All was dust. 

My heart was stone. 

There were no tears left for my world, and what it had become. The Glittering Caves of Jentir were dim, lightless where there were once swirls of beauty. Only the light of the void, gray as it was, greeted my eyes as I emerged from beneath this barren earth. 

Alone. 

The black of my clothes was the only hint of color in a void-scape drained of all else. 

Now the once green fields of Alhast lay before me, grey and colourless. An empty expanse to my final destination. 

The once-brilliant sun hung above a singular, far-off peak, devoid of heat and color. Out here on the surface, closest to the light, it was oh, so, cold. Yet the gifts of the Old Gods did not fade, even in their giver’s absence, and through them my body was sustained. Their whispers of madness had faded along with all else when the Hunger-Tide had come. 

Once, there had been beauty here. Even one as cold as I could say that. These fields had overflown with life and bounty. Now there was naught but dust. 

Dust and Hollow Men. 

They stood before me in their legions. Grim specters devoid of any life and purpose. Faded remnants of a mad Lich’s army. Traitors to this world, to all life. Now they stood between me and their master, endless ranks of the dead amidst the cold dust of Alhast’s ruins. No eyes turned to gaze upon me as I approached. Not a limb moved to raise weapons in defense of their lord. 

Even the dead were devoid of purpose here. Their hollow gazes remained turned upward as I trudged through their ranks. There were glimpses of a city in the sky. Faint whisps of where Miros Nyl had once floated, before it had fled into the void to escape the world’s end. 

The void did not so easily let go. 

I averted my gaze, for there lurked things up there. Shapes without color just beyond the thin veil of reality. Things that stalked dead worlds where naught else moved. Were I more full of life and vigor, I would dare to face them. But the world had ended, and now little remained for me. One more task lay before me, and only then would I surrender my soul to the blind expanse of eternity. 

For only eternity remained, sightless and silent as it was. The great equalizer. Without compassion or notice to all in its domain. Death had come to the deathless, and even the Hells lay empty, their fires snuffed out. 

Only I remained. Last of men. Traitor of Keth. 

The last flame of man. I had once harbored a hope, been the light that would shine in the darkness and save this world. That light had flickered, faltered and faded. Gone out when the endtimes came. 

Now it was blind, bloody vengeance. Rage and hatred. Both bellowed into the void without meaning, lost amidst the expanse of nothingness. Little shifted, and littler cared. 

The hollow men around me swayed ever so slightly, faces turned upward to the endless sun. Their ranks stretched as far as the eye could see, and I was not content to slowly wade their their masses. An eternity of time I might have, but my soul tired. Too long had I tread the wastelands of what was once my beautiful home. Too long had I endured, suffered this unforgiving cold. 

A spear of white I lifted overhead, let it crackle with power. The air distorted around it, a warped wail let loose from within its length. Colorless pulses shimmered through the empty air, and legions collapsed around me, the remnants of magic that held them animated cut loose. 

Their hollow faces turned to watch me in silence even as I parted this sea of the dead, a final flame carried towards the mountain that chained the sun. 

Reality became undone high above, the spear working its grand design as it cut the fabric of magic in twain. Cold followed in my wake, and ice was left behind my footsteps. Heavy as I was cloaked, I was numb to it all. To this place, to the death that awaited me. One final task lay before me, and only then could I finally, blessedly, fall. 

Stolen story; please report.

The Hollow Men did not bar my path as I passed beneath the Doors of Thule, into the great mountain-fortress of the Lich-King. Hollow was the mountain I traveled through, rock hewn by tireless hands to make endless fortifications. Defenses made to withstand any breach, once the mountain’s master enacted his plan. Built to withstand assaults that never came, manned by thousands of defenders that never saw the final combat. 

Here in the darkness, the spear lit my way, its pale light a dim flame in this darkness. Higher and higher I climbed, every step another closer to my eternal respite. 

Long had I prepared for this moment, when my duty would finally be fulfilled. 

I would die on this peak. This I knew, but death did not frighten me. I welcomed it, after this long struggle. Though I knew the afterlife lay empty, I longed to be relieved of this burden. Of the magic that kept me upright and onwards. To be alone was a frightful thing, and too long had I been the last soul that lived in this forsaken shell of a world. 

The mountain’s peak lay white around me as I emerged from the great stone stairs. Not in snow, but in a brilliance that radiated from the cold sun above. Drained of light and heat though it was, the light of Helon still bathed this part of the world. Chained to this peak, locked in place forever more. 

Great bone guardians lay scattered across the peak, their forms crumpled and cut down. It was not them I sought. 

My eyes instead found a figure cloaked in gold, robes slumped in the stillness. 

Archeon, the Deathless. Ever-lord of the Black March, the Hand of Urbas, God of Lies. Wielder of unmatched power, bearer of secrets since the dawn of this world. Here it lay, slumped after its dusk. Taken by the calamity it had unleashed. Made equal in death. 

“Are you happy?” I rasped, my mouth unused to the words after such a long time. “Has this pleased you?”

“Does this satisfy you, oh lich?” I spoke amidst the deafening silence. But the skeleton lay still, slumped across the great altar where it had bound the sun and offered up its light, its heat in exchange for power. A lie that had never been fulfilled. There lay not rage in me, but cold certainty as I stepped forward and smashed in the long-dead skull of an ancient horror that had plagued this world since it’s dawn. 

It had won. 

Ushered in the dusk of all life, until at last it had outlived all else. 

All else but me. 

The last being that still lived on this forsaken world. Now I stood amidst the silence, the shattered remnants of the last great evil broken beneath me. Bells of stone hung silent around the altar, the chimes of the apocalypse come and gone. I smote the altar and all it’s evil, but it’s malicious work had already been wrought. 

And finally, I was alone. My purpose was fulfilled.

I sank to my knees at the peak’s edge and gazed out of the scarred void of all that remained. 

“Come home.” The silence whispered to me. I could not. 

There was no home left for me to return. No familiar faces to share my fire. Those had all fallen across this journey. One here, another there, several at once in battle. All the rest once the cold had taken hold. Now I spread my arms and leaned back, my eyes upturned to the endless expanse of gray. Now I waited for whatever was left to take me. 

But fate was cruel, and I remained. Alone. Unable to pass on. I felt no pain, and experienced no cold. Hunger was a distant memory. The needs of this fleshen shell had ceased even as time had stopped for me. This was the final task, and no reward lay at its end. This I knew. The entire world I had scoured for any light, any life before I had forced myself to undertake this pilgrimage. 

Through the darkness and ice I had journeyed where the sun could no longer shine. Across dark, dead lands. Into the core of the world as I searched for something, anything that was not me. Through the Mines of Holak’s Deep, down to the Underdark and the great ocean below the world, into the forbidden places of fire where man could step into the Deep Hells. To the Tower of the Sun and the stairway that led to the Heavens Above. All lay still. Empty as the grave. Naught to be found. 

How long I remained there, there was no way to tell. There was no need to tell. 

Brilliance took me. 

Light and warmth and goodness. It found a smile upon my face as I closed tired eyes and accepted death. 

But death did not come with the experience of floating. I drifted through the light now, a specter amidst the endless glare. 

Before me was a figure, vast beyond measure. A primordial being of lumination, the very stars in its eyes. Of majesty and splendor that the words of man could scant hope to describe. This being was before me now, and it spoke. 

You could not save your world, child of man. 

Again. 

I woke to a wooden roof above my form. The smell of fresh bread heavy in my nostrils. Warmth and light drifting through the window at my side. Soft bedding beneath me. A hunger in my stomach. Old, unfamiliar sensations. I lay there and stared for a time, shocked. Finally, I raised one arm and gazed at the flesh I could barely recognize. Strong, wiry arms tanned from the summer sun. Unlaced by the plethora of scars I had acquired through my journeys. Hands went to my face as I felt the rough stubble, barely shaven and ill-maintained. 

I was home. 

In a bed I had not slept within for so, so long. 

I knew this. This moment. This day. The decisions that shaped my future. The mistakes I had made, though they were legion. 

I did not think of duty then. Of the coming end, so far away as it was. I lay there and wept for hearth and home. Of a place I had never dared imagine I would return to. Here I was, propelled back in time by some being beyond comprehension.

Now there was a task upon me. I lay here, burdened by great purpose and knowledge that no other possessed. 

The end was coming. I knew the faces of evil. Had seen the cruel and weak that would bring all life low. But this time, I would stop them. Put them down before they could hatch their schemes and evils. No longer would I make the mistakes of mercy. They would be ripped down by my hands, so that all others may live. 

But first, bread. Younger, spryer muscles hopped off my bed and stretched, nearly uncovering the bundle hidden beneath the blankets. I had left in the night. Snuck out to pursue a life of adventure. Damned those I had left behind. 

Not this time. Fate had given me a chance, and I intended to seize it.