Ansephal

Ansephal (pronounced: *AN-se-fal*) is the goddess of darkness, corruption, chaos and deceit, as well as a demon lord. She is considered an enemy of mortal races and is especially hateful of Annalyon, Elalie, and their worshipers. She is worshipped by various people around the world; misguided souls that either have delusions of rewards or were just driven to her clutches by hatred and disappointment in life. Ansephal specializes in corrupting and lying to troubled mortals; that is one of the methods she uses to draw mortal worshippers. There is no known church of Ansephal that openly worships her that is accepted in any realm or country. Of course, who knows how many churches are actually tainted by her influence and how many sects of her cult are hiding in plain sight.

Her church/cult follows a simple rhetoric: Do as the Dark One dictates, bring about the worst in people that is their true nature, and sow chaos and deceit; do that and you shall be rewarded by Her.

Ansephal is also known as ''The Void'', as legends say that inside her exists an interplanar void; and that anything she inhales or eats ends up there for eternity with no means of escape. She is depicted at times as a black-haired pale woman in dark robes carrying a torch or lantern that is almost out and flickers, a purple and black butterfly that whispers in the ears of mortals, or a giant serpentine dragon with six black, feathery wings.

## Ansephal’s Fall and Her Feud with Annalyon

Ansephal was once a Solar in the service of Annalyon, bringing his light wherever she went. However, the eons of her hunting demons and her time spent outside Annalyon’s holy realm exposed her into more extreme ideals. She had developed views that went against her god’s teachings and little by little she found ways to distort Annalyon’s orders and instructions to do what her own lawful code dictated. One fateful moment, she decided that she had to sneak out of divine realm, the personal weapon of Annalyon and use it against an army of demons that had invaded Aldmeer. Annalyon had already dispatched echelons of angels to drive them back including Ansephal. However, it was strictly forbidden to wield Annalyon’s almighty weapon, much less steal it and use it in the material plane no less. The other angels saw Ansephal wielding the weapon; she could not even fully control it, and triedto talk her out of it and stop her. Ansephal was convinced that her way of dealing with things was more effective and that it was a waste that such an almighty weapon should remain doing basically nothing. Of course, the instruments of gods are meant to be wielded only by gods, and Ansephal was not a god. When the other celestials tried to take from her by force, she unleashed its power and being unable to control it how she wanted she decimated more than 200 celestials; diminishing the echelons might and leaving them powerless to fight the rampaging demons in the material. Annalyon then appeared in front of her; he absolutely furious with Ansephal’s actions. Having been fed up with her shenanigans and disobedience, this last act was the last straw. After an outrage about her killing her fellow angels, stealing from her god and sabotaging a crucial mission, much less of what would have happened if she unleased the weapon on the material, Annalyon banished her from his realm and the upper planes in general, and forbade her to ever return. When Ansephsal fell to the lower planes, she slowly descended into chaos and darkness. Influenced by the corrupting Abyss, she became fixated with getting her vengeance against the Heavens and in particularly Annalyon, her former mentor and god. In time she became a Demon Lord and conquered a layer of the Abyss for herself. From there, she amassed enough followers and power to become a deity; the goddess of darkness and corruption as she sought to undo and sabotage anything Annalyon stands for.

The goddess of darkness has sought to ruin Annalyon and his presence wherever she can find it while spreading her influence across the Planes. In that endeavor, she created the alkatars or vampires by corrupting members of the lenavi race. She also hates and combats Elalie who seeks to purify whatever corruption she spews on the world.

## Corrupting the Mortal Realm

Her corruption not only affects mortals but also the very land itself; of course she uses different powers of hers to affect the land. A landscape corrupted by Ansephal is devoid of thriving life. The foliage is dead and creatures that live there also die. Some places are so tainted that creatures die immediately when stepping inside them due to the immense necrotic aura. The dead zones spawned by the goddess expand little by little until they cover tens of miles. Of course, such places must remain corrupted by her agents. There are ways to restore a place but that means going inside it, or kill the leading priest that anchors the corruption in place. Cultists don’t often resort to tainting landscapes because it takes a great toll on them. However, when Ansephal gives that order they do it with no questions asked; an order the goddess gives cautiously and sparringly since she draws the attention of Elalie’s clerics and Elalie herself who races across Aldmeer and restores such places killing said cultists. After all, she draws attention to herself like that and she would rather avoid that when she can.

She is also the ‘’mother of vampires’’ as some call her. As Ansephal slowly descended into chaos and darkness, influenced by the corrupting Abyss, she became fixated with getting her vengeance against the Heavens and in particularly Annalyon, her former mentor and god. Her retaliation had to be something that would create a permanent scar in what Annalyon holds dearest; the mortals he so lovingly protects. After she became a goddess she had the means to exact her revenge. With a little help from the demon lord Barathor, she created a curse that would turn the favored mortal race of Annalyon, the Lenavi, into dangerous, bloodthirsty and corrupt creatures of darkness that would spread their corruption to the living. When she unleashed it upon the world, the curse did just those things. Many Lenavi were inflicted with the curse and by the time Annalyon noticed it was far too late. These cursed creatures of darkness became known as Alkatar among the Lenavi (meaning ''the damned'') and later as Vampires among the other races.

Ansephal was flat out laughing when the Scarring occurred and devastated the world with its corrupting energies, since mortals did her job for her in a sense. She even sent her cultists to research the Landscars and see if they can use them to spread the energies of the Scarring again and create a global crisis, but a great many cultists of hers were corrupt and became uncontrollable Landscar Horrors, effectively hindering her. While she was delighted to see these horrors spread more chaos and destruction plus the Scarring’s energies, she cannot afford to lose such large numbers of cultists since she has other plots to carry out that need them and also combat the agents of her enemies in the Material Plane. She may return to the Landscars’ potential sometime in the future but she has left them alone for now. Every now and then some overly zealous and heretic worshiper of Anshepal may seek to foolishly use the Landscars, but the goddess and the cult itself does not condone such actions although they will not actively hinder them unless it poses an immediate danger.

## Divine Realm

Her divine realm is her layer in the Abyss. The layer/realm is called Dacochde (pronounced: *da-KO-ch-de*). This layer is filled with dark crevices and pitch-black clouds that spawn lightning. The realm is always encompassed by dim light with the exception of some places where is completely dark. Ansephal has total control of when and where the layer is dim lit and where is completely dark, toying with unfortunate adventurers that have been stranded here. She can also summon magical darkness whenever and wherever she wants as well.  There are various plants here as well, some of them can eat you some not dangerous. Demons under the beck and call of Ansephal reside on the macabre and dim cities in this dark and wet plane. Beautiful purple and black butterflies that can see in any kind of darkness fly in many places and one can see them almost everywhere. These butterflies are the eyes and ears of the goddess and if mortals pass through Dacochde, the butterflies sometimes approach them and whisper to dark truths to them. They are otherwise harmless.

## Most notable events involving the goddess in the last 1000 years

During 1220 SR Ansephal’s cultists directed by her prophet, went to the Great Forest of Fali and tried to corrupt its archdruid and in turn the forest itself. They were stopped by the efforts of Elalie, her clerics and a team of members of the Circle of Fali.

In the year 1237 SR, the cult failed to stage an insurrection at the city Owlglade while in the meantime they were caught. Hundreds of cultists were uprooted and killed, and the cult and church of Ansephal was completely ousted by that region altogether.

In 1239 SR, Ansephal made it seem like the prophet was incompetent and also false as she spread the rumors that his prophecies and orders did not come from the goddess herself but from his whims. Infighting started in the cell that the prophet oversaw personally and after a bloody swath she chose another person who killed him as her new prophet. This was done because the last prophet failed her one too many times.

During 1240, Ansephal made the prophet her Chosen. The Chosen, Aleueira Veensa, succeeded in corrupting various temples across Ryth and Alion, and went undiscovered for years. The cult called that the Great Years.

In 1243, Aleueira was discovered but she was just hindered, and her efforts were not thwarted completely unknowingly to Ansephal’s enemies. Ansephal personally gave her a Molydeus and several general demons from Dacochde to be Aleueria’s guardians.

In 1254 SR Annalyon caught wind that Ansephal’s plot had not been stopped way back then. He made an exceptional paladin his Chosen and after they found Aleueira they fought. All temples in both continents were searched frantically; it was quite a big incident. In the end every agent of Ansephal was either killed our ousted by the temples they had infiltrated, it took a year. In their battles, the two Chosen both died and the forces of the gods retreated. That year was later known as the Shadow Purge among the history of the churches of various gods.

During the year 1280 SR, the dark goddess had tried to enter the Tranquil Wilds, the Divine Realm of the goddess Elalie. She failed, and she was left wounded for some time.

The year 1301 SR, Ansephal’s priests and clerics corrupted a large portion of the Forest of Narsis. A large portion of the forest died, never to grow again. The archdruid Narsis, priests of Elalie and forces of the ruling Achmages that could not let such a big part of nature and their natural resources die, tried to stop Ansephal's cult but they were too late.

In 1333 SR, Ansephal brought her Avatar into the Material Plane and hunted Elalie’s Avatar. She hunted and battled the other avatar for almost two to three months before her avatar fell in battle against Elalie’s avatar, one of Annalyon’s angels and a select group of warriors and spellcasters. After her avatar fell, Ansephal went mostly silent for the upcoming decades.

In 1 AS, she sent large groups of her cultists to research the Landscars and the Scarring in general, but this resulted into a failure as she lost a tremendous amount of followers to the Scarring’s energies.

In 80 AS Ansephal started mobilizing her forces with greater strength, and managed to destroy one of the oldest and biggest Annalyon’s temples in Evermoon; a symbolic move that terrified and mocked her enemies while bolstering the morale of her forces. For years, the citizens of Evermoon refused to go near the ruined temple, much less rebuild it, in fear of invoking Ansephal's wrath.

In 111 AS, her hidden forces were devastated in Risalla Desert by the combined efforts of the churches of Annalyon, Elalie, Gideus and Goldenveil.

In 279 AS the goddess made an alliance with the god of conquest Baramus Lyr in order to conquer and corrupt Vjalca. They would have succeeded if not for the efforts of a group of ambassadors between the warring noble houses that made the factions see the threat for what it was and made them act against it.

In 381 AS, people tried to summon her into the material plane, but instead seeing how foolish these mortal were to try to summon a god, she sent her legions of demons and slaughtered everyone. They also slaughtered the whole city of Liehra where the ritual took place as a warning that mortals should know their place.

In 499 AS, Ansephal steered her sight towards the hiding Yuan-ti clans of Yohssalu. She managed to turn a clan away from the worship of Ssathren and she was worshiped instead. Of course, the Yuan-ti did not abandon all their customs; on the opposite, Ansephal incorporated said customs in her rituals and worship as a means to appeal to the Yuan-ti. During that year she created and sent to them a fiercely powerful fiend that she named her Herald. In the years that followed, the clan that was led by the Herald started carefully raiding Yohssalu's settlements under the cover of night. No one ever knew what hit them.

During the year 506 AS, the clan was destroyed by rival clans worshiping Ssathren. The Herald was too powerful for them to kill so they sealed him in a Demiplane using a ritual involving six artifacts of Ssathren.

In the year 600 AS, the demon lord Yeenoghu found a way to enter and invade Dacochde. Ansephal drove him out.

In 774, Ansephal openened a pathway to Sheol and invaded the City of the Dead. She tried keeping the portal permanent, but Goldenveil stopped her personally. After the two deities battled in the closing gateway, Ansephal retreated severely wounded and drained of power. She fell into a slumber afterwards in order to restore her divine energies.

In 808 AS, a sect of her cult in Esterbridge cooperated with the noble family of the Vectorans. Being paid by the latter, Ansephal’s cultists were murdering citizens in the city to make it seem like the city's protectors, the Golden Hands, were incompetent in order to further a plot of the family to drag the city into the Nine Hells. Ansephal was planning to use the sect to overpower the Vectorans after having gained enough time and resources, and blackmail them in order to seize the city before it was sent to Hell. However, the cult’s progress as well as the plot of the Vectorans was stopped by a party of drafted members of the Golden Hands.