She nods. "And instead of a great honor, they were killed on the bloodstones for power. Do you know by what criteria they were—no, if I ask you questions like that we'll be here all day, continue, sorry."

He laughs. "There was a prophecy that said they would lead the White Mantle and their masters to their ends, but I do not know how the Eye knew who was a potential prophecy-filler, no.

"At any rate, a year after the White Mantle took control the Ascalonian prince led a band of refugees to cross the Shiverpeak Mountains to Kryta. He died on the way, but the refugees eventually did cross, with help from the dwarves. And it turned out that a handful of them were Chosen, too, but they found out about the sacrifices and escaped the White Mantle with the help of the Shining Blade, an order sworn to protect the Krytan royal line. The Shining Blade was then sold out by a traitor, but not before the Ascalonians took a boat in the Maguuma Jungle to the Crystal Desert."

"Why would they go there? Last I heard, there wasn't much of note besides some old impressive relics and sand. Maybe some ghosts, if they wanted to talk to dead people."

"Because they heard that the dragon Glint, who lived there, could help them Ascend—that is, become closer to the gods—and so they would be able to see the mursaat and fight them."

"I know what Ascension is," she agrees, nodding. "My father Ascended to visit the Underworld. In that case, yes, the Crystal Desert makes sense."

He nods. "Throughout these travels they were being helped by this wizard who told them they should go back to the Shiverpeaks next in order to find the last Seers, who would be able to provide them with a magic protection to the mursaat's most powerful weapon, a form of magical torture called Spectral Agony. So they went there."

"Makes sense, all right. That might be a thing we should look into for Lazarus if we have the time, later. I do not want to encounter something called Spectral Agony, thank you."

"...I believe all Seers are extinct, actually."

"Ah. Well nevermind that, then, I'll just have to refine my interrupts and improve my situational awareness and reflexes and follow you around to protect you from the horrible thing," she says, lightly.

He nods. "I will teach you the countermagic I used there, too, it's general-purpose enough I think it might work for Spectral Agony."

"Ooo, yes, that sounds wonderful, I love having new types of magic counters and yours did wonderfully."

He grins. "So. After that, they went to the Ring of Fire islands, where some mursaat were holed up, and fought them there, but the wizard who was helping them turned out to be the undead lich of Vizier Khilbron. The White Mantle's sacrifices to the Bloodstone were powering a seal on a portal to the Mists in a volcano, there, and Khilbron tricked the Ascalonians into breaking the seal and releasing demons called Titans into the world. Titans apparently had a bone to pick with the mursaat, because they systematically hunted them to extinction—with Lazarus being the exception, there. The Ascalonians also killed Khilbron again because he wanted to control the Titans—I don't actually know why, but it was presumably bad."

"So the Vizier did actually become an undead lich after blowing up my country. Great. Wonderful. Glad he's completely dead, then. What spell did he cast, though, it's not like any normal large destructive spell would end in becoming a—damn, there I go again, I'm sorry. I am very easy to distract when it comes to how magic works."

"And I unfortunately do not know the answer; some long-lost scroll from when the gods still walked around Arah, I'm sure."

"Probably, yeah." Lean. "So those were some very busy Ascalonians, I'm impressed."

"One of them actually went on to become busy in Cantha and Elona, too. In Cantha there was this spirit of an old bodyguard of the emperor—have you heard of the Jade Sea and the Echovald Forest?"

She blinks, surprised.

"... The Jade Sea, yes, it was the first echo I ever explored. So that's where that was. I actually think I spoke to an echo of the man you're talking about, he mentioned he was from Ascalon."

"—huh. Yeah that could be him. So, there was this bodyguard who let out a magic scream when he died that turned the Jade Sea into jade and the Echovald Forest into stone. His spirit returned a long time after that to try to exact revenge and become corporeal again, and his influence created a horrible affliction that turned people into monsters. After he was defeated—by that same man and some other people—Cantha created the Ministry of Purity to deal with the Afflicted, and later they expelled all nonhumans from Cantha, closed borders, and that's the last we have heard of them in over a century."

"Let out a... magic... scream...?" she repeats, slowly. "I don't. What. How? You know what, nevermind, if they're isolationist and cut off from the rest of the world it's not immediately relevant anyway."

He shrugs helplessly. "It's what the history books say, the serious ones, so it must be true.

"So, about Abaddon: there were six, not five, original gods. And they also did not create Tyria, they arrived here from elsewhere. Abaddon was the god of secrets and he was erased from history and trapped by the other gods."

She pauses to digest this. For a woman from what had been the most religious country in the world, with the sacred city built by the gods as its capital, it's certainly a lot to take in.

"... Kind of ironic, that the god of secrets becomes himself a secret. Okay. Extra, secret god, I'll roll with it. Uh. The gods arriving from elsewhere makes sense when considered with how they left, I suppose. They might have been godding it up in some other world, first. Then when this world became tiresome or inconvenient, they left. Which is incredibly insulting, actually, I would like to reaffirm my newfound atheism."

He grins. "You are a treasure."

Vetareh beams at him. "If they want me to worship them after leaving, then they'd have to make it up to me," she sniffs, loftily. "Which would involve making it up to the rest of Tyria."

"It is not, I should say, universal belief that they have left. Many people think they merely chose to become less active. No one has been to their realms and returned in a while, and even then Grenth was not one for public appearances. And Mad King Thorn showed up again last year after two centuries gone, so who knows."

"Well, if they chose to become less active, then I still have a problem with them, because clearly the world is not okay. Grenth might be off the hook, but where's Dwayna flying around helping the injured? Where's Melandru helping restore the newly risen Orr with life? Where's Lyssa with her sneaky 'hey guys be happy,' thing? I suppose Balthazar might be happy with going to war with the Dragons, but he's not helping, so where is everyone? If they're to be my gods, then they damn well need to take a sliver of responsibility for what happens in the world. Otherwise they're just powerful beings that fuck with us, and as you might have noticed from my opinion of the Dragons, I'm not okay with those."