For centuries, our sisters of the Aes Sedai
have sought to understand the Breaking of the World.
Three thousand years ago, Lews Therin and the forces of Light
struck the Dark One and sealed him away.
Before he was imprisoned,
the Dark One delivered one last defiant strike.
The Dark One poisoned the source of power for male Aes Sedai.
With this, Lews Therin lost his mind.
He murdered his beloved wife.
He slew his children she bore him.
His friends, his court... everyone.
The Dark One released Lews Therin from his madness,
just to show him what he had done.
But it wasn't Lews Therin alone who suffered.
The poison spread.
No male Aes Sedai was spared.
And so began the Breaking.
The time of madness.
It was a time of unchecked, unhinged rage that destroyed the world.
They changed the face of the world and ended the Age of Legends.
Humanity is driven to the brink of extinction.
What few survivors remained
are scattered across a broken and unrecognizable land.
The breaking lasts for over 100 years
and ends only when the last male channeler alive is gentled.
By then, entire civilizations had disappeared.
Centuries of progress and knowledge, gone.
The very lives we live today are shaped by this immeasurable loss.
For those of you destined to take the shawl,
it would be among the most sacred of duties, as an Aes Sedai,
to protect the world from another such breaking.