The Ruins of Illsalin

The prophet and the gladiator

The official strategy guide says a withered shiliskin prophet named Jarzarrad appeared early in their recorded history, believed to have been made immortal by the Korlach, a mighty leviathan beneath Darkhollow’s great lake. He foretold that Jayan, chief general of the war chief Vogan, would betray him by spawning a child.

The Korlach swallowed Jayan whole and later belched him up on a deserted beach to the west. Inside its hollow stomach Jayan had spawned a young shiliskin named Illsalin.

Illsalin grew up in the arenas, led a revolt of slaves, and united the shiliskin nation-states, declaring the outpost south of Corathus Creep their new home. The outpost became a capital, and the city came to share its ruler’s name. Jarzarrad went to the east of Lake Korlach and has lived there in near seclusion ever since.

Sources: EverQuest: Depths of Darkhollow, Prima Official Game Guide (Prima Games / SCEA, 2005)

The empire

The shiliskin deathshed priests learned to fuel their spells with the nargilor coral that grows under the water, and through it the Korlach became the empire’s personal guardian. Lake districts such as Malgrinnor and Xill grew and prospered.

Illsalin died in 4812. Three emperors followed, unnamed in the guide, before Draygun came to the throne.

Sources: EverQuest: Depths of Darkhollow, Prima Official Game Guide (Prima Games / SCEA, 2005)

Xill and the War of Four Crests

In 5200 a horde of drachnids burrowed into the nearby lake city of Xill, which had no defenses. Its fall set off the War of Four Crests, named for the four armies it drew in: the Shadowmane werewolves sided with the drachnids under Master Vule the Silent Tear, and the Ragepaw clan moved in behind the shiliskin lines.

A crippled sage named Bodrak urged the shiliskin to master drachnid necromancy. Afterwards his skin was found lying in a crumpled heap on the shore of Lake Korlach.

Sources: EverQuest: Depths of Darkhollow, Prima Official Game Guide (Prima Games / SCEA, 2005)

The Korlach turns

Then the Korlach turned on Illsalin and broke through the city walls. The guide says nobody knows why, and gives three beliefs: that it was angered by the priests’ necromancy, that the creature in the spire had promised it something, or that the Korlach is simply a force of nature that was never meant to be tamed.

Sources: EverQuest: Depths of Darkhollow, Prima Official Game Guide (Prima Games / SCEA, 2005)

Draygun and Shadowspine

Shadowspine was an ancient spellbook taken in a raid on the Drachnid Hive. When Draygun opened it, its power spread through the city and cursed Illsalin’s defenders and the drachnids alike to undeath. He used it to raise himself as a lich, and every spell he casts from it slides him nearer to madness and servitude. Few adventurers see inside the cursed book, and the only ones who come back from it now are the living dead.

The surviving shiliskin fell back to Malgrinnor, the empire’s last fortress, in the east of Lake Korlach.

Sources: EverQuest: Depths of Darkhollow, Prima Official Game Guide (Prima Games / SCEA, 2005)

The ruins today

The Illsalin Marketplace is where the drachnid army broke in and overran the city. The Nargil Pits, which zone lists call the Nargilor Pits, are little more than a prison for captive shiliskin. The Prince’s Manor is held by drachnids under Prince Drillien, with the Shadowmane werewolves.

Sources: EverQuest: Depths of Darkhollow, Prima Official Game Guide (Prima Games / SCEA, 2005)