The Cataclysm

The day started as any other. The sun broke the horizon and the people of Nerath City began to wake. Smiths hammered their metal, hawkers shouted their wares, merchant and farmers entered the city on wagons with good to sell. The first signs that something was wrong happened about noon.



A letter from a merchant to a friend spoke of strange rumblings, as if there was an earthquake but without the movement of the ground. Many animals disappeared from the streets that were normally found. No dogs or cats, no birds or insects. Any horses or livestock that people owned began to go mad and struggle to exit the city.



That is the last solid piece of information of what happened that day. Everything else is speculation or conjecture that was gathered by clerics speaking with the dead or wizards trying to divine what occurred.



At some point in the mid afternoon, the Cataclysm struck. A massive explosion from one of the taller towers rocked the foundation of the buildings around it. As they began to collapse, a ball of black lightning sat in the sky where the tower once was, and that is when the demons came.



They came pouring out of the black sphere, hundreds if not thousands. There were claims that a dozen balors came forth as an honor guard for Demogorgon himself. Whoever or whatever came through, showed no mercy to any they found. Men, women, and children were torn limb from limb and devoured still alive. The screams echoed for miles around.



But then, yet another even happened. The blackness that was allowing the demons into Rhonnos exploded. It leveled the entirety of the city and miles around, leaving nothing but rubble and scorched earth. Every living thing, including the demons, was destroyed. The sound of the second explosion was heard as far away as Benka.



They send forces to investigate, but as they approached, they found the ground beneath them was dying and had to escape lest they be consumed as well. By weeks end, the growth of the blight ended, but not before it grew to be the size of a large kingdom. The ground was destroyed, but one could enter the devastation without harm, at least on the edges. Approaching closer to where Nerath City once stood, strange things were seen and horrific things would attack travelers.



No one ever took claim for the act, although it has never been determined to have been a malicious act. And none of Nerath's enemies were in position to take advantage of the chaos afterwards, which would have indicated that they knew it was going to happen.



<p style="margin-bottom: 0in; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none;">The fear of such an event happening again is still in the back of most minds, but the hope it was a singular time is stronger.