They heard the rumours about him. The sylvari who managed to almost single-handedly defeat Mordremoth within days of the Fleet crashing in the Maguuma Jungle. Dragonkiller, Godslayer...
The Commander who steals souls.
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Or me just trying to sketch away. Thorn my beloved. Soulless expressions rly don't fit him
vvvvvvvvv If you're like "wtf you mean stealing souls vvvvvvvvv
So this is an AU where Akura was never saved/managed to escape from the Nightmare Court, but instead of fully converting to the Nightmare, something else happened and he became a sort of vampiric entity who leeches nutrients and magic from his surroundings. Has control over vines/plant life/etc, but imo so far I have not connected it to Mordremoth's influence and I'm not sure I will? Undecided and unexplored as of yet.
(Fantasy magic was kept underground for too long torture yaddy yadda)
Leaning towards his name being simply Thorn in this AU, it kinda fits. Instead of him being Aurene's guardian/parent as Commander is in canon, it's Eiladhur this time. I jumbled a lot of the timeline to make it fit. Aurene is instead scared of Thornkura, because, well, something is really really wrong. He's not a bad person, but he's been doing some Nightmare court "cleanup" over the years before Eiladhur managed to kill him. ("Kill him?? Huh?? But he's alive, right?" well, yeah. It's complicated, but really isn't)
And as to the "souls" part, that's where the vampire part comes in too. Basically he can condense someone's magic/soul/blood(?) and take it out of their body and consume it. Makes it a little ball of dense magic, very nutritious. It's kinda like tanking an adrenaline injection to the heart for him tho so he doesn't do it often. He could get addicted.
Scariest about it is probably the fact his victims do not feel pain or fear during the extraction, but instead immense joy and pleasure. So imagine this guy hovering his hand above someone else who is writhing and smiling and sighing before they drop like a sack of potatoes. Yeah.
