Prelude to Chaos
From Apocalypseblade
Blades of the Apocalypse: Prelude to Chaos is the first story arc of Blades of the Apocalypse. It covers the battle with Arius.
[edit] Summary
After millennia of wars, Etrah had come to know a scarce peace, even if it was only because the inhabitants had grown to so few numbers that they couldn't risk fighting without making all sentient life extinct. However, an evil soul had been scheming something deep inside the body of a rodent. He used this time of peace to find himself a new body, one that would not limit his power. As he cold not do this himself, he found peons to do his bidding. Coryn, a demon who'd forgotten his human life, and Messanger, a vampire with a vengance against his own kind, were the evil soul's minions. This evil soul's name was Arius.
His control over the two came easily. The demon did not know his own past, so Arius offered to return memories in exchange for service. As for the vampire, Messanger was so consumed by his lust for vengance, that he would take any opportunity to find the few remaining vampires left. Arius offered him just that. Their first task was finding a body. Coryn managed to find the perfect sample laying face down in the soul stream, and brought it to Arius. He was repayed with his memories. However, Arius had only restored the negetive memories, keeping the much more bountiful pleasant ones from the demon. This rush of pain and anguish drove Coryn into a deep rage, and deeper under Arius' control.
Meanwhile, Messanger had been wreaking havoc on the realm of Etrah, pulling out warriors such as ArkAngel, an angel cast from Heaven at an early age, forced to live out life in Old Etrah, as an outcast of even the humans, and Sollnia, a mysterious young woman with an affinity for Messanger.
As the fights raged on in the world above, Arius and Coryn were well on their way to controling the Hells. Coryn had defeated Lotus, taking Second Hell, as well as Lotus' amulet, which absorbed the souls of the dead, allowing the bearer access to their power, in his commander's name. Arius, in the meantime, had discovered a sword known as Gaia's Tear, that gained power with every innocent soul that was slain in its presence. He'd set out to make a conterpart, which trapped every sould it cut down, innocent or otherwise. Arius' sword was called Gaia's Torment. With that project completed, and one of the three amulets in his possesion, he began his search for the gates to Hell. Arius commanded Coryn to gather Messanger and seek out an artifact known as the Sightless Eye.
Heaven had finally taken notice of Arius' actions, sending their top warrior, Pyrodeus, the Warrior Angel of Fire, to halt the evil actions. The angel met with Solnia, and headed for the Appeak Mountains to find the atrifact before Arius' minions. Ark had simply set out on his own to find Coryn, a childhood friend when the demon was still human. Atop the mountains, a battle raged out, and eventually, Coryn and Messanger made away with the Sightless Eye, returning it to Arius. The artifact located the gates in Reyone Field.
They left for the field, where the guardian of Hell, Satan, had been waiting. Coryn took on the beast alone, claiming a victory, as well as Satan's sword, which unknowingly held the second amulet within the hilt. As Arius and Messanger descended through Hell, Ark had found Coryn waiting for them at the gates in Reyone. The demon accused the fallen angel of making his human life miserable, not knowing the whole story. After a brief, but furious battle, Coryn emerged victorious, killing ArkAngel, who then turned into a blue dust, which was inhaled, and ultimately absorbed by the demon. This fusion of the two brought back Coryn's full memory, which furiated him, and made him vow vengeance against Arius.
In the meantime, Arius squared off with Lucifer, the King of Hell. Claiming victory against the Devil, and the throne, Arius had managed to destroy the third amulet. In a moment of despair, the artifact found its way onto Arius' hand as a tattoo, but still having the same effect. He took this newfound power, and set his sights on Etrah itself. Exiting the gates of Hell, Arius was attacked by Coryn, striking the demon down with a single punch. Arius didn't want to dirty his blade on on such a filthy beast. He took Satan's sword from Coryn, breaking the third amulet from the swrod, thus granting himself unsurpassed power.
By this time, Pyrodeus and Sollnia had arrived on the scene, determined to stop Arius. After a long fight, Arius still had the upper hand. Sollnia had spent most of the fight trying to revive Coryn, unknowingly succeeding. Arius did not see fit of this, and cut her down. Arius had claimed victory with her death, as the Angel of Fire didn't have the strength to fight back. However, a new force had been awakened. Coryn's body had undergone a transformation in the revival, both physically, and mentally, as a culmination of two souls. This new entity was known as Mathew. Driven by two separate but equally intense urges to destroy Arius, an epic battle ensued. In the end, Mathew had disarmed Arius of his Torment by cutting off the hand that held it. The hand also had the amulet tatooed on it. Upon hitting the ground, Etrah claimed the sword and tattooed amulet for itself, instantly growing a twisted tree around them. It would come to be the only tree in the entire field.
Mathew had beaten Arius into submission as two new people happened upon the scene at the right time. These two, Rifel and Jay, had wandered into this dimension by chance, and felt it only necessary to help. They opened a rift to an unknown dimension, known only as the Abyss, and forced Arius through it. The process destroyed the body that Arius had inhabited, trapping him, as well as the other two amulets, in the Abyss. The combination of the massive amounts of souls and power being released, as well as Arius' intense desire to escape the Abyss, split the fabrics of time and space, breaking the barriers between worlds, allowing free travel for everyone. Not even Heaven and Hell were safe from the breaking of realms. The angels, now being exposed to the freedom that humanity had, became jealous, revolting against Heaven, and falling from grace.
Unfortunately for the universe, this was only the Prelude to Chaos.
