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''World's End'' is a novel written by British author Mark Chadbourn and is the first in the Age of Misrule trilogy. It was first published in Great Britain by Millennium on 14 September 2000. An edition collecting all three books in ''The Age of Misrule'' series (''World's End'', ''Darkest Hour'' and ''Always Forever'') was published in Great Britain on 14 September 2006. ==Plot summary== Jack 'Church' Churchill – a man still tormented by the suicide of his girlfriend Marianne two years previously – and Ruth Gallagher – a lawyer increasingly disillusioned with the way her life has turned out – are brought together early one winter morning by a shared experience: walking by the Thames, they witness a horrific attack. A giant of a man with a face that runs like water attacks a smaller man (Maurice Gibbons) underneath Albert Bridge, and the experience is so horrific that it causes them both to pass out. When Church and Ruth awake, the small man is dead, and the police are reluctant to view the crime as anything other than a simple mugging. While Ruth is suspended from work, Church discovers that similar odd events are happening all across Britain, and finds a mysterious message from a woman called Laura who claims to know how all these events are linked. She names Church as one of the Brothers and Sisters of Dragons, and implores him to gather the five Brothers and Sisters of Dragons and find four mystical items – a stone, a sword, a spear and a cauldron – which will return her people to power and help them fight the Night Walkers, giving him a lantern called the Wayfinder that will help point him to the objects he seeks. Laura arrives, and Church realises that she led him here on purpose, under the orders of the mysterious woman, who tells him that he will learn her name in time. Church and Laura return through the hole in the air, and find the industrial estate in ruins in the aftermath of Ruth and Tom's escape attempt. They reunite with Ruth, and reluctantly leave without Tom, who appears to have vanished. Church deduces that Ruth and Laura are both Sisters of Dragons, and they follow the Wayfinder to their next destination. Church, Veitch and Tom make their way across the moors, as they go encountering the worst of what the new word has to offer – a desolate farmhouse inhabited by a desperate man who is being mentally tortured by some kind of gremlin. They stay to investigate, and soon enough the creature begins its torment, but Tom reacts confidently, appearing to have some knowledge of the demon. He fights it with iron, and it appears to recognise him, speaking of his 'royal gift'. Although Church tries to ask Tom what the creature's comment to him meant, Tom doesn't reply – although he works his mouth as though he's trying. He warns them that where they are going, many dangers await, mentioning in passing that in legend it is spoken of as the home of the leader of the Wild Hunt, but that they must take the water to the tor at first light if they want what they seek. 抄文引用元・出典: フリー百科事典『 ウィキペディア（Wikipedia）』 ■ウィキペディアで「World's End (Chadbourn novel)」の詳細全文を読む スポンサード リンク
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