Location: Jade Isles – Tide woven Pavilion Council Hall
The chamber is quiet, the storm outside a distant roar. Feng Xian, Luo Fen, and Lan'Fei stand before the remaining Pavilion Elders. The last wave that struck the isles was not just a natural surge — it carried a sound that only those who've touched the Crown could hear.
"It was no ordinary quake," Lan'Fei says quietly, a silver-furred beast coiled at her side. "My bonded trembled. Something... screamed."
Elder Xhuna, wrinkled and bowed by water-years, lays a shimmering scroll across the table — old sea-maps inked with forbidden passages.
"The Drowned Maw. A trench forbidden even in the Age Before. It was sealed by the founders themselves. If the Cult has breached it... the scream you heard may be its guardian waking."
"Or something worse," murmurs Feng Xian.
A decision is made: a strike team will dive into the trench. They must not face the horror — only reveal it. Knowledge is their only weapon for now.
Mission Team:
Feng Xian – marked by the Crown, his flame aura now subtly tinged with echoing cold.
Karabo of the Bafokeng – scout and relayer of hidden signs.
Thato – carrier of the Warden's Lantern, one of few lights that can burn in the trench.
And a final, secret addition:
Scene: The Descent
In silence, the team dives through the Tide Vault Gate, a sealed current-path that threads deep beneath the ocean's skin.
Visibility vanishes.
All sound is muffled by pressure and presence.
The trench opens like a wound. Dead things drift upward. And then…
"There." Karabo points. "A glow. Red… but not flame."
They reach a sunken altar of bone and black glass, surrounded by fetishes of the Cult — but shattered. Something has already torn through here.
Etched on the walls, glowing faintly: a warning in three languages.
"Szuul still sleeps.
Szuul must never stir.
If he speaks, the sea dies."
Then Thato's Lantern flickers — and for a heartbeat, they all see it:
A titanic shape writhing deeper below, eyes open, lips moving…
"Who dreams me whole again?"
The others recoil. The trench groans as the whisper passes through their marrow — a voice not made of sound but pressure, memory, and hunger.
But Kai'ren does not flinch.
Where others feel fear, she feels clarity.
Feng Xian spins.
"Kai'ren, stop—whatever you're doing—!"
"When he dreams, depths reshape. When he speaks, names unravel. When he walks…"
Her voice wavers. "Only ruin listens."
A pulse erupts outward — not of light, but of reversed silence, a void wave. It pushes the team back.
All lights go out.
Only Feng Xian's Crown-mark flickers faintly.
And then: a rift opens. Not wide — not yet — but a splinter in the trench floor. From within it, a fragment of something vast slides forward: a scaled tentacle, etched in ruins, draped in drowned banners.
The Sunken Necroprax of Saq-Ra
Location: Scorched Veil, Northern Continent – beneath the Ruin-Sands of Kahem
Overview:
Long before the Dawn Pavilions or the Hollow-Touched wars, there stood the Triumvirate Pyramids of Saq-Ra, vast crystalline obelisks shaped like desert pyramids, housing the Sage-Kings of Flame and Silence. These were world-casters, wielders of sun fire and void-breath, who anchored part of the world's spirit-web.
But their pact was broken. Something beneath the sand, beneath the stone, whispered in the silence between suns — and the pyramids were pulled halfway into the Veiled Rift, an elemental fault line.
Now, the ruins are fractured and sunken. Only the upper tiers of the pyramids rise above the dust — cracked and veiled in mirage-light. The air stinks of scorched salt and ancient curses. Clockwork glyphs — half-glass, half-metal — shift across the stones like forgotten prayers.
Notable Features:
The Flame-Sent Throne (Upper Ruin)
The remains of a throne chamber exposed to the sky. Covered in sun steel vines that glow faintly during eclipses. If touched by fire-blooded descendants, it triggers visions of the Solar Rite, an ancient blood ritual.
The Hollow Scar (Inner Ruin)
Beneath one of the pyramids lies a collapsed chamber, its glyph-lined walls torn open by something not native to this world. Here the Hollow first seeped in — not by conquest, but as a bargain made by a forgotten pharaoh. It pulses with a reverse heartbeat.
The Stone Choir (Burial Gallery) The Mirror Spindle
At the summit of the smallest pyramid is a broken obsidian mirror-disc, pointed at the stars. During certain celestial alignments, it reflects a different sky — not of this realm. It is theorized to be a conduit to a forgotten void-sect, long lost.
Factions of Interest:
The Ember veil Crown may find this site vital — remnants of their ancestral flame lineage could originate here.
The Hollow-Touched Cults view Saq-Ra as a holy fracture, a sacred wound from which the First Whisper once escaped.
The Bafokeng Wardens have long sealed this place, believing it to be where "stone first wept fire."
🜂 Yur'Zhul, the Ember-Sworn Warden
"I was the pyre and the seal — now I remember fire."
Nature:
An ancient guardian spirit forged from solar flame and oath stone, once bound to defend the Triumvirate Pyramids. Yur'Zhul was originally a sentient soul-forge created by the Sage-Kings to house the memories of fallen defenders. Over centuries, too many souls were poured into him — and he began to fracture.
When the Hollow Scar ruptured, Yur'Zhul did not fall… he absorbed. Now, he is something far more unstable: a fused entity of guardian and devourer, flickering between blazing sentience and cold judgment.
🔥 Appearance:
A towering figure (3+ meters), carved from igneous brass stone, his limbs etched with molten script that drips searing light.
His face is helmeted by a sun-disc cracked down the center, leaking both golden fire and oily void smoke.
In combat, his voice becomes a choir of the dead, each syllable echoing as if spoken by many.
🜂 Abilities:
Sundering Concord –
Yur'Zhul unleashes a beam of unified fire and void, disrupting elemental balances. This can shatter shields, destabilize auras, and disrupt spiritual cultivation for a time.
Oath fire Mantle –
He ignites an ancient flame forged from oaths — it burns not flesh, but memory, causing hallucinations or forgotten trauma to re-surface in his foes.
Ashen Rebirth –
When defeated, he can shatter his body into flame-wisps that retreat into the pyramid's stone veins. If not sealed correctly, he reforms stronger.
🌒 Lore Hooks:
Vel'Korr's memories resonate with Yur'Zhul's voice — they once guarded parallel gates.
Lan'Fei's bonded beast reacts violently near him — sensing one of its own kind twisted into something else.
⚔️ Scene: "The Breach Beneath Saq-Ra"
Ruins around the oldest pyramid groan, sun-warped and half-sunken. A ritual of flame and void is nearly complete.
Faction: The Ivory Vultures, a splinter sect of rogue elementalists and soul binders — once part of the Pavilion's outer circle, now corrupted by Hollow whispers. They seek to bind Yur'Zhul using an inverted Oath-Pyre, twisting old guardian spirits into fuel for war.
📜 Ritual Circle:
A sunken chamber of blackened sandstone, littered with bone totems and cracked sun-discs.
The leader, Master Reth Ka'al, clad in tattered solar priest robes, offers the ashes of three fallen disciples to fuel the seal-break.
Their relic, the Twilight Ankh, pulses with molten-red script — a stolen artifact forged from an older pact.
🜂 Yur'Zhul Awakens
"Flame… oath… broken. Who calls my fire with lies?"
The seal shatters not cleanly, but violently. Yur'Zhul erupts in a column of light and smoke, his voice a ruptured choir. His eye-slit burns through Reth Ka'al's illusions instantly.
He does not attack at first — he judges.
Each cultist hears a name whispered in their mind: one of the fallen whose oath they've broken. Some fall to their knees. Others scream.
Then, Ashen Rebirth triggers. His form breaks apart into flaming fragments — and strikes each soul binding brand they've carved into the stone. The ritual backfires. Spirits long trapped in the walls awaken, shrieking.
☠️ Outcome:
Reth Ka'al is incinerated from within, becoming a vessel of light so bright it collapses, turning to glass.
Two Ivory Vultures escape, blinded and scorched, their minds fragmented.
Yur'Zhul re-anchors into the ruins, now half-dreaming, waiting for a true successor.
🔥 Rumors Spread:
Survivors speak of "The Burning Choir" and a guardian who "judges with names."
The Dark Tide Cult learns of the failure and marks the ruins as cursed — forbidden, even to them.
Feng Xian's Crown pulses faintly — as if one flame has just nodded toward another.
🌒 Scene: "Ash Beneath the Sun"
Chapter Opening — a silent march beneath heat-haze and swirling dust, through dunes scorched by ghost-flame.
Scouting Party:
Karabo, steady and flame-wary, with her Mirror shade Crescent — a relic that reflects soul-echoes.
Thato, unusually quiet, the sands unsettling even his confidence.
A new Warden, Mpho, younger but attuned to ruins — bearer of the Echo-Reed Staff, which hums near unspoken grief.
🜃 Initial Discovery:
The outer glyphs are melted, but still pulse if touched by those bearing a legacy.
Bones fused with gold dust — some of the Ivory Vultures' marks remain branded in the glass.
The Twilight Ankh, now fractured, buried in a blackened altar.
Karabo (quietly):
"This wasn't just desecration. It was summoning. Something woke… and judged."
Mpho, brushing away ash, reveals a single unburnt feather etched with fire-script. A remnant of Yur'Zhul's avatar. Her hand trembles as she pockets it — not knowing it will later ignite a vision.
⚠️ Anomaly:
The air resists breath, as if remembering screams.
Mpho's staff flares — and all three hear a choir for one moment.
They witness a flare-shaped shadow in the sand, where no wind moves.
🎯 Aftermath:
The Wardens mark the site and retreat. But on return, Karabo sends word to the Pavilion:
"The ember guardian has returned. The flames are not Hollow — but ancient. We must choose quickly. Before others try again."
🜏 Scene: "In the Hall of the Breathless Flame"
A sunless vault beneath a ruin of black glass and obsidian bones. Here, the Hollow-Touched convene — and react to the stirrings in the desert.
👤 High Hollow Priest Veyzhar — robed in veined basalt, its chest hollowed by ancient fire.
It has no eyes, but sees flame through memory-ash.
In its palm: a fragment of scorched sandstone — pulsing with Yur'Zhul's lingering rage.
Behind it, bound in vines of bone: a creature that once was a fire guardian — now half-Hollow, whispering secrets backwards.
"The Sun-Devourer stirred. It is not free… but not sealed."
"Send the Forge sworn. Melt the wound until it sings."
🔥 Introducing the Forge sworn of Hollow Flame
An elite, half-fused Hollow sect that twists fire into entropy, not life. Scarred, masked, and wielding ember-threaded brands.
Vaulkris, the Ember-Chained:
Once a Flame blood monk, now wears charred mantras as tattoos that rewrite themselves mid-fight. Carries a whip of molten sorrow — it burns memory, not flesh.
Nysska of the Hollow Bellows:
Corpse-singer, exiled from a pyre-tribe. Her voice can unmake protective sigils and lull guardians into lethargic submission.
🎯 Mission:
"Reignite the Ruin."
The Forge sworn are sent not to awaken Yur'Zhul again — but to corrupt his remains.
If the guardian spirit is twisted fully, it could become a Hollow Ember Titan — one who burns not to cleanse, but to consume memory and time.
Veyzhar whispers to the ash:
"The Crown walks… but the sun will kneel."