Revelation 9 in plain modern English. New Ground English Translation.

The fifth angel blew his trumpet, and I saw a star that had fallen from the sky to the earth. The star was given the key to the shaft of the Abyss.

He opened the shaft of the Abyss, and smoke poured out of the shaft like smoke from a massive furnace. The sun and the sky were darkened by the smoke from the shaft.

Out of the smoke, locusts descended onto the earth, and they were given power like the power that scorpions have on earth.

They were told not to damage the grass or any green plant or any tree — only the people who don't have God's seal on their foreheads.

They weren't allowed to kill them, only to torment them for five months. And the torment they inflicted was like the agony of a scorpion's sting.

During those days, people will look for death but won't find it. They'll long to die, but death will run from them.

The locusts looked like horses prepared for battle. On their heads they wore something like golden crowns, and their faces resembled human faces.

Their hair was like women's hair, and their teeth were like lions' teeth.

They had breastplates like iron breastplates, and the sound of their wings was like the roar of many horse-drawn chariots charging into battle.

They had tails with stingers like scorpions, and their tails had the power to torment people for five months.

They had a king over them — the angel of the Abyss. His name in Hebrew is Abaddon, and in Greek he's called Apollyon.

The first disaster is over. Watch out — two more disasters are still coming after this.

The sixth angel blew his trumpet, and I heard a voice coming from the four horns of the golden altar that stands before God.

It said to the sixth angel who had the trumpet, "Release the four angels who are bound at the great Euphrates River."

So the four angels who had been prepared for this exact hour, day, month, and year were released to kill a third of humanity.

The number of mounted troops was two hundred million — I heard their number announced.

This is what the horses and their riders looked like in my vision: they wore breastplates of fiery red, dark blue, and sulfur yellow. The horses' heads were like lions' heads, and fire, smoke, and sulfur poured out of their mouths.

A third of humanity was killed by these three plagues — the fire, the smoke, and the sulfur pouring from their mouths.

The power of the horses was in their mouths and in their tails. Their tails were like snakes with heads, and they used them to inflict harm.

The rest of humanity — those who weren't killed by these plagues — still didn't rethink their lives or stop worshiping demons and idols made of gold, silver, bronze, stone, and wood, which can't see, hear, or walk.

And they didn't stop their murders, their occult practices, their sexual exploitation, or their stealing.