Hollow Murmurs

80 years ago, the Cataclysm sent the world spiraling into chaos. Plant, beast, and people alike, entire cultures, cities, and ecosystems were brought through the great sky rifts with reckless and cold disregard, leaving both the refugees who arrived and the native denizens to fight tooth and nail for their survival. The Empire, once the world's greatest civilization, lost its stranglehold over its once vast territories and now cower in their towering walled cities of their homeland. Leaving the rest of the world to fend for itself. Time heals many wounds, but the Cataclysm is a permanent festering wound that refuses to close or heal. Despite being nearly a century since its happening, everyday the people of the world are reminded of what they lost. Some greater than others. This is the story of just one of those people.

A rebellion failed before it could ever start. Escape thwarted by the lapdogs of those in power. Friends, allies, comrades, all dead. Deltairius, the sole survivor, now adrift for days at sea, waiting for his death but refusing to accept it, is miraculously heard and rescued by the great sun goddess, Naraleia. Given a new chance at life, he arrives on the grand frontier continent of Hijhara where he’s offered a boon by the locals of Oakshire: We’ll give you anything, if you can clear the undead of the catacombs. Wanting nothing more than a quiet and remote place to live out his days in peace and isolation, he humbly accepts. Yet in doing so, he soon finds that he signed up for more than he asked for. Approached by an elderly local eccentric, the old man informs Deltarius that an ancient force has reawakened, one that thirsts for an end to humanity in vengeance for the destruction and genocide they wrought against them in the past. He makes a difficult request, one no one would ever wish to hear: with little time and no other options, you’re the only one that can put an end to this. Uncertain and doubtful of the stranger's words, he declines until he comes face to face with the very revenants the old man warned him about. Surviving by the skin of his teeth, he accepts Zao’s offer and the unlikely duo prepare a feeble strategy that may be the only thing standing in the General’s way of complete and total annihilation of the human race.