User:Joshmaul/Po'gaenus the Exalted

"'We find our purpose how we may, and make the best of it. In the end, even as long as we can live, we are not immortal - the journey will end sometime, but it is what we do on that journey that defines us, not where we're going.'"
 * - Po'gaenus the Exalted

An ancient and powerful draenei priest, Po'gaenus the Exalted has followed the Prophet Velen across the stars since the exodus from Argus 25,000 years ago. The draenei were forced to relocate so often that Po'gaenus began to see that it was the journey that was of ultimate consequence, not the destination. He founded a small faction he called the Gorak'nar, ancient Eredun for "Scions of the Stars", believing that the draenei were not bound to the soil of any one world, but to the protection of all.

Biography
Born in Mac'Aree on Argus, Po'gaenus trained early in the priesthood, learning how to wield the power of the Light. When Kil'jaeden and Archimonde swore the eredar people to Sargeras and his Burning Legion, Po'gaenus was among those who fled aboard the Genedar with Velen and his followers, becoming known as the exiles - the "draenei".

As time went on, and the draenei were forced to find sanctuary from those of their people transformed into man'ari and sent to hound them into oblivion by Kil'jaeden, Po'gaenus began to believe that ultimately, it was the journey itself that mattered rather than the destination. Thus he gathered a small band of followers who called themselves the "Gorak'nar", an ancient Eredun term meaning "Scions of the Stars", believing that it was the destiny of the draenei to spread the Light in the worlds of the Beyond. By the time his people had settled on Draenor, Po'gaenus began to wonder if his people had become overly complacent - a worry proven true when the orcs were banded together into the Horde by Kil'jaeden's subtle manipulations.

Though he witnessed the deaths of many of his friends and colleagues in the ensuing slaughter, Po'gaenus never lost faith in the Light, even as he and what survivors remained hid in the wilderness where neither the orcs nor the demons could find them. It would be decades later, after Draenor was shattered into what was now Outland, that the voyage would continue again - this time aboard the Exodar, which crash-landed on an island off the coast of northern Kalimdor.

After aiding his people in settling their new homeland in the Azuremyst Isles, Po'gaenus set out once again, wandering the roads and seaways of Azeroth and learning all that he could. Wherever he went, however, it seemed that conflict was ever-present - starting with the return to Outland, followed by the war for Northrend and the devastation wrought by the Cataclysm. It would not be until the Legion came in force in the Broken Isles that Po'gaenus would set aside his travels, aligned himself with the Conclave of Netherlight, and set out for the front lines. It would be in that conflict that the conflict with the Legion would return to where, for the draenei, it had all began: Argus.

Following the successful conclusion of the campaign, Po'gaenus returned to Azeroth with the Army of the Light; though not inclined to take up the path of the Lightforged himself (something he called the "province of the young"), he supported the effort to bring them into the Alliance with the rest of his people, hoping that together, perhaps they could stem the far greater conflict that seemed to be in the offing. To his regret, they failed; if anything, the Lightforged were more fanatically devoted to the war than the "regular" draenei - no doubt spurred on by the example of High Exarch Turalyon, the human paladin who had been lost in space and time before leading the Army of the Light to victory on Argus. Po'gaenus himself offered healing to the armies in the field, but looked upon the Alliance-Horde conflict as a whole as folly, particularly following events in Nazjatar. He was relieved to see it end without further bloodshed at the gates of Orgrimmar.

In the wake of the armistice, Po'gaenus began to experience visions of a torn veil between life and death - and once again left "civilization" behind to seek out the signs...