Beatrix of Zinaida

Or in This Case: Woman, Atrocity, Artefact

The woman in question is

This begins in Maerinheim, a nation long forgotten to the wilderness and the slow creep of time. Once a bright queendom famous for its princesses, magic technology, and martial prowess, naught remains but crumbling ruins, villages vanished under the verge of old forests, and a single remaining Great Hold, Zinaida. What should come as no surprise is that Zinaida is a dungeon and a particularly nasty one. It holds the legacies of Lost Maerinheim, and the dungeon's champion is the Last and Laconic Prince, Vin Vidaen.

The dungeon itself is the riven husk of a great palace that grew over a much greater fortress and the great arsenal of Maerinheim. The Core didn't create any of this, and the Queendom and Core never coexisted. Rather, the core in its slow growth, broke through into the basement ruins of Maerinheim and was able to quickly occupy the shaped space and make it its own. In this manner, much of Maerinheim was saved by the core as it was assimilated into the nascent dungeon. This included the handful of survivors who remained inside, less than a dozen souls. These would be given the choice to assimilate into the dungeon and become part of it, or face a quick and painless extinction, and then have their unique features still assimilated into the dungeon without their essence. The highest ranking survivor was the Last Prince, Vin Vidaen, and he accepted, as he thought it fitting to carry out his last task, protect the palace, for as long as possible.

He became the Last and Laconic Prince and one of the most terrifying champions of the dungeon, and took great joy and zeal in slaughtering intruders. This caused the core to start holding him back, since there is a sort of unspoken give and take between hero and dungeon, monster and man. It is a symbiotic relationship, and Vin Vidaen was pretty effectively making it a one-sided exchange. The dungeon benefitted in the short term, but eventually, this would lead the Numinous Road to shift and then Zinaida would receive the attention of the terrible rampaging guilds, the sort that smash dungeons, slaughter champions, and shatter cores to use them as spell components or to craft magic items. The core had no intention of becoming a bauble in a piece of royal jewelry, so the Prince was cross-classed into spellcasting and after several centuries the sword-swinging terror was a masked, robed, figure of mystery and no small measure of magic power.

He also completely rejected the core, seeing it not as a nubile feminine force, but as an asymmetrical glowing chunk of pink rock.

The dungeon is known for producing Zinaideen Steel, a good quality steel notable for its purple hue. It also produces Zaleez, or pink dungeon topaz, as its main dungeon gemstone.

I digress.

Zinaida was raided by a strong hero cell from the Guild of Adventurers-Upon-Return. They made great progress into the dungeon and were able to destroy many of the defenders, and almost liberated one of its great treasures, but ill fell upon them. This was no malice or artifice on the part of the dungeon, but rather cloak and daggers from within the cell itself. The party had internal problems before entering the dungeon, debts owed, grievances unaired, and secrets spilled, and then it all came due. When the fight was over, there were only two survivors, Ozganel Razorback and Valyas Lynne. The ranger Razorback fled the scene of the slaughter and barely survived returning to the surface, while the sorceress Lynne lay on the stone of the dungeon bleeding out.

Valyas Lynne ended up being rescued by Vin Vidaen as he saw she had a strong spirit and a healthy command of the magical arts, and most importantly to the Last and Laconic Prince, she had a trace of the blood of the old Queendom in her veins. He healed her wounds and offered her a place to rest and recover. After the initial recovery was made, Lynne stayed in the depths of Zinaida for a long time. Vin Vidaen taught her new magics and powers, told her the stories of the old Queendom, and searched through the records he had to find the line of her blood back to the throne. During this time, the two shared more than magic and stories, and Lynne found herself with child.

Not long after this, Lynne left Zinaida, promising to return. She bore her daughter a short time after that, the babe taking well short of the normal nine months to come to term. The birth was traumatic, and Valyas Lynne technically did not survive. She did manage to summon a spectral servant to take the babe and carry her to her foster home. The creature appeared at the gates of Zizrigal Castle, delivered its message and its cargo, and faded away as haints do.

Zizrigal Castle

The castle is a fell place, built into the caldera of the dormant volcano of the same name. Located in Tir an Scathanna, it is well within the Dragon's Triangle, an area of evil picked out by the Gates of Torment, Mount Ruin and its prismatic pyroclastic eruptions, and the Miriana Abyss. The volcano is dormant but isn't quiet, it shakes and shudders with flows of gases spewing up from the depths of the Land of Shadows. The castle itself is a monstrosity that was created from a guided outflow of lava to form the appearance of the apocalyptic figure of Narak the Immolator, a giant fire dragon/scorpion horror. This had become the stronghold of Cziggur Shadowsword and his horde. This was not where Lynne thought her daughter would end up, as her instruction to the haint was to take her daughter to her mother, Izalde Lynne. In the years since their last meeting, Izalde had pledged herself to Shadowsword as a mercenary mage. Things didn't turn out well, and Izalde was no longer the human sorceress she had been and had been turned into an immortal shadowguard for Shadowsword. The haint completed its task, leaving the child at the feet of a living shadowstone statue in the presence of Cziggur.

The Lord of Zizrigal accepted the babe and the bauble of offering tucked into the swaddling clothes. He would raise her as if she were his own daughter. There was no love here, Shadowsword had no such emotion, but he did see the power and potential she had. The ancient blood of Maerinheim reinforced with the power of the Zinaidan dungeon and the lineage of sorceresses of the Lynne blood. She would become a powerful lieutenant in his forces.

The Life and Times of Beatrix Lynne-Shadowsword

Beatrix grew up in a place of danger. Her adoptive father was a brutal warlord commanding a strong host of warriors, and he had a terrible temper. He was also a highly abusive rapist, murderer, and generally a paragon of chaotic evil. Beatrix was saturated with evil mana, fire and lava mana, and her childhood was one steeped in blood and atrocity, the only thing she knew. This was normal.

Then she went through puberty and this did cause the Shadowsword some concern.

He had no morals, no qualms, no hesitations or regrets, but that changed when he saw his adoptive daughter bloom into womanhood. The thought of her being like the other women he ruined, destroyed, or butchered caused a reaction inside him. His first command was that she was to be instructed with the strongest and most potent magics of Zizrigal and the Horde possessed. The second thing, and the one he considered more important, was the paramount importance of her modesty. By his command any being who saw her bared flesh was to be executed on the spot, no pause, no question, no hesitation. The greater part of this was that she ended up in possession of a wardrobe of niqabs, long dress-like garments that covered every part of her body except her eyes. The lesser part of this was that her servants were either chosen for being blind or had their eyes put out so they could not ever lay eyes on her.

Her magical potential soared, and her repertoire became quite simply, legendary. She mastered the lower order of spells with ease, and the higher-level spells could resist her cunning and artifice for a short time. With her blood affinities, she found she could tap into the elemental mana of the volcano, and the castle, and even tap into the mana generated by her foster father and his armies. As her power grew, so did the rumor of her beauty. This was accentuated by the fact that the variety of niqabs she owned hid her skin, but did not hide the size of her breasts, the sway of her hips, or the demure note of her voice when she spoke. In public, she was referred as the Shadow Witch, the Scarlet Witch of Zizrigal, Daughter of Darkness, and a dozen other titles. Behind closed doors and in the barracks, she was known as the Tiddy Witch.

Beatrix was aware of this, and it amused her more than any of the sundry and unimaginative titles laden on her.

The Stone of Zizrigal

The Stone of Zizrigal is technically a stillborn dungeon core and an exposed clathrate. It is composed of a six-ton piece of malnandwil, black dungeon garnet. The stone is shaped like an inverted cone that is roughly flared at the top, or like a crystal bouquet of blood dark red stone. The purity of the core is very high, and the cause of its failure as a dungeon is that it peaked very early, drew in too much mana from Mount Zizrigal, tapped out the mana supply, and completely stalled its explosive growth.

Beatrix attuned herself to the Stone, and then to the shock and horror of many, she drew the stone up out of the volcano. Having become attached to her spirit, the Stone of Zizrigal normally sits in her alcazar. The great stone fills the main chamber with its ruddy illumination, making her bathing pool look like it is full of blood. Beatrix channels all of her magic through the stone and uses it as her personal mana battery. This means that her casting is done at a legendary/mythic level, and her mana reserve is so large as to be bottomless.

The Atrocity

The story has been long in the telling, but before the atrocity can be explained, its architect, its director, and its method have to be known, otherwise, it is just a dry set of facts.

The history of Zizrigal and Shadowsword is a story of conflict between the volcanic stronghold and the Kingdom of Shatterstone. Shatterstone was a 'crystal kingdom' as they made extensive use of earth mana to grow their buildings from the earth, which included shining crystal walls, towers, and advanced late gothic architecture, but avoiding the baroque to favor clean lines and minimalistic soaring airiness in their stonecraft. The armies of Shatterstone were strong, with ample supplies of crystal mail, crystal plate, crystal weapons, and other crystal-aspected tools. The armies of Zizrigal had been beaten soundly several times, unable to resist the summoned crystal golems, diamond rain attacks, or bring armor capable of stopping the blades of Shatterstone. This allowed Shatterstone to rise as a marginally Lawful Neutral kingdom in Tir an Scathanna. Marginally, as they retained practices of chattel slavery, coverture (all women/female sentient beings are by default property), torture as a performance art, public capital punishment, and were a strongly militant culture.

That being said, most would agree that a dominant Shatterstone would be preferred to an ascendant Zizrigal, as the volcanic kingdom had a huge non-human population, was decidedly chaotic evil, and indulged in casual cannibalism, recreational torture, and looked at public crucifixion and similar methods of prolonged and painful death in the same light as public art displays, and generally left ruin in their wake.

Beatrix was dispatched with a powerful force of Shadowsword's armies. Arriving at the border of Shatterstone, the armies engaged in battle, and the weight of Zizrigal's forces pushed the crystal defenders back. This was augmented by Beatrix using her magic, as well as having the support of her cadre of witches. They sent hosts of summoned undead riders against Shatterstone, caused the dead of both sides to rise as zombies and continue fighting, and conjured other horrors and monsters.

Some of the magical beasts involved:

Dark Unicorn Warriors - humanoid monsters with the head of a unicorn and a taste for violence and blood. As large creatures, the dark unicorns were able to exact a heavy toll from the crystal defenders. They had strong magic resistance and good hand-to-hand fighting ability, as well as a good regeneration ability.

Dark Boar Warriors - humanoid monsters with the head of a boar and a body more resembling a gorilla, thick-skinned and strong fighters, they excelled in charging attacks and ripping foes apart with their hands and tusks.

Dark Vulture Harpy - winged humanoid monsters with the bodies of young women, but the wings, claws, and heads of vultures, feared for using darts and slings, and either dropping horrible things on the enemy or snatching enemy soldiers and flying up to drop them from great height on their allies.

The Battle at the Crystal Gate

Upon fighting the forces of Shatterstone to the gates of their great crystal city, the armies of Zizrigal fell back and consolidated their position. On the other side of the walls, the armies and magi of the city prepared for the usual fight, erecting their protective wards and palings, and then unleashing ritual magics of slashing diamond rain, burning toxic fog, and other horrific defenses. Rather than building siege engines, the Zizrigal army started bringing up captives and started creating ritual circles for sacrifices. Blood flowed, raids sallied out from the city, and skirmishes were fought as the rival magic forces worked their power. Beatrix was faster and didn't have to coordinate as she was the one-woman circle for her spells. With a shudder in the sky, an enormous black ominous sigil appeared above the city, sucking in light and casting a shadow of despair.

When most war mages cast spells, they tend to work in waves of buffs for their side and debuffs for the enemy, and the soldiers do the actual business of fighting. Armies are augmented by summoned monsters, and valuable targets are sought for singular spell destruction, this is how most battles are fought. The Black Sigil was none of these things, it was a legendary tier spell, Perfect Ultima Eschaton, and it destroyed Shatterstone. The city was bathed in a soft glowing light as luminous rings appeared around the sigil and started to rotate. Small bits of debris and dust rose into the air and started spinning in the same direction as the rings around the sigil, and a massive silence fell over the battlefield. Prepared, the hosts of Zizrigal knelt and covered their faces. The glow turned into a flash and the city was engulfed by a ball of light that was composed of alien hues and nameless colors, and soundless thunder shook the earth.

Shatterstone was laid low. Buildings were rent. Crystal was left blackened and smoking. Many beings survived the spell, but they were melted and disfigured, horrifically burnt, or mutated in terrible fashion. These wretches were captured and made into displays of public torture. Crucified, locked in hanging cages, bound and hung from ramparts like living tapestries, the non-incinerated bodies of the dead were desecrated, and many were made into victory feasts.

The Atrocity of Shatterstone was completed, and the forces of Zizrigal ran roughshod over much of Tir an Scathanna. Beatrix and the Stone of Zizrigal returned to the volcano. The stone sank deep into the volcano to begin replenishing itself, and Beatrix would spend a year in a deep magical slumber.

Hooks

Back into the Fray - Zizrigal has joined with Lichelight and Doomguard, reinvigorating those hoary places of power, and now the threat has become real to the rest of the world, and the Evil Horde is preparing to march on the outer lands. Heroes are needed to find relics of power, stage holding actions against the Horde, and buy time while a Chosen One is found that can face the champion of evil and defeat them,

Magic power - Beatrix is traveling the sunward lands, exploring what exists outside of the land of shadows. She is an enemy, but no one knows her as anything other than being a busty traveling sorceress

Hunting Mission - Remnants of Shatterstone fled to the sunward lands, and after her long rest, the Doom of Shatterstone intended to finish what she started. She leads a small retinue of elite lieutenants to complete this task, and to also scout out how weak the sunward lands are.