Last Bastion: Reincarnated Prince of Stormwatch

"Once, we sang to the stars. Now, we poison your towers with root and thorn."

—Vaeryss, before the Verdant Blightmarch

Location: The Deadgrove – Heart of the Withered Bloom

There was no birdsong in the Deadgrove.

The trees bled sap the color of wine. Bark split and gnarled like twisted mouths mid-scream. And where sunlight once poured, only ashen petals now fell—dried blossoms that crumbled to dust when touched.

Amidst a rotting throne of blackened roots, she sat:

Vaeryss, once Queen of the Verdant Circle, now ruler of Blackthorn Elves—a people unrecognizable from their ancestors.

Her skin was pale bark. Her eyes, hollow sockets blooming with green flame. Where her voice once summoned rain and sky, it now summoned rot.

Before her knelt three warden-priests.

"Stormwatch rings again," they whispered.

POV – Vaeryss the Hollow-Bloomed

You planted your towers into the soil like they were seeds of order.

But the forest remembers.

The Choir did not only desecrate stone and sky. They planted roots where roots did not belong—tuned the earth's frequency to their bells, silencing rivers, confusing the bloom-cycle, muting the voices of ancestral groves.

The elves fought. They pleaded.

But the bells sang louder.

"They made war in sound," Vaeryss rasped. "Now we make war in silence."

Flashback – The Day the Choir Silenced the Verdant Circle

She remembered the bells clearly.

Seven of them, tuned to purge "magical interference" in the southern range.

They rang in perfect sequence.

The Ley-Tree groaned. Birds fled. The rivers froze midstream.

And then the forest—her forest—began to scream.

Thousands of elves fell, not by sword, but by resonant collapse. Their soul-roots severed. Magic turned against them.

"That day, I buried a forest," she whispered, voice trembling with rage. "Today, I bury a kingdom."

Location: Council of Thorns – Blackthorn Command

Vaeryss stood before her Circle of Nine—elders turned into rootbound abominations.

Each bore a crown of blooming rot. Each one a survivor of Choir devastation.

They had grown patient over the decades. Dormant. But now, Stormwatch stirred again.

And the bells dared sing.

"We join the Dusk Covenant," Vaeryss declared.

Gasps escaped bark-choked mouths.

"Even with the orcs?" one asked, barely holding back venom.

Vaeryss' expression did not change.

"Even with the goblins. Even with the dead. Even with traitors of bark and branch."

"Because the Choir rises. And where it rises, the forest dies."

Tactical Overview – The Elven March

The Blackthorn Elves would not march with legions.

They would spread.

Creeping rootlines to sap the foundation stones beneath towers.

Thornblight spores carried by wind and crow.

Soul-thorn rangers—archers whose arrows sang dissonance into Choir spells.

Forest wraiths hidden in corrupted bloomfields, waiting to flay any who dare wander beyond tower walls.

Vaeryss did not believe in grand sieges.

She believed in unseen death—slow, patient, irreversible.

System Broadcast: Choir Relay Interference Detected

[WARNING – NORTHERN NODE SABOTAGE UNDERWAY]

Source: Blackthorn Grove

Identified Leader: Queen Vaeryss the Hollow-Bloomed – Class S Entity

Effect: Choir signal degradation in 5-mile radius

Bell Node 4 (Narrowmere Outpost): Risk of complete signal loss

Location: Stormwatch – Choir Signal Monitoring Tower

Rain stared at the monitor.

"Signal decay is accelerating in the northern node. Narrowmere is already silent."

Jag leaned over her shoulder. "Silent as in jammed?"

"No," Rain said softly. "Silent as in consumed."

She handed him a dried black petal retrieved from a fallen scout's armor.

It turned to dust between his fingers.

"The elves are not reclaiming the forest," Rain said. "They're weaponizing it."

Jag's jaw tightened. "What's our countermeasure?"

Rain hesitated. "None. The Choir doesn't resonate well through wildroot fields."

Jag closed his eyes.

They're not even fighting us head-on. They're erasing us.

Cut Back to Vaeryss – Near the Northern Outpost Ruins

She stood before a dead human tower.

The Choir Bell had collapsed inward—its metal warped by root pressure. Inside, Choir Scribes lay dissolved in pools of amber sap.

She approached a dying soldier, barely breathing.

He reached up.

"Mercy… please…"

Vaeryss leaned close.

"Your kind never gave it."

Then she kissed his forehead—thorns blooming from his skull as his eyes turned to bark.