Trin
(#38226518)
She/Her
Click or tap to view this dragon in Predict Morphology.
Energy: 12/50
This dragon’s natural inborn element is Shadow.
Female Imperial
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Personal Style
Apparel
Skin
Scene
Measurements
Length
23.56 m
Wingspan
24.2 m
Weight
8541.61 kg
Genetics
Orca
Wasp
Wasp
Purple
Bee
Bee
Eldritch
Scales
Scales
Hatchday
Breed
Eye Type
Level 25 Imperial
Max Level
STR
126
AGI
8
DEF
5
QCK
59
INT
5
VIT
6
MND
5
Biography
Trinity
In the beginning of time, a great chaos rang out in the darkness, shining brilliantly in the form of a billion small star fragments. Amidst the emptiness, a handful of these shards combined and churned themselves into a series of heavenly bodies, quietly floating around a young sun.
It did not stop there, however. The fourth-furthest world in this celestial family appeared to be having troubles forming. While the other bodies were solidifying, it remained calamitous, suffering from years upon years of explosive tumult.
Magic.
Unlike its brother and sister realms, this fledgling planet teemed with unimaginable energies. As chunks of stone and dust smashed against one another, they prevented the perfect astronomic harmony needed to truly form a world.
From this bedlam, the magical energies themselves began to concentrate and change. Similar particles receded into four great beings, each overwhelmingly dense with a different element. As if eager to proudly display their emergence to some unseen divinity, these beings took on the shapes of great wyrms. At first very similar-looking, each drake became more and more unique as it absorbed the essences that crowded the crumbled mess, until they had become quite distinct: Earth, Fire, Water, and Air. Quite interested now in the jumble of rocks from which they had been birthed, the First Four decided to end the chaos and began to build.
After a few millennia, the planet had taken a truly different form.
The dragon who christened himself the Earthshaker heaved slabs of stone into mountains and valleys, molding a diverse landscape across the surface. From beneath the earth's crust, the being that called itself the Flamecaller burst forth and tested the realm with volcanic eruptions and streams of molten fury. The drake known as the Tidelord summoned great storms and floods to cool this invasion, letting the heat and moisture mingle to form continents, oceans, and rivers. And from above, the spindled form of the one named the Windsinger traced lines of air currents around the globe, crafting clouds as if painting them with a colossal brush.
Though happy with their combined efforts, the First Four were not without their differing opinions on the direction this young planet should take.
"The mountains should be taller, the canyons greater. Our home should stand ironclad against the dangers of the heavens, protected against cosmic bombardment," shouted the Earthshaker.
"Our home should be turned inside-out, and lava should churn violently across its surface. Through me, it could rival the Sun itself in brightness and energy," spoke the Flamecaller.
"With more water, the world would shine like a blue pearl, unlike so many in the Heavens. It could stand alone in beauty and tranquility," murmured the Tidelord.
"The air should be filled with a thousand screaming vortexes, singing a song that the Heavens will never forget," spouted the Windsinger.
Concerned only with their own campaigns, the First Four bickered and quarreled over the planet, until bitter conjecture turned to combat.
Water and Air warred firstly, stirring up roiling, violent storms. The cataclysmic energy created by their relentless attacks made the clouds themselves swell with anger. It was not long until the charged mass expelled a horrendous cascade of electric tempests, as well as a frustrated drake-shaped anomaly. Stunned by the event, the Tidelord and Windsinger abated, unaware of how to handle this new threat.
On the other side of the world, Earth and Fire smashed the landscape to pieces. Each broken mountain or fractured plain only riled the Earthshaker into deeper rage. With one great heave of his front leg, the entire planet wobbled in its orbit, and to this day has remained at an irregular tilt. Emboldened by the sudden disorientation, the Flamecaller beckoned several magma vents into existence, shattering the crust and spewing voluminous smoke billows into the atmosphere. This brash action blotted out the sun, plunging the southern hemisphere into an impenetrable darkness, causing a chill that the world had never experienced. Unbeknownst to the combatants, an isolated island on the bottom of the world began to freeze over, frigid ice sheets expanding their size at a rapid pace.
The battles raged for centuries, until even the ritual of night and day became affected. As the four clashed, the magic essences that were kicked up during the day hovered high in the sky, baking in the sunlight. They soon coalesced into their own bright deity. The Lightweaver had only just come into existence, and was already annoyed by the violence that smashed across the realm. Similarly, the night-gripped half of the planet materialized its own unstable energies into the Shadowbinder, a slithery calculating dragon, who peeked at the confrontations from deep, dark pockets in the land, judging each of the others as they tumbled and ruined what they had spent an eternity building.
Having spent millennia working together, the First Four had not considered the magnitude of the stress their warring had caused. The planet was in far worse shape than when it had been newly-formed, and everywhere they looked, unrestrained energies were being exhibited in their extremes.
Where the charged young Stormcatcher went, thunderstorms crackled, parching once-fertile land into inhospitable desert. The Lightweaver's aggrivations were making the days too bright, and the cold aggression of the Shadowbinder was plunging each night into a murk most foul. The southern land shelf was encrusted in a living frost that would soon freeze into the imposing silouette of the Icewarden.
The turbulent planet--a once-beautiful feat of magical engineering--would soon be at an end if the fighting worsened. And it was not going unnoticed.
As if written to save the Eight from themselves, a sudden silence swept over the land; the ruined spread of the conflict ceased, and a paralyzing uneasiness washed over the behemoths. The relentless ejection of magical energy had been recognized, and the very void from which they had designed their world now seemed to be retaliating.
They craned their necks to the sky and witnessed a horrifying sight: bleak, smokey tendrils began to thread their way from horizon to horizon, veining through the blue. Terrified at the sudden encroachment, the Lightweaver dove to the surface to find her brothers and sisters gathered in a valley, nervously huddled.
The defiling Shade continued its encroachment, sapping enough light from the world that it even distressed the Shadowbinder, who bellowed in defiance. Each dark spindle began to pulse and multiply, some even growing terrifying maws full of thin needle-like teeth. But before the blackness had entirely set in, the Flamecaller roared, breathing great bright flames from her jaws. The Shade recoiled at the explosive plume, emboldening the group to counter.
Each using their elemental strengths, the Eight battled back at the darkness that sought to inhale the magical life from their home. For hundreds of years, the beings who once sparred with one another tore at the Shade, driving each gloom tendril back. The dragon gods ferociously ripped at every gaping mouth that threatened to suck away the energy they treasured, determined to save their shattered world.
]At long last, the nightmarish Shade were defeated, reduced to nothing but wispy remnants of the horror they had been. Peace had returned, but in the wake of eons of battle, the Eight's home was no longer recognizable. Mountains had crumbled, oceans had soured or dried up. Volcanic faultlines ruined much of the surface, and thunder rolled across the sky. Snow drifted in places it had never fallen.
Humbled and embarrassed by the state of the image that surrounded them, the drakes agreed upon a truce, and on the undeniable notion that they were no longer fit to oversee the burgeoning world. It had already seen its darkest days and what little life that existed had not even been given the chance to thrive. Unanimously, the eight wyrms decided to use their remaining strength to blanket the planet in a magical shield strong enough to protect it should the roaming Shade ever return.
Using the Earthshaker's gargantuan form as a foundation, the gods constructed a massive pillar at the northernmost point of the globe, fusing their corporeal bodies together into layers of elemental marble slabs. The World Pillar, as it is known today, would be the Eight's last and final resignation as makers. If the scarred flanks of the young world were ever to heal, they would do so on their own, unmarred by the omnipotence of the gods.
Time heals all things if given a chance.
The Pillar of the World stood, its magical shield encasing the war-torn planet in protection. The last of the Shade had been vanquished and exiled from the realm. Only the raw elements were left to command the future.
Life exploded from each primordial puddle, evolving rapidly as it mingled with the remaining vestiges of magical essence. Creatures became more complex and diverse, leaving the familiarity of the oceans and streams to feel the sun and feed on the earth. The horrific battle scars of the past began to mend.
Young races founded their homes around the permanence of the monument, societies developing with the Pillar's colossal silhouette as a backdrop for stories and scripture. Primitive religions regarded the structure as a ladder of ascension; a direct path to their deities.
Theocracy prospered, adhering rigidly to the runes that adorned the Pillar's tiers. Acolytes of each element spent their devoted lives to understanding their meaning, witnessing their presence and role in nature. Even with their differences, the sects never embroiled themselves in confrontation. Reverence was paid wholly to the Pillar, and not to its singular layers. The arcane words of magi became the law and total governance of the realm.
But as societies grew more diverse focus on the elements began to diminish. Tribes became kingdoms, concerned only with securing their place in the world, which was now abundant with life. Conquest paved the way towards innovations in agriculture, warfare, housing, and technology.
Sects of the ancient elemental castes still existed; however, they were drowned out by the bustle of commerce and industry. These cabalistic groups still worshiped the Pillar. Chosen individuals claimed to have thaumaturgic connections that allowed them to manipulate mystical energies surrounding it. These claims were initially discounted and many elementalists were imprisoned for their unsettling zealotry.
Witnessing the decline of their rule, these magi became increasingly hostile. Attacks on settlements and government structures became commonplace, further widening the rift that separated them from normal citizens. During a particularly horrifying event known as the Firebreather Uprising, hundreds of civilian cottages were set ablaze in a single night.
This act of aggression prompted overwhelming retaliation. Rising warlords and their engineers sought to wrest any remaining control away from the elementalists, and war terrorized the land. Magi wielded their specialized elemental energies as harrowing bolts and beams, while wooden war-machines rumbled overland slinging great boulders or explosives. Thousands died.
It was not until the appearance of a powerful magi who called herself "The Speaker" that the cycle of violence ceased. Awestruck, sorcerers and soldiers laid down their arms to listen. The strange hooded figure bore a single prophecy:
"Only when the children of the Pillar fuel the engine of fate shall they fortify life, challenge death, and know the true potential of magic."
Stunned by the mysterious power of her words, the warring factions ceased hostilities to consider the prophecy and an armistice was enacted to pursue the meaning of the heavy statement. The resulting peace was sustained by continued collaborations in science, magic, and technology.
As the centuries soldiered on in a universal peace, the collection of small nations grew into vast empires. Industry flourished at a breakneck pace. Advances in technology allowed for the complete homogenization of magic and machinery. Elementalism had become a thriving enterprise, improving the lives of thousands of people through fantastical feats of automation. Each sprawling city buzzed along at the pace of its own dedicated magical energy reactor, powered and overseen by elementalists (who were now a surprisingly robust percentage of the population.)
Civilization had reached a prosperous and harmonious future.
From that prosperity, the most powerful empire in the realm made its biggest breakthrough. Harnessing the power of the elements in small reactors had proven efficient in providing power to the masses, but the world's brightest engineers had become involved in a project much more ambitious: a giant engine worthy of The Prophecy's words.
Looming on the horizon, a construct rivaling the immensity of the Pillar itself began to take shape. A massive mountain-sized drum surrounded by bladed spires and miles of copper cabling imposed the landscape. The gleam of its metallic surfaces cast reflections upon the myriad of structures that dotted its perimeter. This mega-reactor's conduits connected to each of its surrounding brethren, having been designed to centralize their collective energy into a super-heated nucleus. The fusion chamber would soon be capable of providing scientists and mages alike with immeasurable knowledge of physics and the workings of the universe.
Citizens from every nation gathered around the reservoir on its opening day. Celebrations sprang up throughout world, hailing the reactor as a technical marvel and a true measure of spirit and ingenuity.
At the end of a reverent countdown, the metal behemoth was powered on. Crowds cheered and threw confetti. Lead engineers waved from the top of the reactor, congratulating one another on a job well done. The engine sparked to life, humming gracefully as the magical energy from several smaller generators was siphoned inward.
The drum began to heat.
Miles of cabling began to buckle and wave, as if part of a grandiose tentacled monster. Rivets exploded from the reactor's seams, and a glow brighter than the sun was beamed through the rips in its flank. Elation turned to horror as pieces of the colossal machine deteriorated like paper engulfed in flame. The mounting pressure released in one immense, silent flash.
The world went white.
The explosion had devastated the realm. Cities and nations laid to waste.
Sound was voided save for the wind, which carried smoke over the ruined land. In a single shattering moment, all life had been extinguished.
At the epicenter of the great detonation, a condensed mass of energy remained to govern the upturned blast zone. It pulsed like a star that had become detached from the night sky, tendrils of arcane energy arcing wildly. The orb appeared curiously sluggish, as if roused from a slumber.
Then it stretched all eight of its spindled limbs.
The world was still. In the wake of the disaster, nothing moved save for the beating of the arcane serpent’s own heart. Coiled and knotted like a rope, his spindled form merely hovered in the comforting glow of the detonation.
He was frailly built. Two sets of emaciated arms stretched out from a wiry frame, and a flat intricate crest fanned from his alien head, supported by a weak curved neck. A pair of small, vestigial wings remained folded at his sides, eclipsed by the larger pair that--until now--had acted as a cocoon.
The first few moments of his existence were sluggish, confusing. Several days passed before he could even unwrap himself from the coiled position that had ushered him into the devastated world. He extended one of his large outer wings, tentatively testing its soundness. He then peeled away the other, wobbling awkwardly. Frightened at the sudden temperature change, he collapsed both wings, huddling and shivering. Perhaps tomorrow.
The next day he unraveled his leviathan-like tail enough to barely graze the soil below him. The sense of touch was exhilarating, but nothing prepared him for the first time he opened his eyes. The sudden stimuli of vision sent him reeling, as brightness invaded his fogged oculars and sent waves of pain throughout his head. Instinctively, he shut them tight again. But by now, his curiosity had been piqued, and he wrenched them back open, the blindness fading eventually.
What followed was an insatiable curiosity for the landscape that surrounded him. The world that he saw was the only world that he knew. The gnarled, skeletal remains of the cities and towns that surrounded him in a deathly ring had always been. This was the true picture of the realm according to the Arcanist.
In the following days he wandered the wreckage, soaking in the scarred remnants of civilization. Each torn structure was a question, every charred figure was an inquiry.
These investigations fueled his hunger for knowledge, and he began to collect pieces of the deluge and examine them closely. Among the wastes he found scattered sheets of parchment and papers that had somehow escaped immolation. Though he did not understand the text covering them, there was much to be gleaned from the illustrations. The serpent began to build a picture of the area’s history.
But there came a point where the Arcanist had devoured what scant information he could, and he decided to venture outside the confines of the great city’s borders. His curious gaze traced the distant horizon, which sloped upwards drastically towards the northwest. There, a glint of bright light seemed to beckon to him. After surveying his birthplace for the last time, he launched into the sky and set off towards this beacon, leaving all he knew behind.
No matter the destruction, there is always a chance of rebirth.
In the time before the Arcanist's awakening, concentrated energies rained across the shattered landscape, seeping into the charred remains of life and industry.
Arcane particles sank deep into the crust, enriching the roots of trees and plants that had been sapped of their life during the blast. Currents of energy coursed up trunks and into the cells of branches. Reactions sparked beneath the surface sending waves of magic through stalks of grass, clusters of bushes, and monumental redwoods. Ethereal flowers erupted from cracks and crevices, and each green cluster grew larger and more robustly than the last. Nature had capitalized on the fallout, taking control of the energies to repair itself.
The rampant regrowth began to take on the guise of a colossal figure. Tree branches and leaves strained and twisted together into four thick, bark-covered stumps. A leafy canopy connected the four towers, until the burgeoning garden had materialized into a distinguishable silhouette. There was no mistaking what had been created: a wyrm of boundless potential, birthed from the leaves and the grass and the moss. The Gladekeeper had grown out of the ashes.
Not everything can be healed. The apocalypse had done more than spur the rejuvenation of flora: the fauna still rotted, left to fester upon the soil, and spoil in the dreadful warmth. Death leveraged the excess energy in another way. Where nature could not mend, decay took its place. Putrid film soaked and crept across the ground, enveloping everything in its path. Whole structures creaked and fell under the weight of the empowered rot that now infected them.
This contagion continued its wave of domination, scouring every corpse and every bit of food. Weaker plants and bodies of water fell sick with filth, and the cycle intensified with each new fallen organism. A runaway viral infection coursed through the veins of the world.
This scourge wrapped around the fallen, ripping away flesh and tearing marrow into a blighted tornado of destruction. Within time, the contamination had taken on a ghastly shape. It haunted the land in the form of a spectral drake, gnarled with veins, pustules and sharpened bone. This harbinger -the Plaguebringer- tested the worth of every sign of regrowth as she scoured over the surface of the realm, leaving behind a frightening scarred wasteland.
It did not take long for the wyrms to encounter one another; each was torn away from their polarized campaigns after sensing the nearness of their nemesis. While the land healed and fell ill all around them, the deities of nature and plague embroiled themselves in vicious, unending combat. Thick roots and brambles wrapped themselves around the Plaguebringer’s legs and arms, chaining her to the earth, only to wither and melt away at her defiling touch. Contagion reached and groped at the Gladekeeper’s every move, but she countered with razor-sharp torrents of bladed leaves and piercing branches. The land took on the hues of red and green as the two sparred and tumbled eternally. Hilltops and cliffs were torn asunder, replaced with lush tropical gardens or seething, stinking, bone piles. Chaos seemed the only constant.
Oblivious to the existence of the warring sisters, the Arcanist had reached his destination: an observatory perched at the top of a large heave of stone and grass. The sight of it was foreign to him, the structure was undeniably more intact than those that surrounded the scrap metal of the reactors below. Its metallic surface shone brilliantly up close, constructed out of polished amber-colored alloys and engraved with intricate patterns.
A massive, tiered scope extended from its domed roof, angled in such a way that a thousand different colors bent through its gigantic lens. The reflection of the rising moon glowed upon the surface of the curved glass.
Curious about the purpose of the construct, the young wyrm entered, approaching the ringed cylinder that led him to this place. Diagrams led him to the eyepiece in the center of the observatory’s central chamber. Tracing its connection to the scope, the Arcanist began to understand what he must do. Unaware of what to expect, he curled up on the floor and looked into the device.
Overwhelming emotion filled the Arcanist's heart. The familiar dreary landscape of orange and brown that had defined his creation was now a sea of black, dotted with a rainbow of color. A million twinkling stars enveloped his senses, and he backed away from the telescope in fear. But for as much apprehension he was experiencing, there was two times the excitement. He was obliviously traveling along the waves of galaxies and pulsars and suns and planets, absorbing it all.
And in this position he remained.
He began to inscribe his studies onto the reams of blank parchment he found preserved below the observatory. Strewn papers and notes dotted interior walls of the dome, illustrating star maps and constellations he found in his observations. The vastness of the skies above were always unveiling new surprises. He was determined and hungry to document it all: Every corner of space, every point in the visible universe.
After a particularly exhausting night of scouring the sky, he noticed something peculiar: a splotch of pure black between two familiar spiral galaxies. Consulting his previous maps of that area, he realized that it had not shown itself the first time he had chronicled the quadrant. A sudden wave of curiosity washed over him and—suddenly reinvigorated--he refocused in on this spot intensely.
The blackness was implausible, and--more alarming: it seemed to move slightly over the course of the night. The arcane one rapped his claws against the floor in deep thought. To move that quickly in one evening had to mean that the anomaly was very close indeed. Close enough, even, to possibly view with the naked eye. A natural account of the enigma would be extremely valuable information to have.
For the first time in a decade, the Arcanist left the observatory. Squinting into the setting sun, he traced a pattern in the sky towards where he knew the blemish would be, and there it was. It was as if someone had removed the stars from the sky, shoving them outward, exposing a hole in the cosmos.
He surveyed the horizon, trying to identify the highest point where he could perch, dismayed that he may have already reached it. From the observatory hill, the Arcanist could see a wealth of landscape spread out around him, though nothing appeared to surpass his vantage. A mighty silhouette faded into view to the northeast. Through a thick brown haze, he could see a tall monument, stretching skyward. A pillar. From its zenith it might just be possible to observe the growing darkness.
The Pillar’s true size became readily apparent the closer he traveled. Waves of powerful energy warped the air, making flight more and more difficult as he approached, finally driving him to ground. As he crawled to The Pillar's base, he looked up. The megalith towered above him, receding into the heavens. He could not make out its summit, and the notion of scaling it soon became sickening and intimidating.
He had to know.
Driven, the Arcanist reached out and gripped the Pillar’s craggy surface with one of his claws, finding handholds in the intricate carvings that decorated its circumference. Using all the strength he could muster, he began to propel himself upward. During his ascent, he never looked down upon the world that was now roiling with plagued lands and terrifying jungles. He was alone in the pursuit of an ultimate knowledge.
For days he climbed, eyes focused on the tightly-rounded horizon that was his goal. Mistral tufts brushed his aching body, and for several hours the young god was lost in a soup of dark, rumbling thunderclouds. He made his best progress at night, when the void was most prominent in the sky. It was growing larger, but he could not determine if he was getting any closer.
At long last, the Pillar ended. Digging his claws into the flattened crown, and with a final exhausting heave, he pulled his body onto the cold, unforgiving stone and collapsed. He slumbered, wrapped within the protection of his wings. The air at the apex was frigid, and an immense pressure pulsed at his temples, but there he remained until night inevitably fell.
The dark spot was now a formidable swath of the sky, and he could make out curious fluctuations along its edges. Tendrils of the deepest black spiraled off; however, there was something even more odd. Although he was closer to his subject, his perception of it still felt skewed. Was it possible that his viewpoint was somehow being warped by the energies emitted by The Pillar?
The Arcanist closed his eyes and focused, meditating deeply within the submersion of the magic emanating from the summit. He felt it shift, glowing, growing, and receding. The drake began to pull at it, each inhale absorbing more and more of the ether. He then opened his eyes.
It was much clearer now. The distortion that had obscured his observance of the void had all but vanished. He took a few moments to closely examine the darkness, soon discovering that it was shifting in accordance to his own movement. When he lifted an arm, smoky tendrils sprouted from the black cloud and spiraled outward in a beautifully fractal dance. If he arched his back, the blackness echoed and bent. This was communion with the heavens, a gift that he had only dreamed of. From this perch, the Arcanist felt he could command the universe itself.
He released some of his power in a stream of red and blue, drawing a serpentine line of fire across his body. The darkness shifted. He waved all four of his arms in different directions, painting the air with coiled ropes of light. The darkness inflated. In one grand gesture, he expelled magic in a dazzling array of explosions and patterns.
The darkness surged.
A low, ominous rumble pervaded the air, and the Arcanist became frightened, halting his display and seizing hold of the edges of The Pillar. Something was not right.
The shadow enveloped the sky, and the tendrils that had enchanted him moments before were taking on a terrifying new guise. Thousands of razor-toothed maws snapped toward him as the night was swallowed.
A harrowing moan rocked the realm. Startled, the Gladekeeper relaxed her jaw, releasing the Plaguebringer's neck. The defiling wyrm tumbled down a ravine, scrambling to right herself. Poised to lunge back into the fray, she froze in her tracks when another deafening groan shuddered over the canyon. The two sisters were silenced as they both raised their heads and witnessed the bleak canopy spreading out above them.
In the far distance, a beacon of radiating pink light pulsed in the clouds, illuminating the mighty Pillar on the horizon. Crackling bolts of thunder surrounded its summit, and each passing moment resulted in more disappearing stars. It was as if a mighty being was blowing out a billion candles.
Terrified at what this could mean, the adversaries fled in opposite directions, determined to preserve themselves.
This was not right.
The Arcanist cemented himself to the stone dais, gaping at the nightmare that grew ever larger, the moaning that rumbled ever louder. A sorrowful, hopeless feeling washed over him, and all of the raw power and energy he had so masterfully wielded was drained. He shook with fear.
The Shade continued the hunt, gaining speed at a horrifying pace. Beckoned by the arcane dragon’s ritual, the cloud of dread hungrily rocketed towards the world it had attacked eons earlier. The darkness sliced through the sky like a dagger.
There was nothing left to do. The young god crept to the precipice and looked down into the clouds. The perceived sensation of falling almost seemed a welcome feeling when compared to the null maw that approached. With one last look at the conquering shadow, he slid off the edge and clenched his wings tight against his body. The Arcanist plummeted as the first tendrils reached the bulwark’s outer barriers.
A deafening noise shattered the silent night, as the brunt of the assailing force hit. The immensity of the nightmarish Shade was overwhelming. The magical barrier, weakened considerably during the summoning, ruptured under the impact. The force of the collision sent devastating shockwaves through the thin air, and in one explosive moment...
...the Pillar shattered.
A muted dawn cut through the murk that permeated the lowlands. The morning was thick with ash and dust and a scent of a burning world was carried on the wind. Dark veins of smoke--the remnants of the Shade--dripped down the sides of the sky as it warmed and brightened, an inky rain falling on the outside of an upturned glass basin.
There was no sound but the slight tumble of fragments of rock settling, and the crackling of growing wildfires.
The calamity had detonated the stone pillar, hurtling entire slabs and chunks of it across the globe. From the northern highlands to the southern ice shelf, not a landmass was unscathed by the shrapnel of the explosion. The most immense layers of the structure gravitated to their eventual resting places in the would-be elemental regions of the modern world. The visual reminders of the shattering were everywhere.
Floating above the massive plinth that remained, loose clusters of stone hovered in a columnar fashion, held aloft by their own will and a stubborn refusal to let go of the shape they once held. Below the ruined silhouette, the world was a tumble of upturned earth and strewn debris. Earthen scars radiated from the monument like a multi-armed star, pieces of it entrenched deep in the rocky crust.
There was no sign of the arcane dragon that had manifested this scene. The sisters of plague and nature stared in disbelief as the behemoths that had fused themselves into the barrier now lay beneath its skeletal remains. The wyrms stirred.
The Lightweaver opened her eyes to the devastation, stricken immediately by the bleak and sorrowful condition of the sky. The sun was rising, but its rays were fettered and obscured by strings of darkness that crept from on high. They faded as they fell, like rivulets of drying ink.
How long did I sleep, tangled up in the spiral of the Pillar? Before she could formulate a guess, a pile of rocks gave way nearby, and a ropy, pronged tail unfurled from beneath the rubble.
What impressed the Stormcatcher most was that he was still very much alive, and full of renewed vigor. Although their long nap had been cut short by the calamity, he once again felt the warm breezes of the world, and that was enough to shake off any lethargy in him. Kicking off the tumblestone, he surveyed the mess with analytic wonderment. His momentary curiosity was soon doused in apathy the moment he partook in the act of his sisters and brothers waking in the post-catastrophic drear.
“Tragic. But expected.”
So that was it. There was nothing left here; they had failed. The Shade had bested their ward.
“Where will you go?” the Earthshaker called, propping himself up on thick, granite-caked legs. The wyrm of thunder paused, but did not turn, his crested head pointed towards the southern horizon.
“Where I may not be found---this farce is over, and I've plans of my own,” Without a look, he took to the sky, sparks of electricity cracking off his wings at each beat.
The Shadowbinder waddled to a rocky overhang and spat on the ground. The dark puddle sizzled when it hit stone.
The brightness of day was in full swing, and the burn of the sun was extremely discomforting. The earthen one appeared to be gesturing to her, but she couldn't make out what he was saying. It didn't matter, she supposed. She remembered not really liking him anyway. Come to think of it, she didn’t really like any of them.
She wouldn't last much longer if she did not find darkness enough to obscure this oppressive morning. She hobbled from shadow to shadow until she, too, had disappeared on the horizon.
The morning heat had begun to wear on the Icewarden, but he could not depart without saying something. The Earthshaker looked pathetic. “This is the way of it. We were resolute enough to keep this world from destroying itself, but now we have another charge. It is evident that we will never hold off the residual darkness together, so we must do so apart. It is time to separate.”
His words withered the mountain drake, he could tell, but with a grim nod, he took his leave.
I will create thousands of children, thought the Windsinger, the air will be cleansed and painted in a plethora of colored brushes. My flight will carry the stories of the realm, and tell of its history. A pity that the others will never know a similar joy.
There was no stopping them now. One by one, the Earthshaker watched his kin recede from the landscape, abandoning the post that had solidified their alliance for so many millennia. The Tidelord rumbled darkly about impending strife and the splintering of friendships before slipping into a murky lake. The Flamecaller left without a word at all, though the earth rumbled and issued hot jets of smoke in her wake. By nightfall, the stone guardian was completely alone, staring at the shattered column.
The evening air howled; a solemn noise that reminded him just how deserted this landscape was. Dust moved in combating vortices, blotting out the glow of the moon, and encrusting the great dragon in gravels and sands.
He did not move for several months, addled by sorrow and lethargy. From this resting place, the years passed him by, calcifying his body into a heap of boulders.
The Eleven founded their eventual homes around the largest slabs of the Pillar that had come to rest across the realm. Although separated and cloistered, they still held a powerful connection to the monument that once shielded their world from darkness.
To further guard these relics, the wyrms used their respective magics to create children in their image.
Dragonkind was born.
They introduced color, pattern, and trait to create tension and diversity. Over many cycles, these children began to form their own primitive societies, like those that had come before the shattering. These new denizens dedicated their lives to protecting their piece of the Pillar, and preserving the strength and significance of their element. Life sprang up around the gods, and dragonkind thrived in this new age.
Furthermore, these clans were becoming powerful. Each new generation was more attuned to their element than the one that came before it, and the saturation of magical energies became increasingly more robust. The recovering realm now hosted a myriad of dragons of all elemental persuasions, all populating and shaping their territories to accommodate a staggering increase in magical affinity.
These denizens dedicated their lives to protecting their piece of the ruined column, and preserving the strength and significance of their element. Only time would tell whether this new order would maintain or destroy that which the gods had built.
In the beginning of time, a great chaos rang out in the darkness, shining brilliantly in the form of a billion small star fragments. Amidst the emptiness, a handful of these shards combined and churned themselves into a series of heavenly bodies, quietly floating around a young sun.
It did not stop there, however. The fourth-furthest world in this celestial family appeared to be having troubles forming. While the other bodies were solidifying, it remained calamitous, suffering from years upon years of explosive tumult.
Magic.
Unlike its brother and sister realms, this fledgling planet teemed with unimaginable energies. As chunks of stone and dust smashed against one another, they prevented the perfect astronomic harmony needed to truly form a world.
From this bedlam, the magical energies themselves began to concentrate and change. Similar particles receded into four great beings, each overwhelmingly dense with a different element. As if eager to proudly display their emergence to some unseen divinity, these beings took on the shapes of great wyrms. At first very similar-looking, each drake became more and more unique as it absorbed the essences that crowded the crumbled mess, until they had become quite distinct: Earth, Fire, Water, and Air. Quite interested now in the jumble of rocks from which they had been birthed, the First Four decided to end the chaos and began to build.
After a few millennia, the planet had taken a truly different form.
The dragon who christened himself the Earthshaker heaved slabs of stone into mountains and valleys, molding a diverse landscape across the surface. From beneath the earth's crust, the being that called itself the Flamecaller burst forth and tested the realm with volcanic eruptions and streams of molten fury. The drake known as the Tidelord summoned great storms and floods to cool this invasion, letting the heat and moisture mingle to form continents, oceans, and rivers. And from above, the spindled form of the one named the Windsinger traced lines of air currents around the globe, crafting clouds as if painting them with a colossal brush.
Though happy with their combined efforts, the First Four were not without their differing opinions on the direction this young planet should take.
"The mountains should be taller, the canyons greater. Our home should stand ironclad against the dangers of the heavens, protected against cosmic bombardment," shouted the Earthshaker.
"Our home should be turned inside-out, and lava should churn violently across its surface. Through me, it could rival the Sun itself in brightness and energy," spoke the Flamecaller.
"With more water, the world would shine like a blue pearl, unlike so many in the Heavens. It could stand alone in beauty and tranquility," murmured the Tidelord.
"The air should be filled with a thousand screaming vortexes, singing a song that the Heavens will never forget," spouted the Windsinger.
Concerned only with their own campaigns, the First Four bickered and quarreled over the planet, until bitter conjecture turned to combat.
Water and Air warred firstly, stirring up roiling, violent storms. The cataclysmic energy created by their relentless attacks made the clouds themselves swell with anger. It was not long until the charged mass expelled a horrendous cascade of electric tempests, as well as a frustrated drake-shaped anomaly. Stunned by the event, the Tidelord and Windsinger abated, unaware of how to handle this new threat.
On the other side of the world, Earth and Fire smashed the landscape to pieces. Each broken mountain or fractured plain only riled the Earthshaker into deeper rage. With one great heave of his front leg, the entire planet wobbled in its orbit, and to this day has remained at an irregular tilt. Emboldened by the sudden disorientation, the Flamecaller beckoned several magma vents into existence, shattering the crust and spewing voluminous smoke billows into the atmosphere. This brash action blotted out the sun, plunging the southern hemisphere into an impenetrable darkness, causing a chill that the world had never experienced. Unbeknownst to the combatants, an isolated island on the bottom of the world began to freeze over, frigid ice sheets expanding their size at a rapid pace.
The battles raged for centuries, until even the ritual of night and day became affected. As the four clashed, the magic essences that were kicked up during the day hovered high in the sky, baking in the sunlight. They soon coalesced into their own bright deity. The Lightweaver had only just come into existence, and was already annoyed by the violence that smashed across the realm. Similarly, the night-gripped half of the planet materialized its own unstable energies into the Shadowbinder, a slithery calculating dragon, who peeked at the confrontations from deep, dark pockets in the land, judging each of the others as they tumbled and ruined what they had spent an eternity building.
Having spent millennia working together, the First Four had not considered the magnitude of the stress their warring had caused. The planet was in far worse shape than when it had been newly-formed, and everywhere they looked, unrestrained energies were being exhibited in their extremes.
Where the charged young Stormcatcher went, thunderstorms crackled, parching once-fertile land into inhospitable desert. The Lightweaver's aggrivations were making the days too bright, and the cold aggression of the Shadowbinder was plunging each night into a murk most foul. The southern land shelf was encrusted in a living frost that would soon freeze into the imposing silouette of the Icewarden.
The turbulent planet--a once-beautiful feat of magical engineering--would soon be at an end if the fighting worsened. And it was not going unnoticed.
As if written to save the Eight from themselves, a sudden silence swept over the land; the ruined spread of the conflict ceased, and a paralyzing uneasiness washed over the behemoths. The relentless ejection of magical energy had been recognized, and the very void from which they had designed their world now seemed to be retaliating.
They craned their necks to the sky and witnessed a horrifying sight: bleak, smokey tendrils began to thread their way from horizon to horizon, veining through the blue. Terrified at the sudden encroachment, the Lightweaver dove to the surface to find her brothers and sisters gathered in a valley, nervously huddled.
The defiling Shade continued its encroachment, sapping enough light from the world that it even distressed the Shadowbinder, who bellowed in defiance. Each dark spindle began to pulse and multiply, some even growing terrifying maws full of thin needle-like teeth. But before the blackness had entirely set in, the Flamecaller roared, breathing great bright flames from her jaws. The Shade recoiled at the explosive plume, emboldening the group to counter.
Each using their elemental strengths, the Eight battled back at the darkness that sought to inhale the magical life from their home. For hundreds of years, the beings who once sparred with one another tore at the Shade, driving each gloom tendril back. The dragon gods ferociously ripped at every gaping mouth that threatened to suck away the energy they treasured, determined to save their shattered world.
]At long last, the nightmarish Shade were defeated, reduced to nothing but wispy remnants of the horror they had been. Peace had returned, but in the wake of eons of battle, the Eight's home was no longer recognizable. Mountains had crumbled, oceans had soured or dried up. Volcanic faultlines ruined much of the surface, and thunder rolled across the sky. Snow drifted in places it had never fallen.
Humbled and embarrassed by the state of the image that surrounded them, the drakes agreed upon a truce, and on the undeniable notion that they were no longer fit to oversee the burgeoning world. It had already seen its darkest days and what little life that existed had not even been given the chance to thrive. Unanimously, the eight wyrms decided to use their remaining strength to blanket the planet in a magical shield strong enough to protect it should the roaming Shade ever return.
Using the Earthshaker's gargantuan form as a foundation, the gods constructed a massive pillar at the northernmost point of the globe, fusing their corporeal bodies together into layers of elemental marble slabs. The World Pillar, as it is known today, would be the Eight's last and final resignation as makers. If the scarred flanks of the young world were ever to heal, they would do so on their own, unmarred by the omnipotence of the gods.
Time heals all things if given a chance.
The Pillar of the World stood, its magical shield encasing the war-torn planet in protection. The last of the Shade had been vanquished and exiled from the realm. Only the raw elements were left to command the future.
Life exploded from each primordial puddle, evolving rapidly as it mingled with the remaining vestiges of magical essence. Creatures became more complex and diverse, leaving the familiarity of the oceans and streams to feel the sun and feed on the earth. The horrific battle scars of the past began to mend.
Young races founded their homes around the permanence of the monument, societies developing with the Pillar's colossal silhouette as a backdrop for stories and scripture. Primitive religions regarded the structure as a ladder of ascension; a direct path to their deities.
Theocracy prospered, adhering rigidly to the runes that adorned the Pillar's tiers. Acolytes of each element spent their devoted lives to understanding their meaning, witnessing their presence and role in nature. Even with their differences, the sects never embroiled themselves in confrontation. Reverence was paid wholly to the Pillar, and not to its singular layers. The arcane words of magi became the law and total governance of the realm.
But as societies grew more diverse focus on the elements began to diminish. Tribes became kingdoms, concerned only with securing their place in the world, which was now abundant with life. Conquest paved the way towards innovations in agriculture, warfare, housing, and technology.
Sects of the ancient elemental castes still existed; however, they were drowned out by the bustle of commerce and industry. These cabalistic groups still worshiped the Pillar. Chosen individuals claimed to have thaumaturgic connections that allowed them to manipulate mystical energies surrounding it. These claims were initially discounted and many elementalists were imprisoned for their unsettling zealotry.
Witnessing the decline of their rule, these magi became increasingly hostile. Attacks on settlements and government structures became commonplace, further widening the rift that separated them from normal citizens. During a particularly horrifying event known as the Firebreather Uprising, hundreds of civilian cottages were set ablaze in a single night.
This act of aggression prompted overwhelming retaliation. Rising warlords and their engineers sought to wrest any remaining control away from the elementalists, and war terrorized the land. Magi wielded their specialized elemental energies as harrowing bolts and beams, while wooden war-machines rumbled overland slinging great boulders or explosives. Thousands died.
It was not until the appearance of a powerful magi who called herself "The Speaker" that the cycle of violence ceased. Awestruck, sorcerers and soldiers laid down their arms to listen. The strange hooded figure bore a single prophecy:
"Only when the children of the Pillar fuel the engine of fate shall they fortify life, challenge death, and know the true potential of magic."
Stunned by the mysterious power of her words, the warring factions ceased hostilities to consider the prophecy and an armistice was enacted to pursue the meaning of the heavy statement. The resulting peace was sustained by continued collaborations in science, magic, and technology.
As the centuries soldiered on in a universal peace, the collection of small nations grew into vast empires. Industry flourished at a breakneck pace. Advances in technology allowed for the complete homogenization of magic and machinery. Elementalism had become a thriving enterprise, improving the lives of thousands of people through fantastical feats of automation. Each sprawling city buzzed along at the pace of its own dedicated magical energy reactor, powered and overseen by elementalists (who were now a surprisingly robust percentage of the population.)
Civilization had reached a prosperous and harmonious future.
From that prosperity, the most powerful empire in the realm made its biggest breakthrough. Harnessing the power of the elements in small reactors had proven efficient in providing power to the masses, but the world's brightest engineers had become involved in a project much more ambitious: a giant engine worthy of The Prophecy's words.
Looming on the horizon, a construct rivaling the immensity of the Pillar itself began to take shape. A massive mountain-sized drum surrounded by bladed spires and miles of copper cabling imposed the landscape. The gleam of its metallic surfaces cast reflections upon the myriad of structures that dotted its perimeter. This mega-reactor's conduits connected to each of its surrounding brethren, having been designed to centralize their collective energy into a super-heated nucleus. The fusion chamber would soon be capable of providing scientists and mages alike with immeasurable knowledge of physics and the workings of the universe.
Citizens from every nation gathered around the reservoir on its opening day. Celebrations sprang up throughout world, hailing the reactor as a technical marvel and a true measure of spirit and ingenuity.
At the end of a reverent countdown, the metal behemoth was powered on. Crowds cheered and threw confetti. Lead engineers waved from the top of the reactor, congratulating one another on a job well done. The engine sparked to life, humming gracefully as the magical energy from several smaller generators was siphoned inward.
The drum began to heat.
Miles of cabling began to buckle and wave, as if part of a grandiose tentacled monster. Rivets exploded from the reactor's seams, and a glow brighter than the sun was beamed through the rips in its flank. Elation turned to horror as pieces of the colossal machine deteriorated like paper engulfed in flame. The mounting pressure released in one immense, silent flash.
The world went white.
The explosion had devastated the realm. Cities and nations laid to waste.
Sound was voided save for the wind, which carried smoke over the ruined land. In a single shattering moment, all life had been extinguished.
At the epicenter of the great detonation, a condensed mass of energy remained to govern the upturned blast zone. It pulsed like a star that had become detached from the night sky, tendrils of arcane energy arcing wildly. The orb appeared curiously sluggish, as if roused from a slumber.
Then it stretched all eight of its spindled limbs.
The world was still. In the wake of the disaster, nothing moved save for the beating of the arcane serpent’s own heart. Coiled and knotted like a rope, his spindled form merely hovered in the comforting glow of the detonation.
He was frailly built. Two sets of emaciated arms stretched out from a wiry frame, and a flat intricate crest fanned from his alien head, supported by a weak curved neck. A pair of small, vestigial wings remained folded at his sides, eclipsed by the larger pair that--until now--had acted as a cocoon.
The first few moments of his existence were sluggish, confusing. Several days passed before he could even unwrap himself from the coiled position that had ushered him into the devastated world. He extended one of his large outer wings, tentatively testing its soundness. He then peeled away the other, wobbling awkwardly. Frightened at the sudden temperature change, he collapsed both wings, huddling and shivering. Perhaps tomorrow.
The next day he unraveled his leviathan-like tail enough to barely graze the soil below him. The sense of touch was exhilarating, but nothing prepared him for the first time he opened his eyes. The sudden stimuli of vision sent him reeling, as brightness invaded his fogged oculars and sent waves of pain throughout his head. Instinctively, he shut them tight again. But by now, his curiosity had been piqued, and he wrenched them back open, the blindness fading eventually.
What followed was an insatiable curiosity for the landscape that surrounded him. The world that he saw was the only world that he knew. The gnarled, skeletal remains of the cities and towns that surrounded him in a deathly ring had always been. This was the true picture of the realm according to the Arcanist.
In the following days he wandered the wreckage, soaking in the scarred remnants of civilization. Each torn structure was a question, every charred figure was an inquiry.
These investigations fueled his hunger for knowledge, and he began to collect pieces of the deluge and examine them closely. Among the wastes he found scattered sheets of parchment and papers that had somehow escaped immolation. Though he did not understand the text covering them, there was much to be gleaned from the illustrations. The serpent began to build a picture of the area’s history.
But there came a point where the Arcanist had devoured what scant information he could, and he decided to venture outside the confines of the great city’s borders. His curious gaze traced the distant horizon, which sloped upwards drastically towards the northwest. There, a glint of bright light seemed to beckon to him. After surveying his birthplace for the last time, he launched into the sky and set off towards this beacon, leaving all he knew behind.
No matter the destruction, there is always a chance of rebirth.
In the time before the Arcanist's awakening, concentrated energies rained across the shattered landscape, seeping into the charred remains of life and industry.
Arcane particles sank deep into the crust, enriching the roots of trees and plants that had been sapped of their life during the blast. Currents of energy coursed up trunks and into the cells of branches. Reactions sparked beneath the surface sending waves of magic through stalks of grass, clusters of bushes, and monumental redwoods. Ethereal flowers erupted from cracks and crevices, and each green cluster grew larger and more robustly than the last. Nature had capitalized on the fallout, taking control of the energies to repair itself.
The rampant regrowth began to take on the guise of a colossal figure. Tree branches and leaves strained and twisted together into four thick, bark-covered stumps. A leafy canopy connected the four towers, until the burgeoning garden had materialized into a distinguishable silhouette. There was no mistaking what had been created: a wyrm of boundless potential, birthed from the leaves and the grass and the moss. The Gladekeeper had grown out of the ashes.
Not everything can be healed. The apocalypse had done more than spur the rejuvenation of flora: the fauna still rotted, left to fester upon the soil, and spoil in the dreadful warmth. Death leveraged the excess energy in another way. Where nature could not mend, decay took its place. Putrid film soaked and crept across the ground, enveloping everything in its path. Whole structures creaked and fell under the weight of the empowered rot that now infected them.
This contagion continued its wave of domination, scouring every corpse and every bit of food. Weaker plants and bodies of water fell sick with filth, and the cycle intensified with each new fallen organism. A runaway viral infection coursed through the veins of the world.
This scourge wrapped around the fallen, ripping away flesh and tearing marrow into a blighted tornado of destruction. Within time, the contamination had taken on a ghastly shape. It haunted the land in the form of a spectral drake, gnarled with veins, pustules and sharpened bone. This harbinger -the Plaguebringer- tested the worth of every sign of regrowth as she scoured over the surface of the realm, leaving behind a frightening scarred wasteland.
It did not take long for the wyrms to encounter one another; each was torn away from their polarized campaigns after sensing the nearness of their nemesis. While the land healed and fell ill all around them, the deities of nature and plague embroiled themselves in vicious, unending combat. Thick roots and brambles wrapped themselves around the Plaguebringer’s legs and arms, chaining her to the earth, only to wither and melt away at her defiling touch. Contagion reached and groped at the Gladekeeper’s every move, but she countered with razor-sharp torrents of bladed leaves and piercing branches. The land took on the hues of red and green as the two sparred and tumbled eternally. Hilltops and cliffs were torn asunder, replaced with lush tropical gardens or seething, stinking, bone piles. Chaos seemed the only constant.
Oblivious to the existence of the warring sisters, the Arcanist had reached his destination: an observatory perched at the top of a large heave of stone and grass. The sight of it was foreign to him, the structure was undeniably more intact than those that surrounded the scrap metal of the reactors below. Its metallic surface shone brilliantly up close, constructed out of polished amber-colored alloys and engraved with intricate patterns.
A massive, tiered scope extended from its domed roof, angled in such a way that a thousand different colors bent through its gigantic lens. The reflection of the rising moon glowed upon the surface of the curved glass.
Curious about the purpose of the construct, the young wyrm entered, approaching the ringed cylinder that led him to this place. Diagrams led him to the eyepiece in the center of the observatory’s central chamber. Tracing its connection to the scope, the Arcanist began to understand what he must do. Unaware of what to expect, he curled up on the floor and looked into the device.
Overwhelming emotion filled the Arcanist's heart. The familiar dreary landscape of orange and brown that had defined his creation was now a sea of black, dotted with a rainbow of color. A million twinkling stars enveloped his senses, and he backed away from the telescope in fear. But for as much apprehension he was experiencing, there was two times the excitement. He was obliviously traveling along the waves of galaxies and pulsars and suns and planets, absorbing it all.
And in this position he remained.
He began to inscribe his studies onto the reams of blank parchment he found preserved below the observatory. Strewn papers and notes dotted interior walls of the dome, illustrating star maps and constellations he found in his observations. The vastness of the skies above were always unveiling new surprises. He was determined and hungry to document it all: Every corner of space, every point in the visible universe.
After a particularly exhausting night of scouring the sky, he noticed something peculiar: a splotch of pure black between two familiar spiral galaxies. Consulting his previous maps of that area, he realized that it had not shown itself the first time he had chronicled the quadrant. A sudden wave of curiosity washed over him and—suddenly reinvigorated--he refocused in on this spot intensely.
The blackness was implausible, and--more alarming: it seemed to move slightly over the course of the night. The arcane one rapped his claws against the floor in deep thought. To move that quickly in one evening had to mean that the anomaly was very close indeed. Close enough, even, to possibly view with the naked eye. A natural account of the enigma would be extremely valuable information to have.
For the first time in a decade, the Arcanist left the observatory. Squinting into the setting sun, he traced a pattern in the sky towards where he knew the blemish would be, and there it was. It was as if someone had removed the stars from the sky, shoving them outward, exposing a hole in the cosmos.
He surveyed the horizon, trying to identify the highest point where he could perch, dismayed that he may have already reached it. From the observatory hill, the Arcanist could see a wealth of landscape spread out around him, though nothing appeared to surpass his vantage. A mighty silhouette faded into view to the northeast. Through a thick brown haze, he could see a tall monument, stretching skyward. A pillar. From its zenith it might just be possible to observe the growing darkness.
The Pillar’s true size became readily apparent the closer he traveled. Waves of powerful energy warped the air, making flight more and more difficult as he approached, finally driving him to ground. As he crawled to The Pillar's base, he looked up. The megalith towered above him, receding into the heavens. He could not make out its summit, and the notion of scaling it soon became sickening and intimidating.
He had to know.
Driven, the Arcanist reached out and gripped the Pillar’s craggy surface with one of his claws, finding handholds in the intricate carvings that decorated its circumference. Using all the strength he could muster, he began to propel himself upward. During his ascent, he never looked down upon the world that was now roiling with plagued lands and terrifying jungles. He was alone in the pursuit of an ultimate knowledge.
For days he climbed, eyes focused on the tightly-rounded horizon that was his goal. Mistral tufts brushed his aching body, and for several hours the young god was lost in a soup of dark, rumbling thunderclouds. He made his best progress at night, when the void was most prominent in the sky. It was growing larger, but he could not determine if he was getting any closer.
At long last, the Pillar ended. Digging his claws into the flattened crown, and with a final exhausting heave, he pulled his body onto the cold, unforgiving stone and collapsed. He slumbered, wrapped within the protection of his wings. The air at the apex was frigid, and an immense pressure pulsed at his temples, but there he remained until night inevitably fell.
The dark spot was now a formidable swath of the sky, and he could make out curious fluctuations along its edges. Tendrils of the deepest black spiraled off; however, there was something even more odd. Although he was closer to his subject, his perception of it still felt skewed. Was it possible that his viewpoint was somehow being warped by the energies emitted by The Pillar?
The Arcanist closed his eyes and focused, meditating deeply within the submersion of the magic emanating from the summit. He felt it shift, glowing, growing, and receding. The drake began to pull at it, each inhale absorbing more and more of the ether. He then opened his eyes.
It was much clearer now. The distortion that had obscured his observance of the void had all but vanished. He took a few moments to closely examine the darkness, soon discovering that it was shifting in accordance to his own movement. When he lifted an arm, smoky tendrils sprouted from the black cloud and spiraled outward in a beautifully fractal dance. If he arched his back, the blackness echoed and bent. This was communion with the heavens, a gift that he had only dreamed of. From this perch, the Arcanist felt he could command the universe itself.
He released some of his power in a stream of red and blue, drawing a serpentine line of fire across his body. The darkness shifted. He waved all four of his arms in different directions, painting the air with coiled ropes of light. The darkness inflated. In one grand gesture, he expelled magic in a dazzling array of explosions and patterns.
The darkness surged.
A low, ominous rumble pervaded the air, and the Arcanist became frightened, halting his display and seizing hold of the edges of The Pillar. Something was not right.
The shadow enveloped the sky, and the tendrils that had enchanted him moments before were taking on a terrifying new guise. Thousands of razor-toothed maws snapped toward him as the night was swallowed.
A harrowing moan rocked the realm. Startled, the Gladekeeper relaxed her jaw, releasing the Plaguebringer's neck. The defiling wyrm tumbled down a ravine, scrambling to right herself. Poised to lunge back into the fray, she froze in her tracks when another deafening groan shuddered over the canyon. The two sisters were silenced as they both raised their heads and witnessed the bleak canopy spreading out above them.
In the far distance, a beacon of radiating pink light pulsed in the clouds, illuminating the mighty Pillar on the horizon. Crackling bolts of thunder surrounded its summit, and each passing moment resulted in more disappearing stars. It was as if a mighty being was blowing out a billion candles.
Terrified at what this could mean, the adversaries fled in opposite directions, determined to preserve themselves.
This was not right.
The Arcanist cemented himself to the stone dais, gaping at the nightmare that grew ever larger, the moaning that rumbled ever louder. A sorrowful, hopeless feeling washed over him, and all of the raw power and energy he had so masterfully wielded was drained. He shook with fear.
The Shade continued the hunt, gaining speed at a horrifying pace. Beckoned by the arcane dragon’s ritual, the cloud of dread hungrily rocketed towards the world it had attacked eons earlier. The darkness sliced through the sky like a dagger.
There was nothing left to do. The young god crept to the precipice and looked down into the clouds. The perceived sensation of falling almost seemed a welcome feeling when compared to the null maw that approached. With one last look at the conquering shadow, he slid off the edge and clenched his wings tight against his body. The Arcanist plummeted as the first tendrils reached the bulwark’s outer barriers.
A deafening noise shattered the silent night, as the brunt of the assailing force hit. The immensity of the nightmarish Shade was overwhelming. The magical barrier, weakened considerably during the summoning, ruptured under the impact. The force of the collision sent devastating shockwaves through the thin air, and in one explosive moment...
...the Pillar shattered.
A muted dawn cut through the murk that permeated the lowlands. The morning was thick with ash and dust and a scent of a burning world was carried on the wind. Dark veins of smoke--the remnants of the Shade--dripped down the sides of the sky as it warmed and brightened, an inky rain falling on the outside of an upturned glass basin.
There was no sound but the slight tumble of fragments of rock settling, and the crackling of growing wildfires.
The calamity had detonated the stone pillar, hurtling entire slabs and chunks of it across the globe. From the northern highlands to the southern ice shelf, not a landmass was unscathed by the shrapnel of the explosion. The most immense layers of the structure gravitated to their eventual resting places in the would-be elemental regions of the modern world. The visual reminders of the shattering were everywhere.
Floating above the massive plinth that remained, loose clusters of stone hovered in a columnar fashion, held aloft by their own will and a stubborn refusal to let go of the shape they once held. Below the ruined silhouette, the world was a tumble of upturned earth and strewn debris. Earthen scars radiated from the monument like a multi-armed star, pieces of it entrenched deep in the rocky crust.
There was no sign of the arcane dragon that had manifested this scene. The sisters of plague and nature stared in disbelief as the behemoths that had fused themselves into the barrier now lay beneath its skeletal remains. The wyrms stirred.
The Lightweaver opened her eyes to the devastation, stricken immediately by the bleak and sorrowful condition of the sky. The sun was rising, but its rays were fettered and obscured by strings of darkness that crept from on high. They faded as they fell, like rivulets of drying ink.
How long did I sleep, tangled up in the spiral of the Pillar? Before she could formulate a guess, a pile of rocks gave way nearby, and a ropy, pronged tail unfurled from beneath the rubble.
What impressed the Stormcatcher most was that he was still very much alive, and full of renewed vigor. Although their long nap had been cut short by the calamity, he once again felt the warm breezes of the world, and that was enough to shake off any lethargy in him. Kicking off the tumblestone, he surveyed the mess with analytic wonderment. His momentary curiosity was soon doused in apathy the moment he partook in the act of his sisters and brothers waking in the post-catastrophic drear.
“Tragic. But expected.”
So that was it. There was nothing left here; they had failed. The Shade had bested their ward.
“Where will you go?” the Earthshaker called, propping himself up on thick, granite-caked legs. The wyrm of thunder paused, but did not turn, his crested head pointed towards the southern horizon.
“Where I may not be found---this farce is over, and I've plans of my own,” Without a look, he took to the sky, sparks of electricity cracking off his wings at each beat.
The Shadowbinder waddled to a rocky overhang and spat on the ground. The dark puddle sizzled when it hit stone.
The brightness of day was in full swing, and the burn of the sun was extremely discomforting. The earthen one appeared to be gesturing to her, but she couldn't make out what he was saying. It didn't matter, she supposed. She remembered not really liking him anyway. Come to think of it, she didn’t really like any of them.
She wouldn't last much longer if she did not find darkness enough to obscure this oppressive morning. She hobbled from shadow to shadow until she, too, had disappeared on the horizon.
The morning heat had begun to wear on the Icewarden, but he could not depart without saying something. The Earthshaker looked pathetic. “This is the way of it. We were resolute enough to keep this world from destroying itself, but now we have another charge. It is evident that we will never hold off the residual darkness together, so we must do so apart. It is time to separate.”
His words withered the mountain drake, he could tell, but with a grim nod, he took his leave.
I will create thousands of children, thought the Windsinger, the air will be cleansed and painted in a plethora of colored brushes. My flight will carry the stories of the realm, and tell of its history. A pity that the others will never know a similar joy.
There was no stopping them now. One by one, the Earthshaker watched his kin recede from the landscape, abandoning the post that had solidified their alliance for so many millennia. The Tidelord rumbled darkly about impending strife and the splintering of friendships before slipping into a murky lake. The Flamecaller left without a word at all, though the earth rumbled and issued hot jets of smoke in her wake. By nightfall, the stone guardian was completely alone, staring at the shattered column.
The evening air howled; a solemn noise that reminded him just how deserted this landscape was. Dust moved in combating vortices, blotting out the glow of the moon, and encrusting the great dragon in gravels and sands.
He did not move for several months, addled by sorrow and lethargy. From this resting place, the years passed him by, calcifying his body into a heap of boulders.
The Eleven founded their eventual homes around the largest slabs of the Pillar that had come to rest across the realm. Although separated and cloistered, they still held a powerful connection to the monument that once shielded their world from darkness.
To further guard these relics, the wyrms used their respective magics to create children in their image.
Dragonkind was born.
They introduced color, pattern, and trait to create tension and diversity. Over many cycles, these children began to form their own primitive societies, like those that had come before the shattering. These new denizens dedicated their lives to protecting their piece of the Pillar, and preserving the strength and significance of their element. Life sprang up around the gods, and dragonkind thrived in this new age.
Furthermore, these clans were becoming powerful. Each new generation was more attuned to their element than the one that came before it, and the saturation of magical energies became increasingly more robust. The recovering realm now hosted a myriad of dragons of all elemental persuasions, all populating and shaping their territories to accommodate a staggering increase in magical affinity.
These denizens dedicated their lives to protecting their piece of the ruined column, and preserving the strength and significance of their element. Only time would tell whether this new order would maintain or destroy that which the gods had built.
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