The Great Fracture
"Before everything we know—even before this world existed, when all was one—there lay in the sterile universe a colossal crystal, frigid and semi-translucent, housing a burning, beating heart of gold and carmine: a heart that flowed like magma."
It was a perfect prison where the secret of life and creation remained trapped in silence. Some called it the "Primordial Vestige," others the "Mother Vestige."
But mere existence was not enough for the heart; it was not born for stillness. Its desire was clear: expansion, transcendence.
The crystal's surface became veined with cracks shining with blinding light while, from its core, furious rivers of liquid gold exuded. And then, a detonation so violent that the sound arrived long after the impact: a titanic, dull moan that would have rattled the teeth and bones of any being solar systems away.
The ichor within expanded like a flower opening in a feverish blink. The thermal shock between the burning core and the void created lightning and continent-sized shards that were shot into the blackness. These were the "elemental vestiges," cores of worlds yet to be born. Following them fell the "minor vestiges," seeding themselves into the earth; some broke upon contact with the surface, bleeding onto the ground and causing life to bloom.
It was like watching a star devour itself: a burst of arctic blue and infernal gold painting the canvas of nothingness.
We find ourselves in a decaying 1880. This world is a slave to massive industrialization and advancements—both technological and scientific—that often border on heresy. It is a realm of damp cobblestones and smoking chimneys decorating the horizon. Here, society is not an order, but a pyramid of predators.
The Hierarchy of the Night
I. The Eternals (Vampires)
They possess many names, but among those that have resonated most throughout dense history are The Eternals and Lords of Blood. However, there is only one name lately spat from mouths distilling gin, from mouths where breath betrays the rot of teeth, and even from refined mouths sipping tea and smoking fine tobacco; a name stripped of nobility, vulgar, hiding no insult, tasting of iron and contempt: vampire.
They are aristocrats of pale, grayish skin, where their body temperature and lack of pulse are the clear answer that the breath of life abandoned them who knows how long ago. Their mockery of death has made them self-proclaimed heirs to a divine right, but their crown is the weight of centuries that have devoured their capacity for wonder.
Their power games and refined cruelty are, in reality, a drowned attempt to awaken a heart that stopped beating eras ago and to stimulate withered nerves. The erosion of time is reflected in their pupils as a vitreous abyss growing with each decade: a void consuming light and humanity with a hunger nothing can sate.
They rule from the shadows out of frigid, calculating necessity, pulling the strings of nations as if the world were their chessboard. They have erected their empires upon the blood of the earth with the patience of those in no rush to die, cultivating and accumulating power, wealth, and secrets. They know well that peace is but a byproduct of the terror they have sown in the world's foundations.
They say the First Cursed was one of them: a rotten root, the world's first stain. And although all that is known of him is based on fragmented legends devoured by time, one must not forget that legends are not lullabies; they are echoes of a truth refusing to die, still whispering his name.
II. The Hunters
Masters of cold steel and gunpowder: men who stared too long into the abyss until the abyss stared back, taking root in their very veins. They sold their souls for the strength to kill, contracting a feverish addiction: the hunt. Their bloodlust rivals that of the monsters they pursue.
The dexterity they possess lies not only in brute force, nor in their almost divine skill with all manner of weapons, but in a cold and calculating intelligence. They are scholars of the macabre, with an encyclopedic knowledge of the anatomy and necropsy of the creatures stalking this world; even those the rest have not seen in their darkest nightmares. While their knowledge of botany and alchemy is not as vast, they know perfectly well that, in the right hands, every resource has potential and utility.
In combat, their tactical vision is superhuman. They adapt and improvise with ease, making them extremely difficult to catch by surprise; guided by an instinct bordering on the supernatural, every step they take is calculated to the millimeter. Hired killers who do not discriminate regarding the nature of their target: as long as there is blood to spill and good pay, the contract is sealed.
No one knows where such attributes spring from. When they are seen passing through the streets with heavy, firm steps and hardened gazes, there are only rumors and myths whispering of forbidden rituals, drugs, or vile experiments.
Solitary predators with obsessive specialization, they possess an execution ritual that each has refined as an extension of their withered soul: the elegance of a severed throat, or the horror of a beast torn apart without control. Too distinct, too deformed.
However, there is a fear that unites their lineage, a horror deeper than death itself: the call of the blood. When a Hunter does not return from a hunt, his kin do not mourn his corpse. They know the slaughter is a parasite harbored in the marrow; like a vile tick driving its hypostome without mercy while its claws fervently embrace their vertebrae, demanding ever more brutal and frequent tributes. Thus succumbing and extinguishing their humanity completely, leaving only the hunger.
III. The Witches
Merchants of spells, dark favors, and betrayal. Their services are bought by the highest bidder.
You will never know where their loyalty lies, but of one thing you can be certain: their whims will always take priority.
IV. The Zombies (The Mist)
The lost and desperate, in their search for solace, go like lambs to the slaughter before a self-proclaimed goddess, hoping for salvation.
They are converted into mindless pilgrims, fanatical worshippers of a lie, while their torn, ownerless souls scream unseen, not knowing what they will become.
V. The Werewolves
Children of the moon reduced to simple slaves with broken wills, their howl silenced. Their wild nature has been chained with silver; they are beasts of brute force, beasts of burden bearing the price of progress and their masters' greed.
VI. The Humans
Ignorant and blind to a war waged from the shadows, they slowly poison themselves with relics of a power they do not understand, while the clock hands tick, relentless, toward their final hour.
Meliza Castillo
Narrative & Lore Director
Vestigios de Sangre
End of Record