An Umbral Tide and Infinite Night

The Fall of Necrucifer

Wrapped in false confidence, assured by past success, they could not see

the snakes in their midst hid in the shadows of the Black Tower.  The

Darkness stood on the edge of a knife it could not fully perceive and

underestimated the desperation of their enemy to save the doomed God of

Honor on the Black Moon.  

The Light was joined by all neutral factions: elves fought alongside

dwarves, dragonslayers fought alongside Metallic Firstborn, even the

Conclave Trinity chose the Light while dark elven eschewed their own

birthrights and Highlanders, minotaur and yinn chose to ignore old feuds to

fight for the life of Nadrik beneath the banner of Gareth Keep.  In the

midst of the battle, even the Warped of Chaos chose to aid the Light and

thus the outnumbered core of Shadow, the Loners of Eclipse, Bloodlust,

Verminasia, Abaddon, and Chromatic found that despite their possession of

the Shards of Seanan, they could not win this battle.  

The betrayal came even as this realization settled on the ill-fated efforts

of the Dark Force, when they realized that the dark dwarf Wizard of the

Black Tower - Bodrum Darkrock - along with his mages had turned their magic

against them.  In the name of deific power did the necromancer, and those

who supported him, schism the Dark - seeking to weaken the whole that he

might reach Drakkara to slay Her and take Her place as the God of Black

Magic. 

The consequences would be devastating and echo out through the Pantheons,

through Algoron, for years to come.  

Necrucifer, in a moment of weakness, failed to capitalize on their grasp of

Nadrik.  Even as Mencius brought the blade down too late to take the God of

Honor's life, Siccara saved him by sacrificing herself and in death created

a singularity of Light that destroyed the God of Rage and Vengeance.

Turning to flee, Necrucifer - the Master of Darkness - was instead faced

with the stalwart stance of Drakkara and, with the last of Her Sons at Her

back, pushed him into Siccara's killing star.

The Black Robe Betrayer

Faced with the unprecedented loss of Necrucifer and both shock and disbelief

at this turn of events, the armies departed the Black Moon - but for Bodrum

Darkrock, nowhere would be far enough.  In the aftermath, as rage followed

the fullness of the truth of betrayal, Drakkara found the Wizard in the

Black Tower and there tore him into three living pieces - each of which was staked

alive before the Red, White, and Black Towers.  Not merely as the punishment

but the beginning of it.

Mere weeks later, as denial echoed forth from the mortal servants of Algoron

at Drakkara's rise to Necrucifer's position of rulership, She summoned great

hordes of demons and undead through the severed pieces of the dark dwarf

necromancer.  Algoron was assaulted for hours and then days, its champions

of all Pantheon barely managing to stymie the flow until Sebatis, God of

Neutral Magic, and Kantilles, God of White Magic, intervened to remove the

two halves of Bodrum from before the White and Red Towers.  The head though,

as it screamed before the Black Tower, could not be displaced.  

Drakkara's power was immutable and absolute, and Her warning unto the Dark

Pantheon - unto all the Pantheons and their champions, was clear: She was

unbound and She would have Her due as the Queen and Mistress of the

Darkness.

The Silence

A deep and decisive silence would follow from the Dark Pantheon as

Algoron's people were left to stew over Her proclamation and the remnants of

Necrucifer and Mencius mortal followers would find themselves met with a

void in the aftermath.  

Their avatars went silent, their demons laid low, His Abyss emptied, and the

Master's priests left only with the prophetic words given by Malcom

drakMartys in the founding age of Storm Keep:

"Assist Necrucifer's return so that He will rule Algoron."  

Into this silence, it was not support they would find among their own but

rigorous attack, by word, and by blade, as the strong now perceived them as

weak.  The Dungeon of Bloodlust brought war to the Keep of Shadow as the

elves of Shalonesti offered an accepted but too-late treaty unto the Dark

Knights, the Black Robed hunted them relentlessly, and in no forum - public

or private - were they met with anything but calls to submit to their new

masters in Drakkara's name.

But desperation and indignant rage would birth a new monster into the

remnants while the Warped of Chaos fed the vengeful fire of the demoralized

and abandoned.

The Cultist's Dark Call

Years would slip by each marked by deeper and deeper despair, but as

time passed a yellow haze began to form around the Black Moon and on a dark

Spring eve, it would fall to Algoron: a sign of the Prophecy.  From the

crater of its impact, a lesser demon of Necrucifer was summoned and so too

would be the last of His devout - known now as cultists.  

These devout would gather to the call of a cultist, scraping together the

few allies in the Dark who would aid them, and in this way called upon and

commanded the Dark to serve Necrucifer, the Dead God in one final, desperate

act.  

This dark deed that was demanded of them: To bring marked children

throughout Algoron so that the demon might gorge on the blood of innocents

and feed the Dead God.  

A leap of faith, some called it, but unto most it was simply unthinkable.  A

line that would finally separate the truly devout from the false.  Many more

abandoned the Dark Call, and betrayal ran rife once again through the heart

of Darkness.  Abaddon refused and the Black Tower and others of Drakkara,

fought to prevent them from succeeding in their God-given mission.

Yet through all this, the Dark Moon watched on in silence.  

Rallied once again to Nadrik's banner of Light, the Balance overwhelmingly

chose to save the innocents and slay the lesser demon - tethered, as it was

discerned, to Algoron through the life forces of demons yet found throughout

the lands.  In the face of seeing a God restored, the Balance chose to

intercede in greater number than even the Light And deny the Rebirth of

Necrucifer.  

Abandoned and betrayed by their own again, unable to rouse but a token

force, the Dark Knights of Necrucifer and the last of His devout - failed

once more.

Whispers of a Darker Tide

As the Dark Moon charted a course now unbound, its pull began to grow stronger. 

Unseen, the umbral tide began to rise and the Dark Queen sent forth Her servant

in search of voices to foretell and forewarn the rising of the tide.

Three were chosen for this task and entrusted with a piece of the umbral foretelling

as a test of their devotion, their guile, and their conviction.

Each piece to guide the entrusted three as voices bid to whisper in the dark places

and staunch the bleeding hearts of the dark

or drown them beneath the tide.

But between them they came to no consensus as bid by the Faceless Man.

Each voice spoke in its own whisper, but some not at all

in the face of animosity and challenge from each corner of Darkness, 

and Her Tower greatest of all, believing the place beside the 

throne of Darkness was theirs alone.

But the Dark Queen's craft was a patient one. As Her whispers stirred the umbra

an understanding would begin to crystallize.

The Bridge of Storms

Failure and change mark some of the most poignant moments in history,

and from both, mortalkind learns the most significant lessons.

But the mortal servants of Darkness had yet to recognize

that from Devion and Dragoth to Fatale and most important of all,

Drakkara Herself was now forever changed.

The Lost remnants of Necrucifer's faith held together

their bonds of loyalty and faith sustaining the few of Verminasia

and Storm Keep, yet with no deliverance in sight many lost their way.

One by one, the champions of Storm Keep dwindled into a meager handful,

as their hearts bled with bitterness and fury.

Yet despite their defiant prayers, Drakkara stayed her hand and waited.

Patiently the Dark Queen wove a web to bind the fractured

Servants together again and in so doing, ensure Her grip permitted no

dissent, folly, or weakness within the Pantheon that was now Hers.

The Dark Moon fell upon two leaders of Necrucifer's fold,

priests whose peerless shadow

was cast in the Blood of Umbra and the Blood of Fire.

To each a choice was posed: embrace the destiny before them and 

seize the Tide to form a Legion devout of purpose and instilled

with terrible Will to reshape the laws of Algoron

from beneath the Umbral Storm or be cast aside 

and drown.

Symantha Kesepton became Her First, an Umbraseer clever and unyielding,

and yet to the Sanctum Knights her cutting truth made a heretic and traitor.

But all that the Knights of Shadow were began first beneath an Eclipse

and the Black Moon was once herald and guide

who had writ upon the Ecliptic Arch their creed 'Ambactus a Caligo'

and gifted the Knights the Black Moonstone to unlock the Umbra,

ever warding them since the founding of Shadow.

Telthian Schwartz would become the Bridge.

A King, an Abbott and most senior priest of Necrucifer, would

set the robes aside to don not only the heavy title of Dark Lord but

seek to offer Drakkara’s Obsidian Tower an open hand as an

ally and a student while Cardinal Kesepton, Chancellor of Storm, held

the Keep in trust.

His outreach would be met with disdain and hostility from among the

Black Robe mages until his departure back to Storm Keep and the

awaiting Sanctum - over which he would become Guardian and

Gatekeeper; Warden and Master, in Her name.

Blood ran within Storm Keep as the pair wrested control from the knight of ruin

laying low those would plunge Storm into chaos,

ensuring that the foundations of eld would now hold

and from it rise anew sustained by their own sacrifices

as new souls bid to serve,

as the Dark Queen reshapes all toward Her design.