As Raziel enters the coutryard from the tunnel he stops, dumbstruck: Raziel: My God... The Sanctuary of the Clans, reduced to ruin... Beyond these walls lay the Pillars of Nosgoth, the seat of Kain’s empire.  How humble it now appeared, collapsing into the dust of its former magnificence.  And yet I had only just emerged...  In the instant between my execution and resurrection, centuries had apparently passed...

The ground shakes violently; Raziel is nearly knocked off his feet.

Elder God:
This world is wracked with cataclysms - the earth strains to shrug off the pestilence of Kain’s parasitic empire.

The fate of this world was preordained in an instant, by a solitary man.  Unwilling to martyr himself to restore Nosgoth’s balance, Kain condemned the world to the decay you see.  In that moment, the unraveling began... now it is nearly played out.  Nosgoth teeters on the brink of collapse - its fragile balance cannot hold.

Raziel pulls uselessly at the large metals doors of the Sanctuary, which are impassably sealed.  He stops and scans the building’s facade for a possible breach.

Raziel:
The doors of the Sanctuary were immovable, either barred from the inside or rusted shut.  I would need to find another means of entry.
 
 

Raziel walks onto the main platform and to the edge, then peers down into the Vortex below. Raziel: This, at least, had remained constant.  The endlessly swirling vortex of the abyss.  My tomb, and the womb of my rebirth. He rises, surveying his surroundings.  Raziel: Though much of Nosgoth’s landscape had changed, these cliffs gave me my bearings.  My clan territory was to the west - I was anxious to see how my descendants had fared during the centuries of my absence.

Raziel’s Clan Territory

Raziel discovers that his clan has apparently been wiped out - the city that they once occupied is desolate, clearly abandoned for centuries... Raziel: Utter desolation.  My once-proud kin, wiped from this world like excrement from a boot. I knew the hand that wrought this deed...

Exploring the western ruins of his clan territory, he spies a band of creatures that he has not yet encountered.  He watches from a safe perch.  They murder a human villager, and perch over their fresh kill, gnawing on it.
 

Raziel: I didn’t recognize these flayed wracks of flesh.  Their scent was vampiric, but they gnawed upon their victim’s carcass like dogs. If returning to the Elder God’s chamber before going to the Necropolis, Raziel receives the following clue/advice: Elder God: Beyond the ruins of your former stronghold, and above the gardens of the dead, your brother Melchiah waits...

The Necropolis

After encountering the decayed, ghoulish Melchahim, and after having recognized Melchiah’s clan symbols scrawled throughout the Necropolis, Raziel realizes that these zombie-like creatures are actually the children of his former brother, Melchiah.

Raziel:
This charnel house bore the unmistakable marks of Melchiah’s clan.  To what depths had our dynasty plummeted, if these ghouls were the descendants of my high-born brother?  Were they so debased as to recruit fledglings from the desiccated corpses here interred?
 

Raziel comes upon an engraving of Melchiah in his near-human form.  This is a towering, heroic monument - contrasted with the scuttling, devolved Melchahim just beyond the next gate. Raziel: My brother, Melchiah, was made last, and therefore received the poorest portion of Kain’s gift.  Although immortal, his soul could not sustain the flesh, which retained much of its previous human frailty.  This weakness, it seemed, was passed on to his offspring.  Their fragile skins barely contained the underlying decay.

 
 

In an interior crypt, and in the spectral plane, Raziel first encounters a vampire wraith. Elder God: Beware, Raziel.  These wraiths are vampire spirits, fettered too long in the spectral realm.  When their vampire natures adapt to this plane, they become eaters of souls.  Do not allow these spirits to reinhabit their corpses...

 
 

Melchiah

Raziel: Show yourself, creature! Melchiah: Do you not recognize me, brother?  Am I so changed? Raziel: Melchiah? Melchiah: Yesss, brother.  You should have stayed where the master sent you, Raziel.  You will find Nosgoth less pleasant than you remember.

Raziel:
What has become of my clan?  Answer me, little brother, or I will beat an answer from your horrid lips.

Melchiah:
Everyone is afraid, sibling.  You awake to a world of fear.  These times of change are so... unsettling.
Do you think I feel no revulsion for this form?  Do you believe for a moment that our Lord would risk his empire upon an upstart inheritance?

Raziel:
Enough riddles - what are you saying?!

Melchiah:
You are the last... to die...

If Raziel is defeated in the battle, then upon his return:

Melchiah:
Welcome, brother...

As soon as Melchiah is trapped in the center cage, Raziel holds his hand on the switch, ready to pull it, and asks:

Raziel:
Tell me, Melchiah - where can I find Kain?

Melchiah:
The master is beyond your reach, Raziel.
He makes himself known when He sees fit - not when commanded.

Raziel pulls the switch:

Melchiah:
(Dies in agony...)
I am released...

The impact of devouring Melchiah’s soul knocks Raziel to his knees.  He’s exhausted; sparks of energy flicker over his body.

Elder God:
You have done well, Raziel.

Raziel:
Am I reduced to this?  A ghoul?  A fratricide?

Elder God:
Elevated, Raziel, not reduced.  Consuming Melchiah’s soul has endowed you with a new gift.
[referring to the iron bars that block Raziel’s exit:]
Insubstantial barriers such as these are no impediment to you in the spectral realm.  Will yourself to pass through, and you shall.

As Raziel exits the Necropolis:

Elder God:
With Melchiah’s gift, your way is opened.  Return to the seat of Kain’s ill-omened empire - its sterile silence has secrets yet to unveil.

If Raziel revisits the Elder God in the Underworld before revisiting the Pillars, he receives the following clue:

Elder God:
Return to the Sanctuary of the Clans, Raziel.  Melchiah’s soul has endowed you with the means to gain entry.
Beware, however - this hollow derelict is abandoned, but not uninhabited...