Atur Academy

Atur Academy is a centuries old academy in Atur, that is little known outside the academic community. It is known for it’s focus on necromancy but it has very little resources compared to the Universities of Morgrave, Korranberg and Wynarn. The Academy was established by Count Beren ir’Vairn in his 1000 room estates over 600 years ago in the city of Atur. The Count established the school in the hopes that he could learn the secrets of the elves and to teach them to people that wanted to know there ancient ways. The academy has grown over the years from a school focused on necromancy to an school with class on different types of so called “dark magic” as well as history and inventions, although necromancy in still at the for front of the academy.
The leader of the Atur Academy is the oldest descendent of the ir’Vairn line. This has caused many problems within the line because Beren made it so that the oldest descendents get very thing and all others get nothing. The Family is intertwined with death because the children of each generation try to kill one another in order to become the oldest child. The leader of the Atur Academy is Countess Varden ir’Vairn of Atur (N female half-elf, aristocrat 4/ necromancer 7/ wizard 6). She has one brother how she crippled when she was 16 when her brother attack her to get the right to become the leader of the Academy.
Thanks to the Last War the Academy has got a lot of help from the government and the Blood of Vol. However, with the Blood of Vol being banded the school has “official” stopped taking help form the church. With the governments money the school has sent many expiations to Xen’dark but has come back with little thanks to Morgarave University taking artifacts and stone tomes and putting them on display. This has made the School and the Countess very upset. With the Vardens contacts in the government, she has agent in the university slowly stealing the artifacts away to take them back to the school. The school has also started to working in a new field, the magic of the daelkyr. The school has had few books on the daelkyr and they have wanted there collect to grow form a two centuries and now with the government backing them and the Last War over they have started to move in the west and unlike the cases with the elven necromantic artifacts, they found many artifacts and tomes. With this boost in the daelkyr knowledge the Countess as her eye on the lock away work of a former student of the Academy. Vardens is has plans to get her hand on the work of Mordain the Fleshweaver in the Tower of Twelve.
With the study of dangerous magic there comes restrictions, secrets and factions. The Academy is very different form others in the academic circle thanks to how small there student body is. The Academy averages between 200 to 250 students and they have 40 teacher with 5 to 6 students to each teacher. This helps them keep an eye on the students so they so they do not do anything that can get other students killed or that can destroy something that could make the government think about funding the school. The Countess is very strict when it comes to this and she does not give second changes.
There are several factions in the Academy divided between what magic they study, races or wealth. The strongest of these is the Dark Five. The Dark Five are the five students that student under Countess Varden her self. These are the five best students of the Academy. They learn spell that only the most powerful necromancer and dark wizards would know. This position gives the Five a lot of power in the school, they get the best book, materials, private rooms, best food and power over other students. The Five do not only get privilege in the school they also can get into high ranking jobs with in the government, money and land, or they can chose get a letter that can get them in to any school they want to. Like the line of there Headmistress students have kill students in order to get in to the Dark Five which is how it got it’s name.
But just because Countess and her apprentices have kill to get where they are, most of the students are not evil they just find thing that people think are evil interesting. A group that shows this is the Line of Blood. The Line is a group of people that are members of noble families that think the ways of the Blood of Vol is powerful but they do not believe in the Blood of Vol. They believe that blood and noble family blood as a lot of power in it and they plan to use it. There main goal is to become some of the most powerful necromancers in the world and then become lichs in order for them to live for ever. There is one that has become what they all dream to be. There leader and founder of the group is a teenage elf named Vestar Talaear (N lich [elf] wizard 10) who made himself a lich. No one knows that he that he even exists because he lives in one of the wing of the manor that is never used and he has cast a spell around his rooms in order for no one can find him.
Key Locations:
The Library of Shadows: This is the schools library with a collection of over 4000 books from necromancy to daelkyr. It is open to all students but no one can take other then the Dark Five. All books are real own by the Countess and will not take some one some much as folding a small corner let alone being written on. Many people have been kick out of the academy for doing so. The library is look after by a great shadow name Darthen who was created by Vaden after the death of the former librarian. The in center of the floor is a mosaic of the a diamond scull with but one tip is replaces with to fangs, around the scull is a ring of runes. This is the symbol of the school and when a spell is cast the stones between the scull and the runes become stares leading to the vault were the school keeps all its artifacts.
The Countess’s Floor: This Floor is the privet floor of Countess Varden ir’Vairn of Atur. It contains her personal library, laboratory, her bed room, her privet museum where she keeps all her family heirlooms and a room here she teaches her students.
The Vault of the Dead: This vault is here the school stores its bodies that they are going to use and this is also where they store there undead