Force and Fury

Code Vein (Closed)

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_{Location: The Crows' Nest // Date: February 24, 2057 // Time: 18:30 // Interactions: Erik @FunnyGuy, Dallas @pantothenic, Vincent @Daxam}

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What Lysandra did following her adventure in the ruined city brought new meaning to the common term 'falling asleep'. Her back was lost to agony and all that she could feel of her arms and shoulders was a throbbing ache. It was a struggle just to transfer out of her wheelchair and into bed. She roughly half-managed and fell onto her mattress, too sore and exhausted to even shift positions. Only barbarians go to bed with their shoes on. Lys supposed that she was a barbarian, then.

To say that she woke up bright-eyed and bushy-tailed would be... something of an exaggeration, but she was considerably better. The myriad aches were duller and, if her arms still felt like spaghetti, at least they were a bit al dente this morning. Besides, she was now powered by science. After hiding from the provgov people by taking a well-timed morning bath, she took her time getting dressed in a cute off the shoulder top and some jean shorts. She was accosted by Erik just outside of the garden but, finally, she got to spend her day with the mistle... and the roughly dozen other projects that she had on the go. This was the first time that she'd gotten to work with a live sample, and most of what she did consisted of first trying to save the plant from its excessive recent trauma. Still, she had a few working if wholly-unsubstantiated theories:

• The blood beads were its fruits and means of spreading its seeds, which were somehow mixed in with the pseudo-blood. The mistle was using the revenants, who were particularly wide-ranging and effective organisms, just like most flowering plants with ingestible fruits used animals.
• It logically followed that the liquid contained in the blood beads was actually a species of sap, evolved or engineered to have qualities remarkably similar to human blood to ensure that the fruits were attractive to revenants.
• This led to a troubling working hypothesis: either the revenants and BOR parasites were much older than previously believed and simply poorly-documented or else classified knowledge or, alternatively, the mistle, revenants, and everything else connected to the collapse that seemed to run afoul of the basic laws of biology had been engineered by someone or some process.
• Finally, she had her suspicions that the mistle must be parasitic in nature. Its structural similarities, at least outwardly, to Monotropa Uniflora - the ghost plant - were striking, and its white colour denoted a lack of the chloroplasts necessary for traditional photosynthetic processes to occur. Just what the plant was parasitic towards remained a mystery, and Lysandra cursed her absence during its discovery. While uprooting the mistle had been an absolute necessity for its survival, not being able to study its environment had meant the loss of vital clues as to how it worked.

Thus, the Commune's lone scientist contented herself with stabilizing it as best she knew: deep, loamy soil poached from Poppy's garden, limited direct sunlight, and some water. That would have to do for now. She spent the rest of the day intermittently picking dirt out from beneath her nails and removing as much of the corrosion from the new radio's wires as she could, replacing them as necessary. She commandeered Dallas to help move things, but he seemed oddly...dumb today, possibly distracted, and she was too busy to be his emotional support animal.

It was five in the afternoon when she rolled out of her little workshop in the storage room, determined to reclaim for her equipment the room that had temporarily been Ionna's. Instead, she found Vincent and strong-armed him into helping her set up the projector screen in the Great Room for movies and karaoke. She trailed him around like an absolute nag as he pushed the speakers into place, making conversation and offering somewhat ineffectual help when needed. She ferried bottles of vodka, whisky, and wine on her lap, shifted chairs around, flopped on the couch for a few minutes, and then plugged ALL THE THINGS in.

At some point, however, she felt the need to eat but no compunction to cook. How bothersome. Poppy had been in the kitchen area earlier, but Lysandra was loath to put herself through another ordeal almost as bad as the Tsar Bomba had been. With a sort of anticipatory schadenfreude, she stole glances at Erik as he walked up and contemplated taking a bite. Do it, she thought evilly. You know you have to now that people are watching. She couldn't suppress her grin. Do it!

The cake was - apparently - good, and Lys was not entirely sure if that was true or if Erik had noticed her shit-eating grin and decided to play an uno reverse card on her. With some degree of trepidation, once he'd gone off to plug in some cables that were out of her reach, she quickly made her way to the cake and cut a slice. No witnesses, she told herself, after looking quickly about the room. With a cup of strong wine ready to wash away the anticipated taste, she took a bite, every muscle in her body tensing up.

Lysandra blinked and... savoured the flavour. She glanced around guiltily. When even Poppy's cooking was good, it could only be an sign that this was going to be a night to remember.

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'Allo

Is it Triune Goddess’s symbolism on your avatar? I like more moody and grounded fantasy for sure, but humor and wonder and ability to reshuffle lots of things in the deck, so to speak, keep fantasy genre my favorite, too. Hello and welcome

@VerminS

This, TBH. I try to make those bedrock components of anything that I write. They're baked into the current RPG that I'm running. A sense of wonder is... pretty much the point of fantasy, IMO. Anyways, good to meet you both. Hope to catch you around the forum!

The Hourglass Order

Awesome character, @pantothenic, and I'm seriously digging the religious angle, which hasn't really been focused on as much as I'd have hoped so far, and his use of the Tethering. He'd have unusually fine control and very long drawing and casting range. His progression of the disease is also considerably on the low end of where most people would be by sixteen, as he's still ambulant, so perhaps some sort of remark about how some people maybe even believe that his fervent faith is pushing back against the disease, delaying it?

I also imagine, given his personality, that he might want to explore binding at some point, genuinely for the sake of healing as opposed to most others' ulterior motives. In any case, he's great and I look forward to having him in the RPG. Pending whatever little tweaks you see fit to make based on this advice, feel free to pop him into the characters tab and do an introductory post. We can discuss a way to slip him into the current arc if you like, either with the groups or staying back with Hugo, Jocasta, and a few others.

'Allo

Welcome aboard! Nothing quite like fantasy. Also, you underestimate just how old-as-dirt many of us are on here. :P

The Hourglass Order

@VolcanicLaval Hey, happy to hear about your interest. We've just kicked off a three or so posting cycle mini-arc. If you can jump in quickly, you can still get in for the first cycle. Otherwise, you can take your time and join once the mini-arc is over. Regardless, unless we're at 12 people (currently at 10), the RP is always accepting! I'd recommend joining our discord to keep up to date and get help from the community in making a character. We're especially looking for anyone to play a Hexaic character, Torragonese, Belzaggic, or yasoi right now. Regardless, feel free to hop into the chat!

The Hourglass Order

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Bianche, Verdi 35, Dami-Zept 54, 1:45 HI

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Penny was dubious about the whole endeavour. She had been dubious when she had watched a raven smack into her window. She had been dubious during every one-legged step she'd taken up the Forked Tower. When she and Carmille had crouched within a drafty stairwell measuring stone blocks with a fork, she had also been dubious. The dubiousness had remained as Hugo Hunghorasz had explained what it was that he wanted of her. It had intensified when she had been swapped teams at the last moment when Karim had backed out. Truth be told, she could not blame him. When she had been handed her hand-chosen... outfit by some Enthish mercenary named Desmond, she had finally reached peak dubiousness. Or so she had thought. A well-placed bookshelf and a bit of an Arcane glamour had allowed her to change outfits quickly and with her dignity intact. Penelope de Perrence had not the slightest idea how to use throwing knives and, when she was walking, only ever had one hand free in any case. The belt was cute, at least. So was the boot, and at least her bosom was... held in with more than straps and faint prayer. It was the pants, though. They were tailored so as to fit her perfectly - even accounting for her missing leg. Yet... they were a man's garment. No respectable woman wore... pants. How strangely exposed she felt. How the snug fabric chafed at her skin. How the shape of her stump was laid bare for all to see. She did not like them: not at all.

"Ahh, good to meet you, you must be my new crew member. I'm Captain Desmond Cutter-Gretz Von Sausex-Eisenac, Captain of the Golden Sun. What's your name and what do you bring to the ship?"

Penny nearly peed herself out of mirth. Surely, he could not be serious! Quickly biting back her laughter, she flashed her winningest smile. "Ahoy, matey. Pegleg Penny be's mi'name. I be a pirate, and pirate I be: born t'sail the seven seas. Yeh best be callin' on me fer yer needs in the galley."

They ended up on a dock and their self-appointed captain traipsed into the lead and began assigning people to go gather intelligence in what appeared to be a maddening mix of arbitrary and considered motive. When he assigned her and Wvysen to the Doge's Breeches, it was indicative of how daft she thought he was by now that she questioned his sanity as opposed to his intentions. Had he been most others, she'd have genuinely wondered if he was trying to do away with her. Sending two Perrenchwomen to infiltrate a staunchly Revidian faction in a time of near-war...truly? Next, she imagined he'd have her try to win a footrace. Perhaps he'd place Onarr in charge of procuring items from high shelving or get that giantess Trypano to squeeze into some tiny space. Penny glanced at Wvysen dubiously and then at Desmond. She cleared her throat. "Ah oui. Nous ferons de notre mieux en tant que Revidiennes et non en tant que Perençaises."*¹ She smiled with exaggerated sweetness and resisted the temptation to adjust her stupid pants for at least the fourth time tonight. "Je ne prévois aucun problème: aucun!"*² She twisted to regard Wvysen and took the other girl, unbidden by the hands. "Viens viens, Wvysen, allons-y!"*³

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Translations

*¹ Ah yes, we will do our best as Revidians and not as Perrench.
*² I foresee no problems with this: none!
*³ Come come, Wvysen, let's go!

The Hourglass Order

C H A P T E R 1 1 : I N T O T H E R I F T

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Some may have considered it the strangest flock to have ever taken flight above the grounds of Ersand'Enise, but such was the school's history and oddness that there had, in fact, been stranger in the distant past. Yet, where great flocks of crows, magpies, and ravens had flown mere hours ago, now items of an entirely different nature swirled through the sky.

Books, maps, clothing, coin, and weapons, there seemed to be no rhyme or reason to them. Locks jiggled and popped open, doors creaked, shutters fluttered, and the strange procession continued. These items, a keen eye may have noticed, all made their way to the same destination: a single window rather high up in the Forked Tower. They found their way into the hands of a pretty young blonde woman who was seated in a wheeled-chair just inside. These, she dispensed to those around her with smiles and well-wishes. The stream became a trickle. Her accomplices gradually disappeared through a door that was most certainly not within the official floorplan of the tower. She was left alone. She let out a long sigh and glanced up and down the stairs. Then, she turned and glanced with annoyance at the door that should not have existed, schooled her features, and wheeled through.

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Inside (but not truly inside, for it was daylight there and quite obviously an entirely different place) preparations were finished. At the flick of a wrist, people had gotten either what they had desired or what they had deserved. In most cases, those were one and the same. In a handful, they were not. They listened to the address of Hugo Hunghorasz with varying degrees of rapt or feigned interest. Some had so little regard for the great mage or else so much excitement for their upcoming endeavour that they could not even feign engagement. "I would wish you luck," he concluded, "but you must remember that there is no such thing and, even if there were, I would expect you to succeed without it."

With that there was a surge of magical energies so intense and alien that a handful of students visibly winced. Temporal magic... felt different: warm, easy, and comforting, like a bonfire on an Dorrad's night, but also as if chaos and void were waiting just outside of its glow. Three portals opened and three sets of students were dispersed through them. At the last moment, one - Karim Nazeri - got cold feet and was replaced by another: Penny Pellegrin, who was all-too well known to most of her peers.

The youths glanced at each other with varying degrees of nervousness and anticipation. Then, they stepped through.

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L O R E N T I N E Q U E E N

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A portal opened and six youths stepped through. They found themselves on a wooden deck near the very top of the Lorentine Queen. The rumble of the great riverboat's engines could be subtly felt even this high up. They were of a peculiar type - unknown anywhere else in the world - that used compressed steam, heated by arcane mages, to power them. The air was warm and muggy, and two towering black iron smokestacks poured great gouts of smoke into it, obscuring parts of the starscape above. The world slowly moved as the ship plied its way up the calm, muddy waters of the river for which it was named. Lanterns and bonfires flickered ashore, illuminating dwellings, businesses, and towering willow trees. Further on were the spratz farms, those notorious places. Other smaller ships - many of them floating rooming houses - hunkered in inlets, oxbows, and creeks by the shore, their lights mostly out at this hour.

Yet, all was clearly not peaceful here. As the Queen headed a bit further up, towards the shallow inland sea of The Gods' Eye, gunfire could be heard. Along one distant part of the shore, torches en masse lit up the night. Down below, were sounds of raucous debauchery, mostly coming from near the stern of the ship. Somebody was hammering away with great skill at a piano - another recent invention of Revidian manufacture - and dozens of card, dice, and darts games were underway. The ladies of the night were out in full force as well, pulling eager and inebriated men into their rooms just upstairs. Periodically, a fight would break out, swords or guns would be drawn, and matters would resolve themselves one way or the other right then and there.

On towards the bow, past the area amidships taken up mostly by the engines and massive paddlewheels and traversible only by means of a passage about three men wide, a different sort of violence was simmering and ready to explode. "Even now," a man shouted, "ashore, they are breaking their chains of servitude. Do not you see their torches in the night? Their tools of farming raised as weapons in defense of their rights? And 'rights' I say for that is what they are! Answer me: where is it in the Menan that one man - or woman - should be subject to another? Where does it say that his freedom to act on his own desires and to profit from his labour should be curtailed so that some other who may - or may not - have had an ancestor who'd done a 'noble' deed in the past may benefit?" Voices rose in angry agreement and he continued. "And then there are ships like this one, to serve your needs, because a mere plant is considered more valuable than your right to own a house and raise a family. They ply up and down this Godsforsaken river, sucking the money from your pockets so that you will never have the resources to challenge those who have named themselves your betters! Rheinsburg! Benrath! Rednitz!" The last one elicited a particularly strong response and he paused for dramatic effect, the ambient noise of water churning, voices shouting, and distant music playing taking over for a moment. "Already, they claim the Gift for themselves, just like they claim the spratz, and jealously guard both. Truly, this is why we bend our backs and obey, why we allow our nature to be suppressed in the service of a 'survival' provided from their lacy-cuffed hands!" The crowd was rather worked up now. "There is a way, my friends. You know me for who I am. I have shared your tables. I have worked in your fields. I have slept in those rat-infested barges they force upon you as homes. I tell you that those great gifts they call 'aberrations' are not to be feared so long as one makes use of them in moderation. I tell you that I can now do the things that a nobleman does because of them. No longer does he hold the threat of inescapabale violence above my head. Mine is now the power to say 'no' to him where, before, I could not. I come, this night, to share with you the Gift!" Close by to where he was speaking out on the forward deck, there appeared a spot of the purest blackness, darkly scintillating. He was poised to invite people up to make contact with it.

Meanwhile, however, there was one further act of note taking place aboard the Lorentine Queen, pride of House Rednitz's rivergoing fleet. The six youths who'd just arrived had been apprised of the location, in the ship's hold, just aft of the engine room, of a holy artifact of priceless value: the Lyre of Ipte-Zept. At that very moment, as the gathering of rough-hewn fieldhands threatened to turn into a shipboard riot, the speaker's accomplices were headed aft to take advantage of the impending chaos. One could only speculate at what they hoped to achieve but, contrary to its grassroots impression, this was clearly a well-planned and tightly executed operation with a clear goal in mind. All that left to be seen was where the six youths who had just arrived would fit into it: allies, enemies, or something else entirely?

The Gamblers

Carmillia Carbonneau, Manfred Hohenfelter, Dorothea Hohnstein, Seung Eun-Ji, Leon Solaire, and Zarra Travendour

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B L A C K F L A G

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_♪

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A portal opened onto Isla d'Amato and a motley assortment of eight youths stepped through. There were three exceptionally tall women, a fourth - merely tall - who leaned on a single crutch, and a fifth who seemed greatly fond of the colour red. The three young men who followed them through consisted of a pair who had the distinct look of mercenaries and a third who was... exceptionally short. They found themselves on a near empty dock at the very edge of a ramshackle settlement. Waves lapped gently at its posts and crickets chirped in the tall grass and subtropical undergrowth. There were birds in the sparse growth of palm trees which swayed quietly in a light breeze.

The eight young people were dressed in clothes that might mark them out as pirates and, looking upon the nearby settlement, it became evident why. Lamplight burned into the warm, humid night, and the sounds of gambling, brawling, and merrymaking wafted out across the docks. Ships groaned softly and sails stood sentry, bound and furled under the light of four moons. This, then, was the Isla d'Amato: notorious place that it was and home to many of the most storied pirate crews of the Ensollian Sea.

It appeared that, near to where the infiltrators had landed, along with a wagon and some chests of what were either plunder or supplies, a dirt road began, winding into the heart of town. Perhaps those perceptive enough would note the names of a handful of establishments close by:

1) A large stone and wood building of some three floors, with wraparound balconies and an inner courtyard. It flew the Pennant of Revidia and was named 'The Doge's Breeches'. It appeared to be quite full but perhaps not as raucous as some of the others.

2) A tall wooden structure in the heart of town, with elegant carved balustrades and balconies and a red lantern burning in one window. It was called 'La Fleur Rouge'. Sounds of drinking and laughter emanated from its direction and a great many provocatively dressed women could be seen in the area.

3) A smaller, well-maintained stone building towards the near edge of town, close to the ships, called 'The Main', which flew a Dorvalish flag. There appeared to be a handful of crews making their way back and forth between it and a couple of ships.

4) A great rambling compound perched on higher ground towards the far edge of the townsite. Its construction was markedly different from that of the other three buildings and a great many individuals seemed to be coming and going from it in various states of inebriation. Its name - in an unfamiliar script - was translated by Ismette as "The Mermaid's Knees".

Further afield, there may well have been other places of interest, and the picaroons, in particular, were known to inhabit areas some ways from the townsite, but these four were the significant ones closest to the ersatz pirates. The question now became, "where to begin?" Indeed, a plan for tackling their goal had been the subject of not a little discussion among the group. Would they remain united or was it time to divide and conquer?

Infiltrators Ahoy!

Desmond Catulus, Benedetto Corvi, Ismet'ych'lahin'dichora, Wyvsen Myranne, Penny Pellegrin, Ingrid Penderson, Trypano Somia, Onarr Yidlob

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SANDSTRIDERS: A Lost Land

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The last time that Azar had been in Qadir, she'd left bodies in her wake. The plural made it sound worse than it was. There had only been two.

It had been freeing, at first: a place where she could walk the streets and... no, that was wrong. The people here loved ayiralites, or had brainwashed themselves into thinking that they did for the sake of mundane convenience or out of thinly-veiled mortal terror. Yet, even among her kind, there was a hierarchy. The Maatrho was water, and so they loved water best. Earth had always fallen closest to human hearts and kinship and was valued as well. Air jinnbloods were... inoffensive even if they were dead, soulless things inside. There had still been unease beneath the fawning: too much sweat in a handshake, subtle crossings to the other side of the street. Azar was young and uneducated, but she was not stupid. They always thought she was stupid. Damn them.

Almost three years had passed: enough time for them to have forgotten her. If not, things were about to get bad. She'd been around the outskirts when a small band of Jushites had materialized out of the dusty foothills and set upon a covered wagon. It had been cheap, on her part: an ambush, but Azar now had seven bodies to her name, not that the people around here knew that name. Officially, she was about to be a hero. Unofficially, she was and would always be a fire ayiralite.

Crickets chirped and the air hummed with an arid sort of life as she walked, torches flickering along the walls of more noteworthy buildings, a near-full moon casting pale light upon the dusty ground. "I cannot thank you enough, miss," the old man from the wagon insisted. It was not the first time he'd tried to make conversation. "And thank Maatrho for sending one of his kin to save me in my hour of need. Your timing was not mere coincidence. You must believe it."

Azar clenched and unclenched a fist. Eight bodies, she thought. I must not leave eight bodies. She'd considered it when he'd insisted on reporting her deeds to the Imit's office. He'd promised she'd be rewarded but, from the youth's experience, rewards were not something that came to her much. She'd be content with being left alone, but he JUST. WOULDN'T. DO IT.

"What is your name, so that I may tell them? My son, he works there! You will see: he is a good man - hard-working, keeps the Gods, serves Maatrho... through the Imit."

Some part of her wanted to talk to him, of course. She'd been two months out in the desert and spoken no more than a couple of sentences to any actual person in that time. Speaking got her in trouble, though. Just thinking about it was starting to put her in a sour mood, so she opened her mouth to blunt her rising annoyance. Annoyance was the vanguard of anger. "Azar," she replied shortly. "Al-Hashimi."

He bowed as he walked. It was almost - but not quite - obsequious. "Then, tonight I shall honour Azar Al-Hashimi, with my wife and our servants."

She was about to tell him that it really wasn't necessary, despite the little warm feeling at her core. Then, they were there, and conversation ended. Guards parted, bowing a little deeper in her direction, a little more warily. Inside were... more guards in front of a pair of double doors, even in these early hours after sundown. Tawr was nothing if not... disciplined.

"I am Naseem Hamidi, a merchant." He marched up to the head guard and announced himself. "I would like to report something to the Imit's scribe: My wagon was ambushed by Jushites." He pointed in Azar's direction. "This one saved me. She killed them all, praise be Maatrho. Praise be Jhator. She said her name was Azar Al-Hashimi: a fitting name for how ferocious she was in protecting me." He twisted back and smiled at her. She nodded back. This place: she needed to get out of it. She knew it. The last time she'd been here, she'd only escaped a death sentence by virtue of her being the wronged party, even in an immoral act. More likely, she'd escaped by virtue of her jinnblood nature. "It was nothing, honestly. I was only..." What do these people like to hear? she wondered for a moment. "...serving as an instrument of the gods' divine wrath. I could not let harm come to a good man such as..." She'd forgotten his name. "this one. I ask no reward and the hour is late."

The guards bowed their heads momentarily in thanks. "You may pass, Naseem and honoured Azar," one said. "Come come," the old man waved her forward. "What sort of fellow would I be if I did not return your generosity at least in part?"

For a moment, Azar thought about running. It was early nighttime and it was cool. She could be well into the Jushite foothills by daybreak. It beat meeting anyone higher up. It beat them remembering her. She was exiled upon pain of death. The fleeting fantasy passed, like many did, and the double doors creaked as they opened. Truth was that she wanted the praise. Some part of her needed it. The path of lesser resistance here was to hope that fate's dice would roll her way and the man she was about to meet - for it was usually a man - would be someone new who did not remember her.

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SANDSTRIDERS: A Lost Land

<Snipped quote by Force and Fury>
She does not suck. Love this quote.

@Gunther

Haha, thanks! That's the kind of snappy, brief dialogue you can expect from her for the most part. I'm the most verbose person you might ever meet, so playing someone who's kind of pithy, sharp, and spare with words should be a fun challenge.

SANDSTRIDERS: A Lost Land

Azar Masoumi

A Z A R M A S O U M I

If you're asking me for wisdom, you're clearly in need of some.

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Art by ninosetiawan ___________________________________ P R O F I L E Age 20 Race Ayiralite Sex Female Height 160 cm (5'3") Weight 50 kg (109 lbs) Alignment Rebel Impure Class Mage Level One Planar Lineage Fire Health Points 20 ___________________________________ I N V E N T O R Y Prayer beads inscribed with the seven virtues of Sharaqism, water can, satchel with provisions, notebook, small coin purse hidden where nobody will dare go for it. ____________________________________ E Q U I P M E N T - A pair of stiletto daggers hidden in boots - One 'prayer bead' is actually full of a solution that burns dirty and creates gouts of thick black smoke. - Her second 'water canister' is full of a naptha and quicklime solution that makes fire almost impossible to put out on whatever it coats. - Armour just slows you down. ____________________________________ A T T R I B U T E S Athletics: 12 (+2) Dexterity: 13 (+3) Intelligence: 21 (2 race + 4 class + 5) Wisdom: 12 (+2) Charisma: 10 Constitution: 10 ___________________________________ S K I L L S (A) Strength: 0 (A) Agility: 1 (+1) (D) Stealth: 0 (D) Acrobatics: 2 (+2) (D) Trickery: 0 (I) History: 0 (I) Nature: 0 (I) Arcana: 8 (2 class + 4 race + 2) (I) Religion: 0 (W) Perception: 0 (W) Medicine: 0 (W) Survival: 1 (+1) (C) Persuasion: 0 (C) Deception: 0 (C) Intimidation: 2 (+2) (C) Performance: 0

____________________________________________________________________________ APPEARANCE Petite and darker-skinned, Azar might've been the kind of girl able to fade effortlessly into a crowd... had she been born human. Failing that, she might've even be considered pretty... had she been born human. As it is, she scares people. She is a pint-sized 5'3" of pure smirking nasty and she tells herself that she likes it that way. Yet, paradoxically, her clothing often demands attention. She'll regularly wear a hooded cloak when she prefers not to draw any (as a fire ayiralite, she laughs at the idea of a sunburn). However, underneath that part-time garment, she dresses provocatively, or in ways that set her apart. Maybe it's something similar to what poisonous animals do; their colouration sends a clear message: stay away. The truth is that Azar really doesn't want trouble, but she'll return whatever comes her way tenfold. ____________________________________________________________________________ BACKSTORY Azar remembers the feel of the fabric. She clung to a woman's clothes. They smelled of jasmine and citrus as she hurried through the darkened streets. Whatever words might've been spoken have not come down to her through time. There were tears. There was the cool of the night air. That was her mother, she thinks, the useless bitch: made a baby with a fire jinn and ran from the responsibility. The foundling house named her Azar, for her planar nature. They gave her a surname too: Al-Hashimi - destroyer. A few years later, when one had it in her mind to be kind to the girl, to not treat her like her future was already written in stone, that name was changed. She became Azar Masoumi: 'innocence', but the die was already cast. She was born bad anyways, or so people say. Azar is young. She doesn't have some epic past. There are no old glories to revel in and few grand tales to regale people with. She was raised as an orphan. Some of the children were put to work. Some were steered towards a life of religious devotion. The lucky ones were taken in by people with kind, needy eyes and some empty space they were looking to fill. Azar was always sent on some errand or given something to play with, away from the other children, when there were visitors. Growing up, she thought that the caretakers were nice about it to spare her feelings. More recently, she's come to understand that it was because they were afraid of her. One day, there was a sorcerer who visited. Apparently, it was customary for the coven to check the orphanages every couple of years and see if anything in need of their attention had turned up there. She was not taken in. She was not raised. Azar was, however, trained. She was treated with the dignity due a promising individual and, by Arhanphast himself, how she came to love those people, to crave their attention and acceptance. What she was wasn't a bad thing to the sorcerers. For every pragmatic kindness they showed her - and even the odd genuine one - she repaid them tenfold. She lit their candles, warmed their hearths, cooked their food, and did their chores. She sung and danced and wrote and read and practiced most of all. She threw her arms around whoever she was to follow for those two days each week without reserve and poured her love into them. Then, when she was sixteen, they declared her sufficiently trained so as not to be a danger to herself and others around her. Their work was done. It took Azar ten seconds to get over the shock. She remembers the salty scent of tears as they evaporated from her cheeks. Love can turn to hate at the drop of a hat, for such are fire ayiralites. She flew at the man with the beard and she supposed he wasn't able to stop her from a mix of shock and maybe because he'd expected her to use her magic. Instead, she dug her thumbs into his eyes and felt them split against her skin with a slimy 'pop'. She melted them right out of their sockets as he screamed. She ran and kept running and she knew that they were after her: 'they' - the people who made rules and laws; the kind who had named her 'destroyer' as a three-year-old. Azar really hasn't stopped running since, from mercenary company to brothel and back, from one odd job to the next. She generally stays away from civilized places. She's fought in Baneghora. She's spent time in Arilqas. There were a few grand months in Qadir until they realized that she was not their kind of ayiralite. She gave her love to a man and killed him when he gave his love to another. She is not currently looking to love again. People are bad at love, she's pretty sure, and she's worse than most. Azar can see the fear in their eyes, but they wait to mutter about her until she's moved on. Sometimes, on those nights when she isn't around the light and warmth of other people's company, giving and receiving, she cries as she tries to sleep. It only makes her angrier that she's lying there crying instead of taking action. Someday soon, she will burn the people who hate and who've wronged her to ash and they will regret it all. She will find somebody who she can love, who won't betray her, and she will love them back with everything she has, even if she was born bad. ____________________________________________________________________________ PERSONALITY Azar is a dangerously unstable young woman, partly as a result of her nature and partly as a consequence of her experiences. She can be warm, helpful, and caring to a fault. She can be protective towards those who she empathizes with or truly trusts, though this side of her rarely comes out. More often, she plays to type, knowing that most people have already judged her by sight or reputation. It's easier that way and she's learned that to let herself care opens the door to attachment, which opens the door to anger. She's destroyed enough things already. When she isn't busy doing mental gymnastics to justify her actions, the guilt sours her insides. Azar tries to be taciturn, and even considers herself so, but isn't much good at it. In general, she's twenty, angsty, and emotionally stunted. Her self-image is often woefully inaccurate. At times, there is an almost puckish quality to Azar, but it's underlain, for most, by a fundamental unease: one moment, she's laughing and joking. The next, she goes still and glares when someone crosses an arbitrary personal line. The offending party stands at the precipice of violent assault. Of course, if she finds herself outmatched or even truly challenged, Azar is a coward at heart and will usually run. In some regards, she is a classic bully because, to not be a bully, in her mind, means that she occupies its counter-role: that of the victim. She will not let herself be a victim ever again. She cannot be powerless but, paradoxically, she does not crave power either, at least not on a macro scale. More than anything else, she just wants to... that's the rub, isn't it? She doesn't really know what she wants. Hopefully, she'll find it. ____________________________________________________________________________ MOTIVATION AND OUTLOOK Azar is essentially directionless at this point. Oh, sometimes she entertains fleeting fantasies about becoming some powerful, respected personage, but she soon sees them for what they are and they evaporate - ethereal - into her unfulfilled dreamscape. Sometimes, she crafts scenarios where she finds her mother and gives the bitch a taste of hell, but then she feels awful. She's caused so much pain already. She doesn't want to cause anymore. Is there completely justified killing? Can she just be 'bad' towards people who genuinely deserve it? Maybe that's why she exists. Maybe that's her motivation at this point and what she's looking for. ____________________________________________________________________________ MISC 1) Every night Inconsistently, but what she tells herself is 'basically every night', Azar recites the seven virtues of her faith: truth, charity, justice, discipline, temperance, loyalty and fidelity, and humility. It's all playacting and self-flagellation, though, to assuage her own guilt. She isn't genuinely pious in the slightest. 2) Her mother was from a family of some importance, and not originally from Esaad. Azar might be surprised when she learns more about the circumstances of her birth and flight to the orphanage.