Broken Throne (Red Queen #4.5)(2)

The changing climate fed into deadly storm systems, both on land and at sea, driving many people inland from the coasts, where they found themselves facing blizzards, ice storms, tornadoes, and drought-born, long-lasting dust storms. Rapidly changing temperature norms effectively pushed humans to the brink, while leading to the extinction of many plants and animals. Sea-level rise also contributed to the boxing-in effect, forcing populations into smaller and smaller areas of habitation. There was also extreme flooding, which transformed the mouth of the Great River and the surrounding region, submerging hundreds of miles of land to form the coastlines we know today.



In conjunction with flooding, widespread earthquakes changed the western coastline, forming a sea in what was once a massive valley. Long-dormant volcanoes erupted in the northwest, shooting millions of tons of ash into the air.

It is interesting to note that, while multiple earthquakes and natural disasters laid waste to the continent, the most feared cataclysm never came to pass. According to the preserved texts, scientists and civilians alike were incredibly concerned by the possible eruption of the caldera volcano beneath what is now the Paradise Valley. Said eruption would have changed the world climate and destroyed most of the continent we now live on. At the time of the preserved texts, scientists postulated that the caldera basin was long overdue for eruption. By now, we are far beyond that. I will be petitioning the Premier and the People’s Assembly to organize an analytical team to keep tabs on the Paradise Valley and the sleeping giant beneath it.



It’s no surprise that, in the midst of such turmoil, disease sprang up in many regions, spreading outward even into “safe” groups. Many diseases were mutated versions of less-threatening illnesses or previously eradicated diseases finding new purchase in once-protected populations. Millions the world over succumbed to illnesses that had once been considered curable, and most civilizations began to fall apart.

All these, of course, were actions of nature or, some might argue, actions of the gods. Not so for the last of the Calamities, an act of choice and an act of men. We have military might today, bombs and missiles of varying size and quality, but nothing to compare to the monstrous weapons our ancestors created. Somehow, by splitting the tiniest pieces of existence, scientists of the old world discovered they could make the most destructive of weapons, called nuclear bombs. These were, throughout the various disasters above, used across the known world to varying degrees of destruction. Even before the advent of nuclear war, governments and citizens feared these weapons. Many planned accordingly. The vaults at Horn Mountain were themselves designed to survive such an attack, carved deep into the rock. According to the texts there, our own continent was largely spared the worst of these weapons. There are lands across the ocean that no longer exist, now either frozen over or sand swept, flattened by the wrath of a few and the ignorance of many. Far worse than the bombs themselves was, apparently, the aftermath. Radiation disease spread with the smoke and ash. Entire countries were destroyed, civilizations collapsing. Such is the case on our own continent, as demonstrated by the ruins of the Wash and the Cog. These lands are still too irradiated to reinhabit, poisoned by deeds thousands of years ago.



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Despite what my research tells me, I find the vast destruction achieved by military technology to be inconceivable, and will do more to corroborate these findings. It simply cannot be possible. Even the strongest of Silvers cannot level a city, and even our bombs cannot cross an ocean to incinerate tens of thousands of people. Perhaps this is my own ignorance, but I cannot fathom the death of millions by the order of one.



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There are few fixed markers of time during the Calamities, especially with long-lasting events such as climate change, which is still largely in play with our own world.

The scientists of Montfort have been attempting ice digs that I don’t entirely understand, but their work in the north is reportedly invaluable to the time line before the Reformation and even during the Calamities themselves. I will record what I can of their findings when they become available, but so far, early reports seem to indicate that radiated ashfall landed in the far north sometime around two thousand years ago. This places at least one act of nuclear warfare (ANW) at approximately 2000 OE, five hundred years before the Reformation. We can then ascertain that true collapse, at least on our continent, lasted half a millennium before civilizations began reforming.

Connecting the Reformation and the ANW to a pre-Silverian, pre-Calamities time line proves tricky, and again we must look for points of crossover. There are several mentions of catastrophic drought in the preserved texts utilizing the date 2015 CE (sometimes recorded as AD; could be an error in translation—must verify) onward. Other Calamitous events, such as earthquakes, sea-level rise, hurricanes, and the like are mentioned throughout fifty to sixty years’ worth of the preserved texts, but rapidly grow in size and scope toward the end of the collection. They are, however, small in comparison to the earthquake that split the western coast and the flood that reformed the Great River Delta.

Again, translation can be unreliable. Some texts vary in quality of preservation, and to my surprise and chagrin, many seem to disagree on the severity or magnitude of events, particularly those regarding climate. While one record might consider a warm winter to be the harbinger of a catastrophic climate shift, another downplays the same period of time or highlights a colder winter elsewhere. This pattern is very troubling, though I assume most consumers of these documents were able to identify the bias, as well as the lies or manipulations being presented.