When it comes to background story, few games are as in-depth and rich
as the story behind NCsoft's Lineage II. As a preview to their next
upcoming free content upgrade, Gracia, the development team has
released an in-depth look at the what's going on in the world during
this content. Luckily, Ten Ton Hammer has snagged the whole story for
you, along with three new screenshots! Enjoy!




The goddess Eva so loved the world and its creatures that to protect it
from the rising tide of monsters, she summoned the Kamael. Her desire
was to bend their original god-killing purpose, and harness their
immense strength to defend Aden. The results were, unfortunately,
disastrous.



The awakening of the Kamael came at a high cost. To push them into the
service of the Light shifted the natural balance of the universe. Just
as there cannot be light without shadow, or summer without winter, so
the benefits of the Kamael’s service to Aden offset the
balance elsewhere…



The Doom of Aden



Without warning, the easy confidence of the people of Aden was
shattered. Sudden disasters were reported throughout the land: whole
fields of healthy crops blighted overnight, unknown plagues laid waste
to villages, and the weather itself became strange and unpredictable.



People began to pay attention to what they had previously dismissed as
the ravings of the “lunatic fringe.” Now those same
dire prophecies of revelation and doom took on fresh and terrifying
meaning. The sages sought to reassure the people, but their words
lacked conviction—they had gazed into their crystal balls and
read the cards; they too felt foreboding deep in their bones. Even the
Orc shamans had prophesied that a long winter was finally about to
descend.



The land’s adventurers and other citizens had been having
strange dreams, where they fought against endless hordes of shadowy
enemies until overwhelmed. Some would wake up with headaches or wounds;
some wouldn’t wake up at all. The sages determined that the
increasing tales of a dream world and the tales of prophecies had to be
connected. They studied the bodies of the dream-killed and listened to
the tales of the survivors. They offered a slew of competing and
contradictory theories, speculations and conjectures, but there was one
thing all agreed on: this was an omen of a great evil advancing towards
Aden. To discover the exact nature of the threat, the sages feverishly
scanned the stars and gazed deep into their crystals.



The Discovery of Kamaloka



It was a tremendous undertaking, but the sages’ efforts
finally bore fruit as the symptoms of the crisis revealed their true
nature one by one. The deadly dreamland was, they determined, a realm
created by the power of darkness. The sages named it
“Kamaloka,” the place between the real world and
Hell. It was an apt name—the monsters encountered there, the
Kaneus, were the stuff of nightmares.



The sages were unified in viewing Kamaloka as a threat. Some grasped
the truth: it was a dimension that had broken off from the cosmic ether
through the power of the goddess of death, Shilen. Although similar to
the subterranean dungeons of the Seven Seals, it was far more
dangerous—those, at least, were controlled by the Priests of
the Seals—this hellish dimension was under no one’s
control. According to the Priests, the doomsday scenario centered
around the possibility that the dark force ruling Kamaloka could join
its power with the dungeons of the Seven Seals. If that happened, they
said, it may rupture Shunaiman's great seal and threaten the very
existence of the world of Aden.



The course of action was clear: Kamaloka must be stopped before it
unites with Seven Seals.



Following the Giran Assembly, representatives of the Ivory Tower
contacted the Priests of the Seals with the Assembly’s
demand: since this darkness threatened all life on the continent, the
Priests must share their knowledge of the Seven Seals with the Wizards
of the Ivory Tower. The Priests agreed. It was best to strike directly
at the foe’s heart, they said; better to defeat the enemy
before it comes. The magicians at Hardin's Academy subsequently hired
masses of dreaming adventurers and used them—inhumanely,
perhaps—to find the best route to strike deep into Kamaloka.



Fortune smiled on their efforts, and through a series of favorable
accidents they finally found the combination they sought. In fact,
their results exceeded all expectations: they managed to create a new
dimension adjacent to Kamaloka into which adventurers from this world
could teleport. They named the discovery the Rim Kamaloka and
adventurers actively attempt to enter from this point to defeat the
evil that lurks within Kamaloka.



The Source of Darkness



To the west of Aden lies the land of Gracia. Ages ago, the empire of
the Giants flourished here, but when they dared to rebel against the
main god Einhasad, she smashed their civilization into ruination with
the Hammer of the Stars., Gracia became infamous as the wretched place
where Emperor Shunaiman of old Oren expelled the worshippers of Shilen.
It is a hard, harsh, and barren land where survival is equally a matter
of luck and skill.



Upon the death the first king of a unified Gracia, the throne was
contested by Karneia, the king's heir, and Kuserus, the king's brother.
The resulting civil war caused a new level of suffering for a people
already accustomed to hardship. In the midst of these troubles, the
darkness began to whisper to the people of Gracia. The worshipers of
Shilen, long hidden but still faithful to their dark mistress, began to
spread their gospel of destruction. Inexorably, their influence spread
across the land and the seeds of discontent grew into hatred. Gracia
was plunged into darkness and chaos, affecting animals, commoners,
royals, adventurers, and even magicians.



Though she did not fully recognize its significance or origin, it was
her anxiety over this supernatural darkness that prompted Eva to summon
the Kamael. She did not realize that in Gracia, Shilen’s
realm was regrouping and descending upon the world until it was too
late. Like the outermost ripple of a great wave, Kamaloka was simply
the first indication in Aden of a far greater threat beyond its shores.



The land of Gracia had been reborn, as a land of darkness and
death…


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Last Updated: Mar 29, 2016

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