Elzynthia Admira

Elzytnhia is a beautiful, voluptuous and tall woman.

Elzynthia has a sharp and beautiful face. Her eyes are light lavender and she has golden freckles.

As the shade maiden, Elzynthia was an incredibly skilled shadow weaver, but her powers easily exceeded that when she became the Chosen of Mystryl. Her spellcasting was more powerful than most wizards could ever dream off and her natural affinity with the weave made creativity her only limit for what she could do.

Elzynthia wears a and purple robe with covered in silver stars, a large wizard hat and long high heeled boots.

Elzynthia is incredibly skilled at swordsmanship and was one of the greatest fighters in the second Kredaria-Valmyran war.

Early Life

Elzynthia Admira is a powerful servant of Mystra and one of her few chosen, she was born around the year A3 1200, but exactly where and when is unknown to her. She never had a relationship with her parents as she never met them. Elzynthia was instead raised by Irius Thelxion who was a powerful sorcerer and mage who lived in Theux in Valmyra an old kingdom located within the Gray mountains, but who originally came from Kyrene. Irius was a very isolated individual and how he ended up with Elzynthia is still unknown to her, but he did raise her and is the reason for why she became the person she is today. Irius was a man of stature within Theux as he served as a magical counsellor to the Grand Duke of Theux, though he was rarely seen in court and prefered to stay in his house known as the Domus Arcani (also known as the house of arcanum). This was also where Elzynthia spent much of her childhood and teenage years. Irius was a powerful sorcerer and had hopes of making Eli his apprentice and successor. Because of Irius’ isolated and determined method of raising Elzynthia, she recieved a very unorthodox childhood.   Elzynthia was originally named Veronica Thelxion after Irius Thelxion, and would be known as that for a long time, many even remembering her as Veronica as she would continue to use that name until she became a chosen of Mystryl in the year A3 1329. Eli was not born a sorcerer or had any innate magical potential, something she was often told by Irius during her first decade in his care. He was a very demanding figure, but she always thought it was because of how important his work was to him and how much he wanted Eli to succeed. When she was 12 years old, she had trained to learn magic for as long as she could read, but never had been able to cast more than a cantrip or two. Irius told her that it would come with time, something she did not believe until she was given a crystal by Irius he called the Dusk Shard. The shard was inserted into her forearm, so she could tune the weave to it and cast spells. After she was given the Dusk Shard, Eli was able to learn spells of higher circles and within her teenage years, she had all but mastered the 7th circle of magic. She did however find herself unable to cast all the same spells as Irius as she could only draw magic from the shadows, Irius would explain that the shard made her able to cast spells only from the Shadow Weave, but at greater power than those who draw from the normal weave. Eli was in his eyes too troubled to learn the normal arcane method and therefore the Dusk Shard would allow her to still match and even surpass normal arcane wielders as the weave could normally not counter each other, meaning if she played her cards right, she could surprise any foe and catch them off guard. The Dusk Shard allowed her to become a shadow weaver, a rare and dangerous type of mage.   Once Eli showed signs of mastery over shadow weaving, Irius had her train with weapons like shortswords and dagger. She was pushed to her limit by Irius, and when he could no longer personally train her in combat, she was trained by a retired adventurer by the name Varnec Tudrik. Varnec was a mercenary and adventurer in his life and was well trained in blades. He was a tall and wide Revanian who had seen much battle in his time. He was covered from head to toe in scars which each told their own story. Each story was fascinating for Eli and she enjoyed his company immensely, the scar which fascinated her the most was his missing eye. He insisted it was a dragon which had taken his eye, but Eli never truly believed him as he seemed to always switch the topic to another battle when she asked about it. Varnec managed to push Eli further than Irius, but he was more caring and acted with a tenderness that was uncommon in Eli’s life. Varnec went on to teach Eli how to master her swords and how to dual wield them while not hindering her weaving. Varnec also taught Eli how to have fun and live a more social life, he took her with him out into the town and kingdom, and was even allowed to have her accompany him home to his home realm of Revania as he was a proud revanian. The world opened much up for Eli as the furthest she had travelled before meeting Varnec was the forests just outside of her hometown.  

Second Kredaria-Valmyran War

Eli never saw much real combat before the second war between Kredaria and Valmyra. The King of Valmyra Arnout Farnlyn made sure to take advantage of Irius who served his Grand Duke of Theux. Irius was usually very timid when it came to his role as counsellor to the duke, but the king forced his hands and he had to contribute. He decided to have Eli take his place and be in direct servitude to the Grand Duke, she would become an essential role in the war as she was used as an assassin and a weapon to counter mages as her magic was unaltered by the effects of the weave. Eli grew more powerful during the war and would end the lives of important political figures, generals and even face the esteemed wizard Elzius Imorin who she killed. She would be given the nickname “Shade Maiden” during the war as she mostly fought during the night and her enemies began to fear the night as no one was safe in the shadows. The war ended after seven years with Valmyra victorious and Kredaria being destroyed and split into six territories, four of which became part of Valmyra and the two other later becoming the independent nation of Arnilva and Aboran.   Eli and Irius gained much from the war as well. Irius was given more resources for his work by the king as compensation for his help during the war and Eli was offered to marry the King’s son and heir Sturias Farnlyn, a proposal which Eli agreed upon after much swaying from her father. Varnec was also part of the war, mostly to protect Eli, but he too was well compensated and was even given a countryside estate where he could live out his retirement with proper wealth and luxury. He would accept and the estate he was given would with time become Tudrhall, a small settlement which would later be destroyed during the Alder Wars 200 years later. His family also gained much prestige from the war and his actions were made into songs in Revania.  

Tower of Wonder

Eli would continue to help Valmyra defeat enemies, far and wide through the continent in the following years as her talent for assassination and stealth became legendary. She was also tasked with retrieving some items and magical relics for Irius as his work demanded some rare artefacts, one of these was known as the Eye of Zaros, a relic which originally belonged to the founder of Thornheart Zaros Magnus. It was a long and difficult task which had Eli visit not only her own plane, but others as well. She eventually found out where the eye was located, it was in the hands of a mage known as Traberion Amonar, she had not heard of the individual, but thought little of it as she tracked him down to his home on the astral plane known as The Tower of Wonder. When she eventually found his home, she snuck inside and found the artefact. The Tower of Wonder was a difficult maze to wander through and she saw magic that was on a completely different level than what she had experienced before. The entire tower was trapped by arcane wards, golems and worse, but with no sign of Traberion himself, the heist was successful and she managed to recover the artefact for Irius.   Retrieving the artefact for Irius was the last major milestone needed for the project Irius had worked on for almost a century. After Eli got back and gave it to Irius, he became much more isolated and spent even more time alone with his tomes than he had done before, she was needed less and less over the months and began living a more settled life with her husband Sturias Farnlyn . The months became years and Irius would sometimes call upon Eli, but she spent most of her time with her family and her three children Arend, Leonia, and Valerie. Eli’s life with her family made her abandon much of her previous life as her children brought her much happiness, the king Arnout Farnlyn also grew more and more sick with time and in A3 1242 he died and Sturias became king and Eli became queen.  

Fall of Theux

After having ruled Valmyra with her husband for a decade with little contact with Irius, he reached out to Eli and her family in hopes of gathering as much of the realm as possible in Theux as his work was finally done and he hoped to show it off as his promise was that it would drive the kingdom to the front of arcane technology and solve hundreds of problems for the nation. Irius, though isolated and private, was well trusted by the noble family and of course by his daughter Eli, who with her husband managed to gather almost 10 000 people in Theux in A3 1253, including her old friend and mentor Varnec Tudrik who she had kept in contact with over the years. He would often visit Eli with his family who all got along with Eli’s new life. When all were gathered in Theux, Irius showed off a massive gateway which he had built which was connected to many contraptions and artefacts including the Eye of Zaros. Irius was also wielding his most powerful tome known as the Lexicon of Occult Knowledge which had been the source of many of his ideas and knowledge. Few knew what was about to happen as Irius had kept it hidden, even for Eli, but none would have guessed what was to come. When the gateway was activated a massive surge of energy swept through the entire city and went on for miles beyond it. Everything living within the reach of the gateway instantly withered and died, the sky dimmed and buildings fell. The “Fall of Theux '' had just taken place and a large portion of the nation of Valmyra and most of its royalty had just perished. When the energy finally washed away, only two beings were standing, Irius and Eli. Eli could not fathom what had just happened and she was holding her children when it happened and all that was left were husks of their former selves. Even Varnec Tudrik who was one of the greatest warriors she had ever met had fallen with no resistance. Eli was not even aware about her surroundings when another figure stepped through the now opened gateway. A withered humanoid person with tattered clothes, a bejewelled and golden open ribcage came walking through. He was clearly ancient and powerful, though his looks was deceiving as he looked battleworn as his eye was missing and his body seemed to almost limp when he walked. He didn’t take much time to take in his whereabouts before wisps of light were ripped from the husks of people around Eli and sucked towards the person who had just emerged. While this was happening Irius was just as shocked and paralyzed as Eli, his face had turned white and his bones to jelly as he fell to his knees. Whatever he thought he was doing all this time, was just a deception. Eli rushed towards him and demanded answers in a fit of rage and grief, but all Irius could say was “It was not meant to be like this. Fertile fields as far as the eye could see, sickness no more and death nothing more but a whisper”. The tattered creature laughed upon hearing Irius’ words proclaimed that he gave what was promised, but not for his people, but his own. Immediately after saying this, Eli saw an army of undead creatures walking towards the gateway from the realm on the other side of the gate. Eli managed to pick herself and Irius up as she knew they could not let whoever this lich was completely his consumption of souls nor let his army enter through the gate. Irius would attempt to stop the gateway while Eli battled the lich. The undead creature was overpowering Eli at every turn while Irius was unable to close the gate. He had made the gateway, but he did not know completely how it worked. He figured during the battle that his gateway did not connect to a random location in the other realm, but rather an identical gateway. The only thing he knew was different was the Eye of Zaros which was on this plane, but something else must have kept it open on the other end as well. Irius told Eli that he would need to enter into the other realm and destroy the gateway there and she needed to do the same in this realm. Eli understood that it would trap Irius with the army, but could not see any other way of closing it off at the time, so she did as her father told her. She managed to hack away at the gate while keeping the lich off her, but as her tricks and shadow weaving became more predictable to the lich she found herself in a bad spot. The lich was about to take her life just as she was about to remove the eye of Zaros, when Irius latched on to the lich and pushed him and himself back through the gate, giving Eli enough time to rip the eye out and close the gate. That was the last time Eli saw Irius as his sacrifice saved the rest of Valmyra and potentially much more. Eli buried her children and husband, but did not return to Valmyra or her home in the capital. She had nothing or no one to return to and she wanted not to go back to her life knowing that the lich was still out there, somewhere. While Eli left her home country, Valmyra would go into a long civil war of leadership and lose much of its territories outside Valmyra’s mountains as the civil war would shatter much of their empire.  

Search for the Whispered One

Eli spent the next decades of her life chasing rumours of the lich and learning as much as she could about him. She had attuned herself with the eye of Zaros after removing it from the gateway which had improved her arcane skills even more. The Lexicon which her father had used as his guide during his many decades of misguided experimenting was now under the control and she would from time to time use it to learn about the lich she had met, even learning that it was called the Whispered One. She would however keep the usage of the book to a minimum as she knew the cost that followed every lesson she learnt from it. While travelling the world in search of clues of the Whispered One, Eli realised it was best for her to keep her past at bay and let her identity as both the queen of Valmyra and the Shade Maiden be dead as she ventured forth into the world. Anyone who asked about her past or name would simply be given the answer Veronica from nowhere of note. She also spent much of her time reflecting upon the many mysteries in her life, including the nature of her powers which she never truly had understood or questioned during her training with her father. It was reasonable for her to believe her elongated lifespan was because of it, but she also feared that it might also be the product of the Lexicon and therefore connected to the Whispered One in some way or another.   During her many decades searching for the Whispered One, Eli would often stay in the same places for longer than she had needed for. This was because she had a hard time leaving people or communities she found in trouble without making sure they were safe or their problems solved. She spent much time helping people, which helped her find meaning in her now very lonely life, but the burning rage inside her for revenge never dimmed enough to abandon her search. She knew that all the people she helped along her journey would suffer a fate like her own family if she could not stand up against the Whispered One. She was also unsure if she was powerful enough to stand up to him again when they met, she had been overwhelmed the last time they had met and if not for her father’s sacrifice she would have been dead for sure. This led Eli to find others in the world who she could learn to trust. She knew that her problems were beyond most who would call themself adventurers or heroes, so she searched for those taught in the arcane arts, which eventually lead her to Shimmerford, school of the arcane arts in Evlora.  

Shimmerford

Shimmerford was an ancient school of magic wielders who had existed for thousands of years. If someone knew about the Whispered One and about the artefacts she carried, it must be them, but to her dismay, Shimmerford would not be the haven she had hoped for. The mages at Shimmerford let her in, but it did not take them long to identify her as the Shade Maiden, who had previously killed one of their greatest arcanists, Elzius Imorin. She was captured by the wizard and held locked up in one of their dungeons for three long years. While captured by Shimmerford, Eli was tested upon, interrogated and used for the arcanist’s seemingly endless void of experiments, most of which caused great harm to Eli and left her weakened, hurt or worse for weeks or months at a time, before having to endure it all over again. The tests she had to go through got gradually worse and worse during her time at Shimmerford, until one day the torture had reached its limit and Eli was killed during one of the experiments which attempted to extract her Dusk Shard, an event which would also kill her torturers. Her body was brought out of the school and into the hands of the archmage of Necromancy Krasior Indassian. Krasior Indassian knew what had happened to Eli and went behind the back of the principal and the other archmages and resurrected Eli. He had not done so out of the goodness of his heart, however, he wanted to understand the item that she had been found with, the Lexicon of Occult Knowledge. Eli was surprised and grateful for being alive, but she quickly understood that Krasior had plans for her. During her resurrection, he had taken a part of her soul captive in a soul gem and made sure that if he was killed it would be unobtainable for Eli. She might have been saved from the torture of the council of archmages, but her new captivity under Krasior would now begin. Eli had to teach Krasior how to use the Lexicon and how to resist its control while keeping the demanded payments to a low. It was a difficult life living under the “ownership” of Krasior while hiding one's existence but after two years of serving Krasior, she had fulfilled his end of the bargain and released her, on the exception that he left her the book. She had not much of a choice in the situation and left the lexicon with Krasior, but she would manage to retrieve the eye of Zaros from Shimmerford before leaving to continue her endeavour to stop the Whispered One.   The next decade of Eli’s hunt was more productive than the ones before arriving at Shimmerford. The torture and pain she had gone through during her stay at Shimmerford had done nothing but anger her otherwise bottled rage. She became less interested in helping out the little people and focused more on her hunt, leaving villages and people to their own for the most part as her views had shifted much after being violated for years on. Any person or being who would come in her way, be in withholding information or angering her in any form would quickly see the Shade Maiden in action. Her journey would send her further than her search before and this time she would travel through countries within days instead of months, even Mar’Dahar and islands far off the mainland in Kyrene, this had however become a trivial task for Eli as travelling great distances became easy for shadow weavers. She could use the shadows in the shadowfell as a conduit between locations far apart, travelling many miles an hour with little effort and cost to herself.  

Return of the Whispered One

This time her long journeys would find conclusive evidence of the Whispered One’s return. She learnt that some daring sailors had seen mysterious movement in the ruins of Lyseria in Mar’Dahar. Monuments had been erect out of nowhere and multiple humanoids had been observed worshipping these monuments. The one thing which all the sailors could agree upon was the symbol on the carved stones which resembled an eye being trapped in a ribcage, something which Eli remembered being odd about the lich she met decades ago. She began her journey to Lyseria, a journey which would be more difficult than the others she had been on in the last decades. Lyseria was a heavily magical and chaotic location which sat upon an incredible unique site as no other place in the known world did as many weave ley lines meet as in Lyseria, making the area almost impossible to manoeuvre using magic, even the shadow weave. Her journey took months, but she made it to the dead land of the moon elves which once had caused their great empire to fall due to their own ambition and shunning of the gods. Eli herself had no divine loyalty as none had ever bothered to answer her during her prayers, so she would enter this dead nation much like the moon elves who once had lived here, godless.   Eli did not have to travel far into Lyseria before she saw the monument the sailors had told her about. They were large pieces of ruins and stones carved to resemble the symbol of the Whispered One with one large structure in the middle which looked much like the gateway her father had made almost a hundred years earlier in Theux, but this one much larger and more decorated than the last. There were also dozens of humans continuously working on the gateway, which all looked to be in a dazed state of mind, mindlessly following orders. She didn’t see any undeads around nor the lich she had fought in Theux. She was unsure how far along they had come with the portal and what terrors it might bring with it. The people working on the gateway seemed to ignore her when she tried to apprehend one of them in hopes of learning about their progress, but its dull mind was not just an effect applied upon it, their minds were broken and beyond repair. Eli became unsure of her course of actions and almost regretted coming in the first place as she had to way of destroying such a large construct, she also didn’t understand how they were going to open the portal as the ley lines of Lyseria was not enough for such a gateway, but then it hit her just as a searing pain shot through her body from her arm. While falling to her knees, Eli understood that the very thing that could bring the Whispered One and his army through was the very thing she was carrying with her, the eye of Zaros. She made it up to her feet just as a blow hit her face. She saw a tall and wide fully armoured man in front of her wielding a terrifying longsword. She tried to guard him off with her magic, but it was first then she realised the cause of the extreme pain was. Half her right arm was missing and the dusk shard she drew her powers from was gone. She had become powerless and unable to draw upon the shadow weave. She had nothing but her sword to keep up with the warrior who fought with unnatural strength and skills that matched her every move, better than any warrior she had faced in decades. The overwhelming power of her enemy combined with her missing arm bleeding her quickly to death, made it so that she began to take hit after hit, only dodging enough of the blade each time to keep herself alive. During her fight she only got one lucky strike on the warrior, but one she was sure to slow him down, she had managed to pierce an eyehole in the warriors helmet and stuck her blade into the attacker’s eye. Eli made sure to make distance between herself and the warrior while he was busy removing the blade, but she was petrified when she saw the face beneath the helmet. She did not believe her eyes, but the person she had been fighting was Varnec Tudrik, a gray skinned version of her former mentor, and with no eyepatch this time, but a downward slit lizard-like eye in its stead which her sword tip was currently stuck in. Varnec with little sign of any pain pulled the sword tip with the eye still stuck to it out of his skull with one grotesque motion. He then pulled the sword from eye and put it back, still blinking and focusing on Eli. Eli, still not believing her eyes had a million thoughts fire up in her mind, questions about what had truly happened in Theux that day and if Varnec had always hid this side to him or if he was now under the control of the Whispered One. While Varnec moved towards Eli she cried out towards her old mentor in a desperate plea to remind him of who he was, but he simply responded with a thrust of his blade to her heart while grabbing the eye of Zaros she had kept around her neck for decades.   Eli came to her senses after an unknown amount of time, but in a different place to where she had been stabbed. She was floating amidst stars in a sea of colours where nothing but light could be seen for what seemed forever. She was not in pain and Varnec was nowhere to be seen, Eli was unsure if this was a brief moment of lucidity before death or if she had already died. She was interrupted from her internal confusion when a beautiful woman with piercing blue eyes in an iridescent silk dress appeared in front of her. Eli was in a continuous state of confusion and had no idea what to say or do in a situation like this as she had never been present to someone so magical in nature nor so beautiful. Eli was not given the opportunity to express herself before the woman began speaking to her, something which probably saved her much awkwardness. She introduced herself as Mystryl the goddess of magic and the protector of the weave, Eli had known about the goddess, but she was a shadow weaver and therefor was told to stay away from the goddess and her domain as her method of casting magic is often viewed as the opposite and adversary method of Mystryl and her weave. Mystryl had watched over Eli’s journey since the chaos in Theux many decades past and been intrigued by her willpower and determination to track down the Whispered One. She had watched her put the needs of those in need before her own and she had witnessed her go through torture for years by her own followers as Shimmerford. Eli was almost sure that Mystryl said her last lines with a bitterness or guilt as if she took the blame of her worshippers upon her own shoulders. Mystryl had not shown herself to her before now because of her connection to the shadow weave, but she had now come with an offer for Eli, an offer of power. Mystryl wanted a champion and she had chosen Eli. Eli took a moment to consider what had just transpired, but remembered what had happened moments before meeting Mystryl. She asked about the return of the Whispered One and how it all had played out, but was met with the answer that all was about to play out and that nothing had happened for now, but that Eli was bleeding out on the foundation that would become the Whispered One’s new kingdom. She could accept her power and return to that moment with the weave at her back, or she could accept her fate and know that she was responsible for whatever the Whispered One had planned with his return. Eli knew that it was not really a choice and that she had to accept whatever Mystryl was proposing, she accepted the deal.   Pain came back to Eli as she opened her eyes again, but she was no longer on an astral plane and the person in front of her was not the beautiful figure of Mystryl but the back of Varnec who was standing in front of an opened gate to a hellish land she had seen once before. While Varnec was distracted with the arrival of the Whispered One, Eli got to her feet and saw that the wound in her chest was healed, but her right arm was still only half there. She was unsure of her new powers, but could feel that her creativity and thoughts beamed with power which almost begged to be released in whatever form Eli could think of. She closed her eyes and focused on her hand and when she opened them, she could see a silver energy reforming the end of her arm before it returned to match her other arm. She understood that her new powers matched her formers, but were not as limited as her shadow weaving. She quickly made her way towards the gateway which she could now see had more figures moving through it, including one she had seen before. The Whispered One made it through the gateway with a smirk on his face as he saw Eli still alive. He made a comment to Varnec which Eli couldn’t hear before mocking her, thanking her that she delivered just as he knew she would, that the trails laid out to her were obvious enough for her small mind to comprehend. Eli didn’t focus on his comments nor the guilt she had felt for causing his return, only on that if she did not defeat him now, who could. She lept into action with her sword and her magic. Varnec went on to counter most of her physical attacks while the Whispered One mostly watched and used his own magic to counter the spells Eli was now desperately throwing out, only knowing because of her years fighting real wizards. Varnec was still a worthy adversary and her blood loss and mostly useless spells did not help her gain any advantage over him. She understood that if she could not figure anything out, the battle would repeat itself and she would soon hope for the pity of another god for a third attempt. Eli also did not want to strike down her old mentor whom she had missed for decades, he was more like a father to her than any other person and it was he who had shown him the world when she was young. She had to think of another method of defeating him.   His attacks only became quicker and more powerful with each swing, or was it Eli who got more and more tired after blocking and dodging for what seemed like hours. She never reached a weak spot in his guard and the spells she continued to cast were always shut down by the Whispered One, almost like a game he was playing with her as he did nothing else while watching the spectacle before him. But the energy that Eli used to create a new arm for herself and that first reached out to be used was not satisfied with the spells she cast, almost like a secondary power which she did not yet understand. She knew not what it was but its power became more overwhelming as it screamed to her to be used. It became too much for her and as she released it, an eruption of silver fire exploded out of her, knocking both Varnec and the Whispered One back. The power she had felt didn’t vanish once it was released, no, it had increased instead. The tirelessness she had felt vanished and she felt rejuvenated. While Varnec got his footing back, Eli was already over him with her weapon striking at him and quickly rendering his attacks as futile as hers had been to him. It was now him who was defending against her quicked strikes and he quickly stumbled backward, losing the grip of his weapon for a moment, but a moment which Eli could easily use to punish his mistake. She disarmed him and brought him to his back on the ground. She had him at his mercy and for the first time in their encounter did he speak to her, he screamed “finish me” at her. The moment took her back as she realised this was not the emotionless monster she had fought, but instead the man held captive within, Varnec the mentor whom she loved. It took all her willpower to stop herself from falling on her knees and hugging him now that she could see that there was something left of him inside. She was unsure of what to do, but the powers that were illuminating her compelled her to light her flames once again. She channelled her energy into a focused beam this time, one focused directly at the eye that matched the Whispered One’s. Varnec now screamed out in pain and agony and she heard the Whispered One telling her that she was killing him, little did she care for his lies as she continued focusing her fire as she could see the relief offered on Varnec’s face as she did so. A flash of colours appeared out of Varnec’s eye, a flash which blinded all present at the time. When sight returned to Eli, she could see that Varnec was alive and the eye was nothing but dust. She now fell to her knees and hugged her mentor as he embraced her back.   The two shared a moment before Varnec struck with his blade. Eli was caught off guard, not knowing if she had been mistaken and it was all a play, but the strike was not at her but instead the Whispered One who had snuck up on her with his own dagger ready to strike at her head. She quickly rose as the battle was not yet done and the gateway behind the Whispered One was quickly filling with dozens of figures waltzing towards them. She knew they would be overwhelmed by his monsters if they were not quick to act. She began to channel her spells at the lich as Varnec picked up his sword and kept the lich too busy to counter Eli’s spells. The two got the upper hand on the lich and they pushed him back towards the gateway. Just when they believed they had him stumbling back, meteors began raining from the sky at them. Eli threw herself as far back as she could but Varnec was hit alongside the lich. When the fires vanished, she saw only one figure still standing up. The Whispered One had been unaffected by the spell and was ready to focus everything at Eli now that she was the only adversary still fighting. He began throwing spells at her while she was now forced to take the place as the counter to his spells. His seemingly infinite spellcasting would go on to overwhelm her, but just as he had broken through her defences, Varnec jumped him with his blade, impaling him and grappling him from behind. His armor was broken and he was scorched and barely hanging on. He screamed out to Eli that this was her chance to fire, but Eli hesitated. She had been in this situation a century before in Theux when her father Irius had sacrificed himself to give her the opportunity to save herself and banish the Whispered One. She didn’t know if she had the strength to do it again, after being alone for so long and just now finally reuniting with her mentor. She looked at Varnec who was fighting for his life holding the lich in place for her as he continued to shout for her to act. He had a look of sadness, but also comfort in his eyes as he watched Eli gather her energy into a powerful beam of silver fire. He was given the comfort of laying down his own life to not only save thousands of people from the Whispered One, but most importantly, saving the one life he cared most about. The beam shot out towards Varnec and the lich who was desperately looking for any way out of this situation. He frantically tried to cast any spell to get him out of his situation but Varnec fought against him to interrupt anything he attempted, even cutting off the lich’s left hand in the progress. In a last ditch effort from the lich he telekinetically grabbed Eli’s severed arm and held the shard up against the beam, knowing something about the item’s nature nobody else knew. The beam hit him, Varnec and the shard as a tear in reality sprouted from the collision between pure silver fire and the powers of the shadow weave. The two opposing forces tore the fabric of reality and planes apart and a massive eruption of black and white took place, knocking Eli back once more. When she woke up this time, she saw that the gateway was completely broken and any monument she had seen in the valley was now in ruins once more. She walked over to where the Whispered One had been standing and found nothing of his remaining. She did however see another figure a small distance away from the broken portal. It was varnec who had been halfway buried in the rubble, but still barely alive. Eli began to hug him as tears flooded her eyes and ran down her cheeks. Varnec could not speak much but he felt the embrace of the person most dearest to him. He could only look at her with pride as his last moments were spent in her arms.