The Cataclysm

The Cataclysm was an apocalyptic event that occurred in prehistory. Little is known factually speaking about the Cataclysm, as no humans, the immortal Artura included, actually witnessed or properly recorded its happening. Most accounts relate it to fire in some way, but even that is not a universal fact. Some ancient cultures also refer to it as a flood or geological event. However, the most ancient telling of the Cataclysm is that of the Arturan myth, and is tied into the tale of her immortality.

The legend was originally an oral tradition, and therefore subject to change. The earliest written summary of the story is from an unknown author in 1e135, and only survived because it was carved into a series of clay tablets.

## **Translated Summary:**

"Once there were four gods. Three were as close as kin, but the fourth was an outsider who often dissented against his siblings. As time passed under their all-seeing eye, the three gods sought to cultivate a perfect creature upon Eratoh. After many failures and trials, they created humans. As humankind advanced into peaceful societies and empires, the three gods thought their search over, but the last sibling declared their victory false. He claimed that humans were fundamentally flawed and said it could be proven. In wager, the fourth god asked that if he could prove the other three wrong, he be given Eratoh for his own - to make his own attempts at perfection. The three agreed, curious to see their perfect creatures put to their sibling’s cruel tests.

When the god, whose name was Goldran, descended to the world, he disguised himself as a man, and offered to grant the wishes of any who asked. The wishes grew in scope and in power until one man wished to conquer the world over and he was given a great and infinite fire to do so. The man walked the earth with his power, weaving great firestorms from the aether until Eratoh was blackened and dead. Enraptured by his victory, the fourth god failed to notice as another man hid his people beneath a great mountain called Ungal and escaped the flame.

When the lord of Goldran’s fire died of age and guilt, the fourth god returned to his kin, claiming his point proven and seeking to take Eratoh for himself. However, his siblings denied him, saying that there were still humans hidden on the world who continued to prove their inherent potential. Furious, the fourth god descended to Eratoh a second time and scoured the dust for the last survivors. It was nearly four hundred years before he found them.

That night a stranger entered the city of Ungal, claiming to be a merchant from another mountain who had found a secret path through the world that still burned outside. The god began his work immediately, once again giving miracles to those who asked. However, there was one who saw him for what he was. Among the people of Ungal there was a girl named Artura, whose sword kept the peace, and who had been taught by her ancestors to see through the demon’s veil. She came to the merchant with her sword and asked him for a miracle - to give her blade the ability to cut through anything she willed it too. Delighted with the possible destruction, the fourth god granted her desire, and she cut him in two. She cast his corpse into the depths of the mountain, and as he fell, the fires that still burned the world sputtered and vanished.

When she emerged with her people from the world beneath, the triumvirate of gods addressed her, and told her that she had proven above worthy of their expectations. In order to preserve the perfection they saw in her, the three gods granted Artura eternal life. Her blade, cast black by Goldran’s blood, became unaging and unbreaking like its master. From that day forward, Artura became the great tower at the peak of humankind, guiding them by her example."

This translation of the story does not include many details of the first legend of Artura, nor does it show any of the following years of her rule.

The “Infinite Flame” mentioned in this translation has been hotly debated for decades. It has been translated as flame, aether, power… and in fact the whole passage has been re-translated several times to say the man in question wished to become a god manifest, or to summon a god manifest.

Artura recognized the demon because her grandmother had passed down to her (as had her grandmother before her) the story of man's fall, and how a disguised god had given wishes to dangerous men. In the original story, the grandmother had a spoken verse of some sort. This is only known because the verse is mentioned in later texts. No version of the verse has ever been found.

Artura's conversation with Goldran was also initially written down word for word, but the original translation has long eluded historians.

After Goldran's death and Artura's rise to immortality, she forsook the gods. After this forsaking, the narrative shifts away from depicting certain gods as good or evil, and depicts all the gods as evil. From here forward it is especially hard to discern the earlier myths from the later revised versions.

## **Later Mythos Summary:**

Artura forsook the gods after finding that they had placed the fate of humanity into the hands of Goldran. The gods refused to admit their folly, so Artura declared her people would no longer worship the Old God Triumvirate. Thus followed 16 years of famine and drought on the world while Artura gathered an army of the bravest warriors among the humans. With her forces gathered, she cleaved a crack in the sky with Trianac and her army marched into the gods' domain. The droughts and famine stopped, the people rejoiced, and none heard from Artura or her knights for two hundred years. In her absence, the kingdom divided into four parts, each ruled by a different king or queen, and all constantly at odds. One day, from the great crack in the sky, a single knight emerged. He was Sir Andreic - one of Artura's most faithful. He proclaimed to the kings and queens that Artura would return within the year, and that her empire should be prepared for her. The kings and queens denounced him, calling him fraud to keep their power. Each day of the year, another knight was sent from the scar in the sky down to the earth. Soon, a great host had gathered beneath the rift, demanding that the kings and queens step down. The kings and queens grew nervous, and the people were getting restless, so they sent their own host against the knights descending from heaven. Just as the armies were about to clash, Artura emerged, wearing on her back, the bloodied wings of the goddess, Demura. On her arm, the tower shield of the god, Herjé. And on her head, the crown of the god-king Borstag. At the sight of her, the united armies of the kings and queens, bowed down and lowered their weapons. She retook her empire in an instant, and called the traitor kings and queens into her great court. Their trial took place in the half-fallen imperial palace which had been abandoned and left to decay when the empire first split. Artura sentenced the kings and queens to permanent exile on the continent across the sea, along with all of their most loyal followers. They were supplied with four of the largest ships ever constructed and set sail soon after.

It is here our narrative splits. The exiled kings and queens settled in modern day Thea. Artura's empire continued until the end of the first era.