Elminster of Shadowdale spread his hands apologetically, struggled up from his knees, and fell headlong into Lhaeo's reaching arms as another surge of Art carried him away, chilled and burned all at once.

In a place of drifting mists, Elminster of Shadowdale gathered his will to banish the pain. Ice took him by the heart and throat as he groped for his Art amid the roiling magic that filled him.

He found nothing. The Art that had served him for many hundred years was burned away. All his power had fled from him. His magic was gone.

From a place where only gods walk cometh the Fall to cast down all the gods. Among them is Mystra, the goddess whose thought shapes and controls the eternal fires men call magic all across the world of Toril. What befalls that world if all the bounds and enchantments of its magic should burst at once, to let the fire flash free?

The world perishes in flames, of course, and so this must not befall. Even in her destruction, a goddess can strive to do something noble, a last act of love for the world she's watched for so long.

No time remains for a considered and orderly passage of power. No mortal frame can hope to hold her essence without burning to nothingness. No mortal mind can carry what she knows, without being snuffed out in an instant.

Azuth must carry more. All of her Chosen must carry more. But one mortal must carry the chief load, lest all perish with Mystra's passing. One mortal must be chosen in an instant. One who can carry more than most. One who can resist the temptation to twist the power to his or her own ends, and by meddling doom all the Realms. One must suffer Mystra's Doom.