Thanar's world, rooted in his veneration of death and the god Thanatos, was perfect in its macabre balance. Yet Nethrath and Arelon had come to test its foundations and direct them under their own weight.
The dragons understood a fundamental truth: death was not just an end, but a powerful vector of power, a tool they intended to wield for their own purposes.
The first attempt was almost invisible but enough to disturb Thanar's very foundations. Nethrath, with his mastery of time flows, watched the lines of this world's history unfold like a great ancient book.
Every major event, every little conversation between the inhabitants, was a page written by the decrees of a destiny dictated by the cult of Thanatos. But the laws of time were accessible, and even an Infinity Dragon like him could twist that line with a little concentration.
On the shores of an ancient lake, a fishing village that was celebrating a particular funeral ritual was a ridiculous scene for Nethrath. He had to intervene. Tchac! A simple movement of the hand and it created a distortion of the time flow.
The ritual was no longer going as it was supposed to. Plop... Plop... Plop... The drops of water falling from the fishermen's net marked an inverted countdown. A young girl, supposed to be sacrificed by the fishermen to appease the spirit of the ancestors, had survived the funeral song.
This detail, trivial in the eyes of the inhabitants, was to mark a turning point in history.
Lisa, an old woman, watched the black smoke rise from a funeral pyre. Still, her son's body remained intact and refused to burn.
—«It's not normal. He should have been gone a long time ago,» she said, her hands trembling.
The inhabitants , gathered at a distance, whispered among themselves:
—«It's a bad omen...» said a man.
—«Thanatos has turned his back on us,» added a woman.
Lisa wanted to say that they were wrong, that it was a mistake, but deep down, a fear set in.
At nightfall, a little squeak, kreeek! , at his door was followed by heavy footsteps, thump-thump, which resonated. Lisa had recognized these footsteps. They were those of his deceased son. His heart began to beat, badum-badum, mixing terror and hope.
"Oh Lord Thanatos, please come to our aid, do not abandon us..." she said, trembling.
The next day, Lisa told the others what had happened to her, which created concern among the inhabitants.
—«You mean you saw your son?» asked a surprised man.
—«Yes! He was there, at my door! But it wasn't him... Not really... he looked like he was angry, I don't recognize my nice boy anymore,» Lisa replied.
—«It's a sign!» cried a woman. «We are cursed. Someone must have offended Thanatos.»
—«Maybe it's you, Lena,» said a man. «After all, your husband died last week and as luck would have it, it's been that day since then everything has gone wrong.»
—«How dare you?» the woman replied. «My husband was a man of peace! It's not him!»
An old man raised his hand to calm the tension.
—«Enough! We will not find a solution by accusing each other. But if the spirits do not find rest... Answers will be needed. »
Meanwhile, in Nethrath, in the remote neighborhoods of the sacred city, a group of necromancers devoted to Thanatos was busy. The incantations resounded, um-mm, as the priests drew ritual circles, their voices mingling in a haunting song.
On the other side, Nethrath, in the remote neighborhoods of the sacred city, chose a group of necromancers devoted to Thanatos since birth to stir up trouble.
These priests were the architects of the cult who mastered funeral spells and incantations that bound the souls of the deceased to the will of Thanatos. Arelon observed them with precision.
According to him, they should not be destroyed immediately, but rather seeds of discord and uncertainty should be sown under their ranks.
He smiled mischievously as he projected a wave of entropy into the core of the group, which caused an alteration rather than an immediate destruction. He altered the arcana of the rituals they used and the energy channels, which facilitated internal confusion.
The necromancers, although masters of the funerary mysteries, were beginning to fail in their rituals. The dead who were supposed to rise did not even do so. Spirits revolted and no ritual appeased them.
Silas, a young necromancer frustrated by the ritual's failure, had his hands shaking as he drew funerary glyphs.
«Why— Why doesn't it work anymore?»
In front of him, the body of a nobleman remained inert. He glanced at his master who was watching him angrily.
—«Because you don't concentrate!»His master replied.«The glyphs you draw are clumsy.»
—«I have done all that you have taught me! It's not me. It's... It's our world that's changing!»
—«Our world does not change, Silas.» Replied his master. «It's the weak who find excuses. If you're not able to take on this role, maybe you're not cut out for this rôle. »
Silas, hurt by his master's words, inhaled and began again. Still, he still felt that something was wrong. The energy that ran through the lines was dissipating.
His master, disgusted with his student's ritual, walked away, Silas felt shame and fear invade him. What was going on? Had he become unworthy of Thanatos' gift?
The other necromancers were incomprehensible. Signs of dissension were beginning to appear. Arelon was approaching and with a simple breath fsshh increased this instability.
The necromancers began to turn against each other, questioning their practices and the authority of the high priest, which sparked internal squabbles. This chaos spread like a disease, fzzzt.
As these manipulations dispersed, the signs of disturbance became more obvious. Sacred rituals failed, crack, click, gulp. Accustomed to seeing Thanatos answer their prayers, the people of Thanar felt a growing sense of unease.
In the streets, the signs of death were dissipating as if Thanatos himself had lost his protective role. The cult was no longer as steadfast as it used to be, vrrrrr.
Nethrath, still focused on the fabric of time, watched as another anomaly occurred: the Order of Necromancers was beginning to fragment, fsshhh. Dissident groups began to emerge and each proclaimed a different vision of death.
Nethrath: «The funeral rituals are failing, and the necromancers are already accusing each other. Chaos is starting to spread, as expected.»
Arelon: «Chaos, yes, but it has to be subtle. If you keep hitting with that much force, they'll eventually realize that something is wrong.»
Nethrath: «Subtle? You talk about subtlety, when your curses are already corrupting wandering souls? They become monsters, Arelon. Raaaaargh The villagers begin to whisper prayers to the old gods.»
Arelon: «Precisely. If they pray to the other gods, it is because they abandon their faith in Thanatos. And without faith, his power will collapse. Everything we do is a matter of precision.»
Nethrath: «Very good. You, you continue to manipulate minds. I take care of the living.»
Some necromancers were beginning to advocate a more open cult, and others wanted to explore occult practices that challenged the very authority of Thanatos. Nethrath's breaking of the timeline had sown seeds of doubt, and that doubt was beginning to take root in the people of Thanar.
Arelon was increasingly delighted with the situation. Each disturbance he caused caused caused a little more chaos in Thanar's balance. His actions were not limited to physical manipulations but to the very transformation of beliefs.
Where death reigned supreme, he sowed the fear of an incomplete death, a failed passage, and an uncertain afterlife. Rituals were broken, crack, spirits of the dead mixed with wandering entities, and lost souls were trapped between worlds.
Panicked, the inhabitants ran in all directions, tap, tap, tap, looking in vain for refuge from the threatening shadows.
Arelon: «The seeds are sown, all that remains is to watch the plant grow and collapse under its own weight.»
Sitting on the steps of a temple, a child named Eldorian clutched his rag doll to him. Around him, the adults were whispering, whispering, but he didn't understand why.
The day before, he had seen something in the woods. He had seen a floating figure with strange eyes, shhhhhh... When he told his grandfather about it, he told him that it was a spirit that accompanied souls to the other world.
But Eldorian knew that wasn't true. This spirit was not soothing, it was rather disruptive. The spirit had looked at him in a murderous way. Sssss...
That night, the little boy could not sleep. In his mind he asked himself only one question: why did the spirits seem so angry?
Some merchants in the streets talked while looking around for fear of being overheard:
—«Yesterday, the ritual of the southern district failed,»a baker whispered to his neighbor. «They say that the soul of their deceased still wanders, unable to reach the afterlife.»
—«I heard it too.» An old man, sitting on a stool, answered him. «My grandson Eldorian told me that he saw wandering spirits near the woods.»
—«Thanatos abandons us,» replied a young woman with her child in her hands. «What will we do if death itself becomes our enemy?»
—«Perhaps... Maybe our faith is misplaced,» said the baker.
—«Don't say that! These walls have ears, and our master does not tolerate doubt,» replied the old man.
Voices of anger against funeral rituals were also heard in the streets and a protest movement against traditional worship was being organized. But for the moment, no one really understood the extent of the manipulations that were taking place.
A man in the center of the crowd raised his voice angrily:
—«How much more must we lose because of their failing rituals? My three brothers are dead, and their souls are now wandering in darkness!»
Voice in the crowd: «The god Thanatos claims to protect us, but where is he when we need him?»
Woman: «They make us pay for offerings that we don't have! All this so that our dead become rabid specters!»
Older man: «Let's give up these superstitions! This cult of Thanatos is a farce! Let's build a future free from these ancestral chains.»
The crowd cheered massively for this idea, clap, clap, clap; The intensity was becoming worrying.
A once unshakable world was now shattering. But these disruptions were just a taste of the big step ahead.