The Mother was the spirit of the earth. The trees, the rocks, the gently rippling rivers all had a part of her soul. She gave life to everything, and she made the planet green. The plants and animals were her children, and the earth was paradise.
But it was lonely and tiresome for her to take care of it all on her own, and over the years, The Mother longed for company, for someone to share her powers with. So one day, she created the Guardians in her image, and she grouped them together and placed them all over the world to rule the animals and plants and the new species of Man and Fae. She gave the Guardians special powers, all unique, but to the four ruling a continent called The Domain, she gave the greatest powers of all: to Athala, she gave the gift of bringing Life into the world; to Vivian, she gave the gift of command over the elements; to Vivian's lover, Daemon, she gave the gift of seeing the patterns of Time, and to Mar, she gave the power of Death.
However, the Mother splitting herself so weakened her, and she never took into consideration the flaws in the designs of the Guardians' personalities. The Lesser Guardians grew to envy both the special treatment and prowess of the Four of the Domain, and they tried to destroy them, only for their plans to backfire. The Mother, weak as she was, was helpless to stop Mar, the Guardian of Departed Souls, destroy them all without effort. So many of The Mother's children perished and were cast to the bottom of the oceans.
For his sin, she restricted Mar's powers to only those who were mortal. Never again could he destroy his kin, and she forced him to reside in a gloomy Underworld.
Athala took pity upon Mar, and she visited him frequently and spoke with him, kept him company. She was a warm welcome to watching death, and she was his light in his darkness. Soon they fell in love, and, like Vivian and Daemon, became Bonded in marriage. But despite the warmth Athala brought to Mar, he remained bitter and vengeful toward The Mother. Athala felt sympathy for her beloved, and she grew blind by her love. Smitten, she would do anything for him. And so, together, the Guardians of Life and Death began to plot revenge.
Despite the warnings of Daemon, the Reader of Time, and the disapproval of Vivian, the Mistress of the Elements, Athala and Mar overthrew The Mother, trapping her. As long as the Four of the Domain lived, she would be sealed. As Mar could not kill them, nothing stopped them. They inherited her supreme power, and Athala, as a gift from Mar and out of reluctance for the power from Daemon and Vivian, ruled the land as the surrogate caregiver of the world.
The world slowly began to die, as the spirit of The Mother was no longer with the earth.
The Betrayal...
The Four of the Domain ruled in peace. The beautiful Vivian kept the earth from dying, though it still lacked the spirit of The Mother that had once flown through everything. The quiet Daemon kept knowledge alive in the world, educating what Man and Fae had evolved into over time, and he kept the sun rising and setting, marking the days and months and years. Athala brought life into the world, creating new species and new people, and each miracle of a baby's first laugh was her doing. She was the mother of the world, the true Mother long forgotten by all except the Four of the Domain, now simply called The Four. The people loved her, and she was joyful and nurturing and caring for her people. Mar continued to reside in the Underworld, still bound by the Mother, and frustrated by it, but Athala made life bearable. His love for her only grew, to the point she was all that kept him sane in his dark, depressing prison.But the people grew so fond of Athala, she couldn't help but return the feeling. Her visits became less and less, and her talks soon became distracted and quick, focused on her people. With time, she never came at all, and whenever Mar was able to peek out from his prison, he saw she was far happier out there than he had ever seen her with him. She was giving them everything, even the gift of magic, while Mar rotted in Hell.
Bitter and heart broken yet still in love, Mar decided to give Athala a gift. Whenever one of her people died, sorrow would touch her angelic, oval face, so he didn't let a single soul die for twenty years. Part of it was in an attempt to make her happy, and the other was that he was tired of taking care of the beings that had all of Athala's love, with none left for him.
Everything grew out of hand. For twenty years, populations exploded. There was no breathing room, not even in what had once been rural areas. Disease and violence infected the land, but no one could die, and the wounded and ill suffered endlessly. Famine kept the people as skeletons, and new babes were unwelcome and scorned and underfed. And Athala, having no power to control Mar, only watched in horror as her people were tortured and miserable.
Finally, she went to the Underworld in hysterics, tears of misery and begging and anger running down her cheeks. She found a Mar that was stony and silent and tense, not meeting her eye and tight-lipped. She shook him, demanding an answer. Finally, he gave in. After twenty years left alone to stew, for not once did she come and visit him until now, he had grown unbearably bitter and angry. He yelled at her that they deserved it, and so did she for betraying him, for leaving him alone in this dank and miserable prison.
The bond of love between the two shattered with those hateful, bitter words. In a fit of hurt and desperation for her people, she turned on him. She forced him to feel every single bit of agony each member of the crowded world felt, all the pain Athala's people couldn't hope to be rid of in the embrace of peaceful death. Crouched over on his knees and between broken whimpers, Mar agreed to lift his curse.
But what Athala did not count on was just how spiteful Mar had become. He unleashed a terrible plague upon the world, which spread fast in such crowded conditions. Entire populations, even civilizations were wiped out and became extinct. Athala's beloved people were reduced to fearful pocket civilizations that battled eachother for survival, paranoid and hysterical. For their own self-preservation, the people were using the gift of magic Athala had given them to destroy one another.
Athala, Vivian, and Daemon punished Mar for his sins and robbed him of the majority of his powers, leaving him with just enough to place his soul into a mortal body, and they banished him across the seas to the watery graveyard of the Lesser Guardians of the past as a reminder. The Four became The Trinity, and together, now with a perfect balance of power, restored the world to its previous condition. The Underworld was still there and was accepting new souls, but there was no one to contain them. They left Angold a barren desert, for none of their magic could take away Mar’s taint on the land that held the Underworld. Instead, they contained Mar’s powers in his cursed realm.
No sooner had they sealed Mar's powers did Daemon have a vision of Mar's return. He predicted their end, and the future of the world. There was only a slim chance of salvation, and it relied on uniting a Domain that would be split in the future, and on the Trinity being reborn.
Daemon recorded the prophecy and hid it in the Domain, protecting it. Athala and Vivian produced their own connections to the mortal world in hopes someone would remember them and discover how to destroy Mar.
Over the years, Mar's soul was reincarnated over and over, gaining a little more strength and independence each time until he was powerful enough to remember who he was, and what he could do, and why he ended up in this situation. Finally, he was truly reborn.
Mar went back to the watery grave he had been originally trapped in, and he raised the dead of the Lesser Guardians. Unstoppable, he marched across the world, destroying everything in his path, rage and hatred boiling his blood. He launched a devastating and direct attack at Port Crescent, diverting everyone's attention as he sneaked to his old prison to reclaim his true powers.
While the Trinity's backs were turned, Mar attacked, severing the Trinity from their powers like they had with him. With Daemon and Vivian, he cursed to be reborn mortal again and again. With Athala, he had a special fate in mind: for ten thousand years, her soul would be trapped in his underworld with the tortured souls of the most hideous of her people.
With the Trinity gone, the world was at Mar's mercy.
The Tyranny...
New eras came and went, and with each new era, the world deteriorated further and further without Vivian or the Mother to prevent the planet dying. The Trinity were completely forgotten, and the power struggle between the Trinity and Mar was vague, forgotten myth, distorted beyond recognition. Mar was the only god, and to say otherwise was blasphemy, and to draw Mar's eye.
The Domain was split into the three nations of Vere, Mast, and Dorian, and magic was a forbidden resource, decreed by Mar himself. Greed for survival and resources now consumed the three nations. Seeking sadistic amusement to punish the world further, Mar promised the leaders of the three nations that whoever could defeat the other two countries could get the magic all to themselves, to rule the other nations and subject them to as much power-hungry torture as they please. Whoever had the magic source was unstoppable and forever rich.
War gripped the world. No place was safe, no place was untouched by the devastation. There was no thought of overthrowing Mar, whom the people were taught was all-powerful. After all, who would be their savior? Hope for salvation and a will to defy Mar did not exist.
That is, until part of a prophecy was discovered, marking the beginning of a new era. This era is where our story begins, for it is the beginning of a time that will come to be known as The Trinity War, the War of the Gods.
