User blog:SsVivid/What I Learned From Plague's End

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 for the quest Plague's End.

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What I Learned About the Dark Lord
Note: though this enemy seems to have been slain during the events of the quest, I am choosing to refer to him in the present tense. I am referring to him using a male pronoun because that is how he was referred to during the quest.
 * The Dark Lord (claims, believably, that he) is a part of Seren. When she shattered herself at the end of the God Wars, she cast away the part of herself who was fascinated by death and wanted the fighting to continue. The Dark Lord is the manifestation of that part of her.
 * The Dark Lord can be summoned with necromancy. He can also be summoned by corrupting the power of the Temple of Light, but something about the temple's security system prevents that.
 * The Dark Lord possesses enough power to re-grow Prifddinas without the help of the elf lords.
 * Dialogue and the presence of "shadows" in the Grand Library indicate that the shadows lurking around the Temple of Light are related to the Dark Lord. Iestin Edern speculates that they are the least powerful of the Dark Lord's minions, more powerful ones inhabiting the Grand Library. The precise nature of these "minions," however, was never fully illuminated.
 * The Dark Lord is a creature is an entity who opposes all building, all creation of life, all continued existence. He is also related to the phenomena encountered in the Underground Pass with Iban, claiming that he is "the voice in your head as you explore the darkest caves, whispering that you should stay...embrace death...destroy rather than create."
 * The Dark Lord confirmed that it is his voice that haunts the underground pass. He asked the travellers who came through to provide new, more interesting deaths to observe.
 * The Dark Lord is not necessarily a creature of death; rather, he is an immortal who is fascinated by the idea, especially since it was a concept he (being part of Seren, creation of Mah and sister of Zaros) hadn't even imagined until he (as Seren) discovered mortal creatures by chance. He witnessed mortals both fearing death and admiring the meaning it gave to their lives. He was puzzled, fascinated, and possibly a little bit envious.

About Seren

 * Seren is present in every elven crystal. In Hefin mythology, a crystal's hardness represents Seren's unswerving faithfulness to the elves; its symmetry represents her harmonious nature; its growth represents her nurturing of all things that grow.
 * Seren gave the elves, on their homeworld, magic. She extended their lifespans to stretch out for centuries where originally they only lived for decades.
 * Before she shattered herself, Seren had a perverse fascination with the elves' mortality. She went to many efforts to grant them immortality (see previous), but never succeeded.

What I Learned About Elves and Prifddinas

 * Whoever (whichever elves) grows Prifddinas controls it and what is available within it. At present, it has been grown by all non-Iorwerth lords and ladies.
 * Trahaearn, Ithell, Hefin, and Meilyr are all led by ladies, implying that those families are matriarchal. Crwys, Amlodd, Iorwerth, and Cadarn are led by lords, implying that they are patriarchal.
 * The Temple of Light was designed by ancestors of the Hefin clan to contain the Dark Lord. Warned by Seren that he dwelled under the mountains, attracted to the death altar, they designed the temple to contain the darkness with the help of the other clans.
 * For all of Prifddinas's history, elves regarded other races as inferior barbarians, but in contemporary times (read: elven civil war) that attitude has been changing into a more pro-interspecies attitide.

Elven Powers and Skills

 * Some elves (at least, some Crwys) are able to transform into trees using a sort of magic that draws the essence of a tree out from within one's self. Doing so can grant greater "immortality," that is, can slow aging and thoughts beyond the normal functions of elves.
 * Some elves - particularly Amlodd, but possibly other beings who have deep understanding of summoning, as well - are capable of passing into the realm of spirits. From there, they can be summoned back using a special charm. They can pass into the spirit realm by performing a simple ritual, taking its power in, and becoming one of the realm's creatures.
 * There are methods existing in the Trahaearn skillset that allow the bodies of intelligent creatures to preserve with help from crystal-and-rune exoskeletons. However, smithing design this advanced is difficult even for most Trahaearn elves to grasp without being taught.

What I Learned About Ardougne and Kandarin

 * In canon Ardougne government, the king is supported (and approved) by a council and has a constitution. That said, some citizens aren't exactly straight on the specifics, particularly paladins who believe in divine right to rule.
 * The canon plague hoax in West Ardougne was not bullet proof. It was described by the warder as "probably convincing" from outside the wall, but obviously suspicious from inside. However, anyone who started to ask questions was the next to "die of plague," so the civilians stayed docile out of fear. That said, pretty much everyone on the inside knew it was a lie.
 * Kandarin was originally one unified kingdom under King Ulthas (Lathas and Tyras's daddy). When King Arthur arrived, Ulthas gave him part of Kandarin, and when Ulthas died, he decreed that what remained of his chunk of Kandarin be split between Tyras and Lathas.

Miscellaneous

 * The Spirit Realm is a realm of pure animal forms of which Gielinor's creatures are shadows.