Prologue

I saw him, once.

"He passed through our village, through fields littered with dead soldiers after his forces overwhelmed the nation of Lumor. His other Elites followed and then rows of black-robed Inquisitors, wielding the white-and-silver banners of the Reaper. Where they went, the sky dimmed and the ground cracked—the clouds gathered behind the army as if a creature alive, black and churning in fury. As if the God of Death himself had come.

He paused to look down at one of our dying soldiers. He trembled on the ground, but his eyes stayed on him. Our soldier spat something at him something vile. But the Reaper only stared back at him. I don't know what our soldier saw in his expression, but his muscles tightened, his legs pushing against the dirt as he tried in vain to get away from the reaper. Then the soldier started to scream. It is a sound I shall never forget as long as I live. The King nodded to his right-hand man the Conjurer clad in all black with a metallic wolf mask on his face, he descended from his horse to plunge a sword through the dying soldier. The Reapers face did not change at all. He simply rode on with his horde of inquisitors marching silently behind.

"I never saw him again. But even now, as an old man, I remember the Reaper as clearly as if he were standing before me. He was ice personified. There was once a time when darkness shrouded the world, and the darkness had a King."

- A witness's account of King Datths siege

Of the nation of Lumor