: Ack, forgot to respond to the rest of this.
: This era has seen two wars: the first, fifty years long,
: the Great War. That destroyed just about everything on
: the continent except the North. Then there were sixty
: years of peace in which half of that was rebuilt. Then
: another War which destroyed all that half and a little
: more in under a year.
: At this rate, we'll have another 9-18 world-destroying
: wars before a new Hero finally shows up. Now we're got
: the Myrkridia back, and a bunch of undead-creating
: spells in the hands of any necromancer who wants them.
: Alric's bound to die sooner or later, and I'll wager
: not much of the Light except Muirthemne and a few
: isolated areas such as the Ermine and the Zerk lands
: will remain after another 900 years of this.
Hmm. Okay, here's my take. This isn't really a Light Age, but it isn't a Dark Age either. It's the world trying to make it Dark while Alric struggles to keep it Light. And so far, Alric's winning. Soulblighter didn't do nearly as much damage as Balor did; the post-Soulblighter Mythworld is much better off than the post-TFL Mythworld. Fewer people died, less property was destroyed, and now there's one less Fallen Lord in the world.
The way I see it, we can expect lots of world wars, as you say, but they're going to be less and less destructive each time. Every time there's a war, the most powerful Dark lord of the time dies--first Balor, then Soulblighter? Who's going to attack next time--the Faceless Man? Meanwhile, Alric only gets more and more powerful, and farther and farther from being killable by anyone in the Mythworld. Fast-forward a few hundred years, and we're going to see Achdhaul and his Legion of Enraged Guinea Pigs attacking the west and managing to kill a single peasant (actually, just surprising him so that he trips and falls under a wagon) before being exterminated by a sneeze from Alric Who Kills and Eats W'rkncacnters For Breakfast. By the end of the millennium, it'll be as pleasant as any Light Age. And that, of course, is when the fun begins.
Because it seems to me that we will then have a real possibility of the cycle's end, and the way it hinges depends on what the Leveller chooses to do. Alric will, at that point, be the single most powerful non-divine being who ever existed on the Mythworld. He's already damn near Balor-level, when he has all his artifacts and whatnot to back him up. Imagine what he'll be like when he's had 15 more lifetimes to enhance his power and skill. If the Leveller enters Alric, the Mythworld will cease to exist. He'll just head on over to Tharsis, lift his little finger and tear the Cloudspine in half. If, on the other hand, the Leveller enters the other Champion who's born at that time, Alric will beat him down in ten seconds flat. And the same with the next Leveller. And the next. It's very possible that Alric will be ruling the Mythworld for-very-close-to-ever, either as its eternal Lord of Light or as the cackling Leveller, dancing on its ashes.
I should stick some "maybe's" in that preceding paragraph--actually, a whole lot of them--but I'm too lazy to go back and do it now. :-)
: Actually, it was Myth II's epilogue basically saying
: "The Leveller is the Bad Guy, and has nothing to
: do with the Good Guy" that turned me. :-)
But metaphorically, y'know, it WAS Swedish toughs! Metaphorically!
--SiliconDream
