The Eternal Darkness
The final and most terrifying age of the Chao in Space Chronicles now follows. It was a harrowing time of mystical fear and strange otherworldly forces. The Basalt Kings had restored order, but their great foe, Indie, was not vanquished. The once-honored Angel Chao had been wandering Malodor for several years, and as time passed, the filthy conditions took their toll upon his body. In his weakness, the spirit Mayhem entered into him and corrupted his flesh until he was no more than a mockery of the children of Chaos. Mayhem called his abhorrent creation the Catastrophe Chao and he unleashed Indie upon the world of his most hated foe.
Indie began by slaughtering his fellow criminals who wandered Malodor, and every Chao that fell at his hands was tainted with the essence of Mayhem until he, too, arose as a vile Catastrophe Chao. This plague swept through the catacombs of Xeros until they had amassed a legion of vile abominations of Mayhem. Within those fetid caves they bred and multiplied to unholy numbers until their hordes swelled forth to the surface.
The Light Chao received prophesies from the Chaos spirit warning them that this was the end of their age. They called the Catastrophe Chao the harbingers of death, sent to punish them for the many heresies they had committed.
The Basalt Kings refused to heed their prophets and retreated underground where they established clans to protect the Mobian gems that contained the spirit of their master. It was a time of darkness and desolation. The Catastrophe Chao swept across the land, marring the once holy planet of Xeros. There were some who dared to challenge them, but they stood no chance as they were consumed by the rushing tide of black filth. Only the subterranean strongholds of the Basalt Kings held fast against this great evil, but even they could not defend themselves forever.
At last it was that Xeros was aligned with the path of the Mayhem Machine, and Bad Lad fired the terrible machine at the hated planet. The hallowed Death Blossom eclipsed that once sacred world and reaped the life from its very core. The Catastrophe Chao were scattered like insects as their lives were extinguished like mere embers submerged in an ocean. Only the seven clans survived the onslaught and even they incurred great losses.
In a matter of days, all light was blocked out from the planet and nothing lived that was good. The Seven Kings then assembled for the first time in years, and it was agreed that they could not save their families without coming together to face this alien threat. Together they ascended through the shadowy firmament and, led by its traces of death, they discovered the unholy fortress of Bad Lad where the Mayhem Machine dwelt therein.
With their combined might, the seven kings sundered the gate and purged every monstrosity that the powers of Bad Lad could muster. At last they entered the rotted heart of the fortress where the Mayhem Machine's ritual was proceeding. Suddenly they were assailed by maddening creatures of the Void, and one-by-one they fell to the cleansing fire of the Devil Chao.
Out of the flames did Bad Lad arise and he spoke with the tongue of a viper: "Where is your master who alone is worthy of facing me in open combat? Who are you to challenge me, whose sight is all-seeing and whose reach is beyond the confines of this world?"
Then Bad Lad held aloft the orb of the Fortune Teller, and the kings quaked in fear. With the orbs blasphemous power he altered the kings' names beyond recognition until they were unpronounceable.
So great was their shame that the kings were prepared to take their own lives when a glimmer of hope shone through the darkness. It was none other than the Mobian gems encrusted within their crowns. In a flurry of blinding light, the emeralds were emblazoned with the radiance of seven stars.
Then the seven kings, imbued with the power of Chaos, smote Bad Lad with a holy bolt of white lightning, and he fell, a ruined wreck of twisted metal and black blood.
Then they turned their fury upon the Mayhem Machine, and with the sound of a thousand peeling bells, the cannon cracked and its shadowy entrails were emptied into the atmosphere, enshrouding the broken planet in a nebula of darkness.
The fight was not yet won, however, for Bad Lad arose, his form now wholly visible in all its morbidity. With a wave of his hand he revealed the wondrous Angel Stone—that sacred gem that contained the spirit of Chaos.
"Raise your sword against me," hissed Bad Lad," and I will crush what remains of your master."
The seven kings were not at all shaken by his threat and together they poured forth all their strength into a lethal blast that shook the very foundations of the mortal plane and the Void alike. And as the body of Bad Lad was being rent asunder, molecule by molecule, he spoke, "Let my life be a sacrifice to the Great Dragon!"
The light faded and the Mayhem Machine roared to life once more. Its Hellish furnace belched forth putrid flames and the entire machine melted into a metallic sea. Out of the molten lake emerged a hideous claw larger than the planet itself. It was the Great Dragon, the body of Mayhem that had been imprisoned in the Void since the end of the Formation.
No amount of logic or reason could describe the return of Mayhem. His body filled the galaxy until he was unrecognizable to the mortal eye. With his tail he swept out a thousand stars, he rent a hundred planets with a single swipe of his claws, and in his jaws he swallowed galaxies.
The Great Dragon unleashed a star-splitting roar that shattered the sanity of the Chao, rendering their minds as blank as newly born infants. Then with a single beat of his wings, he unmade the planets of the Chao and reshaped them into worlds of darkness and desolation. The Mobian gems and the Angel Stone were scattered throughout the universe, and the seven kings were now seven children cowering before this supreme being of destruction.
Mayhem's victory was all but complete until one of the kings (scholars argue over which one exactly) tripped over the Orb of Naming. In one ridiculous motion, the king threw the orb at the Dragon as one might throw a pebble at a mountain.
No one is certain how such a miracle occurred in that moment, but surely the spirit of Chaos must have been present. The orb began to glow like a candle submerged in a sea of darkness, and when it struck him he roared in agony as his body was returned to its state of molten metal. The black liquid, pulsating with dark energy, was sucked into the orb, and the darkness faded.
Thus ended the Great Dragon and his brief yet terrifying reign. The orb, however, was not nearly strong enough to contain his entire form; thus, the spirit of Mayhem was allowed to wander the mortal world thereafter.
Here ends the Chao in Space Chronicles, a history full of both glory and shame. Only time will tell what the great Chaos Spirit holds in store for our future. Long live the Lasting Crown!
