The Multiverse is a strange place. You see, unlike many have theorized, the Multiverse is built on thoughts, not possibilities. Every person has a mind, a Soul, and when they imagine, when they consider, when they question, when they want, those thoughts have power. Those thoughts create a Core, and that Core uses those thoughts to create a World. Cores naturally attract similar thoughts, using them to refine the rules of the World, growing sturdier and sturdier as the new thoughts bring them more and more power. This is where things begin to get… weird.

I don't know about you, but there are times when my thoughts aren't pretty. Times when my baser instincts get the best of me. When I consider violence. When I consider lust. When I consider evil. When I think the world should revolve around me. But unlike me, Cores don't take those thoughts and shove them away. They don't just shake them off and move on with their day. You see, Cores don't have a Soul. They don't have a mind. They don't have desires or wants or anything that would enable them to judge an idea. They simply take the Soul that comes to them, look at the ideas that gave birth to it, assume that's how things should work. That Core takes that thought and starts making a World, setting up rules to make things work the only way they've ever been shown.

There was a time when this wasn't an issue. A time when thoughts weren't so dark. But to talk about that we need to talk about Immortals. Immortals are beings who have bonded with the Core of a World, gaining influence over it. They can do pretty much anything they want within the World, as long as it's within the rules. Think of it like admin privileges in a video game. They can give themselves the coolest items, the best abilities, spawn or delete objects, etc. but everything has to be a part of the game already or it doesn't work. Immortals also gain a few other advantages, mainly the ability to be, well, immortal, and to travel between Worlds. Ideally the Immortals would travel between Worlds, spreading the knowledge of their own World, doing what they could to nurture young Worlds, and yada yada yada. Everyone happy and peaceful and all that good crap. However, back when everything was first starting, one Immortal decided that they didn't like that idea. But we gotta talk about something else first.

In the beginning… well, you know. The Creator made the first World. Then that World acted as a seed, the thoughts of the first humans spreading out and creating even more Worlds, which created their own humans, who had even more thoughts and so on and so on. Time passes faster in Worlds with less Soul, since they aren't as sturdy, so the Multiverse expanded fast. It didn't take long before the first Immortals were born and began stepping out into the Multiverse. This is where our villain steps in. Freedom. You could also call them Choice or Free Will, but it's all the same. The concept of being the master of your own fate, of doing what you want.

You see, Freedom didn't like the way things were, because when the Creator made the first World, he didn't give the humans the knowledge of good and evil, which meant they didn't judge, much like Cores. Nothing was more or less important than anything else, and Freedom hated that. They wanted to be special. It made sense in a way. Choices are all about deciding you want one thing more than another. Freedom was built on the idea that choices need to be made, and they wanted people to choose them. The fact that so many people simply didn't care drove them mad. You could almost feel sorry for them, if it weren't for the fact that it still made them a selfish piece of shit.

Anyway, Freedom wanted to be more important, and what would make them more important than everyone suddenly caring about the choices they made? If everyone suddenly had this knowledge that one choice was good, and another was not, then they would obviously find the decision a lot more important, right? Yeeeah… you guys know the story from here. Freedom tricks the humans into doing the one thing the Creator told them not to do, and now everyone has decisions to make. I'm not sure if Freedom knew things would turn out like this, if they knew how twisted the Multiverse would become as everyone suddenly learned of, and began thinking about, all the evil choices they could make, but I know that they don't care. Everyone is obsessed with Freedom now. Just like they wanted.

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Okay, now, I bet you're wondering where the Four fit into all this. 'I thought this was a story about the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse not the Fall of Man.' Well, you're right, you probably didn't need to know about Freedom, but this is my story and I get to put what I want in it! Plus, fuck Freedom. Everyone should know how much they suck. You did need to know about Immortals in general, because it's important to note that the Four are not Immortals, because they aren't connected to a World. Well, World is a World, so they're technically connected to one? But it doesn't have any Soul, or a Core to process it if it did, so I'm going to say it doesn't count.

I suppose we should start with what the Four actually are, huh? Basically, they're what make all of reality possible. You need a World, which encompasses the space objects exist in and the rules they operate under. You need Soul, obviously. Besides the fact that it's how Worlds get made, it's also the basis for consciousness, without which we'd all be animals at best. Then you need Body, because reality needs substance. And finally, you need Spirit to connect all of it together. But wait, those aren't people, are they? They're concepts, aren't they? Well, that's a part of the problem.

You see, technically the Four shouldn't exist. In order to truly embody a concept, the World needs to completely revolve around it. In Freedom's World, choices are everything. Same with Fire, Sword, Hitler (why do you people think about him so much?), or any other concept with an Immortal. However, for the Four, if you throw in any of the others, the World is no longer just about them. Just like Fire World doesn't have any water in it, Body World couldn't have any Soul in it, which means no thinking creatures. It couldn't have any Spirit either, which means no life at all. And it couldn't have any World, which means no space to exist and no rules for how anything should work. It's the same for all of them. So none of them could form a World. None of them could even form a Core, since a Core needs all four to exist. If anything did exist, it would be three dimensionless points and an empty void. How could any Immortal come from something like that? The answer? They didn't. The concepts themselves woke up. You could only ask the Creator how. Maybe that evolution idea got to them. Life finds a way, right?

So now they're out there, walking, talking embodiments of everything that makes life possible, just existing. Which wouldn't be a problem, except, there's this tiny issue of how people tend to think about things. You know how people tend to think they're special? How they think the world is out to get them? How they hope to be noticed? To be wanted? I'm not judging, I do it too, but because of thoughts like that, the Multiverse has this nasty little tendency to fuck with special people. With unique people. And is there anything more unique than the Four? Each one a singular existence, unlike anything else in the Multiverse. You can only fuck with someone so much before they start fucking back. Before they get sick of the bullshit, and decide to end it. And since they can't end themselves… Well, there's only one other option, now isn't there?