The Crimson Apocalypse

There was a time you remembered names, faces, warmth.
A time where innocence, once reigned upon your soul.
A time before you unmade the place of your rebirth, in a single, beautiful act of ruin.

With it, the last remnants of your humanity, burned away.

Your heart died, making room for something far older to beat in it's place.

A Crimson Calamity, Bearer of the Aspect of Destruction, it is only a matter of time, now, until that legacy, blossoms in full - and beautiful ruin, comes to those last few, in your way.

Prestige 1 - The Birth of a Red Eclipse

The legacy within your veins, and the vampiric physiology that reforged you, have at last become one - a perfect fusion, a hunger crowned in dusk. The body that once clung to mortality now advances toward a legacy of beautiful ruin, empowering every dormant predatory instinct within you.

Your presence radiates a regal dread when your Ascended nature is not masked. Humanoids and Beasts of a CR equal to or lower than your level instinctively recognize the truth - the curse that coils within your blood, waiting, to be unleashed, and feast upon them. Such creatures automatically fail any contested checks against your Intimidation attempts.

When you would drain life force from a hostile creature to gain Temporary Hit Points, as per your Rasetsu feature, you may choose to forgo gaining these Temporary Hit Points. If you do, you may choose to begin weaving that stolen vitality into a 'Blood Pool', a mix of vampiric sorcery and your own elemental mastery, to safeguard both you, and your soul, from internal and external threats. Whenever you would gain Temporary Hit Points while this protective ward is active, the amount which would have been gained is instead transferred to the Blood Pool, increasing it's current amount of Hit Points. Whenever you would take damage, the protective ward instead absorbs the damage - and when it possesses any amount of Hit Points, effects which would kill you instantly, erase you from existence, or similar, instead immediately destroy the Blood Ward. If damage reduces the barrier to 0 Hit Points, you take any remaining damage. This barrier only remains active an amount of hours equal to your current Prestige, before its completely empty, and you must remake it with new life, and for every 10 minutes spent outside of combat initiative, the energy in the pool depletes by 20% of it's current amount.

A lifetime ago now, that sanctuary had been offered to you, on behalf, of the most unlikely of allies. A woman, dripped in gold and crimson, a second chance, a new beginning, beyond a life best otherwise forgotten.
Adapting towards the ways of the dead, that unholy way of life, learning their ways, their histories, their world - you never belonged, always an outsider, always, a toy, to their whims.

Until, that night, it all came burning down.

Prestige 2 - The Crimson Storm

The elements of the world around you, the ambient mana in the air, none of it is safe now, from that ever-growing, ever-hungry, vampiric essence which drives you on - the elements themselves, now victim to it's blossoming need to devour. Whenever you would apply your sneak attack damage to a creature, you may choose for its damage type to change, choosing one damage type from among coatings you have on weapons you are holding or wearing. In addition, through your Helm of Elemental Mastery, you've now learned how to adapt the coating's on your weaponry further, to unlock their full potential, beyond just the traditional elements: you may exchange the damage type of one of your coatings for any other damage type of your choice, per your Helm of Elemental Mastery's standard method.

This elemental adaptation has also further enhanced that sanguine sorcery of yours. At will, you may change your form into a Bat, while still retaining all of your original statistics. During another's creature turn, but no more than once per turn, you may expend a corresponding percentage of Hit Points, from either your own Hit Point maximum, or the Blood Pool's current amount, to activate the following abilities. You may only expend Hit Points from the Blood Pool in place of your own, if the amount expended would be equal to or higher than your own Hit Point cost:

Vampiric Rejuvenation (25%): Two conditions or effects of your choice are immediately cleansed from your person, which would be reversible by the Wish spell. 

Coagulopathy (30%): You may immediately make an attack against a creature within reach, and upon a successful hit, you can force their body to stop regulating it’s own repair. Until the start of your next turn, the creature cannot regain hit points, and whenever it would attempt to regain Hit Points, it instead suffers an amount of Hit Point loss equal to the amount which would have been recovered. This attack cannot generate THP or fuel your Blood Pool, as your essence is instead poured into the creature.

Endorphin Rush (50%): When subject to a saving throw, which you would fail, you may immediately activate a rush of blood to shove your body into a temporary overdrive. The failed save instead becomes a success. This effect can only trigger three times per short rest.

Vampiric Frenzy (Recharge 5-6, 80%): All creatures of your choice within 2000 feet of you become enraged by a sudden vampiric bloodlust. The creature is forced into a state of utter violence until the start of your next turn. While in this state, the creature is incapable of taking any action except for the Attack action, and you may choose the targets of their attacks. A creature may expend a use of its Legendary Resistance to avoid this effect. This effect ends at the start of your next turn.

When your home fell to betrayal, you did not crumble as they expected you to.

The ashes of your home, clung to you, burned into your heart, your mind, your thoughts.

Reforged, by their grief, by the spite that hangs onto you even now, the hunger within you rose, and started to cry out, for vengeance. A rebirth, in wrath.

Their victory, became your catalyst.

 Prestige 4 - The Crimson Court

The curse in your veins has shed its origin. No longer the remnant of ancient vampiric tragedy, your blood now carries a lineage forged in the promise of annihilation. The old vampirism was a parasite - a relic birthed of demonic taint. Your regal strain burns with a higher purpose; to unmake the origin that once birthed their vile kind, and to stand atop, all forms of hunger.

You may now offer your blood to a willing, non-traveler (or traveler pet) creature, irrevocably transforming them into a Primordial Vampire. This strain overwrites all prior vampirism and anchors them to your will. Their creature type becomes a mix of their original creature type and Primordial, and though they remain biologically alive, they are forever bound to your will and legacy. Their lifespan extends dramatically, their physical form refines beyond mortal limits, and they pass among mortals effortlessly. The DM determines the exact nature and extent of these enhancements.

Freed from traditional vampiric weaknesses, they instead inherit the flaw of destruction. Rather than a thirst for direct blood, their satisfaction comes from bringing upon change. They possess an instinct to reshape the world rather than accept its shape, intense emotional responses to power imbalance, and a quiet gravitational pull toward catastrophe when gathered, an urge, to bring upon revolution.

Your progeny cannot create more of their kind unless personally elevated by you in a ritual of your choosing, granting them the right to spread your lineage. In the same vein, you can perform an alternative ritual, to break a creature created to this ritual, from your direct control and influence - while still allowing them to retain, all of the benefits.

All blood in their bodies is tied to you. You always know their general location; their thoughts echo faintly against your mind, and they are compelled to answer your commands. Any creature affected by this strain which dies, or any creature whom dies to an entity affected by this strain, or yourself, immediately has their soul ushered to your domain.

There was a time I believed that loyalty was born from all the sweet things in life, kinship, struggle, grief. God, what a lie.

How many mortals cling to their lives in fear?

Vampires, to their existences, in hunger?

Both are despicable, but still... something in between, something, given a purpose, to push on, and thrive.

To usher in an end. Perhaps, that will be acceptable.

 Prestige 5 - Throne of the Crimson Eclipse

The areas most touched by your influence, where your servants have taken root, can now be molded freely to your will - adapted, to impose a portion of your sovereign will, upon the battlefield, reshaping the land within the entire region, fusing it, with your own personal pocket-dimension. This transformation lasts until dismissed, and within the area, the environment immediately warps into a gothic-esque castle, cloaked, in eternal moonlight. The area is filled with various gargoyles, undead thralls, staircases, and traps, made to your desire and whim - and all hostile light within the dimension is immediately dimmed to complete darkness. 

While this domain is active, you may freely shift between Humanoid, Bat, Wolf, Shadow or into a form akin to the Gaseous Form spell, as a free action, while retaining all of your statistics. Creatures allied to you within this fused pocket-dimension share in your class features for the duration of the effect, and they all gain a single Legendary Action, usable only within this domain:

Crimson Step: They may immediately teleport up to 60-feet in a swirl of blood-red mist.

Whenever this pocket-dimension is activated, any of your Crimson Court progeny within 100 miles may choose to manifest in the dimension, taking form anywhere within, under your command. Any creature reduced to 0 hit points within your this dimension may be claimed by you. If you choose so, they rise at the beginning of their next turn, as an Undead beneath your command.

My sancutary, filled with puppets.

Perfect marionettes, to play the game to my whim, to sacrifice themselves, to my commands.

The most, I can manage, in this accursed plane... but still, it should be more than enough, to deal with you.

Prestige 6 - Dominion of Eternal Night

Despite the attempts of your rivals, and those who's hold you seek to uproot, you now exist as a fixed narrative point in the world - an inevitability, a calamity, that no matter what occurs, will never truly be forgotten. 

Whenever you have personally visited a settlement and fed upon a living creature there (willing or otherwise), that location becomes Marked by you (at DM discretion), and falls under your indirect dominion. You can sense when blood is spilled within that settlement. You always know if your name is spoken there, and by whose lips. Your commands whispered to a loyal thrall there carry across any distance. Vampires you personally sired can teleport to any Marked location once per day, emerging from mist, shadow, or other unnatural phenomena.

In each of these Marked locations, a single figure amongst all turned by you rises naturally to act as your silent representative - a Crimson Regent. These Regent's share in all of your class features and abilities, and cannot be magically compelled through any means to betray you. Only a single Regent can exist in a location Marked by you at a time. If slain, and another of your lineage resides within that territory, a new Regent is immediately elevated in their place.

Accursed creations, amusing to think, I spent most of my life, killing similar, but no... these ones, these are my own. Sometimes, a moment is needed, to succumb towards that vile influence... to stand a chance, against a greater demon.

Prestige 7 - Crimson Beyond the Veil

The mortal world knows your name, your mark, your hunger. But even that power, has it's limits - a place of sanctuary, carved away for yourself, a place, to amass your power, in relative safety, away from those who would conquer you. 

Any creature slain by your hand, or your direct command does not travel to its destined afterlife. Instead, it awakens in your Jotunheim.

While within your realm, they regain their body in their own perspective of it's peak form, retaining all memories and skills they had in life. They are unable pass on to a different Underworld unless you decree it, and while within your presence, cannot disobey direct commands from you. Creatures slain a second time while within Jotunheim do not die a final death, but are instead transformed, into one of three fates:

Warden: Their bodies become colossal giants of frost, under your will, tasked with the endless duty of patrolling the borders of your realm as titans. 

Hunters: Their physiology shifts, into that of rabid, wolf-like shadowy beasts, or bat-like creatures, with the eternal duty of guarding your wilds, and protecting them against those who would attempt to infiltrate your lands. 

Forgotten: Their spirits become forgotten, and the mana that made up their soul, is instead dispersed, into Jotunheim's wilds, to refresh the landscape, and help refresh, the ushering in of the next winter.

Above the tree of Yggradsil, above the limitations imposed upon the mortal world, a paradise.

A land of frost. A land of unmatched beauty.

Rotted, forgotten, and yet, no longer.

A bit of beauty is long overdue now, isn't it?

 Prestige 8 - Final Calamity

Here, in the midst of your domain, your power is no longer bound as it once was - a permanent shard of your elemental essence, and Alatreon's essence, stored and guarded, in the very center of your domain. While within your domain, and while this essence survives, your base statistics become that of Alatreon, while still retaining all of your own class features and abilities. While this essence still persists, you cannot be truly destroyed and have genuine immortality, even to the effects of things that would wipe you from existence. Regardless of how you are trapped, you may always return via rejuvenating from this essence within 24 hours. The only way to truly slay you, and for the essence to become vulnerable, is to defeat your Alatreon within your domain, and seal the essence away from it's soul.

I suppose that once, I was cursed, bound to this fate.

But after everything I've been through, everything I've learned, about this accursed home of mine..

Perhaps, it isn't so bad, after all.

Only once their influence is gone, only once it's all been remade, I believe, I'll be able to truly rest.