Silanar
Silanar is a highly consequential lead character in The Metalwood Saga, serving as the Council Leader of the Eldrim village of Sylrantheas. He is the son of the ancient Prime Mage Cariel (operating under the alias Myriani), the husband of Melenora, and the father of Elanil and adoptive father of Arra.
As a powerful strengthshaper, Silanar is a figure of immense authority and stoicism. However, his legacy is profoundly darkened by his role as the architect and primary executor of the Sundering—a catastrophic magical ritual that wiped out over seven billion humans. He bears the crushing weight of this genocide for centuries, forever haunted by the title "Silanar the Destroyer". He ultimately sacrifices his life to protect his adoptive daughter from the Cothellon assassin Quynn.
Appearance and Personality
Silanar is a tall elf who carries himself with an unwavering, grounded presence, his back always straight and his expression carefully neutral. He possesses long, brown hair and is consistently clean-shaven. Following the apocalyptic events of the Sundering, his face takes on a permanently haggard and ashen quality, weighed down by the immense guilt and fatigue of his past choices. During times of intense grief or stress, his eyes are frequently noted as being red and bloodshot.
His voice is one of his most striking features: it is deep, resonant, and measured, often compared to the texture of "stone grinding under pressure". He speaks deliberately, rarely rushing his words, making everyone in a room lean in and listen to his quiet authority. However, when pushed, his strengthshaper magic allows him to amplify his voice to deafening, hall-filling volumes.
Personality-wise, Silanar is a strict, hard-headed leader who balances his commanding presence with a deep, internal well of regret. He operates like a "commander who won the war by committing an atrocity and has spent 300 years trying to justify it". While he can be emotionally volatile and explosive in private—especially during the days leading up to the Sundering—he projects unwavering authority in public. He loves his family fiercely, though his relationship with his adoptive daughter Arra is frequently fraught with tension due to his strictness and his secret knowledge of her true origins.
Biography
Early Life and the Banished Friend
Silanar grew up in Sylrantheas alongside his closest friends: Orym, Kharis, Orist, and Thalanil. He was raised by his mother, Myriani, a woman who served as the High Priest of the village but who was often absent and enigmatic (secretly being the ancient mage Cariel). Unlike most elves who discover their magical alignment in childhood, Silanar was a late bloomer, not manifesting his strengthshaping Talent until he was twenty years old.
Decades later, Silanar uncovered a terrible secret: his friend Thalanil had engaged in an affair with the elf Aelynthi, resulting in a pregnancy that drove Aelynthi to commit suicide by jumping off the church bell tower. Silanar discovered the body and the suicide note, covering up the truth to protect Aelynthi's honor and her husband, Tanyl. When he confronted Thalanil, he learned that his friend was secretly a mindmaster who had defected to the enemy faction known as the Cothellon. Disgusted, Silanar banished Thalanil from the village forever.
Shortly after, a mysterious, amnesiac girl wandered into the forest. Silanar and Tanyl took her in, naming her Keya and giving her to Tanyl to raise as the daughter he had lost. Decades later, Keya returned to the forest with another ageless, amnesiac elven girl. Silanar and his wife Melenora adopted this second girl, naming her Arra, and raised her as their own while hiding her ageless nature from the rest of the village.
The Typhoon and the Bell Tower
In the days immediately preceding the Ascension of the sky cities, Silanar was in San Francisco with a group of elves when the record-breaking Typhoon Velma struck. Seeking shelter in the Stevenson Place building, the group was trapped when the concrete structure began to collapse. During the chaos, Melenora was crushed beneath a massive slab of cement. Utilizing prime oak, Silanar channeled immense strengthshaping magic, lifting the concrete column long enough for Kharis and Keya to pull his wife to safety.
Later that night, Silanar confronted Thalanil once again in the Sylrantheas bell tower, where Thalanil had come to steal the Book of Amplification. Enraged by the presence of the traitor, Silanar used his magic to attack, brutally destroying the walls and support structures of the bell tower in a blind rage. Thalanil ultimately escaped through a magical gate, leaving Silanar to prepare for the end of the world.
The Soulsundering
Convinced that humanity's unchecked growth and environmental destruction would doom the planet, and alerted by Orym that the Cothellon were preparing to launch their floating cities, Silanar invoked a "Code One" to summon the elven World Council. He forcefully argued for the ratification of the Sundering Act—a ritual designed to kill ninety-nine percent of the human population.
Armed with the ancient Book of Souls, Silanar personally led the ritual from Mount Tamalpais. Connecting his mind to the network of fourteen Prime Trees across the globe, he channeled the lethal soulsundering magic, unleashing it across the Earth. The ritual was a horrifying success, instantly killing over seven billion humans. However, the unprecedented use of this magic caused a catastrophic backlash: all the Prime Trees on the planet immediately withered, cracked, and died, falling to the earth and robbing the elves of their unlimited source of primewood. Silanar survived the collapse, but carried the horrific guilt of the genocide—and the loss of the Trees—for the rest of his life.
The Remnant War
Three hundred years later, Silanar still served as the Council Leader of Sylrantheas. When the human survivors—the Remnant—began aggressively encroaching on elven territory under the influence of the supposed god Magona (who was actually his mother, Cariel in disguise), Silanar was forced to lead his people into war.
Despite his strategic attempts to avoid bloodshed, the Remnant launched a devastating attack using ancient Gatling guns and war machines known as Destroyers, killing dozens of elves. The conflict culminated when Magona revealed her true identity as a Prime Mage and nearly leveled the island of Stromboli. To stop her, Silanar commanded the elven forces, watching in horror as the human forcefinder Phoenix sacrificed herself to defeat the ancient god.
Years later, Orym returned from the sky cities and informed Silanar of an even greater threat: the Cothellon were preparing the Conjunction, joining the seven sky cities together to power the device Xyclami and teleport the entire planet across the galaxy. Realizing the planet was in imminent danger, Silanar rallied the surviving elves and forged an unprecedented alliance with the peaceful human faction known as the Splinter.
The Final Stand and Death
To counter the Cothellon's apocalyptic machine, Silanar agreed to Orym's desperate plan to recreate the fourteen Prime Trees. In a harrowing ritual, thirteen volunteers—including Silanar's beloved wife, Melenora—sacrificed their lives, their blood transforming ordinary saplings into a new Prime Forest.
As the new Prime Forest rose into the sky to battle the Cothellon cities, Silanar prepared to initiate a targeted soulsundering to eliminate the Cothellon leadership. However, the Cothellon assassin Quynn ambushed the command center. When Quynn attempted to kill Arra, Silanar intercepted the attack, striking Quynn with his sword but taking a fatal stab wound directly through his heart in return.
Arra desperately tried to heal him using prime birch, but the magic violently rejected him. The immense karmic debt of the Sundering—visible as a dark, cancerous block in his soul—prevented any healing magic from taking effect. In his dying breath, Silanar confessed the truth to Arra: he was not her biological father, and she was an ancient, ageless being. He accepted his death as the ultimate payment for his sins, kissing Arra softly before passing away.
Powers and Abilities
- Strengthshaping (White Oak/Cedar): Silanar is an exceptionally powerful strengthshaper, Aligned with the Way of the Governor (white magic). By burning prime oak or cedar, he can vastly augment his physical strength and sensory perception. When utilizing this magic, his musculature bulges, and he can lift thousands of pounds of solid concrete.
- Vocal Amplification: Silanar can channel his strengthshaping into his vocal cords, amplifying his voice to deafening, hall-shaking volumes that send vibrations through the floor.
- Ritual Master: Using the ancient texts within the Book of Souls and the Book of Amplification, Silanar possesses the exceedingly rare knowledge required to orchestrate global magical rituals. He successfully linked the minds of fourteen mages across the planet to execute the catastrophic soulsundering.
Key Relationships
- Melenora: His wife. Silanar loves her deeply and fiercely protects her. When she volunteers to sacrifice her life to create a Prime Tree, Silanar is devastated, begging her not to go through with it.
- Arra: His adoptive daughter. Though he frequently clashes with her headstrong nature and strictly punishes her disobedience, he harbors a deep love for her and ultimately sacrifices his own life to shield her from Quynn's blade.
- Elanil: His biological daughter. He is highly protective of her and is utterly shattered when she is temporarily killed during the conflict with the Cothellon.
- Orym (Aten): His oldest friend and eventual rival. When Orym defects to the Cothellon, Silanar feels deeply betrayed, though the two men are forced to work together centuries later to stop the Conjunction.
- Thalanil: His former friend. Upon discovering Thalanil's betrayal and affair with Aelynthi, Silanar banished him from the village, harboring a deep hatred for the mindmaster that lasted for centuries.
- Myriani (Cariel/Magona): His mother. Silanar often found her eccentric and creepy, completely unaware that she was an ancient, shape-shifting Prime Mage who manipulated the village from the shadows.