@rezay I can see how his influence would be positive for Monica. I think they have a surprising amount in common, too.
I think, based on my newest additions to the CS, Orren and Seig could have been allies in the past. But I don't think Able would be(though this could depend on how he's approached).
@rezay I like how Able's and Monica's aspects are similar, though I think he has much better control of his. Looking forward to everyone's interactions, and I'm sort of hoping the Dead Cruiser creates an OC Alison that just beats the shit out of all us for some reason.
I'm working on what's shaping up to be a beefy update to my CS. The substance shouldn't change any, but it will add a lot of lore and flavor.
Included will be a lot of names that were omitted previously, as well as some cultural flavor for Heimark. Also some info on the previous bearer of Song.
I think one of the first things Able will do, upon inheriting his throne, is to abdicate it. Or, at least neglect the responsibility it represents.
He has become jaded to things that do not last, and he'll need to learn what Royalty is. I think his lessons will be harsh. And I think others will pay the price.
Sobriquets: The Muse. The Fairest. Collector of Songs.
Appearance: A fair young man of slight build and flawless features. Able carries a spear whose shining head hums like a struck glass. The haft is quite long, and made of stunningly pale and straight driftwood.
Aspect: SONG A form of art, true, but Song has also been used throughout human history(in most worlds) to pass along knowledge and wisdom. It may express oral history, and contains an aspect of magical knowledge as well. Song can be used to evoke emotions, and move the hearts and minds of those who hear it. It makes for a bearer who inspires joy, and whom others follow happily.
World: Heimark. A world defined by bitter, cold salt water and a multitude of rocky islands. Resources are fairly scarce, and one of the most precious is wood, which is absolutely necessary for the building of ships to cross the oceans. Many people double as raiders in addition to whatever trade they take on their home islands.
The people of Heimark are resilient and independent by nature. They are excellent shipwrights, and hold a vessel in high esteem, considered to be a credit to its home island.
Ship building is assisted by shamans who work with wood spirits, called wudwyrds. Traditionally, only one tree is cut down for a ship, though salvaged wood can be used(with great deference). Such driftwood, however, is considered quite valuable, because of how rarely the sea returns what it takes. This tradition ensures that no tree that plays host to a wudwyrd is cut needlessly, and also preserves the spirit as a singular entity in the completed vessel. A ship with a wudwyrd can always find the way back to any island it has visited, and can steer itself if needs must(though they typically prefer not to).
Race: Human
Legacy: Able was born to a small village on his home island of Briige. His parents were quite poor, and when a shaman who was traveling through took notice of him, they were happy to believe he would live a better life as an apprentice. What they did not understand was that the old man(name of Hroki) desired Able for his beauty and youth. He learned from his new master, but was loved by him as well, and as Able grew older, the wise man could not bear to see it. Besotted by the youth, the shaman turned to deep magic that even he did not properly understand, and entreated Time and Change themselves to refrain from touching Able. He was made to prove his worth and love, through trials that Able knew nothing of, but by the time he succeeded, and Able was finally spared the ravages of Time, and the fickle gifts of Change, he was a young man, and the shaman grieved the loss of his childhood.
Able outlived Hroki, and all those around him. He sought employ, with his new gifts, as a soldier and raider aboard a ship out of his homeland. He worked well enough for a time, but found that he could not train his body to become any stronger through natural means, and was weaker than hid fellows.
In a far flung land, he found knowledge from a monastery of monks who knew the secrets of transcending their physical limitations. Through meditation and force of will, Able learned to overcome the baser parts of his mind and body that, in a normal man, prevented one from harming themselves. Unable to suffer harm himself, Able could use these techniques to achieve superhuman strength and speed. Still, his body had its limits, and he sought power through his spirit.
Able lived on. He continued his study of magic, but lived primarily as a strange, hermitic nomad, and generally lost interest in the conflicts between islands. He returned frequently to the monastery where he first learned his greatest physical gifts, to further meditate and consider the mysteries of the world. It may have been inevitable that he discovered a key to divinity on his own, but fate had another plan.
Heimark was broken into from the outside by a strange army, claiming to follow a god. The people of Heimark, being tough and contrary, fought back, and Able joined the conflict for the first time in decades. He joined with Elga, the Jarl of Briige, and fought under her as she first united the people of their world, and then fought to push back the invaders. Their resistance finally attracted the attention of the god himself, who stepped down from his throne in heaven to take to the field personally. He heard of a particular fighter who none of his disciples were able to slay, and sought him out on a rocky battlefield. The god’s blades sang as he fought, and in moments he had slain many of Able’s shield siblings, until finally he found the soldier whose body refused to be split by his swords. One of the Old Gods, or even a New God bearing a different Word may have been capable of stripping Able of his gifts, but this god and his power was only able to see them, reading his power like notes on a staff. He got too close, and Able plunged his indestructible fingers into the god’s forehead, plucking the star from his very brow. Holding a key to creation in his hand, Able looked back at the rest of the field as the god withered at his feet. The invaders and natives alike stared at him, expecting a new decree. Able turned the key, and stepped away from his world, into heaven.
The previous bearer of Song was a human man named Seig. He was called The Blind Maestro, or(behind his back) The Mad Maestro. He ran perhaps the most ordered of the New Gods' empires, and was prone to micro manage. He claimed he could hear the order of his sphere of control as Rhythm and Rhyme, and plucked out his own eyes, claiming they distracted him from it. It is argued by many theologians whether this action was a symptom, or the cause of his madness, but all agree that he became much worse after this.
He now believed he heard the Rhythm and Rhyme at all times, and found any disruption to it unbearable. And so he was known to personally flit about the multiverse, putting perceived errors to right.
Might: Able does not age, and(under normal circumstances) no change can be made to his body. He has mastered a technique to bypass the body’s resistance to using its full potential, and has a fair understanding of magic(enhanced by the Aspect of his Key). With his Aspect, he can read and understand magic that is affecting any object or person, much like reading music. Given effort and time, he can edit such magic as well by, to keep the metaphor, moving notes around.
Able can uncover, and even restore lost things by finding them preserved in Song.
The invaders of Heimark were stranded when their god lost his Key, but most of them would be willing to obey its current bearer, should he return to collect them. Able entered heaven alone, however, and at present has no followers to his name.
The empire of the God-King Seig is controlled by an efficient army of bureaucrat-soldiers who kept the Rhythm and Rhyme of the worlds moving. They were collectively called The Orchestra. Though far from well liked, they are generally considered benevolent, if meddlesome.
Seig's predilection for overseeing the details personally has left the Orchestra with a simplistic hierarchy, and nothing much in the way of a chain of command. Seig is known to have disappeared, but as the key that controlled his army's interplanar travel is now in another's hands, the news of his actual death has not left Heimark. The Orchestra is still able to travel between established worlds, but cannot create such permanent openings.
Path: Able seeks lasting companionship with anyone who might be an equal. He has long since withdrawn from society, having tired of the sorrow of outliving those close to him. He is new to Heaven and the multiverse at large, and wishes to see it, and what others have made of it.
@Dead Cruiser If you have a full-stop problem with it, that's alright, just let me know so I can work something else out.
The idea was inspired by Baldr, in Norse mythology, whose mother made every thing(with one exception) in the world promise never to hurt him, leaving him(almost) invincible. It creates drawbacks that are outlined in the bio I'm writing, and from a meta-gaming standpoint he has at least one specific, tangible weakness I can think of(along with certain strategies to deal with him).
So I'm taking it that the divine words/aspects are not already decided, we'll decide our own?
Can we play as a character who took one from another, previous New God?
My thought right now is a character who was loved(or at least desired) by a sorcerer on their own world. and was given immortality and invulnerability by them(this sorcerer could not bear to witness my character grow old and less beautiful, and beseeched the abstract ideas of time and change to spare them). A New God invaded their world to add it to His empire, but was not able to destroy my character, who plucked the star from His very brow and took it for themselves.
EDIT: second question, is there a set number of those aspects? I believe in K6BD it was seven, but obviously that may depend on how many characters are wanted.
