 When the God-Being Sigmar fell through the Aetheric Void upon the Rock of Malice, he believed himself to be the sole survivor of the lost world that was, the only one spared, for whatever reason, from the destruction wrought by the dark gods of chaos. With the survivor's conviction, Sigmar travelled far and wide across the new Mortal Realms, the star Drake Dracotheon had borne him to, discovering to his shock and delight that this lonely fate was not the path destiny had written for him. Instead, he found the realm spheres to be full of life, some as new as the morning dew, others seemingly centuries old. He found humans, Ailes, Dwarden, Uruks, Ogors, and races newer and more bizarre than he had ever seen, all in need of guidance, of leadership, of, it seemed, the presence of the Divine. Sigmar was to discover he was not alone in yet one more fashion. The familiar was to re-emerge, but in ways not so mundane, and indeed ways wholly unexpected. Know then, that this is a further record of the dreams and visions of the Oculus, aetheric sights sprung from the fevered imaginings of the night, pertaining to the gods of the Mortal Realms, and their rediscovery at Sigmar's hand. When the world that was had been sundered by the machinations of the dark gods, the magic contained within it was jettisoned into the void, raw and untamed, yes, but diffused. It would take time for it to coalesce into the realm spheres of the Mortal Realms, but coalesce it did, and in finding its form in these new worlds, the winds of magic of old bore with them shards, echoes, reflections of the world that they had become such a part of. Before the final catatlysm, an apocalyptic war had raged upon the surface of the world that was, during which mighty heroes and dread villains had become living avatars of the eight winds of magic. When the realms were forged by the inscrutable workings of the universe, forming within the great outer void, nestled within each, were echoes of beings that had, through channeling the raw power of so much magic, been ushered into the realms of the divine. Sigmar, a god-being himself, sought them out, for this new world was in need of those he knew of old. Mayhab he was worried, suspicious of the motives of these fellow gods, or that one day the ruinous powers would discover the mortal realms and draw their covetous plans against them. Or perhaps he was also lonesome, bereft of company he could call his own, for what friendship can the fleeting lives of mortals provide a god? Whatever his true motivations, Sigmar spent an age questing for these divine beings, making their recovery and resurrection his utmost priority. The visions of these findings come in no particular order, as it appears time during this age of the realms was no solid thing. Some of these gods needed no particular awakening. Tyrion, once a mighty elven prince of the world that was, awoke in Hish, the realm of light, but found himself blinded to the shining glory of his new home. Crawling pitifully across the surface of the land, grasping what felt uselessly, he discovered he was not alone, but had found one he had thought forever lost. His brother, Teclis. Knowing full well that he was now his blinded brother's eyes, Teclis became their guide, the two ails setting forth to explore this strange new world they found themselves in. Their search rapidly grew desperate, for they were unable to find any other ails, no matter how far and wide they looked. It was on this hunt that Sigmar found them, overjoyed to have such firm allies of old recast into these new worlds. Their reunion was a bittersweet one for the brothers, however, for though they too were delighted to meet Sigmar, they despaired to hear that the only ails he had found in his questing now resided in his city of Azerheim, vastly outnumbered by all other races. Sigmar, however, rallied the Forlorn brothers, bidding them to join him as allies, and that together they would solve the mystery of the lost Ilven people. Unbeknownst to the brothers of Hish, their literal shadow had fallen into the inversion of their own dominion. In Olgu, the realm of shadows, the echo of the dreaded Malirion awoke, incorporeal and bereft of memory. Alone in a land of darkness and shade, he sought out anyone who may aid him. The more he raged against his now-ghostly form, the more his frustration awoke memories of his life in the world that was, of the entity he had been before by the name of Maliketh. And with this rage came tangible physicality. It brought him into his new form, and in this new form, oh, did he rage and despair yet more. Twisted by fate and conflict, his bitter mind roamed the depths of Olgu for years, seeking out every corner of its thirteen domains, but finding none other like him. Just petty shadow entities and dark hunter things. He met not a single living soul, until, by chance, he came across the form of an elf just like he had once been, for all he knew, the only other survivor of the world that was, being preyed upon by Olgu's demons in a clearing of that realm's twisted forests. Setting about them with the savagery that echoed his long-lost past, Malirion discovered with no small amount of horror that it was none other than his mother, Marathi. The reunion of mother and son was unpleasant, stained by a bitterness and resentment that had now become mythic, carried across time and space and plain. Marathi had barely assured of the divine power her offspring had, but in her exile had become adept to wielding the shadow magic of Olgu she now called home. An uneasy alliance of convenience was struck, born of isolation and desperation. The two would not meet another like them until Sigmar arrived at the gates of the Drukiroth, the citadel they had carved out of the dark rocks of their realm's fear. Recognizing the gods of shadow for what they were, but unwilling to simply turn them aside, Sigmar bade them to join his alliance, for they finally had the chance of a divine clean slate, to earn redemption and to craft a world anew. Yet one more elven god remained, but of the goddess of Gairan, the realm of life, her origin is altogether unclear. Alariel, once the ever queen of the elves, had ascended to become an embodiment of the fundamental forces of life and nature, combining, it would seem, with the ancient elven goddess she had once simply been a mortal aspect of. Visions of her are conflicting. Some show her as having simply always been, created whole, if not incarnated fully, in the instant the mortal realms themselves were. For life, it would seem, must always possess a guiding hand, a divine gardener to nurture its precious seeds. Sigmar, in his wanderings, found her, but in what form it is unclear. I see tableaus, tapestries of legend fashioned by elven hands, that show her as a wandering nymph, humble, but purer than any, encountering the god of man in the depths of a forest more ancient than contemplation. Others show him, waking her from a hibernation, emerging from encasement in the oldest tree of Gairan, to aid the barbarian king god, in hurling back his enemies. Yet another depicts her as a plant queen, surrounded by a court of glowing forest spirits, a fully fledged monarchy, pledging itself to Sigmar as an equal. The very last show her as a brittle and wiry form, weeping in solitude as enemies beset her realm from all fronts. Whatever the origin, the result was the same. The goddess of life found great kinship with Sigmar, and readily joined his side. The gods of the squat, Dwarden folk, took an altogether different path. A thought was half remembered as a once fulsome ancestor pantheon. Only two had survived the death of the world that was. Grimnir, the god of battle, and Grungi, the god of the forge. The former, and disappeared from the old world many thousands of years even before its ending, tracking a quest into the great northern wastelands, and passing, by the telling of ancient Daoi legend, from their world into the realm of chaos itself, venturing beyond the polar gates into an other world of pure magical energy, wherein lie the dread intelligences of the dark gods. It appears the legends were indeed true. None, not even the battle ancestor himself, could say for how long he wandered the plains of the abominable deities, for within the depths of chaos time has no bearing whatsoever. All that is certain is that by chance or fate, his path one day bade him lay down to sleep, and when he awoke, it was in the company of his own kin. Dwarden, who rejoiced, as much as he now did, to have him return to the land of mortals. Weiried from his long journey, but filled with the vigor of the reborn, Grimnir set to taming the lands of Ashki, the realm of fire. He hunted and laid low the god-beast Ignax, shackling him forever to the land of the chained sun, so that it may bathe in its nurturing glow. He shielded his new kin from all that came against him, for the growing pains of the firelands were as volatile as the realm itself. But, despite this service, it was not to protect Grimnir, from the Thadduegi, the great betrayal. My visions do not reveal exactly what transpired during this time, but all that is known is that Grimnir awoke in chains, shackled to the tallest peak of the Iron Mountains of Chamon, the realm of metal. He did not, however, awake alone, for next to him, equally imprisoned, was his brother Grungi, although whatever tragedy had before the Dwarden gods had now left the Forgemaster, crippled in aspect. Mayhap they would have remained at this lonely mountaintop for an eternity, were it not for the arrival of questing Sigmar, who, remembering the Dwarden as ancient friends of both himself and humanity, struck their chains open at once. With the deities of Aelves and Dwarden, Sigmar had found ready friends, or at the very least with Malerion and Marathi, convenient allies. But what of those who did not so readily accede to the god-king's offerings? What of the savage deity of the green-skinned Uruks, Gorka Morka, the two that are one? For as long as Uruks had trod the paths of the mortal realms, surviving the odds as their pernicious kind so often do, they did so under the gaze of their twin gods, Gork and Mork, the former cunningly brutal, and the latter brutally cunning. They are a peculiar deity, being two that are, at the same time, one. The legends of the Uruk clans say that they were once combined, a two-headed beast, but they quite literally tore themselves in half during a spectacular argument that led to them falling out. But due to the sheer belief in them, conjured from the bestial hearts of the green-skins, their brutal, straightforward simplicity that embodies the Uruk character, Gork and Mork recombine to become an avatar of wanton destruction the green-skinned hordes represent. Finding them buried in Dracotoa, the living avalanche, neither of the two heads of Gorka Morka were to be parlayed with, for they respected not the craft of words, only the craft of battle. To earn the respect of the great beast, Sigmar knew he had to challenge them to contests of purest strength. First they fought, a jewel that lasted for a decade and leveled many of the peaks of Gur, the realm of beasts, into flattened wastelands of rubble. With neither able to best the other, they, according to the legends, bellowed by Uruks around the great fire pits, got creative. How much of this is reality versus sheer green-skin hyperbole is impossible to say, but at the very least they make for good tales. One such myth relates that Sigmar and Gorka Morka had an eating contest, seizing great fist-wolves of the mortal realms themselves and stuffing them into their gullets. Sigmar ate a whole volcano, to the horror of the Dwarden Grimnir, so Gorka Morka laughed and drank an entire ocean. Sigmar inhaled the sky itself, belching out great thunderclaps, but Gorka Morka did him one better, devouring the kingdom of Thrun. According to the Uruks, the residents of this now-fallen monarchy still live within the gut of their god. Yet another tells that, during a contest of raw strength, Gorka Morka ingest stole the hammer of Sigmar, Gal Maraz itself, from the ground as the man god lifted a mountain above his head, before swinging the hammer into the human with all his might and knocking him clear to the other side of the eight realms. The hilarity this caused between them sealed their pact, for both knew that neither could best the other, and to the Uruk god, Sigmar would, at the very least, have all the best enemies for them to slake their battle thirst upon. Having bested and brought all aspects of life to the table, Sigmar lastly turned his attentions to the one whose depths had eluded him thus far, Shaish, the realm of death. Long had he thought upon what must dwell within its darkest reaches, and so it was the man god would have his fears confirmed. Deep within an impossibly ancient cairn within a lonely mountain, Sigmar came upon the shattered essence of Nagash. Once a man who had been the first to have conquered the horrible barrier between life and death, Nagash had been the great necromancer of the world that was, a thing of sorcerous power beyond almost any other. It was perhaps not surprising he had survived, and though Sigmar was loath to be in the position he was in, he knew that now, with an alliance of such incarnate aspects of the magic that made up the mortal realms, that Nagash and his peerless command of death magic would be ultimately necessary. Reconstituting him into something that approximated a real form, Sigmar related to the god of death his plans, of the deities who even now were raising civilizations from nothing, of the realms beyond Shaish, of the sheer possibilities this new world represented. Nagash's eyes, pinpricks of light set deep within a face of Bowden, watched keenly, giving nothing away, before his voice, a raspy death rattle, assented. He would stand with his fellow gods in this new order. He would take his place at the table, as an equal. Thus it was that the age of myth truly began. The pantheon of order was complete. Sigmar, Dracotheon, Tyrion, Techless, Grimnir and Grungi, Malerion and Marathi, Alariel, Gork and Mork, and finally, Nagash. It was a union unprecedented, for never in the history of the cosmos had so many disparate gods been bound together for a sole purpose. The millennia that followed was an age of truest wonder and purest hope. Across every realm, life flourished. Civilizations rose, taming the wilds with the aid of their gods. Monuments and cities were raised in the name of these deities. Science, learning, magical arts, all flourished as the united races of the realms accomplished feats not even seen in the headiest days of the world that was. The zodiacal beasts, Dracotheon's kin and foes were tamed or subdued and bade to join the efforts of the pantheon where they could. Travel between the realms, made possible by the mighty realm gate portals, flourished as trade promoted the free and open exchange of cultures and learning. In that era, many a bard, or chronicler, would venture to see as many of the great wonders of the mortal realms in person as they could. The crystal spires of threats, the spear of malice jutting from the coast of tusks, the bone pillars of Antgor, the peak of deific mons in the Shai-ish inner lands, the sky bridges of Gur. All were sought for all were possible to see. The realms were truly possibility unbound, and all that even a mortal could achieve was limited only by the scope of their imagination. All gods were in their heavens, and all was right with the world. Sigmar ruled from the skies of Azir, the celestial realm. Tyrion and Teclas flourished in Hish, the realm of light. While inverted from them, Malirion and Marathi brooded over Ulgu of the shadows. Elariel shucked the boundaries of Gairan, realm of life, to sow Ilven soul pods across the worlds. While in Ashki and Chamon, realms of fire and metal, Grimnir and Grungi raised the mountain fastnesses of their Dwarden subjects. Gorka Morka, now the mightiest champion of the pantheon, rampaged across the beast-magic planes of Gur, bringing as many god-beasts as he could find to heal. While in the depths of Shai-ish, the realm of death, Nagash raised his sepulchral capital, Nagashisar, from the shifting Ash-sans. This, then, was the pantheon at work, an unparalleled alliance of the divine. Could such an order last? Well, dearest Damned Acolyte, what do you think?