Brotherhood of Light

Warning! This article contains spoilers. Proceed at your own risk.

The Brotherhood of Light is an organization formed by knights. Their main objective consists to remove the forces of darkness that plague Europe in Castlevania: Lords of Shadow.

History

Lords of Shadow

The Brotherhood of Light was an order of knights founded centuries ago by three great warriors: Zobek, Carmilla, and Cornell. These idealistic warriors were dedicated to serving God, it was their sole purpose and the order was tasked with combating the forces of evil. At an unknown time they fought the sovereign of the elemental Plane of Darkness known as The Forgotten One. This powerful demon was summoned by the Bernhard family, but broke free of their control and had to be stopped. During their battle with the creature, the founders combined their powers to create a dimensional rift to imprison the Forgotten One within the centre of the Bernhard Castle. For decades the three Founders fought fiercely against the minions and spawn of Satan until finally tipping the balance in Heaven's favor. Their sheer commitment to their crusade led to them uncovering in their studies, discovering the location of three sacred sites where the power of God converged so immensely that they each created a bridge between the spiritual and physical planes. Using this power, the founders purified themselves and abandoned their physical bodies, becoming nigh-omnipotent spirits who's power was second only to God himself. Unknown to them and many others, the bodies they left behind weren't simply devoid of souls but were instead consumed by their darker sides. Thus the founders inadvertently created the Lords of Shadow who rose to power and plagued the lands with their evil.

Some time later, the link between the Heaven and the Earth began to grow weak for unknown reasons. The Brotherhood attempts to stop the End of Days by defeating the Lords of Shadow and hoped to discover the one who cast the spell that separated Heavan from Earth, and released the forces of Hell, however many knights of the order died throughout Europe in an attempt to discover and defeat that evil. This led to the Brotherhood consulting an ancient prophecy which spoke of a Warrior of Light who would be sent into the domains of the Lords of Shadow and end their reign of terror. Thus, they selected one of their own, namely Gabriel Belmont. Gabriel is eventually successful in his quest but ended up becoming a vampire, obtaining astounding powers from the Forgotten One and started referring to himself as Dracul (meaning "The Dragon").

As an insurance policy, the Brotherhood hid and raised Gabriel's son, Trevor Belmont, who later started a journey to defeat his demonic father.

Mirror of Fate

Out of thirst for revenge Trevor Belmont sought to kill his father for the death of his mother. Decades later Trevor's son Simon would attempt to finish what his father started. It is currently unknown what part the Brotherhood played in these events, though they did desire the end of Dracula.

Lords of Shadow 2

By the time of Lords of Shadow 2 the Brotherhood now sees Dracula as an enemy and attempts to invade his castle to kill him. It is shown that they now possess advanced technology for their time in the form of a large Titan made of wood and machinery. They deploy hundreds of knights and a Paladin. Dracula, however, proves more powerful than they anticipated and their entire army is destroyed.

However due to Dracula's sudden disappearance at the battle's conclusion history remembers the Brother hood as the victors.

Epilogue

Victor Belmont is the last leader of the Brotherhood of Light. The organization has gone underground to avoid being wiped out by the Army of Satan or other factions such as Zobek's Society.

Background

The signature weapons of the order was the Combat Cross which the origins of were largely unknown, but what was known was that many of the additions to these weapons were made on the orders of chief artisan and alchemist, Rinaldo Gandalfi, though certain designs that he included were rejected by the elders of the Brotherhood. They also use unique sub-weapons like the Silver Daggers, Electric Bomb, Boomerang and Holy Water.

Members

Founders

• Zobek
• Cornell
• Carmilla

Other

• Cardinal Volpe (Leader, and founder of the school)
• Cardinal Vicus (Grand Master)
• Grand Master Quisada (Brotherhood General)
• General Channarong
• Rinaldo Gandolfi (Inventor)
• Roland de Ronceval (Paladin)
• Gabriel Belmont
• Trevor Belmont
• Simon Belmont (under guidance of both the Brotherhood and the Barbarians of Wallachia)
• Victor Belmont
• Agustin of Wygol (High Inquistitor)
• Thorir of Norway
• Victor
• Stefano
• Michael
• Sister Laverne
• Brother Bernard
• András de Wygol
• Raul Duke
• Gisverio "The Beardless"
• Gerard the Lion-Hearted
• Baiou
• Danasty
• Chupacabra
• Mario (assumed)
• H. Hughes (Master Engineer)
• H
• Hilbert "The Stubborn"
• Frederic
• Eric
• Rolan
• Sir William Rem
• "One-Eyed" Gregory
• Alvar "The Wise"
• Vincent V.
• Chester de Vries
• Nuallan "The Miserable"
• Rainer "The Illiterate"
• Reginar de Camp
• Andreas Aloisius
• Ledorinian (Brotherhood soldier)

Factions

• Brotherhood Soldiers
• Heavy Brotherhood Warriors
• Paladins
• Brotherhood Clerics

Allies

• Pan
• Toy Maker (at one time apprentice to Gandolfi)
• Mountain People/Barbarian Tribesman of Wallachia (helped the Brotherhood train Simon Belmont)

Trivia

• It seems that the Brotherhood has been in contact with Pan. It was to him that Gabriel was sent to find the Lake of Oblivion and it was he that convinced Marie to keep the birth of Trevor a secret from Gabriel, thus assuring the continuation of the Belmont line. Mirrors of Fate shows Pan and some of the Brotherhood leadership take Trevor from Marie.
• The Brotherhood seems to borrow broad concepts from other orders of warrior monks.
  • The Knights Templar was a group of holy warriors which existed in the same time frame as the Brotherhood.
  • The Brotherhood also bears much in common with the Order of the Dragon (Dracul in Romanian), a Christian order of knights who defended Europe from the Muslim Turks. It was to this order that Vlad II Dracul, the father of Vlad Țepeș belonged and from which he drew his surname (Dracul).
  • The Brotherhood also has traits in common with the Jedi of the Star Wars franchise.
    • Both organizations serve a higher power (God/The Force).
    • Both grant their warriors special weapons (Combat Cross/Lightsaber).
    • Both were betrayed by a "Chosen One" who turned to darkness (Gabriel Belmont/Anakin Skywalker).