Far away from willow creek, more to the south laid the capital of Frienia, Ferion, bearing the name of the legendary founder of the Frienian kingdom the city was a remnant from the kingdom's glory days.

In those days Frienia had still completely laid at the borders of the Badlands and prevented orcs and barbarians from entering the other kingdom's lands. Frienia was the only safe way to travel through if one wished to go south or eastwards coming from the north or the western realms, the other roads lead through treacherous mountain ranges and deadly forests. To protect this gateway that was so important to trading from two realms to another Frienia had to be able to stop invasions from those that would want to invade them. To solve this Ferion, the first king made a pact with the dwarves who lived in the mountains that made up the rest of the Badlands border with the southern realms.

Ferion would help the dwarves defend themselves and support them in political cases and in return, they would give him weapons and equipment for his troops. The dwarves agreed and they formed the alliance of the borderlands, the dwarves kept a look at the mountains and the humans of Frienia guarded the entrance to the Badlands.

Ferion became the first defender of the “shield nation” Frienia, he was respected by the dwarves, humans, and even by the elves for protecting the trade routes and for defending what they called “civilization”. After Ferion's death Frienia still stood as the wall protecting the south and east from attacks that occurred quite a lot, yet the Frienian army managed to defeat them time and time again.

Even mighty Orcish hordes would be trampled by the heavily armored cavalry of Frienia charging in, their footsoldiers clad in dwarven metal would be sometimes fighting an opponent one on one and their archer's arrows were poisoned so that each shot would bring certain death. even their mages and wizards were all hardly trained men and women ready to defend their kingdom from the dangers threatening it.

Harold The sixth, the current king of Frienia was sitting on his throne, it was one made of solid stone, sparsely decorated according to the Frienian tradition to put functionality above appearance. The current king knew that once his nation's founder and national heroes had sat upon this throne when meeting ambassadors and diplomats of other nations, it was a relic from the past, just like this castle.

Harold felt unworthy to be here, in this castle and sitting on the throne of Ferion himself. Because during his reign, hundreds of years after Ferions death the status and power Frienia once held had dropped. It had all begun 10 years ago when in the western Wilderlands which bordered the Badlands a new goblin king came to power, he was a wolf rider from the highlands and the orcs saw it as a threat. The Badlands and wildlands were massive and yet the orcs had decided to expand their territory to prepare for an attack by this new “king”.

In untold numbers the clans and tribes gathered in the Badlands, millions of orc warriors, shamans, berserkers, and many, many more… As one green tide the orcs stormed to the east, to the borders of Frienia, they did not go to the mountains for they knew that the dwarves and the natural dangers of the mountains would only decimate their numbers.

Harold had just been crowned and in his panic, he sent the order to his general to prepare to defend their country, but none of them expected that this was not just a large horde, it was an army! The Frienians fought valiantly, but it had all been for naught, The orc shamans called down hurricanes and lightning upon the Frienian legions, direwolf riders ripped the mighty cavalry apart and wyvern riders and orc warriors tore through the human defense lines.

Once the border walls were destroyed the Frienian army ran, they retreated, for the first time in history the Frienian army had retreated! Harold had let the armies gather around the cities and had given the order to evacuate the farmers and civilians, he had thought the end of his kingdom was near!

But Frienia was not destroyed, that was never the orcs plan, the orcs split up Frienia in two from the west to the south and marched to the east where they took over many lands and established outposts and new tribes. Frienia had been split in two and now existed of a southern and northern part, in the south still sat Harold their king and the northern Frienians still obeyed and fulfilled the task of protecting the “civilized” countries and realms.

Harold had tried to strengthen the army in the hope of retaking what was lost but the morale had been crushed and his troops now had to protect the new “borders” of south and north Frienia. Harold remembered that at that moment he had thought things could not possibly get any worse, his kingdom was split in two, Frienias political and military power had waned and there was no sign that it would stop soon!

But Harold had been wrong, a few months after the great splitting of Frienia he tried requesting aid from the Southlands and the northern kingdoms of the compass continent to help his country in these times of need. The Nothern kings had been understanding but they could do little more than aid the northern part of Frienia right now, the southerners, on the other hand, were as usual seeing the frienian nation as useless and not worth their time. The northerners had recently also been providing information on the wars in the west where the wars between elves, humans, and dwarves had caused the rise of the goblin king in the wildlands.

The good thing was that this king of the goblins seemed to have no interest in taking over more territory, the wildlands and Badlands were massive pieces of land after all but due to the war in the west, he had fiercely chased out anyone traveling through it causing the west to be cut off from the south expect with ships.

Sometimes the king found it laughable, the north, south, east, and west of this continent were all colossal pieces of land and these could easily be self-sufficient, yet he was blamed for losing the trade routes he and his army had given up to prevent the orcs from going southwards. The southern nations called him weak and a fool, they cut off their support to Frienia and let the kingdom fend for itself.

Harold had at that point sworn to himself that things could not get worse, but once again he had been wrong, that was when rumors started emerging about demonic cults and rumors about a court of wizards practicing dark arts. It was not only rumors though, but he had also gotten reports about this issue, reports about cases where soldiers or adventurers had seen rituals and necromantic activity and kidnappings occur all across the country.

Harold had done what he could, he strengthened his armies, increased patrols, and tried to find out the truth about all that was happening. And then the summonings had begun!

Cultists all across the land were practicing infernal rituals and called forth fiends from the abyss and hell, Demons started emerging and sometimes they had attacked cities and towns. His army had been dispatched and had routed out several cults although demons who caused casualties in cities still were present. It was during the times of these cultist hunts that another person emerged who had caused the king a great deal of trouble the past few years, the wicked Warlock!

Harold did not know where he came from but the first time he emerged was during the events of a demon summoning, witnesses saw an adventurer running away from his party which evacuated the civilians and stood before the demon, what exactly happened nobody knew, but when he stood before the demon the fiend took the hand of the adventurer and vanished.

His former party members tried to apprehend them but he managed to flee away. It turned out the adventurer they had recently added to the party was not a normal mage but a warlock! Warlocks were practitioners of the dark arts, some of them were wizards or mages but most were normal people who made contracts with fiends to gain power. This warlock had shown up time and time again when demons were summoned in towns, each time he seemed to take these demons with him as if the cultists who summoned them already made a deal for him with that demon.

The general of the Frienian army himself had tried to catch him when he appeared in his city but was killed by the black mage, this crime was what would result in this person's nickname, the wicked Warlock. Harold had not known what to do until help came from an unexpected direction, a necromancer had fought against the warlock in a town where a demon was summoned and after losing to the warlock the necromancer did something surprising, he contacted the adventurers guild!

Normally no one would bargain with one who raises the dead, but the guild and the kingdom both were desperate to put a stop to the destructive summonings they held the wicked warlock accountable for. After hearing what he had to tell the guild master contacted the king and what Harold heard had shocked him!

The rumors about an association of dark arts practitioners were right and the wicked warlock, this mysterious enemy turned out to be their leader's disgraced son, Iskander Orobas! Harold had invested almost half his kingdom's treasury to the hunt on this individual for the necromancer stated that while the court of black magic sought to stay neutral, Iskander was probably preparing for a war against Frienia and then his own father.

But each time Harold had thought that his armies or adventurers had finally found him, the warlock would slip through his fingers, a couple of days ago a group of strong rookie adventurers found him and they had the task to defeat him before veteran adventurers arrived, Harold had hoped it would work, that this problem would be ended, but it turned out differently.

Not only had the warlock been too strong for those rookies, but he had also vanished before the veterans arrived and those rookies brought news about something the warlock had done with his powers.

Harold, king of Frienia now sat upon his throne in an empty throne room with a grim look on his face as he thought about the question he had asked the man standing before him five minutes ago. Alastor, the king's court wizard looked quite pale after hearing his king's question, “how strong is this warlock?” It was a question of which the answer terrified him. Alastor was a wizard who in his youth could singlehandedly destroy armies with a flick of his fingers and while he obviously was still capable of doing that Harold saw that the old wizened man with his blue robes and the wooden staff was shaking in fear. “Your majesty, Alastor spoke, If he can use that magic and if he is able to teleport a select few persons and himself with that accuracy he could possibly be close to my level of power.” The wizard sighed, if this growth of power keeps up he’ll be stronger than me soon enough.”

Harold's slightly grey beard began to become more grey after hearing this, his court wizard, the man who had been one of the best mages in the kingdom was frightened by this warlock. “Alastor do you know what he is planning to do?” The wizard sighed, “my liege in my opinion he is gathering an army of fiends, if what that necromancer said is true he will take Frienia and then the cults will summon more minions he will use to attack his father and then the Southlands although I have my doubts it is like that completely.”

Alastor sighed, “whatever his plan is, he is gathering an army, it cannot be something good for us my king!”

Harold looked through one of the windows of the room at his city, “let us hope that we will be ready once he unleashes his true plan upon us.”

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In the dark forest at the northern borders of the Frienian kingdom a blue flame, a will o wisp floated through the woods, it was a pretty harmless being that only was a real threat for peasants and farmers. Yet suddenly a spell circle appeared beneath the wisp. The arcane power crackling from it was greedily absorbed by the wisp as it grew larger with the second, suddenly the wisp imploded in a blinding flash of light that startled the animals in the surrounding area. When the light dimmed a man stood where the unfortunate will o wisp had been a moment ago.

He wore a dark blue cloak and leather boots that gave him the looks of a very shady figure, under his hood two blue eyes shone with an arcane glow that most mages had after using transportation magic. The person looked around at his surroundings as if he expected to be ambushed any second now. After a few minutes of simply standing there the man's gloved hands took off his hood and revealing his face.

The light of the full moon shone on his unnaturally white hair and pale skin, the man looked young, about 20 years old yet he also seemed thin and malnourished as if he ate very little. His opened cloak now revealed an armor of leather and chainmail as well as a strange book hanging from his belt. For a few seconds, the boy stood there in silence before throwing his head to the sky and screaming, RAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAGH!”

The few animals and monsters still around fled away as if their lives depended on it because as he yelled a torrent of purple flames roared at his feet, sending a pillar of roaring fire into the night sky. Suddenly the man fell silent again, the flames disappeared without a trace as the young man sat down on the ground with his face in his hands. “why, the voice of the boy was filled with pure sadness and grief, as if all hope was lost, why does it always have to happen like that?” The calm look on his face from earlier had broken down completely and tears were flowing from his eyes as if they were waterfalls of sadness.

Gone was the mask of the cruel demon summoning warlock who had chased of the adventurers that had come after the rookies a few days ago, Iskander, the wicked warlock, the terror of Frienia was laying on the ground crying as if all he hoped for had been destroyed and actually that was pretty close to the truth.

“First my friends, Iskander cried out into the forest, then my own father, the whole damn kingdom and the guild, what have I done to deserve this!?” No one answered, as usual, unsurprising, who could give an answer to why he was a warlock?

Was it because he was the son of an evil madman experimenting with curses (his father), was it the gods themselves who wanted to play a cosmic prank on him, or was fate itself just against him?

He did not know, it had been the 13th time this month he had to flee away from adventurers and soldiers, he had only slept and eaten a couple of days and he felt spent, yet he could never rest or relax, he was always on the run. Iskander thought about what could he have possibly done to deserve this but was soon interrupted by a weird chuckling sound. While crying out his sorrow Iskander did not notice that behind him a spell circle had slowly opened up from which a demonic fiend slowly appeared, a hulking demon with a skin that looked like a volcano, with fiery veins coursing through it. His horns were glowing like fire and his face resembled a human skull.

The fiend bowed over Iskander who was still on the ground with tears in his eyes, “I say we smash every single one of them, my master.” The fiend spoke with a voice sounding like the rumbling of a volcano, “we will burn all of them, the adventurers, the king, this country and your father will all be consumed in the fires of wrath!” Iskander looked at the walking volcano fiend, his eyes red of the tears, Krato…s go… back to hell, I really cannot use your tantrums right now okay!”

The fiend chuckled, “as a demon of wrath I see it as my duty to make my master get his revenge for all that has been done to him.” Iskander sighed, of all the fiends he had contracted Kratos was not the one he wanted to speak to right now, especially not because of his tendency to remind him of all what happened to him. Yet Iskander did not cal him off, he lacked the focus right now, if he tried to he might summon another demon instead of putting Kratos back.

Kratos went on, “master, what you feel is sadness, not wrath, and wrath is what you need right now, you must take revenge and slaughter them all, you must…..” “Become what they believe me to be, Iskander bit back with a slight bit of anger in his voice, A maniac who sacrifices souls for power and destroys whatever he hates, like my father!?” Iskander did not want it but he started to feel angry and that was bad because if Kratos went on like this Iskander could lose control.

He cursed himself, why had he forgotten the other reason he did not like Kratos?!!

He struggled against the anger, trying to suppress it but the smiling face of the wrath demon and the aura he projected around him negated his attempts. He felt the red wrathful aura closing in and starting to enclose him! Fear almost subdued the wrath when Iskander realized how close the demon was to overtaking him!

The wrath demon laughed as Iskander felt his consciousness slip away and his limbs became numb while his mind began to burn with pain and rage, “Yes, yes that’s it use that hatred, let it consume you and…… “ Kratos did not finish that sentence, because in an instant a whip wrapped around his neck and pulled him backward, behind the demon another fiend had appeared who was holding the whip in its hand. This fiend was far smaller than Kratos, the fiend looked like a human female with large leathery wings covered with scars, a tail with a sharp ending and two purple horns, one of them was broken in half. Iskander felt the wrath aura loosening and Kratos grip on his consciousness fading away. He tried to get up but his limbs were still numb.

Thorn had arrived, but if he did not help her, Kratos would slaughter her!