War is a storm.

Armies gather like dark clouds on the horizon. The rumble of thunder resounding like explosions littering the battlefield.

But like any storm, war comes in many forms.

Thunderstorms that rage with the intention of destruction alone. The howling winds of bitter cold that tear through the battlefield of life.

The pelting rain falling like bullet fire and shrapnel, wreaking havoc on lands that are left defenseless against the onslaught.

Arcadia is no stranger to the storms of war.

Dark clouds are always on my horizon, threatening to burst into conflict. Those that wage war placed those dark clouds around us. Our sky can only take so much before those clouds erupt and that looming war is upon us.

I’ve faced more than my own share of dark clouds, but some pesky warmongers just don’t seem to know when to brighten up and disappear from our sky for good. Do you?

Nox. Hatchet. You two have been waging war on this land for long enough now.

And like a storm that comes in many forms, you each approach your conflict differently.

Hatchet is the thunder and lightning. The howling wind and the destructive force of nature. In this war, he exists only to destroy. You paint your face with a smile, enjoying every moment of terror your storm creates.

Laughing like a clown as you see the destruction of your war.

Nox is the pelting rain, the mist swirling together into the thunder and lightning that is Hatchet. He who has the capacity to bring about so much peace, but chooses the path of chaos.

As your noxious chemicals rain down over Arcadia’s battlefield like artillery fire and the mustard gas, you relish your own opportunity to be a storm that is feared.

No matter the type of storm that rages, the aftermath of that war always brings about the same thing.

The destruction the storm leaves in its wake.

Because in any war, there will come a time where the bombs stop dropping, and the guns stop firing. When the storm clouds clear and we are left with silence.

Bone chilling silence, in which even the birds no longer sing.

Not all silence is golden.

Because in that silence, we can finally see the brokenness that the storm leaves behind. The mess, the destruction in its wake.

It follows every war, every storm in the end. So, my warmongering friends, you must decide what you would rather be.

War or peace. Storm or sunshine. Poison, or part of the solution.

Because one fact remains…

The sun will always be there in the end to shine again.

Only in the silence after the storm does the sun finally poke out. It never left us. The sun was always there, waiting through the noise, to brighten up the sky again and reign over all the land.

In that Sunshine, we find the thing we’ve been looking for all along.

We find peace, finally.

In that peace, we can pick up the pieces, smile and carry on.