Auberon

This page contains spoilers for the following products: Tower of the Drowned Dead.
You can disable this banner in your personal preferences.

Auberon

(Person)

Aliases

The Drowned

Alignment

Neutral evil

Ancestry/Species

Pureblooded Azlanti human lich

Class

Wizard (spell sage) 16

Gender

Male

Homeland

Alabaster Trident, Azlant

Organization

Spindle Solution

Images of Auberon

Source: Tower of the Drowned Dead, pg(s). 58f.

The lich Auberon the Drowned lives on one of the small islands that are all that remain of the ancient continent of Azlant. A wizard of considerable power, he is one of the few remaining creatures that can claim to have actually lived in that first human empire on Golarion, although his breathing days passed over 10,000 years ago. He is the master of the Alabaster Trident, a large Azlanti prophecy hall built around the entrance to the Omen Dominion, a timeless demiplane where prophecy is enhanced, and has long been conducting a genocide against the aquatic races whom he blames for having destroyed his nation.

Appearance

In life, Auberon was a handsome, imposing Azlanti man with long black hair and a severe widow's peak. As a lich, he keeps his violet eyes, which now glow with a fire. He still wears magical jewellery and green-and-gold robes, the style favoured in old Azlant.

Background

Auberon was born in a wealthy family in the Azlanti city of Kalmeron, who provided him with the best magical education possible. The naturally intelligent and charismatic Auberon grew arrogant and domineering, leveraging his family's monetary and political wealth to acquire everything he desired, and becoming affiliated with elite organisations like the Spindle Solution. When Auberon visited the Alabaster Trident to receive a prophecy on his family's behalf, he decided to take it over for himself, all but ignoring the prophecy: he would ride the tower into the sea and burn within it for thousands of years.

Due to Auberon's influence and wealth, no one contested his claim. He simply moved into the tower and started renovating it, dismissing or getting rid of those who refused his ownership. Auberon reconfigured the laboratories for his personal research, plundered anything he found useful in the vaults, and installed eldritch mechanisms to enhance his necromantic studies. Auberon left the Omen Dominion untouched, unwilling to endanger it, only taking over a lodge within it.

Auberon remained affiliated with the Spindle Solution, but his goals (which involved eradicating humanity's enemies) did not align with those of the organisation (which concerned itself with improving humanity's condition). He was one of the few people who knew that the so-called 'veiled masters' did exist, and sought to punish them and their minions. When Earthfall was coming, Auberon deemed the cataclysm inevitable and did not try to avert it, becoming obsessed with placing blame. Knowing that he needed to survive Earthfall to exact his revenge but unwilling to leave the Alabaster Trident, Auberon transformed himself into a lich, and warded his phylactery against detection magic. Earthfall sank most of the tower underwater except for the topmost tines and the Omen Dominion, but Auberon's magic kept it intact.

Following Earthfall, Auberon became more determined to punish the instigators of Earthfall and started to believed that the merfolk and aquatic elves were also responsible in addition to the veiled masters. Entire communities were destroyed, with the survivors being turned into Auberon's undead servants.

In 4717 AR, the veiled master Ochymua, after being released from stasis, learnt of Auberon and surmised that it could learn of the location of the Compass, the Spindle Solution's secret base, from him. It sent the alghollthu master Uluuthan for this purpose, but Auberon killed Uluuthan and reanimated it as a nosferatu.

Ochymua then took the matter into its own hands and disguised itself as a human wishing to become Auberon's apprentice. Auberon fell for the ruse and eventually granted his 'apprentice' a lodge in the Omen Dominion. From the Omen Dominion, Ochymua acquired the location of the Compass and stole Auberon's phylactery before fleeing. Upon learning that he had been tricked, Auberon was enraged and ashamed, recalled his most powerful minions, and locked himself within the Alabaster Trident, unable to locate his phylactery.

Associates

In addition to shadows and zombie minions, Auberon employs a scrag clan who lives in the upper levels of the Alabaster Trident, and several cyclopes who serve as his personal prophets in the Omen Dominion. His most prized clockwork invention is Xochatli, an intelligent, improved version of the clockwork nautiloid with the soul of a kraken bound inside it. After Earthfall, Xochatli once patrolled the seas around shattered Azlant according to Auberon's last orders until he recalled it to his side after Ochymua deceived him.

References

For additional as-yet unincorporated sources about this subject, see the Meta page.