---

So rang the bells of hope and healing

And through all the land did they resonate

Kingdoms rose, no evil concealing

Nor wicked man's folly to castigate.

Armies grew lazy without war to wage

Drinking, laughing, sporting, sleeping

Truly saw they no end to this age

'Twas all the greater for the darkness creeping.

Whispered fears grew ever louder

Bodies gone to fat began to stir

As dormant forges now floundered

Warriors's preparation was deterred.

Iron hearts trembled at the slightest shadow

And martial arts once potent had been lost

Spirited resistance faced a great embargo

Cowering fops raising rusted swords crossed.

Shaking hands bore sapphire flags

As cold sweat began to flow.

The horizon filled with clouds like rags

And eldritch lightning struck aglow.

Across the land did the chaos mount

And what came next was nightmare given form.

The black sky cracked and evil poured out

A yawning portal spawning abyssal swarms.

Screaming demons and unhallowed ghosts

Flooded the sky and tainted the land.

The defenders balked before the foul host

And many fled, their posts unmanned.

Open slaughter was their goal

And slaughter they did with otherworldly glee

Crimson rivers flowed around ivory knolls

And dead eyes bore witness to the bloody spree.

They drank from skulls filled with blood

And wet their blades on all they found

Innocents choked under suffocating mud

And unholy blasphemies left charred mounds

Yet amidst the tumult an even greater evil

Descended from the portal and with him came damnation.

His minions cowered at his approach

And burning steeds paved his way.

He bore the weight of power beyond reproach

And all was naught before his fell gaze.

His cadre of elites kneeled before him

and reaffirmed their black allegiance.

Chattering devils lingered amidst the din

eager to march as untold legions.

The arch-demon brought forth a sinister orb

its purpose the harvest of human souls.

He raised it high and spoke words warped

and glimmer it did with ethereal cold.

His retinue trembled as silent energies built

crackling in the air and staining the earth.

So it was that all those killed

were snatched from the ether and locked in berth.

The screams of thousands echoed through the void

and from the sphere flowed to the portal.

Muscled knights cheered with blades deployed

As the light gave form to a serpent abnormal.

The Great Beast roared, and they answered its call

a dozen pronged heads bellowing at once.

it descended from the portal, and the angels balked

for now the voice of doom had sung

Blackness filled the skies,

and the tainted earth split,

before an ocean of lifeless eyes

and the yawning of a red pit.

So it was that the Great Beast arrived

glimmering, shivering, laughing, seething.

Bearing the weight of impending demise

ethereal fire its unholy breathing.

Assembled legions cackled and screamed

raising bloody hands and weeping with joy.

Feverishly bellowing their blackened creed

witnessing fruition of the unhallowed ploy.

Amidst a forest of blades they sang

bloody hymns and foul salutations,

and they let hang the dead as they

declared their plot to unmake creation.

And yet as they cried of the end

hundreds died in a moment's span.

The sky broke once again

and the angels descended upon them.

Bright hammers broke their swords

and fight they did with fury and craft.

On ivory wings, flanked by his wards,

their leader charged the arch-demon and with him clashed.