The League, wanting to protect those humans who are happy under their guidence pull out all the stops to crush the rebellion. After only 23 days, Mark's rebellion is shattered. However despite a full scale search, Mark and his closest Metapsychic allies are never found.

They arrive on the Leathiadorian homeworld of Duates and are quickly captured.

Hannibal fights his way into the Qual's Gate-room, site of their Master Gate and source of the Qual's Gate-force rings. He plants a Fusion Bomb near the open gateway and jumps through just as Quiverin, Battlemaster of the Qual arrives on the scene. Taylar Deville (known for hating all types of aliens) manually triggers the bomb, killing himself and several thousand Qual in the process.

Quiverin escapes by using his Void armor to let the blast pass through him but the effect on the Gateway is catastrophic. The Master gate is destabilized causing its colossal energies to begin draining Sha'lean. It doesn't stop there though, triggering a cascade reaction throughout the 7 Homeworlds and their smaller gates. Within 3 days of the explosion, all life on the 7 Worlds is extinguished.

The only way to escape the cataclysm is to jump through the unstable gateways - but during this mass Exodus many of the Qual and their kindred races become lost in the Void. Some arrive on other Worlds, others become suspended in the Void outside of Time.

A monk called Olbe arrives a few days later. Olbe draws the stranger's image from Chance's mind, saying "You have a very good imagination." A mourning Cley goes to live with the Matlorns - despite hating them.

During those two weeks alone, Chance begins planning his "great escape". He is convinced Cley's parents went to Lower Taal and starts asking questions about this horrid place. He learns a great deal and decides that one day he will travel there disguised as a beggar.

Chance contemplates the existence of a Gray Thought, Black Thought and White Thought.
He and Cley explore underneath people's houses, searching for hidden stashes. One of the things Chance finds is a shift of scale mail armor.

Chance invents a hump for his beggar outfit.

Soldiers pass by By-water. Chance grows curious, leading Cley on a trip east to By-bridge and Keep Stonewell. Passing himself off as a cripple Chance tries to get the soldiers to recruit Cley - much to Cley's annoyance.

After losing and then finding their boat again, Chance and Cley head back home. On the way the spy someone washed up on the bank and stop to investigate. The figure is male and strangely armored. When Chance turns him over he sees a deformed man with a strangely angular face and pointed ears. Adding to the oddness of the encounter, the man's armor proves to be incredibly light.

Taking a chance, Chance and Cley take the unconscious stranger back to Cley's old house and leave him there overnight, trussed up in rope.

The next morning Chance returns to check on him. He notices that the man is wearing a silver collar and tries to cut it off with a saw. But the man suddenly awakens and starts muttering in a strange language. Chance tries to push the man back down but as he does the man escapes his bonds and wrestles Chance to the ground instead.

Another strange pointed eared figure enters the house - this one is female and similarly armored, except around the chest and thighs. The female places a black torque around Chance's neck, sealing it in place with a loud click.

As soon as the Torque grows warm against Chance's skin, he finds himself able to understand the two strangers. They introduce themselves as Brysen (the man) and Eloin (the woman).

Even though Chance was going to kill the man (or at least steal his stuff), Brysen thanks Chance for saving his life. "Things are going to change. We can do nothing to stop it," says Brysen somewhat cryptically.
As a parting gift Eloin triggers the collar causing a wave of pleasure to coarse through Chance's body - "You can never remove this collar. If you do you will go insane," she says.

Keeping the whole thing secret (especially the Torque) Chance settles back down into his boring life. A couple of days later the rain stops. Chance and Cley go fishing with Toroc. Cley uncovers a dead human soldier caught in their river nets - a bad sign if ever there was one.

13/3
About this time, Chance decides to head south. He gathers up his beggar's disguise, dons it and hides Brysen's armor (that he stole and didn't give back). Then without wasting time he begins walking south.

After a couple of days it still hasn't rained. That's now five days without any rain whatsoever - the most Goth has ever gone in the last several decades is three days ! Rumors are now rife about strangers in the northwest who have attacked and killed several dozen soldiers. The whole of Middle Taal is now mobilizing against these invaders.

16/3
Strange lightning flashes across the cloudless sky. Goth's drought continues.
Chance arrives at Ends Meet in Lower Taal. At first he is attacked by a young teenage girl called Doe who steals his boots and hits him in the groin with her staff. Later though he is invited inside Ends Meet by a middle aged woman called Lean (looking after her baby son Oscar). Lean asks him for news from the north and the invaders. By telling her everything he has heard Chance earns himself a meal, the return of his boots and a place to sleep.

That night he hears two voices speaking in his head... One is female and called Priss, the other male and called Adulin. What worries Chance is when the man says this; "Brysen is a fool. If Lucitan says we can't tell them, we must do as he says. They are all going to die. There is nothing we can do about that. Maybe though we can save a few of their animals - there are such varieties here. I have never seen the like."
All going to die... those words ring out in Chance's mind like a bell of doom. Experimenting he manages to speak out through the Torque and attract Adulin's attention. Adulin begins heading his way - curious to know who is calling him.

Outside of Ends Meet, Adulin rides up on his horse and meets with Chance. Adulin decides to take Chance to Brysen, commanding the young man to sleep (by using the in built commands in the Black Torque) and rides north with Chance sat behind him.

When Chance awakens he finds himself by a ruined stone house. He meets with Brysen again and learns a little about the Fate his World. Brysen explains about the Great Cataclysm and how he and Adulin are Leathiadorian refugees from a now dead World.

It's a lot for Chance to swallow but he gives it a go. Brysen then takes Chance to see the Fate of Goth - the two giant black obelisks that will inevitably destroy Goth and all its inhabitants over the next few weeks.

Chance is horrified. He cannot believe that Brysen and his people (only 33 of them as well) have condemned his World to death, nor that they are willingly going to go back through the gate to another world and bring destruction there as well. He argues this with them and grows increasingly concerned by their in-humane beliefs. Brysen is greatly pained by Chance's arguments but Adulin is not - saying "Our race must survive no matter the cost. Our history is thousands of years old. To let it die would be a crime."

"But what of my world's history?" asks Chance. "How many worlds will you destroy trying to keep your own people alive?"
"As many as it takes to find a cure and repair the gateways," replies Adulin.
Brysen explains how he would have liked to share the problem with Chance's people - to try and find a cure for the cataclysm together using Goth's wisest men and women to help. But Lucitan - his Lord and wearer of a Gold Torque forbade him, seemingly out of irrational fear.

"We're just animals to you aren't we. Inferior animals," says Chance angrily.
Adulin does not deny it.

After heated debate, Brysen sadly takes Chance back to By-water and his family. "I want to find a way of stopping this destruction," says Brysen.
"Then die," replies Chance. "Admit your time is up. Because I hope one day you'll find who ever made these gates and find that they are superior to you. They'll look at you and the countless races you've destroyed to get there and condemn you for it."

Chance returns to his family and friends. Over the next week and half he witnesses his world undergo even more changes. The sky becomes streaked with color, the water dries up and all the fish die. But through it all he rallies those around him, keeping their spirits high and faith in the Great Thought stronger than ever. They can hardly believe the person he has become.

31/3
Whilst sat on his bridge next to a sunbathing Cley, Chance experiences an almost divine realization. Faced with impending death he realizes he can't just sit back and let it happen again. Goth is doomed - he realizes that. But what horrifies Chance is the other Worlds that Lucitan and his people are going to destroy. "It has to end. I can't let them go on."

With one last look at his family, friends and home, he walks away, dons Brysen's stolen armor and marches off towards the Gateway. When he arrives there it is dark.

Brysen lays near to death at the foot of the gate, run through the stomach by Lucitan's weapon. "I tried," the Leathiadorian gasps, "Lucitan didn't want to tell your people because he feared them. Feared your Great Thought."

With Brysen dead, Chance takes a deep breath, solemnly severs the man's head and places his first silver Torque on his belt. "The first of many," Chance mutters prophetically, before stepping into the curtain of Void, leaving Goth behind him. 

513 3A.
The Shokar are buried beneath the earth in an enormous volcanic eruption. Their primitive slaves survive and flee into the wilds.

4A.
The Age of Man. The Shokar’s slaves form into barbaric tribes that brutally war against one another.

5A. The Age of Promises.
Man is inspired to build great things. The Tower of Illion is erected as one of Man’s six great Temples; the others being the Tower of Dulim, the Tower of Serad, the Tower of Pelane, the Tower of Yod and the Tower of Wain.

6A. The Fall of the Towers.
The Towers of Yod and Pelane fall in a religious war.

2121 7A.
In the 7th Age of the World of Darin, on the Continent of Thesellas, there arose a great and terrible evil in the form of the Shokar. For two thousand years these pale skinned, dark eyed beings had lain asleep in the earth and passed out of history.

But awakened by the wars of men above, the Shokar crawled from their earthen tombs and took by force the great Tower of Yarin, that sacred place built as a Temple to Darin’s sister-world.

Now one of the Shokar had grown tall and strong in the Great sleep until he towered like a giant over the others and could smite the strongest rock to dust. The other Shokar saw an otherworldly greatness in Illion and began following him like a God.

They also discovered that they could see the spirits of the dead and by seeing them, control them.

It was Illion who commanded them and he ordered any spirit in the land to be brought to Illion as slaves.

The Shokar were natural masters of machines so they built a great mechanism to hold the spirits in. They used special stones (Ghost stones) to light their great Tower and special glass (Spirit Glass) on which to write their ancient spells.

A darkness crept from the Tower of Illion and covered the land.

After covering the Continent in an age of darkness, the Tower of Illion became known as the Tower of Eternal Night and Illion himself as the Divine Dark.

By imprisoning the souls of the dead, Illion and his Shokar had unbalanced the World. Using the channelled spiritual energy, Illion turned light into darkness and life into death.

All manner of creatures, foul and sinister were drawn to Illion like a magnet and Darin foresaw its own doom.

An army of men, priests and other allied races fought battle after battle against the Shokar but each time were defeated. Finally, when it seemed as if no hope was left in the Hearts of Men, a young peasant boy called Engel threw a proverbial spanner in the works of Illion’s plan.

Engel was drawn to the Tower after seeing the ghost of his dead father captured and dragged away by Shokarian priests. With another young ghost called Trema at his side, Engel bravely entered the Tower of Illion and climbed his way through its serpentine bowels to the very heart of Illion’s Great Machine.

Designed by Illion supposedly in the Great Sleep and meant to represent Time, Destiny and the Mind of the World, the Machine had been turning for nearly two hundred years. But because of Engel’s bravery, it suddenly stopped.

10,000 captured spirits flood out of their confinement; too many for even the Shokar to control, the spirits soar skyward to the Tower’s peak and proceed to rip Illion apart.

192 8A
Human followers of the Shokar continue to plot the downfall of the Nine Tribes of Man. Their ineffective plans are suddenly made quite the opposite by the discovery of Illion’s Heart; After the Spirits of the Tower of Illion tore Illion apart at the end of the 7th Age, they carried pieces of his body to the far corners of Darin. Now, discovered by a warrior called Vhalence, the Heart still beats with Illion’s damned spirit and the followers carry it back to Illion.

Once at Illion’s summit, the Heart begins beating like a drum of doom. It again awakens the Shokar and they in turn rebuild Illion’s great machine.

Over fifty years, the forces of the Shokar swell in number and again Illion’s darkness threatens to extinguish the sun forever.

256 8A
The arrival of strange beings through the Obelisks of Rannet.
One being, a man called Hannibal Murdoch O’Neal pursues a Qual Battle Master (Vernal) to the Tower of Illion.

The Qual seeks refuge inside and is excepted as a long lost, but strangely different brother. Believing the Qual to be a messenger from Illion, the Shokar quickly obey the newcomer.

Hannibal fights his way into the Tower of Illion with powerful mental abilities. He confronts and kills the Qual, before placing explosives around Illion’s Heart and collapsing the tower.

23/6/256 8A - The Tower of Illion falls.