Oftentimes I look back and remember what came before. When the world was yet pure of fire. A/N I have nothing against fire. I will remember what used to be, but I do not long for those days. 

For evil was yet brewing, hiding in the secret places of the world, secreting away its vast knowledge; preparing to unleash its fury upon us. 

We lived in a delusion. 

The calm before a storm. 

Even then it was not bad, for we lived away from the places where in the cracks and crannies, evil came seeping forth, poisoning us. 

Turning us. 

They say, in the eye of a storm there is peace and no destruction. 

I do not know. 

For those who lived in the eye of that storm, there was never peace. only a burning, scorching, hungry and relentless desire. 

Then it was that fire entered the world.

                                                                                 ~~~

It began with one person. It always does. Lennoth was his name. He was a good man, loved by all. 

Until. 

One day he ventured out, seeking the mountains.

Many regret this. I do not.

For how else were we to be purified?

He stopped for water. He drank from the wells of Agern. He did not know that evil had begun to escape its prison in the deeps of the earth. Lennoth did not know that evil had found a way out, creeping into the water, waiting for him. 

And he drank.

                                                                                  ~~~

Evil was freed, in Lennoth. He began to carve out new ideas-but they were not new, really. They were old, far, far older than Lennoth; indeed, as old as the very earth itself. 

But to Lennoth, they were new. 

Plans of breaking and burning, of hacking and hurting. 

Plans of Fire.

It was he who started the First Flame. Conceived in evil, it gave birth to evil, bearing generations of flames and evil. 

The First Flame was guarded heavily, for if ever it was to be put out, all flames shall die.

Evil will once more be banished to the deeps. 

And the earth will be resealed, sealing evil into the deeps, never to resurface. 

It was in hopes of doing so that our resistance was formed.

                                                                 ~~~

In the beginning, it was just a few of us. Kimberly, Drew, Darren, Eval, and Andrea. But little by little others joined until we had many. 

But not nearly enough.

It was laughable, and still is.

A handful of people against the power of Evil? Impossible. And the First Flame is unreachable. 

But we decided that it was better to die fighting for something we believed in than face eternity enslaved in everything we stand against, knowing we could have done something, and chose not to. In living in submission to slavery.

So we pressed-and press-on.

Hey guys, hope you enjoyed that-another chapter will be out soon!