Concept art of the desolated lands with the Ashen Veil.
The End, also known as the Apocalyptic Warnings, is a speech by an unknown deity, spoken to all civilizations of the world. The speech will unfold in parts as the Armageddon Counter reaches certain thresholds. The first part will arrive at 10 AC.
The End[]
AC 10[]
Effects: None
Hear me, mortals, and heed me well. Whispers of forgotten lore have found my ears, the currents of time flow through my veins with every beat of my heart and bear visions of death and despair...
...As the wickedness of man takes hold of him, darkness will start to engulf his world. At first he will see nothing, only a few of the most gifted will even sense the change. The world will go on as it has, for a time, but the seeds of its downfall have been sown...
AC 30[]
Effects: Blight strikes. All living units on the map suffer a random amount of Death Damage (~25% to 90%, can kill weakened units) & all cities receive a massive unhealthiness penalty for 10 turns, all but guaranteeing city shrinkage.
...and thus the first sign of the oncoming darkness shall come to the mortal realm; crops shall be destroyed by withering sickness, leaving only barren fields of desolation to meet the eyes of hungry children. Animals shall perish as plague and disease rages rampantly throughout every pasture, and so shall the desperate mortals trying to feed off their meat...
Many shall die during this first time of hardship, yet those who survive will live to become envious of the dead...
AC 40[]
Effects: Stephanos spawns in a random location on the map as a Barbarian unit.
... as the people remain blind to the imminent threat to their world despite the previous signs, four harbingers of destruction shall arrive, riding dread steeds and each keeping the shadow of terror as a constant companion...
...and the first of the four shall be known as Stephanos, though the terrified mortals in their whispers of dread will name him the Conqueror. He shall claim the lands of the mortals as his own, he shall slay the armies of men who attempt to stand against him, and soon all the empires will fall to his unyielding rule...
AC 50[]
Effects: Buboes spawns in a random location on the map as a Barbarian unit.
...and the second of the four shall be called Buboes, though the unfortunate survivors of the initial reign of Stephanos will come to know him as the Warbringer... dissent and strife shall reign amidst the lands while he rides along the crest of a wave of human blood, reveling in the torrents of death and destruction following in his wake.
...Men, women and children of all creeds and nations shall rise their flags for causes long forgotten, battling friend and foe alike 'til only scattered survivors on broken fields remain, soon to be struck down by the horseman's unforgiving blade...
AC 60[]
Effects: Yersinia spawns in a random location on the map as a Barbarian unit.
...and the third of the four shall be called Yersinia, known amongst mortals as the Witherer. He shall ride across the charred and burned battlefields, travelling to the few settlements that continue to exist in the doomed world, and with him shall fly a terrible plague on black wings, to sweep down upon the poor souls in his path...
...many shall perish with horrible suffering, parents shall watch their
children wither and die before their eyes, lovers shall be torn form each others' arms by the horrid embrace of enthropy, and the sole comfort of those left behind in the land of the living will be the knowledge that they are soon to follow...
...and he shall cause crops to wither and animals to perish in his wake, so that those who survive the plague will think longingly of even the first blight as the time of plenty, as they vainly seek to sate their hunger with ashes and dust...
AC 70[]
Effects: Ars Moriendi spawns in a random location on the map as a Barbarian unit.
...and the last of the four shall be called Ars Moriendi; not to be known by any other name by mortals, as none will know him and live...
...he shall be the most cruel and powerful of the horsemen, dousing the spark of life in mortal souls through his presence alone, yet many shall come to greet him with longing rather than despair...
...his shall be the final embrace, as countless souls will fall to his blade, only to rise again to join his dark retinue of wailing spirits; yearning now to consume the souls of their former families, friends and neighbors...
...he shall leave in his wake an empty world; once proud cities fall into ruin, marketplaces once filled with laughter and conversation now desolate and abandoned, the only voices heard the rushing of dead leaves in the cold wind...
AC 80[]
Effects: Hellfire nodes spawn randomly on the map. Hellfires can spawn powerful barbarian Demon units, or if in Infernal held lands, spawn Demon Champions.
...as the presence of evil and cruelty grows ever stronger in the world; the very landscape shall undergo a fell transformation. The earth will be torn apart by horrible tremors, and cracks to the underworld shall spring open wherever the land has been marked. The infernal fires of Hell shall spread forth from these cracks, and the world shall be seared and scarred by unholy flames...
...the wicked and the righteous alike shall be engulfed by the blaze, and all shall die in pain and anguish...
AC 90[]
Effects: Avatar of Wrath spawns in a random location on the map as a Barbarian unit.
...there shall be a last sign before the End, in a time when the anger and confusion of all the souls that have died during the previous calamities reaches its pinnacle...
...the force of their anger shall come to transcend the boundaries of each individual soul, and thus shall they be merged into a single unfied flame of hatred towards the living...
...and this flame of anger shall be channeled into the world of the living and be given physical form. Many shall be the armies of men who will feel an irresistible calling in their hearts to join this final crusade of destruction, and the Avatar shall lead them in a great battle against all the nations of the world...
AC 100[]
Effects: Armageddon occurs. All cities lose 50% of their population; each living unit has an independent 50% chance to be killed automatically by Armageddon. (Nonliving units such as demons, golems, etc. will not be harmed by Armageddon)
...finally, if all the previous portents have gone unheeded by those amongst men who still had the power to stop the decline of the world, the apocalypse shall strike the world. The sky shall rain fire, the seas shall boil, the sun shall be eclipsed by eternal darkness and plants, animals and people shall perish in greater numbers than ever before...
...those who follow the darkness shall revel in the suffering of the world, while the righteous who tried in vain to prevent it shall weep and howl with despair as they lose all hope and dreams, as they forget the very nature of life and light, and as they finally are forever lost in darkness, their souls doomed to wander ethereal pathways throughout eternity, tormented with bitter regret, even as their bodies are consumed by flames...
...thus Hell shall be merged with Erebus, and thus Erebus shall become Hell...