The Magi

13 High Magi working together were able to pierce the veil and step through into the Above.

Edwin, Eli & Bethom went mad and were lost.

Queri & Gaius never mastered immortality and died of old age

Keverin was killled by Ophir.

Innovera killed herself.

Alric, Noctis, Mathian, Ophir, Aelvis & Kestra are all presumed to be alive.

History
There's an academy. Not one that takes in kids and teaches them. More like a conclave of great minds. A place where knowledge isn't just gathered but the sources of that knowledge are put together in rooms and awesome shit happens.

The Magi were all parts of different cabals within the academy but their talent and love of magic drew them together. Some of them were experts in craft, others had huge talent with the art and some were strong in the gift.

They called themselves the magi, originally there were 19 of them but only 13 thought it was a good idea to step through the veil and saturate themselves in the Astral sea.

So they get the idea to step through to the other side, knowing that it would grant them all power and open their minds like nothing else could.

There are huge risks involved but they take their time preparing and when the time comes they enlist another group of magic users as a killswitch incase something goes wrong, ensuring that any damage of negative energy can be contained if things go south.

Their bodies are pulled through but it's their minds that matter

So the fabric of reality is pinched and pulled through, They're only gone for a split second but to them it's an eternity

Their bodies and minds are steeped in the power and knowledge of the Astral Sea

So in a crack they're gone and back and totally wrecked. Everyone would think it was a failure. They're missing three of the Magi and most of them are in shock, burned, frost-bitten or worn raw

They spend weeks sleeping the days away, holing themselves up to scribble down everything they remember, comparing notes on things, etc. They disappear from the public view for months to gather their wits, recover, etc.

There are mental breakdowns during that time. Maybe they go somewhere secluded to figure themselves out

They've just had their preconceptions of everything shattered. Their minds crammed full of knowledge. Their lives reviewed ad-nauseum and their egos, psyches and everythiing that made them individual scraped raw.

I'd say they stick together for a very long time. They stick with the academy, maybe doing some traveling in pairs. Like celebrity appearances. The Magi who navigated beyo nd the veil. so for a time after it recently happened, everyone believes and knows it's a very real thing that happened, and then over time, as the people who were alive at the time die off, it becomes more and more disbelief and the stuff of legends.

Exactly. It's so fantastic a thing that experience fades to legend and legend fades to myth. It also doesn't help that The Faith get's it's start a little while after this. Since the Magi will have learned how to attune the shards and allow normal people to use them.

being steeped in the Astral Sea would help give them all a greater purpose, a drive towards achievements greater than themselves. It changed them greatly. They would get sad she loved ones die but they've also been given a drive and passion befitting their power

Inovera
She teaches a group of Mages a way to compel their soldiers into being calmer, showing them how they can keep their forces level headed in the midst of battle. But they then go and use it to take over the minds of the soldiers who then turn into savages.

She resolves the issue, or so she thinks, and takes her own life in shame at what she's done.

Innovera tries to fix it but makes it worse, tries to make a antidote but ends up making it communicable through fluids. In exasperation she kills herself so she would stop making it worse. Because she is driven to make it better and can't. So she see's madness on the horizon and realizes that the only way to be free is to end it all. She can't fix it but HAS to fix it and if she does not she will go mad. So, she puts on her best dress and dies in her bed.

The Weir
It can be passed through saliva and blood, will lay dormant on a surface for decades. It has been a hundred years since the last outbreak so much of the world has forgotten. But there is a corspe, pinned to the wall of an old barrow with a sword. And somebody nicks themselves on that sword.

And in a few hours they find the sunlight is far too bright. Everyone around them irritating and infuriating to deal with. They get a fever and hole up in bed for a day. Then he wakes, his wife sleeping next to him. Fury that she should sleep while he was not rises in him and he strangles her to death. Then he moves to the room of his son and daughter in law, killing his son with a chair and biting his sons wife and casting her across the room where she is knocked out. He stalks out into the night and savages a guard, ripping his throat out with teeth and fingers like claws. He is taken down by other men of the watch but that sickness spreads and soon the town has only 5 left alive, all of them crazed savage shadows of their former selves.

Keverin
Greatly liked by the people, charismatic. swears allegiance to some king, cuz he's impulsive. That king is kind of a douche and decides he wants to take over some neighboring city-states. The city-states band together and go to war to defend their lands. The king demands that Keverin helps and so he goes to war and the City-states don't stand a chance against his power. he helps a corrupt king take independence away from several peaceful city-states, Maybe he is given a barony in one of these city-states and he does a very poor job taking care of it. the king dies of old age And the kings son is a much better man

A man that is going to give independence back to the city-states. So Keverin decides to take over. "What this nation needs is an immortal god-emperor". So he murders the royal family and declares himself god-emperor. And for a time things are actually really good. He does a much better job when he's got aids and councilors taking care of everything, But eventually he starts wanting to make ALL of the decisions

and things go to shit. The economy tanks, people are fleeing the country, bands of brigands spring up everywhere. So he comes down with an iron fist, conscripts a massive army and uses them on his own people to keep them in line. But at the same time he makes public appearances and many of the people actually adore him because he showers them with gifts, heals the sick, helps their crop grow, while the outer territories are under marshal law. Eventually things calm down, he figures things out and the country improves. He becomes more of a servant and helps his people and things get really good but he's still pretty much Kim-Jong-Il, silencing his opponents and dissenters brutally while showering his supporters with gifts. So the people adore him but Ophir is over it. It's only a matter of time before everything goes to shit.

Alric
Alric the brave, Thraiendor's Lion, Raising chittering birds and cooking for kobolds.

He'd have a garden since Gaius loved ferns and green plant-life. He'd raise and care for Wrennics, Gaius' favorite bird. Invite the occasional passing band of Kobolds to dinner since Gaius had a soft spot for the low kin.

Alric, who loved Gaius. Gaius could only extend his life so much and eventually died of old age. The other Magi moved on but Alric stayed, tending Gaius' grave through millenia

The city has crumbled, a few towers still stand, maybe an EI (elemental intelligence) is still up and running, at least keeping Alric company so he's not bored to death. He spends his time reading, putting on plays for the ei aat Gaius's tomb and caring for the manor he build around it. So what happens to Alric is even more depressing. He has a drive and ambition to live and be a benefit to the world but he's broken and doesn't know how to do that

Noctis
Tall dark and handsome. He looks like a pretty and dumb brute but brilliant in a savant kind of way.

Ophir
Kept more to himself, quiet, withdrawn person. Cold, distant, and grouchy, always doing what needs done. Not as well-liked as Keverin. He met with Keverin and discovered the cracks in the man's psyche, tried to help but only made it worse. He realized he had to put down the rabid dog but after Keverin was dead, Ophir was painted as a murderous villain and a traitor.

Current whereabouts: Ophir would be in the new world somewhere, helping a kingdom of kobolds become respectable.

Ophir comes to the palace and in front of everyone kills the God-Emperor.

Maybe he stands trial for it, is found guilty and thrown into prison for the rest of his life. A few hundred years pass, memory fades, and Ophir gets pardoned by the senate, because one of the other Magi convinced them to. Ophir is banished. But in that time the kingdom has grown, taken over most of the known world so he goes into the south and isn't heard from again.

Ophir never finds out that the Magi were behind his release. If he knew he'd refuse to leave his cell. He did murder a man, after all, even if he was a false god.

Kestra
Artisan of Dusk, Evenlight, Weaver of The Waning Light,  Sunset Cartographer.

On to something bad for the world, working with Noctis.

while Kestra's researching that thing she's working on, she comes across historical reference to what Ophir did and the fact that he's still imprisoned and she's like "wait a fucking minute""cmon Kronk" *drags Noctis off to break Ophir out*

Mathian
Speaker for the Dead,  Cartographer of the Veil, Kestras Lament, Bard of the Gallows & Steward of Twilights Dawn.

Traits
Very good looking, on the thinner side, hair always a mess. Not at all concerned with how he looks. Eccentric, very perceptive, socially awkward and often times rude. Extremely petty, gets even when things don't go his way.

I think he should've been way more responsible in the past and he's kinda degraded somewhat over time, either become jaded, or bored, or whatever.

and a lot of these titles should be hyped up legend that have a kernel of truth, like "speaker of the dead" the legend is a whole city burned and he gave himself as a vessel as you said, but in reality it was only ONE spirit.

The Bard of the Gallows was a real person but it wasn't Mathian. It was a man who would sing for the condemned as they died, maybe speak for them after they had passed so people assumed it was Mathian in disguise

Steward of Twilight's Dawn could be a fable that he can return souls of the dead to life but he actually can't, and he got tired of people seeking him out to bring loved ones back

Speaker for the Dead because he held and gave himself as vessel to a group of slaughtered spirits so that they could say goodbye to their families and accuse their murderer? Something like that. Something totally fucked up and weird but awesome and vengeful