The Mercaerin: Origins Revealed?
 

Elex May

UP: Pacific

    My name is Elex May, a War Paladin of Honor. I've served a long time, and fought through the first great battles of our war with Minax, but I am shocked the deepest now. Stuck in Trammel on official duty, I was unaware of the extent of the damage that this Order of Mercaerin has been causing. I was told, in the Great Horns Tavern, that several murderers were stirring things up. I thought nothing of it, until the names Lothair Maltus and Zar'el Darkan were mentioned.

Lothair Maltus and Zar'el Darkan, I'm sad to say, were Paladins. Good ones, too. In fact, it has been disputed that the two of them were the best warriors we ever had. Their skill was legendary. Lothair was a master of combat, and could enter a sort of controlled berserker rage, if that can be understood. Zar'el was a cool, calculating man, and almost never missed a strike.

About a year before the arrival of Minax, the two of them were selected to lead an expedition into the Lost Lands and mount an attack against the Terathans within their Keep. Of course, they did this without qualm. I didn't have much time to think on it, as I was deep in study at the time, but rumors flew of them being dead when the target date for their arrival passed. A week after they were expected home, they returned. They were bloodied, and I hear near death, but alive. The entire strike team that accompanied them died. I cannot begin to imagine what happened to them in the Lost Lands, though I often wonder.

Lothair and Zar�el became more secretive after this, though neither was very talkative in the first place. I never saw them regularly, but just before the Minax invaded they seemed to be more active and visible. I had been transferred to Vesper, and fought there, though the tales of their valor in defending Trinsic are still told. Whatever experience they faced, it improved their already legendary skill.

Soon after the recapture of Trinsic was accomplished, they simply vanished. No one knew what happened, or where they went, but their quarters were empty one morning, and they were never to be seen again. Or so we thought.

News of their return has sent me into deep thought. It is unlikely that a Paladin should ever fall, especially as far as they have...but for some reason it has happened. I urge everyone to stay away from where they have been known to strike � or, at the least, to come heavily armed. From the reports I have heard, their skills have not dwindled in the slightest since the year of their disappearance.

Honor protect and guide thy path,