The Black Hole Tragedy

The Black Hole Tragedy remains one of the most harrowing and studied events from the apocalyptic age of The Seven Lords of Avarice. Occurring at the height of their dominion, the tragedy was not born from armies, plagues, or rebellion—but from a dungeon that was simply left alone for too long.   It is the clearest—and most chilling—example of just how catastrophic even a Sovereign-tier dungeon can become when ignored.  

Cragburg: A City Forgotten by its Rulers

  At the edge of the Lords' vast territory sat the once-thriving city of Cragburg, a stronghold of trade, scholarship, and arcane research. While loyal to the Lords, it remained politically insignificant—spared from conquest, but granted no protection. For over a decade, a small dungeon had been growing beneath the cliffs outside its borders, dismissed by its people as nothing more than a curiosity or potential profit vein.   But in the era of the Seven Lords, no one cleared dungeons unless commanded. And the Lords commanded nothing, unless it interested them. The dungeon fed on time and silence. It grew, layer upon layer, until one day it stopped mimicking the structure of dungeons and began bending reality.  

The Rise of the Sovereign

  Unlike lesser anomalies, this dungeon did not shriek its ascent. It simply became impossible. Gravity shifted at its borders. Rivers flowed sideways. Sounds echoed backward. And the sun above Volgrad began to hang unnaturally in the sky, caught in some invisible arcane field.   The city panicked too late. Mages failed to contain the anomaly. Scouts sent in never returned—or returned whispering in dead tongues, their minds melted by dimensional pressure. Then, it collapsed inward. A pulse of inverted light swept out from the dungeon's core. Cragburg, in a span of moments, was drawn into itself—folded, compressed, and lost. Buildings shattered upward. Towers crumpled into black spirals. Citizens vanished mid-step, leaving behind shadows that took hours to fade.   It was not a battle. It was an erasure.  

The Lords Descend

  Only then did the Seven Lords of Avarice turn their attention to the region. They arrived not to halt the destruction, but to witness it. Some believe they sensed the dungeon’s Sovereign ascension and feared its potential. Others speculate they were intrigued by the dungeon’s display of arcane gravity—a force unclaimed by any of them.   What is known is that they watched. And when the moment came, they entered. Seven immortal beings, each rewritten by the Guild Heart convergence, strode into a dungeon that had warped all known laws. Their presence stabilized the land—temporarily—but it was not salvation. It was curiosity. Or perhaps, competition.  

The Sovereign Core

  Inside, the dungeon had become an impossible space—a spiraling, living structure of lightless gravity wells, logic-bending architecture, and temporal fractures. It had no theme, no biome, no monsters that could be mapped. It was pure hostility wearing the skin of a dungeon. The Sovereign core at its heart was said to resemble a spinning gyroscopic cage of light, surrounded by failed timelines. Magic was consumed rather than cast. Healing turned to decay. For mortals, it would have been certain death.   But for the Seven Lords, it was a challenge. And so they cleared it—not through teamwork, not through valor, but through sheer supremacy. Some tales suggest they competed to see who would reach the core first. Others say they fought within it, reshaping the dungeon mid-fight.   What is confirmed is this: the dungeon did not collapse. It was conquered. And when they emerged, Cragburg was no more.  

The Eye of Cragburg

  In place of the city now lies a crater known as The Eye of Volgrad—a deep, glassy basin where gravity still falters, and echoes carry too far. At its center, magic dies. Nothing grows. It is a wound in the world, proof that Sovereign-tier dungeons are not just rare—they are existential threats. Scholars would later note that the dungeon never reached Cataclysmic classification. It didn’t have to.   The Black Hole Tragedy became a grim testament to just how dangerous even a Sovereign-tier dungeon can be when allowed to grow unchecked. And the Seven Lords? They left as they came—wordlessly, their purposes known only to themselves. But some believe the dungeon left a mark on them. Most suspect it left a piece with them. One name—Meiora, the Sixth Lord—was never seen again in any account following Cragburg. Whether she fell within the dungeon or found something greater than the world could hold… no one knows.  

Legacy

  The Black Hole Tragedy is taught today not only as a warning against dungeon negligence, but as a lesson in the unpredictable power of the Sovereign tier. While the Lords are long vanished, the Eye remains and every now and then, when the stars shift and the wind goes still, the gravity at the center of the crater changes... as if something remembers.