The uneasy equilibrium between the Crown, the One-Church and the Academy which ensured the supremacy of the Kingdom of Argys is about to be shattered.Dissent is rampant among the nobility and the One-Church, though weakened by heresy, is bent on bringing all magic practitioners of the Academy to heel. Meanwhile Argyss neighbours are mobilizing and the spectre of war looms large.Meanwhile, a new prophet has raised his standard. Tens of thousands are answering his rallying call for a world with No Kings, No Gods and No Mercy. Another madman perhaps, but Gaelyon, the Red Prophet, is no ordinary man and plans to reunite the shards of the Dark Gem with the complicity of Leweth, a vengeful rune mage embittered by the murder of her mother.Unlikely alliances will form in a deadly race against time. Martemio, an unassuming noble, fighting both inner demons and fiends from the Netherworld, finds himself at the centre of an epic struggle where the Universe and his own soul are at stake.