Lore:Mantella

The   was a massive green gem, a "Crux of Transcendence"  that contained the "heart", or life force, of the entity known to   as the  .  Twice, the Mantella was used to power the gigantic brass golem,  —first by   when he conquered Tamriel, and again during the events of the  .   

The Mantella was lost after Tiber Septim's conquests. For most of the  , the Mantella was hidden on a plane of   known as the  . It was later located by   the sorceress and recovered by an   of the  , which led directly to the Miracle of Peace.   

History
Second Era
 
Under the terms of the   that brought   into the   in the late  , Emperor   received the ancient   construct,  . The Mantella was created by Imperial Battlemage   as a replacement for Numidium's original power source, the  .     The gem needed to be infused with the life force of a powerful being, so Arctus used his own  (though   claims he trapped the heart of  , another saying it cost Tiber Septim his own heart to create it;   it has been suggested that both men may be    of  ).  While the heart within the Mantella was "not exactly Lorkhan['s]",  it was sufficient to awaken Numidium, and with it Tiber Septim was able to conquer all of Tamriel. 

Numidium was destroyed not long after; some say Zurin Arctus became infuriated that the Emperor had begun using Numidium to crush the neutral royal families of Tamriel and enthrone those loyal to him. The Battlemage attempted to reclaim his heart but was killed in the attempt, and as a result he was transformed into the undead  .  In other accounts, it was an already-undead Underking who attacked Numidium.  Each account ends the same; Numidium was obliterated and its pieces scattered across Tamriel, and the Mantella was blown out of reality and into  , where it came to rest in a plane that would come to be known as the  .   

In the years that followed, Tiber Septim sent out agents to recover the scattered pieces of Numidium, and they would become known as the  . Likewise, the Underking sent his forces to recover the Mantella. 

Third Era
thumb|right|The Mantellan Crux
In  , the Mantella's location was divined by the sorceress  , the Dowager Queen of  , in her astral travels. However, she went mad in   following the death of her son, King  . Nulfaga retreated with the secret of the Mantellan Crux to  , her castle in the  .  

In  , Emperor   sent an   of the   to investigate Lysandus' death, and why the King's spirit was haunting the city of  . The agent discovered the king had been murdered and brought down the culprit, and also recovered the  —another artifact from Numidium, which allowed the bearer to control the automaton. In choosing a bearer for the Totem, The agent   gave it to seven different powers around the   region.   

Nulfaga, clear-headed with her son's shade at rest, then sent the agent to the Mantellan Crux to recover the gem.  Upon the Mantella's return to Tamriel, Numidium sprang to life once more; seven separate realities unfolded simultaneously across portions of   and   in  , an event known as the  .   In the end, the Underking was able to finally reclaim his heart from the Mantella, resulting again in the destruction of Numidium and giving him the death he had sought for so long. 

See Also
'' '' — an alternate account of events leading to the creation of the Mantella.

References