Origin of the First Vampires
Following the climatic end of
The Tricentennial Darkness , Dahli sealed the
Daidrin Gaiostone away in the heart of a treacherous mountain in the North Pole. To unearth it, a seeker would need to destroy the mountain or undertake a deadly excavation. She then personally executed a divine genocide of the Night Elves, forcing the species into effective extinction by splitting it into three distinct sub races:
- Frost Elves - descendants of the Night Elves that resisted Dahli’s genocide by hiding out in icy strongholds in Cyregnor. These strongholds were forged into frozen city-states across the vast Arctic tundras, having resisted several attacks and hardship over the centuries. It was the Frost Elf race that eventually birthed Denothis’ third child, Cyr. As such, they worship her directly, as well as any deity within her pantheon.
- Dark Elves - descendants of the Night Elves that retreated to the Underdark, having adapted to their new world. Worship devils & dark spirits/deities, with an indirect worship of Cyr through these beings.
- Moon Elves - descendants of the Night Elves that survived the genocide by amplifying their nomadic ways, abiding by a strict code of only traveling at night to avoid the Sun/Dahli’s notice. Despite their best efforts, Dahli slaughtered more of these Dark Elves than any other subrace, pushing their kind to the brink of extinction. It was this desperation that led the last survivors to migrate to Cyregnor and search tirelessly for the Daidrin Gaiostone. Worship Cyr & Inihla.
Eventually, Cyr overcame the obstacles Dahli left behind and unearthed the Daidrin Gaiostone. She forged it into
Cyr’s Claw and spread her divine influence across the entire continent, renaming it
Cyregnor. By completely driving Dahli’s influence from her lands and ending the Night Elf Genocide, Cyr ascended to godhood and ruled Cyregnor as her undisputed domain. During the
Divine War, Cyr left the mortal realm to conquer the Underworld, and made it her permanent domain after the war’s end. She left Cyr’ Claw behind at the North Pole, allowing a successor of its power if they could survive it.
The First Vampires
Seeing their opportunity for a full comeback, the Moon Elf nomads immediately sought the Daidrin Gaiostone, warring with several Frost Elf factions before finally overcoming them and claiming Cyr’s Claw. However, the few survivors (30 Moon Elves led by Armedaeous Vawne) found themselves surrounded by Frost Elf armies on the outside of the artifact’s cave, who promptly laid siege to the cave. Running out of food and resources, the Moon Elves were forced to draw the Daidrin Gaiostone’s raw power to fight off the countless Frost Elves. This sudden intake of raw dark energy permanently transformed the Moon Elf race under the full moon’s light, turning them into the first vampires. With this new power, the vampires turned the tide and slaughtered the Frost Elf armies that surrounded them, turning most of them into the first vampire spawn. The vampires used this devastating first strike to form the First Vempire, with Armedaeous Vawne crowning himself as the Blood King. The other vampires became the Blood Lords, and developed a new social structure for citizens of the Vempire:
- Blood King: Asmodeus Vawne, immortal emperor of the Vawne Empire
- Blood Lords: Imperial rulers that each held domain over a region of the Vempire, reporting directly to Blood King Vawne. No lines of succession, as vampires are immortal and have no intention of giving up their thrones. One of these vampires was Lord Daedrius , who serves as the commander of the Blood Generals in most situations.
- Blood Generals: Vampires that commanded the regional armies of the Vawne Empire.
- Blood Governors: Vampires that governed individual territories in the name of the First Vempire.
- Blood Troopers: Frost Elves that have been chosen/became worthy of the vampiric curse and serve as soldiers in the imperial & regional armies, as well as some well-off local militias. When the curse transforms them, they become Moon Elves.
- Blood Scouts: Frost Elves that have been chosen/became worthy of the curse and serve as local law enforcement/agents for the Blood Governor. When the curse transforms them, they become Moon Elves.
- Frost Wights: Frost Elves that died and were loyal to their empire, but not worthy of the vampiric curse. However, they get to serve their empire after death as wights, fierce undead warriors dedicated to go down swinging after they’ve already done so. Serve under Blood Troopers as foot soldiers/cannon fodder for their empire.
- Frost Elves: near the bottom of the caste system. Most are just trying to survive. Some serve under Blood Scouts as wage slaves, but usually turn into blood slaves after a while. Very few rebelled for a long time, with those getting crushed quickly. That is, until the Tundra Wars.
- Frost Zombies: the bottom of the caste system, and the fate of all Frost Elves who die and aren’t considered loyal to their empire. After their blood is completely drank, they serve as zombie slaves.
The Tundra Wars
The Tundra Wars refers to an ancient series of bloody conflicts fought between the Darkfrost Empire & the continent’s living populations about 700 years before the present day. The vampires reigned supreme for much of these conflicts, conquering almost 80% of the continent in their prime. However, several Frost Elf societies formed loose alliances to resist takeover. Many of these alliances crumbled under vampiric pressure and their societies fell soon after, but several forged strong city-states that could trade resources and coordinate tactical information with each other.
The Daidrin Gaiostone remained at the center of the conflict; while the vampires maintained control over it through most of the war, both their kind (Moon Elves) & the Frost Elves were innately connected to the Daidrin Gaioforce. This made for a messy, chaotic war with several simultaneous fronts, many of which would be geographically impossible in conventional warfare. However, both sides learned the importance of Space Magic through the Daidrin Gaioforce, allowing entire armies to teleport to different battlefields within minutes or hours.
Eventually, the wars reached their climax during the Siege of ???, the ancient capital of the Darkfrost Empire and the birthplace of the vampiric curse. The Moon Elves of Cyrofel, the last Moon Elf society standing against the vampire scourge, breached the capital with King Avernion leading his army. His men suffered near total losses against the vicious Darkfrost soldiers, but they laid waste to the city and killed as many vampires as they could before they died. In a crucial blow, King Avernion and a unit of his most powerful soldiers slew Blood King Vawne at his coffin deep undergound, who then used the last of his power to destroy Cyr’s Claw and release the Daidrin Gaiostone from its prison. The release of untamed dark energy killed the closest soldiers in seconds, while Avernion and the rest used their Daidrin powers together to resist. Slowly decaying under the Daidrin Gaiostone’s dark pressure, Avernion ordered his men to use the last of their magical strength to command the Gaiostone’s spatial power. With it, they cast a miniaturized black hole, which implodes the city under gravitational dark energy and crushed it into a crater of ice, killing themselves along with it. The Daidrin Gaiostone closes the hole and freezes over the crushed city with the remaining energy. With the main seat of their power decimated and the Blood King dead, the empire crumbled. Infighting from the Blood Lords to fill the power vacuum destroyed all hope of a unified front, and with renewed hope (but near depleted forces) from the Frost Elves & Mammodons, the vampires began losing more territory than they could gain. The Warian Collective, a relatively new organization at the time, joined the Frost Elves in their fight, as the Darkfrost Empire attempted to claim portions of Dalterra in their later offensives. One by one, the Blood Lords were hunted down and slain to dismantle their imperial hierarchy. Lord Daedrius was banished to the Astral Fog by a legendary Warian Master, and the last one died at the climax of the Siege of Cyrofel. After that, the remaining Blood Governors & Generals divided up their territory and ruled as individual factions, officially ending the Darkfrost Empire.
Legacy
Several centuries later, the endless blizzard continues to rage over the 200 mile wasteland, sealing away the Daidrin Gaiostone from all Cyregnorians. Several rumors and legends depict what happened to the brave Frost Elves who froze themselves under with the Gaiostone; some say that they were brutally slaughtered by the remaining vampires they trapped themselves with or the power of the Daidrin Gaiostone, while others believe they guard the Gaiostone after it granted them necromantic immortality.
In the modern day, the vampires control approximately 30% of Cyregnor’s living populations. Almost all of these are Frost Elf settlements, with very few Mammodon Tribes under their control. The Frost Giants keep the vampires from controlling any territory in the Southwest land mass from the continent, while the Frost Dragons maintain the Southeastern land masses between Cyregnor & Vulsemar.
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