Nehrim:The History of Vyn and the Shadow God... or my story...
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The History of Vyn
Author: Arkt
A thousand years after the downfall of Treomar, the already unstable political situation in Nehrim was shaken even more. The war between Cahbaet and Erothin began and the oppressed land was further torn apart. For over thousands of years millions had been dying for the same countries. After the banishment of the Gods followingErodan's death, Narathzul Arantheal took over the reign of Nehrim at first, then after his imprisonment Chancellor Barateon, even though the Gods had had great interest in winning the land back for themselves the whole time.
On an uncertain day before the outbreak of the war, a child was born to unknown parents.
Although his home Ledur was ruined in the war, and his parents killed, this child was brought to Tirin Abbey which was located in a remote spot in the great forests of Faltrindtal so he could grow up there as an orphan. Nobody would have suspected this orphan to become one of the land's greatest and oldest legends many years later. Many would fail, he would be God among people.
The orphan was subject to the imperious upbringing of the monks in the abbey and didn't see anything of the world that lay further than the monks let him go.
Being of a lower class, he entered the Mage's Order of Merzul as a simple scholar, completely unaware of the role in history he had yet to play.
He witnessed the destruction of the Order by Barateon's henchmen - who was acting suborned by the Gods who gave him false information, in order to overthrow Merzul who could do nothing against Barateon's unleashed power.
The orphan, the sole survivor, was able to escape. He fought his way to the mountain monastery where an old friend of the Order, Callisto, was living a life away from the war. With Callisto's help, the orphan managed to find information in the ruined city of Treomar about the secret place where the Gods had imprisoned Narathzul Arantheal back in the day. At the same time, he discovered the missing Star Map of the Star People in the depths of Treomar.
However, Barateon had his men follow the orphan and it did not take long for his henchmen to attack the mountain monastery aswell. The orphan had to flee through the ancient tunnels of the dwarves, the Daromith Galleries, where he presented the Star People with their much longed for Star Map. After his escape, the orphan managed to enter the city of Cahbaet. He joined forces with the rebels there, whom Barateon was also fighting, and with them he freed the city of its besiegers.
After that he continued his actual mission - to free Narathzul Arantheal who wanted to banish Barateon and the Gods from Vyn and fulfill the predestination of the Tel Imaltath, a God announced by the stars who was to equilibrate the world again.
After he sneaked into Barateon's palace, the orphan managed to find Arantheal's prison and free him from his chains. Together with Arantheal, he freed the mountain monastery of its besiegers and overthrew Chancellor Barateon, thus releasing Nehrim from a centuries-long era of slavery and oppression.
After the fall of the chancellor, Arantheal sent the orphan to recover the prophecy of the Tel Imaltath from the old temple of the Creator. In doing so, the orphan had the chance to enter the small circle of people who knew about the predestination of fate. After the predestination was recovered, Arantheal's fight for freedom began in Ostian, where the totalitarian rule of belief had made its home. The orphan was successful here too and freed the people of Ostian, while Arantheal managed to spy out the Gods in order to fulfil his long-cherished wish to become the Tel Imaltath.
Immediately after that, Arantheal's battle against the Gods began. He sent the orphan to retrieve one of the ancient and powerful weapons from the temple of Tyrat, like the sword Soulflayer Arantheal himself had, for only with such a weapon could the fight against the Gods be victorious.
Then they both confronted the Gods and killed four of them - Esara, Malphas, Saldrin and Morala. As they came across Tyr ad Irlanda, Irlanda revealed to Narathzul Arantheal that he was her son. As a descendant of the Gods, he had divine blood running through his veins which made it impossible for him to fulfill the predestination of the Tel Imaltath. The banished seraphim Arkt took the chance and killed Arantheal while Tyr and Irlanda fled back to Inodan, the city of the Gods.
With Arkt's help, the orphan took the opportunity the predestination gave him and followed them to Inodan. There he discovered that the Goddess Irlanda had taken her own life, but was able to pass a test of Tyr and so fulfilled the predestination of the Shadow God.
At this time the eternal wheel of fate was not known to him - this existed long before the Gods. The rise of the Shadow God is predetermined, just as his fall. First, fate ensures that special mages become Gods and rule the world. Then a human Tel Imaltath comes to overthrow the Gods again. But a final rule by the Shadow God is not forseen. He too must fall again - and quickly, so the Messengers of Fate can put the world back into its original state. Into a time before any kinds of Gods.
It is the eternal cycle of the worlds. The only purpose of the Shadow God is the deposition of the Gods. This predestination was written long before the people, maybe it even existed before the Creation, maybe the Creation only exists to offer a place, an arena in which the different powers are to take on each other. But why? Why the predestination? We do not know the answer, we can only speculate. The imagination of man is too limited, perhaps. Maybe we are all just a means of entertainment for a higher power. A game between two powers...
The orphan avoided his downfall by destroying the predestination - he threw it into the maelstrom of the great Sanctum underneath Inodan. The predestination was flung from the world somewhere into the magical storms and from then on has been existing in a place beyond space and time. Thus the validity of fate was overruled and the orphan was able to defeat the Messenger of Fate, Sarantha, who normally destroyed the Shadow Gods.
By destroying the predestination, however, the orphan lost his special power as a Shadow God - the only thing remaining his natural immortality. Neither disease nor age can hurt him. For the Shadow God, an unnatural cause of death is predetermined and the orphan avoided this by conquering fate.
Fate has been overcome, no longer appropriate. We have defied it. Our world has defied it. Never again will a god rule over Nehrim. The people shall, whether that is good or not. Won't they?
The eternal wheel of fate seems to be still. But will it really be forever? Time has no meaning for Creation, as well as everything that mortals can do. They are just ants in a neverending ocean of tides.
If there really are higher powers that created fate, why did they not stop us? Or did they, without us knowing? Have we perhaps only reached the next sphere of predestination? Time will show us. One thing is certain: it always continues.
