.
They struck against kingdoms all around the world from Corona, to Agrabah, to Arendelle, to even the small nations blossoming in the new world. But these kingdoms were strong. They banded together and pooled their resources to fight against Maleficent and her army.
After many years of fighting, the allied kingdoms came up with a plan. They attacked Maleficent's terrirtory and the people living their forcing her to withdraw her forces from their kingdoms to protect her own land. Then once all her soldiers were there, the allied kingdoms used magic to transport their soldiers out of the lands. Then three powerful beings, Zeus, Triton, and the Genie of the lamp, used their powers to cut Maleficent's lands off from the rest of the country she hadn't managed to conquer and created a magical barrier around the ends of it making sure none could escape and weakening the magical powers of those who lived there. It soon became known as the isle of the lost.
But there was still much to do. Knowing Maleficent's army had spies in the low class peoples, the kingdoms banished many of them to the isle. They also banished the families of those who had fought in the war believing that they could not be trusted either. They also spent years hunting down the creatures and monster Maleficent had used but instead of killing them, sent them to the isle as well hoping they would torment their former enemies. Even those who had been chosen to go straight were banished, fearing they would revert to their old villainous ways. Eventually the isle became a prison for the criminals of the kingdoms and their allies. Any who committed a crime would be banished their along with all who shared their blood. This caused crime to almost completely disappear.
Seeing how well they had worked together to protect their kingdoms, the alliance forged and interconnected group of kingdoms know as united kingdoms, led by the head of the alliance, King Adam. and their first act was to create a grand country where all could live out their dreams. They built it on the same part of land that they had disconnected the isle from in honor of their victory and named it Auradon. It soon sprouted into a place of magic and wonder.
On the Isle, things were a bit different. Downtrodden by her defeat, Maleficent at first simply wandered the island until she started seeing the plight of those who now lived there, many of them living in fear of monster, thieves, and the villains who lived there not to mention the dangers of starvation. Seeing no other option, Maleficent gathered her top generals and together they formed their own kingdom. While it had no name, it was a safe haven for the people of the isle where they could live somewhat peaceful lives under the protection of Maleficent. Soon, many more villages and homes appeared on the isle all under the protection of Maleficent and her people.
And so the years passed, and life on the isle and Auradon continued…..
Okay, I'm trying to break into the descendants fandom and I'm just hoping I do an alright job. For those wondering about this chapter it's basically something that has bothered me about the descendants universe and that is the idea that all of the people on the isle grew being all "Good is bad and bad is good." For a start that's just weird but for another it seems like a waist in storytelling. i could easily see a lot of the villains on the isle chilling out about the whole villainy thing and just raise their dang children. Id love to see that. I also felt like things in the descendants verse are always way more black and white than they should be and have too many holes or errors so I'm trying to fix that. Any way, here are some notes
Maleficent: For her I'm going with a mix of live action animation backstory. She's still done all the insanely bade stuff as in the animated film, but she did it for very sympathatic reasons that I will touch on later. And thus due to this, Mal and the isle will be very different too.
Hades: I think these two could very easily bond over shared pain. Like Maleficent, Hades had done some horrible stuff. But also like her, he has somewhat of a sympathetic reason. Think about it, would you be happy living in the underworld for literally all your life? So that might be part of why he helps her. She offers him the one thing he wants more than anything else: Repsect. Plus, it feels better than saying the heroes revived the villains just to put them in jail because that is just too horrible even for this AU.
Good villains: Yes, I noted that some villains didn't join in Maleficent for revenge because again that's a realistic outcome. not every bad guy that gets beat cares about revenge. And I picked Frollo and Hans for good reasons. After finding out the info in the book Frozen Heart I could easily see the dude not wanting to get involved in more treachery and regicide and just wanting to love his life. As for Frollo, I could easily see his time in the underworld actually changing him. Sort of like in an Ebeneezer scrooge visited by the three ghosts sort of way only he was actually punished and the fact that he was sent to what is basically hell would definitely have an effect on the deeply religious man.
Isle: I could not understand why in the movie the Isle of the lost is literally right across from the city where not only are the children of royalty kept but actual royalty live. So I came up with that.
Families and lower class: For the thing about family members of the isle being sent there too. I know it sounds harsh but it's actually not that nuts. The people might be worried the families of the members of Maleficent's army could come after them for revenge and as such would feel safer if they were gone. For the lower class thing, it's based on the idea that no one in auradon seems to be in poverty. Sure, that could be explained by it simply being that nice a place, but It seemed weird the Isle would be the only place with thieves and crime. So that's why.
Auradon: On the tropes page for the movie someone pointed out that a bunch of countries wouldn't let themselves be ruled over by one dude. So I took a little inspiration from Avatar. The united kingdoms in this story is a bit more like a slightly more united UN and Auradon is a seperate nation from all the others where people from these other kingdoms can come to live.