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Difference between revisions of "War of Night"
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Only time will tell whether the Emperor will attempt his eldritch ritual | Only time will tell whether the Emperor will attempt his eldritch ritual | ||
and try to bring about an end to all things. | and try to bring about an end to all things. | ||
==Variach 451 MA== | |||
Upon the month of [[Variach]], the Nazedha Emperor Baelak Shipbreaker found | |||
a solution to the problem of too few sacrifices - intending to suppress | |||
rebellion within the ranks and fulfill the prophecy and the ritual | |||
simultaneously, he took the men of the Nazedha tribes Karthek and | |||
Adessim and put them to the blade alongside captured victims, using them | |||
to spill the necessary blood. | |||
He was not met without challenge, however - braving the Nazedha-infested | |||
City, the combined forces of Sapience, aided by explosives from the | |||
dwarven engineer Rhulin, attempted a last-ditch strike to stop the | |||
ritual in its tracks. The Nazedha forces proved fearsome, however, and | |||
hope seemed lost until a fragment of [[Omei]], taking the form of a glowing | |||
cat, opened a portal past the Nazedha lines and straight to the Nazedha | |||
Emperor - now ascended into the form of a [[Chaos Lord]]. | |||
The ensuing battle, in which the Duamvi Aban was mortally wounded, raged | |||
across a good portion of the day - many of the Nazedha fought amongst | |||
each other in the streets, driven to rebellion over Shipbreaker's | |||
slaughter of his own men. Surrounded by chaos, it was unpredictable from | |||
moment to moment what would serve to hurt the Emperor, and what would | |||
not - but in the end, the people of Sapience emerged victorious despite | |||
their losses in the battle of Enorian. | |||
That was not all, however - soon after the death of the Emperor, the | |||
skies opened, and it seemed for a moment that the ritual had worked. | |||
Unfortunately, however, for the Nazedha, it had not been sufficient to | |||
awaken Lanu Du, the Faceless God, merely to stir It in Its slumbers. In | |||
response, It lashed out at Enorian, flattening the City and much of the | |||
remaining Nazedha army before rolling back over and resuming its sleep. | |||
As the people of Sapience returned to the ruined lands, they discovered | |||
a crater where Enorian's palace had been, filled with ocean water - and | |||
just off the shore, the remnants of the Nazedha fleet. Boarding the main | |||
vessel and killing the Emperor's skald, they descended into its depths | |||
and rescued Qeddwyn, the Wise - [[Lenci]], the Luminary tutor - and | |||
capturing the Empress of Nazedha, [[Freydha Shipbreaker]]. | |||
While Qeddwyn traveled with Bloodloch, Lenci set off in an effort to | |||
save what was left of the Sparks following the devastation of Enorian. | |||
The Empress, meanwhile, was taken into the custody of Enorian, after | |||
commanding the remaining Nazedha forces to surrender. The Nazedha | |||
Empire, as it transpired, was no more - without Baelak to unite them, | |||
and with many of them frightened of Lanu Du after witnessing It | |||
firsthand, they had become splintered and fragmented into their old | |||
tribal rivalries. | |||
In the wake of this destruction, three new personages emerged - the | |||
first two were Goddesses. One was [[Ethne]], the Rekindled, the | |||
reincarnation of [[Mebrene]] into the Ogre smith [[Katshkele]]; the other, a | |||
Goddess of new origins altogether, was [[Avareti]], titleless and | |||
ill-understood as of yet. The third was a prophet, reincarnated from the | |||
soul of the first Illuminai whom Lenci had carried with her for many | |||
hundreds of years - and this was [[Kayalenki]], sent by the Gods to serve | |||
the cause of Light in Enorian. Avareti, being tethered to Shadow, made | |||
Her way north toward [[Spinesreach]], while Ethne remained in the south. | |||
Kayalenki went to the ruins of Enorian, however, and called upon the | |||
fragment of Omei embodied as a glowing cat - and together, with the cat | |||
sacrificing Her essence and Her being to the effort, they raised not | |||
only a Temple, but a [[Grand Flame]] that was an amalgamation of the Spark | |||
of the [[Luminaries]] and the Crescent of the [[Daru]]. Standing at the center | |||
of the ruins and casting its light downward upon the nearby territory, | |||
the Temple stands as a moment to the Gods and to the triumph of Light | |||
over the Nazedha. | |||
The shadows have remained quiet in Variach, though there is no telling | |||
when they will strike once more, and with still-greater vehemence. | |||
[[Category:History]] | [[Category:History]] | ||