Norvrandt

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One of those reflections─the one nearest to the Source─is our home. And we were the heroes blessed with Her Light. But not all worlds hold Light and Dark in equal measure. In ours, the power of Light was greater by far. So the Ascians who once threatened our home were no match, and they fell before us, one after another, till none were left. Victory, we thought...

...And then came the Light─a flood of pure, blinding radiance, annihilating shadow and color and life itself. Ere long, it will consume our world, leaving naught in its wake but blank perfection.

Ardbert

Norvrandt [ˈnɔːrv.rænt] is the main setting of Final Fantasy XIV: Shadowbringers. It is a region of the First, one of thirteen reflections of Source that was created when the goddess Hydaelyn banished the dark god Zodiark, and roughly analogous to Hydaelyn's Eorzea.

Profile

By the time of Shadowbringers, Norvrandt is the only region of the First that has not succumbed to the Flood of Light that has consumed the rest of the world, and is bathed in perpetual daylight.

While Norvrandt at its base is a perfect reflection of Eorzea from the time the worlds split, millennia have passed in the time since. This has resulted in drastic differences in the worlds' histories and geology. Nearly everything familiar between the two worlds goes by a different name, cities appear where there were none in the other world and vice versa. Additionally, time runs at a different frequency on the First than the Source, with over 100 years passing between the time that Ardbert visited the Source and the Warrior sub-sequentially visiting the First.

Geography

The regions of Norvrandt are analogous to the geography of Eorzea:

• Eulmore to Limsa Lominsa
• The Crystarium to the Crystal Tower
• The Rak'tika Greatwood to the Black Shroud
• Amh Araeng to Thanalan
• Kholusia to Vylbrand
• Il Mheg to Coerthas
• Lakeland to Mor Dhona
• The Tempest to the Rhotano Sea
• The Divide to the Strait of Merithor

The familiar races of Eorzea also appear in Norvrandt, but their cultures have diverged drastically to the point of being alien, and they are known by different names:

• Hyur to Hume (ヒュム, Hyumu?)
• Miqo'te to Mystel (ミステル, Misuteru?)
• Elezen to elf (エルフ, Erufu?)
• Roegadyn to Galdjent (ガルジェント, Garujento?)
• Au Ra to Drahn (ドラン, Doran?)
• Lalafell to dwarf (ドワーフ, Dowāfu?)
• Hrothgar to Ronso (ロンゾ, Ronzo?)
• Viera to Viis (ヴィース, Vīsu?)
• Amalj'aa to Zun (ズン, Zun?)
• Sahagin to Ondo (オンド, Ondo?)
• Kobold to Mord (モルド, Morudo?)
• Goblin to hobgoblin (ホブゴブリン, Hobugoburin?)
• Qiqirn to Qitari (キタリ, Kitari?)

Some characters from Eorzea have counterparts in Norvrandt:

• The Warrior of Light to Ardbert
• Brendt/Brennan/Bremondt to Traveling Merchant
• Gerolt Blackthorn to Grenoldt
• Rowena to Mowen
• Wandering Minstrel to Minstreling Wanderer

History

Migrations and ancient history

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The Shadowkeeper's campaign and Warriors of Light

The Shadowkeeper was a being that came to power within Lakeland, ancestral home of the elves, after seizing power during a conservative bid to return to the power balance of old where elves ruled over Norvrandt. The distrust of the elves toward other races, including the Humes whom they were allied with, made the shift of power easy, enabling the Ascians to use them to their advantage in the tip toward Light. The Shadowkeeper was introduced by the Ascians, secretly an elf from the void, who had survived the destruction of her world once it fell to a Flood of Darkness.

Meanwhile, a young Hume adventurer, named Ardbert Hylfyst began to journey at 18, joining the Eulmoran adventurer's guild, meeting the dwarf Lamitt, who saved him from a hobgoblin ambush. Adventuring together, the pair met the Galdjent knight Branden and the Mystel hunter Renda-Rae, eventually falling in with the elven swordwswoman Cylvia when they were hired by a noble lady's parents to locate her after having escaped from home to elope with her sweetheart. The party eventually discovered the lady dead at the hands of her sweetheart who had turned into a warg, as part of the Shadowkeeper's machinations. The party eventually met the mage Nyelbert. Each member of the party eventually obtained a crystal of Light as they proceeded through their adventurers, leading them to their confrontation with the Shadowkeeper, who was revealed to be Cylvia, working for the Ascians. After defeating her and her minions, Ardbert and his party spared her life, and confronted the Ascians Mitron and Loghrif. Harnessing a Blade of Light, the Warriors of Light slew Loghrif and harmed Mitron, causing the Ascian to transform into Eden, the first "sin eater", a being suffused with Light aspected aether. From within Eden, light poured out, causing a Flood of Light.

The Flood

As the Flood began to consume the world, Ardbert and his team were approached by the Ascian Elidibus who presented them with the opportunity to save the souls of all the peoples in the realm: infusing everyone's aether into the Source, rather than allowing their souls to become stagnant in another void. The Warriors were made to kill themselves so that their souls could be transported towards the Source to incite a Calamity of Light in order to initiate this rejoining. As they travelled to the Source, where time at the current passed quicker, they called themselves Warriors of Darkness and began to work with Elidibus and the Scion turncoat Urianger to attempt to rile "beastmen" races to bring about the Calamity. However once they confronted the Warrior of Light and their Scion compatriots, Urianger revealed his complicity in their schemes was a ruse to cause the intervention of the Mother Crystal, who used Minfilia Warde as Her voice, sending her and the spirits of the Warriors of Darkness back towards the First, where Norvrandt was about to be consumed by the Flood of Light.

Eternal light

Due to the actions of Minfilia Warde, who became known as the Oracle of Light, Norvrandt was the only region in the First not consumed by the Flood of Light. As the Flood consumed nine tenths of the First, and in a bid to prevent the loss of the another shard, the Mother Crystal acted through Minfilia and halted the Flood along with the spirits of the First's Warriors of Light, save Ardbert. Although Norvrandt survived the Flood, for the next century, it would constantly be harassed by sin eaters, mindless creatures created through the Light, acting out of their basic instincts. The people of Norvrandt lived in constant fear of being attacked by sin eaters and becoming sin eaters themselves. This fear led to anger towards Ardbert and his companions for causing the Flood and allowing this misery. Over time, legends of the Warrior of Darkness would keep the people's spirits up.

Around the time as the Flood was stopped, the Crystal Tower suddenly appeared in Lakeland, transported from an alternate future of the Source by the Crystal Exarch, who used the tower as a base to protect people from the Flood and the sin eaters that accosted them, eventually founding the Crystarium.

Eulmore mantained and lead the offensive against the Sin Eaters, finding the reincarnations of the Oracle of Light, allying with the Crystarium.

However, the Ascian Emet-Selch created a new plan to stabilize the realm to prepare it for the rejoining with a Calamity on the Source. He manipulated the mayor of Eulmore to let his unborn child be influenced with the power of a sin eater, with promises that through this child his rule over Eulmore, and the remainder of the world, would be absolute. This child was known as Vauthry, who was able to control other sin eaters. After eventually gaining the title of mayor, Vauthry would lure people into Eulmore to let them live in bliss before the inevitable end of Norvrandt by the Light, promising safety from the corruption while feeding those in the slum area outside of Eulmore a type of hand food called Meol, which contained the flesh of those who succumbed to Light within the city for one reason or another and became sin eaters. Eulmore was a heaven for some, but a hell for others that were pushed into a servitude class for an ever stagnant and vapid citizen class. Promises of citizenship and safety could easily be ripped out from under the serving class before they were cast out of the city, sometimes directly into sea.

Vauthry's rule was challenged when the Crystal Exarch began his attempts to summon the Warrior of Light from the Source. The Crystarium accepted those cast out from Eulmore and trained them in defense and culling of the sin eaters. This caused a cold tension between Eulmore and the Crystarium, as Vauthry used the masses of sin eaters lurking the corners of the shard to coax people to the shanty town outside of Eulmore desperate for sanctuary. During this time, the Exarch raised the Viis Lyna, an orphan from the ever constant war against the sin eaters. From the Crystal Tower, the Exarch used the special magick Call to reach out into the Source, intending to summon the Warrior of Light to combat the Light in the First. However, his first attempts managed to summon a number of Scions of the Seventh Dawn to the First instead, each taking years of preparation that felt and seemed like they were only hours apart on the Source: Thancred Waters, Y'shtola Rhul, Urianger Augurelt, Alphinaud and Alisaie Leveilleur. He only summoned their souls, as their corporeal bodies remained in the Source. In his final attempt he summoned the Warrior of Light to the First, providing the souls of the Scions access to return home with their memories and aether carried within crystal.

Jet-black villains

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