Wolfwing and original Darkovia

Wolfwing and the Rivals of Darkovia

Darkovia lives under perpetual night and a war that neither of its peoples will abandon. At its gates, the vampire Vannier and the Lycan Warclaw each seek help against the Werepyres while blaming the other side for the danger. Their tests lead the hero through the graveyard: paying respects at the mausoleum, thinning the Skeletal Fire Mages and Rattlebones, capturing displaced albino bats for relocation, and defeating the undead werewolf Blightfang. The guards allow the hero into the forest.

Shadowslayer Z offers another series of trials before opening the way to Safiria's castle. The hero obtains Red Hunting Hood's wolf-slaying axe, deals with the forest's Dire Wolves and Blood Maggots, and defeats the Chaos-empowered Lich of the Stone to recover its Necrompendium. Having proved the hero's ability, Z explains why hunting the familiar monsters of Darkovia is no longer enough.

Z tells of a man bitten first by a werewolf and then by Safiria before his first transformation could finish. The two infections made him a Werepyre, Wolfwing. Rejected by both peoples, he lived apart from them. Now his power has grown: he can change vampires and Lycans into more Werepyres, and his followers search beyond Darkovia for something their master wants. Z suspects Drakath's involvement. Neither Safiria nor the Werewolf King will trust the Shadowslayer, so the hero must try to bring them together.

Safiria must also be approached through service. The hero destroys Blood Maggots that are draining the humans she keeps as a feeding population, soothes frightened bats, and fights the invading Lycan Knights. Defeating their formidable warrior Twisted Paw earns an audience with the Vampire Queen. These tasks gain her attention without ending her contempt for either the Lycans or the mortals on whom her kingdom feeds.

The hero argues that the attacking knights are Wolfwing's corrupted forces, sent to keep Safiria occupied. As the warning is given, the story shows Drakath empowering Wolfwing and Wolfwing spreading Chaos among the Lycans. Safiria nevertheless refuses to divert her forces from the war. She grants the hero passage through her territory toward the Wolflands, but offers no army for the confrontation ahead.

At Lycan Ridge, the hero arrives during a dispute over leadership. Constantin accuses the old Werewolf King of wasting the pack against the vampires while failing to recognize Wolfwing as the immediate threat. The old king answers with a challenge. Constantin defeats him and claims the position of Alpha, becoming the new Werewolf King.

Constantin's people have their own account of Darkovia's past. He tells of a winged wolf, child of Night and Forest, divided by sunlight into Wolf and Bat. In his telling, the vampires forgot their shared origin and hunted the wolves, who eventually united under the old king. The legend accompanies a present demand for proof of loyalty: the hero brings meat, earns the pack's respect in combat, destroys Chaos Vampire Knights and defeats their general Sanguine.

Constantin then reveals what his scouts discovered. Wolfwing's followers have captured a full-grown dragon and dragged it toward his lair. Feeding on it is one possible explanation, but bringing it home rather than feeding where it lived makes little sense to either king or hero. Constantin allows passage onward, yet cannot spare fighters while his pack faces two enemies. The hero has gained both rulers' attention and neither ruler's commitment.

Wolfwing and the Unfinished Peace

The struggle for the Valley of Death makes that refusal impossible to ignore. Vampires and Lycans fight for the territory while Wolfwing remains free to prepare his own assault. The Lycans win the war, but Safiria's strongest champion, Edvard, stands at the end of the fighting. The hero reaches him through the Lycan warground.

Edvard's sparkling appearance and grievance over a lover who left him for a werewolf make him easy to underestimate. His allegiance is more dangerous than his vanity: Wolfwing has promised him Chaos power. Edvard intends to kill Safiria and blame the Lycans, deepening their war until neither side can interfere with his master. The hero defeats him. Edvard escapes as a bat, leaving the hero to expose the betrayal to both rulers.

Safiria admits that pride blinded her to Wolfwing's threat. She yields the Valley of Death to Constantin, though only provisionally, and agrees to join the struggle against the Werepyres. The rivals have accepted a temporary truce rather than settled their claims to Darkovia. Z emerges with the reason they must act immediately: under the Mystic Wolf Moon, Wolfwing intends to bite the captured dragon and turn it into a Dracowerepyre, the next Chaos Beast.

In the Chaos Cave, the hero investigates the gate protecting Wolfwing's work. A key taken from a Werepyre is not sufficient; the lock also requires secret words. The hero obtains the password from his followers, allowing Z to activate the key. The passage opens, but their preparations have not been quick enough.

The Mystic Wolf Moon has arrived. Wolfwing tells the hero that the hatred between vampires and Lycans gave him the time he needed. He bites the captive dragon, and it transforms into the Dracowerepyre. Drakath approves of the result. The hero defeats the new Chaos Beast, after which Z scouts ahead and asks the hero to gather Safiria and Constantin for the confrontation with Wolfwing himself.

Wolfwing detects the hero before a surprise attack can begin. He describes his army as an answer to centuries of exclusion: if vampires and Lycans become Werepyres, there will be no separate sides left to fight. Drakath has given him a way to build a clan that will never reject him. The hero challenges the limits of that promise. Elves, dwarves and humans would still exist beyond his new family. Wolfwing answers by expanding the plan to all of Lore, beginning with the hero.

The hero defeats him, and Wolfwing asks to be finished. At this point, the encounter offers two responses. In one, the hero refuses to kill him and proposes that he use his power against Chaos alongside Alteon and Gravelyn. Acceptance, rather than forced transformation, might give him the belonging he wants. Wolfwing struggles to think through the corruption and begins to consider the offer.

In the other response, the hero insists that the threat to Lore must end, but orders Wolfwing to stand rather than killing him on his knees. This changes the hero's answer to the defeated enemy; it does not lead to a separate final fate. Both paths converge before the hero can settle matters.

Z shoots Wolfwing, who breaks apart into dust. The Shadowslayer explains that the united vampire and Lycan forces kept his army occupied long enough for them to enter unnoticed. Z sees a monster removed and a safer world. The hero answers with grief for someone whose desire not to be alone has ended this way.

The final image returns to Wolfwing's dust under a shaft of moonlight. Two eyes glow from the purple remains. The immediate danger has been stopped and the rivals have fought together, but the scene leaves Wolfwing's ultimate fate unsettled.