With the fighting done, Yui retrieved her weapon and let out a sigh of relief. ”By The Father and His Children, I don’t want to fight those again…snakes give me the creeps.” She muttered, inspecting her rifle for any new scuffs or scrapes; hearing Jing’s reply, she laughed aloud and clapped him on the shoulder. ”You really know the way to this girl’s heart don’t you boss?”
The trip back was uneventful, if a bit more tiring due to the loot they’d acquired. During their evening rest stops, she reloaded the fired casings. Pouring a careful measure of black powder into a shell, she’d then cautiously press the powder tight with a wooden dowel; too loose and the next shot would be all smoke and noise but not effect, and too tight could risk setting off the Stone, which would be bad a whole host of reasons.
Once the powder was set, she pressed a small wad of fiber on top of the powder and then set the bullet in place, setting it with a few careful taps with the handle of her knife. Reloading each shot took Yui about 20 minutes. -- During the trip back Yui, on several occasions, nearly made to try and strike up a conversation with the man mountain; she’d noticed him glancing in her specific direction more than once and part of her wanted to ask what did he find so interesting about her? A small voice whispered in the back of her mind, that maybe he somehow knew who she really was and was looking to collect a reward, but she did her best to dismiss such thoughts.
She never did end up trying to talk to Hafrbjorn during their trek however; he gave off the distinctive aura of a man who didn’t wish to be disturbed.
Back in Gatehouse, such thoughts were quickly pushed aside by the promises of pay, drink, food and a bath.
After she’d finished Jing’s round, gotten a meal and a few more drinks, Yui snagged one of the Tavern staff and enquired about renting a bath. If he’s got a problem with it, I’ll just tell him to take it outta my cut. She thought as she told the serving girl to just add it to Jing’s tab.
The girl came and got her once the bath was ready and led Yui to a backroom that contained a large wooden tube full of steaming water.
“Will this suffice, Mistress?” The girl, who couldn’t have been older than fourteen, asked a bit nervously. ”This’ll be just fine.” Propping her gun against a wall, Yui began to shed her gear. ”Dear,” She asked as she began to unlace her Jack and then the gambeson underneath. ”Could I trouble you to knock some of the desert out of this?”
She handed the girl a few soverns, and smiled. ”Nothing fancy, just throw them over a fence and beat them like a rug.” “Right away Mistress!” The girl squeaked as she staggered off under the weight of the armour.
Alone now, Yui stripped to her skin and stuck a toe into the bath. The water was almost too hot, but that was perfect. She hissed slightly as she stepped fully into the bath and the sat down. The tub was large enough that, with the exception of her head, her entire body was under water. Letting out a long sigh as the heat worked at her tired body, she leant forward and dunked her head, running her hands though her hair. Leaning back once more, she rested the back of her head on the edge of the tub and closed her eyes, and just relaxed.
Isbeil Camshron
Isbeil sat quietly in the room she’d been given, idly read though her grimoire, though her heart wasn’t in it. It’d been a few years since she’d had to do any mercenary work, a lucky find out in the sands had left her with enough soverns to work in peace, but those funds were getting down and she’d decided to shore up her finances before any troubles arose.
She’d been a bit leery of getting back into merc work as far too many Companies where just thugs with richer paymasters; but the Bloodrose Irregulars had a reputation of being an honorable Company.
--
Now having, apparently, passed all of Hector’s tests, she found herself waiting to meet Master Sanada.
Her thoughts were broken by a sharp whistle from outside. Time to work I guess. She thought, tucking her book away and adjusting her clothing.
Stepping out of her room, she saw the other new recruits exiting their own rooms, nodding to them, she made her way to the living room where Hector was standing with another man who must be her new boss. Approaching the pair, she kept her ‘withered’ arm tucked across her midsection and bowed. ”Master Sanada, it is a pleasure to meet you. I am Isbeil Camshron.”
With the last Snake Men either dead or is full retreat, Yui retrieved her rifle once more and reloaded it, before sitting against a wall; when Gwen came past to check on her, she waved the sorceress off. She’d suffered nothing worse than a little fatigue, and maybe some minor bruises.
”Well what do you know,” She quipped to no one in particular. ”We all lived.” Though from the sounds of it, it may ‘ve been a near thing for Pox. With other sorted out the loot situation, she took a personal inventory. So far she’d expended five shots, with another five ready to go; but she didn’t have a whole lot of spare powder. The little Stones, she’d replaced with fresh ones before they’d set out, so those would be good for a bit. Should see if there’s an apothecary or alchemist in the town we get to…maybe do another patch of powder if there’s time. She grimaced at bit at the thought. Her rifle was great for un-levelling a battlefield in her favour, but it cut into her purse to keep in ammo.
”So boss,” She called out from where she sat. ”We heading back to what passes for civilization out here?”
Isbeil is dead average in height and weight at about 5’5”, maybe 100 lbs and has a slightly pinched, almost underfed, look about her. Despite the fact that she moves from place to place fairly often, she is remarkably pale, like someone who has rarely, actually stepped out of doors. Her deep green eyes are made all the more noticeable by her pale complexion. She has a shoulder length mass of wavy red hair that she rarely shows, under her head scarf.
Clothing-wise she wears some knee high boots, trousers and a slim fitting shirt under a pricey enchanted robe and with a head scarf that when wrapped up, only leaving her face exposed. The robes and scarf have been enchanted with both Physical and Magical Resist enchantments, which let them act as light armour. Isbeil also wears long gloves pretty much all the time.
The reason for her concealing clothing is literally etched into her skin. From her neck to her left wrist to her ankles, she is covered in an intricate series of wards, runes and sigils. The dark lines stand out in stark contrast against her pale skin, are used in to protect and guide her in her more challenging spell casting. To anyone even moderately versed in magical studies it is plain to see her tattoos are all centered on the use of Dark Magics.
Her right arm from fingertip to shoulder socket is something else however; there is nothing but bone. No skin, no muscle, no tendons, just bone. The bones themselves are obsidian black and inlaid with true-silver. The inlays form both the same designs that mark the rest of her body as well as runes of binding that bind the bones to her body and let her use it like one normally would. About where the bicep would be, a section of the bone has been removed, and a small true-silver cage has been grafted in place; inside the cage is a black Soul Stone.
Isbeil leaves her right arm heavily wrapped in cloth as much as she can and deflects any questions about with the explanation that she was simply born with a withered arm.
BIO
Isbeil’s early life is unknown, as she was left outside an Imperial orphanage as a toddler. From there, she was quickly made a ward of the Southern Coast Collage of Mages, as her magical affinity began to manifest before she was five. She was always a most apt student, eagerly absorbing everything he instructors taught her, willing to push herself to uncover whatever she could find on the latest interest to grab her attention; though this sometimes led to difficulties, like trying to preform spells that were beyond her current skill level, or trying to get in to place she wasn’t supposed to be. During one of these explorations, she managed to find her way in to a series of long abandoned cellar chambers.
During subsequent trips to the old cellar, she found a disused study, still full of writings. While looking through the accumulated works, she slowly began to realize they were all works on Dark Magic, specifically Necromancy. Isbeil was only twelve, but she knew enough to recognize what she was looking at and that if she told Mistress Thalia, her guardian, about her find, Mistress Thalia would have all of the writings sealed away or destroyed. Instead, Isbeil kept it a secret and over the next six years did what she could to teach herself Necromancy. She had no desire to try and raise armies of the dead, or to subjugate the world, or any of the other innumerable evil things people seemed to think Necromancy was used for; she simply wanted to know. It was a discipline that was not commonly known, and that alone made its pursuit worthwhile. -- While her guardian and instructors had hoped she’d stay in academia once she reached adulthood, Isbeil knew that if she wished to find more on Necromancy she’d have to try and find it herself. For years she signed on with expeditions that were going in search of pre-Starfall artifacts. The writings she’d found had on more than one occasion had notes mentioning necromantic knowledge had been found in the desert, so that seemed like the best place to look.
While on one of these trips, her party found some early pre-Starfall ruins that led into a natural cave network. Exploring deep into the caves, they found what could only be described as a necromancer’s lair. The rest of the band, hired more for their strong arms than their brains only saw the coin a trove that a find like this could bring Isbeil saw knowledge that called to her…and sensed that they were not alone. The spirits of the necromancer still inhabited the space, and it was not happy at the intrusion.
It lashed out, tearing the soul from one man, a slew a couple others with the shambling bones of undead who had found the cave in times past. Using what she knew, Isbeil halted the undead while the survivors ran, and when the shade turned on her in wrath, she bowed as one would as a supplicant towards a king. Speaking fast, she begged the spirit to impart what it knew to her. “What good is knowledge if it stays locked away in the sand?”
It took every bit of persuasion she could muster, but eventually the shade relented. It would accept the lives already lost as partial payment, but it warned her, she would have to pay a price in flesh and blood as well; without hesitation Isbeil accepted. -- When she awoke, Isbeil found the bodies of the men who’d died next to her were desiccated bodies wrapped in corroded and rotten armour, even though her own clothing was no worse than before. The shade was gone, and with nothing else to do, she staggered back towards the surface; she’d not gone far when the cave collapsed behind her. Staggering into the harsh sunlight, she finally saw her ‘price’; her right arm was nothing more than bones, tied to her by runes of binding far stronger than she’d ever seen, and across any skin she could find, black tattoos marked and protected her in ways she did not yet understand.
One would thing such revelations would be shocking to say the least, but, while she couldn’t remember the details of what transpired in the cave, she knew what had happened had been necessary and that she’d asked for it. The greatest shock came when she finally made it to the town the band had originally set out from. It had doubled in size and none of the outfitters that they’d used even knew of the group she’d been a part of. Eventually she came to understand what had happened, while she had communed with the shade it had preserved her, and passing so much had not been a quick task; while she learned, a century had passed, even though she still appeared to be a young woman in her 30s; before entering the town she’d done what she could to hide her right arm, explain to anyone who got curious, that she was born without it. -- After creating a new identity, she went back to what she had been doing. Much of what she’d learned in the cave was still beyond her, but the more information she studies and the stronger she gets, the more the understanding that was given to her makes sense.
FIGHTING STYLE(S)
Some basic knife fighting moves taught to her along the way, and her magic
EQUIPTMENT
Weapon
Dagger – A pattern wielded steel dagger with a black handle (The handle scales are actually made from the piece of bone that was removed from her right arm)
Armour
Enchanted Robes
Enchanted Scarf
Gear
‘Endless’ Grimoire – A book she found while on an expedition into the desert years ago. No matter how much you write in it, you can always find a blank page, and no matter what you may open the book to search for, you always open to the right page.
A leather pouch with four black Soul Stones. (Don’t worry, the world is better off without the people those came from)
Ritual supplies for some of the more complicated spell works
SKILLS & ABILITIES
Dynamic Mage – Isbeil’s innate magic allows her to impart or eliminate motion on any object.
Wind Blade – Creates a focused ‘blade’ of air that can cut through soft tissue quite easily; harder minerals and magic barriers are generally unaffected.
Barrier – A wall of super dense air to halt most moving objects, though something with enough speed and/or mass may still get through.
Hasten – Accelerates a single object to incredible speeds (The smaller/lighter the object, the easier it is)
Cessation – Robs the target of all motion
Necromancer – She can manipulate, summon or banish the souls of the dead and turn them to her own uses if she wishes.
Greater Life Leech – Powerful, but slow to cast and requiring much preparation; it allows her to ‘feed’ off the Life energy of a large area for a limited amount of time. The greater the drain the shorter it lasts.
Lesser Life Leech – Not nearly as powerful, it has a much shorter cast time and needs no preparation; however it does require direct contact with the subject and has no area of effect.
Soul Summon – She can recall a soul from the afterlife for a time, through the use of a talisman made from something that belonged to the soul in life. The closer the talisman was to the deceased and the more recent the death, the easier it is.
Reanimate – Turns any dead bodies into an undead automaton, capable of preforming simple tasks. Like with Soul Summon, the more recent the dead body is, the better.
1. Listen to the GM(s), if you have a complaint tell me. I am not an evil dictator and if I am wrong I will admit it. 2. Romance and Gore allowed, but keep it in good taste and in site rules 3. Now not all characters will play nice with each other I understand that, but keep the disputes in the RP not in OOC 4. Be civilized and polite please 5. All basic RP rules apply to this roleplay: Power playing, Meta gaming, and others are not allowed. 6. The story isn't exactly set, if you have an idea for a mission feel free to pm me the details and I'll try to work it in. 7. Copy the rules into a Hider in the "other" of your cs so I know you read them. 8. Get into your character's skin become him or her as you are playing have fun and give us insight into their thoughts. 9. Try to keep active, in both the IC and OOC pages please. And even if you don't have anything to say, at least read the OOC
@Arthanus Banging my head against a 2nd character sheet, and I've got questions. I know 'Old Kingdom' enchanted items are worth a lot of coin, but are there new enchanted items on the market? (maybe not as good as the old stuff, but more available and comparatively cheaper?)
Yui twisted and dodged as the Snake Man came at her again and again. Although weakening, it was still a dangerous threat that she wasn’t taking lightly. Bleed out already! She was considering making a move, when several things ‘clacked’ on the stones near the two of them, and the immediate area filled with smoke. That works… The Snake Man had instinctively lashed out into the densest part of Stephan’s smoke cloud, obviously expecting an attack from that direction.
Instead, Yui went to opposite way and found herself almost tripping over the Snake Man’s tail. Bringing her blade down into a viscous low slash that connected with the exposed flesh. The naturally tough skin of the desert-dweller resisted to some degree, but not enough to prevent Yui from drawing blood. It roared in pain and rage and rounded to strike her, but she’d already brought her blade up, and instead ended it with a cleaving blown between the eyes. Prying her sword free, she nodded a ‘thanks’ to Stephan through the thinning smoke, and looked about. They seemed to be winning, and rather handily at that; Pox seemed to be attending to Garrett, but from where she was it didn't seem to bad. @Arthanus
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