Aendún Gesceadneth

"I beheld five pale riders with horns atop their heads and calamity followed with them. The leader among them sounded a great horn that shook the world to its core. Upon this signal these riders drew gleaming white swords from their scabbards and with a peal of thunder they took peace from the world. Such blood was spilled by their hands that the very rivers and lakes became red forever after."
^{-Common, if somewhat inaccurate, translation of one of the Aendún Gesceadneth's most famous passages.}

The Aendún Gesceadneth is a tome of unknown origin that supposedly foretells the events of the world's ending- a period that has become known as the Anomie of the Gods. Cryptic and strange, the contents of the book are difficult to read and even harder to interpret. That does not stop doomsaying Widlasteri from preaching the imminent destruction of the world with this shakily-translated document as proof. The earliest known copy of this document resides in the library of Eruvanir, the homeland of the Elves, but other copies are widely distributed across Verrin.
The text is written matter-of-factly, from a first-person perspective. According to the text itself, it was written by an Elf named Ithist who lived in the second age of the Thurún calendar, before the Orcish invasion. The language is ancient Vaynir Elvish, which due to the immortality of Elves, has remained almost constant throughout the centuries. However, translation becomes difficult because some words interspersed in the text are of unknown origin, including the title. The meaning of many passages can only be inferred by the context of the preceding ones. Almost all sentences in the entire text have two or more possible interpretations.
The title, Aendún Gesceadneth, is traditionally said to mean 'The end of the stars and the heavens', but there is no evidence other than folk tradition for this translation.

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Aendún Gesceadneth

The text's narrative follows Ithist as he is purportedly shown by the creator god, Thengalir, the inevitable end of the world. The writer gives the impression that even the gods fear this event, and are unable to prevent it. When he begins describing the events in detail, the text becomes much harder to translate as more terms from the unknown language appear.
The first chapters describe a multitude of non-apocalyptic events that Ithist is shown, but these are not spoken about in any significant depth. He recalls seeing shattered shields and blood-soaked earth, as well as ships sailing the sea. A great tree, and a procession of horned riders. Some other imagery is cryptic and undecipherable, for example something is described as 'dripping with motes of otherness', and a lengthy section is given over to describing a 'tree of the wolfhead'. There is a verbose section that is thought to describe the breakdown of society, where all bonds of family and fellowship are discarded in favour of personal gain, and the worship of the gods is ended in favour of worshipping profane idols. As such, some have suggested that the following apocalyptic events are intended to be interpreted as a just punishment for the heathen people of Verrin. Some passages have been taken to describe conflict between the gods. The most common translation is Anomie of the Gods- a concept that has become a point of contention among scholars.
Around halfway through the text, the apocalyptic predictions begin. Ithist first describes how he witnessed the destruction of the stars (or perhaps the sun), which are extinguished one by one. Next, the moon is shattered into shards which rain upon the earth and level entire towns and cities. Then the oceans boil and the sky is turned to perpetual night. Ithist laments to Thengalir the terrible suffering caused by these events, but is interrupted by the sound of a great hunter's horn that shakes the world to its very foundations. One section of this part of the text makes mention in the unknown language of what are assumed to be Verrin's main sentient races- Elves, Dwarves and Giants. However, two more are mentioned. Some have suggested that these could be Orcs and Men, both of which were not known to Elves at the time of writing. Some point to this as evidence for the Aendún Gesceadneth's prophetic nature. The passage, although complex and verbose, is thought to describe how all the world's races are equally terrified by the peal of the horn.
Five beings of an unknown nature, often tentatively called 'pale riders', are then described as 'rending apart' the sky to allow them entrance to the mortal plane. Whether these beings were the source of the horn blast is unknown. Ithist watches with Thengalir as they draw their swords one by one- many speculate that their weapons are the Hargead Ýrnen. The riders swoop down to the earth, decimating cities with a single swing of their blade. Thunder and lightning accompanies each of them. The text states that Thengalir allowed Ithist to see no more, because it was too painful for the creator god to see his work undone.
The author Ithist never elaborates about his own life before or after this experience, although there is a small epilogue where he claims to be writing in a monastery in the city of Vanitasir. He also claims that Thengalir came to him in a dream some time after his apocalyptic vision, commanding him to create a written record of what he had seen to serve as a warning to the world.

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