Velldune Blightmantle

"By the will of the Lich King do the dead surpass the living."

Scourgelord Richard Velldune is a Second Generation Death Knight of the Scourge and commander for the new undead being risen into the ranks of the Scourge under the watch of Lich King Bolvar Fordragon.

A knight of Stormwind in life, he fought a dozen conflicts for his kingdom and trained generations of soldiers to make them ready for battle. In death, he accomplishes much the same, serving his king and raising new generations of knights to do battle with the evils that plague the realms of Azeroth.

As one of the relatively few remaining Death Knights of the Scourge, Velldune is charged with the consolidation of Scourge power, raising slain scourge champions back into service, and going out into the plagued lands of the world and recalling the rogue or feral undead back to Northrend.

Description
Richard Velldune would have been the picture of a Stormwind knight in anouther life, for at one time he was. He carries himself with knightly dignity, and as such his stride is measured and rigid. His face is gaunter then in life, and his eyes glow the icy blue of any Death Knight. His body is strengthened with unholy power, and his bulk and power belay the appearance of his age. He is filled with the vitality of youth and many times over. His skin is pale, even translucent in some places, revealing black varicose veins beneath.

His gaze is narrow and his eyes are not wide, he very infrequently displays human emotion. His movement is unnatural when still, possessing none of the small movements of the living. If not in motion he is like a statue, he does not shift weight or adjust his posture and doesn't even breath. The instructor regards all with an even stare, assessing all he lays eyes on. His frozen stare flicks about people as they speak.

Early Life
The life of Richard Velldune is one of inevitable struggle and warfare. Born into a low noble family during the period of long peace after the Gnoll wars to the Knight House of Velldune, he would know a life of relative ease in his younger years amidst the peerage of Stormwind and would follow his father into the Stormwind Army for military prestige. His father, a colonel in the army, drilled discipline into his son but gave him no special favors.

His youth and early career would see Richard engaged in minor skirmishes with the Gnolls at the edges of the city and out into the local realms, ensuring that war-bands would not rise up and harass trade caravans. His relatively prestigious birth lending him well to warzones of his choosing. As he aged the conflicts he saw increased in scale and in scope, moving from Gnolls to Trolls as the need for experienced soldiers continued to grow. As time went on, the bulk of the army began to dedicate almost all their time to the encroaching Gurubashi trolls. The trolls, incensed to violence as human settlers continued to creep south from Stormwind, had began raiding and incurring into human lands. Over and over Richard would beat back the trolls and over and over would more marshal together to break upon the ranks of the Stormwind Guard.

Conflicts would continue to escalate as the two species clashed, Richard and his unit would gradually be whittled down by conflict and raiding parties and turnover was high. It would come to boil when the prince and his friend Medihv brought ruin to Stranglethorn Vale and send the united troll clans Storming into Stormwind lands in all out war. The outer defenses of the land crumbled instantly and the armed forces were forced into constant retreat back to the cities gates. The weeks long grueling conflict would see Richard elevating to command of his unit and promotion to Sergeant, and the deaths of uncounted civilians and soldiers, including his own father. It would have gone on longer if not for the intervention of Medihv to end the war in one fell swoop.

In the wake of the relatively brief but intense war the Stormwind military saw itself greatly depleted and in need of building up again. Taking after his father, he would take to instructing the next generation of knights and passing on the lessons learned in the Gurubashi Wars. Throughout the next 17 years, he would serve his king as a sergeant for a brief time and gradually advance to captain, training new generations of knights and engaging in numerous conflicts with Gnolls, Trolls, and other foes throughout the realms. In time as he aged he would begin taking squires as well, eventually taking in the son of a lesser noble house by name of Vanidicus Alexander to begin his martial training.

First War and Second War
The long peace would come to and at year 0, when human society was shattered. The Orcs poured through the Dark Portal and into the Black Morass. Marshaling his trainees and recruits to serve as a reserve force. A reserve force that was quickly brought to the front. Weeks of fierce fighting took their toll however, and eventually Richard would fall in battle, severely wounded in battle against an Orc Chieftan, the price for slaying the leader and breaking the spirit of the warband in that minor battle in the overall war.

Unable to fight, he began to make his way back to Stormwind with the wounded, eventually though, the Horde caught up, and reached the city proper. As caravans broke down, Richard fled into the city, rushing to find his ward as the city burned, searching the stables for the boy, a group of Stormwind knights and magi escorted several civilians to safety, Van among them. Thankful for their aid, the two fled on horseback and headed north, eventually reaching dwarven land and from there ships to Lordaeron.

Lordaeron would be a time of recuperation. As other refugees from the south sought out northern aid, they brought with them tales of the Horde. Richard, unable to soldier in his current state, settled with Vanidicus in Eastweald, in Cinderholme and participate how they could in the military buildup, working the farms and smithies. Richard would spend his time ingratiating himself with the town leadership trying to impart a sense of urgency into the townsfolk of the need to be ready, with mixed results.

Eventually the Orcs reached the north some 6 years later and the people of Lordaeron were as prepared as possible. The Horde marched from the south and the hastily assembled town militias stood ready. While the greater battles took place at sea to the north, when the horde moved to sabotage Stratholme's oil platforms, the defenses in the Eastweald were tested. Goblin sapper groups on land moved to harry Lordaeron defenders and splinter groups from the warbands crashed into the defenses of the outlying villages around Stratholme. With some luck and an organized defense in part organized by Richard, Cinderholme survived. In time the village would be rebuilt as Stratholme was.

Death
The purging of Stratholme had left the peoples of Lordaeron troubled. Paranoia gripped the land as plague continued to spread slowly throughout the land. As towns became isolated in quarantine became the norm. As trade gradually broke down throughout the region, the remaining trade dealt with weapons and defensive stockpiles, with the greatest buildup at Darrowshire to the south, itself a target during the second war. The undead began to shamble about the land and wander into the towns; the Scourge had arrived.

The period of silence came to an abrupt end as the Scourge took control of Lordaeron. Pouring out from the capital, the scourge washed across the land. The Cult of the Damned rose up simultaneously as the agents of the Lich King claimed vast swathes of land. The greatest servants of the Scourge, the Liches, servants of Ner'zhul, marched at the head of the armies. It would be the Lich, Zhekkan Gravecaller, who would be Richard's undoing.

As the undead began to encroach upon Cinderholme in greater and greater numbers, Richard and the town elders made an effort to evacuate the town. The town's militia rallied to a valiant defense to hold the line and Vanidicus, now a capable knight and soldier, fought with him. As the assault reached its peak and the defenders began to wear down, Richard sent Van away with who was left.

Once the battle was assured to be a scourge victory, the Lich himself appeared to taunt the remaining defenders briefly. Their efforts were magnificent, and their resistance invigorating to the once-orc, and thus he ordered the remaining militia subdued. Richard remained as leader, and he was identified. When the town was overrun and he was captured, he was congratulated for his efforts by Zhekkan asking for his last words. Richard gave none, and for his efforts the lich reached down and froze his heart in his chest, and handed him his runeweapon as a death knight of the scourge.

The Scourge
In death, he was reinvigorated, his wounds mended with grafted flesh, and his body clad in rune inscribed armor. Imbued with great necromantic knowledge at the will of his master, Richard's eye for talent was put to use in death to select the most skilled militiamen of his former town for Zhekkan's personal guard, and Velldune his Dread-Captain. Zhekkan Gravecaller would move on to Stratholme, now filled with the corpses of the dead. Under Richard's careful eye and advisement were the finest knights and guards raised to death knight status and by Richard's vampiric blade did any remaining stragglers fall in the name of the scourge and raised into the service of the Gravecaller, their souls claimed for the Lich King.

The grasp upon Lordaeron was most important. As the bulk of the Scourge marched north into Quel'Thalas, Richard, under orders of Zhekkan Gravecaller joined with the Cult of the Damned along with a contingent of his personally selected knights. Serving as an adviser and protector of the cultists along with his men, holdouts of resistance were crushed and bodies taken back to the slaughterhouses and schools of Necromancy.

During the final hours of the third war, as the Legion fell at Hyjal, the Lich King would command Arthas to return to Northrend in the wake of a sudden weakening of his powers. At this moment of mental lapse, huge swaths of undead broke free of the Lich King's control and divided into three factions. The Dreadlord Insurgents, the Forsaken, and the Scourge proper. The Scourge civil war raged across lordaeron, with Kel'Thuzad himself leading the loyalist forces. During the war, Richard would see conflict under the rising star of Razuvious, a mighty risen champion of the capital city by Kel'thuzad himself. In the end, Sylvanas's forces would be victorious and claim the capital city, forcing the scourge back into the Plaguelands. In the coming years, Richard would remain in the capital city of the Scourge, under his tutelage, Dark Touched warriors of the cult would ascend into knighthood, and Death Knight acolytes would grow mighty in service to the Scourge. He would come again to serve under Razuvious and claim the title of Instructor, moving to the dread citadel of Naxxramas as the Scourge consolidated their power over the Plaguelands. He would never again think of Stormwind or his home in Cinderholme, now known as Terrordale.

For three years Velldune would dwell within Naxxramas until the time came for the Scourge to reach out into the world once more to carry out the long term plans of the Lich King. At the command of his masters, his students finally took to the fields of war. Death Knights, cultists, and the undead surged across the planet, striking out across the Alliance and the Horde to weaken them and claim precious resources and bodies for the Scourge. Though objective after objective was completed and Scourge influence grew, in time, the heroes of the living would reach the citadel of Naxxramas and begin their attack. Velldune would meet his match in the Plaguewood, overwhelmed by a force of warriors and paladins with great flaming swords while on patrol with a force of skeletons and scourge soldiers. It was not to be his final end, the paladins and warriors instead aimed to subdue one of his minions, and drove the knight off.

In the interim two years, the mortal races would find themselves distracted from the Scourge by the Burning Legion's invasion once more. The phylactery of Kel'thuzad, thought destroyed, was delivered back to the dread citadel and the master of Naxxramas returned. The overall goal of the Scourge's previous attack was completed, and thousands and thousands of bodies were recovered by the unliving. Where before humanity made up the bulk of the death knights, Instructor Velldune would find himself tutoring members of all races, raised into undeath and selected for their unique strengths and powers, members of the horde races were especially prized for their greater physical strength and prowess. For half remembered reasons, he despised training Trolls and was especially harsh upon them. With a newly resurrected and stronger army at his command, the Lich King called Naxxramas back to Northrend so that his plan to thwart the Argents could go into effect.

The War in Northrend
Upon reaching Northrend, Velldune would be recalled to Icecrown shortly after return with a small contingent of death knights. Once more would he enter the service of the Lich Zhekkan Gravecaller in Icecrown. As the war against the living ramped up, initial assaults began upon the great gates of Icecrown. Under the orders of the Lich, Velldune took part in the defensive strategy at Mor'drethar, the Death Gate. As the alliance mounted their first tentative assaults, the Scourge forces under Zhekkan proved to be too much. Ordering a masterful flank maneuver, Velldune broke the offensive and fully engaged with the invaders. But as the Alliance forces regrouped to attacked again, a horde force struck from behind, allowing the Scourge to overrun both groups and destroy them. Velldune ordered the horde bodies destroyed and the Alliance bodies added to the growing number of risen soldiers. Velldune would spend the majority of his time in Icecrown after the initial defenses fell. His prime directives were to continue the raising of new soldiers and ensuring that the stream of warriors to fight against the living remained steady after the loss of the Ebon Blade knights. As war raged across Northrend, Velldune was ordered to retreat back to the holdings of Zhekkan within the lower citadel along with a contingent of prospective students and damned cultists. They would be a reserve force as the forces of the Ashen Verdict closed in upon Icecrown; he was ordered by his King to ready himself, to garrison, and to be ready to slay the living...but no further orders came. When he reached out to the Lich King he received only silence. Without further orders he carried on with his last instructions, to train and to wait, and be ready. For weeks he and his understudies made ready, they fought off Argent mop up forces and remnants of horde and alliance groups that skulked the base of the citadel. Eventually the attacks slowly ceased, patrols no longer came to Icecrown.

Weeks became months and months became years. Eventually, the knights, now more free-thinking, decided to venture forth out into the wastes and found the Scourge strangely dormant. Gone was the sense of purpose, replaced with a dull lethargy. Only the evidence of a great and terrible siege remained. Over the years, the Death Knights scattered, drifting apart to carry out their last orders as they saw fit, some trying to grasp for power in the vacuum of the Lich King's absence, some were resigned to their fate in perpetuity. Velldune would walk across the lands, slaying all living he came across, making note of who showed promise. The eye of the instructor always seeks new students...

The Lich King Awakens
For years the Lich King was silent. One day while on patrol about the citadel, a voice spoke into his mind. The rumble of power that marked that of the Lich King. Velldune felt a faint twinge of relief and a hint of gladness...the King is dead. Long live the King.

His orders were simple, to cleanse the realm of Northrend, to raise new soldiers, to make ready for war upon the Burning Legion, something Richard Velldune relished the thought of. He set off immediately on orders from his king, seeking out the resting places of fallen knights and deceased soldiers of the Scourge. Though his necromantic powers did knights old and new return to life. Antheros Frostgrave, Dimonar Icecaller, and others. All raised back into the Lich Kings service. An alliance with the Ebon Blade was being established...and the Lich King had plans. The traitorous Ebon Blade was returning to the fold and they would need new knights.

The Interim
The knight was given a simple order; to consolidate the power of the Scourge. To this end, Richard was sent south from Northrend and into the Plaguelands, where the last bastions of undead power lay and petty once-scourged warlords and feral undead polluted the land. Richard took to his task with astonishing speed and efficiency, rounding up legions of undead and casting down dozens of would be lords. Assisting him with this grand task were the remnants of the schism-ridden Cult of the Damned, operating from his main base in Ebonmourne. It would be here that the knight would venture out into the world, from this bastion of loyal undead, and through the death gates established in the ziggurat's would the undead return to Northrend.

Upon venturing Northward, close to the Elflands, Velldune happened upon a group of Dark Rangers. Soundly defeating them and forcing them to flee, these dark rangers would hound Velldune throughout his mission, and Velldune would take every opportunity he could to slay them and return them to the service of the Scourge. As the rangers found out more about the knight, they followed his patterns to the town of Terrordale, once Cinderholme, where the knight dwelt with a risen militia of the once inhabitants. Richard was lured from his command post by the rangers, who he considered a stain upon his warped sense of honor, and chase them down, savagely beating the once human forsaken, known as Aleksi, within an inch of his unlife before the banshee rangers managed to dislodge him. Eventually chasing them into a house, the knight was distracted for but a moment by the remnants of his mortal life, long enough for the set bomb to go off and blast him underground and leave him under a couple tons of rubble. He would survive and spend two days digging himself out, sending his messengers to track down the forsaken and offer them terms for an honor dual.

The duel was accepted, and the rangers met with the Knight, and bested him in fierce combat. The fight invigorated and for a moment his former sense of honor and glory returned. Defeated and interrogated, through dark magic was he compelled to reveal knowledge they truly wished for, the knowledge of one of Velldune's allies, Warmaster Anton Frostheart. The knight granted their wish to find him and tore open a death gate to Icecrown where he took them to the citadel and waited.

The rangers took their revenge, and got their answers, but found that it was a pyrrhic victory, for even as the dead closed in around them, the two knights, slain by the rangers by black arrows and dark magics, rose up from the hallowed ground of the Scourge. The rangers were forced to flee back through the holes of the death gates, wondering if they truely won.

The Legion War
Velldune was commended for his mission. The sheer number of undead returned to Northrend and for his tactics in bringing rebel forsaken back into the fold had boosted the ranks of the Scourge by a significant number. For this he was called before the frozen throne, and made a Lord of the Scourge.

Throughout the legion war, the Scourgelord served at the forefront of the Lich Kings armies. The legion swept through Azeroth as it staked claims and footholds upon the planet. No land was exempt, including Northrend. Throughout the legion war, the once masters of the Lich King, made great efforts to seize their once servant. The dreadlord Makathra spearheaded the assault, leading a fleet of voidships to the frozen north, and begun the assault upon Icecrown.

The mightiest generals of the scourge were assigned to the defense of Aldur'thar, the horror gate. To serve him, a mighty army of abominations and flesh constructs strode forth as uncounted ghouls swarmed around them at the command of lesser knights and soldiers. For fourty days and fourty nights, the scourge fought. Pushing back wave after wave of demons. The frostwyrms, recalled to defend the Icecrown Citadel, could not aid them in reaching the ships from the ground. It would take days until the endless waves of demons broke upon the fleshy mass of the scourge. The brief pause would see gargoyals and bats swarm the ship, picking off demons and lesser soldiers of the legion.

It was during this war that Velldune would come to know the Lich King's momentary displeasure, as command of the overall armies was given to anouther of his favored; a Hand of the King, Lord Vahled who assumed overall command over the defenses. Velldune was ordered forward into the tide of demons to stake out a more solid battleline.

Repeated attacks marked the bulk of the war as the legion fought to claim other footholds across Northrend, but the focus was always upon the Lich King. On the fourty-first day, the dreadlord Makathra appeared at the head of his army, calling a great challenge forth to the Scourge, challenging their greatest knights to go against his mightiest Fel Lords. Dozens of knights fell in battle, and many fel lords did in kind. In the end Lord Vahled sent Velldune forward. The Scourgelord did not challenge a fel lord, and instead ordered all scourge forces to surge forward at command of his King. In a decisive battle amidst the swirling chaos, Scourgelord Velldune defeated the dreadlord by commanding abominations to bind him with chains and he rammed his runeblade through the dreadlords chest, drawing his essence out and casting him back into the twisting nether. The break in leadership, finally allowing a moment of disorder from the legion voidships, allowed the frostwyrms to swoop in and destroy them, breaking the legion assault upon Icecrown.

For the remainder of the Legion War, Velldune would fall under the overall command of Hand Vahled, and charged with the fortification of Scourge Armies alongside Scourgelords Chaucina; Warden of the Necromancers, and Motivid the Plaguelord. He would be tasked with drawing out the Legion remnants who encroached upon the fallen kingdom of Zul'drak, gifted with the Necropolis Haramas. With methodical precision, the Scourgelord drew out the demons and crushed them. The campaign would be marked with gradual bouts of infighting with his fellow knights until Velldune and Chaucina were recalled to the Cathedral of Darkness and charged to commune with their King directly. After this, Velldune alone would head up the shoring up of Zul'drak, and afterward would remain there, keeping parts of it under his protection, taking parts of the Scourged realm as a feif to watch over as the lord he never was in life.

Personality and traits
''"Though we both have died, the tomb of the noble is greater then the grave of the peasant. In death we are not equals." - Scourgelord Velldune''

Richard is distant, prideful, and confident in his service to the Lich King and acts as a knight would in service to his lord. In death his emotions are deadened but he maintains several habits he possessed in life in some form, even if most of his former life is fragmented in his memory. He thus possesses a twisted semblance of honor, seeking to separate the weak from the strong and elevating them to new levels. He has an intense hatred for traitors and utter contempt for the cowardly, he is willing to work together with former enemies to accomplish a greater goal, and will not turn on them once the task at hand is complete. In addition, while in Icecrown he feels compelled to attend the Cathedral of Darkness on Sundays for reasons he cannot place.

Richard follows the Code of Chivallry, but warped and twisted to dark means:

To fear the Lich King and maintain His rule

To serve the liege lord in valour and faith

To protect the scourge

To give succour to the dead and the dying

To refrain from meaningless overthinking

To live by honour and for glory of the Lich King

To strive only for Eternal Reward

To fight for the welfare of the Scourge

To obey the Lich King and his chosen Liches

To guard the honour of fellow knights

To bring the justice of the grave.

To keep faith with the Luch King

At all times to speak the truth of the Lich King

To persevere to the end in any enterprise begun

To respect the honour of the dead

Never to refuse a challenge from an equal

Never to turn the back upon a foe

He expects much of his students but gives much to those under his guide. Commanding extensive prowess in the unholy, his skill in raising the dead is equaled only by his martial skill. He drills his students to incorporate magic into their techniques, for simple fighting is for mortals, true greatness comes from an agile mind and a talent for exploiting the weaknesses opened up by the magic of decay.

Equipment
Knightly Tools: Velldune carries various items about his person. A vicious looking dagger dipped in the blight of Putricide's labs, pouches containing bone power and pieces of slain favored students, and rune scrolls for necromantic rituals for the raising of powerful undead.

Frostguard: Most prominent is the runeblade carried upon his person at all times. Given to him by the Lich Zhekkan Gravecaller, It glows with the same witchlight contained in his armor. As a weapon of a second generation knight, it contains his soul, and glows with dim green light when held in his hand. Reworked and inscribed with powerful necromantic runes, this blade wails with each swing, it's constant motion in combat producing a ghostly chorus as trapped souls cry out.

Armor of the Gravecaller: This artificer set of runic battleplate glows from within with a pale green witchlight. The Saronite armor is inscribed with runes of death and decay, such that magic fizzles about the wearer and decay infects that which strikes it. Undead near the wearer would feel a compulsion to look upon the wearer. Welding seams in key locations would indicate that Velldune is sealed inside his armor. About the gorget beneath his helmet, written in the language of death is the name 'Zhekkan'.

Deathshroud Cloak: A growing occurrence among death knights who have earned favor from Warmaster Frostheart, These fur cloaks are taken from beasts as proof of kills and beguiled by necromancy to hide the Death Knight from the presence of the Light. Velldune's cloak is woven with Bloodfibers, crafted by the Darkfallen and styled in regal fashion.