The Blood of Vol
Faith Profile: Non-Theistic / Mystical–Individualist
Symbol: A tear-shaped red gemstone or shard of glass
Priestly Vestments: Robes of red and black
Dominant In: Karrnath and the Lhazaar Principalities; congregations in major cosmopolitan centres across Khorvaire
Liturgical Calendar Reckoning: FH (Fall of the House), counting from the destruction of House Vol
"Death is the end. Dolurrh is oblivion. If the Sovereigns exist, they are cruel. Stand with those you care for — all we have is this life and each other." — Core teaching of the Blood of Vol
The Blood of Vol is one of the oldest faiths indigenous to Khorvaire — not imported from Aerenal or Sarlona, but born here, in the hard soil of the eastern coastlands, among people who had been failed by distant institutions and empty promises. Its followers call themselves Seekers of the Divinity Within, and the name is apt: theirs is a faith that looks inward.
The central conviction of every Seeker is simple and unsparing. Death is not a passage. Dolurrh is not a gateway to some mysterious beyond — it is oblivion, a grey nothing where the soul dissolves and is gone. If the Sovereigns exist, they designed this fate and did nothing to prevent it. Against this bleak cosmology, the Blood of Vol offers a defiant answer: every mortal carries within their blood a spark of divine potential. The work of a Seeker's life is to find it, cultivate it, and if the faith's most ambitious hopes are realised, to transcend the death that robs every soul of its chance at divinity.
This is not a comfortable faith. It does not offer the reassurance of an afterlife. What it offers instead is community, honesty, and the radical insistence that your life — this life, right now — is the only sacred thing you have. To waste it in servitude to indifferent gods is the worst heresy a Seeker can imagine.
The Blood of Vol is a grim faith, but it is not an evil one. The perception that Seekers love death, want to become undead, or serve a lich queen is — for the vast majority of ordinary Seekers — simply false. They hate death. They hate it more than any other faith in Khorvaire. Necromancy exists in Seeker practice precisely because death is the enemy, and the enemies of the enemy become tools.
"Look not to the skies, nor to the depths below, nor even to the distant past or future. Seek the divine within, for the blood is the life, and in its call can be heard the promise of life eternal. One has but to listen." — Creed of the Blood of Vol
Origins
The Blood of Vol takes its name from a noble house — the line of Vol — that was destroyed in a catastrophe so ancient that its details have passed into myth. The faith reckons its liturgical calendar from the year of that destruction, noted as FH (Fall of the House); in 998 YK, the Galifar calendar corresponds to 2398 FH, though most Seekers use this reckoning only within the faith.
What is known, or at least widely believed among the Seekers themselves: the house of Vol was an Aereni family of great power, destroyed by jealous forces who feared what it had become. Elven exiles who had supported the family but survived the purge were driven from Aerenal. Many settled in what are now the Lhazaar Principalities and drifted west into the lands that would become Karrnath.
These exiles brought necromantic knowledge and stories of how the heroic family of Vol had reached for godhood and been destroyed for it. The people of the eastern coastlands knew nothing of Aereni high politics — but they recognised the story. They blended it with their own experience of harsh winters, grinding poverty, and priests who promised divine favour that never materialised. And in doing so, they discovered something real. It was not the line of Vol that found the divinity within — it was these first priests, human and elf together, who drew genuine divine power from their own conviction and their own souls.
The true details of the Vol family's fall — what they had become, who destroyed them and why, and whether any scion of the house survived — are the subject of considerable scholarly debate, whispered rumour, and deliberate concealment. Most Seekers have never heard the full story and do not need it. The faith stands on its own.
From a Seeker catechism, eastern Karrnath:
"Who was Vol?" "A house that burned." "Why did it burn?" "Because the powerful feared what it had found." "What had it found?" "That is what we are still looking for."
Core Doctrine
Seekers are diverse in their specific beliefs. There is no centralised creed enforced from above. What unites them is a shared set of convictions:
Death is oblivion. Dolurrh does not lead to the Sovereigns or to rest — it leads to nothing. Some of the most powerful figures in the faith claim to have descended into Dolurrh and returned, and their testimony describes a vast, grey emptiness — no sovereigns, no welcome, no light.
Blood is life. Blood is the vessel of the soul, the carrier of the divine spark. Creatures without blood — constructs, oozes, undead — are removed from true divinity. The key to unlocking the divinity within lies in understanding and honouring the blood.
The divine is within, not without. The gods, if they exist, designed a universe in which every soul burns briefly and is extinguished. The only force capable of breaking that cycle is the divine potential already present in every mortal. When Seeker priests commune with something greater, they believe they are awakening a sliver of their own developing godhood.
Undeath is martyrdom, not aspiration. Seekers do not want to become undead. Undeath severs the soul from its divine potential — without blood, the spark cannot be held. Undead champions are viewed as martyrs who have sacrificed their own chance at divinity to protect and serve the living. They are honoured, even revered, but also pitied.
Corpses are not sacred. Once blood and soul are gone, what remains is simply matter. Most Seekers want their bodies put to use after death — as guardians, labourers, or soldiers — rather than left to rot.
Rites and Worship
The most important ritual is the Sacrament of Blood. Each month, practitioners gather to donate blood via an enchanted dagger known as a bloodfang. The blood is stored in preserving casks for use in rituals unique to the faith. During the ceremony, participants recite the creed. The abactor then delivers a speech — topics range from mundane community concerns to abstract theology — followed by communal discussion and a shared meal.
In some temples, donated blood is given to vampire champions, sustaining them in their martyrdom. Through this practice, the congregation literally feeds its martyrs, and the martyrs serve them in return.
The faith observes a single holiday: Revelation Day (13 Zarantyr). The Sacrament of Blood performed on this day involves the abactor purifying the blood, which is then passed back around the congregation to imbibe. Recipients often experience visions and waking dreams, which they are left to interpret themselves.
Soulflames — one for each member of the local congregation — are kept burning, bright and red, whenever the temple is in use.
The power of a cleric of the Blood of Vol comes from within them. Each chooses a unique holy symbol: an object with personal significance, not a standardised icon.
Hierarchy and Organisation
The Blood of Vol is not formally hierarchical. Local leadership rests with the abactor — the priest who oversees a specific temple or community. Much of this decentralisation is practical: until the ninth century and the invention of the lightning rail, rural Karrnathi Seeker communities had few ways to communicate. An abactor cannot force another into compliance through religious authority — they have only persuasion.
The exception is Atur, the City of Night — the most public stronghold of the faith, built on a massive Mabaran manifest zone. Expanded and fortified during the Last War, Atur houses the Atur Academy (the continent's premier school of necromancy) and the Crimson Monastery, an enormous pyramid of blood-red bricks that channels the zone's energies upward through its structure, concentrating the most potent forces into a shrine at its apex.
The current spiritual leader is Malevanor (also written Hass Malevanor), a mummy lord and high priest of the Crimson Monastery. His predecessor, the mummy Askalor, held the post for over four hundred years before transferring his power and undead existence to his apprentice when Malevanor was grievously injured during the Last War. Malevanor is publicly vocal in condemning the Order of the Emerald Claw.
Behind Malevanor are figures known as the Crimson Covenant: ancient undead champions who have guided and protected Seeker communities for centuries. The full extent of their influence is unknown to most ordinary Seekers.
Temples and Shrines
A shrine requires only an altar and a means to collect ritually shed blood without waste. Full temples are almost always stone — a dedicated altar room, a system for collecting and preserving blood, and vaults or catacombs designed to house undead or store remains. Temples are fortified, built as sanctuaries — stark and functional compared to the ornate chapels of the Silver Flame.
The Blood of Vol in Karrnath
No nation is more shaped by the Blood of Vol than Karrnath, and no relationship is more complicated. Before the Last War, fewer than one in ten Karrnathi citizens identified as Seekers. Then came famine, plague, and the early disasters of the war — and the Blood of Vol provided what the crown could not. Undead soldiers stemmed the tide of Thrane's advance. The Order of the Emerald Claw supplemented the elite forces. Under state sponsorship, numbers swelled.
Then Regent Moranna turned on the Seekers. Her publicity tour included public vampire executions — a brutal culling that revealed some nobility had secretly passed into unlife while continuing to rule. She blamed Seekers for the famines and plagues they had helped contain. Seeker nobles lost their lands. Chivalric orders were disbanded. Her 976 YK disclosures revealed that some abactors had manipulated Revelation Day ceremonies and that others had secretly reported to a hidden master.
Today, around three in ten Karrnathi citizens identify as Seekers — still substantial but declining. Open worship has been banned within Korth. The faith persists most visibly in Atur, in Fort Bones, in Fort Zombie, and in the rural east.
From the Voice of Breland:
"While we'd like to take the abactor at his word, our research shows that Malevanor was personally involved in the programme that produced the infamous Karrnathi undead soldiers. After decades of driving the Karrnathi war effort, this foul creature expects us to believe that he has nothing to do with the necromantic attacks on our people? Here at the Voice of Breland, we think something about this smells rotten, and it's not just the mummy."
Internal Movements and Heresies
The Cult of Life — exposed in Moranna's 976 YK disclosures. Its upper ranks pursued personal immortality through profane magic. Some mixed worship of the Divinity Within with the Dark Six or various Overlords. Branches persist across Khorvaire.
The Order of the Emerald Claw — originally an elite military force of devoted Seekers, now an outlawed extremist organisation employing necromantic terrorism. Most Seekers despise it. Its ultimate leader is the lich known as the Queen of the Dead. The Order is not representative of the faith.
The Keepers of Blood — a controversial sect revering both the principles of the Blood of Vol and the Dark Six god known as the Keeper. Some Seekers welcome them; others view them as heretics.
Thieves of Life — hermit necromancers determined to unlock their divinity within at any cost. They represent the faith's most solitary and morally ambiguous expression.
The Bloodsails of Farlnen
The Bloodsail Principality shares the same roots but has diverged significantly. Founded by Aereni exiles, the Bloodsails have remained closer to their elven ancestors' traditions. They do not believe in the divinity within and readily seek immortality through undeath — but the island can support only a finite number of vampires. Would-be immortals must pay velgys (blood money). Those who fail are bound to objects after death — often to the sails of ships, enabling vessels to move without wind.
The Blood of Dorn
A hybrid faith that emerged during the Last War, blending Vassal and Seeker practice. Soldiers who cut themselves before battle as offerings to Dol Dorn began incorporating Blood of Vol ritual. Despite the dubious historical claims involved, the faith has manifested genuine miracles. Its most vocal leader is Simon Vince, a khoravar veteran commanding a mercenary company through House Deneith's Blademarks Guild.
Relationship with Other Faiths
Sovereign Host — Seekers regard Vassal teachings as comfortable lies.
Church of the Silver Flame — acknowledged for discipline, but rejected for its dogma, persecution history, and insistence that divine power flows from something external.
Undying Court — viewed with complicated respect; proof that undeath can be meaningful. But the Aereni path is elitist and closed.
Dark Six and Cults of the Dragon Below — rejected outright as surrender to madness or alien hunger.
Path of Light — philosophically adjacent in its emphasis on inner discipline.
Common Sayings and Invocations
"As the blood is the power, and the blood flows through me — the power is mine."
"Death is the end. Dolurrh is oblivion. Stand with those you care for."
"Life is suffering and death is annihilation, but you can defy this cruel fate."
"Everyone has a spark of divinity. Find that power within."