New York during the Blackest Night
The Blackest Night is an eschaton that will mark the complete annihilation of vampire-kind and the subsequent near extinction of humanity.
Description
The Blackest Night is an apocalyptic event that will signal the end for all vampires across the world. It is also claimed to be the "second chapter" of the fabled Anung Un Rama, Urush Un Rama which will then lead up to an event known as the End Times where the Ogdru Hem reign over a barren and ruined Earth eventually culminating into the enigmatic Final Conflict.
However, the Blackest Night is interpreted in many different ways. The themes displayed by the Book of Erebus (a vampire bible equivalent to the Book of Revelations) are common in many depictions of the End Times written by prophetic mortals. Although, some interpretations tell of greater cosmic powers at play or epic wars between mortals and fiends of the night.
Overview
The Blackest Night is often a mysterious topic of debate even amongst vampire fanatics who are focused on the signs that lead up to the End Times. Many of the tales which cover its events intersect at various points.
The catalyst behind the Blackest Night will be none other than Lilith herself. She will assemble a great number of her allies like the Black Hand to resurrect Theokoles, the Demon's Three (consisting of Yomyael/Varvara, Bifrons, and Beleth), and even her son Mundus to create destructive supernatural occurrences that play out before and during the events of the Blackest Night to summon forth the Dracaena, a tree sprung from the depths of Hell that can only be brought forth via unspeakable number of sacrifices. She does this to bring about a "new Eden" on Earth which she will rule over.
There are various signs and prophecies which prelude this catastrophic event which then project great paranoia into those that believe in this purported myth.
- Awakening of the Elders: The death of thinners will force the Thirteen Elders to awaken who are Lasombras and the first thirteen vampires in existence.
- Wild Hunt: Hunters will rise in the hundreds or thousands and begin slaying vampires even in their strongest cities.
- The Crone: With the massacre of humanity across the world by the hands of the Elders who would later fall by the elder Werebeasts, Lilith will step out of the shadows and commence the final phase.
- The Abyss Moves: Some say this speaks of Theokoles, one of the Maleficar, who was born from the depths of Tartarus which is often equated with the Abyss. When the Shadow of Hell returns, he will wreak havoc across human society and his activities will split the earth in two allowing demons to emerge.
- Rise of the Dragon: Some believe this relates to the resurgence of demons and entities from Hell which will roam the Earth once more. Another candidate could be Dracula himself who is titled as the Son of the Dragon and the Blackest Night marks his final days on Earth. The last is Mekhet, the first of the Turok-Han to ever be sired by Lilith that will awaken from its deep torpor beneath the earth (suspected to be New York City) after it is fed an untold amount of blood and bodies from Theokoles' rampage.
- Unclean Ones: The "unclean ones" refer to Gog and Magog who will be called forth by Lilith to destroy the remaining resistance of humanity. They will be freed by a "rebel angel" suspected to be either Yomyael or Mundus and will be used to clean up the mess left behind from Lilith's machinations.
- Daughter of the Demiurge: An enigmatic woman will appear as the last bastion of hope. None will know this woman, only that she will face torment, hatred, violence, and treachery. Some believe it to be Heather Ortega who has experienced such atrocities in her life while others say it is Rosemary Winters who will use her powers to destroy Mekhet sacrificing herself in the process.
History
Final Nights
The first sign is the surging rise of "thinners" who are basically vampires loyal to no coven or brood. It is said that after the events of the biblical Apocalypse, humanity had undergone a disastrous crisis which severely impacted the resources for vampires, essentially it was akin to a "famine" that vampires were struggling to manage. This led to the subsequent feeding by many vampires on as much humans as they could find, to the point where they would go so far as to keep them in "pens" like cattle to stay alive.
This spike in Thinners are the result of clanless vampires causing a food shortage for the elite covens, and more troublesome is turning said humans into vampires as well. This will subsequently result in the shattering of the Masque which hides vampire society from mortals. This growing unrest provides more than enough open opportunities for the deranged cult known as the Black Hand to find the severed pieces of Theokoles, the Shadow of Evil while their enemies are distracted with the conflicts around them.
New Inquisition
The Masque will shatter due to the events of the Dagor Dagorath where the existence of monsters come to light for the public, vampires included. The footage of monsters and vampires leaks onto every media platform across the world.
Whilst alarm is spread across every country, the Blackest Night does begin here, for some countries are accepting of the supernatural living among us whereas others condemn their existence entirely. It began with discontent, brewed into suspicion, before igniting into revolutionary upheavals against organizations that kept the existence of these monsters from public knowledge; it exploded into a full-blown world-wide panic and unrest when the news of Britain was completely destroyed during the Dagor Dagorath.
It would not be long until humanity took matters into their own hands with emboldened hunters emerging across the globe to purge these vampires. The Vatican are said to also play a crucial role in this by arming human troops and hunters with equipments more than capable of destroying these vampires, and is dubbed as the Ninth Crusade or the New Inquisition.
Lasombra War
The vampires themselves would fight back and ferociously at that. According to the Book of Erebus, thinners have a connection to the Thirteen Elders who are the founders of the Thirteen vampire clans that sit at the Order of the Dragon's table. With each thinner killed, a psychic pulse is sent out to the slumbering Lasombras, stirring them, until they are at last awakened from their torpor. When the Lasombras had awoken, humanity sent advanced tank brigades and infantry which even that was nothing but childsplay for these god-like vampires.
The Allied Nations assembled under the Global Occult Coalition and Federal Bureau of Control to establish the Armored Response Coalition or ARC in an attempt to contain and destroy them as much as they can where modern militaries proved ineffective against them. They would even be joined by the Werekin who replenished their numbers and united for the first time in thousands of years after their battle with Azog, choosing to collaborate with humanity who aided them in their war against Azog and the earthly powers of the Demiurge. Unfortunately, these will be the last days of the Werekin who will fall in their final stand against the Thirteen Elders, marking the penultimate end of the Spiritual Warfare between Vampire and Werebeast. Dracula will also meet his demise during his climactic battle with Ur-Shulgi, the last standing Elder.
Hell on Earth
With the untold amount of bloodshed that was wrought it was more than enough to awaken Mekhet from his slumber in the depths of its crypt beneath New York after Theokoles' rampage. Mekhet would act as a vessel for the Dracaena which would sprout from its body and spread throughout every corner and crevice of the island. It is said that Mekhet was the first vampiric beast to embraced by Sarkicism and thus was technically the first user of the Demiurgic power over flesh. Moreover, Mekhet was dubbed as the "Seed of Evil" meaning it is quite literally the seed of which the Dracaena grew out from after being nourished by the amount of blood and evil committed throughout the world. The roots and branches of Mekhet upheaved and overturned massive sections of the island and New York was now completely overtaken by the demons who claimed it as their new kingdom of Pandemonium on Earth.
Lilith meanwhile would prepare to devour the heart of Daniel Ellis who is revealed to be the son of the Woman of the Apocalypse and essentially a modern-day Christ. She would do this by having Daniel eat Theokoles' own heart of which he is then hooked to the nerve centers of the tree and after a considerable amount of time Daniel would metamorph into a natural Rebis for Lilith to consume and ascend to godhood over her new kingdom of Eden. With the world's military prowess crippled during their war against the Thirteen Elders victory seemed inevitable for the Dark Mother.
Fortunately, not all was lost for resistance was blooming beneath the noses of the hellish fiends. The forces of the Bureau for Paranormal Research and Defense joined up with Devil May Cry and numerous troops still standing under the employ of ARC launched a covert assault on the demon infested New York. In another surprising turn of events, Yomyael discovered that Hell's forces were nearly wiped out by none other than Hellboy himself who alongside Sargatanas led a rebellion against the remaining lords of Hell and consecutively wiped them out. Seeing as how the armies of Hell are now but few they decided to enlist the aid of Gog and Magog. The forces of the B.P.R.D. attacked the remaining forces of Hell and Gog and Magog. Both Balam and Bifrons were killed by Nero, Trish, and Liz Sherman while Yomyael fought against Illyana Roth and Ashley Strode. All the while Dante and Vergil were accompanied by Immanuel, Damian, Beatrice, Sapia Heather Ortega, and Rosemary Winters to the top of the Dracaena to stop Lilith. Dante and Vergil would personally fight and finally kill Mundus while their children and Immanuel reach Lilith who succeeded in devouring the Rebis.
Gog and Magog would be destroyed by Wormwood, a red star sent by a dying Sanna. Immanuel, Damian, Beatrice, and Sapia fight an empowered Lilith in a four-on-one battle while Heather takes Daniel's body out of the makeshift chamber within the Dracaena. Rose would use her powers to remove the megamycete from the tree which would effectively overload Mekhet's physiology that was bonded to the tree and effectively kill it. Tragically, during the climactic battle, Immanuel met his end by Lilith's hands, enraging the three cambions. Rose herself would die from the excruciatingly taxing process of destroying the megamycete inside the Dracaena, killing Mekhet and severing Lilith's link with it. Finally, the three were soon joined by Nero, and were able to successfully defeat Lilith despite her ascension to godhood. Yomyael himself was also defeated when he was weakened enough by Illyana Roth and cast out of Varvara's body with an exorcism before being forced to kneel in front of the Bureau's agents.
As Lilith laid battered and fatally wounded, she curses the cambions and their allies, claiming to have committed a grave mistake. When questioned, Lilith's final words to them were, "Without me...you would have no victory. And its cost will be more...than you can pay." Her body crumbles to ashes leaving the cambions pondering on what she meant. Unfortunately for them, their answer arrived in Yomyael's death. Just as the demon tried to claim that he was holding Varvara back, he was decapitated by Strode with the Twin Blade before he could finish. What many failed to realize in time was that Varvara was a backup plan for Grigori Rasputin who would use his own daughter as a means to resurrect himself.
The Day the Earth Stood Still
Rasputin, now speaking through Varvara, kills Strode then himself using the Moonblade that was "carved from the abyssal beach" and with her death coupled with wielding Shakti came an explosion that completely wiped out New York City off the map; this was the cost Lilith warned them of. Varvara's death via the Moonblade's contact with Shakti was intended as an explosive beacon for the Ogdru Hem to rise from their graves across the world with the explosion sending a signal for the Old Ones to lay claim over the now barren planet. This was the day the Earth stood still as all that lived now perished, from plants to simple creatures, the world grew cold and humanity attempted to withstand the darkness. Hell had been emptied of its demons as its gates rattled in the wind. But luckily, humanity had a chance to survive; the Hollow Earth beneath the surface of the planet itself, in which humanity could survive the end of the world.
Guided by the ghost of Edward Grey, the coordinates of the secret cave-entrances to the Hollow Earth are beamed into the computers of ARC, who in turn share the information with the various civilian governments and militaries around the world, hoping for as many people as possible to make it to them. ARC also plants to evacuate and reestablish itself underground, but Dante, Vergil, and Nero decide to stay behind and find a way to bring Hellboy back in order to face Rasputin and the forces of the Ogdru Hem. They leave the surviving population of humanity under the watchful care of their children whom hesitantly remain behind in the Hollow Earth alongside the remnants of the Dark Knight Initiative.
Thus comes the End Times, where the world above is completely barren and devoid of any life. Ecosystems devastated, the geography of the world became unrecognisable - ground has been weathered, plant life has mutated enormously, animal populations have been killed en masse and artificial structures built by humans have decayed, all while the Ogdru Hem reign supreme. Humanity slowly but surely thrives in the Hollow Earth while being sheltered and supported by Agartha, replenishing their numbers and resources to take back their home.