Theria Guild Guardian: Code and Courage- Prologue

Prologue: Njaro Mountain

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Njaro Mountain rumbled with a deep, earth-shaking roar that struck fear into every living soul. Dark billows of smoke swelled over its peak, thicker than the heaviest rain clouds, and rushed down the slopes as if guided by a malevolent force.

Within minutes, wildlife erupted from the forests encircling the mountain. Men, women, and children in nearby villages felt their courage evaporate. After all, when lions flee, what choice does a person have but to run?

Within the hour, seething red lava burst from Njaro’s core. Scalding and furious—hotter than any hell humankind can imagine—it poured down in rivers of molten fire, annihilating all in its path. Neither ancient trees nor birds, insects, or the last frantic animals escaped. Certainly, no human who remained, praying for divine deliverance, survived its touch.

When at last the flow cooled, it left behind a silent expanse of devastation stretching a hundred miles. Yet out of those hardened vents crawled a calamity even worse than the lava. In a violent twist of nature, new creatures emerged; what the people of Afrotheria would come to call ghost wraiths. These massive, dark beasts sported oily black hides and jaws lined with teeth that could shatter a human body in a single bite.

Thus, began a new era in the Empire of Afrotheria¹, one overshadowed by the menace of the ghost wraiths².

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1. Empire of Afrotheria – A fictitious empire found in the horn of Africa with high-tech capabilities. It is the setting of the story Theria Guild Guardian: Code & Courage. ↩︎
2. Ghost Wraiths – Massive, dark beasts with oily dark hides and jaws lined with teeth that could shatter a human body in a single bite. ↩︎