The Velak’ar Lords of the Hollow Beyond

When the Velak’ar tore through the Shudderpoint and bled into Darraknoir, they brought with them not only darkness - but Lords, vast and eternal wills that governed aspects of entropy, ruin, and corruption. Each Velak’ar Lord claims dominion over one primal force, and from their forges and formless dread they crafted not only the beasts of war, tut the monstrous races of the Nightspawn who walk the world even now.

Velkharas, Lord of War and Wrath

“The Mouthless Flame”

Once the pit champion of the Shudder Forges, Velkharas embodies rage unending. It was they who first proposed the Nocturnum Binding, and it was through their endless wars that the skies were shattered.

Domain: The Crimson Spire - A land where the ground bleeds molten iron and eternal war is waged by echoes of the fallen.
Creations: The Vel’surak, progenitors of vampire-kind, were born of Velkharas’ need for generals who could consume not just blood, but history and fed his insatiable thirst for conquest.
Aspect: Conquest, violence, martial perfection. Every scream is a hymn.

Icarion, Lord of Change and Discord

“The Flux-Eyed Whisper”

Icarion delights in reshaping. They shattered the laws of causality in the War of Nine Shadows and fractured time itself in the western spires of Darraknoir. Their actions are rarely predictable.

Domain: The Shifting Veil - A realm where time fractures, identities warp, and change is the only constant.

Creations: Reality Weavers and Vel’kin Sorcerers, beings capable of folding spells into lies and dreams.

Aspect: Subterfuge, transformation, inevitability through instability.

Melantha, Lady of Stillness and Rot

“The Flowering Decay”

Melantha speaks rarely but is always listening. Her silence suffocates. Her touch turns cities to gardens and corpses to shrines.

Domain: Melantha’s Garden - A paradise of eternal overgrown, beauty choked by timeless decay.

Creations: Her children, known as Verdant Ones, act as anchors in the rotted parts of the world. Their spores lull, their breath petrifies.

Aspect: Timelessness, decay, passive domination.

Querizav, Lord of Hunger and Avarice

“The Gilded Maw”

Querizav is not a lord of war, but of want. The first to trade soul-iron for influence, he corrupted mortal kings before a blade was ever drawn.

Domain: The Gilded Vault - A spiraling treasure-labyrinth filled with cursed wealth and imprisoned oaths.

Creations: The Thirstborn, goblin-like misers who eat silver and breathe deceit.

Aspect: Obsession, corruption, driving need.

Xeriks, Lord of Control

“The Chain of Souls”

The second oldest, and perhaps the most feared. Xeriks is no brute, but an architect of obedience. The first to attempt to enslave mortals and immortals alike, the first to forge soulsteel, and the first to tame the bloodborn.

Domain: The Last Light - An infinite palace of comfort and submission, where lost souls rest in artificial peace.

Creations: The Hybrid Kin, seductive diplomats, watchers, and caretakers of the dead.

Aspect: Control, subjugation.

The Hollow Beyond

Also known as the Black Eternity, this is the origin realm of the Velak’ar - what the mortals called the Aetherial Abyss before they forgot its name. It exists behind the cracks in light, in the yawning chasms beneath ley-lines, and in the stillness between dreams.

Where the Velak’ar tread, their Lords remain in shadow. And in their wake, the world withers, bleeds, and forgets its own name.

The Rift

Not a place, but an event. A thin wound between Darraknoir and the Hollow Beyond. It appears when the veil grows thin - during eclipses, blood rites, or where memory collapses. Through it, Lords whisper. Through it, Nightspawn are born.

The Betrayal

It was only a matter of time before Xeriks’ influence grew too potent to ignore. His whispered promises, his mastery of the soul, and his subtle manipulations had ensnared not only mortals but Lords alike. Melantha, once a distant and impassive force, fell under his sway, reshaped by his vision of controlled peace.

Velkharas, Icarion and Querizav - united not by trust but by necessity - conspired to end Xeriks’ influence before it could undo the balance of ruin they all shared. In a rare convergence of will, the three enacted the Binding of Reversal, a ritual of great violence and sacrifice, that cast Xeriks and Melantha back into the Hollow Beyond, serving their connections to the material plane.

The result was immediate: Xeriks’ control shattered across the Badlands, his Hybrid Kin left scattered and listless, and the peace he had crafted within The Last Light fractured into silence. Melantha’s garden withered at its edges, recoiling from the betrayal she had become complicit in.

Though bound beyond reach, the names of Xeriks and Melantha are still whispered in the dark by those who seek comfort or control, and some believe they still wait in the Hollow Beyond - planning their return.

Velkharas and Querizav returned to the Hollow Beyond, to start repairing the damage that was done. Only Icarion remains present within the Badlands at this time.