in the cities of The Divide, the miles-deep hole that cracked open the earth hundreds of years ago, lie several sprawling cities built into the cavernous walls. tonight, we focus on two.
on the middle layer of The Divide lies the industrial powerhouse of Umbris. founded by the Albescu family and still run by it, Umbris was a city of invention since it's very first days. Now, it's filled to the brim with aspiring inventors from all around and is one of Hezal's beacons of progress.
not all is perfect in Umbris, as this city, almost always ticking like the gears of a clock, chokes on the smog of it's own inventors and the cities above it. over the years, it's become overcrowded, and with it came The Plague.
this disfiguring plague sweeps through Umbris, it's fellow kingdoms of the middle divide, and even the kingdoms of the layers below it. umbris itself is hit the hardest. it's lower to middle-class population is almost entirely wiped out. grieving families turn to necromancy to bring back their dead, causing a massive rise in the population of graveborn.
the west-most side of umbris is given the nickname "The Gravekeeper District," as a small amount of laborers living there are quarantined and forced to dig the graves for the mass amount of plague victims. necromancers flock the area, looking for bodies or spare parts to continue their work, of which is in high demand currently.
it is here in umbris we find Lepite Mortion, a vaguely familiar face. working as a mortician amongst the gravekeepers, lepite is more notably known amongst the gravekeeper district for his "miracle elixirs," with have been noted to be able to heal one of the plague, and most other ailments that one can befall-- even death itself! just a single gold piece!
trust him, he would know. he doesn't look it, but he's graveborn himself! ( its already hard to tell what race he was in the first place-- a fiendling and drow mix-- and even harder to tell that he had been dead! ) raised back up from the grave ages ago, staved off the decay and rot most graveborn experience with his own elixir!
just don't ask how he makes them.
( MORE ART UNDER THE READMORE! )
"why are you hesitating? you need to begin your search for mellot again immediately."
"i just had one more question about your son, lepite?"
"what about him?"
"what happened to him?"
"one of my patients killed him. he was a doctor here, just like me. she murdered him as she was escaping the asylum."
"oh..."
"even worse, after we buried him, someone stole his body. five days after his funeral, we found the grave desecrated and torn apart. empty."
"did you ever find his body again?"
"no. now if you are done pestering me on such unimportant matters, i suggest you get back to finding mellot."
"and what about veroni, sir?"
"it seems she's already failed her mission. kill her if she tries to intervene."
no one is quite sure where this plague comes from, but many have looked into it. quite a few people trace it back to an old asylum on the east side of umbris. this asylum is looked over by the brilliant drow man Dr. Kalill Stockam. Some suspect that he had a hand in creating it, but that would just be silly, wouldn't it? After all, Dr. Kalill and his young rabbitfolk nurse, Alma, worked very hard to create and release a cure almost immediately! sure, it costs an arm and a leg and only the upper class of Umbris can afford it, but that's just how it goes, isn't it? after all, dr. stockam has more motivation than just the money and fame his vaccine brought him! that's what the public says, at least.
those in the lower divide tend to silently disagree.
Mellot Mariam, founder of Miss Mellot's Sanitorium for the Mentally Alternative, poses for a portrait with her dear friend Veroni Harlow and their godson, Varian. The three of them are all survivors of this plague, and have been working on finding and making a cure that will be obtainable to all walks of life.
the kingdom of Evaria exists in one of the only habitable zones of the lower divide, as what little light reached this far down into the earth is blocked out by the cities above them and the smog they've created, and evaria is the furthest from these. the warmest and brightest of these barren, perpetually dark lands, evaria is a city founded by and filled to the brim with vampires. this kingdom is responsible for almost the entirety of plant life and sustains both itself and the two other kingdoms of the lower divide, who were unfortunate enough to get stuck living in the uninhabitable zones.
this is where a few familiar faces live. Mellot owns and runs her own sanitorium for those who need it, inspired by her own mistreatment at the hands of a different asylum. her facility is easily one of the most respected for it's humanity and proper medical practices, a rare commodity for mental hospitals in hezal in this time and era. she has recently re-united with a former lover of hers, also a victim to the previously-mentioned "different asylum." funnily enough, they were victims to this plague several years before it reached the public. mellot herself died from it, only escaping from the pits of bodies after awakening as a vampire herself.
the two women hold their tongues about what happened to them. they know what happens if they don't. they know if they bring the horrors they were subjected to by the hands of Dr. Stockam to light, he'd find them. he'd find them and use any means at his disposal to silence them.
so they build their case against him in secrecy. the discovery of Varian was certainly a huge break in the case, a child born of Dr. Stockam and another patient, who mysteriously died after giving birth and who's child vanished from thin air. sadly, the young wererat doesn't recall much from his past, but he does carry the plague with him, allowing them the chance to study it up-close and work towards releasing their own cure.
but these aren't the familiar faces you're quite looking for, are they?
how about...
does the name Whovyx Derati ring any bells?
tonight, this young fiendling inventor returns to his library after an... eventful night with another man named Verion. you knew him by another name, but their back-and-forth relationship is one you know very well.
tonight, whovyx derati returns home to his library to find his lovers waiting anxiously for him.
"o-oh. you're still awake... heheh... i thought you would have gone to sleep by now... this is kind of awkward..."
"we... we were worried! you said you were only going to verion's for a few hours! it's been three days!"
"...has it? heh... oops... i guess i've been walking around with this on me for a while, huh?"
"are you bleeding? what the fuck happened to you, whovyx? who did this? i'll--"
"we need to get him inside right now, he's delirious-"
"i-it's fine! it's not mine! heheh! i'm sorry, i probably s-should have started with that! i didn't-- i didn't mean to startle you, hehehe--"
"...whovyx, what did you do?"
"it's just-- i think-- i think you may have been right when you said zerion didn't really love me, haha..."
oh. maybe we should come back to this one a little bit later. they seem a bit busy.
how about... ah! yes! we did leave this one on a bit of a cliffhanger, didn't we? let's play a little catch up.
leaving evaria, and heading all the way down to the deepest layer of the divide....
this city was not even graced with a name. people simply call it "The Beneath." here is where dead things go to rot, where those who have fallen from grace wind up, where creatures who have never once before seen the surface world of Hezal make their dwelling. The Beneath is not much of a kingdom as it is much as a shanty city built amongst the sewer systems of the various kingdoms above them. It exists in pure darkness, but life here still booms-- albeit much more twisted and strange, as the very magic that runs through the earth itself leaks out through fissures this deep into the earth-- much like the deep sea of our own world.
here, a twisted circus run by a member of the fae court suddenly booms in popularity with the addition of two new members.
"the modern era of necromancy is just spectacular, isn't it? these poor things were found dumped into our water systems, bodies broken and nearly sawed in half. they weren't citizens of the beneath, either, so they must have been dumped there from somewhere above. gods know how long they fell."
"either way, it only took a little 'speak with dead' spell here and a 'reanimate dead' spell there, a few healing spells for good measure, and they're good as new! and yes, they insisted they stay connected! that's not the interesting part, though. they can tell your future! all you have to do is join them for tea!"
now coming to Lunaan's Spectactular Sideshow of the Strange and Unusual are two twin girls, conjoined at the shoulder. at least, they were, before they died, but the circus-goers don't need to be made aware of that fact. they quickly become a popular attraction amongst the people of The Beneath, who are fascinated by these two young girls with the power to tell one's fortune through tea leaves. people flock to the strange twins to say hello, grab a cup of tea and have their fortunes read.
the graveborn girls, named Lottie and Lollie, don't stay long at the circus, however. after only a couple of months, a triton man by the name of Sentry Terros shows up to the circus and rushes to their tent, revealing that he is their father, and that he had been kidnapped and held hostage by the same woman who had murdered them. thanks to his bold escape and the help of a clever detective woman named Peyton, they managed to track his daughters to lunaan's circus.
both the reunion and goodbye is filled with tears as lottie and lollie re-unite with their father, and bid the circus that had graciously sheltered them adieu.
what they don't realize is that at home, someone is there waiting for them. someone's who's been waiting a long time to re-claim what she believes is hers. when she found his home, she had originally intended to simply take sentry back, but finding miss peyton there, Skeela Albescu Vaiska Kiseleva decides to have a little bit of fun with the detective that stole sentry away from her before he returns.
( banging on door ) "peyton? what's going on in there? are you alright?"
"you're an idiot, vaiska."
"oh, please enlighten me."
"you got so distracted by torturing me you forgot to think about what'll happen when he finds out about it."
"and what will he do?"
"hey! who's in there with you? peyton!?"
"he's going to kill you."
"heh."
"vaiska!? open the fucking door!" ( pounding against the door continues )
"eheheheh..."
"why the fuck are you laughing?"
"AHAHAHAHAHA--!! you stupid girl! you've gotten so distracted trying to fuck him you forgot who controls him!"
( sound of door cracking & breaking )
"he's not going to kill me. he can't!"
"VAISKA!"
"he's going to kill you! isn't that right, my dear sentry?"
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