Prologue

 

They say that power corrupts. There’s no truer case than with Abaddon, God of Secrets. I, Halrah of the Mists, am the true witness to the events which unfolded in Elona involving Abaddon, his demise by Sunspear hands and the following story of one poor traveller. I write this account neither for glory nor pleasure, but so that once and for all the truth may be known. In 1075AE, Abaddon was not destroyed - not completely. The Sunspears thought that with the ascension of their beloved Kormir, all was well in the world, but they were wrong. So long as I may exist, Elona shall not be plagued by ignorance of these events. From here, let it be known that this is the story of what truly happened; this is the story of the decaying diary.

 

At the hands of Abaddon magic was cast out to the world, flowing outwards towards the races of Tyria. He blessed each one in turn, bestowing upon them the greatest gift of all. Inside, he began to fill with contentment, basking in the enjoyment he was bestowing upon Tyria. He thought about this new feeling he was experiencing. Not contentment, he thought, it feels more than that, it’s almost...
“Abaddon!” came a female voice from the distance, desperate to hear a reply. Arah was large, and sounds echoed through the city’s walls. He had no time to finish his thoughts, but for her he did not mind.
“Abaddon! Please, I beg you, stop this! You were warned of the consequences, you know not to give out magic so freely! For one so powerful, how can you afford to be so ignorant?”
“Lyssa, I’m-“
“Don’t tell me you’re sorry; don’t lie to me. You know how much your actions disturb the other gods and they can’t remain neutral for much longer. The human king, Doric, has been pleading with us to intervene, and the others are listening. They will stop you if you don’t stop yourself. Just do it, for me. Please.”
“Lyssa, I can’t. Of all the gods, you know most that I cannot remain a passive god. Without this I’d be nothing, but with this power it fills me with a feeling that I’ve never felt before in all my existence and I’m not ready to let go, not yet.”
The goddess sighed. She knew she could never change Abaddon, no matter how hard she begged him. She felt like saying to him “You wouldn’t be nothing, you’d have me”, but couldn’t bring the words to her lips. And at the same time, she realised what a mistake it was to entrust this power with him to begin with. Fools, all five of them had been. Fools. “They’re going to take you; the Underworld is already prepared and lying in wait for your arrival. I don’t want them to but they’re being forced by your actions. I don’t want to lose you; I don’t want to lose what we have.”
Lyssa extended her hand to Abaddon, her palm encircled by a cloud of pink mist. The mist began to form a small, leather-bound book and as it did so, a tear began to move down her pale face.
“Take this. If you feel the same way about me as I do about you, you’ll put something in it. I don’t care what it is, I just... just want something to remember you by when you’re gone, something to hold onto always.”
“Lyssa, I’m not going anywhere...”
Another tear began to form in her eye. “Yes, you are. I don’t need one of my visions to see that. I’m sorry Abaddon, for everything.” Seeing that he would not take her gift, Lyssa placed the diary on the floor beside Abaddon and began to walk away slowly, forcing herself not to look back.

Lyssa appeared by Abaddon’s side again the next day. Soon after she had left him, he had left Arah in search of some final moments of peace, arriving somewhere along a beautiful stretch of coastline spanning outwards into the Crystal Sea. A look of despair covered her face and her lips trembled as she spoke.
“They’re coming for you. I tried to reason with them, but Balthazar and Grenth insisted. You’re going to die, Abaddon. I can’t tell you how sorry I am.”
Once again, tears began to run down her face. Abaddon turned to look her in the eyes.
“I put something in the diary,” he replied.
“May I have it? This means so much to me, I promise I’ll forever... forever...”
Lyssa’s despair had turned to fear, her mind becoming wracked with the stuff.
“I can’t, I refuse to seal my fate so easily.”
Abaddon moved quickly, dashing behind Lyssa before grabbing her neck with his hand. Choking, Lyssa forced herself to expel a pink energy from her hands, causing Abaddon to lose his grip. Lyssa turned to him, a mix of confusion and fear in her eyes.
“What are you doing?! You cannot hope to defeat five gods!”
“I don’t have five to defeat, only four. Come to my side, Lyssa, together we can defeat the others, or if not defeat them then at least flee together. Come to my side and I’ll give you the diary. Inside I placed the thing most special to me, the thing that I’d share with nobody else: part of my magic. Come to my side and you can have it. We’ll be together, forever.”
“No, no, this is wrong! Abaddon, I cannot do what you ask of me, I have a duty to Tyria to uphold. Even if I didn’t, we cannot defeat the others, let alone comprehend capturing their power should we manage it! Please, don’t fight their decision...”
Abaddon began to join her in tears, allowing himself a moment of weakness.
“Then it is I who is sorry for you, Lyssa. Forgive me.”
He growled deep within his throat, calling his Margonites to him. Hundreds appeared, and pointing to Lyssa, he commanded them to capture her. In a flurry of purple energy, they travelled as one towards the lone goddess. She fell easily, not wanting to fight. They cast brutal chains around her, bringing her kneeling before the renegade god. In that moment, the others arrived: Dwayna, Melandru, Balthazar and Grenth in one line stretching far along the coastline. No words were exchanged for everyone present knew what they were here to do. In harmony, four of the Five True Gods cast a spell directed towards Abaddon, which he did his best to counter, casting a blue shield made of magic around himself. But it wasn’t enough. Their combined magic broke through his shield, reaching the god behind it. He became paralysed, unable to move his body. The summoned Margonites raced to attack their master’s enemies, their weapons pointed and primed, but with simply a whisper from Grenth the first line of the Margonite army fell. As Abaddon’s servants attacked, Lyssa’s chains began to fall from her body, loosened by Abaddon’s deteriorating control. With metal crashing to the floor, she ran to Abaddon.
“Please, give me the diary!”
Abaddon strained to close his eyes, saying nothing, wanting to escape the situation.
“It’s time, Lyssa,” said Grenth.
In one of the quickest battles, the gods had defeated the army of Abaddon. Grenth and Lyssa stepped back a little to join the others and once more, this time with the fifth god, they cast in harmony. The spell erupted towards Abaddon, reaching him. Time stood still. What happened next, none of them had expected: Tyria shook, the landscape being transformed into a dry wasteland. A hole was ripped in the newly-formed desert that would come to be known as the Desolation. Inside it, a twisted world of nightmares emerged. Abaddon had become trapped in his selfish mind giving magic to Tyria, and now he was to become trapped in it once more. The gods threw Abaddon into this new world for him to rot eternally, unable to do anymore than that. They had tried their best to destroy the god but had failed. Still paralysed, but with the grip weakening, Abaddon managed to force himself into looking up through the opened Mouth of Torment to see Lyssa calling out to him.
“Ab..do., I lo.. .ou!”
The Mouth closed and, together, the Gods left Tyria, ashamed.

1075AE and the Sunspears entered Torment to end Abaddon’s increasing reign over Elona – to end what the gods had begun. Their bloody battle succeeded, ending in the ascension of Kormir, Goddess of Truth. With Abaddon’s defeat, his energy was absorbed by the mortal Spearmarshal and she rose to join the Five in the Mists, becoming the stuff of legends. What nobody noticed, however, was the diary. Ever since he was imprisoned, Abaddon had held onto his precious diary containing a portion of himself. Now, with his defeat, it vanished in a cloud of purple smoke.

 

Chapter 1

 

Sandals crunched on the arid ground. Walking slowly, with his head drooping, a weary traveller moved closer to the Mirror of Lyss. Droplets of sweat dripped from his brow onto the ground below, evaporating almost as soon as they touched it. He was tall, with wide shoulders and a muscular build. As he grimaced with each new difficult step, the shallow wrinkles around his mouth and eyes became deeper. The journey he was on had aged him far more dramatically than he’d have liked; those who’d have known him before he set out would now not recognise the man standing before them, instead seeing a weary man, lost. He sighed, moving a long dark strand of hair from his eyes. He had been walking these lands for years, wandering from place to place, searching - none of his travels had been so hard as this portion of his journey, though.

He kept going, however, because recently he had felt drawn to this place like a moth to a flame, his instincts telling him to come here after his many years of wandering. The man breathed in quickly, pushing his chest outwards, before exhaling, allowing another sigh to leave his body. He stopped, in need of a break. Unbuttoning his white cloak, which had turned brown in many areas due to many years of living wild, he lay it on the hot ground beside a large rock, the traveller himself seeking what little shade he could find. Doing this revealed a large, silver scythe climbing up his back, which shone in the hot Elonian sun. He sat on his cloak, knees up to his chest. Around his waist was a tattered leather belt, from which hung many small bags. He removed this too, though he made sure to keep his precious weapon upon him. He hadn’t taken it off since he began his journey, and would not do so until the very end. From one of his bags, he produced a small, brown container filled with water, from which the traveller took a gulp, the cool liquid rushing down his parched throat.

The sun continued to blaze down on him, forcing him to squint into the distance. Doing this, his eyes caught something a little away from him; a small object lying alone on the ground. Looking harder, the traveller saw what appeared to be faint purple smoke rising from the object. Staring at the mysterious object, he eventually let his curiosity get the better of him and deciding to see what it was – after all, what else was there to do except bake in the heat? He stood up, placing his water container on his cloak, and began to walk forwards to the object.

As he moved closer, it began to take form; a small, leather-bound book lying in the middle of nowhere. The traveller moved closer still, curious as to why such an object would be out here. The purple smoke he had witnessed just moments earlier had appeared to have vanished, leaving no trace behind. Upon reaching it, he found himself bending down to pick up the book, for he was like that – always inquisitive into his surroundings, always wanting to know more of the world in which he lived. Clutching the somewhat tattered book in his hands, he began to walk back to his resting spot, eager to see what was inside.

He sat back down on his cloak, noticing a small spider creep underneath to seek shelter. He had grown used to sharing his things with the creatures of the wilderness, and in some ways he was glad of the company they brought. Though they couldn’t communicate, the presence of another life reassured him that he was not alone in this world. The urge to open the book was growing inside him, like some form of primeval instinct, similar to that which drew him here. His head began to swim, feeling as though this moment was what his whole journey had been building up to. Opening the book, he carefully placed his fingers on the outside cover so he didn’t accidentally ruin whatever may be contained within the pages. Nothing - the pages were blank. Disappointed, he closed the book and threw it beside him. As he did so, his head began to turn wilder and wilder, a sick nauseating feeling coming up within him. Assuming this feeling to be because of too much walking, the traveller readied himself to rest for a few hours, before resuming his journey. He leant backwards on the rock, closed his eyes and slowly drifted off to sleep, before beginning to twist and turn as the nightmare began.

 

Piercing screams filled the morning air in Kourna.

“NO! PLEASE! HELP! AHHHHH!”
“Dwayna, save our village! Cast these demons out!”
The screams awoke the traveller from his sleep, jumping out of bed and rushing to the door. Monsters not of this world were attacking the small, peaceful village set in the middle of Kourna. Unsure of what to do, the traveller frantically looked around the village, but everywhere he turned all he could see were monsters slaying the cowering villagers, recklessly tearing through them as though it were a game. Bodies lay on the floor, arrows and spears triumphantly sticking out of them with small capillaries of blood beginning to creep along the sand. The monsters themselves were blurred to the traveller; something was preventing him from seeing them clearly. All he could see was bright purple light protruding from each of their bodies and the faint outline of weapons as they took life after life. They were tall, he could see that, and loud; their war cries heard over the screams of his friends.
He began to despair, quickly indentifying bodies of those he had come to know so well. He had not been born in this village, but had stumbled upon it with his partner many years ago and had come to like life here, and now it was being slowly taken from him with each new death. The pain of losing his life here became unbearable, quickly turning to a pure, violent rage. He would not lose everything, not again. Darting quickly back inside his hut, he grabbed his scythe next to where he slept and set out to attack the enemy. Just as he had been taught, he swung his scythe, precisely striking the nearest foe in the abdomen. It fell, wailing. Rage had blinded him, though, and he was not striking to kill instantly, but rather exact a slow and painful death by bleeding. He was going to make them suffer as they were doing to him. He thought, “I will exact my own retribution on these demons which plague us.”

A flash of purple light, brighter than the others, drew his eye to the left. He saw a monster, taller than the rest, carrying a small, frightened girl on its shoulders. Her face had drained of all colour and fear had paralysed her lips, making her unable to scream for help. Black hair covered half of her face, the other half showing an eye filled with tears. The traveller threw his scythe on the ground and ran after this monster, determined not to let such an innocent child die at its hands. It began to move faster, calling the other monsters to its side. They joined it, moving as one in a huddled group. The traveller ran faster, his bare feet pounding the earth, all the while regretting throwing away his only weapon. But no matter how hard he ran, no matter the fact he was not encumbered by weaponry, he could not make the distance. The huddled group moved farther and farther away, edging steadily towards the horizon. Moans of pain could still be heard behind the traveller, yet he had no time for them; he was going to save the girl. And as soon as that thought had left his head, they vanished. Roars came up from the earth and the monsters disappeared from sight in a dark cloud, taking the girl with them. He stopped running, and fell to his knees, sobbing.

 

The traveller awoke, unshaken by what had just happened inside his head. He had been experiencing the same nightmare over and over again ever since he began his travels and now they no longer affected him as they once did. He had come to expect them every time he went to sleep, and in some ways they had begun to comfort him, much like the wild creatures he met, providing normality in his otherwise so-far chaotic life. But most of all, they reminded him of why he was here, why he had been travelling all these years. “Years,” he thought. “I’ve spent so long searching, so long walking across these lands. What if... No, I cannot think like that. But, just, what if I don’t find what I’m looking for? What then? No, I will, I must. But I’m getting older... in fact, how old am I? I’ve been travelling for so long I can’t remember my age! Maybe it’s time to think of alternatives...”

And with that thought, the traveller decided to leave behind a memory of himself. Although he dared not doubt he would succeed, he wanted to leave behind something just in case all else failed. He grabbed the book he had thrown away. Taking a quill and ink from his belt beside him, he opened the book, touching only the outside cover once more to help preserve the pages. He thought for a moment about what to write, unable to convey everything he wanted to say in mere words. “Perhaps once I begin, it will come to me,” he thought. He set the quill to the paper of the book and began to write.

My beloved H..

The quill was sticking to the paper, making it difficult to write. He placed his thumb on the page, to get a better grip. Immediately, the traveller’s world went black. His eyes were forced shut, limbs becoming instantly limp. His head fell forwards and his hand dropped the quill, the feathered instrument rolling away from his lifeless body, as though it knew what was coming next. Abaddon’s diary had taken him from the Mirror of Lyss, and he would not be coming back.

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