Lord Hopebane


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Lord Hopebane

Birth and Early History

Lord Hopebane (born Patik Bane) is a principal villain of the Tides of Epic Conflict Saga. Little is known of his childhood, save that he was born in the Bay of Cream in the Sickle. He later claimed he was the child of two great Elemenstors of the prior generation, but future investigation found that both Elemenstors named were male, though one did have long hair and a "feminine face." It is believed that Patik Bane actually was the illicit, unacknowledged child of a minor lord of Cream and a servant, and as such spent much of his life working menial jobs around the great castle-city Teisti.

 

Bane made his first major appearance in court when the Duke of Hopea (later determined to be his biological father) was found dead, leaving his title and possessions to "the first man who can guess the number I was thinking of when I died." Though it is not recorded how, it seems Bane guessed correctly, and inherited the title, styling himself Lord Hopebane.

 

Rise to Power

The new Lord Hopebane retreated to his realm of Hopea, a small patch of land on the outer fringes of Cream territory containing little notable, except for Mont Skyfinger. On a hike though his new land (attempting to survey his new subjects for tax purposes) he came across a small enclave of Dark-Elemenstor hermits. He agreed to grant them tax-exempt status on the condition that they teach him the art of poison. After two years of training, Hopebane was a master of assassination.

 

A serendipitous trip to Bizarkule and a run in with Kettletrop Longerdunger secured Hopebane with the large untracable supply of just the right poison to enable him to begin to realize his ambitions.

 

He made a similar tax-exempt deal with the only other subject of note, Blacksmith Smithy Blackfinger of Skyfinger, who agreed to make for him several poison-tipped pens, daggers, and the like, as well as the now-famous Armor of Fullchesthood, which he immediately gave to his most-attractive servant, Lopae of Hopea.

 

With Lopae beside him, Hopebane returned to the court at Teisti, where he determined that he was the 27th person in line for the Throne of Cream--which, upon capturing, would have made him the most powerful man in Sickle. He began a whirlwind campaign of glad-handling and alliance-shifting, occasionally using Lopae's charms and a bit of poison to remove a rival from the scene.

 

Probably the most elegant of these seduction/poisonings was the death of Duke Amalgum. Since Lopae fell in love with the charming Duke, Lord Hopebane couldn't use his usual tactic of poisoning his adversary as Lopae would catch on. Instead he gave Lopae a "love potion" that would "make the Duke love Lopae forever." However it was a very rare poison derived from Epic Flu. The next day the Duke foolishly charged off to his doom to fight a group of bandits naked, bragging that he would "own them". While Lopae greived at this loss, Lord Hopebane hit her up on the rebound and strengthened his hold on her.

 

After several years of musical-chairs with the throne (and several dozen mysterious deaths), Hopebane was Grand Prince, with personal territory covering a third of the Sickle and with his influence in Teisti unmached. And now, after years of alliance-building yielding in a court bowing to him, he needed only to murder the Emperor of Cream to take the throne outright. Deciding poison would not send a message of strength suiting an overlord, Hopebane began preparing a coup d'etat in which he would formally execute the current monarch, The Hyacinth Emperor--a man he had personally selected the previous month for his incompetence, weakness and unpopularity, hoping these traits would make his reign look better in comparison. Before returning to Hopea to prepare for his final victory, Hopebane committed one last act of betrayal, sleeping with and then killing the now-useless Lopae, the one person who knew of his murders.

 

Fall of Hopebane

After Hondana, furniliar of Lady Arisa, handmaiden-in-waiting of Lady Ambivilia, saw Hopebane's latest murder and told the Lady, Ambivilia quickly realized Hopebane's sinister plans. On the night before Hopebane's departure, Lady Arisa seduced Hopebane and stole the Armor of Fullchesthood while he slept. She gave it to Ambivilia, who soon confronted Hopebane at Castle Hopea. After dealing with Hopebane's dumbstruck Dark Elemenstor guards, she indirectly caused the death of the Lord. During their battle, he managed to knock off a small piece of the Armor, granting him a deeper look at her cleavage. While staring at her, he walked into a pillar, knocking Hopebane's Bane off the wall, at which time it fell and killed him instantly. In a masterful turn of irony, Hopebane's Hope could have protected him from both mind numbing cleavage and head injury, if it had not been stored in a box in the basement of his keep at the time.

 

Unfortunately, though Hopebane's dark hopes had been banished, Ambivilia's heroic actions resulted in the survival of The Hyacinth Emperor, resulting in the disastrous Pax Hyacinth.

 

After-death

 

A long time after his death, King Basarack the Rich took his remains, had the ground into powder, mixed into mortar, and had a small hut built out of it. Then had the house banished to one of the nastiest planes.

 

Not for any particular reason. Just because he could.