It isn't easy to think of any person who has influenced the world of Magic: The Gathering more than the planeswalker Urza. He was first introduced in the 1994 set Antiquities, which was about his war with his brother Mishra. This brutal conflict cost countless lives and set in motion events that would impact Dominaria and the other planes for millennia to come.

However, it was not just Urza's life that changed things. The planeswalker's death was every bit as important, all the more so because he died twice, and each time, he threw the planes into chaos.

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Urza and Mishra. The Brothers' War. Magic the Gathering

The prolonged conflict between Urza and his brother Mishra was known as the Brothers' War (which author Jeff Grubb described in a novel of that name) and was the focus of the game's second Expansion Set, Antiquities. Both brothers amassed political influence, gaining control of mighty empires. They strip-mined the entire continent of Terisiare for resources which they used to build Artifacts for their war. Cards like Mishra's Workshop, Strip Mine, Ornithopter and the three Urzatron lands reflect the nature of this conflict. Each of the brothers was also in possession of half of a powerstone, a relic used by the ancient civilization known as the Thran. Their climactic final battle ended in a magic explosion known as the Sylex Blast, which killed Mishra and brought Urza's human life to an end. However, he was transformed into a planeswalker with the two halves of the Thran stone replacing his eyes.

The blast that ended both of their lives also threw the world into chaos. Sets like The Dark and Fallen Empires came out afterward Antiquities, as the end of the Brothers' War toppled nations and caused catastrophic changes to the environment, eventually resulting in the Ice Age that consumed the world. Meanwhile, Urza traveled through the planes and learned of the Phyrexians, a group of powerful bio-mechanical monstrosities who invaded one plane of existence after another. The Phyrexians were the descendants of the ancient Thran and ruled over by a godlike being known as Yawgmoth (a former Thran genius who had achieved apotheosis). After trying and failing to defeat the Phyrexians, Urza returned to his home plane of Dominaria to begin preparing a defense against the future Phyrexian Invasion.

Urza trained entire generations of spellcasters and artificers, experimented with time distortion, and even engaged in breeding programs (known as the Bloodline Project) to create heroes and armies who could repel the Phyrexian Invasion. He assembled a collection of powerful Artifacts called the Legacy, including the skyship Weatherlight and a sentient silver golem named Karn. When the Phyrexians attacked (roughly a millennium after his return), Urza was ready for them. Still, the war was catastrophic. Even as Dominaria was overrun, Urza led a group of nine planeswalkers to invade Phyrexia, detonating soul bombs across his enemies' homeworld. Despite this, he was captured, as was his greatest champion, Gerrard Capashen, a human warrior created in the Bloodline Project. Yawgmoth forced them to fight each other in a gladiatorial arena. Urza defeated and killed Gerrard twice, but both times, Yawgmoth resurrected the human hero. Gerrard then beheaded Urza, and in reward, was declared Yawgmoth's personal champion.

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Magic the Gathering. The Legacy Weapon. Legacy Artifacts. Urza. Karn.

However, Urza was not going to let a little thing like death stop him, and Gerrard was not about to let the enemy he had spent his life opposing become his new master. Gerrard escaped with Urza's severed head. Then, they gathered the rest of the Legacy Artifacts, including the golem Karn, the Weatherlight, and the stones in Urza's head, creating the Legacy Weapon--a powerful Artifact that was finally able to kill Yawgmoth once and for all. Both Urza and Gerrard died (for good this time). However, Karn ascended to become a planeswalker, just as the Sylex Blast had done to Urza so long ago.

A century after the end of the Phyrexian War, the only continent not still reeling from the devastation was Ontaria, which was central to the plot of the Odyssey and Onslaught Blocks. Karn left Dominaria and created an artificial plane of his own, Mirrodin. Unfortunately, Karn had some Phyrexian components within him, and these became infused in Mirrodin, which began to transform gradually into a New Phyrexia.

The impacts of Urza and the other planeswalkers meddling with the timestream and using reality-warping blasts in their wars had damaged the fabric reality, creating time rifts. However, Urza had left other Artifacts that helped in the Great Mending of reality, an act that caused the remaining planeswalkers to lose their immortality. Long after his passing, the impact of Urza's life and both of his deaths were still felt throughout the planes.

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