So small has the World become that news travels freely between what remains of the City, the Unaligned and the Watchers. The last people who remain now exist in the tattered remains of reality that is gradually being eroded by the encroaching Disjunction.

"Madam de Beers and the staff of the Tre Rái Cá call those who remain to convocation, near the World's Wake festival at the Ark of Pleasure.

Let us take time out from the festival to discuss the end of all things in the company of friends and acquaintances. I hope you will stay for the festivities."

- Mme de Beers

A great party has commenced upon the marble decks of the Ark of Pleasure as beneath it the True Church of the Void conducts a great ritual.

The Ark of Pleasure is a huge, vaguely ship-shaped, though more spherical, vessel carved from a single piece of blood red marble. Clearly it has been years in the making and is a thing of outstanding craftsmanship and beauty. At the centre of the deck stands a stage, surrounded by an open space. This central area is surrounded by tents and pavilions, containing all manner of entertainments - food, drink, music, dancing, story telling, sex and drugs. There is even a tent dedicated to people needing to weep and scream.

As the day progresses, there are many acts on the main stage. Of particular note are the dancers from the Tre Rái Cá club - seen for the first time outside of the club. There are many performers of cultural dances and rituals - most from cultures no longer existent outside the Wake. One of the acts causes the audience to be almost silent - a young girl, probably no more than 5 years' old, gets onto the stage and sings a nursery rhyme. As she leaves the stage, she gets the loudest applause.

When the sun changes to moonlight, several fires are lit across the deck. After the last act on the main stage, the people continue to party - sitting and lying around the fires, telling stories and spending what may be their last night in the company of others.

In the dark of the early hours, the fires have become red glows across the deck. It is much quieter now than earlier, but there is the hum of thousands of people talking quietly, some snoring, some still having fun. As the stone that starts the avalanche, someone calls, “Who remembers Brink?” Several “Ayes” respond. Then someone else shouts “What about Trap Town?” It continues, as people call out places they remember from the edges of the world before they fell - even from the other continents. Somehow, it doesn't turn to chaotic noise, as the names of places, and soon people, are shouted into the night - the memories are all that is left.

The Circus has arrived at the Ark and already performances of some great musical show are under way to welcome the end of all things.

Beneath the Ark the followers of the True Church of the Void have ignored the ritual and have conducted a great ritual welcoming the advancing darkness.

One evening the dimming light of the sun is utterly dwarfed by a blazing azure glow that radiates outwards from the direction of the City. Looking to the source of the glow it is impossible to miss the collosal figure of glowing clockwork and burning blue eyes.

The sound of the thing hits next, like a constant thunder, the crunch and clang of turning cogs rings out across all creation, deafeningly loud. Finally the figure gives a broad smile and then vanishes in an explosion of cogs.

It rains ethereal clockwork components for the rest of the week.

In Ossuaria's sandy silence, all alone,
Stands a gigantic Stone, which far off throws
The only shadow that the Desert knows:
“I am the the tomb of de Beers,” saith the stone,
“The deed of Lotti; this mighty Party shows
“The wonders of my hand.” The City's gone,
Nought but the Stone remaining to disclose
The site of this forgotten Tre Rái Cá.
We wonder, and some whore may soon express
Worry like ours, when thro' the wilderness
Where Lotti stood, holding the blade in hand,
Whoever will be next? and stops to guess
Whose life shall soon be gone
To Ingvar's vile blade.

-The Dirge of Lotti

From the words of Taften Gosz, Emissary of the Cult of the New Sun

“In the world that remains, there is still suffering, so much suffering. Thousands have died; cut down by swords; bellies distended from hunger; out-paced by the ever-advancing Void. There is so much suffering.

Worst of all is the plague, which whispers through the air, infecting so many. Bleeding, choking, burning with fever, and finally, finally whispering, whispering until they end.

But there is hope still. Hope that the suffering can be abated, hope that no more must die when they could live. And we have hope because the Sun still burns for us. Both that which hangs in the sky and warms our skin, but also the New Sun, the New God, who wanders the world and does what he can to save it.

How many hundreds have food and water that would not otherwise have any? How many thousands have been saved from the plague, from the disjunction, from the roving bands of murderers? Great Crystalline Magics have been brought through to the end of the world to save us and we gives thanks.

There is hope, even in the face of suffering.

Diary of Reginald Aurora

The sun dawns, and for the first time since I first beheld the Disjunction, I feel true despair.

I weep for our House, brought low by the conspiracy of Greta and her ilk.

I weep for our Princess, under lock and key like a commoner.

I weep for our saviour Emilio, on the run from the City he tried so hard to protect.

I weep for Keeper, the true ruler of the City, usurped by the Lord Profector.

House Aurora is broken. Truly these are the darkest of days.

Within the City house Aurora has been broken and the entity calling itself Keeper has been deposed. It remains unclear who exactly is in charge. The Lady Greta controls the majority of the Noble Houses while the Watch controls the streets. The Lord Protector has been little heard of since the fall of the Keeper and is believed to once again have seized control of Fortress Terra.

From the Journal of The Steel Mask, Vigilante of the City

“Disease-ridden bastards walk this City. Watchmen who claim to know justice, men who claim to know virtue. Vile cowards they are and vile cowards they have been.

There was only one man who truly saw this stinking pile of metal and scrap for what it truly was, but equally had the vision to see what it could be. Only one man who stood up when the whole world was going to Hell and said “No”.

At first we only knew him as The Masked Man but later we learnt his real name. Horatio Aurora, the last good man in this City of cockroaches. I won't let them take me. My blood will stain the streets before I let them take me.

I can't believe in the shining vision Horatio saw, of a City without vice, without corruption. But I can believe in one where the criminals, the murderers, the liars and cheats are strung up to die. I am not a great man like Horatio, but I swear, I won't die like him, murdered by the Watch.

I am not a great man, but I follow in the footsteps of one. Horatio Aurora, The Masked Man. Try to kill the idea Watchmen. Try to kill the idea.

Being a full record of the Case of the Bloody Handed Priest, by Inspector Woodward

“As a student of the ways of crime, I have seen many terrible things. Evils beyond the minds' comprehension. Vile monsters greater than a storyteller's darkest imaginings. But little I have seen has matched up to the tale of that bloody handed priest, the Servant of the Most High, and the Annual of murderers and assassins. His victims, and the victims of his colleagues are a long list: Corin the Healer, the Leveller, the Master of Pieties, the Empress Abena, and many more….

I had first met the Servant, as he calls himself, during a convocation at….

…

And so the Servant was at last cornered. The Lord of Whispers would answer him no more. He had no friends left. Surrounded by foes, he fought, as animals would fight, desperately for his survival. Like a wild animal, he brought swift and painful death to many of his pursuers.

But justice would at last no longer be denied. At the end, he fell. His death was especially gruesome, cut up into thousands of pieces by an unholy piece of horological engineering. Did he regret his deeds over that last moment? Did he reflect on how his victims would have felt.

No one would know. A nightmare has ended, one the world shall try its hardest to forget.

CASE CLOSED.”

Alan Redspan's daily briefing

It seems that not so long ago, everyone shared an uniform faith in the holy church of the Trinity. Nowadays, the world is crowded with a diverse mix of affiliations and faiths, each scrabbling for followers in these final days.

Sebastian leads the greatest group, the True Church of the Void, numbering about eleven thousand followers.

The High Warden of the Varkal Oak leads about five thousand remaining followers.

The Dark Lord Mordaeon controls about three thousand men, having suffered heavy losses recently.

The Tyrant of Kyrine, ruling over the Kyrinian remnant, and some refugees, has about six thousand subjects.

Kassandra of Countrylandtopia rules about six thousand remaining men, though some of them seem distinctly inhuman.

The remnants of the city number approximately sixty thousand, though their allegiances are divided into a large number of small factions and many are in the process of fleeing the City.

The peasants guild of Flavius Itsaso number approximately eight thousand.

Many others have dedicated followings: Tycho, for example. Lady Greta of the City. Rayne, the supposed new God of wisdom. The Circus of Phael Toron. Even the Behemoth has a small retinue of followers.

As the remaining land shrinks, expect these numbers to decline….

Cries of a street preacher in the City

“The war engines of the Empire of Blood and Skulls, with their allies, those Terrible Iron Men, at last came to the True Church of the Void. They came not to conquer, no - they came to destroy!

Now, I know there are those who have criticised Sebastian's apparent lack of leadership at the start of Mordaeon's sudden and unprovoked assault. But who can question that at last, men have stood against the Dark Lord and his abomination of an ally - and not backed down.

Of course, thousands died. Tens of thousands died. But when Sebastian declared: 'Not one step back!' his followers answered. And this day, evil has been forced to back down, in the name of the great and holy void!”

A guild of peasants worker relaxing beneath the shadow of the City

“Another one of them Chasms ‘ave opened and I swear t’thee that I saw spires down there in the shadows.

Something’s lurking in d’ose depths; some wonder or some monster. I heard that City noble, the one with the moving balloon, ventured down but was never heard from again.

You ask me it be something someone wanted hidden. Someone with the power to sink a City beneath the earth and seal it away.”

Report of a Kyrinian scout to his superiors

“I watched as the forces' of the taker Hellspit assembled and as I as counted the horde I gazed in terror as their faces changed and altered, golden light reforming them into a host of warriors each bearing an identical face of a man I did not recognise.

They moved as if tracking some prize until another force came to meet them beneath the banners of the Empire of Blood and Skulls. The Empire's forces were clearly better commanded and within the taker host chaos broke out as strange music filled the air.

Pandemonium ensued. I saw a band of noble heroes assault the centre of the Taker army even as the Empire's infantry cut into its flanks.

Then the fire came. A golden conflagration filled the skies; tornadoes of flame scourging the Empire's men as burning waves blasted across the battlefield. The Screams were terrible to hear, the smell monstrous. I am ashamed to say I fled rather then watch so many men boil alive.

I heard sometime later that in the wasteland of that terrible battle the Takers have hailed the rise of a new liege-lord; A Sorcerer-King.”

Around a camp-fire, from Frenya Kins, eye-witness to the attack

“So there I was, just camped out in the lee of a hill, minding my own business, trying to get a fire started, when I heard the most almighty sound.

Well of course I ran up to take a look, seein' if it would be needful for me to flee or not. And when I got to the ridge and looked down, I saw the most almighty battle breaking out. On the one hand, a great construct of glass and gears, binding flesh-filled crystal spheres together into an unholy abomination. On the other there was a smaller machine, metal and gears, with a young woman piloting it from within an armoured cockpit.

The two were locked in a deadly struggle, and the sound of rending metal and the whining of cogs filled my ears. I watched in terror as these two colossi fought and struggled, until finally, with a cry of exultation that I could hear, even across the sound of the battle, the young woman piloting the smaller horological machine threw herself into her opponent ripping one of its arms from its torso, flesh and blood spewing from the shattered remains of its glass and crystal body. Then, crying out, the attacking construct of glass and flesh turned and fled, a voice rising forth from the construct 'I shall have my genius back! I shall have it!'”

Speech by the Patriarch of the Order of the Silver Quill

Thirty years we, the Will Blades of the Order of the Silver Quill, swore an oath to the man who freed us from the Tyranny of the Three.

Forever would we stand against the oppression of the creator Gods and the dominion of destiny. We have waited and watched and now we see that we are needed.

Now once more the Gods arise to chain us all and we shall ride out to fulfil our oaths. These new Gods are pale shadows of the Trinity of old and then are not invulnerable. The Order shall meet them on the field of battle and set our Wills against theirs.

Here we shall fight the final battle of the Will War.

Sobbing words of a midwife-devote, a member of the Dandle caravan that sits now nearly cut off from the rest of creation by the Disjunction.

“Please! Please! You must help. They are trapped. Trapped by a tendril of the Darkness.

We could not move the caravan fast enough, the children were scared and afraid to move. They will be lost, condemned to die alone in the darkness. Please help them. I beg you. You cannot ignore the wails of three hundred little ones.

Come, there is so little time!”

Speech of man amongst the caravans from Countrylandtopia

“Come then! Come through the causeway! We have stabilised this fragment of the world against the void through our faith and as the rest of the world dies so shall our settlement endure; a fragment of the world to sail through the darkness eternal.

We seek survivors; those who can grow food or teach or heal. People who will join our commune and help us build a new society in the remains of creation.

We can offer little but we can promise survival.”

The Disjunction now moves erratically, fragmenting parts of the world that remain unpredictably and with terrifying speed. Reality is no longer shrinking but rather disintegrating and there are only hours left of existence as the remains of the world huddle together before the ravaging darkness.

“Wealth beyond imagining for the fair princesses hand in marriage! Prince Midas always pays his dues.”

“For sale: the legendary Box of Snulvindus! Never opened! Never rivalled in its power! The greatest artefact of the Will-Workers of old. Opening it was said to herald the end of the world; now guaranteed totally safe!”

“I have seen much War in these past few years but never met my match. I would not die having never faced an equal, there in no honour in such a death.

A game of stones is all I ask. To sit and test the art of strategy against a worthy foe at the end.”

“The Behemoth stepped on my house. My wife, my son. Dead. Everyone knows it's an evil monster- probably sent out of the Disjunction to kill us all, if you ask me. Won't somebody finally stand up and put an end to it?”

• What's the point in even trying any more? What does it matter now?
• A whisper on the wind …Would you Kindly?
• Even the Gods have weaknesses
• Lord Dreadulous III has defeated death itself.
• The Greatest Song in the World, oh Lord!
• The Toad…it…compels…me…
• You've got to find first gear in your giant robot cart.
• You have to worry when the ticking stops.
• So Featherinne Aurora wore mourning for her remote cousin for months, but for her brother-in-law whom she affected to love for only two weeks?
• The Servant mourns your loss, and regrets the necessity.
• The thing about good stories is that they're rarely true.
• Repent or be damned. Its make your mind up time.
• I hear World's Wake will have dancing badgers!
• This is just a tribute, but you gotta believe…
• The Behemoth is controled by a spider named George who set up home in his left leg.
• If you step into the Disjunction at just the right time and in the right place you'll find safe haven.
• I am the horological skeleton thing that will swallow the heavens.
• Chicks dig giant robots.
• The Lord of murder shall perish.
• Mercy is for the weak. The merciful should be punished.