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"Beauty fades. That is why it is beautiful."

N A M E /  A L I A S

Dormeria – Herald of Quietus.

A G E  O F  L E G E N D

48,000.

M Y T H O L O G Y
Of the Triumvirate to which Dormeria's legend belongs, the aspect she was said to embody was that of the physical realm and the corporeal, of the flesh and blood. She has long been touted as the embodiment of mortal desire, of wealth and power, but also of its temporary nature and the price which must be paid to achieve temporary greatness. Just as history is written by the victor, legends are told by those who choose to espouse the subjects of legends as the heroes that history remembers them to be, and those wont to tell terrific tales of these individuals are also those prone to exaggerating the traits they saw or admired the most. Such is the fate that befalls all who fall into the annals of the legend, and Dormeria is no exception.

Born to a long gone family of minor nobility, Natalya de la Lune started her life as many in her situation did - affluent and irreverent to the world outside of her gilded cage in the bustling town of Tyral. Even at birth, Natalya was set apart from her kith and kin by the gift of magic that bled sorcery through her veins - weak and uncontrolled though it was, it set her apart and others aside. The clergy of Tyral thought her an abomination, her parents a resource, and the townsmen an object of awe - but Natalya felt something deeper. Life felt transitory to the young sorceress, and she felt her power lay in the uncharted realms beyond, in the throes of death.

Growing up, all attempted to indoctrinate Natalya with their faith, be that the Goddess of Virtue, Arete, be that the money that the de la Lune family worshipped, or be that any display of divine providence that the smallfolk longed for to give them direction and purpose in life. Natalya rejected each of their narrow-minded ways of thinking and focused only on the unfathomable sense of purpose she innately possessed - working it into its own faith, and that faith into the arcanery that simmered within her lifeblood. Years came and went, and Natalya de la Lune became withdrawn, focused so much on her own destiny and desires that everything else fell to the wayside.

When Natalya's perception became so inwardly focused that the outside world effectively ceased to be, her magic blossomed. She came into degrees of power she had only ever imagined, and whispers of that power echoed within the pious streets of Tyral. Very soon, the clergy's mistrust developed into incarceration of her by all accounts abominable magic. Seeing the perfect opportunity to test the limits of her power, Natalya unravelled the living flesh of the entire town in a burst of necromantic power and reformed it in the visage of the dead, a horde of corpses for her to command.

Though she had only intended to murder her would-be assailants, she had taken the lives of an entire town in a burst of magic that had been building for years, but left her drained of the potential she had once felt. Unable to stay where she was, Natalya de la Lune shed her very identity and moved on as Dormeria, to the lands extant of the heartlands she had called home.

~

"The inchoate stages of Dormeria's legend, her Restless March, began during her southbound travels, towards the set of islands south of the Heartlands where the Isle of Orthus was said to lie. Though Dormeria knew little of her patron god, her dreams led her to the temple dedicated to his worship and with nowhere else to go, she headed there. Much hearsay was generated by the hooded woman who was followed by rotting corpses, and the stories of her purpose and designs vary wherever one goes - we believe that she travelled south to meet the emissaries of Orthus to hone her gift and stop her Restless March.

What transpired on the isle is a mystery, even to those of us that dedicate our lives to understanding what Dormeria's motives and methods were - by far the school of thought with the most credence is that she travelled to the priests to learn of the demon that she later vanquished, Lazarus,  but others think many things from her learning the intricacies of her magic and her artefacts, to simple boredom. It is well known that the Isle of Evaeryn was small but inhabited before the Restless March, and eerily vacant after she returned. None disagree that Dormeria took the lives of the entire isle, but few have any idea why. Many think she judged the isle and found it wanting, but I believe that she merely wished to test the limits of her power after her visit to the Isle of Orthus." - Historian Lachery Sissarin, Second Fate of the Order of the Skyward Eye

~

"Of the Triumvirate, it was the Herald of Quietus that took the most overt action. The Soul's Bastion is lesser known among the smallfolk, a popular tale to soothe frightened children, and the Beacon of the Lost had practically no real involvement amongst the gentry or the smallfolk, followed only by tragedy. Dormeria influenced the courts in many ways, setting a new standard for the law based on the judgement of worth by her example of deposing or killing those that she felt squandered their potential and their life and giving that very same essence to those who had potential quashed by circumstance. King Trinius Maximillian Atronan XI, Last of his Line, was the first to fall to the sorceress. While generally beloved in his small kingdom by the smallfolk, Dormeria judged him unworthy and installed a new ruler, who catapulted our society into an era of prosperity.

The gentry learned to fear her retribution and seek her patronage, and the smallfolk looked up to her as one who might deliver them from poverty and ill circumstance if she felt their cause worthy. Many villages were outright slaughtered by her, but those found worthy were often found gracing the Imperial Court. Some are reluctant to call the Herald a hero, despite her accomplishments in vanquishing Lazarus, but we inducted of the Order of the Skyward Eye firmly believe that Dormeria brought much good to the world and is worthy of the title "hero", even if she committed her fair share of acts that one would believe evil." - Sage Atroa Posarye, Third Fate of the Order of the Skyward Eye.

~

"When the Restless March was completed, the three Trials of Mind, Body, and Soul overcome, the time came for the Triumvirate of eld to set their sights upon the Elysian Plains and meet the destiny that the Prince of the Void laid out for them. Few records manage to recount precisely what it was that was fought, referring to it only as a great evil, but the true name of the scourge of the realm that they faced was Lazarus, the Undying.

As little literature survived Lazarus' various onslaughts, and history is written in the glory-emboldened eyes of those who did manage to drive the abomination into slumber, the truth of what Lazarus was or could do is lost, even to we Fates. Lazarus possessed unnatural durability, to the point that it simply could not be killed by normal means or normal men, and only with great sacrifices was it pushed to the brink of dormancy that it hovered upon before it set to consume all things. We believe that Lazarus corrupted and twisted the natural cycle of life to its own benefit, drawing strength from the untimely demise of those around it to extend its own time in this world. Perhaps, initially, it was no more than a nuisance but the continued reaping of helpless souls eventually rendered it beyond death until the Triumvirate arrived. Even now we do not know if this explanation is true, as none of the Triumvirate survived the encounter (with the exception of Lyr, whose mind was broken and thus was of no use)."

As only the three witnessed the battle, the stories that are told are all the world has to go by, with different cultures each celebrating a particular member of the Triumvirate and lording them above all others - some venerate Sarynia as an all-benevolent martyr betrayed by Dormeria, some laud Lyr as the hero who outsmarted an undying demon, and some idolise Dormeria as the very essence of power and sacrifice. The only thing these various legends have in common is that they speak of the total eradication of Lazarus - and naught has been heard of the demon since then. - Exemplar Clorissa Thossarian, First Fate of the Order of the Skyward Eye

A P P E A R A N C E

Though many legends tell of Dormeria's extravagant and ravishing looks, her appearance was far less beautiful than what was described in song and hymn. Blessed with high cheekbones and an angular face, Dormeria's features were exquisitely carved in her youth, though age was not particularly kind to her and she lost much of the beauty she possessed as her vitality was drained by Ukenagasu. Raven black hair adorned Dormeria's face until it was left white and ashen from her exertion in the final battle with Lazarus, and her iridescent violet eyes once shone with myriad colours but dulled in the wake of the horrors she saw. Never blessed with a particularly ample bosom nor any large sums of fat anywhere, Dormeria had the build typical of many mages - tall and elegant, but fragile and thin. While many would consider Dormeria to be beautiful, she was not the ravishing beauty that legends attributed to her. Striking, and noticeable, but certainly not the epitome of beauty.

E Q U I P M E N T

Legend states that Dormeria and Orthus met at a crossroads as she left Tyral to explore the world, and that he would ask her three questions. For each question answered correctly, Dormeria would receive a boon to aid her in her travels, but each question answered incorrectly would result in a boon being stripped from her. Orthus' first question pertained to the nature of life and death - "If all life leads to death, what is the purpose of life?". Orthus' second question pertained to the hearts of men - "What desire unites all mortals?". Orthus' final question pertained to power – “If life and death are yours to command, what more power could you require?”

Dormeria replied immediately:

“The purpose of life is to end. If it were not temporary, it would not have value.”

Orthus nodded.

“The desire to continue to live past their time, to accomplish all they think destined of them.”

Orthus smiled.

“To breathe life into that which has never lived, to imbue it with purpose and form.”

Orthus laughed.

The answers were not what Orthus had expected, but they were true to Dormeria’s heart and true to his teachings, and so he granted her three boons: Ukenagasu, Caller of the Dead; Silaxes, Plucked from the Void; Volayre, the Flesh Unbound. As Dormeria took the staff, the book, and the gem, she found herself alone in the crossroads and begun her march towards her destiny once more.
U K E N A G A S U ,  C A L L E R  O F  T H E  D E A D
The staff Ukenagasu is the first and most important of Dormeria's legendary effects, the crux upon which tales regaling her exploits are built, and the first gift she received from Orthus in order to defeat Lazarus.

Ukenagasu is, at its core, a simple wooden staff that has been modified through careful placement of ebon-black metal plating and careful carving of the still-living wood. Approximately six feet in height, the staff was plucked from the core of an ash tree and carved into a perfect cylinder, with sigils and symbols etched just into the surface in a spiral ascending from the base to the very top. The areas not covered by the eldritch scrawling are covered with a plate of thin metal, completely matte and ebon-black, which is in turn carved with similar etchings in a reverse pattern downwards. Though plain in design, the duality of the staff represents the fluid nature of life and death, one leading to the other and back again, and showcases that all power has a price to be paid, in this life or in the next.

Once a veritable wellspring of arcane power, the staff's power has leached into its surroundings for the many thousands of years that it has been kept dormant. Blessed with a spark of Orthus, Prince of the Void's power, the staff both magnifies and restricts its bearer's innate power, affording them the capacity for great feats in areas of exceptional talent but introducing an expiry of this power far more quickly than traditional long-lasting magic would allow. The staff burns power far more brightly than it could ever reach on its own, but consumes its essence in a fraction of its potential. Imprinted originally onto Dormeria, the staff allows her innate necromancy to raise armies of corpses, to unravel and to knit the flesh, and to hasten or delay the inevitable expiry of all living things it encounters - though all of this commands a heavy toll on its owner's own inner flame, using their own potential lifespan as a fuel source. All things are temporary, and Ukenagasu is a constant mortal reminder of this singular truth.

S I L A X E S ,  P L U C K E D  F R O M  T H E  V E I L
The gemstone Silaxes is the second of Dormeria's gifts, less integral to her legend than Ukenagasu, but still an example of Dormeria's lasting (if waning) influence in the hearts of men.

If not for its latent magical power, Silaxes would have found worth as a prized gemstone in a crown fit for the God-King himself. Lovingly carved from a deep violet crystal, Silaxes' facets reflect and refract light in such a fashion that each individual claims to see a different image within its crystalline folds, from images of vast wealth and riches to humble family lives. The size of a small child's fist, the gemstone is clearly exceptionally valuable, but this decadence belies a solemn aura of deep sorrow projected by the stone, as it interacts with desire but never meets or fulfills it.

Individuals that gaze upon the stone are showed a vision of whatever it is that their heart desires the most, and magical individuals who wear the gem close to their head are able to see these visions when looking at others. While the stone shows a single vision with utmost clarity, it may only read the desire of an individual once before they are unable to see anything in its myriad reflections but the constant, hungry void. Like all of Orthus' gifts to Dormeria, usage of Silaxes comes at a cost - for each desire they uncover, Dormeria loses a desire of her own corresponding to what it was that she revealed. Multiple desires of the same type can be revealed at no additional cost to the wielder, but Dormeria is incapable of finding love, having a family, or having wealth. After extended use, Silaxes can no longer pluck desires from Dormeria, however - she has paid her price, and the gem now offers its power to her freely.

V O L A Y R E ,  T H E  F L E S H  U N B O U N D
The rune-covered tome Volayre is the last of Dormeria's gifts, used only once, but was integral to defeating Lazarus, and represented the gift of life, temporary though it may have been. Volayre was the most sought-after of Dormeria's relics after her death, but was never found on her person or in the Elysian Plains after Lazarus had been defeated.

Simple and elegant in design, Volayre is an unadorned black leather grimoire that one could easily mistake for being an average book rather than a font of arcane power. The spine of the book is still uncracked, and the surfaces are matte and featureless. Even the aura of power the book innately has is smooth and nondescript, easy to pass by unless one knows what it is that they are looking for. The pages within the book crawl with runic markings that seem to shift and shy away from light, desperate not to be read, and even Dormeria does not understand the contents of the book.

Volayre acts as a veritable repository for unused flesh, bone, and blood - sustaining and nurturing it within the indecipherable scrawls of its pages. This flesh bears myriad purposes, allowing Dormeria to create corpses where none existed, to replace lost limbs, or even in the case of Lazarus to create an avatar whose life is bound to the book and to the wielder. Most often Volayre will create monstrosities of its own peculiar design, misshapen and mismatched amalgams of various body parts and functions and forms all with whatever particular intent that its bearer has at the time. Like all of Orthus' gifts, Volayre demands a price, a binding of one's own body to the book in order to lend life to its creation - and should its creation be killed, so too will the linked body part or individual. This cost was instrumental to defeating Lazarus, and following that event Dormeria is no longer subject to its thrall as she paid its price once before.

A B I L I T I E S

 Dormeria's magical abilities were largely related to the manipulation of the body in various and myriad ways - most often as a necromancer raising soulless and mindless corpses to do her bidding, and in this regard she was exceptionally potent due to the power of her equipment. Dormeria's inherent magical abilities are strong, but without Ukenagasu her ability to raise the dead is severely limited. Less limited is Dormeria's power to weave and unravel the flesh of the living, to restore health or sap the last breath from those she comes across, but even this power was raised to the status of legendary by the artifacts given to her by Orthus. Dormeria is capable of transforming her appearance or the appearance of others, and is largely able to manipulate anything about the human form given time due to her broad purview of body - but the subtle intricacies of these arts are again linked to her artifacts and without their presence she does not have the power or fine control necessary to utilise these abilities.
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