Urza

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Template:Character Urza is a planeswalker originating from Terisiare on Dominaria, best known for his millennia-long struggle with Yawgmoth and the plane of Phyrexia.

Early years

Urza was born on the first day of the year 0 AR to a noble family of Argive, one of the three coastal kingdoms of Terisiare. His younger brother Mishra was born on the last day of the same year. Urza's mother died while she was a child, so his father married another member of the Aristocracy. This woman treated Urza and Mishra with indifference at best and contempt at worst. In 10 AR, their father fell ill, so he sent them away to his old friend Tocasia to serve as students at her archaeological dig.

Apprenticeship to Tocasia

Under Tocasia's guidance, the two brothers learned a large amount about the manufacture of artifacts from the archaeological excavations of the ancient ruins of the Thran, the mysterious civilization that ruled Terisiare thousands of years prior. During this time, Urza developed a talent for study. Rarely having a hands on approach, he would prefer to study the artifacts the excavations uncovered rather than participate in the diggings.

Over their years at Tocasia's camp, Urza and Mishra made several important inventions and discoveries. While the most obvious of these was the ornithopter, the most important turned out to be the Caves of Koilos. A mysterious cave filled with old Thran artifacts, the Caves were also the location of a long-sealed gateway to Phyrexia, used in every Phyrexian infiltration and invasion of Dominaria. On their first visit, Urza and Mishra acquired the Mightstone and the Weakstone respectively, the two halves of the stone that had been holding the portal shut. Mutual desire for the other brother's stone led to a falling-out between Urza and Mishra, as well as the inadvertent death of Tocasia.

The Chief Artificer

After Tocasia's death, Urza moved to Yotia and put his skills with machinery to work as a clockmaker's apprentice. Shortly thereafter, a public contest was announced by the ruler of Yotia. Any man who could move a gigantic jade statue across a courtyard would be married to his daughter. Urza wasn't particularly interested in the daughter, but in an attempt to acquire a Thran tome that was in her dowry, Urza built a gigantic machine to move the statue. He succeeded, and was wed to Kayla bin-Kroog. However, being wed did not make him any more affectionate towards his wife - on the contrary, he left her bed on their wedding night to study the Thran book from her dowry. However, he threw himself headlong into his new position of Chief Artificer, working excessively on his attempts to improve his artifacts.

The Brothers' War

While Urza was inadvertently acquiring the reins of power in Yotia, Mishra was doing the same with the Fallaji desert people, becoming a close advisor to the Fallaji ruler over the course of several years. A series of double-crossings and sneak attacks quickly commenced between the two brothers and their kingdoms, soon resulting in an open war. An increasingly elaborate set of machines developed by the two brothers began to fight on either side, and the war slowly spiraled out of control. It continued for decades, until the fateful day at Argoth when the brothers met face to face at the head of their armies. Urza discovered there that Mishra had been corrupted by Phyrexian influence, slowly turning himself from a man into a living machine. Urza responded to this with the frightening force of the Golgothian Sylex. The sylex blast was one of the most traumatic events in Dominarian history. It slaughtered both armies, blasted the landscape for miles around, sank the sub-continent Argoth, and altered weather patterns for centuries, leading to the Ice Age. However, it did something more important than any of that - it turned Urza from a mortal to a planeswalker, an immensely powerful immortal being, able to move around the multiverse with merely a thought.

Urza then departed Dominaria after saying a final farewell to his student and good friend Tawnos in which he asked his former student and close confidant to go to his wife, whom he had come to love and cherish, that she not remember him as he was but instead that she remember him "As he tried to be."

Quest for Vengeance

Urza realized that, after he had destroyed his brother, Mishra had been completely corrupted by the black mana from Phyrexia. This realization filled Urza with grief, and pushed him to begin his lifelong hunt for retribution against Phyrexia, and its demonic ruler, Yawgmoth.

Exploring the Origins of Phyrexia

To be written

Returning home

Ratepe was a young Dominarian recruited by Xantcha, Urza's Phyrexian assistant. Xantcha sought out Ratepe from a small nation in order to impersonate Mishra, Urza's long dead brother. Urza was becoming increasingly obsessed and guilt ridden over his role in his brother's death, so much so that he was abandoning his defense of Dominaria in the hopes of finding a way to undo his brother's death. Xantcha brought Ratepe, posing as Mishra, to Urza in the hopes of alleviating some of his guilt and allowing him to focus on defeating the Phyrexians. Thanks to Xantcha's coaching and Ratepe's ability to hear Urza's Weakstone singing to him, Ratepe was able to help shock Urza out of his guilt. He continued to help Urza and eventually became Xantcha's lover. Both Ratepe and Xantcha were killed when Urza fought the Phyrexian Demon Gix in Koilos. Ratepe and Xantcha's sacrifice helped Urza defeat Gix and also revealed to him the shared Phyrexian ancestry with the Thran.

Tolaria and the Time Streams

Though Urza got over his obsession with reversing his brother's death, his interest in the past was far from over. Having learned that the impending Phyrexian threat was more dangerous than ever, Urza created a vast school of magic and technology on the island of Tolaria - the Academy. From all around the world, Urza summoned the most talented artificers, sorcerers, mathematicians, and biologists to study in his prestigious school, including Barrin, Teferi, and Rayne. Using the information he had gleaned from Gix and the technology being developed by his genius resident staff, Urza began the creation of a time machine that allowed him to gaze into the past and see the ancient war that led to Phyrexian banishment.

By implanting Xantcha's heartstone (her only remains) into a silver golem, Urza created Karn, a being that could theoretically enter rifts created by his temporal disruptor and change the past. Tragically, during the machine's trial run, the temporal vortex drew far too much energy and "exploded", destroying the majority of the Tolarian Academy, killing inhabitants, and covering the island in odd (and sometimes horrific) temporal disturbances. Although Karn and Urza survived without injury, and much had been learned about the history of the enemy, Urza was devastated.

After being distraught and guilt-ridden over causing another horrible explosion (the first being the Sylex), Urza eventually rebuilt the Academy and realized that the temporal rifts throughout Tolaria could be used to his advantage. He engineered magical-technological armor that allowed Tolarian researchers to finish decades of work in mere hours in fast-time bubbles. Potions derived from water in slow-time bubbles could extend a promising student's life by years. For the first time, Urza had a viable means for gaining ground on the multi-millenial head start the Phyrexian invasion force had so long held.

Atonement for Past Sins

To be written

Building the Legacy

To be written

Bloodlines and Rath

Rath was an artificial plane utilized by Yawgmoth to 'overlay' upon Dominaria, in essence creating a giant land portal for his Phyrexian armies. Rath was able to overlay Dominaria due to the properties of "flowstone", a substance produced by the Rathi Stronghold. Flowstone was a magical substance that could increase the mass of a plane, thus moving Rath into the position occupied by Dominaria and 'fusing' them together.

Urza constructed an army of sorcery and power to resist the coming invasion. He called them the Metathran.

The Invasion

During the Phyrexian Invasion, Yawgmoth tried to invade Dominaria using the land-based portal in the Caves of Koilos. Urza, determined to never allow him re-entrance, resolved to stop him. All of the forces of Dominaria banded against Yawgmoth and tried to push him back. The elves of Llanowar, Metathran (artificial humanoids created by Urza to emulate Phyrexian physiology; much stronger, faster, and smarter than humans with certain other biological modifications), and Gerrard Capashen (commander of the Weatherlight & inheritor of Urza's Legacy) banded together. At the head of the Phyrexian troops was Tsabo Tavoc, one of Yawgmoth's generals. She has a mechanical torso with 8 spider legs, segmented insect eyes, and a detached mouth (could open larger than humans) and poison injectors attached to her torso.

The Nine Titans

The nine Titan Engines were huge artifact creations that were built by Urza to assist in the attack on Phyrexia. Each titan was controlled and powered by a Planeswalker and as such, they grew to emulate that planeswalkers' characteristics. There was one titan engine for each of these nine planeswalkers: Commodore Guff, Tevash Szat, Bo Levar, Daria, Taysir, Freyalise, Kristina, Lord Windgrace, and, of course, Urza himself (he intended Teferi and Parcher to join him, but the first phased out, and the second was considered too crazy to work with them). The Titan engines were huge constructs with a vast arsenal of weaponry. They contained aeries of falcon engines (artifacts created by Urza to detect glistening-oil, dive towards it, and then once inside the Phyrexian, burst apart and destroy it), rocket launchers located on the wrists, mana cannons, as well as colossal hands and feet that could crush hundreds of Phyrexians at a time. These weapons, combined with the formidable power of the planeswalkers themselves, made each and every titan engine a force to be reckoned with.

Betrayal

Entering Phyrexia, using the powers of the Titan Suits, the Nine Titans began to destroy the artificial plane in a final gambit to protect Dominaria. However, over time, Tevash Szat began to betray and kill his fellow planeswalkers, turning to the side of the Phyrexians. At one point, Urza was able to defeat him, and used the power from his life force to charge together the soul bombs that he planned to use to destroy Phyrexia for good. While Barrin had argued with Urza that the power source for them, the life force of a living being, was a punishment not worthy of even the worst crime, Tevash's betrayal was so devastating to the fate of Dominaria that Urza declared his use for the soul bombs a form of "justice." Unfortunately for the remaining Titans, as well as Dominaria itself, Urza found himself unable to complete his lifetime goal of destroying the artificial plane, when he found himself becoming fascinated with the fact that it was something that had been created completely artificially. Unwilling to destroy a place full of such potential knowledge, he dismantled the master soul bomb, which would have been able to set off all of the others, creating a ripple effect that would have decimated Phyrexia to the point of no return. After destroying it, he surrendered himself to Yawgmoth, but the ruler of Phyrexia forced him to battle Gerrard Capashen in the Phyrexian Arena, feeling that slaying the captain of the Weatherlight, Urza's former ally, was the only way that he could prove he was not surrendering as part of an elaborate trap.

Final Atonement

To be written

Urza's Legacy

To be written

In-Game References

Represented in the Cards:

Associated Cards:

Associated Artwork:

Template:Nine Titans Template:The Weatherlight

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