The air in the Eldoan village was cool and damp as light rain fell from the cloudy sky. Nine-year-old Ash Minse sat alone in a dark room, with only the flicker of a small candle lighting his pale face. His dark, intense eyes were focused on an old, worn-out book he had secretly taken from the village library. The book was forbidden, hidden deep in the archives, and it told the story of Aurathos, the First Calamity. Ash was fascinated by the chaos and destruction Aurathos had caused, and he couldn't stop reading.
Ash's fingers traced the strange symbols on the page, his mind captivated by the descriptions of the dark magic Aurathos had wielded, the sheer destruction it had caused. The words seemed to pulse with a sinister energy, and each sentence he read made his heart race faster. Where most would have recoiled in fear, Ash felt something entirely different—a twisted fascination, a deep admiration.
As he read on, he felt something stir inside him. A dark voice—whispering, calling.
"Aurathos…" Ash murmured under his breath, his small fingers gripping the edges of the book tightly. "The embodiment of darkness… the one who nearly destroyed the world…"
In the back of his mind, he could hear the faint echo of his father's voice, warning him about the dangers of dark magic, how it had corrupted even the greatest of mages. But Ash never cared for those warnings. The more he learned about Aurathos, the more he wanted to understand, to delve into the very power that others feared.
Ash had never been like the other children. While they played in the fields and laughed with innocence, Ash was always different—silent, calculating. The other children avoided him, sensing something wrong in his gaze, something too cold, too distant for a boy his age. His teachers at the academy often spoke of his brilliance but were unnerved by his complete lack of empathy. He didn't care about friendships or fun. He was obsessed with one thing: chaos and darkness.
Chaos fascinated Ash. And nothing embodied chaos more than the magic of Aurathos, the First Calamity. The more he learned about the devastation Aurathos had brought upon the world, the more he longed to recreate that destruction—to witness the world consumed by darkness once again. His obsession grew until it consumed his every thought. He didn't just want power; he wanted to summon Aurathos, to unleash another calamity upon the world.
It was this relentless search for forbidden knowledge that led him to Athos, the son of Aurathos.