Malefliction — Matthew Smith

Many millennia have passed since a sorcerer – Kel'Deth – bound humanity to his will to repress a colossal error, creating of himself the first deity. Humans stopped questioning their true nature, and the world became a place devoid of meaning. Now, pleasures abound as a deity works toward promises of delivering eternal earthly life from a seat of bliss in the capital of meaninglessness, Teldorio. But the cost for mankind was the complete disconnection with his true nature. And the energy to feed this sick, empty society must come from somewhere: the ultimate universal violation of man's essence, the leaching of his lifeforce in Kel'Deth's abysmal soul fields. Vedrath, ancient sorcerer and erratic genius, sets out to reunite his clandestine cabal to challenge the deity of self-indulgence. But even more ancient powers lurk in obscure realms, and Vedrath is blind to their presence and motives. The northeast lands lay under a miasma of darkness, where a single authority holds demesne: The Dread Sorceress, who desperately craves a way to relinquish her burden of humanness. But this promises to be another ravaging failure, threatening to pull humanity into a darker pit than the one their souls currently inhabit.