The Beginning

  “A mindless being, an entity without much thought, existed for an indefinite time. In a space without space, a place without time, the only things in existence the creature itself, all things that once were and to be, mere concepts. But something changed somewhere along the line, something within the thing itself. It thought, and it thought only once: To not be alone.

  This mere thought was the creation of the fractured and tortured multiverse known as Agratall. The entity’s body was made into the space itself, and the spaces between spaces. It’s will was made into the various creatures to float within those spaces within spaces, now known as the void, and it’s mind made into the odd thing known as time. It’s soul, however, was left exposed. Left out for a feast for the creatures it begat. If it knew surprise, this would be it, for the very creations it had made had turned on it the moment of their birth. The entities within the void feasted and ate and ate and ate, consuming the soul of the nameless thing. In turn, those that feasted gained power, and the more they feasted the more power they gained. Soon enough, the last of the nameless thing was eaten, and all turned to chaos once more as the beings it once created sought to fight amongst eachother.

  In the void they fought, for unknown times, in undefinable spaces, and still they do and forever they will as long as there is at minimum one. However, as the beings in the void fought and consumed and multiplied, some also became curious, capable of thought and possibly sentience. These few capable of reasoned thought soon became the apex predators, the best at hiding from predators, the best at being the predators. They fought less, and delved within themselves. What they found there was something they were intimately familiar with-- afterall it was the very first thing they ate-- a soul. An amalgam of having an identity, possessing a minimum intelligence, and a core of power, was what made up a soul. Most of these beings with souls went mad at the thought, and consumed themselves, creating something in their own self-destruction.

Did you know this story is from Royal Road? Read the official version for free and support the author.

  However many did this form of self-destruction is unknown, but what is known is that by the destruction of their own soul was the creation of new realms, of new worlds. The most reasoned and least maddened-- or possibly most mad and least reasoned-- of the entities in the void still left with souls slowly grew in power and domain, their very thoughts influencing the very things that are around them. In some way, these beings are to gods to the normal voidlings as the gods are to the mortals in most realms. These few beings that came into such power only knew to expand their power, in the few ways that only they know. Some created a realm or many realms without using their soul as a catalyst. Some continued their self-discovery, becoming far beyond mere sentience, beings capable of thoughts unknown and maddening to any mortal who dares seek them out. Others went and devoured and consumed their lesser brethren, of those a portion decided to become many, others to further themselves. Whichever way they went matters not, as in the end, as all things do, things changed.

  After a point in the void, that unknown place without clear meaning in time or space, a tiny portion of the void’s denizens became so potent in their power and domain that they, by accident or on purpose, fractured reality itself. These fractures spread and spread, fractures so extensive they separated portions of reality into new realities outside this one, or consumed unknown millions of billions of realms. A few fractures end directly inside realms, corrupting them and turning them inside out, so that those realms spread ever more cracks and breaks into reality itself. This fracturing of the very fabric of existence continues endlessly, as endless as the infinite multiverse is.

  The void gods, and the other eldritch beings of similar power lent their power to either further the cracks, or to become part of these cracks. Some decided to repair the multiverse, others deciding to simply glue it back together. Then there were the mad ones that tried to gain power from the cracks. Most failed, but the few that succeeded had started the first of an infinite many wars by the creatures of the void. This first war had luckily happened before the current era of stability in Agratall, allowing us to document and learn from these wars[...]”

--An excerpt from one of the most sold texts in all of Agratall, The History of All That Was and Likely Will Be made by The Historian