Deep into the night, a single candle flickered atop the desk in the royal pavilion. Beside it, an incense burner smoldered, releasing the faint, medicinal fragrance of soothing herbs. Luthier sat at the edge of his bed, engrossed in a heavy tome titled The Origins of the Uld Dynasty.
As one of the earliest civilizations in human history, the Uld Dynasty arose during the early Star and Moon Era, nearly three thousand years ago. Their centralized kingdom was established in the same epoch as the founding of Farum Azula. The Uld people, worshippers of the Artisan God, Valestoque, once shared the central Lands Between with the Hornsent followers of the Ancestral Spirits. Together, they built a civilization in the fertile Altus Plateau that rivaled the Storm Kingdom of the south in sheer splendor.
However, approximately one thousand years ago, at the very zenith of the Uld Dynasty's power, a cataclysmic war broke out. The records from that time were notoriously vague, but the devastation was absolute. Overnight, the Uld and the Hornsent were all but erased. Farum Azula, once the heart of the continent, was shattered and cast into the eastern seas. Even distant Stormveil and Caelid suffered a massive regression of culture and power.
In the oral traditions of the Ancient Dragons, this conflict was known as the Forbidden War.
"The cause, the combatants, and the progression... not a single detail is recorded," Luthier muttered, flipping through two thin pages that glossed over the tragedy with frustrating brevity. This historical void wasn't limited to modern compilations; even primary sources from centuries ago treated the event with the same terrified silence.
For some unknown reason, every survivor of the Forbidden War had chosen a vow of absolute secrecy. To a modern observer, looking back at that era felt like looking at a world that had been deleted and forcibly rebooted.
Luthier tried to reconcile these facts with his knowledge of the game's lore, but the pieces refused to click. Giving up for the night, he stretched his aching shoulders and stepped out of the tent. It was near midnight. The second shift of knights had taken over, and a heavy silence draped the camp, broken only by the soft clatter of armor and the whispering night wind.
He closed his eyes and took a long, slow breath of the cooling autumn air. He let his Focus expand. Like a vast, invisible web, his psychic attunement rippled outward, covering the camp and stretching hundreds of meters into the dark wilderness.
As a pure-blooded Ancient Dragon demigod, Luthier had discovered early on that his affinity for Mind and Focus was as potent as his physical lineage. While he didn't see literal red or blue bars in his vision, his Mind attribute dictated the sheer strength of his perception. Even without formal training, he could sense movement within a mile. The Dragon Elders had noted this, predicting the Prince would one day be a master of the Ancient Dragon Incantations.
He calmed his heart, practicing his control by tracking the local wildlife. The feedback hit his mind like vibrations on a spider's silk: a night hawk diving for a rabbit, fish swimming upstream, the frantic scuffle of crickets in the grass. Then, something else.
Luthier's eyes snapped open. In his mind's eye, a point of violent turbulence had appeared three hundred meters south of the camp. It felt as if space itself had cracked, bleeding a cold, necrotic aura. Yet, looking with his physical eyes, he saw only the tranquil, starlit night.
Then, more points appeared. They materialized in a ring, encircling the camp. A terrifying, unnatural chill began to seep through the air. The sentry knights sensed the shift, but before they could raise the alarm, a roar echoed from the royal pavilion.
"Ambush! To arms!"
The moment the shout left Luthier's lips, twenty overlapping sigils, shaped like unblinking eyes, manifested in the dark. They erupted in swirling flames of black and white. A tide of frost-cold energy swept through the grass, coating the blades in rime. Figures clad in ghastly, pale skin-leather stepped from the sigils. Great godslayer gems hung from their chests, and they brandished twin-headed blades of bone-white steel. The pressure of their presence was suffocating.
"Godskin Apostles!" Agheel shouted, charging from his tent with a spear in hand.
For centuries, the Godskin Apostles had been a shadow myth, as elusive as the Black Knife Assassins. While the latter had been heard of recently, the Apostles had not been seen for a hundred years. Even the long-lived dragons knew only that they once served the mysterious Gloam-Eyed Queen before vanishing into the depths of history.
The moment Luthier saw them, he didn't reach for a sword; he dove back into the pavilion. He slammed his hand down, channeling his Focus into a hidden array. A spherical barrier, wreathed in red lightning and dragonfire, erupted from the earth to encase the tent.
He had no intention of playing the hero. Three months of testing had taught him that he could barely take on two Storm Knights, let alone these legendary killers. His only job was to stay alive so Agheel and the others didn't have to worry about him.
On the nearby hill, Greyoll had sensed the intrusion the instant Luthier called out. She immediately targeted the largest cluster of enemies, preparing to dive into their rear. But as she coiled her muscles to leap, a sudden shiver raced down her spine. The air behind her whistled with the lethal shriek of a blade.
Years of instinct took over. Greyoll jerked her head aside, narrowly avoiding a rapier's thrust, and spun in a blur, lashing out with a curved arc of her blade.
Her Dragonscale tachi clashed against the rapier, sending a shower of sparks into the moonlight. In the silver glow, she saw the massive, imposing figure of a Godskin Noble. In his hand was the Godskin Stitcher, a narrow, terrifying blade designed to pierce the flesh of the gods themselves.
Greyoll dropped into a low crouch, her grip tightening on her weapon. In an instant, her form blurred. Shimmering white scales rippled across her skin like liquid silver. A hard, bone-like mask formed over her features as her hair stiffened into draconic horns, and her sword-arm swelled into a powerful, muscled claw.
Clang!
The Dragonscale tachi slammed into the Godskin Stitcher. The sheer, mountainous force of the blow traveled through the weapons, forcing even the massive Godskin Noble to stagger back.
"Hmph," the Noble sneered. "The Dragonkind truly are the most formidable of mortals. Even a mere High Wyvern possesses such strength when transformed."
Below in the camp, the battle had turned into a bloodbath. The initial Godskin strike had cut down several knights, but the Dreadwyvern warriors had quickly rallied. Though most were of lesser blood than Agheel or Greyoll, their partial dragon transformations allowed them to suppress the Apostles through sheer ferocity and numbers.
Near the elders and Agheel, the Apostles were being driven back. In the first few minutes of the skirmish, nearly ten Godskin corpses already littered the ground.
"Since you know you are outmatched, what gave you the arrogance to strike at the Prince?" Greyoll demanded, her blade weaving a relentless wall of steel.
Amidst her frantic assault, the Godskin Noble held his ground with a single hand. His arm elongated and retracted like rubber, parrying or dodging her strikes with uncanny grace. After evading a blow that could have split a mountain, he leaped lightly onto a nearby crag.
"My lady, you misunderstand one thing," he chuckled, his voice thick with fanaticism.
He threw his arms wide. "You are indeed the strongest of mortals."
"But we," he hissed, as black flames erupted beneath his feet, "are the slayers of gods. We follow the Queen of Death!"
The hilltop turned into a pillar of black fire. Dozens of soaring flame columns formed a cage, trapping both himself and Greyoll within the inferno.
"I have toyed with you this long only to keep you here," the Noble said, the face-shaped hood on his head twisting into a grotesque mockery of a smile. "We were born to kill gods. And only a god is worthy of our lives."
Greyoll's heart sank. She whipped her head toward the camp. Below, the remaining Apostles had launched a suicidal charge against the Elders and Agheel, pinning them down. Simultaneously, a new sigil of black flame ignited on the camp wall closest to the royal pavilion.
Through the fire, a second Godskin Noble emerged. He cut through two Dreadwyvern warriors in a flash of silver steel and charged straight for Luthier's tent.