The Nameless Ruin, born with the name Cein Ād’belōr (meaning “Great Below”), is the child of the second highruler, Lord As'deghorath, the precursor of the semi-ratenous beings (of neither true birth nor among the lesser category), and the Harbinger of Erosene, or the End Times for all humanity and mortal kind. It is depicted as a six-legged mass of monstrous proportions rivaling mountains, whose passage sunders the deep earth and swallows the fiercest of storms. It is unclear the true sizing of the beast, with texts describing it rivaling the mountainous amenoths, while others describe it dwarfing them, and some posing all of the above as exaggerations. Although mistaken as a ferron, the terror is a mandragora (noted as the first mandragoran) which carries upon its body the Valus Worldcutter, an immense and emburdening form of armor forged by the realmic daemons as both safety and sentence. The Valus Worldcutter is always depicted along with Cein Ād’belōr, and is what lends to the beast’s mast-like head and stern-like body.

(For information of prophecy, see below)

Sometime within the Age of Solset, it was believed that a brief period of ethereal but unyielding darkness manifested and claimed a significant portion of the World’s surface, effectively dividing all life and land between two halves upon the Sunlands. This event was known as the Black Eclipse, or the God-wall, in reference to its linear, wall-like shape, and it allowed a brief period called the Age of the Schism in which the demons of the Realm could reign terror wherever the God-wall stretched. At the time, no being was thought capable of summoning such a catastrophe—save one, whose name was not spoken, and whose shadow already laid across the world before: the Dark Harbinger. It is believed that the Age of the Schism—though spanning four centuries—was but a test by the realmic Lord to gauge both the power of the then young beast and the aftermath that would ensue in the wake of its path. Such theories are only supported with the notion that the Age of the Schism only occurred once, and no more.

The name Cein Ād’belōr originates in likeness to an older power, a god spoken of in fragments older than the daemons themselves, and which drove them to inhabit the Realm. It ruled over an era with no crown, but as a presence in likeness to a divine being, and was given the name Cein Ād’chasor the Unreachable. Though never fully accounted for nor explored, the god is described as bearing ‘burning hands and an eternal veil, with a Worldly body of white.’ Both omnipotent and omnipresent, its rule has no documented history, for nothing that endured its time remained to bear witness to it directly, but only in reference. In rebellion to its power, Cein Ād’belōr was created in defiance against the Unreachable, and was fashioned to bear the armored mantle against its wrath and reign. What followed is left to inference, for it is said that the beast was not meant merely as a shield for the World, but to endure the god’s presence and power—and, in time, to subdue it—and take away its sway of influence so that the very skies and the residents of the Realm may no longer be at any god’s mercy.

In myth, Cein Ād’belōr is thought to be born a dragon, however, no hexapedal beasts, like regal dragons, were known to exist at this time. Instead, the Lord of the Realm and their power perfected the beast’s body through rituals and rites to better fit their goal. These rituals were described as involving a selected group of powerful daemons, called Erticiples, along with the Lord, with a massive collective effort to mystically reshape and biologically engineer the creature to better fulfill its destiny. A verse of the Book of Annalaid, from the Chapter of Revelations:

Detailed to have taken the Lord and Eirticiples nearly a calendar year before they succeeded, there were many changes to Cein Ād’belōr’s making, such as a hellishly hyperdontic maw, scabrously jagged and impenetrable skin, and most crucially: a ‘stolen breath and cleft pride.’ The two latter specifiers, detailed in the Tome of Revelations, being a focal point to the Ruin’s role, wherein the Eirticiples took away its breath and harnessed it into an artifact, and the Lord took its pride (or wings), illuminated within a duel between those two which lasted for a lustrum and caused significant destruction and hallowing. While it is thought the Lord’s decision was made for the fact that they would be repurposed as midlegs that would support its enormity, the Tome reveals it was rather a vow inspired by the mythical mandragorans; massive, regal creatures of the deep Realm, they terrorized the realmic daemons for all their time there, and in this ritual would they be conquered beneath the shadow of their making. Unknowingly, this is also thought to be the origin of all hexapedal beasts, as the six limbs would soon become a major evolutionary milestone for later descendants, of which follow from the Nameless Ruin.

After the near-pyrrhic victory, Lord As'deghorath drew his blade and severed the creature’s wings, and carved a massive wound along the ridge of its back. The process of the spar and effort it took to perfect this single swing resulted in the permanent maiming of his arms, yet there, the Eirticiples stowed its breath, but not before accursing it with their most infernal binds, a process which also resulted in their near-extinction. Repurposed, the creature’s breath endlessly released from the Lord’s scar. Wherever it walked, a World encumbering darkness followed; a darkness filled with an accursed myst capable of degrading all life and living, and absorbing the light of the sun, giving it extremely pernicious properties. Thus, within archives, versus, and stories told, its presence became less a name than an omen. Dread followed the beast through all tellings, one akin to one of the Great Sorrows, and within it mortals found a reflection of their own helplessness. This alone gave a fear enough that many would not speak its name, and thus, the title Nameless Ruin followed in spite of it.

In prophecy, myth, stories and fears do they share a commonality: that Cein Ād’belōr represents inevitability, and the misery it entails in its wake. Sometime in the far-future, the beast would reawaken, and in its return would arouse another God-wall—but unlike before, one more true. Not as a test, but in its full and final making to bring about the final era.

The Prophecy of Ruin

From an Unknown Seer about the lost chapter of Finality: