Chapter 1: The Tyrant and the Prophet

Digax the Tyrant looked out onto the sea of molten glass that had once been a city on a verdant plain, and he grinned. He had been humbled by the vermin of this world, and it felt good to remind some of them what he was. He was not powerful. He was power.

There was no one left to challenge him on this continent now. Every element of resistance had bent the knee, or been reduced to cinders. And now that his authority had taken root in this place, his word was absolute law to all who called it home.

He would take his time to rebuild himself here. Nurse his lingering wounds from the war with the Corsan Empire, regain his strength, replenish his hordes. When he was rested, and the time was right, he would make his glorious, triumphant return.

Even the thought of laying waste to the upstart nation that had dared to challenge his claim to this world filled him with immense satisfaction. He thought of the screams of his enemies. The tribute the vermin would pay him. Shown their place, they would sing his praises, chanting his name—

"DIGAX!"

A vermin's voice, surprisingly loud, interrupted the Tyrant's fantasies. It took a bit of time to find the source of the voice. The vermin were such small creatures. But eventually, Digax spotted it.

It was a beige skinned male vermin, adorned in ash colored robes with a heavy golden medallion around its neck, flowing black hair that came down past its shoulders. It was marching across the still faintly glowing glass of the new desert, unharmed by the heat, and though it wore a bandage over both its eyes, its confidence in its step never wavered.

"TYRANT!" the vermin shouted. "MURDERER! SCOURGE OF ASHER!"

"Flattery will get you nowhere." Digax's voice choked the air with his own smug tone. It drowned out everything else around him. The air was his voice.

The vermin did not flinch.

"BE SILENT!" the vermin commanded, and Digax felt his jaw briefly tighten.

The tyrant blinked in genuine surprise. He had never felt a vermin command so much presence at once before. He'd very nearly had enough power to actually compel Digax with the command.

Nearly.

Still, Digax complied without the compulsion of the vermin's power. This little thing had his curiosity.

"I AM GIDUS, OF THE CHURCH OF THE SEVEN'S LIGHT!" the vermin proclaimed. "AND I BRING THE TIDINGS OF YOUR END!"

Oh, it was one of these. How disappointing. Digax opened his mouth, and bathed the vermin and the land around him in a column of white hot flames.

When his blast subsided, there was a new crater freshly melted into the earth, its edges glowing with molten rock. And standing in its center was the vermin, untouched.

Digax's head listed to one side. Forget curiosity. Now the vermin had his attention. Digax opened his mouth again, letting the power and flames build in his jaw, but this time, he held off on unleashing the blast so he could see the vermin's reaction.

The vermin threw up a massive shield of golden light in front of him, the front of which was decorated in the image of seven stars arranged in a ring. When Digax let loose his blast, it crashed against the shield, scattering all around it, but leaving the vermin unharmed. Digax kept up the assault this time, testing the limits of the vermin's power.

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Sure enough, as the flames continued to pour on, the golden shield began to crack. Its light began to dim. The landscape for dozens of miles around them was scorched and charred from the heat of the attack. Then finally, the shield shattered just as Digax's flames gave out.

"Impressive," Digax said in genuine acknowledgement. "Now. Kneel."

Even speaking casually, Digax's words shook the ground and rattled bones. And they carried with them the divine authority of his presence. Their sound drew in the natural presence of the land, and when it reached the vermin, it resonated in the soul of one who had been born to this soil. The vermin kneeled instantly.

"You cannot raise so much as hand against me that I do not allow." Digax always loomed over vermin, but he made a point of looming over this one in particular, blocking out the sun with his form. "No one in this land can."

"IT IS NOT ME WHO WILL BE YOUR END!" 

Digax had to hand it to the vermin. It was a shouty one, even when it was being subjugated. 

"Heed my words digax! For they are the proclamation of the Light! Very soon, a hero shall come from beyond these shores, unbound from your will, and they shall end your reign! The days of your rule are numbered!"

"Is that so?" Digax chuckled darkling, the sound like rolling thunder. "And who is your 'light,' that they make such proclamations?"

"They are the new gods of this world!" the vermin shouted. "The gods of this world's true inheritors! You are a relic of a bygone age, Tyrant. Humanity has already ousted you from your first throne. And the Light will see the job finished!"

For the first time since the encounter began, Digax's smile vanished, because what the vermin was saying should have been impossible. The gods were dead, killed in the same collapse that claimed the elven empire. 

And yet, in the tyrant's bones, he instantly knew it was true. Somehow, a new generation of gods had succeeded the old. And they had chosen—

Digax couldn't finish the thought. It made no sense. It wasn't possible.

And yet.

How else, expect by divine intervention, could it be explained that an empire of vermin had defeated him in his old home? 

And if that was the case, was it possible that this vermin, this "Gidus," was actually telling the truth? That he, Digax, had been marked for defeat by the gods themselves?

"TREMBLE, FOUL CREATURE!" Gidus continued. "VERY, VERY SOON, THE HERO SHALL COME! DREAD IT, RUN FROM IT, THEY SHALL—"

Digax batted Gidus away with a swift backhanded swipe, sending him careening over the horizon. Let the vermin rave. Let the gods scheme against him. He was Digax the Tyrant, and this land was his.

He didn't know what constituted "soon" to humans—given their impossibly brief lifespans, it had to be a very short time—but when this so called hero came, he would be ready.

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