Disclaimers: I don't own any of the characters or settings from Lord of the Rings or Xena the Warrior Princess
Author's Note: I appreciate your patience throughout the extensive prologue. It was crucial to establish the world and offer a glimpse into the profound impact of the Ring's return to Middle-earth. Now, our tales truly begin.
I: Prologue
Act VIII: Return of the Dark Lord
Barad-dûr, 3019 TA, March 25
The Ring of Power, a malevolent force that had tormented Middle-earth for centuries, was on the brink of destruction. Frodo Baggins, the unlikely hero who had borne this heavy burden across the perilous landscapes of Middle-earth, found himself standing precariously at the very edge of Mount Doom's fiery abyss. It wasn't just the physical weight of the ring that bore down upon him; it was the moral weight of his quest, a quest that held the fate of the world in its balance.
As Frodo gazed upon the sinister, alluring gleam of the One Ring ensnared upon his finger, the pernicious whispers of Sauron's malevolence crept deeper into his soul. The ring's seductive promises of power and glory unfurled before him like a tempting scroll, revealing visions of a future he could command, the ultimate master of all. The One Ring was no longer an inanimate object; it had become his confidant, his precious possession that he could not bear to relinquish.
Resisting the ring's insidious allure proved nigh impossible. Frodo, eyes aflame with both desire and despair, declared in a voice heavy with the ring's corrupting influence, "No, I cannot. The ring is mine!"
He turned his back to the roaring inferno and confronted Samwise Gamgee, his loyal companion through thick and thin. The look in Sam's eyes was a mixture of horror and disbelief. He had journeyed alongside Frodo through countless trials and tribulations, risking life and limb in their shared pursuit. Sam had prayed that Frodo would summon the strength to resist the siren call of the ring, but it seemed that hope was fading.
"Mr. Frodo," Sam implored with tears in his eyes, "do you not see the peril we're in? You must cast it into the fire! It is the only way to vanquish Sauron! Please, Mr. Frodo, for the sake of all that is pure and just in this world!"
Frodo, ensnared by the Ring's malevolent grip, remained deaf to the desperate pleas of those who cared for him. With a twisted smile, he raised his trembling hand, fingers inches from donning the accursed One Ring. His resolve seemed to waver, and the shadow of despair threatened to consume him completely.
Just when it appeared that all hope was lost, a dark figure emerged from the shadows. Gollum, the wretched creature who had trailed the two friends with sinister patience, seized this opportune moment to reveal himself. "It's mine," Gollum's cry echoed a mixture of madness and possessiveness in his voice. "My own, my precious."
Invisible to the common eye, Frodo had succumbed to the Ring's sorcery. However, Gollum's uncanny intuition led him straight to his elusive prey. With a frenzied lunge, he launched himself at Frodo, locked in a ferocious battle to strip the Ring from the hobbit's finger. The two figures, locked in a life-and-death struggle, inched perilously closer to the cliff's edge, their fate hanging in the balance.
In a final desperate maneuver, Gollum sank his yellowed teeth into Frodo's finger, wrenching the Ring free. But victory came at a cost, as Frodo found himself clinging precariously to the cliffside, Samwise Gamgee's desperate strength the only thing keeping him from plummeting into the abyss.
Meanwhile, Gollum, his eyes gleaming with malicious triumph, clutched the One Ring with trembling fingers. He teetered on the precipice, intoxicated by the power of his "precious." With a fateful step, he descended into the fiery chasm, the Ring slipping from his grasp as he fell.
For a fleeting moment, all seemed hopeful. The Ring tumbled toward its doom, descending into the seething fires of Mount Doom. Middle-earth stood on the cusp of salvation, the weight of its redemption resting upon this pivotal instant.
Frodo and Sam found themselves on the precipice of destiny, a palpable sense of impending doom descended upon them. The sky darkened, and a chilling roar reverberated through the air, causing their hearts to race. High above, an ominous silhouette eclipsed the sun, casting a foreboding shadow over the scene. It was a Nazgûl, one of Sauron's sinister lieutenants, mounted atop a nightmarish winged creature. Its malevolent presence signaled the arrival of a relentless force, driven by the insatiable desire to claim the One Ring for its dark master.
A mere moment before, when Frodo had donned the Ring, Sauron's malevolent attention had been abruptly drawn to Mount Doom. His gaze, along with the sinister focus of his servants, had converged upon the ring's irresistible lure. With terrifying precision, the Nazgûl descended upon Frodo and Sam, their monstrous steed swooping down with eerie grace. The dark riders flew over the hobbits and into the very cliffside, executing a daring maneuver that allowed them to intercept the Ring before it could be consumed by the molten abyss, where Gollum was sinking.
With a swift and ruthless motion, the Nazgûl's clawed hand snatched the Ring from Gollum's trembling finger, rending flesh and bone in its terrible grip. Gollum's anguished scream pierced the air as he watched his "precious" wrenched from him, only to realize that it was now engulfed in the searing fires of Mount Doom.
With the One Ring secured in its possession, the Nazgûl departed in a dramatic whirlwind of destruction, leaving behind a haunting tableau of blood and fire. It set a relentless course toward the imposing fortress of Barad-dûr, where Sauron eagerly awaited its return.
Sauron, perched atop his sinister tower, had been an omniscient witness to the unfolding events through his malevolent eye. A surge of fear and despair had gripped him, as he believed his very doom was imminent. He dispatched his loyal Nazgûl with unwavering resolve, and they moved with unmatched swiftness and stealth toward Mount Doom, evading any detection or opposition.
The culmination of this gripping narrative came as Sauron received the Ring with a triumphant exultation. With a sense of boundless satisfaction, he slid the accursed artifact onto his bony finger, and an electrifying wave of power coursed through him. In that moment, he felt invincible, an indomitable force that knew no equal. A terrible laughter, echoing with an unearthly resonance, erupted from his lips, shaking the very foundations of the earth and sky.
"The Ring is mine!" he bellowed, his voice a malevolent proclamation that sent shivers down the spines of all who heard it. The fate of Middle-earth now hung in a precarious balance, as the Dark Lord reveled in the possession of the One Ring, and the forces of good faced their greatest challenge yet.
As Sauron gazed out from the heights of Barad-dûr, his malevolent eye turned towards the sprawling expanse of the Black Gate. There, the epic battle raged on as his formidable army clashed with the resilient forces of Hope, led by none other than Gandalf and Aragorn. The defenders of Middle-earth fought with unwavering bravery and valor, their swords and spells flashing amidst the chaos of combat. But despite their indomitable spirit, the odds were stacked against them, and they found themselves retreating, inch by inch, before the relentless tide of Sauron's minions.
From his dark vantage point, Sauron contemplated their struggle, a sinister smile playing upon his spectral lips. He possessed the power to bring an end to their defiance once and for all, to extinguish the last flicker of hope in the hearts of these valiant warriors. However, for the time being, Sauron's malevolence found its satisfaction elsewhere. With the One Ring now securely in his grasp, he had ascended to the pinnacle of power in Middle-earth, an entity beyond challenge.
No force in the land could stand against him; they could try, but they would ultimately fall before his might. Time was a luxury he now possessed in abundance, and he relished the thought of dealing with certain adversaries personally, savoring every moment of their inevitable defeat. Chief among these foes was the King of Gondor, whose fate Sauron reserved for his own macabre enjoyment.
Sauron's grand design was to assert his dominion over all of Middle-earth, a task he had entrusted to his vast legions. These minions of darkness would carry out his will and extend his rule, but there were select individuals who merited his direct intervention, for their defiance ran deep, and Sauron derived perverse pleasure from their suffering.
However, at this moment, his unwavering focus remained fixed on the One Ring, the source of his ultimate power. The hobbits who had borne this burden now lingered unnoticed in the shadow of Mount Doom. Sauron knew they had no escape, and he had no doubt that his relentless forces would soon locate them. His dominion over Middle-earth was no longer a dream but a nightmarish reality, and the world trembled beneath his malevolent gaze.
The moment had arrived, a culmination of centuries of dark designs and a relentless pursuit of power. Sauron, the Dark Lord, stood atop the accursed tower of Barad-dûr, his skeletal hand gripping the One Ring. It was a momentous occasion, a crescendo in the symphony of malevolence that had played across the ages. As the Ring slid onto his bony finger, a surge of ancient, unfathomable energy coursed through him, and Sauron's very essence seemed to shift.
Memories, long buried beneath layers of time and darkness, surged to the forefront of his consciousness. He remembered the forging of the Ring in the fires of Mount Doom, the insatiable hunger for dominion that had driven him to create it. The Ring had been his masterwork, a vessel of his essence, and now it had returned to its rightful owner.
Emotions long suppressed by the dark shroud of his existence resurfaced with a torrential force. Sauron felt an intoxicating blend of triumph and ecstasy as he realized that his dominion over Middle-earth was no longer a dream but a devastating reality. He was no longer a disembodied eye, a distant menace; he was corporeal, his presence an undeniable force.
With the Ring upon his finger, he felt a unity with the land itself, an intimate connection that sent shivers down his ethereal spine. He perceived the world in a way he had not since his fall from grace, sensing every heartbeat, every footstep, and every tremor of fear. The very earth groaned beneath his newfound might.
In this pivotal moment, the energy of Middle-earth seemed to shift, as if acknowledging its new master. The very air thickened with malevolence, and the sky darkened as if nature itself recoiled at the return of this ancient evil. A terrible laughter, echoing with a resonance that shook the heavens, burst forth from Sauron's lips.
"The Ring is mine!" he proclaimed again, his voice a cacophony of triumph and malevolence, a declaration that resounded throughout the land. In that instant, the fate of Middle-earth was irrevocably altered, and the forces of good quailed before the newfound might of the Dark Lord. For Sauron, this was a moment of ultimate vindication, a resurgence of his dominion over all that lived and breathed. His malevolence had triumphed, and the world now cowered beneath the shadow of his tyranny.
Indeed, as Sauron reclaimed the One Ring, a complex and enigmatic dynamic unfolded, one that left even the Dark Lord himself both exhilarated and wary. The Ring, crafted by his own malevolent hands, bore a consciousness of its own, a sentience that had endured through millennia of separation from its master. In its absence, the Ring had journeyed through realms unknown, tasted the ambitions and desires of different wielders, and imbibed the essence of countless worlds.
As it slid onto Sauron's bony finger, the Ring did not merely bestow power upon its master; it reasserted its own claim to dominance. It was not a mere tool, but a sentient entity with its own ambitions and agendas. The Ring cradled within its ancient core the echoes of a thousand whispered secrets, the desires of countless souls who had coveted its power. It had tasted the intoxication of dominion and the bitter sting of betrayal.
For a moment, Sauron felt an exhilarating surge of energy, an affirmation of his supremacy over Middle-earth. But this sensation was accompanied by a subtle undercurrent, a whisper of defiance from the Ring itself. It was not a willing servant; it was a force that sought to manipulate and control, to shape the destiny of all who came into contact with it.
Sauron, in his lust for power, had unwittingly forged a double-edged sword. The Ring was both a tool of dominion and a cunning adversary, its true intentions veiled in shadows. It could serve its master's insatiable hunger for power, but it also harbored its own inscrutable desires. As Sauron reveled in his resurgence, he could not ignore the unsettling notion that the Ring possessed an identity apart from his own. It was not an extension of himself; it was an enigmatic entity with its own will. The implications of this realization were shrouded in mystery, and Sauron's emotions swirled in a tempest of triumph and unease.
The One Ring was not a passive artifact; it was a player in the grand tapestry of Middle-earth, a participant in the unfolding drama of power and destiny. Its motives, its desires, remained inscrutable, hidden in the depths of its ancient soul. And in the turbulent days to come, as Sauron wielded his newfound might, the true nature of this ancient relic would become a source of both intrigue and peril, a mystery that would test the boundaries of his dominion and the resilience of those who dared to defy it.
Nevertheless, Sauron and the Ring were not the sole beneficiaries of the Ring's return to its master. As Sauron donned the One Ring and embraced its malevolent power, Mordor itself seemed to come alive with a sinister fervor. The very land pulsed with an unnatural vitality, as though the very earth beneath its darkened skies responded to its master's return. It was as if the shadows that enshrouded this accursed realm had deepened, grown more potent, and more malevolent.
Sauron's presence, now amplified by the Ring, coursed through the veins of Mordor like a venomous surge. The very air seemed to crackle with dark energy, and the skies above Barad-dûr churned with ominous clouds. As the Ringwraiths returned to their master's side, they too felt the change, their spectral forms pulsating with newfound power.
Within the fortress of Barad-dûr, where Sauron's will was most concentrated, his servants, the Orcs, Uruk-hai, and all the denizens of darkness, felt the palpable shift in the balance of power. They reveled in the malevolent energy that flowed from their master, their loyalty and obedience intensified by the overwhelming darkness that now emanated from him.
The very earth of Mordor seemed to tremble beneath the weight of Sauron's dominion. The twisted landscape, barren and desolate, bore witness to the rekindling of its dark heart. The mountains loomed like ancient sentinels and the plains spread out like a sea of shadows, all resonating with the dread and anticipation of the return of their Dark Lord.
As night fell across Mordor, the land itself seemed to awaken. Sinister whispers echoed through the blackened valleys, and eerie, ghostly figures flitted at the edge of vision, haunting the fringes of reality. The moon, obscured by smoky clouds, cast an eerie glow upon the desolation, intensifying the foreboding atmosphere.
The creatures of Mordor, already steeped in cruelty and malice, found their malevolence heightened by Sauron's return. Their eyes gleamed with a sinister fervor, and their snarls and growls reverberated with a newfound savagery. The very darkness of this realm became a weapon, a shield, and a source of power, as Mordor itself rallied in response to its malevolent master.
It was a terrifying transformation, a resurgence of darkness that sent shivers down the spines of those who dwelled within its bounds. The world beyond Mordor could not comprehend the depth of this sinister change, for here, in this accursed land, the very essence of evil had taken on a tangible form, and its dark reign was absolute.
((Upcoming Act Eight))
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