OE 112
January 18th
Location: Cape Town, South Africa
A burning, dying sun set over a scene of flame-kissed ruin.
It had all started with the Lunar Pulse. That was what people remembered - a gleaming lance cast down from the Moon, spearing the Earth. With it had come countless Dimensional Beasts, and the accursed Lamalice, twin plagues reminiscent of those that had once blighted the Pharaohs of Egypt for their cruelty.
But they were just the first of the blights that would fall upon humanity.
War - profound, terrible bloodshed fell upon the world as brother turned upon brother, fingers pointed in accusation, as puppet masters worked behind the scenes in a grand chess game against one another. Battle raged day and night for year upon year - until they came. They had waited, biding their time on the sidelines, loyal not to any mortal, but to something even greater and more sinister than any could have imagined.
From the frozen North came the heralds of the Lord of Destruction, whose name alone spread paralyzing fear among the populace. Faceless, endless legions of sulfurous, bleak-visored machines marched at the whim of the Melior Esse, feeding parasitically off the bloodshed and sorrow that they spread - and in turn growing even more twisted, more fearsome, more malevolent with every passing day. The advance of the Ruina seemed unstoppable, and though many rose to fight against them, all were swept aside like wheat before a scythe, little more than wheat for their foul harvest.
As if in response, when all seemed lost, the skies split asunder - and from beyond, from Crescentia, came golden, lordly entities - the Giants, they were called. At first, people clamored for their salvation - only to discover to their horror that the price of deliverance was the surrender of the self - the soul. Shackles of gold and silver adorned their masses, and a final, cataclysmic war erupted between entities of cosmic stature - one that shattered the skies, rending the planets from their orbits, and which threatened to tear the very cosmos into little more than unrecognizable shreds.
Meanwhile... The final observer, a calculating, fell consciousness... Watched, patiently, as all variables proceeded according to its machinations.
All... Save one.
Even after the continents had been sundered, Cape Town had held fast onto what it could. The stadium - sunken and ruined, served as a hideout for those that sought to avoid the roaming packs of Ruina that still patrolled the horizon, searching for the smallest of scraps to pick at. Furtive scavengers picked through piles of debris, not unlike the Ruina themselves as they sought out the tiniest scraps of sustenance. It was far from a perfect sanctuary, as the savaged city could attest...
But tonight, at least... Felt strangely peaceful.
Overhead, a hundred thousand shooting stars crossed the darkening skies - they were anything but natural, products of war between entities that dwarfed those below in size, scale, and comprehension, as they once again locked horns in a struggle for dominance...
Despite this, however... The sight was no less beautiful, even at the end of the world.
January 18th
Location: Cape Town, South Africa
A burning, dying sun set over a scene of flame-kissed ruin.
It had all started with the Lunar Pulse. That was what people remembered - a gleaming lance cast down from the Moon, spearing the Earth. With it had come countless Dimensional Beasts, and the accursed Lamalice, twin plagues reminiscent of those that had once blighted the Pharaohs of Egypt for their cruelty.
But they were just the first of the blights that would fall upon humanity.
War - profound, terrible bloodshed fell upon the world as brother turned upon brother, fingers pointed in accusation, as puppet masters worked behind the scenes in a grand chess game against one another. Battle raged day and night for year upon year - until they came. They had waited, biding their time on the sidelines, loyal not to any mortal, but to something even greater and more sinister than any could have imagined.
From the frozen North came the heralds of the Lord of Destruction, whose name alone spread paralyzing fear among the populace. Faceless, endless legions of sulfurous, bleak-visored machines marched at the whim of the Melior Esse, feeding parasitically off the bloodshed and sorrow that they spread - and in turn growing even more twisted, more fearsome, more malevolent with every passing day. The advance of the Ruina seemed unstoppable, and though many rose to fight against them, all were swept aside like wheat before a scythe, little more than wheat for their foul harvest.
As if in response, when all seemed lost, the skies split asunder - and from beyond, from Crescentia, came golden, lordly entities - the Giants, they were called. At first, people clamored for their salvation - only to discover to their horror that the price of deliverance was the surrender of the self - the soul. Shackles of gold and silver adorned their masses, and a final, cataclysmic war erupted between entities of cosmic stature - one that shattered the skies, rending the planets from their orbits, and which threatened to tear the very cosmos into little more than unrecognizable shreds.
Meanwhile... The final observer, a calculating, fell consciousness... Watched, patiently, as all variables proceeded according to its machinations.
All... Save one.
Even after the continents had been sundered, Cape Town had held fast onto what it could. The stadium - sunken and ruined, served as a hideout for those that sought to avoid the roaming packs of Ruina that still patrolled the horizon, searching for the smallest of scraps to pick at. Furtive scavengers picked through piles of debris, not unlike the Ruina themselves as they sought out the tiniest scraps of sustenance. It was far from a perfect sanctuary, as the savaged city could attest...
But tonight, at least... Felt strangely peaceful.
Overhead, a hundred thousand shooting stars crossed the darkening skies - they were anything but natural, products of war between entities that dwarfed those below in size, scale, and comprehension, as they once again locked horns in a struggle for dominance...
Despite this, however... The sight was no less beautiful, even at the end of the world.