FIRST APPEARANCE: p.86 (S1)
LAST APPEARANCE: p.360 (S1)
ORIGIN: unknown/Perceptive Times
CURRENT STATUS: pending
Refusaleth Badidea is a truevil (a true evil) that exists in both Perceptive and Narrative Times. He is monstrous beyond imagining, a living engine of cruelty to which there is no earthly comparison. Any vestige of humanity in his appearance is a mocking facade. He is responsible firsthand for the loss of countless lives, wiping out colonies, provinces, even entire species, without using any kind of weapon. He knows a thousand esoteric methods of inflicting agonizing pain, or erasing his opponent from existence, seemingly without much effort. At full power, Refusaleth can literally move mountains.
PERCEPTIVE HISTORY
Refusaleth was born when a bad idea crossed paths with bad intentions. The details of this are known but not yet fully disclosed.
A thousand years ago, Refusaleth formed an army of the Mankind of the Beyonding, and led them to slaughter the Glowborg tribes. Some accounts dispute Refusaleth’s role as leader, claiming he was manipulated or exploited by an unknown group into orchestrating the genocide of the Glowborgs.
Before he could be punished for his atrocities, Refusaleth disappeared, jumping across time and letting his legacy of terror grow, for centuries.
NARRATIVE HISTORY
Refusaleth as he is presently known first emerged near a farm in the desert land of Drymouth, having traversed the temporal cyclone unaided. Already his great power was evident; upon arrival he could levitate solid matter, and he quickly devastated the farm, its occupants, and almost all the surrounding peoples and fauna. He spared one single subborg, who repaid the gesture by taking Refusaleth’s side for the remainder of its life.
A master of arcane and forbidden knowledges, Refusaleth could draw power from the mere speaking of his name, or even similar-sounding words (see p.100). Soon he learned how to conjure or change matter, and he recruited the fallen Overkeeper Curdelbludd, rebuilding his physical form. They made their way underground into one of Nefaria the Red’s hidden monstrances, where Refusaleth uncovered a captive army of anathemites, and evidence of the dark art of maniplacation. A blind Mog-Rifect revealed a cache of rare, powerful gems, and Refusaleth remade him (into Mogrum) as a reward.
SECOND FORM
Flush with energy and bristling with new information, Refusaleth exploded out of the desert sand from the catacombs below, downing a small plane with a flick of his finger. Both pilot and passenger were killed, but one of them- a comely young termagant named Shiraadh- was returned to life by Refusaleth. Shiraadh became his close companion, locating a ruin that would become their headquarters. Soon Refusaleth’s invasion of the Upper Frontlands would begin in earnest, with Mogrum’s release of the Skatalyx Hordes (p.147).
Under command of Refusaleth, Curdelbludd ramped up the slaughter of Inway’s population to genocidal extremes, and Shiraadh decimated the Midirian Empire’s air forces. During this time Refusaleth stated his larger goals; deicide (of the creator goddess Aga Regata), and reclamation of the pieces of the Prime Resinate (a stone so powerful, it was broken into pieces and dispersed long ago by the Old Ones).
The truevil’s plans were first thwarted by the killing of Curdelbludd, whom Refusaleth had remade using his own physical materia. He recovered slowly as fear spread about him, and King Reclinus V of Inway surrendered to him, greatly increasing his power. He used a resinimp to contact Jellyback, one of the few remaining Glowborgs, who believes that Refusaleth slaughtered his people a thousand years ago, long before his own birth. He offered the Glowchief a deal; let Refusaleth wipe out mankind, and in return, his ancestral lands would be returned to him.
Refusaleth’s personal retinue continued to grow, now including the mysterious conniving Quiatas, and Tremenz, a murderous monster from Badman’s Island who could detect human flesh by smell. Mogrum orchestrated the capture of the Agratian knight Guntaur, whom Quiatas presented to Refusaleth, now in his third, more powerful form.
THIRD FORM
As a display of his new abilities, Refusaleth teleported himself and Guntaur to a desolate area, miles from any living thing. Spotting Insanus’ island laboratory floating high overhead, Refusaleth caused the land mass to fall from the sky, then disappeared from underneath as it crushed Guntaur.
At his fortress, Refusaleth conferred with Quiatas, who suggested that his “Lord” expand his terror campaign to the Midlands, across the Regatian Ocean. Refusaleth revealed his knowledge of the names of the Dark Unmentionables and the Void, as well as his captive Norris Bundt, whose penchant for cursing and lying had partially twisted him into a lowly besmurchin. Quiatas learned that his chosen master knew the tragic origin of the Unicorns, and that if Refusaleth could locate an actual human being, he could locate our ordinary world, and travel there as well.
Refusaleth found and revived Shiraadh again, following her encounter with resinatus sent by Darkana, which he reprogrammed to seek out the pieces of the Prime Resinate. When Shiraadh reported her discovery of the sunken kingdom of the Gargiles as well as a genuine human, Refusaleth countered that he had already caught Cornelius’s scent, and that he’d heard his name (when Zaz recited it in confusion) spoken at the bottom of Lake Ziera, and therefore knew what was down there. Sensing demoralization in Shiraadh, Refusaleth offered to give her the Backlands, if she would help him conquer the Farthest Point of the Beyonding; Fargon.
High above the ocean in the Cloud Concourse, Refusaleth met with Fargon’s Prince Karbunkel, who was lured there under false pretenses by a disguised Shiraadh. Refusaleth told Karbunkel that in The Past, he was very close to the prince’s mother, Nefaria the Red. Karbunkel claimed to have no need of Refusaleth, and turned his back on him, causing the truevil to lose control of his anger and obliterate the Cloud Concourse, killing everything else aboard. More than 5,000 lives were lost. Still apoplectic with rage, Refusaleth punched through the floor of his fortress from the air, rocketing through the continental shelf towards the Lowest Point.
In Fexes, Refusaleth managed to summon the colossal Dark Beast Nadira. Nadira questioned the truevil’s purpose, and Refusaleth stated his goal of killing Aga Regata (“the false demiurge”). Nadira promised Refusaleth that if he was successful, he would rule the Beyonding forever, just as the Dark Beast inserted a long shard of itself behind his eyeball.
Shiraadh discovered Refusaleth motionless and unresponsive, seated upon his throne in his fortress. When his acolytes returned with pieces of the Prime Resinate, his body began to spin until he became a centrifuge, pulling all nearby matter into it, killing Norris Bundt, the subborg, and the resinatus. Shiraadh barely escaped alive, receiving a dislocated jaw in the process.
FOURTH FORM
When Refusaleth reappeared, his crown and collar were adorned with fully Darkened crystals, indicating his maximized power. He overheard Quiatas explaining to Mogrum that he had secretly researched Refusaleth’s origin, and found the exact point that he believed could unmake the truevil. Despite Quiatas’ belief that he would not cross the ocean to Midiria, Refusaleth used the dormant Gargiles to do just that, overloading them with evil energy until the rock-beings grew to hundreds of feet tall. He stacked the Gargrudgen atop each other until they could simply carry the truevil across the water, as they walked across the ocean floor to Midiria.
Preceded by waves of Darkness, Refusaleth interrupted the Tournament of Greatest, informing the announcer and crowd of thousands that he came from the Void Xenihilo. When his scheduled opponent claimed to originate from the Kingdom of Inway, Refusaleth told him that he had “returned” the territory to the Dark Unmentionable Holocough (who was currently annihilating it). Sensing Refusaleth’s murderous intentions, Allied Councilor Yakimastu Obeisan tried to appeal to the truevil’s honor by offering him the capitol spires if he competed fairly and won. If Refusaleth lost, then he must leave and never return.
In short order, Refusaleth brutally massacred all competition, including the Agratian knight Eldlyfe. Yakimastu Obeisan angrily confronted Refusaleth, claiming he’d broken the rules by killing. This was a distraction to stall Refusaleth so that he could be sniped by Dedurum of the Midirian Empire, who had camped in hiding. Needless to say, Dedurum was not successful. Obeisan had better luck by directly challenging Refusaleth’s power and calling his bluff, but the truevil vaporized the ground beneath the Councilor’s feet, sending him tumbling into the Void below.
In a desperate effort to contain the situation, Imperial air carriers (zeppeloyers) deployed legions of giant Wallopers, piloted by humans. What no one knew is that the manufacturers of the Wallopers had initiated a secret recall command, overriding the controls and marching them slowly back to Shoadom. The zeppeloyers strayed too high up, and fell prey to the titanic worm-like sky sliggans, attracted to the death and chaos. By now the Gargrudgen had arrived at Refusaleth’s location, and at his order, they collapsed, crushing and burying the Tournament and Wallopers under a mile of solid stone. Over 130,000 lives were estimated lost.
Now nearly omnipotent, Refusaleth used “connective Darkness” to surprise Quiatas by questioning their association. He disputed Quiatas’ account of his recruitment, and brought him to the temporal cyclone. Unlike Refusaleth, Quiatas could not withstand the tides of time that whipped all around them, and disintegrated.
Following the death of his chief devotee Shiraadh at the hands of Nefaria the Red, Refusaleth experienced extreme physical trauma, as the fortress they rebuilt crumbled underneath him. He teleported to a safe place somewhere, recovering also from the subsequent death of Mogrum (Nefaria again). He used his powers of magnetism to pull the last remaining form he had conjured; the rebuilt body of Curdelbludd, which had been hijacked by the head of a fallen knight. Refusaleth squeezed the head to tiny size, tossing it aside, and reincorporated Curdelbludd’s body back into his own, taking his final form.
FINAL FORM
Now only one piece of the Prime Resinate remained to be uncovered. Standing high atop the capitol spires of Midiria, Refusaleth surveyed the lands far below, concentrating on the fragment’s location. His solitude was interrupted by the arrival of Nefaria the Red, and he confronted her about taking credit for his genocidal misdeeds in the Past. Nefaria extended an olive branch in the form of the final section of the Prime Resinate, completing the super-powerful stone. Nefaria bid the truevil Godspeed as the Prime Resinate repelled the peak of the tallest crystal spire, pushing Refusaleth heavenward, to the Highest Point.
Refusaleth rode the crystal “centrifugue” upward until the demiurge Aga Regata could see him, as he fought Bromance Evergreen, the sworn protector of all Aga had created. Refusaleth revealed that he knew about Earth (the “ordinary world”), as well as Bromance’s original name. Speaking this name, particularly with a goddess in earshot, would take away the last of Bromance’s power.
Only three syllables of the name were spoken before Refusaleth, distracted, was impaled by Radish-Hoof the Unicorn, who had flown Bromance onto the centrifugue. With Refusaleth now unable to speak or move, Bromance ripped the truevil’s head apart, declaring him Void. The titanic land-mass of the centrifugue, no longer powered by any source, began to erupt and crumble, before exploding in a blinding flash that illuminated the uppermost cone of the atmosphere.
- FUN FACTS
- Can move his teeth independently for no reason other than to demoralize
- His laughter can cause madness in those who hear it
- Bears vestigial resemblance to an obese human being, particularly the one who caused him to be born (glimpsed on Quiatas’s gem, p.280)