Below is roughly what I intend to become the first chapter (short of the epilogue) of the Twilight Hollow game. It's intended to introduce Final for the first time as the somewhat demented being he is. You might notice that the title of the chapter is a double entendre, just like the "Advent of Dogma".


The Beginning of the End

The town was bustled with activity. The market square was packed, buyers and merchants alike. Hollering and jolly laughs rumbled throughout the crowded center of town. Much was going on, though it appeared to be like any other ordinary day in the trade town now calling itself Twilight Hollow.

Kids weaved in between legs, parents struggled to keep up and everyone else was in various shades of contentedness.

It was on this day that many things would happen.

One this day a lowly shipwright will discover the perfect source of energy to power the first airship.

On this day a hungry homeless boy would finally manage to steal a loaf of bread from a farmer's vendor without getting caught.

On this day construction on the town's first theatre of arts would come to completion.

On this day a helplessly romantic's confession of adoration will come to fruition.

But none of these things would be what made this a historic day. Not a one of these things would appear in a scribe's writings for many many years.

No, what made this day was the fact that is was both a beginning and an end. On this day the first sermon of the newly established Church of the Fallen would be concluded. There would never be another one within the city walls of Twilight Hollow, and it wouldn't be until the sun returned the next day, that everyone in Twilight Hollow would know it.


Down the street a ways, in the northern part of town, the bustling wall of people that pushed past the entrance to the town square was barely visible among the gleam of the sun.

The church's doors open and from it spilled a dozen or so civilians, apparently enlightened by the sermon they had just heard. As they stepped down from the steps and onto the stone street, a young woman pushed, very carefully down the short staurcase, a custom wheelchair in which sat the short heavyset body of a weathered old man. His hair was white with age and his spectacles were smudged from use. He worn an ornate robe that frayed at the shins, evidence of an attempt to cut away excess fabric as not to get caught by the mechanical seat. As his assistant steered him into the small group of people below they turned and looked on him with great reverence praising the words he had delivered just moments ago.

The humble old minister did his best to bow gratefully at the compliments he received.

"Oh minister, that was a wonderful ceremony!" a heavily garbed woman gushed, "it was positively inspiring!"

"Oh, thank you." the preacher replied quaintly.

"It was... interesting." a rather stout man said crossing his arms, "there will be another one tomorrow, won't there?"

"Of course, my son." the minister responded knowingly.

"Minister! My mother suffers the curse of a bogart!" she burst into the circle pulling along with her a withered old woman notably younger than the preacher himself.

"Come here, my child." he said beckoning the young woman and her mother to draw forward. The young woman agreed and kneeled down before the minister, her mother followed suit.

"Let us see what cannot be done... with the powers belonging to Asgard..." he spoke placing his wrinkly palm upon the forehead of the poor wretch.

Her forehead seemed to glow beneath his open hand for but a brief moment, causing everyone around them to bend forward and question whether they really saw what they thought they had witnessed.

At once the old womans eyes flickered open and she looked up at the minister and then to her daughter who she embraced. Cries of joy and lost lament rose from the small gathering, celebrating the couple's blessing.


"Heh. Typical."


The laughs and congratulations ground to a halt as the group split apart to reveal a new person in their midst, an apparently young man, fully cloaked in black at the edge of their perimeter.

"An unbeliever?!" the previously gushing woman blurted in immediate disdain.

The peron shifted his weight putting his hands on his hips.

"Heh. Like I said: typical."

He proceeded to stroll into the center of the church member's circle, looking down upon the young woman still clutching protectively at her mother and the old minister that gazed suspiciously up into the shaded hood that covered the newcomer's face.

"Who are you?" the small bearded minster gruffly demanded.

The young man drew back his hood revealing a relatively handsome face with piercing blue eyes and short cropped brown hair. He seemed more of a boy than a young man.

"I am called Final. At least, that's what the people will call me by tomorrow."

The man suddenly dipped low into a deep graceful bow, taking the minister hand in his own, and kissing the ring that adorned it.

"It's a pleasure to speak with you, minister..."

The young man looked up at the preacher and snarled the last word, his mouth forming a toothy sneer.

Suddenly a terrible fear lay it's grip on the crippled preacher, a shiver ran up his spine as he subtley struggled to remove his hand from the boy's sudden crushing hold.

"My dear minister, sir," the boy spoke in feigned innocence, the smirk still plain on his face, "how is that you have the power to cure blindess, but not the power to remove yourself from that tired old chair?"

He stepped up, releasing the minister from his death grip and began slowly circling the minister. The group spread out, afraid of what might happen.

"I-I mustn't abuse the power our lady bestows upon us by using it selfishly." the minister grunted.

Final grinned devilishly, "Oh? But wasn't curing that woman's blindess selfish? A demonstration of the abilities your so-called goddess provides to her 'chosen ones'?"

"I will not hear of this." the minister said cuttingly, "the goddess's power is given to only those who intend to help others in need. That is the way of the church. That's the only way I will have it."

"The goddess's power? You mean this?" All of a sudden Final, from behind the minister, lunge forward and placed his open palm upon the preacher's back. A flash of light shone for a moment, illuminating the old man's legs, and vanished as Final roughly shoved the cripple from his chair.

The old man staggered onto his feet in disbelief, wobbling slightly, but standing. The crowd hummed in disbelief.

"Wha-? You-?" he stammered only to be immediately faced by Final once again.

"Well, minister? What do you intend to do? Explain away the pheonomenon, that's what you do isn't it? Why don't you say it was divine intervention? Or say to these people that I am in fact a monk of the Fallen, merely playing a crude joke on an unsuspecting public? Or will you simply admit, you have full motor skills to begin with?"

The minister sliently coughed in surprise.

"You see, minister..." Final leaned in gently to the old man's ear, "I never had a fondness for liars."

With a single push and loud snap of dark energy, the old man fell back into his seat, his legs buckled painfully beneathe him. The crowd gave out shrill cries of terror.

"My, my, sir. You don't seem to be very good shape. We should bring you back into the church and get you fixed right up."

Without a moment's hesitation, Final drew down his hood and hooked a hand behind the back of the chair and jerkily dragged it and it's occupant up the stairs.

"Hey! You! Stop!" the man of the group ran forward and grabbed the hooded foe by the sleave.

Final turned to gaze upon the fool before him, his eyes shimmering mercilessly from the depths of his hood.

"I'd think you'd enough deception today. Were the ministers brainwashing lies not enough?!" inconceivably wrapping his arm around the offender's grip, Final pulled back and threw the man across the street, where he landed with a sickening crack. It was apparent his shoulder had been dislocated.

"Very well: you'll be fine, you'll shape up in no time! Your leg is not fractured and you are not suffering fatal internal bleeding!" Final burst out into cruel laughing as he lugged the chair and minister in through the double doors of the church and down the aisle leaving the crowd behind in disbelief.

Dropping the chair onto the floor like deadweight, the minister helplessly tumbled onto the floor, only exacerbating his already painful joints.

Final strode over towards a row of hands and with a snap of his fingers and a short leap of magic they all lite and dimly illuminated the daunting room. He stood just before the alter leaving the preacher on the floor between the seats.

"I've had enough the Light preaching lies, minister, I want it to stop."

The minister struggled to climb back into his chair as he spoke in exasperated breathes, "A Dark will never understand the powers that be... Let alone accept them."

The young man clapped an open hand to his forhead giving out an eerily fake laugh, "Assumptions! That's all that seems to drive your futile little engines isn't it? Tell me..."

He stomped over to the fallen preacher and lifted him promptly into the air by the collar with seemingly no effort.

"why do you assume that I'm Dark!? Have you forgotten already?" Hold his free hand up to the ministers neck, in it materialized a long translucent blade of light that crackled with life. It shimmered deathly close to the old man's exposed neck.

"You stupid, narrow-minded, fool. You never look at the big picture do you? You even came to this town because it had no allegience! Still trying to win allies over and drag them into the maelstom of a millenium old war, one which even yourself would be too cowardly to take part of!"

The blade vanished and he dropped the paralyzed preacher back onto the ground like a ragdoll.

He wandered around the room picking up and carelessly tossing aside random objects he found.

"It's truely the oldest trick in the book isn't it? Trick the guillible by luring them with rewards of an afterlife and nirvana, then locking the door behind them with threats of hell and damnation if they step out of line! It seems such a ridiculous ruse. It's a pity the populace is fool enough to believe it. What is this? The blood of your gods-?"

Final had picked up a goblet filled with a mysterious red liquid. After a quick swig he lurch forward and voilently spat it out.

"Alcohol!? You even poison your way into their heads! You scum!" Final splashed the remaining contents of the goblet into the ministers eyes, throwing the solid gold goblet at his head for good measure.

"The Dark are no better, I know, their greed is rivaled only by your own, but while they remain obsessively materialistic, you continue your tyranny behind the guise of religion and nationalism. It makes me want to puke!"

He lifted the now blinded and lame minister by the back of his robes and dragged him to the alter.

"And what's more? You so blindly start to belive your own lies! You're now hopelessly convinced that your imagined gods will lend you eternal life in a heaven you've never even seen! How inconceivably dumb is that!?"

Final breathed deeply, calming himself.

"But rest assured, minister. For you will no longer have to live this life. This world was never yours, nor anyone's to conquer. I will not stand by and let the Light and Dark make a victim of everyone and everything. Sleep well, minister."

In a single attempt, Final through the old man through the stained glass window behind the alter when he fell into the alley behind in a shower of glass.

Final gave one last maniacal laugh and the minister died a few minutes later.

The next day, two converging armies of Light and Dark were found brutally slaughtered. Witnesses claim it was the work of a single man.