Suzerain Katonn

The Dragonkin Empire's colonies and provinces were once governed by suzerains – officials who enforced a territory's loyalty to the Dragon Emperor. While these provinces were expected to follow the will of the Empire in dealing with other cities, they were granted some degree of autonomy in how they handled their domestic affairs. While most suzerains were Dragonkin nobles from the heart of the Empire, the burgeoning colony of Kaerok was governed by a Human – a powerful sorcerer called Katonn. One of the highest ranking non-Dragonkin in the Empire, Katonn was not only devoted to his duty as suzerain, but to the teachings of the Eternal Dragon, Iragoth, from which he learned the fundamentals of time magic. Through intense training and instruction, Katonn had been able to drastically prolong his life. With this, he kept a firm grip over the clans of Kaerok for several decades, allowing the region to shine as a model colony for the Dragonkin Empire under his guidance. However, the Sin of Dragons – the Dragonkin's opening of a portal to Siroth's realm of Anathraad – changed everything. Hordes of Demonspawn poured out from the magical gateway and ransacked the Empire. Iragoth herself, who had been manipulated and tainted by Siroth, wreaked havoc and devastation. It was enough to nearly break Katonn, who had adored Iragoth and the empire, and now saw the former destroy the latter. He agonized in his search for a solution – surely his time magic could reverse all of this? As Katonn watched from afar as the Great Dragon Shrine in the empire's military capital of Twinrift exploded in a magical cataclysm, he felt a great surge of arcane energies, which he found bolstered his own great magical power. It was exactly what he needed. Not knowing how much longer this bounty of sorcerous energy would last, Katonn knew he had to quickly weave a great spell – one that he hoped would reverse the flow of time, and give him the opportunity to prevent the Dragonkin from committing their grievous sin. Sealing himself in a makeshift tomb on the borders of Kaerok to isolate himself from outside distraction and interruption, Katonn channeled the unstable power that surged through him. Fighting against the great river of time, Katonn sailed upstream, hoping to reach his port of call. For what seemed like both seconds and eons, he fought against the temporal tide, until his body could take no more. He awoke inside his tomb, shuddering and exhausted from the ravages of his struggle. Within seconds he felt the weight of centuries crash down on his body, rip away his soul, and condemn him to death, only for the process to halt – stopped by an unfamiliar magic. Though he did not know it, it was Undeath. This was a sensation Katonn did not recognize, a phenomenon he did not understand. What was this power binding him? Struggling to anchor his mind, Katonn moved his body – a broken shell halted in the process of withering to dust, for reasons he could not fathom. Desperately trying to grip onto the present, Katonn unsealed the tomb's great stone door and stumbled out into what he expected to be the past. Time's flow cannot be fought, however – one can only be swept along by it. Rather than traveling to a time before the Dragonkin's fatal sin, Katonn had advanced centuries or more into the future. The now-bustling kingdom of Kaerok lay before him, with its gleaming Bibliotheque Spire piercing the sky – far removed from the draconic colony he left behind. Questions flooded Katonn's mind. Once he learned that he was in a time so far from both his own and the one he had sought to find, he needed to know what had happened. Now he wanders Teleria, trying to piece together how much of his world still exists, what power has taken over his body, and to piece together some kind of purpose for himself.