The sky didn't darken all at once. It began with a distant rumble, a low vibration that seemed to come from deep within the earth. The ground trembled beneath their feet, unsettling and ancient. But the explosion came soon after—blinding, searing, a flash that seemed to swallow everything in its path. The shockwave, noisy and violent, rolled across the land, tearing apart buildings, forests, and lives in an instant. The king watched, frozen in the palace, as the light filled the sky. For a brief moment, it was as if the sun had come crashing down, and then it was gone. All that remained was a massive crater, a burning scar that stretched across the land, leaving behind only rubble and dust. The bomb was the product of a mistake. The Y2K glitch, something no one had thought was worth worrying about, had ignited the disaster. It wasn't supposed to happen. There were no machines involved, and no calculations had gone wrong. The glitch, driven by human arrogance and an underestimation of what might unfold, led to the explosion. It was a series of small, cascading failures that triggered the largest nuclear bomb ever detonated—a bomb not built with the technology of the day, but with old, forgotten methods of destruction that had long since been buried under layers of history.
The world was irrevocably changed by the explosion. A few months after the dawn of the new millennium, the explosion of the largest nuclear bomb ever created sent shockwaves across the globe, tearing apart nations, erasing borders, and rendering entire regions uninhabitable. It wasn't the work of an enemy or a premeditated strike; it was an error, a simple glitch from the Y2K bug that no one had anticipated, setting off a chain of events that would unravel everything. The bomb, triggered by the technological failure, obliterated hundreds of millions, leaving countries like Russia, Kazakhstan, and Poland reduced to radioactive wastelands. Cities turned to ashes in seconds, while entire populations vanished from the maps, their existence erased from history. What was once a complex web of international relations collapsed under the weight of the disaster. Governments fell, and what remained of society was left scrambling for survival, the very idea of countries and nations barely a memory. The Dominion Pact, a brief alliance formed out of desperation during the chaos that followed, had seemed like a beacon of strength for a time. United by a shared will to dominate and survive, they initially thrived, taking advantage of the shattered world to seize control of resources and land. But the Pact, like all things born from desperation, was fragile. Internal conflicts, power struggles, and a lack of cohesion slowly tore them apart. They were weak now—fractured by infighting and the consequences of their own aggressive expansion. Once a formidable force, the Dominion Pact now barely resembled the powerful coalition it had once been. The countries that had been under its influence had been ravaged by the fallout. Some had collapsed entirely, their people scattered, while others had become lawless territories, where the strong preyed on the weak. The Union League, the last remaining force of order and stability in this broken world, now stood alone, desperately trying to maintain some semblance of control as the rest of the world descended into madness. Even they, however, could feel the fragility of their position. While they remained a unifying force in theory, cracks were beginning to show. The once-flourishing cities were now decimated, their infrastructures crumbling. With every passing day, it became harder to sustain the League's influence, especially with the growing number of rogue factions emerging from the chaos. Survivors in what remained of the Union League's territories were still reeling from the trauma of the disaster. Panic was a constant companion, and fear of another attack—this time perhaps from a new threat—was ever-present. Yet, amid the devastation, a small glimmer of hope remained. Some survivors clung to the belief that there could still be something left to salvage, that a new world could rise from the ashes.
Years later
A long time had passed, Elias soon discovered, this was a world where survival came at a price, where the history of what once was—before the explosion—was only preserved in whispers and forgotten diaries. Fifty years later, an explorer, part of a new generation of wanderers who had never known the old world, stumbled upon a relic—an ancient journal, its leather cover worn and pages yellowed by time. It was the diary of a king, someone who had once led a great nation, now a shadow of the past. The explorer's discovery would lead him to uncover the final days of the Dominion Pact, the crumbling of the Union League, and the fall of the nations that had once been pillars of the world. A world now unrecognizable, where the lessons of the past were as much a mystery as the future itself. The kingdom that had once stood strong was no more, and the survivors who remembered it were few. What remained were the stories of a time long gone—written in the pages of a king's diary, telling of a world teetering on the edge of destruction, a world that had vanished, leaving nothing but its shadow in the pages of history.
The wind howled through the ruins, carrying with it the scent of burnt wood and charred earth. It swept through the skeletal remains of what had once been a thriving civilization, now reduced to nothing but piles of broken concrete, twisted metal, and crumbling buildings. The young explorer moved cautiously through the wasteland, his boots crunching on the shattered remnants of the old world beneath him. The landscape was a ghost of its former self, with only the occasional ruin rising out of the desolation to hint at the grandeur that had once existed.
The earth itself seemed to tremble in the aftermath of the explosion that had changed everything. There were no longer any living cities, no bustling streets or markets. The world had been silenced, its vibrant pulse replaced by a deafening quiet. The sky, once a bright and endless blue, now hung heavy with ash, casting a dim pall over everything below. The land was scarred, as though the earth itself had been wounded, unable to heal from the violent impact that had torn it apart. The young explorer paused for a moment, taking in the broken world around him. He could feel the weight of history pressing down on him.
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But power built on desperation and fear could never last. The glitch, the bomb, the mistakes—they had all come together in a perfect storm of disaster. What had started as a small error, a glitch in the old systems, had snowballed into a catastrophic failure that had brought the world to its knees. The bomb, nicknamed Sovereign's Wrath, was a relic of the past—a weapon of sheer destruction, waiting to be unleashed. And when it did, it consumed everything in its path. Cities were obliterated in an instant. People were vaporized. The world screamed, but there was no one left to hear it.
The Dominion Pact had crumbled in the aftermath, its territories scattered and broken. The once-unified force had fallen apart under the weight of its own mistakes. Leaders had fought for power, alliances had fractured, and the world descended into chaos. What had once been a powerful coalition was now a shadow of its former self, its influence all but wiped out. The survivors, once loyal to the Pact, were now scattered across the ruins of a world that no longer made sense. Some tried to hold onto the old ways, but they were powerless to stop the inevitable decay.
In the wake of the explosion, the world had become a wasteland. There were no governments, no leaders, no nations to rally behind. The land was ruled by chaos, by rogue groups fighting for scraps of food, shelter, and power. Cities that had once been thriving centers of culture and technology were now nothing more than piles of rubble. The Union League, the last remaining force with any semblance of order, tried to maintain some level of control, but even they were on the brink of collapse. Survivors in their territories lived in constant fear—fear of attack, fear of hunger, fear of losing what little they had left. The world was broken, and there seemed to be no way to fix it.
Elias had heard the stories, passed down through generations of survivors. He had grown up in the aftermath, in a world that had forgotten what it was like to live without fear. He had never known the old world, the world before the explosion. To him, it was just a faded memory, a world he could never fully understand. The past had been lost to time, and now, there was only the present—harsh, unforgiving, and filled with uncertainty.
He had found something—a relic from the past that might hold the key to understanding what had happened. Buried deep beneath the rubble, he had discovered the king's journal. Doomsday 2000, embossed on the cover in faded white letters. The book was old, its leather cover worn and cracked, but the words inside were still legible. The journal chronicled the fall of the Dominion Pact, the rise and collapse of an empire built on ambition and fear. It was a testament to the mistakes of the past, a warning to those who might try to rebuild what had been lost.
Elias paused to look around, his breath heavy in his chest. The earth itself seemed to tremble in the aftermath of the explosion that had changed everything. There were no longer any living cities, no bustling streets or markets. The world had been silenced, its vibrant pulse replaced by a deafening quiet. The sky, once a bright and endless blue, now hung heavy with ash, casting a dim pall over everything below. The land was scarred, as though the earth itself had been wounded, unable to heal from the violent impact that had torn it apart.
He felt it deeply—the weight of history pressing down on him. The silence was overwhelming, as if the land itself mourned what had been lost. And yet, amidst the desolation, Elias couldn't help but wonder: Could there be something left to rebuild?
As he opened the first page, the young explorer found the king's handwriting, hurried and uneven. The words spoke of a world on the brink of collapse, a king who had watched helplessly as everything he had worked for unraveled before his eyes. The entries told of the glitch that had ignited the chain of events leading to the explosion, the bomb that had wiped out entire nations in an instant. There were no machines involved, no advanced technology to blame. It had all been human error, arrogance, and miscalculation.
The king's words grew more desperate as the journal continued. He wrote of the Dominion Pact's rise, its temporary strength, and how it had crumbled under its own weight. He described the aftermath of the explosion—the devastation, the loss of life, the collapse of order. There was no hope left, only regret. The king's last entry, a scrawled mess of words, was dated the day before his death. It read:
"To whoever finds this, know that we failed. We failed to see the cost of our ambition, the weight of our decisions. I leave this as a warning, though I doubt anyone remains to read it. If you survive, build something better. Rise from the ashes of our mistakes."
The young explorer closed the journal slowly, the weight of the king's words settling heavily on his chest. He had never known a world of unity, a world of order. The land around him was a wasteland, a reminder of the past's failures. But even in the face of all this destruction, he couldn't shake the feeling that there was still hope. The world was broken, yes, but it wasn't beyond repair. There were still people who wanted to rebuild, to rise from the ashes of the old world and make something better.
As the wind whipped around him, the explorer knew that the journey ahead would be long and difficult. But he also knew that it wasn't over yet. The king's journal had offered a glimpse into a time long gone, a world that had been lost. But the explorer understood that history wasn't just a record of what had happened—it was a guide, a lesson for those who would come after. He was part of a new generation, one that had the chance to do things differently, to build something stronger, something better.
With the journal tucked carefully into his pack, he set off toward the horizon, where the sun was slowly sinking behind the mountains. The world he knew was broken, but it wasn't beyond repair. And he, along with the others who still believed, would fight to make sure that it wouldn't stay that way forever.