The Great Cataclysm

The Great Cataclysm, also known as the Reckoning, the Second Coming, the Burning, and the Cleansing by various surviving factions throughout the new world of Ashrain, was a worldwide series of natural disasters triggered by the arrival of the Ash Gods that resulted in near total ecological destruction of the planet formerly known as Earth. It constituted the last great mass extinction of Earth's history, and the dawn of a new era. Most forms of terrestrial and marine life, both flora and fauna, were wiped out in a matter of years, those that survived adapting to the new world with terrifying results. New species also emerged, thought to be invasive species brought by the Ash Gods from their home world. The Cataclysm most notably resulted in the deaths of approximately 97% of all humanity, bringing the human race to the brink of extinction. In the years that followed, failure to adapt to and survive the harsh new world of Ashrain resulted in the death of approximately 1-2% of those left alive, leaving less than 100 million human beings left alive across the entire planet.

The Arrival

Forty-Seven Seconds

When the alien beings known as the Ash Gods arrived on the planet Earth, they landed on all of the major continents of the world at once: the United States of America, Brazil, Mongolia, the Congo, Greenland, Australia, and Antarctica. They were only present for forty-seven seconds before a worldwide blackout occured. Virtually all electrical power (phones, internet, vehicles, computers, lights, etc.) winked out in a moment, globally.

The Firestorms

Less than a minute after the EMP attack, the power and technology of the Ash Gods was demonstrated in full force. Massive tidal waves of blazing fire, hundreds of feet high, swept across the surface of the world, charring the planet's surface and burning nearly everything on Earth to cinders and ashes in a matter of hours. In this initial attack, the majority of Earth's plant life and animal life was destroyed, resulting in an ecological disaster. Furthermore, nearly 75% of all humanity was wiped out, all before sundown on what would come to be known as X-Day, or Extinction Day.

The Devastation of Earth

The full undoing of the planet began with the eruption of volcanoes, including systems such as the Yellowstone supervolcano in North America and the volcanic chain comprising the island of Hawaii. At the exact same moment, across the entire planet, active and dormant volcanoes alike erupted in tandem with more force and power than ever thought possible by human scientists. The ash and smoke spewed forth by these eruptions contributed to the already growing ash cloud, begun by the inferno of the firestorms. This choked out the atmosphere and created the ash cloud which would soon cover the entire planet, blotting out the sunlight and leading to an immediate cesstion of photosynthesis. Consequentially, all remaining plant life reliant on the sun's energy died, and the corals of the oceans were reduced to chalk husks. The oceans themselves increased in temperature by a matter of tens of degrees, effectively boiling everything within them and leading to the death of most marine life. As such, the planet Earth was destroyed, in one fateful day, X-Day, leaving a charred rock behind, the new world known as Ashrain.
X-Day+1, the environmental destabilization continued. Volcanic activity increased, spewing more and more ash and soot and pyroclastic material into the atmosphere. Accompanying the eruptions, widespread earthquakes devastated the rest of the terrain, and sub-marine earthquakes triggered tidal waves and tsunamis that flooded the annihilated coastlines. Within the first few days following X-Day, the ash snow had already begun to fall. A secondary consequence of the intense heat and destabilization of the earth was the mass, widespread meltdown of nuclear reactors, resulting in devastating, immense explosions that released radiation into the atmosphere and across the world. 

The Aftermath

The Last Mass Extinction

The fallout of the Great Cataclysm was the last great mass extinction event in the history of the planet Earth. Within a year of X-Day, 97% of humanity and nearly all other forms of life were dead. The life-forms that survived faced the harsh conditions of the newly remade world of Ashrain, an inhospitable ecosystem of fire, ash, lava, toxicity, and radiation. With the sky perpetually blacked out by the global ash cloud, both flora and fauna were forced to rapidly adapt over the course of the next decade, or be wiped out completely.

Survivors

Less than 3% of all humanity survived the Great Cataclysm. In the aftermath of the fires and beneath the global ash cloud, the remnants of civilization attempted to rebuild and start over in the new world. However, the harsh conditions of Ashrain proved too much, and all attempts to organize any semblance of former civilizations fell flat. In the decade that followed, another 2% of humanity died out, leaving less than 100 million individuals alive across the entire hellscape that was once Earth. These remnants, scattered across the world on most major continents, formed tribal groups of survivors, each attempting to find a way to live beneath the ever-falling ash snow.

The Constructs

Shortly after X-Day, the titanic, metallic structures known as the Constructs appeared across the landscape of Ashrain. Supposedly built by the aliens, the purpose and nature of these super-structures is unknown, but their presence towering into the ash cloud and burrowing into the planet's crust served as a constant reminder to the remnants of humanity of what had been lost and by whom it had been taken.

Type

Natural