Sand Soldier

Sand Soldiers are spectral golden warriors conjured from the desert by Azir, the Emperor of Shurima, and animated by his solar magic. Each is a phantom wielding ancient Shuriman weapons, an echo of the legions that once made Shurima the dominant empire of its age. Though not truly alive, they fight with the discipline and formation of the empire's greatest warriors, assembling into overwhelming ranks at their emperor's call. Their return is bound to Azir's own. As a mortal ruler he stood before the Sun Disc to undergo the Rite of Ascension, the sacred ritual that had made god-warriors of Nasus and Renekton before him. At that very moment his closest advisor, the slave-born mage Xerath, betrayed him, killing him and seizing the disc's power. The cataclysm destroyed the capital and buried Shurima beneath the sands, ending a golden age in a single instant. Millennia later the blood of his descendant Sivir, a mercenary and tomb raider unaware of her royal lineage, activated the dormant Sun Disc and completed the Ascension that had been stolen from him. Azir rose as a towering hawk-headed god-warrior, and legions of sand soldiers rose with him as the buried capital climbed back into the light. Since his resurrection, Azir has summoned Sand Soldiers as he gathers his strength and works toward restoring the Sun Disc and rebuilding his shattered civilization. But the soldiers are as much an instrument of wrath as of renewal. At Saikhal, where the dry riverbed called the Cut had begun to flow again after Shurima's fall, a girl named Khari met Azir at the water and voiced sympathy for Xerath. His grief turned to fury and he raised sand soldiers to destroy the town. Khari threw her bowl to break his focus and begged him not to repeat his old mistakes, and he relented, withdrawing his forces and mending her cracked bowl with golden sand before he left. The soldiers embody Shurima's lost might returning under a single command. Azir means to restore the empire his betrayal ended, though the desert he has come back to is now home to scattered nomads, contested by Noxus, and haunted by Xerath, who survives to plot against him still.