9 Then the fifth angel blew his trumpet. And I saw a star fall from the sky to the earth. The star was given the key to the deep hole that leads down to the bottomless pit. ² Then it opened the bottomless pit. Smoke came up from the hole like smoke from a big furnace. The sun and sky became dark because of the smoke from the hole. ³ Then locusts came down to the earth out of the smoke. They were given the power to sting like scorpions.^{[a] 4} They were told not to harm the grass on the earth or any plant or tree. They could harm only the people who did not have the sign of God on their foreheads. ⁵ These locusts were given the power to cause pain to the people for five months. But they were not given the power to kill anyone. And the pain they felt was like the pain that a scorpion gives when it stings a person. ⁶ During those days people will look for a way to die, but they will not find it. They will want to die, but death will run away from them.

⁷ The locusts looked like horses prepared for battle. On their heads they wore things that looked like crowns of gold. Their faces looked like human faces. ⁸ Their hair was like women’s hair, and their teeth were like lions’ teeth. ⁹ Their chests looked like iron breastplates. The sound their wings made was like the noise of many horses and chariots hurrying into battle. ¹⁰ The locusts had tails with stingers like scorpions. The power they had to hurt people for five months was in their tails. ¹¹ The locusts had a king who was the angel of the bottomless pit. His name in the Hebrew language is Abaddon. In the Greek language his name is Apollyon.^[b]

¹² The first great trouble is past. There are still two other great troubles that will come.

¹³ The sixth angel blew his trumpet. Then I heard a voice coming from the horns on the golden altar that is before God. ¹⁴ The voice said to the sixth angel who had the trumpet, “Free the four angels who are tied at the great river Euphrates.” ¹⁵ These four angels had been kept ready for this hour and day and month and year. They were freed to kill a third of all people on the earth. ¹⁶ I heard how many troops on horses were in their army. There were 200,000,000.

¹⁷ In my vision I saw the horses and their riders. They looked like this: They had breastplates that were fiery red, dark blue, and yellow like sulfur. The heads of the horses looked like heads of lions. The horses had fire, smoke, and sulfur coming out of their mouths. ¹⁸ A third of all the people on earth were killed by these three terrible things coming out of the horses’ mouths: the fire, the smoke, and the sulfur. ¹⁹ The horses’ power was in their mouths and also in their tails. Their tails were like snakes that have heads to bite and hurt people.

²⁰ The other people on the earth were not killed by these terrible things. But they still did not change their hearts and turn away from what they had made with their own hands. They did not stop worshiping demons and idols made of gold, silver, bronze, stone, and wood—things that cannot see or hear or walk. ²¹ These people did not change their hearts and turn away from murder or evil magic, from their sexual immorality or stealing.