Ladranix

Ladranix was the leader of the Shel'na Kryhas, a protoss faction stranded on Aiur.

Ladranix wore battered golden armor and fought with psionic blades. He was capable of incredible feats of jumping.

Ladranix considered the Dark Templar to be a dark and shameful secret.

Biography

Following the destruction of Aiur by the zerg^[1], the protoss fled through the world's sole remaining warp gate to the Dark Templar sanctuary of Shakuras.^[2]

Ladranix, along with warriors Fenix and Jim Raynor, personally defended the gate from the zerg. However, some zerg followed the protoss to Shakuras, necessitating the closure of the gate. The remaining protoss scattered, eventually congregating in the old cities, forming a new faction, the Shel'na Kryhas ("Those Who Endure"). Ladranix became their leader.

However, the feelings of abandonment reopened a racial wound among some protoss, causing them to behave like their ancestors during the Aeon of Strife. Alzadar, a fellow Templar and friend of Ladranix, joined the growing movement, which was led by Felanis, whom Ladranix believed was acting strangely. The movement became known as Tal'darim ("the Forged"). Felanis insulted Ladranix for clinging to the old traditions, then took his followers and departed. The Shel'na Kryhas do not believe in conflict between protoss, and did not interfere.

The Tal'darim settled into a vast cavern underneath Aiur, and it became evident to Ladranix that the Tal'darim were losing fewer followers to the zerg (no corpses of zerg were found near the caverns). Ladranix refused to consider joining the Tal'darim in the caverns, which the former Conclave had declared off limits. The Shel'na Kryhas continued to lose members, until they had very few Templar left. Some members of the Shel'na Kryhas defected to join the Tal'darim (Ladranix believed this was due to the safety the Tal'darim enjoyed).

Preservation

Ladranix encountered a pair of terrans who had arrived on Aiur, several years after the warp gate had been disabled; Jake Ramsey, an archaeologist, and Rosemary Dahl, a mercenary. Ramsey carried within his head something which awed Ladranix; Zamara, the spirit of a preserver.

The pair, whose ship had crashed and was damaged beyond repair, were being attacked by the zerg until Ladranix and his small force rescued them. They took weapons and other supplies from the terrans but thanked them; they would offer food and water in return.

Ladranix, Ramsey and Zamara discussed the situation on Aiur and pressed Zamara to know the reason she had come to Aiur. Zamara needed to enter the very caverns inhabited by the Tal'darim in order to acquire an extremely pure khaydarin crystal. Ladranix was reluctant to fight the Tal'darim, who would guard the caverns; not only did protoss not kill each other (in order to prevent a return to the Aeon of Strife) but also because he believed the Tal'darim had lost fewer members to the zerg and thus outnumbered the Shel'na Kryhas.

The group agreed to send the stealthy Rosemary Dahl into the caverns, protected by a mental screen. However, she was captured and tortured with drugs by Alzadar in an attempt to lure Jake Ramsey (and, more importantly, the preserver within his head) to the Tal'darim; their master, the Xava'tor, desired preservers. The plot didn't work; Dahl admitted her experiences to Ramsey. Zamara discovered form Dahl's memories that the Tal'darim were the unwitting pawns of a powerful dark archon, Ulrezaj, who was transforming them into something like Dark Templar.

Dahl lured Alzadar to a meeting place. There, Ladranix and a force of Khalai Shel'na Kryhas ambushed Alzadar. Ladranix found it hard to fight his former friend, but used a leaping technique to knock him off balance long enough for the others to capture him.

Alzadar was shocked to learn the truth about the Benefactor, and after his mind was restored, Alzadar planned to join an expedition against the Tal'darim. Zamara and Ramsey knew a secret pathway to the chamber which held the crystal; unfortunately this chamber was declared off limits by Ulrezaj on pain of death. A party of Shel'na Kryhas, accompanied by the two terrans and Alzadar, entered the caverns.

Within the chamber, the party discovered strange creatures hidden in vats, one of which lay directly underneath the massive pure crystal. Ladranix used his jumping abilities to reach the crystal and sever a piece for Zamara's use. Unfortunately, as the group headed to the surface, Alzadar accidentally triggered an alarm, causing the Tal'darim to fall upon them. Alzadar related the truth about the Xava'tor to the Tal'darim, and during the confusion Ladranix ordered half of the Shel'na Kryhas in the party to remain behind and assist Alzadar. The rest (including the two terrans) fled, intending to reactivate the warp gate and finally leave Aiur... only to be ambushed by zerg led by an intelligent infested terran.

The group received the surprise assistance of a small Terran Dominion task force, and headed to the warp gate, which had been damaged. Once there they fended off the zerg while Zamara and Dahl repaired the warp gate until Alzadar returned at the head of a force of former Tal'darim. Unfortunately, an enraged Ulrezaj himself appeared on the battlefield. All the forces in the area (Shel'na Kryhas, former Tal'darim, Ramsey, Dahl, Dominion and zerg) could not hold Ulrezaj back.

Ramsey, drawing upon memories of Adun, proposed a solution. The Tal'darim, being so similar to the Dark Templar, could create uncontrolled psionic storms. The Shel'na Kryhas could control the storms, using them to strike at Ulrezaj. The protoss arranged themselves in pairs and started the attack; many of them burned out, but their life energies fed the storm. When Ladranix and Alzadar personally contributed, the storm grew into a cocoon surrounding Ulrezaj. This gave Dahl and Ramsey (and therefore Zamara) enough time to repair the warp gate and escape. Ladranix died among the other sacrificed protoss, knowing he would never leave Aiur after all.

References

• Golden, Christie (November 27, 2007). StarCraft: The Dark Templar Saga #2: Shadow Hunters. Simon & Schuster (Pocket Star). ISBN 0-7434-7126-1.