Ravidel

Ravidel
[[File:{{#setmainimage:Ravidel.jpg}}|250px]]
Details
Race	Human Planeswalker
Birthplace	An unnamed plane inside the Shard.
Lifetime	Born a short while after the formation of the Shard. Possibly died in 3980 AR.
Sources
Ice Age, Homelands, The Shadow Mage, Wayfarer

Ravidel, called "the Battlemage", was a crazed, wicked and powerful planeswalker from an unknown plane. He initiated the Planeswalker War.

History

Youth

Ravidel was born during the time of the Ice Age, somewhere among the twelve planes of the Shard. The calamities brought on by the Brothers' War threatened to wipe out Ravidel’s people, and his parents thought it best to apprentice the young magician to the planeswalker Faralyn. This wizard accepted Ravidel as a spellsquire, and set him to be the keeper of the Elder Dragonling he held in thrall – the Chromium Dragon Rhuell.

Ravidel was embittered for being cast out of his homeworld. He would have chosen the dignity of suffering with his people rather than being exiled into the multiverse with a strange wizard. But he took solace in caring for Rhuell, and even under these extreme circumstances, the two became friends. It was one of the last times Ravidel would ever feel compassion for another being. Together with the dragon, Ravidel aided Faralyn in the study of the physics of the Shard.

Death and resurrection

Eventually, Faralyn deduced a method of escape from the Shard. He led a number of other planeswalkers to the Summit of the Null Moon, and precipitated a battle among them. In the course of the battle, the Rhuell was slain – and so was Ravidel. Faralyn used his spellsquire’s life energy to escape from the Shard, leaving the young man’s corpse behind.

The planeswalker Kristina of the Woods cast a spell of resurrection and revived Ravidel with a fully-manifested spark. Betrayed by his honored mentor, his truest friend Rhuell lost to him, Ravidel went insane with grief and cursed Kristina with his enmity forever.

Under the wings of Taysir

Ravidel might well have become just another minor planeswalker were it not for the planeswalker Taysir, who was also at the summit on the Null Moon and a long-time friend of Kristina. For perplexing reasons, Taysir eventually found Ravidel and took him on as as spellsquire after his falling out with Kristina. Taysir was one of the most powerful planeswalkers ever, and his tutelage allowed Ravidel to grow in power exponentially. The pair spent some time tracking down the planeswalkers Leshrac and Tevesh Szat to exact vengeance for their slaying of Rhuell and Ravidel at the summit. They found Leshrac and trapped him in Phyrexia, but Szat stayed out of reach. However, Ravidel’s hatred of Szat burned as strongly as for Kristina, and this did not rest well with Taysir. The planeswalker was in love with her, and had hoped to reform Ravidel to some degree. This was clearly not going to happen.

Conquest

Taysir, discouraged, eventually tired and cut Ravidel loose to continue as he saw fit. Ravidel took this to mean he was entering a new phase of his apprenticeship, and began a series of conquests throughout the multiverse, collecting artifacts and perfecting his dueling skills. Returning to Dominaria, he crossed paths with the Ash Warlord Embereck, one of that world’s most powerful planeswalkers, and they dueled over the fabled Argivian Sylex amidst the submerged ruins of a city in Terisiare. Ultimately, Embereck defeated Ravidel but allowed him to leave with the Sylex. Ravidel explained that he needed the Sylex to take revenge on those who had wronged him (Szat and Kristina), and the honor-driven Embereck sympathized. He would soon come to regret his poor judgement.

Over the next few centuries, Ravidel would occasionally visit with Taysir and continue his training. Taysir consented to this reluctantly, but he gave little thought to Ravidel or his desire for vengeance, considering him just another hotheaded young planeswalker.

The summit of Minorad

As the last vestiges of the Ice Age disappeared on Dominaria, a new age was dawning. Many of the world’s greatest wise people gathered in the Haven of Minorad, the northernmost habitable point in Corondor, to share their knowledge and document the passing of time. The new Corondor calendar was established, and the date of the meeting was declared Year One of a new age.

Ravidel attacked this Summit of Minorad, and hatched an insidious plan. He used the Argivian Sylex to blackmail his arch-foe Kristina, as well as the Ash Warlord Embereck, Grenfell Mor of Golthonor, Altair of Coloni, and Liana of Minorad, all powerful planeswalkers – into his servitude. He did this by using the Sylex to threaten the butchering of all Minorad’s sages. The last bastion of Corondor’s knowledge would be destroyed before their eyes, and the new age would end before it began.

The planeswalker war

Ravidel hatched a long-term plan on the Dominarian continent Corondor to erect a Mox Beacon with Liana of Minorad's Moxen, thus drawing all planeswalkers that had ever harmed him to Dominaria so they would slaughter each other. Ironically, in his quest he created his own nemesis by robbing Jared Carthalion of his title, his wealth, his parents, and his friends. Jared was taught by Kristina and became her lover, and the two went on to lead the fight against Ravidel. The end of the Planeswalkers' War, and thus Ravidel's ultimate fate, is unknown, but Kristina is known to have survived it.

Planeswalkers met

• Altair
• Embereck
• Faralyn
• Freyalise
• Grenfell Mor
• Jared Carthalion
• Kristina
• Leshrac
• Tevesh Szat
• Liana
• Taysir

Planes visited

• Dominaria