07/26/2025
The Students of Life and Death, the Gaping Maw of Sound, the Wild Bunch, and the Belligerents, the four founding groups of the Listeners organization out of Queen's Meet, met together in Wilder to witness and participate in the election of the new leader of the Kindred Isle
After all four candidates, Shaka, Quillium, Famina, and Havyn had a chance to talk about their hopes and dreams for the isle, a vote took place in which Quillium was able to gain the vast majority of votes based on his desire to save the Kindred Isle from the rot.
However, before Quillium could be crowned, Doxx the Dire returned to the Kindred Isle after two long years away, a time which the groups later learned had been orchestrated by Famina in an effort to rid the Kindred of his violence by transforming him into a elderly man and hiding him away on an island.
Doxx challenged Quillium to a fight for leadership of the isle, which the Kindred seemed to get behind. Quillium was allowed to choose two champions in his stead, so Frog and Tricks volunteered to stand as his champions.
The fight was hard fought but Tricks and Frog were able to come out victorious, and Otho of the Students convinced the assembled to allow him to burn Doxx alive in a ritual sacrifice to some dark power.
Rusty attempted to help Doxx during the fight, but only to the degree that everyone would assume he wasn't attempting to save his old friend.
After Doxx's death, the Students of Life and Death presented Quillium with the Crown of the Kindred, but atop a being of such little power, it did little to push back the rot. Therefore, the assembled would need to travel to Torn's Rest to destroy the rot once and for all.
On the trip to Torn's Rest, Quillium asked about the Listeners and their various achievements throughout their time as protectors of Vault, and each member gave an account of something they were proud of.
Upon arriving at Torn's Rest, Quillium was able to use the Crown to form a path across the Untroubled Waters straight to the tower that had landed in the Kindred Isle some time earlier that year.
The Listeners crossed to the tower and entered, each group being whisked away to a space where the champions of Bane awaited: a rot monster formed from corrupting Moon Pools across the isle, the deer kindred from Heron's Harbor Dreya, the brother of Doxx, Traxxus, and one of the avatars of Bane, Neverending.
Each of these champions was destroyed by the Listeners.
Back together in the tower, the Listeners were approached by Raithe, who had accepted the power of Bane to become one of his avatars a couple weeks earlier.
Raithe kept his mind, however, as he claimed he'd siphoned much of Bane's power away and gave himself up to be destroyed in order to dissipate that power and give the Listeners a chance to destroy Bane.
The groups all tried to destroy Raithe before Bane took his power back, with the exception of Hukbi, who refused to attack. The final blow was given by Flapjack, who apologized to his very old friend, though they both understood what needed to be done.
With Raithe destroyed and Bane weakened, the Listeners descended to the tomb of Torn crushed below the tower. The tomb had been smashed down into a lower chamber below the Untroubled Waters where Bane also had a resting place.
The groups fought against the different aspects of Bane, and were able to destroy his remnants.
With Bane and all of his champions and avatars dead, the rot receded and was destroyed as well, freeing the Kindred Isle and all of Vault of its influence.
The Listeners celebrated together outside the tower and watched the sun set on a new day for the Kindred and their new King.
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