A long long time ago, well before the rise of the Roman Empire, Earth had various thriving civilizations which have become lost to history. Those civilizations were unlike those that came after and only the wealthiest societies of today could even compare to their splendor. It was a time of legends, a time of Gods and a time of magic. You see, back in those days the people could use magic freely and did so in a multitude of ways. While most just used magic to make their daily lives more comfortable, much like the technology of today, there were others who used their power to protect their homes from terrifying magical beasts and those who sought to use their power for nefarious ends. As time flowed, the most powerful of those noble warriors came to rule the strongest societies and were worshipped as living Gods.
For over five hundred years the Pharaohs of the middle kingdom in Egypt, the immortal Emperors of the Shang dynasty in China, and the kings of Atlantis, amongst others, ruled peacefully and humanity prospered like never before or since. Alas, this was not to last for one day, around 3000 years ago it all changed. As if out of nowhere, shadow like creatures flooded the seas and invaded the land, laying waste to everything and everyone they came across. The weaker societies crumbled almost instantly, and even those who had capable warriors struggled against the sheer number of demons, being overwhelmed before long.
Only Egypt, China and Atlantis, being protected by living Gods, managed to hold out. But even they wouldn’t have been able to last forever against the constant barrage. Therefore, the Gods made a plan to lure and bring the strongest and most capable of the demons, as well as their own warriors to one place in order to crush them in one final battle for the fate of humanity. The kingdom of Atlantis was chosen as the battleground, and through feigning a critical weakness most of the demon generals attacked to capitalize on it and those that didn’t were brought in through teleportation traps from battlegrounds elsewhere. A global coordination effort had paid off, the final battle had begun.
All throughout the war the demon generals have been on par with the human Gods but by catching the demons off guard the Gods managed to take down their generals and for the first time since the start of the war humanity was at an advantage. Alas, this too, was not to last. Amongst the demon forces there was one demon who stood out amongst them, as while until now he hadn’t fought himself, he gave orders to the generals with devastating effects. It was therefore assumed that he was a tactician, brutally effective on a large-scale battlefield but with no fighting capabilities of his own. This assumption was soon proven to be very, very wrong.
With his generals fallen around him, he finally took action himself radiating an aura like the Gods had never felt before. The Gods realized that this tactician wasn’t someone who couldn’t fight, but that he didn’t need to fight, until now that is. And fight he did, despite outnumbering him a hundred to one, the Gods felt their chances of victory wane into almost nothing. Still, they fought on, but as their numbers diminished, their despair grew. They who grew to the apex of humanities capabilities, being revered as Gods by the people, stood almost powerless against this demon who could only be described as the Demon God.
However even the Demon God wasn’t invulnerable as with each of the Gods he slew, he took damage that he couldn’t recover in the heat of battle. This had now turned into a battle of attrition, and when the number of human Gods was diminished to around twenty, the Demon God for the first time seemed tired. Seeing weakness and not wanting to let this opportunity go to waste, the leader and strongest of the human Gods unleashed one final devastating attack using all of his remaining strength. Doing so however came at a great price as his attack engulfed all of the remaining Gods, demons, human warriors and the entire continent of Atlantis itself, all of them vanishing from the face of the earth alongside the Demon God.
With the Demon God gone, the remaining demons vanished in smoke, as if they’ve never existed. Humanity was victorious. However, the damage was immense and with all of the Gods gone there was a power vacuum that needed to be filled. It didn’t take long for humanity to forget their once common enemy and they turned on each other. Whatever of civilization remained soon fell to war and the remainder of the warriors who fought against the demons, not wanting anything to do with useless wars amongst themselves, retreated from society altogether, taking the knowledge of magic with them.
Still humanity is nothing if not resilient, and slowly over time new kingdoms and empires rose and fell. Magic however was seemingly forever lost to the ages as the histories of the great demon invasion faded into stories, which faded into legend and were finally all but forgotten, with only a few records in China, Egypt and Greece remaining of the once fierce battle between gods and demons, as well as the name of the lost continent, Atlantis. And while historians won’t believe the truth of those records, taking them for mere myths, they can’t help but wonder what kind of event would suddenly lead to the fall of so many civilizations, naming it the mysterious collapse of the bronze age.
