Another Fine End-Myth

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((This is written by my now Exalted ST over three years ago. Still find it fun))

Obviously, as my favorites are Werewolf and Changeling, this will probably have its greatest emphasis from them.

For the longest time, the Garou thought the Apocalypse would be precipitated by the Wyrm, envisioning a final, glorious battle that would decide the fate of Gaia. After all, all the signs, the portents seemed to be indicative of it. The Birth of the Perfect Metis, the Red Star, all of it.

As for the Fae, they knew that the Long Winter was upon them, that it would be a time of great suffering before the rebirth of Spring. And they knew that if the Winter was suitably harsh, the promised Spring would fail to come. The world frozen in Stasis, a result as their prodigal cousins the Garou would say, of the Weaver.

And as some of the wiser Garou knew, it was actually the Weaver that caused the fall of the Wyrm, rather than the Wyrm itself. Not that the result mattered, for the Wyrm proved to be a more proactive foe than the Weaver ever was. So, the Garou focused their attention on the greater threat, and the Weaver went about her business.

Short-sighted though the Garou might be, not all of Gaia'sAnother_Fine_End-Myth/Danu's children were. And ultimately all came to the conclusion that humanity was to blame. Though the Mother of All had created humanity, she also birthed numerous children, both spiritual/chimerical and physical, and they were languishing as much under the Weaver directed onslaught. So, they set about to rectifying that matter, for with the fall of humanity, it would be much easier to bring about the changes that were needed. There were a few twinges of regret at the planned genocide, but not many, for while GaiaAnother_Fine_End-Myth/Danu was merciful, she could be quite brutal as well.

And so it came to pass that the Ratkin (rat shapeshifters) and the Acheri (fae with a facility with disease) came together, and created a plague, one with both a chimerical and spiritual vector, allowing it to be passed from human to human without even physical need, through their dreams even.

The end result? It succeeded. Within a week, all of Africa was infected. Two weeks, Asia and Europe had succumbed. By the third week, the rest of the world had succumbed to the plague. Within four weeks, 99.5% of humanity lay dead in the street. Of course, humanity is a resilient animal, and so some would prove resistant to it, but with such massive death in such a relatively short time, civilization as it was known ceased to exist. However, world wide, there was only approximately 30,000,000 left, and that was only assuming they survived the disease.

As deadly as this plague was, not all people were affected equally. While the rack and run of humanity died, those who were not human weren't infected at all. Whether shapeshifter or fae, they proved immune. They weren't the only ones, of course, for the undead (whether vampire or wraith) were spared the onslaught, as were those who followed the paths of magic, their mystical nature seeming to have set them apart from the multitude of humanity. And much to their own surprise, those who called themselves Imbued found themselves invulnerable to the disease as well, though their family, friends, and acquaintances succumbed to the disease. Needless to say, those who were styled the Fallen and the Mummies proved totally resistant as well.

However, the lesser kith and kin of these supernatural groups also survived. The Kinfolk of the Garou, the Kinain of the fae, the spirit touched (such as fomori, drones, and kami), ghouls, hedge magi, dhampyrs/dhampirs (children of Kue-jinAnother_Fine_End-Myth/Kindred), all survived as it were.

The deaths of so many humans all at once had the singular affect of rending the Gauntlet, tearing apart that barrier that separated the spiritual realms and physical realm. While there was still a slight Wall between the two, in many places the physical and spiritual merged into one. And with the deaths of those actively enforcing the Mists, the Dreaming reacted much as the spiritual realms did. Those places which were already caerns/freeholds, found their power boosted tenfold, or even more, for they were already ruptures between the physical and spiritual/chimerical domains.

Such a massive death of humanity sent the Weaver reeling, unable to exert control over the threads of reality as she once did so, allowing the Wyrm of Balance to shed her webs, and emerge once more. It quickly found its corrupted avatar, the Defiler Wyrm, and went to battle with it...and won, reabsorbing its power. As a result of this, the other two surviving avatars, Beast-of-War, and Eater-of-Souls, allied to prevent their primogenitor from subsuming them once more. As this created a schism in the spiritual world, so to did the surviving minions find themselves splitting in the physical world. The Perfect Metis becomes the first, and ultimately most powerful servant of the Wyrm of Balance.

Speaking of the Perfect Metis, one affect the Garou soon come to notice is that where before the mating of two Garou resulted in a sterile metis, such coupling actually gave fertile offspring. Those who were metis before found their own inability to conceive removed as well.

So, with greater access to the spirit realms, the Garou were able to call on their spiritual allies to much greater effect, while the fae found that they were able to call on greater stores of Glamour, enough so that eventually the dross of their mortality faded away.

Which served them in good stead when the Antediluvians rose. With the deaths of so many humans, the Kindred didn't fare so well. With such a drastic reduction of their food supply, there was great competition for the remaining 'herd' of humanity, and in most instances, they were treated no better than farm animals. This thinned the ranks of all but the most powerful, cunning vampires. Of course, when a great number of vampires dies, their death cries can awaken the eldest of their kind. So, as the Antediluvians regained their awareness, needing to assuage their hunger on the oldest of blood, they found they were unable to do so since most of their childer were already dead.

However, the Garou and Fae waged war on the Antediluvians as they rose (and not all of them had survived as it was through the passage of time). Between their own power, and great spiritual/chimerical allies, they defeated the Antediluvians to Final Death, and in their death throes, condemning the last few survivors of their clans except for those Kindred who were truly Caitiff.

Matters were better for mages, at least initially, but even with the reduction of Paradox, they found that their magick wasn't as far reaching as it could be. Since everything, every rock, every tree, even the land itself has its own spirit, the mages learned that even then there were limits to their powers. It didn't take long for those of a more shamanistic, natural bent succeeded better than those who put their faith in technology. Of course, with the destruction of technological civilization, those who relied on such an orientation found their powers drastically curtailed.

The Imbued found themselves protecting the last remnants of humanity, those who weren't captured by the last surviving vampires, as well as trying to safeguard them from more vengeful creatures. Probably the largest shock to them was finding that their abilities came from those spirits who were meant to be guardians of humanity, for with the fall of the Gauntlet, communication became more clearer...and in some instances, the spirits who imbued humanity also were spiritual guardians for the GarouAnother_Fine_End-Myth/Nunnehi.

The Fallen found with the death of the majority of humanity, most of their power was curtailed since the largest share of those to give Faith was gone. However, this was ameliorated somewhat by the fact that those who survived tended to have much more potent faith.

The deaths of many humans sent shockwaves into the Dark Umbra, though, creating another wind that took the Maelstrom to the greatest strength ever, to the point where its winds shredded even the Malfeans, and thrusting those human souls on the very periphery back to the living world...

Mummies themselves find that as bad as the deaths of so many humans were, it was instrumental in breaking the back of the force of corruption, allowing them to try and set things right once more.

Heh, well, I'm sure you get the idea...