Going to use this as a bit of a walkthrough.
I have created my character, Harlax. She is a Necromancer Enchantress belonging to the race known as Trogs, but that’s the name Men gave them. In the time after the Titans, they formed their own Empire known as Yithril. This is her story.
The world had been destroyed…
After her wanderings, she came across one of the few areas that could be cultivated; a seat for her future empire.
Her keen sense allowed her to weigh the benefits of a land with 4 grain, 3 materials and 2 Radiance. Radiance: something that few spoke of because it wasn’t truly understood. Where did it come from? It was as if the blood of a god had leeched into the soil itself, and in select places where the Titans hadn’t bottled it up into their accursed crystal shads, it could still be found.
Grain meant bigger cities, materials meant faster production, and Radiance meant magical potential of the city.
The crude keep constructed, a few followers now stand guard.
With her power, channeled from far off shards, she enchanted the city. Still a novice, she only knew a few spells.
Meditation and Oppression. It was better this way. “Worship her and be grateful” would be the fate of those under her rule. Paradise.
But she also knew that idle hands were treacherous hands, so she put them to work.
Such a construction would be a beacon for others, powerful others, to join her.
Her minions set to work. In a couple years it would be done. Now, it was time to explore her new realm.
To the north she encountered a nest of Darklings. Inwardly, she fumed, adopting the language of Men to describe these tragic little creatures. What they called themselves she did not know. But they occupied lands she needed and she knew that their lives were wretched and without meaning. They operated on instinct, robbing and murdering any who crossed their paths.
Three versus one. It wasn’t remotely fair, for she was a channeler - gifted with the power to use the shards of power across the world. Even barely armed, they were no match. But this was just the first battle she would encounter.
Upon victory, she began her wanderings to cleanse the land to make it safe for her empire. In the distance, she could hear the magic of others being used. There were other Channelers in this world. Not too close, but not so far that she couldn’t still hear their spell making.
…Time
Passes…
For two years, Harlax traveled the desolate wastes. When one day, in the distance, she could see the power of the Tower she had ordered constructed radiating into the sky announcing her glory. Ruah was. . . is a psychopath. She sees things that are not there.
Ruah was a Channeler, much like Harlax, but she was also mad. Harlax spent much time trying to weave the lies from the truth but ultimately arrived at what she believed was something resembling where she came from.
Ruah's story was harder to untangle. She spoke freely, even eagerly, about things that would make most people sick. There was no shame in her voice - no guilt, no performance. She talked about killing the way a craftsman talks about their trade. That was the problem. It was difficult to tell what was real and what was a story, she told herself, because Ruah didn't seem to know the difference either.
What Harlax could piece together was this: Ruah had lived in a small village plagued by several murders. She had taken up with the murderer, a mill worker named Kronyu, when one night she had killed him in his sleep. Not because he deserved it, but because she wanted to know what it felt like.
Everything after that was just Ruah being Ruah. She drifted from place to place, selling her skills with a dagger to anyone willing to pay. She was good at violence and unbothered by it, and in a land full of monsters and warlords, that combination kept her fed.
Was she evil? Harlax thought in the quiet, clinical way that a scholar diagnoses a disease. Ruah lacked something fundamental. Whatever it is that makes a person flinch, that makes them hesitate before doing something terrible, Ruah was born without it. Or maybe she had it once and it broke. Either way, it was gone.
She would be useful.
Returning home after two years in the wilds, the capital, Ahilga, could be seen from many miles away thanks to the shard.
Given the amount of Radiance still free in the area, this must have been an incredible place before the Titans stole the magic of the world to imprison in their shards. Now this shard was hers to channel, but she needed more. To that end, she ordered her people to “volunteer” to be pioneers to scout this land and find more places to settle and more shards.
Lord Verga. The self-named Empire of Verga had risen in the East. Possible ally , but likely foe. Verga was ruthless.
Worse, the further she traveled, the more robust were her foes.
The enemies more numerous, better prepared.
And while she slogged through dealing with the wilds, she knew others were consolidating their powers. Was there another way?
That was when she stumbled across The Black Gate.
Steeped in myth, it was known that within these gates was the Forge of the Overlord. Guarded by an immense power in the Pit of Lost Voices, the Forge would give her the power to rule this world and become the immortal Sorcerer Queen. But right now, she stood at a locked gate.
The key would be found at the Shrine…
But in the meantime, Verga had surrounded her.
She would have to trim him back, even if it cost her everything.
She would need specialized soldiers for her conquest.
Lacking in weapons technology, they would make up for it with greater training.
But Harlax had become a powerful Necromancer, able to summon hordes of ghouls to do her bidding.
And she aimed to take Verga’s most vulnerable city. It was well defended, but it did not have a Channeler.
One side had brute. Another side had magic.
It was not difficult to tell which was which. Despite the magic, it was a close fight, but Harlax won the day and the city.
Harlax could not compete with the greater populations of the Empires of the east. From the West came Tuan, a man. The most famous scout in the world of that time. It was, despite her well known misandry, that Harlax wedded herself to him.
Her power was undeniable, but what of the offspring that was sure to come? Only time would tell.
To prepare for the future, Harlax made sure to spend time in the capital with Tuan. An army of channelers in twenty years could be of great use.
And Verga, chastened, now knew to keep his aspirations to the East.
The Shrine of Samarra took much time and lives to reach.
The secret to the shrines had long been held by the Darklings, the very beings she had been spent years exterminating. There were not many of them left, but now she would have to find one.
Thankfully, there were rumors of one of the eldest of their kind lurking in the far north. That would be her next task.
The Shaman, is not impressed.
Oof. This was going to be difficult.
After a costly battle, the shaman turns over the key in exchange for his life.
Harlax inserts the key.
To her dismay a second gate is reached.
A demon, or some creature anyway, appears and whispers that perhaps a night at the sacred camp will clear minds and strengthen hearts.
At the camp, Harlax dreams of terrible things. Visions of beings from another world. The Titans. The beings that came to this world in its youth. The battle for control of this world. That was it. The battlefield. The last battlefield. That is where the second gate key must be.
Moreover, the battlefield’s location becomes obvious. It drew you to your starting location in the first place. The source of all the Radiance! It wasn’t left over. Of course it wasn’t! It was part of the debris of the last battlefield!
On the outskirts of your capital is a nondescript mound of earth. You and your powerful allies approach.
Harlax’s husband, Tuan. Ruah the psychopath. Frizl the ice elemental. Now was a moment of triumph or a moment of doom.
Curgen the Dread Lord, the Titan who slew many here, the fools. The Magi who believed they stood a chance against a Titan. But Curgen’s Maul, it is the key and he left it. But something took it, although the maul would have been useless. Impossibly heavy to be wielded by a normal mortal. Who could have taken it? An ogre. Were there any ogre lairs near?
In fact, there was one…
Very close.
The maul is there.
In fact, it is being wielded.
“Great,” Harlax murmurs.
Using her necromancy, she raises a small army of ghouls in front of them to soften up the ogres.
They don’t last long.
They hurl boulders. They smash.
But her luck would last. Knocked unconscious, the psychopath was out dreaming of peeling the skin off of small mammals.
The maul would kill any being in a single hit. Bax the ogre untouched. No one dared approach.
Her husband was the next to fall. Unlike Ruan, her husband was not a channeler. Would he survive?
Only Harlax remained.
There was no chance she’d survive.
Her husband alive, but now blind in one eye. Ruah injured, and Bax now on their trail, she escaped the battlefield. But Bax was not done.
Another Ghoul army.
The ogre chief was surrounded.
But..
That..
Isn’t.
Bax.
That is Bax.
No escape scrolls.
Now only Bax against her friends and zombies.
Ruah down.
Ghoul down.
Now just Harlax and Bax.
Out of mana.
Blooded.
With her last moments of awareness, she uses her channeling ability to bring those she has a connection with, But Ruah is dead.
The psychopath’s story comes to an end.
And there is now a very angry ogre on the loose.
What’s worse, if Harlax fails to kill him, she knows someone else will and to them goes the maul and the key to enter the Pit of Lost Voices!
…Time
Passes…
As. . . luck would have it, Bax wouldn’t need to be hunted. Because he was hunting Harlax.
Harlax’s husband would never recover. And Bax systematically wiped out all of the farms, mines and other outposts that were on the outskirts of the capital. There was nothing to do but wait.
But time was passing and the children of Harlax were growing.
Harlaxis, half man, half Trog, took more after Harlax, but had traits of her father as well as she looked like a cross between Trog and man. Almost…feminine.
Bax, not willing to attack the capital, merely taunted from the gates.
With the benefit of hindsight…
During the siege of Ahilga, Harlax remained in the capital to act as a counter to Bax. But secretly, her daughter, Tuana, was sent off to begin her training.
For some years, she would travel the wilds and go on many adventures that are told elsewhere. In time, Tuana’s fame rivaled her powerful mother’s.
During that time, Bax had reduced the Empire of Yithril down to just two cities. He razed Horzara and murdered every being in his reach in Aliza.
The enemies of Yithril were not idle during this time, and it was only a matter of time before they took advantage. So it would be in the year 231 that Gilden would strike the capital, with Harlax and Ruan present. The boldness.
The kingdoms of men were known for their treachery. That they could assemble so mighty an army and make it this far demonstrated just how severely Bax had broken the Yithril’s awareness of the wider world during the siege.
In the battle, Harlax’s first move was to conjure an army of ghouls behind Markinn. While in giant form, he was powerful, but he was also much easier to strike.
His motley crew of villains would be occupied.
The ghouls bought time, but that was all.
With Markinn came Naegach the Summoner. Not a necromancer, but an endless barrage of wild creatures seemed to arrive from moment to moment.
Fortunately, a studded collar was on hand.
In the end it was not enough.
Yithril was down to a single small town.
Bax still held the wilds and Markinn was now on his way to destroy the last city. Princess Tuana was too far away to make a difference, though she sprinted towards home.
And yet hope. . . for on the way she would find a recall scroll. Using it, she appeared at home. The two armies rejoined, Markinn’s army backed off.
Ahilga, in their absence, had become a stronghold. Far too powerful to take now.
And so Ahilga, occupied. And if Alhain, the last city, is left alone, Bax will certainly destroy it.
What happened next…well I leave that to your imagination.
Every game is different. Different quests, different characters. What you saw here will never happen again. But that is, after all, what Elemental is all about.