How would you outline Masters of the Universe’s “Preternia” era?
For me, it’s important that the Three Towers be there, as they always were until Revelation said they only exist in Heaven.
Central Tower would be built by Noah, his student Hordak (with a softer head design than is-that-metal-or-your-bare-skull, matching whatever his skin color was) and a Cat folk architect.
I haven’t figured out if there would be a King Grayskull that Grayskull Tower was named after, or if such a person only comes along later and it has to be named after something else.
There would be a team of heroes, led by He-Ro and including Hordak.
His mentor Eldor would fill a mentor role rather than one of the main hero slots. Eldor would bring He-Ro, who was raised as a primitive tribesman, to the Hall of Wisdom, the pole that balances King Hiss’ fortress.
(The Powers of Grayskull style guide says that Gray/He-Ro was raised by Eldor and the tribal chieftess Sharella. Perhaps she could be his big sister and they lost their parents to the Snake Men, for motivation.)
The first story arc would end with the Snake Men conflict becoming so hopeless that they combine their magic to sink the Three Towers into a fault in the ground to keep King Hiss from using their combined power.
In the next arc, King Hiss accumulates enough power to still come close to winning the war. The team casts another ritual spell, creating a portal to a timeless dimension under Snake Mountain, sucking the evil Snake Men in, at the cost of Eldor’s life. Many Snake Men remain, and they have to decide how to treat their defeated enemies. Hordak and Sharella are the most sympathetic to them, but the others vote that they be denied self-determination.
Hordak leaves his seat on the ruling Council to hole up in his laboratory. As the mortal son of the demon Seferus Kur and an Eternian witch, he envies his evil paternal relatives their immortality and make an evil artifact so that when he dies, he can cheat death as a lich. With no fear of death, he re-emerges and rallies the Snake Men to fight their “good” rulers. He dies, but that doesn’t stop him. The undead Hordak goes as far as reducing the Hall of Wisdom to rubble. Yet the Snake Men eventually suffer a third and final defeat, whereupon some of them flee Eternia through a magic portal.
To protect Eternia against the return of Hordak and forces greater than him, He-Ro and the other four Good Wizards of the Council prepare to make the ULTIMATE SACRIFICE! The wizard Keclar crafts two magic swords to be used by future champions from a chunk of metal from Heaven. The five tell the remaining Snake Men, who will come to be known as Reptons, to elect themselves a peaceful leader. Then the wizards stand at the site of the obliterated Hall of Wisdom and transform themselves into Castle Grayskull. The protege of one, Veena Grayskull, becomes the first Sorceress to guard it.