Safiria and Lightovia

The Vampire Throne After the Chaos War

After the Chaos War, Safiria's death leaves the vampires divided while Lycans test their borders. Four contenders gather at Eternal Night under the Convocation's temporary peace, each seeking support from you and Lore's other warriors for a claim to the throne.

Solani, Safiria's niece and First Fang of Cor Mortis, invokes royal blood and tradition, while Baron Luca's Nyx Aeterna prizes predatory strength and endurance. Rapaxi offers the Umbral Legion's secrecy and martial skill, while the Werepyre Lich Kurok Gravefang rejects pedigree in favor of proven power. You can back a contender against their rivals, with the first contest leaving Solani and Luca as finalists.

Behind the contest, Edvard tries to make Esmee a ruler he can control, but she refuses and later hears from Enkara that Ensis has dealt with him on Solani's orders. Rather than take a throne, Esmee wants to learn to fight, and Enkara agrees to teach her under Solani's protection.

You interrupt Solani and Luca's dispute with an offer to help decide the contest, prompting them to invoke the Blood Run. Outside heroes will test their champions, Ensis and Rekshar, over three nights, with the result to be declared on the fourth morning.

Solani wins the throne through birth, blood and battle, but Luca rejects her rule and leaves with an invitation for others to follow. You present her as queen, though she doubts that either he or the other defeated contenders will disappear.

The Blood Moon and Safiria's Return

Safiria's return begins when the Blood Moon brings Count Maxius's castle to Lore for a celebration that becomes a trap. Waking in a dark abyss, you meet the Vampire Queen's ghost. She explains that the moon has opened a way from Gehenna, where vampire spirits go after death. Maxius lives there in exile rather than death, having lost his challenge for Safiria's crown long ago. He has separated his guests into prisons designed to feed one another's torment.

After defeating the maddened Constantin, you destroy the speakers carrying a sound only he can hear. His escape opens the way to Kimberly, forced to play beneath falling spikes. Blocking the trap lets you follow the monsters surrounding her to Voltaire, whose thoughts a parasite is turning into creatures. Defeating its hidden brain stem frees him. Maxius then reveals that the captives were meant to keep you imprisoned until he could sacrifice your life energy and reverse his banishment. Bubble and her transformed cat remain under his influence until you subdue the cat and break his hold over them.

With help offered by the rescued guests, you fight through Maxius's minions and his butler Barnabus before facing the Count himself. Maxius's defeat leaves him on his own ritual circle, where he becomes the sacrifice he intended you to provide. Barnabus survives and admits that he knows how to finish the ritual after centuries of helping his master prepare it. Safiria sees a chance to return permanently, but Constantin fears that she will destroy the peace Solani established in her absence.

The sacrifice has supplied the unwilling blood needed for the ritual, but Safiria must finish before the Blood Moon wanes. Rayne rallies her defenders while Saros and Constantin seek to stop them. When Solani learns what is happening, she understands Constantin's wish to protect her reign yet refuses to let him hurt her aunt. Safiria's defenders keep the ritual going: Constantin reaches the crypt too late to prevent her materialization.

Solani stands between the returned queen and the Lycan king, arguing that Lore's dangers make their alliance too important to throw away. Safiria reclaims the throne with her niece beside her to learn, warning that she will hold Solani responsible if Constantin turns against her. He survives in the hope that Solani can influence her aunt toward peace. The queen's life and rule are restored, though the truce still depends on more than the ritual that brought her home.

Mirror Safiria and Lightovia

Memet brings a warning from Dage the Good and Mirror Drakath. Your world's Vampire Queen Safiria has returned to life, but the Mirror Realm's Lycan Queen is missing, leaving the worlds out of balance. She is chained in the Shadow Void, losing her sense of time and of anything beyond it.

Gravelyn opens a route into the Void with the Doomblade, whose fragment of Sepulchure is connected to another that can sense Safiria. She warns that remaining there can damage living minds and bodies.

Light matter slows that damage, while Shadowsilk conceals you from a distance. You help Gravelyn make paths through the shadow and replenish the Doomblade's strength as it guides the search.

You find Safiria and dissolve her chains, but the Fragment of Doom blocks the escape, insisting she is the key. After you defeat it, the Doomblade explains that the Queen and the Void have driven this other part of Sepulchure mad. The spirit in the blade orders the damaged shard to yield so you can leave.

Back in Shadowfall, Safiria feels the strain of sharing a world with her living counterpart. Using her as an anchor, you open a route to Lightovia. Archmage Brentan is already there with an occupying force. Though Mirror Alteon remains timelocked, Brentan says the king intends to fill the dead Queen's power gap and keep the worlds unbalanced.

Safiria fights for her home with help from Light Slayer Z, who says being evil does not mean letting Alteon ruin his world. You release imprisoned Lycans and cleanse the tainted land while they rally the defense.

You defeat Archmage Brentan, but he escapes with a promise to try again. Safiria feels stronger in her homeland, where Z and Mirror Drakath remain to help defend it.