Myth: The Fallen Lords - Story - Plot

Plot

The game opens in the seventeenth year of the Province's war against the Fallen Lords, a war humanity is losing badly. The principal cities have fallen, with only Madrigal, Willow and Tandem still standing. The armies of the west are led by The Nine, a group of nine sorcerer-generals called Avatara. The known members of the Nine include the leader Alric (the former King of the Southern Provinces), Cu Roi, Rabican, Murgen and Maeldun. They've recently found a living severed head buried in the Barrier, which they believe can turn the tide of the war with the Fallen Lords. The Head claims to be an ancient enemy of Balor's, and the Nine intend to use the intelligence it provides to their strategic advantage.

The Legion represents the elite within the armies of the west, and the gameplay centers around the actions of the Legion. It begins in the village of Crow's Bridge, where a small detachment of the Legion has remained behind to guard a bridge at the request of the locals. After repulsing an attack on the town, they move on to flank the army of Shiver, which is laying siege to Madrigal. With every major city in the Southern Provinces destroyed, Madrigal is now the headquarters of the Nine, so its fall would effectively end the war. The Legion scores its first notable victory as they completely destroy Shiver and her armies, saving Madrigal. Also significant is that on the first night of the battle, Shiver is unexpectedly slain in a Dream Duel with the Avatara Rabican, a victory owed to the advice of the Head (who alerted them to Shiver's exaggerated sense vanity, which was exploited by Rabican).

The Nine take advantage of this momentum and attempt to recover the Total Codex, a book that contains the past, present and future within its pages, from the ruins of the historical city of Covenant. After doing so and escaping the army of The Watcher by fleeing in an underground tunnel, the Legion heads east to meet up with the Avatara Maeldun and his southern garrison. They learn that the combined armies of the north are en route in an attempt to hold Seven Gates and Bagrada, the middle and southern passes of the Cloudspine mountain range respectively, against the army of The Deceiver, who is preparing to cross the range to replace Shiver's forces in the west. They need only hold out for a few days, until snow covers the passes. First, though, they destroy a World Knot (a means of magical transport) behind their lines, which would have allowed The Deceiver to send his forces directly into their territory. After they successfully hold the passes, they prepare for a violent winter, as the army of The Watcher remains behind their lines, and they plan to turn and hunt him down.

Around this time, the Avatara Alric is captured by The Deceiver. Alric has been searching for a fabled suit of enchanted armor in The Barrier, on the advice of The Head, and he realises that he had been deliberately sent into a trap. However, the army of the west knows nothing of this. They send a small group of heroes east over the mountains in a balloon, and they are able to free Alric. Meanwhile, the Legion heads to Silvermines in search of the Arm of The Watcher, lost when Balor freed him from captivity. The Deceiver has a force in Silvermines searching for the arm as well, for he and The Watcher were old enemies before Balor bound them to his will. The Watcher was generally acknowledged to be the second or third most powerful sorcerer in living memory, and when Tyr fell, he and The Deceiver fought a Dream Duel, which The Watcher barely survived.

The Legion succeed in recovering the Arm, but suddenly the great volcano of Tharsis overlooking Seven Gates erupts, melting all the snow in the pass, allowing the forces of The Deceiver to cross the Cloudspine. At the same time, The Watcher surprises Rabican's army from behind and crushes it, seemingly slaying the Avatara and scattering survivors around the mountain range. After this, The Watcher's forces press forward and tear through the army of The Deceiver, moving east of the Cloudspine and away from the army of the Province. Maeldun positions his army to retake the passes of Seven Gates in an attempt to close the pass to the Fallen Lords. In this he is successful, both holding the pass and managing to kill one of The Deceiver's shades, Scaripant, who was trapped by the rising waters.

The following spring, the Avataras Cu Roi and Murgen take the rested and reinforced Legion over the Cloudspine and into Forest Heart in an attempt to regain the support of the Forest Giants, who mysteriously withdrew their support of the west thirteen years earlier, leading to the fall of the Southern Provinces. In a surprise attack, Soulblighter's army falls upon the Legion and Soulblighter himself traps the Legion within the Tain. Small enough to hold in the hand, the Tain contains a pocket universe of limitless capacity. Trapped within by Connacht years previously, the Myrkridia cannibalized each other until the last of them starved to death. The Legion came across a skull platform 30 feet high and 100 feet across topped with a battle standard, evidence that the Myrkridia had been here. Murgen searches for a way to free the 4000 men trapped within, and eventually finds it, shattering the Tain, at which point Soulblighter flees, startled by the unexpected destruction of the powerful artifact.

Cu Roi and Murgen do not survive the destruction of the Tain, thus leaving only three survivors out of the Nine, with many of the Legion dying as well. Messengers inform them that Maeldun has lost the important mountain pass of Bagrada (and was presumably killed in the process) and that The Deceiver has crossed the Cloudspine at the northern pass known as Stair of Grief. They learn of a civil war erupting in the west as soldiers rise up unexpectedly in support of The Head as the surviving Avatara of the Nine attempted to destroy it, based on Alric's theory that it set him up to be captured. The war has taken a terrible turn for the worse with so many Avatara dying. However, the survival of Alric becomes known to the Legion as he joins them. A small group of Dwarves, led by Balin the Pathfinder, leaves the Legion at this point and sneaks into Myrgard in an attempt to slaughter as many of the occupying Ghôls as possible. Impossibly, they are able to destroy the Ghôl Godhead during their attack, securing their place in legend and retaking their homeland, killing the thousands of Ghôls occupying the city.

At this point, Alric convinces the surviving members of the Legion to head north through the Dire Marsh towards the fortress of Balor. Their small force can do nothing to save Willow, Tandem, and Madrigral from the armies about to lay siege to them, but they could win a more important victory instead. During his captivity and interrogation by the Deceiver, Alric has learned by chance that the Fallen all draw their power from Balor. If Balor were to fall, all of the armies of the Dark would collapse, leaving only the Fallen Lords themselves to contend with. And so they move north, with The Watcher in front of them and Soulblighter behind them. Alric performs a daring feint, attacking Soulblighter's army, and then suddenly turning north to attack The Watcher himself using arrows tipped with bone fragments from his own lost Arm. The feint is a success, and The Watcher is slain, turned to stone by the arrows and then shattered, scattering his army and clearing the way ahead. As they pass out of the Dire Marsh, they approach the abandoned Trow city of Rhi'Anon, in which Balor's fortress is located. After securing a bridge within, the Legion passes into the city. Alric now comes into possession of one of the five legendary Eblis Stones, an extremely powerful magical artifact. The beserk who delivered it, having come all the way from Willow, refuses to talk about events in the west, only hinting about the terrible situation back home.

Alric orders the 2200 survivors of the Legion to attack the fortress of Balor in a suicidal feint. A half-million undead stand between them and the fortress. Alric then prepares to take 100 hand-picked men through a World Knot to a spot directly on top of Balor's fortress. With Balor distracted by the Legion's suicidal charge, Alric believes that this small force could sneak up on him and assassinate him. During the nights leading up to this moment, the great comet that had been growing brighter and brighter in the sky has become brighter than the moon and now is visible by day. As he departs, Alric informs the Legion that Madrigal, the last city in the West, has fallen.

Alric plants a Myrkridian battle standard retrieved from within the Tain outside the fortress in an attempt to draw out Balor, as he believes this will enraged Balor, who, as Connacht, trapped the Myrkridia within the Tain a thousand years earlier. The plan works. Balor is drawn from his fortress, enraged at the sight of the Myrkridian battle standard. Alric takes the opportunity to strike at Balor, immobilizing him with one of the Five Eblis Stones, leaving Balor vulnerable to the swords of the Legion. They decapitate him, and plan to take his head to the Great Devoid, a bottomless pit created by the Ancient Callieach, an extinct race of powerful magic users. Only by doing this can Balor finally be destroyed. It is believed that throwing Balor's head into the Great Devoid will destroy the spirit of the Leveler itself rather than its mortal form. The thirty survivors of the Legion, magically transported to the Great Devoid by Alric, are ambushed by Soulblighter as they carry the head toward the pit, but despite their losses, they are successful. Balor is destroyed, and the Fallen are rendered powerless, the undead armies collapsing. Soulblighter flees the Great Devoid, having failed his master. The Deceiver is pursued to the Stair of Grief by the remnants of the armies of the West after his army suddenly collapses around him, and he is trapped inside the Dramus River, separated from his scepter, using all his magical power just to stay alive. The Dramus then freezes solid around him to form Angurvadal Glacier as the heat from the eruption of Tharsis fades. With Balor, Shiver, The Watcher and The Deceiver all destroyed or imprisoned, and Soulblighter fled in the form of a murder of crows, the war between the Light and the Dark comes to an end.