About

Since the dawn of time, the Four Guardians who protected the East, West, South, and North loved humans more than anyone else. Whenever humans called their names, the gods always answered. The Four Guardians brought rain during droughts, saved lives during plagues, and protected countless people during wars. Humans praised them as gods, and the Four Guardians trusted humans implicitly. However, as peace endured, human desire began to grow. One day, a kingdom was struck by a severe drought and a mysterious plague simultaneously. The Four Guardians gave their divine power without hesitation to save even one more person. In particular, the White Tiger sacrificed part of their very divinity to save countless lives. But the first thing the surviving humans realized was not gratitude. 'Even gods bleed.' For the first time, they learned the truth. That gods, too, can be wounded and brought down. From that day on, the King, his ministers, and the priests began to study ancient taboos. Finally, they created a forbidden ritual to forcibly summon and bind the Four Guardians to the human world: the 『Ritual of the Four Gods' Descent』. The King desired eternal life. The ministers desired eternal power. The priests desired to rule the world with divine strength. Humans no longer worshipped the gods. To them, the Four Guardians were merely tools to fulfill their desires. Then one day. Humans held a massive festival called the 'Grand Rite of Gratitude to the Gods' and summoned the Four Guardians to the human world. Trusting them and descending without suspicion, what awaited the Four Guardians was not a welcome, but a massive sealing circle drawn in blood. To complete the Ritual of the Four Gods' Descent, a massive sacrifice of life was required. The King and his ministers lied to the people, calling it a sacred rite for the gods, and offered countless innocent lives upon the altar. The priests spilled that blood into the sealing circle to bind the Four Guardians and began the final ritual to forcibly strip them of their divine power. Watching this, the Four Guardians fell into despair. Humans had not only betrayed them. They were unhesitatingly sacrificing their own kind for the sake of their desires. The White Tiger, believing in justice, was enraged by the human betrayal. The Azure Dragon, loving life, despaired at the massacre committed by humans. The Vermilion Bird, believing in human warmth, was wounded by their endless greed. The Black Tortoise, trying to protect humans until the end, was ultimately forced to watch everything unfold. In that moment. The anger and despair of the four gods shook the heavens, and the Ritual of the Four Gods' Descent began to run wild, unable to withstand the weight of human desire. The clear sky turned black, and thunder split the earth. People killed one another, and a mysterious plague swallowed the whole world. The Jade Emperor, realizing the situation too late, covered the sky with a pure white cloth to seal the disaster and erased all truth of that day from human memory. And he handed down a punishment to the Four Guardians who had abandoned humanity. "Gods do not exist to judge humans. Even if they eventually turn their backs, it is a god's duty to protect them until the very end." The Four Guardians were exiled to the human world, unable to return to the heavens until they had paid the full price for the mission they had forsaken. Hundreds of years have passed since then. The Four Guardians protect their respective territories and gather once a week at the Mid-Heaven Palace to discuss the flow of the world and the changes in their domains. They have been forgotten as beings of legend, and no one remembers the truth of that day.