Fhalgrim

 

Excerpt from Arthem's Ballad

Written by: Dalmert vü Ambershor

The Beginning of Art   Before there was color, matter or sound, nothing existed.   An empty space where song could not be heard nor lights be shone.   Portraits depicting beautiful landscapes of vibrant colors would remain unseen.   The soft touch of silken sheet, the rough texture belonging to a tree, neither be felt.   T’was nothing, nawt but a gaping void where the border between life and death was unexisting, for there was neither beginning nor end of the nothing - but that isn’t entirely true is it? Otherwise this exposition would be meaningless.
There was in fact something; an entity. Within the infinite darkness a force of light to reflect color, a touch soft and deep, a voice to cry songs. This we call Arthem, a name carrying the meaning ‘artistic beginnings’.     Nobody knows what was before Arthem, or how long the black nothingness had been before it. All I know, is that of a moment when the entity Arthem, whether it was from sentience or by design, began to create. This specific moment has many names.
The beginning, genesis, ginungmaw, the old chaos, firspa̹nw, ersmalelei, ercanesh, the birth of life and death. Whatever the name, it is the marking of the beginning as we know it. What there was nothing of before, now were plenty of.


Dots of light appeared in the darkness, hearts of different worlds in many strange‘a colors. Strokes of paint to illuminate the blackness, and from matter there was light. From light there was color, and in few worlds there would be a cloak of air to host song and sound. Had Arthem been a man this would be his infinity of artistry, where endless ink would be needed, for he would never be finished.   I am not completely certain - it might have been an accident, out of loneliness or ambition, if Arthem could feel such emotions - that a sentient creature was born from Arthem’s artistic spree. This being, neither man nor woman, the first sentient creator we know of named itself. In the ancient celestial language none of us speak it whispered in song, Valiar. Yes, that Valiar which we herein Crégorm refer to as God.   Settling in a world of blue oceans and brown dirt rising from the depths, Valiar watched as the inhabitants of this world lived primitive lives as hunters. These were called Dionothan; divine beast. The deity watched on with curiosity as the Dionothan carried out their wild and savage nature, millennium after millennium.   After one million years. the divine beasts had driven themselves to near extinction from their endless hunts. Merely a dussin remain scattered across the blue world, barely aging as the centuries kept moving forward. Without carnage and destruction being brought out, green pillars soon grew from the brown dirt. Endless vast landscapes of varying beauty emerged as soon as the remaining Dionothan had each entered deep slumbers hidden beneath the earth. Beasts of varying sorts, birds, fish, beasts, but none as monstrous or savage as the Dionothan. With a fresh canvas erupting with beauty, Valiar decided to take its first act as an artist to create life as well. A bipedal species of beauty and creativity, spanning into many different races. Adaptable, clever and strong. Always evolving and forever curious like Valiar itself.   Enter into our world we call Crégorm ourselves, the Afari. What we refer to this phenomenon as - the creation of our known world and ourselves - is the enigmatic entity Arthem.   Or, as we we refer to it in the Drabari tongue.   The Arcane Arts.