Prologue
Pardon me…my name is Knoll…pleased to make your acquaintance… You may have heard of me, since I am a royal magician of Grado. The reason I decided to become a sorcerer was for two purposes: the former was to serve my silent but considerate Emperor Vigarde…and the latter was to prove that dark magic should not be mistaken as...how should I say this..."evil". The misconceptions of relating dark sorcery with evil die rather hard and slow. When I first became a shaman, a practitioner of elderly magic, I could barely contain my astonishment. By chanting the ancient language contained inside a tome of dark magic, I was able to manipulate the energies of darkness used by archaic magicians. In fact, the legendary Grado himself was a master of dark magic. The deep, ancient magic was…potent and useful… To study elder magic, one must focus and be dedicated toward one aspect: knowledge. Unlike the magic of light which is bestowed to those who pray to divine yet unknown entities, the magic of darkness roots from seeking knowledge, from understanding. We sorcerers distrust what we do not understand and strive to know the unknowable. The urge for knowledge has corrupted several magicians and has driven them to insanity. This further led to the belief that dark magic was power from the abyss. But one man made a decision; Prince Lyon's aspiration was to prove that dark magic had benevolent uses. The other royal magicians and I supported his cause, and did our best to provide him with as much assistance as possible. But who would have known…that this "research" would have such disastrous effects…This is my tale…