Legends of Runeterra

The caravan took me to Dust Town.

The town was bleak and silent, a place so far south of the railroad line that it might soon be swallowed by the desert like so many other two-street towns. I remembered it as a place of grandeur during the Great Expansion, but now all that remained was a grimy bar and a few houses sunk in the sand. Everyone's face was heavy—they looked at me as if seeking salvation, but I wasn't a true angel, and I couldn't answer their prayers.

I don't know how much longer this place can hold out in the darkness of the frontier, or whether I'll ever see it again when I return. Regardless, I must keep going.

My target lies to the east, nestled between arches of massive stone and miles of open wilderness. No sane person would settle in this land, for no matter how well prepared, they would be unable to withstand the dangers it presents. And the prey I seek is no ordinary bandit or highwayman. Therefore, I am traveling with a hitman. Half the fee has been advanced, and the remaining half will be paid upon completion.

He's a massive, powerful man, filled with the darkness common to all of humanity. I can practically feel his blood boiling in his blackened heart, but this adventure demands a man like him. No doubt. No hesitation. Just pure strength and intuition. That's why I've brought Darius the Headhunter with me, and we'll ride into the heart of the Black Canyon.

Deep in that barren land, we will search for the devil and slay him.

April 1868, 6

It's been two days since we left Dust Town, and Darius has barely spoken. He's cold and single-minded, fueled by a raging rage deep within him. He reminds me of the East, my creator, but even more of his own ancestors—the ones who trampled the Garden of Paradise years ago, slaughtering everything within it.

This made this adventure seem quite ironic. A machine built in the image of an angel, and a killer, descended from a killer, made a pact to destroy the products of human sin. I'm sure my companion would find this laughable.

We rode against the wind, following the scent of sulfur smoke, the prints of burning horseshoes, and the grass scorched by hellfire. We walked a thousand miles after a thousand miles, the land an endless, monotonous patchwork of dust, scrub, and wild lavender stretching to the horizon. This is a blessed land, much of which I have explored since my birth, and will continue to explore for decades and centuries to come, as long as this body can hold out.

Sadly, the secret art of my creation has long been lost. I am now the first and last mechanical angel, fueled by the blood of the old Choir. Their whispers still reach me, but the gods are dead, their servants scattered across the borders. Those whispered prayers no longer hold any power, and eventually, they too will vanish from the world. That's why I carry this journal with me: so that those who survive will remember us, or at least our stories, after the old ones are gone.

One day, my physical form will rust, and the things that reside inside will return to the souls of angels. It may be a long journey. I often wonder, when my age comes to an end, whether I will have the chance to take another look at this land full of painful beauty.

April 1868, 6

We smelled the ranch before we even saw it. The two-story farmhouse and stables lay reduced to charred ruins. These signs pointed unmistakably to the demon we were pursuing: smoking horse hoofprints and the charred remains of humans and animals littered the ground, as if a tyrannical giant had wantonly abandoned them to oblivion. Each scorched face twisted upward, as if gazing fearfully at the mouth of Hell in the distance.

Cursed devils! They had all fled their prison of smoke and darkness, a horror from another realm. Some might have made this place their home, most notably the bull-headed stalker of the Old World, who had stalked this land since the time of the ancestors of the ancient gods. But others had spent eons in the underworld, tormenting the souls of sinners and inflicting pain on the malevolent and broken spirits of humanity. Then, in the continent-wide enclosure movement, Paradise fell, and humanity lost its paradise forever.

The human soul has long been lost, and now they have nowhere to go but the grinning Mouth of the Abyss.

Yet even Hell could not contain the vast numbers of humanity, and so it erupted in flames and fury—the devils finally able to flee to their long-maligned kin, the demons. These bestial beings, disguised as snake oil salesmen, amusement park sideshows, and itinerant undertakers, their penchant for orchestrating brutal ends for the desperate coincided with this new explosion of hellfire and death.

Now that heaven is empty and hell is full, these poor mortal souls are almost all helpless and can only wait to accept the hell curse they created with their own hands.

Yet, Darius seemed unfazed by the devastation we'd left behind. He recounted his contractual obligations, vowed to me the success of this adventure, and then wondered what a mechanical angel could possibly gain from the long-overdue battle between good and evil. He didn't seem to feel out of place in my presence, nor did he expect an angel to miraculously alleviate the darkness within him. He seemed indifferent to everything except the battle that lay ahead and the rewards that would follow.

I trust this man, but I have my doubts about humanity and human nature. It's a pragmatic feeling, and I suspect he has the same trust in me.

Sometimes I would watch him while we camped for the night, and his eyes would always be drawn to the glowing coals of the campfire, perhaps searching for something I couldn't see.

April 1868, 6

After many days of tracking the devil's terrifying riders, following the charred hoofprints of horses, we arrived at the mouth of the Black Canyon. Darius's horse refused to move forward, so I will leave my horse, Fuchu, here, and the two of us will continue on foot. Ultimately, this is to our advantage. It will prevent them from being suddenly startled and our prey from being alerted.

The headhunter carried a massive axe, its handle etched with countless notches, each representing a bounty on a head. Those who have renounced emotion are uncorrupted by fear or weakness, a quality unmatched by the bailiffs, who instead display a stubborn hostility toward anything inhuman. His eyes were consumed by violent intent, alerted by the slightest movement, yet in reality, he saw nothing. Like any seasoned killer, he was accustomed to the sudden, unpredictable intrusions of the supernatural.

A gentle breeze blew by, and the only sound was the crushing of gravel beneath our feet. Darius asked why the devil had made his home here. I told him that for the devil, any place is fine as long as it's not hell.

We stand among the bones of a god, recently murdered by humans.

Just fifty years ago, the god retreated to the Far West, and those who remained were ruthlessly hunted by the government, shot by federal marshals, and dismembered by skinners and scavengers. The god's remains were too massive for even the greediest to remove, so they were left here. The rocks formed a unique landform around it, which cartographers demarcated as a canyon, but it wasn't a canyon.

Darius laughed, his laughter echoing off the limestone walls and deep beneath the earth. Twisting, tumbling, and surging among the massive, overlapping slabs of stone, his voice faded to a whisper and then died away. And then the headhunter smiled.

"How long do you think it will take those men to kill the gods?" he asked me. But before I could answer, he hefted his weapon, a hungry expression on his face, and strode forward, his pace faster than ever.

April 1868, 6

I began to worry about Darius.

I brought this headhunter with me because of his ruthlessness, but this place seems to have awakened the venomous snake within him, and darker intentions are beginning to emerge. His steps are firm, his grip on the great axe tight. The way he looks at me now makes me feel that he is no longer a companion, but a challenger—one who, if he were to exert his power, could split the world in two. In his eyes, I am merely a guide to that power. He is simply suppressing the urge to act, watching the receding sky and breathing in the increasingly hot air.

He muttered to himself at night about demons and devils and the deals they peddled.

He always said, the devil satisfies your desires. The devil satisfies your needs.

June 1868?

The true nature of the Black Canyon began to unfold. The whispers in my blood were silenced between the towering stone walls, whose cliffs stretched towards the vaguely visible sky. Ghostly vegetation sprouted from the dust—broad patches of strange white flowers appeared in gullies where they should not have been, surrounded by hills that did not conform to geological age. Day and night began to blur, seemingly repeating themselves every hour, but we continued to move deeper underground, towards the devil's lair.

Darius's mouth would occasionally crack open, questioning gods and monsters, angels and demons. His questions were accompanied by inexplicable twitches. He would peer behind him, as if sensing a presence; he would flap his ears, as if insects were constantly flitting about. Whenever we camped for the night, I would watch him closely. His frantic eyes would reflect on the glowing coals of the campfire, where flickering sparks would rise into the stagnant air, as he repeatedly questioned me about the life of the god who had died here and how he had been slain.

While he slept, I occasionally caught a glimpse of the grinning figure of a stranger in the distance. Although those strange gamblers would never dare test the angel's patience, I knew they were there because they sensed the killer was eager for a deal he couldn't refuse.

Darius is becoming a threat. But the demon is very close—I can sense it, and we must slay it... No creature can accomplish this task alone. Surely, if this feat is accomplished, my companions will regain their sanity, and perhaps the dark cloud that hangs over this place will finally dissipate.

I'm prepared for Darius's betrayal. We need to keep each other alive and reach the monster's lair, but after that...

Perhaps, this person will die at the bottom of the world.

Or, if fate is unavoidable, all three of us will die.

? Year? Month? Day

I wonder if I will remember my own death.

The thought haunted me. I could remember my birth vividly—a feeling of being pulled from afar, waking to the clattering clatter of ancient machinery. They told me I was a miracle. My designs came from the discovery of an ancient silver city, infused with the essence of lives that no longer lived here. Their whispers began to reach me, and then I knew the pain of loneliness. I was the first and the last, with only half my memory.

Yet I know that when I die I will remember the devil Hecarim, his skull burning in the eerie darkness of the canyon.

When we reached the bottom of the chasm, my companion turned back into himself. The once solidified air began to breeze, and the anxiety that had been following us seemed to finally dissipate. In front of us was a huge rock mouth, the entrance was stained with inky black, and there were many flames dancing on the ground. We knew that the prey was within reach. Those hateful riders, that group of demon-like cavalry seemed to have been following Hecarim all the time, and they must have been waiting in formation inside. We took up our positions and entered the cave -

Nothing.

Ahead of us lay a dark tunnel, but there was no sign of the riders. How long had we been preparing? How long had we been down here? It was hard to say. We followed the path for a while, into the shadows, into the heat of the furnace, the only light coming from the glimmer of ash at the edge of the cave floor. Ahead, in the distance, lay what seemed to be open country. The caverns stretched across the ravine and out to the other side, pulsing with orange flames, a sign from the legends of the devil welcoming visitors.

As we hunt the devil, he hunts us in return. This is the devil's unchanging nature. The devil is the great king of Hell, and his appearances demand a grand ceremony, the airs of an Old World noble or an Eastern bureaucrat. Demons may lie, cheat, and deceive. They may satisfy mortals' material desires, then demand their price when the weight of the gift begins to show. But the devil always comes prepared, always ready to provide the most needed gift for those who seek him.