Editing Warhammer Meta-Setting (section)

== The Cycle ==

[[File:Crossover.jpg|thumb|500px|right|[[Araloth|Elven heroes with spears]] alongside [[Kaldor Draigo|high tech demigods]] in the same setting? It's more likely than you think.]]

When Chaos wins in a cycle and devours it, the universe is left as a half-empty void, with the surviving souls bobbing around, alongside leftovers from the old world and what not. The surviving characters are (usually) the ones who can be considered gods or half-gods (since they'll be bound up into powers about as strong as Chaos, such as the Magical Winds). From here on, it's essentially a free-for-all, with the vying Gods now having the ability to take the raw magic of the universe and form it into something, the way they like. The general world is created by a sort of godly being by the name of Dracothian, a dragon made of starlight whose only purpose in existence is to recreate a physical world for the beings of the new one to live in, using what's left behind after Chaos is done with the previous world as raw materials. As such, he's more of a cleanup crew for the Warhammer worlds than anything else, as he's not shown to have any inclination towards intervening in whatever universe ends up coming into existence until after its inevitable destruction, at which time he will again recreate it. Similarly, the Chaos Gods neither seem to know nor care about its existence.

The new gods are then essentially allowed to do whatever they want with the universe. Many of them will likely want to fight Chaos to avenge the world they once lived in, but nothing necessarily requires them to do so. It is normal for them to create new races or form new armies that are made to fight Chaos, but since no one has been able to stave the Chaos Gods forever, no one seems to be able to make an army that can actually resist Chaos completely, or at least repel it from their universe. That said, [[Sigmar]] is suggested as being the first entity to be considered an equal to the Chaos Gods in power, and the [[Emperor]] has similarly held out longer than the Ruinous Powers anticipated (albeit with more grimdark than in Sigmar's case).

Just as the worlds, realms and universes are formed, Chaos gets its shit up and running, and after having picked the last few mortal souls out of their corrupted, jagged teeth, begin taking on the physical world again and corrupts it as much as possible. Though they might lose many times before any actual damage has been done to the physical world, a little corruption at a time will let the [[Grimdark|thirsting Gods enjoy a little refreshing souls]] from time to time, while planning out new ways to kill the world off for good. The Chaos Gods often have mutually exclusive goals in every Cycle, [[Khorne|as some]] [[Slaanesh|of them]] enjoy wracking up shit better [[Nurgle|than]] [[Tzeentch|others]] do, so they rarely have the entire force of Chaos behind them, just as the different Gods left from the last cycle might have their own agendas to pursue.

Then, when Chaos finally get tired of the current Cycle, or when a sufficiently powerful [[Abaddon|Chaos]] [[Archaon|Champion]] rallies the forces of Chaos behind him, Chaos goes all out and begins taking over the Material worlds, until the worlds are so strained that they can't keep themselves running and the Gods of the Cycle can't keep it together anymore, the world simply rips itself apart. All creation is engulfed in the Warp, and everything goes back to the Void it started as. While the Chaos Gods go snack on souls and the old Gods are destroyed, new gods formed from the mightiest heroes and warriors of the past world will inevitably escape and witness the creation of a new world.

And then the Cycle begins anew, as it has ever since Chaos first came into existence.

TL:DR- It's basically [[Vikings|Ragnarok]], as GW, being big fans of Norse myth, couldn't pass up taking the Germanic concept of cycled fate and destiny.