The Legend of Tantus - Book 2

Chapter 1 - Dishonoring the Darkness

    About a hundred winters before the end of Sevenn's reign, the lord of darkness, a young moghran stood out, even among his race, in splendid talent and elemental strength, descended from a respected lineage of black moghrans, he grew in fame, character and pride, his name was Zeijadel, the red eyes. Easily noticed Zeijadel caught the attention of Sevenn, who was looking for a worthy successor, longing for his long-awaited final rest, red eyes fulfilled all expectations becoming exceptionally talented and powerful, above the average of his race, especially in the elements of darkness, life, planar life, fantasy and nature, but Zeijadel carried within him a flaw, precisely the weakness that his people were so proud to imprison, he was propitious to evil, but not being able to contain it in your deepest feeling. He secretly studied the f*******n arts, long forgotten and excluded from the Library of Magic, but how or where he acquired such studies is totally unknown. Perhaps due to his own amazing talent he developed black spells such as "Manipulation", among dozens of others that involved sacrifices and blasphemy, but his greatest and most terrible discovery was "non-elemental" power. Nothing in history has ever been recorded about this, the secrets of this black force were more obscure than anything, and perhaps more than any other that was to be born. Even the lords just speculated that this power was the opposite of all life itself, like eradication, simply pure and absolute... Zeijadel was indeed unique. Sevenn, who had kept the dark lord's pride intact until then, chose the talented moghran as his esteemed successor, and he was received with honor by all his new brothers, except Zeon Harkonen, who saw something more in him than the dignity that Sevenn cherished...

    Zeijadel proved to be a highly competent lord in his duties, honoring the choice of his predecessor, and even Harkonen surrendered to his pure goals, but what everyone did not know was that the new dark lord's cunning went beyond what his hood revealed. In his selfish efforts, Zeijadel managed to extract, perhaps, the most distant memory of the abandoned past, about the lords' own divine strength, and thus he understood that his raw powers needed a life to fill, and since this life met its end it should proceed with the objective of its existence: to continue existing. And so the theory was born about inheriting the other elemental powers, becoming supreme, but how to steal the strength of an enemy that was equivalent to him? For a long time he dedicated himself incessantly to strengthening his mind, and was quite successful on this point, managing to deceive his brothers even though they had a mental link that bound them indefinitely, and this became an extremely admirable quality despite everything. The limitation that the other lords began to impose on him was certain in many ways, but late, and perhaps decisive, for the betrayal. Zeijadel was kept in privacy and committed the greatest dishonor ever made among all peoples, using his f*******n knowledge, the lord of darkness deformed the race of men, thus creating the new and disgusting race called: goblins. He kept them hidden for a long time, both from the eyes and from the minds of the lords, and when he was finally discovered he claimed with all his might that his new creation should not be judged by appearance, as they possessed the same dignity as men. Merciful, the other lords reluctantly accepted them, wishing to believe the words of their new brother. In fact, goblins have always had the same potential as their "cousins", but the evil nature was so absolute in their hearts, that even power was diminished by the deepest side of hatred, leading them to extreme cruelty and blindness of the mind. The goblins, as proved a long time later, were excellent builders, especially with regard to war, developing various types of catapults, armor, blades and contraptions that shoot arrows, although they lived in mountain caves some records report that they were never poor or miserable in their way of life, achieving their own satisfactions and comforts in their dark kingdoms, even though repugnant to other peoples, however, bloodlust was their greatest defect, hatred for all other races incredibly dominated their intelligence, making them practically irrational beasts in battle, a fact that was responsible for their greatest defeats. Although always very numerous, few were able to keep the mind focused, using muscles instead of intelligence, and this also hampered his magical evolution, as a goblin was rarely recorded awakening splendid power, much less using extraordinary magic, Runglu was one of those very few exceptions, not for nothing he became the greatest general of his race, and his combat against the king Valdnar, who was also powerful and respected, was memorable before he finally fell. In other words, quantity never meant quality... This was perhaps the greatest and most definitive frustration of the lord of darkness over his "children". Another peculiarity was the extreme seclusion of the gorgans, very little was known about them, they almost never left their refuges and did not participate in the war, it has long been speculated that they were totally submissive to their partners, perhaps by nature, or more likely out of fear.

    But Zeijadel was already identical to his creations, his greed was such that he could see, absurdly, the anger and envy of others against him. The lord of darkness also managed to corrupt the giant race of cyclops, who since creation were kind and generous beings, but started to serve the same purpose as goblins, and their descendants followed the same path becoming a disgraced race. Initially they had an elemental talent almost as refined as that of the moghrans, but after the corruption of Zeijadel they simply lost this privilege, their intelligence ended up being considerably limited, but in return they received an even greater brute force, because this was the objective of the lord of darkness, to transform them into walls on the front lines, which worked quite well in the first winters, his attacks as infantry were terrible, requiring a certain adaptation of the kingdoms to better fight them, which, fortunately, they did, as the giants also carried a certain amount of blindness, similar to goblins, although more controllable. Melyngo was a fearsome commander, not only for his strength, which was used impressively astute in battle, but mainly for the ability to control his fellow men in war, subdued only by the mighty Hagiliak, and after his death the giants never found another leader like him. There were also rumors that there were cyclops among the first lords. The griphons were the next victims, and the great proof of this was their bat wings, a symbol of evil in Zeijadel's own conception.

    Seized by his selfish desires for power, the new lord gathered all the forces of his authorship, forming a terrible army destined to the extermination of the other races, and the domination of that world. On the continent of Scyra, where it all started, the land became totally lifeless, partly because of his evil power, partly because of his children, devastating like plagues, becoming the Dead Land. All of this was happening in secret, incredibly, from the lords, but destiny always finds its ways, and the child Amy Alessar, the destined girl, the only one of her age (twelve winters) who enjoyed the wandering adventures as an adult, giving a lot of work to his parents and running away several times. She traveled through the strange land seeking her satisfaction, and seeing with her own eyes the terrible plan of Zeijadel, ran home, pursued by griphons she escaped miraculously, but mortally wounded. Before her life went out Amy reached the Kingdom of Scyra, dying in the arms of her parents and leaving the warning that changed the history of the world and that, most likely, was responsible for the future victory... Amy was an anonymous heroine.

    Zeijadel finally went to war, revealing what Harkonen had once suspected, but the strength and new ability to keep a blank mind allowed darkness to hide his location efficiently, and even when he appeared to transmit his orders to his servants it was long enough to disappear again, before he was precisely seen by the rest. Their armies flooded the continents with terrible battles, who haunted the kingdoms for seven winters, but thanks to Amy everyone was prepared, not entirely, but enough to guarantee many lives. Due to the incompetence brought on by the goblins' blind will for c*****e, Zeijadel's armies lost space on the basis of the cunning, determination and collaboration of the kingdoms, and through notable victories they destabilized the mind of the lord of darkness, causing him to surrender his position and goals, Harkonen finally intercepted him and the titanic battle of the lords ended exactly where it had started, in the Dead Land. With his defeat he was banished and sealed in the Solitary Prison by the seal “Uroboros”, leaving behind the imbalance followed by much pain for the losses of the peoples, and that was exactly what prevented his immediate replacement. After all the evil that he unleashed on the world, things could not be the same, finding a new lord of darkness became extremely difficult, and the rest of the lords could never risk anything like that. In an attempt to maintain a minimum of order in the world, the Guardians appeared, to correct or, if necessary, eliminate something definitely incorrigible, but there was another objective in the creation of these, predicting the inevitable return of Zeijadel. Something definitely should be done, but he was also astute, as everyone already knew, and he found ways to put his moves into practice, transforming the world into a big board, subject to the strategies of the gods, the mental link became a two-pronged knife edged for both sides, demanding a lot of patience, and this was the big reason why the lords did not directly assist in the journey of Arkan Marne and his group, avoiding watching them as much as possible to prevent the enemy from taking accurate knowledge of their steps, which fortunately ended in success. But regardless of all the affliction and wounds left by the lord of darkness, before, during and after the great war, of many warriors and heroes, direct and indirect, integral or partial, he, for all, had unquestionably dishonored the darkness, raising doubts which were only erased much later by a new lord finally found, who at great cost recovered everything the great Sevenn had achieved, and lost... About the imbalance, each element exerts its function on the world, whether it is directly notable or not, but some elements can be considered “unlimited”, because even neglected by their lord they never stop acting, as the element of darkness, whose function is put out the flame of life. But this slight negligence is enough to affect the life cycle, and everything that is affected is destined to perish, whether in the short term or the long term. Without the lord of darkness in his role, the lives that came to an end continued to fade, but cruelly, their spirits went through immense suffering, perhaps unimaginable, before finally reaching the other world, a suffering considered totally unacceptable, as a first punishment even for those who would fall into purgatory... All the lives that were lost in the discord of the power went through this, and Taria, the Lady of Planar Life, claimed that observing the desperation of souls for all those winters it was the most difficult time of her existence, reaching almost insanity, needing a lot of psychological support from everyone else, at some point she came to hate Zeijadel for all that, but she was wise, though not easily, to avoid this, as she knew that this was a path she should not take... Sumith, for very little, did not go through this, thanks to the freezing of his body and the direct interference of the lady, who simply removed his spirit from the line of the dead, granting him total freedom in the spiritual plane, so that he could receive training to save the city of Mérit, in addition to finally discovering the truth and meeting his father again. In other words, Zeijadel brought terrible suffering to his enemies, and to his allies...