The Fall of Ironkeep

Every disaster had begun with a mirror, an utterly ordinary mirror.

That day, the king had finished another day of governing and, as usual, retired to his bedroom for a good rest.

But in the clear, bright mirror in his bedroom, the king happened to notice a wrinkle at the corner of his eye.

In that brief instant, the spirited king of old vanished, replaced by a wretch terrified of death.

The king could not bear to die. He had accomplished such great deeds and received countless tributes of praise. Ever since founding the kingdom, he had governed it diligently. How could he possibly die?

And so, like so many monarchs who descended into madness in their old age, he began pursuing immortality.

Research into all existing technologies was halted. At the king's command, it was redirected toward methods of prolonging life.

Vast sums of money and resources were poured into the effort. Taxes grew heavier, and the people could only work longer hours.

Mining also accelerated severalfold. During one excavation, a passage leading deep underground was accidentally broken open.

The king discovered new territory and once again chose conquest. But unlike his former policy of conciliation, this time he chose brutal, bloody suppression.

His armies smashed through the natives' defenses and utterly subjugated them, reducing them to slaves.

For a short time, plundering the new territory barely kept Ironkeep afloat.

But as time passed, the king grew increasingly impatient and irritable. He could clearly feel himself growing older.

During the territorial expansion, the research also bore fruit: a technology that allowed souls to inhabit steel.

This technology greatly increased productivity throughout the kingdom, but the people's standard of living scarcely improved.

The king adamantly demanded further research into new technologies. To him, this was no immortality, merely a laughable form of dependence. Steel still had a lifespan. He wanted true eternity.

Reverence became terror, and praise became cautious flattery. Ironkeep had become the king's dictatorship.

Then, at last, a rumor circulating in a fishing village beside an underground river caught the king's attention.

Among those people, who lived year-round amid mist and moisture, a warning had been passed down since ancient times.

Follow the current down, ever farther down, to the bottom of the world. There dwells an eternal threat.

A threat that devours the living, a darkness that shrouds the land, an ancient presence that whispers curses.

Never listen to the voices echoing through the abyss. Stay away. Stay away.

An eternal threat. Perhaps there was something there that could be put to use.

The king immediately gave the order to dig downward. Down, and farther down.

First came the slaves, then countless citizens. Countless bugs fell one after another along that road paved with corpses.

Those years were made of suffering: uprisings, plagues, taxes, and the unending excavation.

Layer after layer, until they reached ground that even the hardest pickaxes could not break. At last, the excavation ended.

What appeared before the exhausted miners was a structure forgotten by time, its purpose beyond comprehension.

Even by Ironkeep's reckoning, it was a relic of an unimaginably distant age.

At the very center of those ruins stood a tightly sealed gate.

The massive stone gate seemed impossible to move, yet a miner's light touch opened a narrow crack.

That was the end.

In a single instant, the Void surged out. The gap widened and widened until the entire gate stood open.

Just as the ancient warning had foretold, the living were engulfed, and darkness descended upon the land.

Countless frenzied screams rang out amid collapsing buildings and slowly rotting tapestries.

The surviving bugs fled into the wilderness. The king sealed off his royal city completely, yet the abyss continued to encroach.

The dark tide persisted for a long time. Black fountains erupting endlessly from underground spread upward until they utterly extinguished even the flames of the Torch Crown atop the mountain, the symbol of the king.

After devouring everything it could, the abyss departed-or rather, the tide receded.

Scattered lives survived, bearing the grief of a fallen kingdom. Yet none would miss the home they had once known.

And thus Ironkeep vanished.

Snap.

Lin Jin closed the book and remained silent for a long time, but he felt neither shock nor fear.

He had imagined worse than what the book described, and he had already made some rough guesses about what had happened in the past.

Now that he had read the notes recorded by the Snail Shaman, he could count himself extremely fortunate. There had been no unknown disaster beyond anything he could imagine, nor any eternal curse lingering over this land.

Although the records after the Void's eruption were extremely sparse and fragmentary, they were enough for him.

All I need to know is that there's nothing I haven't encountered before. The Void is frightening, but the unknown is the most terrifying thing of all.

With that thought, Lin Jin set the book back on the table himself.

Perhaps I shouldn't believe everything in this book, but it still has value as a reference.

As for what happened in the past, a rough understanding is enough. I'm not necessarily powerless against it, either.

"Snail Shaman, you've done well. From this moment on, you are my priest."

"My deepest thanks, my lord."

The Snail Shaman was thrilled. His path was finally complete, and he had even touched upon a new realm.

An enticing, unknown power-nothing could capture a snail's attention more than that.

Lin Jin had no intention of keeping him in suspense. Since the shaman had chosen to pledge his loyalty, he ought to receive some reward.

Lin Jin placed a mental imprint within the Snail Shaman, containing the results of his recent research into the Soulfire Arts.

After all his efforts during this time, Lin Jin had reached a preliminary conclusion: he was utterly unsuited to scientific research.

Apart from the little he had discovered at the very beginning, he had made no further progress with Soulfire.

Even his sole spell, Flame Burst, had been developed independently by one of his followers.

For a deity, that was certainly a little embarrassing. But Lin Jin did not quite understand why. He could analyze the logic thoroughly, yet putting it into practice was another matter entirely.

Now that he had finally managed to acquire a specialist, failing to make good use of him would be a waste.

As the light sank into the point between his brows, the Snail Shaman grew increasingly animated.

"Hoo hoo hoo! The Soulfire Arts are the complete opposite of my Path of Sacrifice. How fascinating."

"If my sacrifices draw upon outside power to unleash might beyond my own limits, then Soulfire is power the user releases all at once, bursting from within."

Having gained a new path, the Snail Shaman was eager to experiment immediately. Still, he patiently offered heartfelt thanks to the deity he had pledged himself to.

Lin Jin gladly accepted. This could also be considered a form of prayer. The Snail Shaman's devotion was a little strange, but at least it could provide some power of faith.

Lin Jin could already feel it: the bottleneck beginning to loosen, the approaching instant of qualitative transformation.

If he simply kept going, it would not be long before he could truly attain Godhood and kindle his Divine Flame.