I think it’s time I talk about Asynjur, the worldwide umbrella corporation. Most of the old content that I had about them has been removed by my host after it received some threatening letters from the corporation’s lawyers. So I will only write the facts that are known about the company – hopefully you, my friends, would be able to read between the lines…

Roots
1974 – Patrick Woden and Michael Allen, two software engineers fresh out of Harvard, developed a programming language they called SIMPLE for Key Networks Ltd., a computer manufacturer.

1975 – The duo continued developing SIMPLE and eventually made it available for other platforms. Their software became an immediate hit.

1976 – Following their success, they founded Simple Systems. In the next four years they would release several other successful products that would gain them fame and success and enough money to secure their future for years to come.

Golden years
1980 – Simple Systems released Simple Gateways on this year, the groundbreaking OS that is used to this day. This helped solidify the small Colorado-based company as a leading software developer.

1986 – Following their growing success, they moved their offices from Castle Rock, Colorado to Denver. In the next five years they open over a hundred offices around the world.

1989 – Simple Systems starts branching into other product lines – buying companies producing everything from automobiles and air planes to fast food franchises. And every company they buy doubles its revenue within the next two years. Pulse Magazine releases an article called A Simple Midas Touch and that becomes the company’s unofficial slogan for the next few years.

Asynjur
1991 – The year everything changed. Marie Diamond, an overnight (and until then – nameless) billionaire performs a hostile takeover, buying 51% of Simple’s shares. Simple Systems is renamed The Asynjur Corporation the very next day. Patrick Woden and Michael Allen find a loophole that allows them to remain within the company and secures their positions there; however at this point they have very little control over the company. Asynjur becomes a monopoly in almost every field, ruthlessly crushing any competitor. Michael Allen openly challenges almost each and every company decision following the takeover. He was quoted more than once as saying that Asynjur was destroying everything he and his partner worked to achieve.

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1993 – Michael Allen is found dead in his mansion by his housekeeper. His suicide note describes his dismay at his failure to change Asynjur and the company’s way of making business. Many say the letter is far less aggressive than Allen’s usual stance against the corporation and the specialists examining the handwriting surmised that he must have been distraught and maybe even ashamed at his public outbursts.

… but what else can I do? I know they probably have their reasons and we don’t always see eye to eye… [They] had to fire so many people and I just can’t live with that… So many [people] without a job. I fought long and hard to make Asynjur a better company; maybe I was just unable to see… [that] Asynjur has a positive influence on the world after all…

1996 – Patrick Woden and his wife Rachel are killed in a hit-and-run accident with a large vehicle – possibly a semi truck. They are survived by their son who was with them in the car at the time of the accident. Miraculously the boy survived however he was left paralyzed from the waist down. The offending vehicle was never recovered and its driver remains at large.

2000 – According to Nations Magazine, every household in the world uses an average of three Asynjur-made products.

2004 – Marie Diamond, the enigmatic woman behind the Asynjur Corporation hands over the reins of the company to her only daughter Ann. Marie completely disappears from the business world and from the public eye.

2007 – Asynjur owns at least one company or has at least one office in every country around the world including developing countries and lands under dispute.

2009 – At present, the corporation owns 10% of the world’s wealth, yet it employs an estimated number of 4000 employees globally, relying heavily on automation. Most of their products, like cars and electrical appliances are exclusively assembled in developing countries.

Brother Justice is a weapon of the church trained for death and destruction; a creature that does not need eyes or ears to locate its prey and kill it; an evil force that, at the height of its power can destroy life with a mere touch. Molding a person into that being is perhaps the worst sin against Dalanos, the patron of life. That thought never crossed the Father Abbot’s mind. In fact, it was only one part of the grander scheme.

Days before Soran’s transformation into Brother Justice was complete, more of the Father Abbot’s plan was revealed. In Triel, the town closest to the Albian Monastery of Dalanos, a strange sickness started spreading. People stopped eating, stopped caring, stopped thinking. They shambled along in the streets, their bodies slowly withering and decaying as their apathy grew. Eventually they would die but some dark force kept them going, waiting for the Father Abbot’s commands. It is believed that the old evil man wanted to create an army he could use to launch an attack against the high king of Nyrondria. The walking corpses could distract the king’s army long enough for the Father Abbot to unleash his full force on the land.

Among the ranks of the Albian Order, a Master is highest in rank after the Father Abbot. All of the masters of the order were in league with the malicious old man, all but one. Master Jonas was a true believer of Dalanos and he realized what the Father Abbot was doing in Triel. Going against the Father Abbot’s wishes, he departed the monastery with two of his students and went to Triel to try and heal its dying people.

Enraged, the Father Abbot called upon the newly trained Brother Justice to exact the church’s wrath upon the disobedient master. He decreed the three as heretics and ordered Soran to go after them and bring back their heads. Since Master Jonas knew about the fashioning of Brother Justice and probably anticipated his eminent attack, and since Soran’s training was never tested, the old man wanted to increase the mission’s chances of success. He released Dymir, the renegade elf, from the monastery’s dungeon and left him in the care of Soran. Should Dymir try to flee, Brother Justice was instructed to eliminate him as well. But the elf had nowhere to go. He was lost, alone and filled with self-loathing for the murder he has committed. And so he followed Soran’s lead and did as he was told to do.

Together they reached Triel and were ambushed by Master Jonas and his disciples. They were captured and tied up. Master Jonas tried to reason with Soran, showing him the evil that was the Father Abbot. But he was addressing Brother Justice. Soran was only there by name, by some distant memory. All that was left was the Father Abbot’s will – nothing else mattered.

And so the elven hands burst in flames, scorching the ropes that bound them. And the brother of justice howled in rage, hatred and loathing and the ropes around him broke. Barely a whisper was heard as the two disciples were slain and a great battle between Master, Brother and Mage commenced.

But the two proved far superior to the Master standing before them and before long he was dead. They beheaded the corpses and left the bodies in an alley.

That night one of the Masters was tasked with building a pyre and conducting a dark ritual. He was then ordered to throw the heretics’ heads into the blaze. The next morning that master was found dead, the scorched remains of his head visible among the ashes. Master Jonas’ head and body were never recovered.

In the swirling flames of the abyss you are nothing until you are summoned to the material plane. Such was the case for the newly summoned imp, invited by the Father Abbot of the Albian Church to possess the local king’s bastard son, Eric. The imp had no trouble taking over the child’s terrified psyche, all but erasing the young innocent mind with his own will. Its mission was to get close enough to the king to assassinate him, thus throwing the land into chaos only the Father Abbot would be able to control.

The plan worked well but the body of the child had to be disposed of as it could no longer contain the chaotic nature of the demon within it. And so the imp was allowed to possess a man from the southern regions of Nyrondria. And that man was known as Shakur. The demon liked the name so much it took it as his own. And so Shakur travelled the land, exacting the Father Abbot’s will together with Soran and Dymir. When not on a mission he was allowed to spread his own chaos in the land.

And so the demon Shakur gained more power and once again, outgrew his body’s usefulness. So he was forced to take over a new body – this one used to be called Darlos, a dark man with a darker past. Shakur liked his old name and kept it. He possessed Darlos’ body the longest and he grew into it, in more ways than one. He continued to occupy that body long after the group stopped serving the Father Abbot.

On one dark day, Shakur performed a dark ritual, allowing him to became an adult. He no longer needed a host – he could retain a humanoid shape for as long as he wanted. He shed what remained of Darlos, and became a demon lord. His true form was that of a giant cat-like humanoid creature with great wings, horns, bright green cat-like eyes and blood red fur, brightest around his chest and stomach (or so all of his church’s paintings depict him).

Shakur grew to trust his new friends – a concept that was very alien to him. Yet it provided him with stability this creature of chaos was unaccustomed to. Together with Soran and Dymir, Shakur was responsible for many great and noble deeds as well as great feats of courage. But he also exacted terrible acts of brutality, such as the massacre of Voria together with his son Haris and the annihilation of the University of Magic and all its occupants in Cimia. His last known act on this world was one of nobility and selflessness, when he flew over Soran as The Blind Prophet stood on the mountaintop praying to Dalanos, and protected the holy man from evil together with Dymir. For his great accomplishment he was granted a seat among the gods. His church claims that he didn’t want so many people to die because that would make the world less entertaining for him, with fewer people to torment. Scholars think it may have been a rare act of friendship and mercy performed by a demon. Only one god truly knows what happened there on the mountaintop…

Dymir never knew his parents. They left him when he was but a baby in the care of the Archmage of the elven academy in the forest of Quin’Sidin, the ancient homeland of the high elves. The old Archmage raised the boy as his own and quickly learned that Dymir had hidden talents and an innate affinity to magic. The boy mastered cantrips and minor spells before he was twelve years old and something within him yearned to know more, to weave more powerful spells. He urged his adoptive father to let him open the books reserved for more experienced mages; to learn the secrets of the ancient arcane rituals. But the Archmage refused, fearing that so much power would corrupt the boy and lead him to harm himself or others. Always impatient, Dymir finally decided to practice his art in secret, running off into the woods and trying out new incantations, new spell ingredients and new gestures. It seemed so natural to him, so pure – an extension of his own being. On his 17th birthday he wanted to surprise his mentor. He climbed up The Tower of the Arcane where his adoptive father taught other students, entered the Archmage’s office and told him he was practicing magic that some elves, much senior than him, have been struggling for years to master.

Instead of being proud of his son, the Archmage berated Dymir for dabbling in dangerous spells he could not possible control! Dymir was furious at this, and attempting to prove himself to his father pointed his hand at the office’s entrance, summoned a magic missile and launched it at the closed door. But at that unfortunate moment another student entered the room – a young girl who only recently began her apprenticeship as a mage. She died instantly.

Dymir, filled with horror and remorse, fled the forest and headed east where an unknown power was pulling him. He did not realize this but his path had taken him into the ground surrounding the Albian Church. He was captured by several masters of the order who threw him into the dungeons below the monastery where he stayed for several long and grueling days. The Father Abbot of the church recognized the power within the young elf and decided to harness it to his own gains. Dymir was sent on missions, with Soran and Shakur keeping him in check at first but later becoming his friends.

After a few years of servitude and many years of great deeds the three vanquished a great evil and saved the land. During these adventured, Dymir met his wife and together they raised three children. After Soran joined Dalanos and Shakur took his place as a true god, Dymir returned to his people who now saw him as a hero who has atoned for his past misdeeds many times over. Dymir and his descendants all served at one point or another as Archmages of the high elves, teaching generations of elves, humans and even a few dwarves the secrets of arcane lore. He was the longest living elf in the history of Nyrondria and the most celebrated with countless of legends and rumors surrounding his final years. Some of these tales insist Dymir lives to this day…

The story of Soran is a long one and I have many books written about his life and legacy in my possession. Little is known about his life before joining the order of Albian. What we do know today is that his parents were extremely poor. At some point Soran found himself drawn towards the temple of Albian and to Dalanos. He joined the order after he was promised he could leave some years later and will be given a substantial amount of gold, enough to support his family for many years.

It is said they tortured the boy until he forgot his family back home, until he forgot about his ideals, his beliefs and finally even his name. They made him into a puppet. They taught him to feel no pain, no anger, no fear and no remorse. They taught him to be a weapon, to do as he’s told with no question or doubt, to move when he’s told to move, to kill when he’s told to kill. Then they broke him again, taking away everything he ever was, making sure nothing remained and then rebuilt him into a killing machine. His final test was to kill one of the church’s brothers. A young wide-eyed boy like he used to be. The boy was dead long before his body hit the floor. The process has been successful. Soran was gone. The Hand of Dalanos was all that remained, and the Father Abbot of the Albian church was pleased.

Together with Dymir the renegade elf and Shakur – then merely a demonic imp, Soran performed atrocities in the name of the Father Abbot. He never deluded himself that this was Dalanos’ wish – he even suspected the Father Abbot was in league with demons. He did not care, though, for his mind was blank – the only thing that mattered was the Father Abbot’s approval. In time the trio developed a rapport and then something others would even call friendship and Soran realized how far he was from Dalanos’ will. He tried to redeem himself numerous times but failed – he never knew what was expected of him. Should he follow his heart and what he knows is right or should he continue obeying the Father Abbot of the Albian church.

Eventually Dalanos showed him forgiveness but took away his sight. Soran the Blind Prophet travelled the land – and much like Albian he spread the words of Dalanos and healed the land of evil and injustice. The pinnacle of his attonement happened when he sacrificed himself to save the land and its people. He was declared a saint some years later and the order changed it’s name from the Albian Church to the Soranian Order of Dalanos in his honor.

Legends have it that he now sits next to Dalanos in the Halls of Truth and watches over the god’s true believers.

The age of The Scepter, the age of religion of the the last cycle was perhaps the land’s darkest time. It was also the longest. The people of the land forgot the Gods and their ways. They regarded the old stories as myth and fables designed to scare and educate the little ones. “The Gods of old have long since forgotten us” they would say as they went about their daily chores.

The Gods, disappointed that the people forgot about them have indeed turned their backs in anger. They refused to keep the people of the land safe from plague and from drought – only one god still had faith in mortal-kind. It was Dalanos who made peace between the people and their Gods. It was he who reached out to one blind peasant boy called Albian.

“And I saw a figure draped in white. And the apparition spoke my name. And he told me his name was Dalanos.”

He appeared in the boy’s dreams and told him all about the old religions. Albian spread the words of Dalanos together with his brother and a friend from his village. Together they travelled the continent and brought Dalanos’ touch to the sickly and the poor. The people of the land gladly accepted their encouraging words, their healing touch, and the land prospered. A great fortress was constructed to honor Albian and Dalanos. Centuries later it was that fortress, the Temple of Albian, where the land’s greatest evil emerged.

Many years after Albian’s passing, The Father Abbot of the Albian Order of Dalanos looked over the temple’s walls into the horizon and was dismayed.

“… there were many non-believers still – even the village of Triel that dwelt beyond the forest to the north was overflowing with heathens. He prayed to Dalanos to smite them. To force them to stop their evil ways, to turn them from letchery, greed and lust to his holy path. For the Father Abbot hated them, loathed their very existence, trembled with rage at the thought of every sinful breath they took into their bodies. For in this holy land, even the air was sacred and they had no right to breathe!”

And Dalanos did not respond to the Father Abbot’s prayers. He was greatly saddened that this once great man was driven to such hatered. The God hoped this misguided old man would realize that his wrath and hatred were not the God’s way and return once more to the light. Unfortunately, in his blind rage the Father Abbot thought the God was testing him. And so began the shaping of the Hand of Dalanos, the church’s most evil of weapons. This was when the wide-eyed Soran, barely a man, merely a few weeks in the order of Albian, was taken… and broken.

It is said that the new king of Nyrondria always rises from the ashes of anarchy. When the kingdom lies in ruins, he or she rises from among us and leads the people of the land to a better life.

This is true to Cassius De’Nyre, a servant boy who grew up in the court of a vicious, wicked lord. The lord always boasted he was a direct descendant of the kings and queens of old. He brutally murdered Cassius’ father when the boy was a mere infant. He later savagely beat and killed Cassius’ mother before his very eyes. Being only twelve at the time, Cassius had to flee. Fortune smiled upon him and he was taken in by a kindly old couple who looked after him like their own. It was through them that he learned that his last name was derived from Nyrond and he was, in fact, the one and only rightful heir to the throne.

As he grew up he honed his skills, learning history, diplomacy and swordplay until he was skilled enough to challenge the evil lord and defeat him in combat. His decendants ruled Nyrondria since then and were almost always kind and benevolent.

And so the tests commenced and the people of the land had to prove they are not all arrogant and greedy and that they are willing to sacrifice themselves for the good of the land. Mortals were given three chances to prove themselves worthy over three millenia.

Each thousand years, called Cycles, will be divided into four eras: The Sword, The Scepter, The Staff and The Dagger. These represented Monarchy, Theocracy, Magic and Chaos respectively. That meant that every Cycle, every thousand years, had four distinct eras. And when one Cycle ended another devastating force hit the land and cast the world into chaos. If, by the end of each Cycle, the Gods deemed mortals to be selfish and greedy, another cycle would commence. If this were the last Cycle, all life will be wiped from the world and the Gods will begin anew.

We don’t have many records of the first two Cycles. All we know is that mortals failed – badly. Our documentation starts following the chaotic period at the end of the Second Cycle.

We don’t know much about The First Creation and the little we do know is a bit sketchy. The only facts we are certain about are the following:

• After the first creation, the chromatic and metallic dragons were nothing more than small semi-intelligent animals, sometimes taken in by humanoids as pets. The real dragons were shapeshifting magical creatures that, in their true form, resembled gargantuan winged lizards with scales that glimmered like gems. The mightiest of those were the Aquamarine dragons, a noble and benevolent race. Dragons were the sole creation of Osric, then known as Azaron. Dragons were therefore often referred to in literature as the sons and daughter of Azaron the First (e.g. the first true God, since The Core is considered a force rather than a living, breathing entity).
• At some point humanoids grew in power and became arrogant and powerful and proclaimed themselves gods of the land. This did not sit well with the true Gods and especially Osric who decided to bring this world to an end. He came before the trembling mortals, slew their arrogant leaders with a wave of his hand and proclaimed their eminent doom. Dalanos, not a very popular deity at the time, took pity over mortals and tried to convince his father to give humanoids one more chance. After the humanoids cried out in fear and desperation Dalanos stepped forward and explained that indeed there will be widespread destruction but some will be spared. The survivors will be tested and would have to prove themselves to the Gods as worthy to continue living on this world. And thus the world ended and the few survivors witnessed what we now refer to as the Second Creation.