Liam Acornley (Year one) - The Blight's Return

This is a prologue for a story I'm working on called "The blight's return" (placeholder title)
Turns out I like writing set-ups more than the actual stories, oh well, enjoy WAF'ing this.

“Well” you may ask, “How did this world take its form?” Why of all worlds in creation has this one strange properties, its diverse and eldritch collection of creatures, cultures and lore? “The answer,” one whispers, “lies with the Fundamentals.” These four progenitors were there when the universe was forged, and if not, they were born with the initial burst of creation still ringing in their ears. Formed with the earliest energies of the universe, the Fundamentals wished nothing more than to begin their own lives as sculptors and creators. So they began the task of manipulating matter to their will: blasting and shaping it, creating planets, stars and suns. However, when matter became nothing more than a trivial craft to them, the Fundamentals twisted their tools upon themselves, producing physical forms and reshaping their spirits until they too were one upon this plane of existence. As reality itself became the very object they shaped, they yearned for more challenging targets, harder objectives to fulfil, until at last they decided they would create sentient life like themselves, and scatter it amongst the planets they had made in their infancy. Three of the four Fundamentals forsook their immortality and celestial forms to become one with those that they create, and they took the names Light, Chaos and Void; whilst their fourth sibling maintained a watchful eye from every corner of reality, and was known as Pneuma itself.

Light set to work, forging creatures with every possible spectrum of colour and scattered them unto this world, he created happiness, heart, courage and every discernible positive aspect of existence. Chaos, not wishing to be outdone by his sibling, began to set to work in creating the paradoxical equivalent of Light’s creations, and formed war, death, hunger and famine. Thus began the bickering of the two Fundamentals, while Light created the day and brightness, Chaos would create the night-time and shadows. Whilst Light placed peaceful creatures upon the surface of the world, Chaos produced predators that would snuff them out.

All the while that this was occurring, Void watched in vested interest, noting that without Chaos, Light’s creations would become too much of a burden for the world, and would decimate the lands if not put in check, and likewise Chaos’s agents of death would themselves die out if not for the creatures of Light. Intrigued by this, Void devoted himself to ensuring that one Fundamental would never out-do the other, there would never be light without darkness, nor life without death under Void’s omnipotent gaze.

Taking a backseat from the creation of this world, Pneuma decided that it would play less of a vital role in its siblings fight and instead yearned to see life from the perspective of a creation, instead of a creator. As such, it tore itself asunder and spread its fragmented form into the minds of Light and Chaos’s creatures, becoming the very embodiment of what we refer to as ‘soul’. Pneuma was everywhere, and in all things. Denounced by enemies as the great unmaker, worshiped by scholars as the twinkling of a divine eye, it occupied all planes at once and yet is never present. Upon a creature’s death, Pneuma’s shred would shake off its fleshy prison and make its way back into the stars, where the birth, life and death of the creature would be played for Pneuma who cherished every moment of the performance before sending its shred back to the world to embed itself on a newly birthed creature.

At this point, the world was in a constant state of renewal. Civilisations rose and fell, and races warred for superiority of the planet, more and more creatures were made and placed in the great oceans, the sprawling jungles or the flattened plains. Void, now regretful of his physical form decided he too would create something, something complete and balanced without any vestiges of Light or Chaos. It was at that moment Void realised, as he had become the embodiment of balance in all things, he must create something which could rival Pneuma itself, for his celestial sibling was truly the most powerful being in all of creation, and without a counterweight to this, Void would never be satisfied. So much like Light and Chaos who crafted the very world, Void went to work in creating a being with no soul, neigh, a being that could destroy a soul, that would be able to tear the fragment of Pneuma that a creature weighed down and consume it; allowing there to finally be the ultimate balance of power between the four Fundamentals. It was here, that Dirge, the Deadgod was formed.

Void created Dirge with one thought in mind, snuffing out the imbalance that Pneuma presented to the world, and Dirge obliged joyfully. With an insatiable hunger, Dirge took to the lands and slaughtered men, women, children, animals, fish, birds and even nature itself, tearing from its downed masses the shards of Pneuma and feasting on them. Blight spread from its footsteps and entire cities were razed by this one being, for with no soul to lose, the Dirge, no matter how many swords split its belly apart, no matter how many arrows pierced its head, and no matter how many times he was incinerated, could never die. As such Void saw the immense err in his ways, for a being without death was the ultimate imbalance, Pneuma itself could be consumed and destroyed, and as such had a weakness, but a being that feared and felt nothing, with no discernible way of being stopped was impossible to end.

Light and Chaos, now tired with this world left it, to pursue the errant creation and destruction of countless others, Pneuma followed suit, and expanded its reach to these planets too whilst still maintaining itself here. However Void was committed to this world, he has wronged it and would not stop until the Dirge’s march was halted. Unable to physically interact with it in his current form, Void instead influenced and twisted the minds of man, Orc, Naga, Trolls, Elves and so forth, to band together and create a grand prison for the undying Dirge to inhabit. Based hundreds of feet below the earth’s surface, the prison walls and roof was cast in the hardest substances each race could bring forth and after several years of toil, it was ready. At this point the deadgod had spread throughout a multitude of continents, wiping out entire races and civilisations, leaving few to contest his mission of consuming what shards of Pneuma he could find. Void imparted a final mission onto his people before shooting off into the cosmos in chase of his siblings, to draw Dirge to the pit that begat the entrance of the epic prison, and end its rein of terror.

It is said that after the Dirge was sealed away, and the races split once again to build their civilisations anew, the world flourished in perfect balance. Ecosystems were formed and the world began to heal over time, the blight seeping away into the bowls of the earth where the Dirge hopelessly clawed at the roof of its containment, still hungering for souls. Yet with no means of raising itself back to the surface, its efforts were in vain.

“And that is how this world took its form my son”, stated the grand savant to the child; “A bickering amongst gods that’s conclusion led to us, and this world we call home.”
“But what about the scary Dirge” questioned Lief, mind wandering to the images he saw in the holy-texts of his church,
“the Deadgod is on all accounts no longer a threat to you and I child, instead, you should be more worried about preparing for tomorrow, it’s a big day you know…”,
“Yes, yes I know. I only wish I could stay here longer, I don’t want to sit on a boring throne all day! And I still miss my father, what if I can’t rule the country as well as he can?”
“I will be by your side every step of the way Lief…apologies, my liege.”
“Oh well, goodnight! I want an early night’s sleep so I can go on my first monster hunt as king tomorrow, Lief the monster hunting king, doesn’t that sound amazing!”
“Of course my liege, goodnight.” And with that, the grand savant left the little princes chambers, not knowing the next time he returned to them, a great evil would have awoken.