Hasra was not the only power to form in the aftermath of the Fall. Several thousand miles southeast a godtouched of incredible strength set events in motion with consequences still felt today.
He was known as Olivanticus, a decorated war hero during the final years of the Elentian Empire. Olivanticus was both a powerful summoner and binder, and had used his powers to enslave and kill many enenies of the empire. Eventually he reached the limits of the rites he was allowed to know, for Celeste had decreed that the darker arts were forbidden.
Olivanticus chafed under such limits and broke her decree, becoming the first Dreadlord to exist since the dawn of the Empire. Eventually he was discovered and forced to flee for his life, barely escaping into the relatively unsettled West just a few years prior to The Fall. He knew that if he sought sanctuary anywhere near an established kingdom he’d be found by the empire’s assassins, so he was determined to find a remote location.
Olivanticus arrived in the West by ship, docking at the coastal city of Jer Herrod, where the Southern Ocean and the South Sea meet. He travelled northeast through dozens of small valleys as he worked his way inland.
Most of these valleys were controlled by violently territorial orokh tribes. Since Olivanticus was a powerful Dreadlord he batted them aside like annoying insects. He enslaved the strongest, using those warriors to slay their brethren as needed.
Olivanticus spent nearly two years wandering through small forests, valleys and caverns seeking the perfect place to conduct his experiments. He was a patient man, which was hardly surprising given the long lifespan of the Godtouched.
During that time he learned the Orokh tongue to better subjugate the tribes under his domination. The further east he went the more these tribes told tales of horrifying monstrosities that drank blood and killed any who dared enter their lands.
These tales intrigued Olivanticus. The orokh were fearless to a point bordering suicidal, and saw combat as the ultimate expression of worth. What monster could be so terrible that even they didn’t dare enter its territory?
He gathered his most powerful minions and made his way east. The tribes he passed grew increasingly fearful. Each gave warnings of the Kar’gara’na, which roughly translated to the consumed. Consumed by what, Olivanticus wondered?
He finally arriving at an immense forest of towering redwoods that dominated the east in an endless arboreal wall. Olivanticus had seen wonders throughout the Elentian empire, but the forboding majesty of those trees put them all to shame.
The orokh he’d brought warned that the Kar’gar’na would emerge after dark, so Olivanticus ordered them to erect defenses atop a small mountain overlooking the forest. He summoned several earth elementals to speed the construction, and by the time the first night fell he held a well fortified position.
Olivanticus controlled powerful demons, nearly two hundred Orokh and a host of elementals. He believed that his force would easily deal with whatever these consumed were. His mistake nearly cost him everything.
Hundreds of consumed boiled out of the forest minutes after sunset. Some were animals, bears, wolves and even squirrels. Others were orokh. Still others were elfen, though the hue of their skin and hair were different from any Olivanticus had ever seen.
Every consumed had several things in common. They bore razor sharp claws, two inches long and black as night. Each held the same awful eyes, pools of crimson like fresh blood from a heartwound, with only a tiny black pupil to relieve it. All also bore a maw of jagged fangs and could dislocate their jaw to sieze their prey when ready to feed.
These consumed swarmed his defenses in a black tide, overwhelming his slaves. The orokh fell quickly despite their immense strength, for any wounds the consumed sustained healed nearly as quickly as they were made.
Even his mighty demons were overwhelmed eventually, though those able to wield the destructive forces of the void had some success against the consumed. Their magic literally dissolved their opponents, melting them into nothingness.
Within hours all of Olivanticus’s followers were dead. The dreadlord himself would have perished, but he used binding to seize control of the surviving consumed. The effort taxed him greatly as there were many foes, but with his life on the line he found the strength needed to control them.
The Dreadlord found that the consumed were more difficult to control than any being he’d ever dominated. It was as if something or someone had already enslaved their will and wrestled for control.
By the time dawn finally broke Olivanticus had reached the very limits of his strength. He released all but one of the consumed, who fled back to the shelter of their forest as if they feared the sunlight. Olivanticus didn’t wait to learn more. He fled bringing his single consumed servant with him.
Oddly while the consumed seemed to fear the sunlight it suffered no visible ill effects. He expected it to burst into flames, or be harmed in some way, yet nothing like that occurred. So why did it fear the sun? Olivanticus desperatley wished for the answer.
He also wished to know what transformed animals, orokh and even elfen into monsters. Where did their terrible strength originate? He brought the consumed to a village several weeks from the forest of the consumed. The tribe quickly capitulated and he used the cave belonging to their shaman as a laboratory to experiment on his captive.
Olivanticus summoned two powerful demons to retrain the creature while he disected it. This process was difficult in the extreme, because the consumed regenerated extremely quickly. After several hours of study he made a startling discovery. Root like veins grew through the creature’s entire body, with the concentration growing increasingly dense the closer he came to its heart.
Cutting out the heart revealed the source of the creature’s power. A walnut sized seed proved to be the source of the roots growing throughout the creature’s body. It’s removal killed the creature, though the blood seed (as Olivanticus named it) survived the removal very much intact.
Olivanticus was fascinated by the seed. Was it a parasite or more of a symbiote? Where did it come from? He implanted it in one of his strongest Orokh. The transformation was immediate, converting the Orokh into one of the consumed within a matter of minutes. Yet there was something curiously different about the transformation.
The orokh’s blood red eyes glitted with intelligence. It had retained its will and could both understand and follow orders. The new creature made the perfect servant. Inhumanly strong, able to regenerate from grevious wounds and able to smell its prey from a league away.
Olivanticus made many forays back to the forest and captured dozens of consumed in order to create more of these fabulous servants. The second and third attempts did not retain their will, instead becoming little more than maddened animals. The fourth, however, retained its will just as the first had.
After much experimentation Olivanticus learned that only those with exceptional strength of will could maintain their sanity when given a blood seed. The others were consumed by bloodlust, forever altered into mindless beasts enslaved by their hunger for blood.
Olivanticus could control these consumed, though the effort it took was far greater than any other minion he’d bound. The intelligent ones, on the other hand, were much easier to dominate.
He spent the next several months capturing more consumed and removing their blood seeds. Each time he would implant promising Orokh, binding those who retained their will. He named these new creatures vampyr, an Elentian word for a mythical demon reputed to drink blood.
Olivanticus converted a score of the finest Orokh warriors into vampyr. This cadre was so powerful that they decimated every foe they encountered, allowing Olivanticus to forge dozens of tribes into a single army.
This army provided both the freedom and resources to conduct whatever experiments he wished with no fear of discovery by the Elentian Empire. Even their mighty forces avoided the Orokh lands, which left him to run things as he pleased.
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The Rise of a Nation
Olivanticus continued to expand his dominion. He created more and more vampyr, enslaving each using the infamous Bond of Jhordil. These vampyr became a sort of nobility among the orokh, each seizing a tribe to rule.
Within a decade over seventy tribes were welded into a single nation, one controlled by the iron grip of Olivanticus. These Orokh lived and died at his pleasure, and his vampyr servants easily kept control of the tribes.
Yet despite his growing influence Olivanticus was unsatisfied. He still had no idea where the blood seeds originated, nor had he taken one himself. His own will was strong, almost certainly strong enough to survive the transformation. Yet what if he failed? He’d become a consumed, his mind destroyed by the blood seed.
Olivanticus decided the risk was worth it. He’d seen the enormous power gained by the Orokh he’d converted to vampyr, and decided it was time to claim the power himself. He harvested a blood seed and ordered his minions to insert it into his chest. Fortunately for him he survived the transformation, growing greatly in power from the experience. Yet the experience was not without a cost.
The seed was a living entity with its own will. He waged a constant battle for control and was subjected to endless whispers in his mind, always prompting him to surrender. He simply ignored it.
Olivanticus long suspected that the seeds came from the blood wood where he’d first encountered the consumed. He was determined to find out more about it’s orgins, hoping that this understanding would grant him even greater powers and might possibly allow him to silence the voice in his mind.
He gathered fifty of his most powerful vampyr and headed into the forest. His forces were under near constant assault by the consumed, but with their magic allowed them to drive their opponents back. They pushed deeper and deeper into the forest until they finally encountered a strange tribe of Elfen.
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The Na’Elfen
Two days into the forest Olivanticus and his followers were attacked by mysterious opponents. They were ambushed from the trees, facing a rain of arrows and spears.
The vampyr were unable to scale the trees quickly enough, so Olivanticus summoned several giant spiders. These spiders drove off their attackers and captured a pair of strange Elfen, similar to the consumed he’d already encountered. They had pale skin and silver hair.
He interogated his prisoners and learned of an entire tribe of elfen that dwelled in the forest. They called themselves the Na’Elfen. Olivanticus knew elfen meant fallen in the ancient tongue, and after interogating his captives learned that Na’Elfen meant further fallen.
He enslaved the two captives with the Bond of Jhordil, and used them to find the Na’Elfen’s arboreal village. His Orokh were able to round up most of the villagers in a surprise night attack, and Olivanticus had them gathered in the small clearing at the center of the village.
He learned that they followed a matron, an ancient elfen the others called the Singer. This Singer told him much about the tribe and about the forest. They had dwelled there for centuries, and every last one was a vampyr…even the children. Yet not a single one of them possessed a seed, and the Singer was shocked and outraged when Olivanticus suggested that they might. The elfen were not slaves to the seeds, and explained that they had taken the blood of the godess. .
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The Tree of Blood
The Singer gave a tale that smacked of myth. In the days when gods walked the land the forest was a land of peace and tranquility where the legendary Vithi spread life and healing.
One day a terrible battle erupted in the skies over the forest. The Daughter of Night battled the three golden sisters. The struggle lasted six days and seven nights, but in the end the last surviving golden sister impaled the daughter of night through the chest with the fabled Heartwood Spear.
The goddess plummetted from the skies, hitting the earth with such force that she created a deep crater. Over the centuries the forest covered that body, but it was not the only thing to take root in the corpse of the goddess.
The Heartwood Spear was a living weapon. It put down roots into the very heart of the goddess, drinking of her divine blood. As the years passed the spear grew into a mighty redwood that towered thousands of feet into the air.
The spear was intelligent and as it transformed into the Tree of Blood it grew still more so. The Tree had millenia to learn, watch and grow. Unfortunately the blood of the godess twisted the tree into a dark, malevolent force intent on spreading it’s influence across the world.
It did this by planting seeds in other living being. Each seed contained a tiny fraction of its power, complete with a drop of blood from the dead goddess. The seeds imbued their bearers with an insatiable hunger, forcing them to feed on blood. Once each consumed was sated they journeyed back to the tree to give it the blood they’d taken, allowing it to grow still mightier.
The Na’Elfen were descended from a tribe of Trolls who’d gravitated to the corpse of the fallen goddess. They became the further fallen because their tribe willingly accepted seeds from the tree. Many became consumed, but those who retained their will were horrified by the malevolence of the tree.
They wished to oppose it, but lacked the power to do so. Because they’d taken seeds they were no longer welcome among their subteranean cousins, and were forced to retreat to the surface where they lived in solitude.
The Na’Elfen were hunted by everyone. The tree and their former kin who served it hunted them endlessly, forcing them to move frequently to avoid capture. Even the Sa’Elfen, their subtereanean cousins, attacked on sight.
Olivanticus released the Na’Elfen once the Singer finished her tale. The sudden understanding that every consumed existed to fuel the power of The Tree horrified him. It meant that something far more powerful than anything he’d ever encountered had some level of control over him. Even worse he’d provided that control by taking the seed.
Olivanticus struck a bargain with the Na’Elfen. He would aid them in their war against the tree if they would provide him with guides, information and servants. He declared war against the Tree, and vowed to wipe out the consumed.
This would curtail the Tree’s power, perhaps enough that he could eventualy destroy the Tree itself. This goal became Olivanticus’s focus, because he was terrified that one day the tree would find a way to usurp his will.
To win his war Olivanticus knew he would need allies capable of enslaving consumed. That meant he needed new Dreadlords. This would require access to three very specific Catalysts. He would need Water, Spirit and Void to fuel summoners and binders. The best of these would become his new Dreadlords.
Further complicating the problem was the fact that most orokh made poor mages. He’d need humans or elfen willing to follow him. The Na’Elfen were all too happy to give him apprentices, but they were too few to suit his purposes.
Olivanticus sent scouts back to every city along the coast of the South Sea and Southern Ocean. They brought back several hundred promising candidates, which Olivanticus made good use of. He’d learned from the Na’Elfen that vampyr blood could cause a void catalization, as it was taken from a void Catalyst.
He forced the students to ingest large quantities. About a third died. Most of the rest gained various catalizations, and several ended up with void magic. Olivanticus brought the survivors to the Skull of Xalegos, which was controlled by powerful liches. He used the threat of his armies to secure their cooperation, and exposed his students to the Spirit Catalyst.
Another fifth died, while the rest gained various catalizations. Nearly a dozen ended up with both spirit and void magic, while another fifty or so had one type or the other.
The nearest Water Catalyst was The Drowned God, which was controlled by the merfolk of the South Sea. Olivanticus took a more diplomatic tact when dealing with them than he had with the liches at the Skull.
He offered the merfolk a deal. If they would allow his apprentices to catalize he would create a navy and help the merfolk battle their ancestral enemies- the Maw Pirates. Since the pirates were undead Olivanticus and his Dreadlords were uniquely suited to deal with them. The merfolk realized this, and eagerly accepted the pact.
Olivanticus exposed his remaining students to the Drowned God. Another ten percent died. About two dozen gained water magic. Of them six had spirt magic, and five had void. One had both. This gave Olivanticus six binders, five summoners and one new Dreadlord. It wasn’t what he’d hoped for, but it was a beginning.
He now possessed a cadre of apprentices capable of binding hundreds of consumed. Each was given an orokh tribe to serve them, as well as Na’Elfen retainers to look after their day to day needs. The summoners and binders became the new nobility of Olivanticus’s fledgling kingdom, and the one woman with the potential to become a Dreadlord became his personal apprentice.
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The Stronghold of Mountainshadow
Olivanticus knew he’d need powerful backing to destroy the tree. Not just a few dozen mages and several thousand Orokh, but an entire nation with a powerful military. He began to slowly conquer the lands surrounding the forest, and as his domain grew he began his most ambitious project yet.
Thousands of slaves were brought to the mountain where he’d first encountered the consumed. They were set to work hollowing it out to create a stronghold for Olivanticus. When this stronghold was finished all the slaves were used as food for the vampyr, their silence sealing the secret of the fortress’s existence.
Olivanticus also built a manor in the valley that lay in the shadow of the mountain. A town quickly grew up around it that he dubbed Mountainshadow. He kept it intentionally small, allowing only his most loyal followers to build manors in the village.
A small number of serfs were brought to the town to establish an inn, a smithy and the other services that the vampyr required. This became the first true city in Olivantia, the name Olivanticus chose for his new kingdom.
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Na’Elfen Servants
In the years following the alliance between Olivanticus and the Na’Elfen the tribe suffered setback after setback. The Tree was determined to erradicate them, and as their numbers dwindled they finally turned to the vampyr for help.
More and more wished to leave the forest, which Olivanticus was all too happy to support. Some became apprentices to his new apprentices. Others became manservants, assassins or vassals.
The Na’Elfen were excellent fighters and scouts. Accepting their loyalty was a masterful stroke on Olivanticus’ part, because he gained powerful servants for prosecuting a war he’d already intended to fight. Now that he had trained his apprentices he decided it was finally time to take the fight to the Tree.
Olivanticus and his apprentices led hundreds of vampyr with legions of orokh shock troops into the forest. They drove back the consumed, slaughtering and burning thousands. This gave the Na’Elfen who remained there the respite they needed, allowing them to recover their strength and relocate to safer areas of the forest. They were extremely grateful to the vampyr for their aid, and this act solidified the alliance between them.
