[color=D4DDDD][center][h2][u] Ansi Envolier [/u][/h2][/center]
[center][hider=Concept][img]http://i.imgur.com/ZAbhM5g.jpg[/img]
Art by airuko on deviantART
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[b][center] "Take the sturgeon. Yesterday he was his own fish; today he's my dinner. His life was cheap, and his death was nothing to me. The efertide feels the same about you and I." [/center][/b]
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[center][h3][b] 27 | Carnelian | No Mage-Eyes[/b] [/h3][/center]
 
[h3][u]P E R S O N A L I T Y            [/u][/h3]
[indent]❖ Reserved
❖ Cynical
❖ Pragmatic
❖ Highly principled
❖ Begrudgingly good-natured[/indent]
Over the years, Ansi has accumulated a grim understanding of the merciless world in which he lives. Virtue or iniquity, the efertide devours it all. The constant nearness of death has driven the remaining pockets of civilization into a frantic sort of apathy. Every last man for himself.
 
That being said, Ansi does reluctantly hold that if there can only be one last honest and unselfish soul left in this bleak existence, then it may as [i]well[/i] be him. He may not make friends easily, it seems folly to try when anyone you know may be gone tomorrow, but he admits that life without compassion isn’t a life worth living.
 
[h3][u]A P P E A R A N C E            [/u][/h3]
In the sunlight, Ansi’s black carapace boasts an iridescent, bluish sheen, though it’s rare to see him out before sunset at all. He drapes himself in a drab, hooded cloak, relegating all expression to the occasional smile on his pale, unnervingly inhuman lips. Otherwise he’s usually seen in faded, leathery hued linens, with his bow on his back and a quiver of arrows on his belt. He forgoes light armors, relying on his natural chitinous plating to help deflect harm if he gets into a scrap. 

Ansi is a tall fellow, just about six feet, and agilely built with long, three-jointed limbs and a deliberate, spidery gait. The Carnelian possesses an smooth, unnerving grace, natural to his kind. The sort that makes his allies glad to be his allies. Despite his arguably forbidding presence, his voice is perpetually young and airy, if often dry.
 
[h3][u]H I S T O R Y            [/u][/h3]
It’s been nearly six years since Ansi’s release from a prison in Ingen Biot, where he spent a year of his life serving for a count of brigandry. In that time, he’s put as much distance between himself and that harbor city as he has been able to manage. And there hasn’t been a moment since when he hasn’t appreciated the clean air of an open sky or the smell of a cold river. 
 
In the past half-decade, Ansi has lived a transient existence rebuilding his life. Upon arrival in a new settlement, he offers his skills to the nightwatch in return for an agreeable wage or room and board. Length of limb and his natural dexterity aid his marksmanship by affording him high perches in trees or atop architecture. When time comes to move on, whether it’s after days or years, he hires himself out to a traveling caravan seeking guards, one that doesn’t seem especially doomed (or sometimes, ones that do). The journey is then spent atop a swaying wagon, chatting if the conversation’s good, or simply staying alert to fend off threats.
 
Though an adept marksman in present day, Ansi did not study under a master or receive any formal military training. Rather, he got his start as a bowfisher in the small Quishan village of Kilhorn, just north of the Autumn Hills. Though the village received occasional aid from King Masbeth, he was one of many siblings in a household that was far from well-to-do, so he fished from the river mainly to keep his family from going hungry. 

In those days, he resented all the young Carnelian men who left home to chase life on the water as sailors, or to work at the drydocks in larger cities. If nothing had ever changed, he might have been a simple fisherman for the rest of his life. The gift of a pristine, well-tuned crossbow from his sister was the highlight of a decade.

As he grew, some of his siblings went off after their own pursuits. Two never reached adulthood. His parents died. Gradually he began to lose touch with all the things that made Kilhorn special to him. Ultimately, to the dismay of his former self, all it took to draw a young Ansi away from the only life he’d ever known was an errant infatuation that ended in disappointment and left him in an unfamiliar city.
 
Circumstances and misplaced self confidence would change his trade from bowfisher to marksman. This eventually landed him in prison, where he found little else to do but sit and regret his choices. Surprisingly, it only afterward that he discovered the cheapness of life. In his travels, he came to know messengers and traders who vanished in the night, never to be heard from again. Witnessed once thriving villages, where he’d restocked or once been employed, become deserted and empty.
 
He hasn’t even been back to Kilhorn since he left almost ten years ago. Most likely he’s afraid of what he might find.
 
Or what he won’t.
 
[h3][u]I N V E N T O R Y            [/u][/h3]
[indent]❖ Bow
❖ Rusted crossbow (still line-rigged and used for fishing)
❖ Belt-mounted quiver
❖ Arrows and specialized bolts
❖ Simple knife
❖ Antique Nephilim harquebus[/indent] 
[h3][u]O T H E R            [/u][/h3]
Although Ansi just came into possession with his latest love, a Nephilim-built harquebus, he hasn’t had much chance to practice with it. Ammunition and black powder are hard to come by. And besides, the thing is blooming loud.
 
Ansi is also also accompanied by a young but steadfast gelding named King, which he acquired two towns ago.

Most recently, and for roughly over a week now, Ansi has found himself employed in Alonso's local militia. He has been there long enough to rest and recover, so he plans to head out again whenever a sound opportunity presents itself.[/color]