From somewhere deep within the heart of the Great Seal, a blinding flash of light turned night into day. It was both beautiful and terrifying. A moment later, a prismatic wave of chaotic roiling energy erupted from the source of the flash, cascading in all directions. The energy bathed the land in a sea of raw elemental and magical forces. The elemental forces surged beyond anything seen my mortal eyes!

Earthquakes wracked the land, leveling cities and rending deep fissures throughout the ground. Long dormant volcanoes exploded, choking the sky with ash and leaking rivers of magma, igniting wildfires that raged across the world with abandon. Punishing hurricanes and freezing blizzards sprang from nowhere as tornadoes tore across the earth, scoring the land like the fingers of an angry god. Tsunamis crashed against the coast wiping away everything in their path.  Rivers rushed beyond their banks with unfathomable speed. Enchantments, wards, and magi-tech devises exploded or went haywire, acting unpredictably or ceasing to function altogether.

 As the first waves of energy slammed against the Great Seal, it seems for a moment that everything would be contained by the barrier, as it has always been…but then fissures appeared, spider-webbing across the Seal as far at the eye could see. For a moment, the Great Seal faltered, and in that moment the cascade of primordial energy surged though, blasting across the land outside the seal with catastrophe trailing in its wake. After the last wave of energy passed, the fissures began to disappear, and the Great Seal appeared whole again, though seemingly changed, possibly as if had been weakened by the power unleashed by the Cataclysm.

The storms, and earthquakes, and floods, and volcanoes, and fires raged for hours, punishing everything and everyone. Finally, after a seeming eternity, the first light of dawn broke across the horizon. Slowly, the elemental energy began to return to balance. The unnaturally strong storms slowed to a gentle rain. The earth ceased to tremble. The volcanoes quieted to a rumble. The waters abated and flowed back into the sea. The world returned to some semblance of normal.

But nothing is as it was. Everything is different after the Cataclysm. The Great Seal may remain…but everything else has changed.