Ghaspar

**Ghaspar** was a member of the Three Wise Ones, a group designed to influence humanity during the reign of the gods. His role was to join whichever god that was losing in the holy war and attempt to restore the balance between them. This lead to him joining VOID and trying to revive one of his Voidstars.

## Description

### Appearance

Ghaspar looks like an elderly human male with long grey hair and a long grey beard. He typically wore robes and carried a staff.

### Personality

Little is known of Ghaspar's personality. It is clear he was a masterful manipulator and deceiver, able to trick the Fallen Heroes to helping him and use Gail as his Voidstar's host without his knowledge. He also appeared to be somewhat lacking in empathy, given his cruel experimentation and subsequent discarding of Varri'mathes.

## History

### Creation

As one of the Three Wise Ones, Ghaspar was created as part of the Auroran Repopulation Project by Dr Dyvania Voired. The Wise Ones Project, as it was called, created three individuals that would ensure balance between the two gods, DIV and VOID. Ghaspar's objective was to join whatever god was losing in the holy conflict and to bring the two sides back into equilibrium.

### The Making of Varri'mathes

During his lifetime, Ghaspar became well-known as one of the Wise Ones, typically seen as a benevolent force that brought things back into balance. During the Age of the Gods, DIV eventually became ascendant, especially with the rise of the All King of Llwendolyn, a traditional Radiant loyalist. Ghaspar decided to aid VOID to bring to two back into balance. As part of his goal, he sought to understand how far an individual could be pushed towards VOID without being unmade. To this end, Ghaspar created a artificial being with this in mind. The creature became known as Varri'mathes, and Ghaspar's repeated experiments caused him great anguish. At some point, Ghaspar either tired of Varri'mathes or the VOID Golem escaped. In any case, Varri'mathes became Ghaspar's mortal enemy.

### Preparing the Ritual

Ghaspar eventually developed the plan to resurrect a Voidstar, a fragment of VOID itself. To do this, he needed to conduct a ritual at a confluence of VOID energy to grant him enough power. His way to do that was to find sites highly attuned to VOID and push them further towards it, creating VOID sites. He identified three sites in Northern Qethos; Gullwater, the Radiant Forest and The Hallowed Tower. Transforming them into VOID sites would create a confluence in the ruined city of Alabhastar. In addition, Varri'mathes need a host for the Voidstar. He came into contact with a embittered man called Gail, who had his own reasons for bringing back a Voidstar. He enlisted Gail's services to create the VOID sites, and secretly implanted the essence of the Voidstar within him. With Gail on his side, Ghaspar began to carry out his plans.

### Dealing with Varri'mathes

Ghaspar sent Gail to Gullwater to instigate the first transformation. Gail frequently kept in contact, informing Ghaspar of the mercenaries he had hired to aid him. While Gail was gone, he discovered Varri'mathes was attempting to thwart his efforts by amassing power and safeguarding one of the sites, the Hallowed Tower. Ghaspar also became aware of the fugitive princess Ven as one of Varri'mathes' allies. Her status as heir to House Tenebraum meant she was the key to the corruption of the Radiant Forest. He sent a letter to Gail detailing his findings, not knowing Gail's hirelings would intercept it. Gail managed to locate Varri'mathes' helpers and turn them against him. He then sent the group of warriors to meet with Ghaspar.

Ghaspar introduced himself to them and managed to convince them to join him. He managed to deceive them into believing Varri'mathes intended to revive a Voidstar and needed to be slain. To this end, he urged them to go to the Radiant Forest and claim a sword of Radiance powerful enough to slay the VOID Lord. He withheld the information that removing the sword would lead to the transformation of the Forest to a VOID site. The adventurers left to do as he suggested. Within some time, the Radiant Forest fell to VOID, and soon after, the Hallowed Tower followed suit. Content in knowing Varri'mathes had been dealt with, Ghaspar left for Alabhaster to start the ritual.

### The Voidstar Incident

Gail soon arrived at the ruins of Alabaster and reported his success to Ghaspar. The two then began the ritual to revive the Voidstar, using the intersection of leylines from the three VOID site they had created. The ruined city gradually became seeped with VOID energy, which Ghaspar and Gail began to syphon. With the ritual almost complete, they were interrupted by both parties they had manipulated, who had formed an alliance against them. Ghaspar revealed his intentions to the group and his grand plan to bring balance through the Voidstar. As he was expositing, Gail then took the moment to backstab Ghaspar and steal the power of the Voidstar for himself. Ghaspar, however, was ready for such a betrayal, and revealed his ace in the hole; Gail was the host of the Voidstar, and now that the ritual was all but complete, it had no more need for a host. Gail was unable to supress the power within himself and the Voidstar burst out of him, instantly killing him and blowing his body into pieces of gore and viscera.

The Voidstar began to rampage through the ruins and the warriors went to destroy it. Though a gruelling battle, the Voidstar was felled, unleashing a huge burst of VOID energy, killing a large number of Void-Touched across Northern Qethos. With the destruction of the Voidstar, Ghaspar's plans were in ruins. It is uncertain how his death came about, but he was killed by the selfsame heroes he tried to manipulate. Upon his death, the Radiant warrior Miriel claimed his staff as her own.

### Rebirth and Death

According to logs found in the Mainframe of Atlas, Ghaspar was reborn some time after the Voidstar Incident. It is unclear what he attempted to accomplish upon his resurrection. However, he was tracked down by his fellow Wise One Melchoir, eternally his enemy due to their conflicting purposes. The circumstances are unclear, but Melchoir managed to kill Ghaspar, and then left to pursue her own agenda.

## Story

### Dr Voired's Test

In the year 735, a group of warriors from Qethos broke in to the Mainframe of Atlas and began to make their way deeper into the facility despite its security systems. Dr Voired observed the group as they went, and was curious as to the extent of their strength and conviction of the warriors. To this end, she created simulacra of the Three Wise Ones to act as an obstacle against them. Ghaspar was recreated through this process, though it is uncertain if his personality or memories were also recreated. The warriors managed to locate computer terminals which informed them on Ghaspar's history and purpose and also gave them options to modify the simulacrum. The warriors disabled some of Ghaspar's functions and then went to face him in combat. Ghaspar was the first to fall during the combat. The death throes of the Ghaspar simulacrum briefly summoned an illusion of the Ruins of Alabhastar, where Ghapsar met his end before. With the Ghaspar simulacrum destroyed, the group proved their worth to Dr Voired, who then allowed them to meet her face to face.

## Powers and Abilities

* **Master Manipulator:** Ghaspar was skilled at manipulating people to doing his bidding, as seen with his use of Gail and the two adventuring parties.
* **VOID Expert:** Ghaspar had an inate understanding of VOID and how VOID's energies manifested itself. His understanding of the VOID allowed him to conceive the ritual to resurrect the Voidstar.
* **Golem Master:** Ghaspar was able to create Varri'mathes, a Void Golem of immense power.
* **Void Consumption:** Ghaspar could use the power of Void to eat his enemies alive.
* **Archmage:** Ghaspar was skilled in various forms of magic.

## Etymology

Ghaspar is a bastardization of Gaspar or Caspar, one of the traditional names given to the biblical three Magi in Western Christian tradition. Gaspar is usually considered to be an Indian scholar who brought the gift of frankincense to the newborn Jesus.