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Name: Annabelle
Age: 25
Gender: Female
Race: Human

Appearance:
Height: 5'6
Eye Color: Red
Hair Color: Black

Personality. Annabelle learned in her short history to be quiet. Words are special, and finely placed in conversation. To that end, she is a woman of few words, and out of deep-seated reverence never fails to be polite with them. It is difficult to rouse her from anything but a flowing and calming but brief experience. She keeps friends easily thanks to her predisposition towards amicable social behavior, and is reliable perhaps to a fault. While certainly selfless, she will still vocalize her displeasure of being taken advantage of (calmly, of course).

While her words are soft and personable, her actions are anything but. She is swift and decisive, brutal and unforgiving. She is a fighter and explorer and little else, and her inhospitable upbringing lends to a ferocity when fighting that seems barbaric and pitiless. Annabelle will claim it is without emotion that she acts in this manner, but the gleam in her eye might speak to others of a lingering fear that's never left her.

Overall Annabelle can be a bit innocent and unguided, making it hard to understand some of the finer details in life. She is quick to try no matter how behind the curve she is, nevertheless, and if given the chance to prove herself will even more quickly prove her dedication along the way.

History:


You wander far to the north in search of your prey -a herd of elk trampling the snow into a dense sheet beneath their hooves. You have been here before, but this is the edge of the world. Out here there is nothing but you and the untamed wild. Your expertise and wisdom have guided you through the taiga time and time again, given you both life and the means with which to pay for it. This is just another season of hunting, trusty bow slung around your shoulders.

The elk are wandering far this time, giving you trouble. You've made a few mistakes, but now they have nowhere to run besides a dense wood across the snow plains. You chase them there. A few stragglers will inevitably dart into the trees where it is easier for you to hide and approach. They make a run, and you follow. Your boots trudge across the field, sapping your stamina, but it is no different than any other day. You're built for this, and the cold stinging in your throat only invigorates you further.

An elk springs into the treeline, disappearing behind a prison of pines. Its tracks are easy to follow, and it will inevitably stop to consider its situation before returning to the herd. Deeper and deeper you go into this nameless forest. A place that no man, living or dead, may have ever set foot in before. You think for a moment that you might be the first thinking creature to ever touch the bark of these trees or their ancestors. It is desolate, but it is yours and yours alone.

You draw your bow, readying yourself for a shot that you hope will down the beast with less trouble than you've been given thus far. One in the chest, right for the heart or lungs. It has stopped in the woods, and you tread carefully, not making a sound. From beside a trunk, you find your mark. The beast cries out, staggers, and drops. It yet lives, but finds not the strength to resist the skill you have employed. You wait a moment for it to truly settle, and approach. Pulling out a knife, you waste no time in finishing the creature off, and set to work amassing the meat of your capture.

It is dark.

You stop your work and look up to find that you can no longer see anything. An all-encompassing blackness has enveloped you. Pitch-blackness -the sort that shrouded your very hands held in front of your face. You struggle to prepare your lantern without even an inkling of light of help, but eventually you bring it to life.

The snow is gone, but the trees and carcass remain. You are crouched over a path. A man-made one. As you stand to meet the barely-illuminated darkness with your lantern, you find that you are not in the woods you once were. Not truly, anyways.

The dead elk can wait. Were you to saddle the bounty over your shoulders, you do not think you could find your way home indefinitely. Magic was afoot, and you do not know if it is the kind you can escape. You push the wet chunks of the elk meat into a couple bags slung around your belt. At the very least, you have something to cook for a time. You set foot down the path with only your lantern to guide you away from stumbling and falling. The path is well-worn, and eventually you come upon an old road sign.

Holzwand

You have never heard of such a place, and certainly not here in the north. You carry on, hopeful that this location will be able to right your confusion. The path continues on for some time, winding through the unending forest. It doesn't take long for you to realize that there is neither moon nor star in the sky. Nothing to orient you upon the land. There is a rustling in the foliage beside you, off the path. You stop and throw your light its way.

From the darkness creeps a chattering congregation of maddening figures. Twisted faces of half-beast forms slag and melt, constantly righting themselves into more distinct shapes, only to fall away again. Their bodies float across the blackened earth... towards you. Distorted claws of shadow and flesh grope at the air where you stand, hungry for something you cannot fathom.

You draw your sword, and fight for more than your life.



Annabelle awoke upon an island of dim light, surrounded by a sea of darkness. She knew not her past. Not her origins, nor her reason for being here in this forest. She had no one, nothing, and not a clue where to begin changing any of that.

It did not take long to learn of the place in which she was now trapped, this 'Holzwand'. By the grace of something unknown, she was given reprieve from what would otherwise be utter darkness. Sight blessed her path, showing her what she needed to make do initially. This was an evil place lost to time, now bereft of any hope of cleansing. No man remained save herself, this wood-surrounded castle city populated only by three things: the various natural fauna of the land, somehow surviving in a desolate, malevolent place, the Wraiths, and the Twisted, as Annabelle came to call them.

The Wraiths, Annabelle thought, were once human beings, now turned into single-minded things hellbent simply on adding to the menagerie that is the Twisted. Half-man half-beast abominations stuck in the crossroads of life and death. She felt for them, but they knew only hunger for something she did not understand. All the beasts which died here became Twisted, and, she assumed, so too would she.

It took some time before she found her footing, learning of how to survive in the Holzwand. An ancient kingdom dilapidated but stuck frozen in time in a sequestered-off realm. She knew not how to escape it until an encounter with what she presumed to be the reason any natural creature could yet live.

A spirit of the land, defiant of the cursed air which plagued its stomping grounds, came to her in time, and offered her reprieve from the prison of darkness. With sunless years did she learn under the forgotten landgod until she was bade to leave Holzwand for the wider world. While the spirit could not leave its domain, it could send another out to seek aid. Annabelle often wondered if she was summoned simply for that purpose, but she yet remains unsure.

With her purpose clear but the path hazy, she broke free of the cursed realm, and set out into Oublioth in search of a cure to the ancient plague where her journey started.

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Level: 20
Class: Spellblade
Profession: Survivalist

Stats:
Strength (STR): B
Vitality (VIT): B
Dexterity (DEX): D
Intellect (INT): B
Wisdom (WIS): F
Charisma (CHA): F

List of immunities:
None

Resistances:
-Druidic spells
-Natural cold
-Fear

Weaknesses:
-General magic

Equipment:
-A greatsword named 'Therio'. Serves as a focus through which she can also summon an attending spirit at the cost of blood. Takes on an arcane nature when empowered in such a way.
-A ritual dagger, utilized for any number of preparations, as well as general hunting.
-Longboots that have seen better days. Annabelle attests that she's seen deeper mud than most anyone she's ever met.
-Her jacket is enchanted, granting her a perpetual warmth. Thank the gods given her scant attire otherwise.

Skills & Spells:
Summon Spirit (Crimsig) - Manifests a bound nature spirit to her side, possessing of high Magic Power and Resistance, and negligible Strength and Dexterity. Crimsig cannot physically interact with the world except in minor ways including producing light (visible) and being unable to pass through objects (tangible). It can shift small objects, and cannot speak or otherwise communicate. Crimsig can cast generic druidic spells with a Blood Element tinge.

Control Familiar ("Carpenter") - "Carpenter" as 'he' is named, is a blood elemental controlled by Annabelle. As it is a conglomeration of her own vitality, she has full dominion over it, and any attempts by other actors to sway the actions of the familiar with their own magicks will be met with a high resistance. Carpenter can morph into shapes maintaining current mass including additional melee weapons for Annabelle to wield, but can also act as an independent physical combatant with moderate Vitality, Dexterity, and Magic Resistance, but low Strength and no magic-casting ability.

Calm Animals - Compels natural animals with low intelligence (D or lower) to be calm, eliminating aggression or fear.

Sacrificial Empowerment - Annabelle can, at the temporary expense of vitality, undergo ritual bloodletting to empower herself or appropriate equipment. Empowering herself slightly enhances Strength and Magic Resistance, while empowering equipment bestows a curse effect that deals heavy damage to afflicted individual's MP pools and magic strength.