Vetrano the Illustrious
Vetrano Imber Xavendrathus of Cdaol, better known as Vetrano the Illustrious, was an accomplished necromancer and tyrant who lived in the late Era of Cloud. He was most active in the kingdoms of Selzoryn and Gamiria, both located in present-day Gaulvista. His main stronghold was Gwâthcana, though he had several other loci of operation, some known, some secret.
Born at some point in the early EC 4000s, Vetrano spent his early adulthood studying wizardry all over the continent. He became interested in shadow magic, and spent several decades conducting research seeking new ways to channel this magic into necromancy. In the 4300s he gained renown in the academic world when he, assisted by his friend and colleague Epherion Gelathirniell of Lillastam, created the necromancy spell spirit shroud. Within the decade he achieved widespread fame when he came to the aid of the lord of Keraphina, Volan Eristella, when a mysterious plague seemingly of divine origin began to manifest in his people. Vetrano concluded the plague had been created by the fanatic fallen aasimar Quinanna Gecuiliheth, and he killed her himself by infecting her with a terrible disease of his own.
These events brought him wealth in addition to fame, which he continued to accrue through various research and adventuring tasks. He never worked for the crown, and rarely assisted other researchers. Within a few decades he owned land and villages in Gaulvista, Selzoryn, Gamiria, and the Jeltiri region of Vumboldt.
He famously punished criminals by taking them as test subjects, and many were promptly killed and reanimated as undead. Several villages under his control employed a single guard, a servant of Vetrano, to whom the zombies answered. Some of this land reportedly carried the foul stench of undeath to the point of strange phenomena manifesting. When these phenomena were reported, Vetrano's usual first response was to study them in fascination, though he generally did try to resolve them afterwards.
It is estimated to have been the mid to late 4300s when Vetrano conducted an experiment with the intention of creating a portal to the Shadowfell, something he had been reportedly trying to develop for some time. He never went public with the events of this day, but based on his written notes and accounts of his close colleagues, historians believe that he tried to step through the portal, and it collapsed around him. As he lay dying, he was visited by a mysterious, powerful creature, which, in the same motion, healed him, and imbued him with tremendous power.
Immediately after this day, many accounts describe the dramatic difference in Vetrano's abilities, which manifested almost as those of a sorcerer. He was stronger, his spells were stronger, and these were especially true whenever he was exposed to sunlight. His research took a sharp turn towards studying light instead of shadow. He learned to unite life forces and sunbeams into foul aberrations, which he used first to uphold the law in the land he owned, and then gradually to subjugate more and more villages. It was at some point during this time that he went beyond punishing criminals and began taking what he needed for his experiments; though only a handful of accounts of this happening exist, it is assumed that there were many more undocumented occurrences.
At some point, Epherion Gelathirniell disappeared, something that Vetrano was believed to have had a hand in, though this could never be confirmed. After a few of his deeds in particular drew attention from those who would stop him, he was hunted by and subsequently defeated the Company of the Burning Branch as well as the famous paladin Hawke Eldemarr, among others. Also during this time, his fame in the world of magic grew every day, as his limits were pushed further and further away. His chief rivals were those of the Gamirian College of Necromancy, who, multiple times, sent members to try to defeat him. They claimed moral motivations before their nature was well known, but it was shortly revealed that they were more interested in stealing his research, which Vetrano had become more and more protective of as the decades passed. The conflict between them lasted for many decades, during which they did many increasingly horrendous things to each other.
Vetrano disappeared, abruptly and completely, in EC 4553. The Gamirian College of Necromancy seized much of his Selzoryn property, but they were destroyed in the Great Shadow less than a century later. It was not until several months into EL 1000 that it was discovered, albeit only by a select group, that Vetrano's soul had been bound to a gemstone which had been sent to a remote part of the Underdark, far away from sunlight, where it had remained until its discovery by the Light Brigade. This gemstone, along with several other mundane ones, was picked up by Æshir Þorlássón, and, as the hex binding Vetrano's soul to it had been decaying over several centuries, Vetrano's soul then entered Æshir's body.
Vetrano was able to take control of Æshir's body on a limited basis after he came back to the surface world, though his presence remained unknown to Æshir himself, while being revealed to his party at the time, consisting of Wivvyrholdalphiax Adrex, Caledaya Alvishar, and Vyselrin the Wanderer. Vetrano leveraged his knowledge of the location of the Tether of Kaeli, vital to the ongoing Eventide, to convince them to keep his presence a secret, which they did until some months later, when Æshir's mental condition had noticeably deteriorated due to the influence of Vetrano's soul.
Vetrano continually made deals with Æshir and the rest of his party throughout their journey through the Tors, convincing them that he could remove himself from Æshir if he could access his hidden lab in the Rimstall Mountains. However, Æshir's condition had reached the point of blackout episodes, memory issues, and his magic coming out as necrotic, and he was weakened to the point of being struck down in combat with a party of drow nightbringers the party encountered shortly before reaching the Tether's resting place. This killed Vetrano as well, but when Adrex and Caledaya traveled to the Space Between with the assistance of the ki-rin Amin-El to retrieve Æshir's soul, his was the only one brought back.
Rumors circulated of some vestige of Vetrano's influence or power remaining in the world, specifically in Æshir, even after Vetrano's death, or of Vetrano having successfully cheated death once again and escaped into the world. An incident in Hemejdd wherein a surge of blinding light killed 16 people and raised several from a nearby graveyard as zombies was later connected to the presence of Æshir and Adrex in the city, but no official investigation was ever conducted as far as the citizenry of Jeltir is aware.
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