Greetings Duelists,
In addition to the announcement of the new Duels Expansion, we are releasing a new Desktop Wallpaper and a short story that will help explain a bit of backstory of the mysterious Abtu-Kahn and their return to Phyrra.
The Abtu-Kahn
You sit on a stone bench in the dank, sweaty haze of the Arena pit. You wipe your brow and flick a rivulet of blood to the dirt floor. Your fellow Duelists move through the darkness, the stone-on-steel sparks and the echoing screams of wounded combatants. You stand up and grow suddenly light headed. All around you, other Duelists are teetering and looking around with confusion and concern.
Then nothing.
You are floating in a void of warm darkness, held aloft by invisible fingers. The blackness before your eyes parts and you are staring at a tall feline figure. His short fur is orange, with deep black stripes. Dressed in simple robes of gold and blue, he wears a wide crown and carries a hooked staff and a flail. Despite sharp incisors, his smile fills you with warmth.
“I am Kuth-eh-Ket, High Phearaux of the Abtu-Kahn. I hope that you will pardon this intrusion.” With a wave of his hand, he indicates the large golden scarab that has appeared next to him.
“It is our custom to use the Scarbis only in times of dire need. To invade the mind of another being is grossly inhospitable. To invade the minds of a city would be inexcusable but for the grave circumstances at hand.” Kuth-eh-Ket sits down, regal on a throne of nothing. A deep but comforting purr emanates from his throat.
“To understand the danger we mutually face, you must understand the notion of ‘Qa’; The Great Mission.” The immense cat-man fades from view and you are staring into the cold, infinite darkness of starless space. The High Phearaux’s voice comes from all around you, intimate yet inescapable.
“In the beginning, there was naught but the cold void. Then, before anything else came to be, there were the Ket, the Creators.” In the darkness, a pair of enormous, green cat’s eyes open, filling your vision like heavenly bodies.
“Corveyne, man and Djena, woman. They could sense each other in the darkness, but they could not see.” Below the eyes, a cavernous, tooth-filled maw opens and emits a savage yowling. It shakes the void around you and leaves you feeling ill.
“They spent many ages wandering in the darkness, lost and calling for each other. Finally, in desperation, Corveyne plucked out his eye and used its light to cut through the darkness.” Before you, one of the cat eyes blinks out of existence and, with a deafening howl of pain, a sun blazes into life.
“Finally, in the new light, they saw each other…” In front of the newborn sun, two black cats the size of small planets float through the void. They see each other and embrace, rolling into a raven-black ball.
“…and their love created the world.” The black fur peels back to reveal the world of Makanis, an azure sphere in orbit around the new sun. The black cats reappear and float in space on either side of the globe. One-eyed Corveyne looks down on it with love, while Djena looks, panting, out into space. She turns transparent, her form fading to nothingness.
“Unfortunately, the strain of birth was too much for Djena, and she faded away into the blackness.” Corveyne looks around, his remaining eye wide with fright.
“In a desperate attempt to find her, Corveyne tore out his remaining eye, hoping to create a new light for her to follow home.” Corveyne’s remaining eye disappears and a large moon appears in orbit around Makanis.
“But the moon that was created gave off no light. Now he wanders the universe, blind and screaming the name of his lost love.” Corveyne fades away into the darkness.
“We are the Children of Ket, abandoned while our parents wander the vast emptiness of the cosmos, alone.” Kuth-eh-Ket appears before you again, seated on nothing, with a look of deepest sorrow on his long, savage face. He looks up at you.
“Only the concentrated power of the followers of Qa can bring them back. It is their guidepost. And so, we began Qa, the Crusades. We visited the land of Men, Orcs and Elves…” You see a ship filled with Abtu-Kahn cat-people arriving on the shores of Sarantalas. The Kahn disembark to a greeting of Elvish archers, bows drawn.
“We attempted to share the truth of Qa where we could…” You see a group of Abtu-Kahn enter a crowded tavern. Though you cannot make out their words, their sermon is met with jeers from a group of drunken men and they are chased out.
“Marked as heretics by the bald, distrustful denizens of this continent, we returned to our homeland. We had a desperate need to spread the truth and save our Gods, but no one to spread it to.” Your vision is filled with the image of a hard-faced woman, holding a glowing orb to the sky.
“Then came the light in the West.” You see a vast desert, pyramids dot the skyline like an angular mountain range. Across the desert, crackling circular doorways open up.
“It was Ahmett who first saw the truth of the portals…” A great black Abtu-Kahn, headdress in the shape of an alligator, steps through a portal and disappears from sight.
“If we could not share the truth on Makanis, we could bring it to the universes.” Kuth-eh-Ket fades into your vision, a knowing look on his face,
“And so it has been for seven hundred years. Though stories of the great Crusaders make up much of the Book of Qa, no Missionary ever returned to our world.” Your mental-host stands and looks into the void.
“Until recently…”
You see Ahmettt, a haunted look on his face, covered in dripping yellow lesions, step through the gate.
“A Crusader has returned…”
Behind Ahmet, in the darkness of the portal, you see red eyes and hear terrible chanting.
“But not alone.” Your vision is once again filled with Kuth-eh-Ket’s pleading visage.
“Something beyond belief, beyond terror and beyond the truths of nature has come back with him. Once again we must ask the Men, Elves and other beasts of the West for assistance. Our ships have already sailed.” The Kahn’s face, finally, fades from your vision and you hear a last phrase, echoed in your ear.
You stand up. Other Duelists are standing as well, shaking their heads and looking around with expressions of doubt and fear. In the same moment, you all mumble the same phrase…
“The Abtu-Kahn are coming… but not alone…”
