Velhelsins Clone
I did not seek immortality for vanity.
I sought it because the world is ruled by time, and time devours even the greatest minds.
During the long centuries of the Great Elf War I watched kings fall, generals age, and entire strategies vanish because the mind that conceived them turned to dust. An empire cannot be guided by brilliance if brilliance dies before its work is finished.
So I asked a simple question:
What if death itself could be delayed?At first my experiments were crude—failed vessels, malformed bodies, lifeless flesh. Many attempts collapsed before they could sustain a soul. But eventually I discovered that the secret was not merely copying the body, but preparing a perfectly receptive vessel for the returning spirit.
The soul, after all, is not easily tricked. It must recognize its home.
Thus was born the spell now called Velhelsin's Clone.
When the ritual is performed correctly, a duplicate body is grown within a sealed vessel over many months. It is inert—empty—but perfectly prepared. Should the original body perish, the soul finds its way to the waiting vessel and awakens once more.
A continuation. Not a resurrection.
Many call this spell unnatural. Some even call it blasphemy.
But the truth is simpler:
The world is shaped by those who endure long enough to finish their work.And I have always intended to finish mine.
— Velhelsin Oreiner, Empress of the Velhelsinese Empire
For the complete mechanical description of Clone, see D&D Beyond or the Player’s Handbook.
Manifestation¶
The casting of Velhelsin’s Clone is slow and ritualistic rather than visually dramatic. As the caster traces sigils in the air over the prepared vessel, faint strands of dark violet Aether gather around the fragment of flesh placed within. Over the course of the hour-long ritual, the vessel becomes filled with a dim, pulsing glow, like a heart beating in darkness.
When the ritual completes, the glow fades and the vessel becomes still once more. Nothing appears to happen—but deep within the vessel, a new body begins to grow.
Over the next one hundred and twenty days the clone slowly forms, suspended in alchemical fluids and surrounded by lingering Aetheric residue. Sensitive mages sometimes report hearing faint echoes of thought within the vessel as the body matures.
Discovery¶
Velhelsin developed the Clone spell during the height of the Great Elf War, when she realized that the fate of the Velhelsinese Empire depended on her continued leadership.
Already one of the most powerful archmages of the Age of the Elves, she turned her attention toward necromancy and the mysteries of the soul. Her research focused on the boundary between life and death, seeking a method not to revive the dead, but to preserve the self beyond mortal limits.
After years of experimentation, she perfected the ritual that allowed a soul to inhabit a prepared duplicate body upon death. This discovery would later become one of the most feared secrets of Velhelsin’s court.
Rumors persist that many of the Empress’s later appearances were not the same body that first took the throne, but successors grown in hidden chambers of the imperial palace.
Whether those rumors are true has never been confirmed.
Material Components
a diamond worth 1,000+ GP, which the spell consumes, and a sealable vessel worth 2,000+ GP that is large enough to hold the creature being cloned
Gestures & Ritual
Casting Velhelsin’s Clone requires the caster to establish an Aetheric connection between the living creature, the fragment of its flesh, and the empty vessel in which the duplicate body will grow. The ritual proceeds slowly, with the caster tracing a repeating sequence of sigils over the vessel while directing strands of Aether through the diamond catalyst and into the preserved flesh.
The verbal component consists of three binding phrases, repeated throughout the ritual:
“Caro formetur. Anima meminerit. Vinculum maneat.”
Let the flesh be formed. Let the soul remember. Let the bond remain.
Each phrase serves a distinct purpose. The first directs the Aether to use the fragment of flesh as a pattern from which the new body can be formed. The second establishes the forming body as something the creature’s soul will recognize as itself rather than as an imitation or foreign vessel. The third anchors that recognition within the Aether, allowing the connection to persist after the spell is cast and remain dormant until the original body dies.
As these words are spoken, the caster moves their hands in slow circular patterns above the vessel, repeatedly drawing the gathered Aether inward. The gestures prevent the energy from dispersing and gradually bind it to the flesh and diamond. With each repetition, faint strands of dark violet Aether become more tightly woven around the contents of the vessel.
At the conclusion of the hour-long ritual, the caster places one hand upon the vessel and traces the final binding sigil with the other. The caster then speaks the full name of the creature being cloned.
The name is the final sympathetic link. The flesh identifies the body, but the spoken name identifies the individual. At that moment, the Aetheric pattern closes around the vessel, connecting the creature’s living soul to the body that will eventually grow within it.
The diamond is consumed as the binding becomes permanent. The gathered Aether remains within the vessel, sustaining the slow formation of the duplicate body over the following one hundred and twenty days.
Related Discipline
Imperial School of Velhelsinese Necromancy
Related School
Necromancy
Effect Duration
Instantaneous (Clone grows over 120 days)
Effect Casting Time
1 Hour
Range
Touch
Level
8th