The history of our world tends to move along a shallow spiral--when completing a turn, you end up mighty close to where you started. The history of Second World, in contrast, seems to have simplified its path to a ring from which there is no apparent way out. An unforeseen invasion lays waste to whole provinces, prompting the game's most powerful clans to ally with the emperor's guard to stop the monstrous hordes in their tracks. A war erupts that nobody saw coming, shattering the tedium of peaceful life. All the while the world's most elusive character--once a lowly miner, now a powerful mage--finds himself in an impossible situation, and sorely in need of allies of his own as he searches for a way out.