The Magical Apocalypse

The Magical Apocalypse

“The world ended on a Monday.”

Overview

The Magical Apocalypse refers to the cataclysmic impact of an unknown celestial body on January 18th, 1886—a single event that ended the old world and birthed the modern era of Apocalyptica Arcanum.

The object—later associated with the origin of Shardisite—obliterated multiple regions of the Earth and triggered a chain reaction of geographic, climatic, magical, and metaphysical upheaval. From this moment forward, time has been measured as Anno Meteorum (A.M.), beginning with the first full year after the fall.

No part of the world was untouched. Nations collapsed. Natural law fractured. Magic—once the subject of folklore—erupted into daily existence. Even the planet’s axis itself was torn askew, plunging the world into a new, unpredictable age.

The Event

Witness accounts recorded at the time describe the sky burning green for hours before the impact. The object itself was not an ordinary meteor. Survivors spoke of unnatural auroras, strange magnetic phenomena, and visions of impossible things in the hours preceding disaster.

When the celestial body struck, it did not merely destroy—it transformed. The immediate blast vaporized Greenland and Iceland, sending shockwaves through the Earth’s crust and unleashing torrents of raw arcane energy into the atmosphere.

Where the impact occurred, Shardisite emerged—crystalline, pale green, humming with chaotic power unlike any known material.

The oceans surged, mountains crumbled, and entire coastlines drowned. Magic flooded into the world like blood from a reopened wound.

The Aftermath

In the first days after the Strike, Earth became a storm-wracked wasteland. Fires rained from the skies. Emerald lightning split the heavens. The seas swallowed cities wholesale. Uncontrolled magic warped animals, plants, and even survivors into grotesque new forms.

Worst of all, the planet itself shifted violently. Earth’s rotation tilted nearly ninety degrees, repositioning the poles. - The Atlantic Ocean became the new North Sea. - The Pacific Ocean became the vast Great South Sea. - Former tropical regions plunged into permanent winter. - Former polar regions warmed, and ancient ice sheets melted, flooding the world anew.

The Sea of Ghosts—a vast, cursed ocean covering the old Arctic—was born amid the ruins, concealing the original impact site beneath storms and shard-saturated waters.

The Awakening of Magic

Magic, once a myth, exploded into reality. In the wake of the Meteor Strike: - Spells manifested spontaneously among survivors. - Shardisite began to radiate chaotic magical fields, affecting minds, bodies, and landscapes. - New races emerged—elves, dwarves, orcs, gnomes, and others—mutations that stabilized slowly over centuries. - Divine forces awoke: Angels and Demons manifested in physical form, drawn by the raw emotional and magical upheaval of a broken world.

Belief itself became a catalyst for magic. Faith could now mold reality. Doubt could be lethal. Civilization struggled to adapt to a world where the impossible had become common.

Long-Term Impact

The legacy of the Magical Apocalypse defines every aspect of the world to this day: - Time is measured by the fall: Anno Meteorum (A.M.). - The Earth's geography bears no resemblance to the Beforetimes. - Nations rose and fell around Shardisite mining and magical warfare. - Environmental collapse—pollution, mutation, magical disasters—became constants of daily life. - Technological innovation and arcane power grew intertwined, birthing the industrialized magic of the modern era.

Culturally, the old world is mythologized as the "Beforetimes," a lost age viewed with equal parts nostalgia and horror. Few reliable records remain.

Speculative Accounts

The true nature of the object that struck Earth remains unknown.

Some scholars argue it was a fragment of another plane—a shard of a broken world or forgotten heaven. Others claim it was a divine punishment for humanity’s pride, citing the rise of religious extremism in the late 19th century. Arcane researchers speculate that the object was an ancient artifact, a seed of chaos sent deliberately—or accidentally—across the void.

While the origin remains hotly debated, the consequences are undeniable: the Magical Apocalypse shattered Earth’s physical, magical, and metaphysical order in a single, irreversible moment.

Modern Legacy

Every major religion, government, and magical institution traces its existence to the fallout of the Meteor Strike. It remains the defining wound of the world—unhealed, perhaps unhealable.

The Sea of Ghosts still hides the true crater beneath its cursed waters. The Maelstrom—a permanent magical storm—rages above it, preventing any direct exploration.

Scholars, priests, and sorcerers alike agree on only one truth: > The world did not survive the Apocalypse. > It became something else.