[CHAR] Iris Ascendis

[Nanaya]

Students

Chloe

Name: Chloe
Race: Half-Elf
Gender: Female
Age: 18
Appearance:

[+]

Alignment: ?

Prime Essence: ?
Ethos: Phrase unknown. At the moment, Chloe's Ethos seems to be rapid aging applied through touch, turning teenagers into elders in seconds. This touch does not seem to require skin contact, based on the observation of her current victims. Additionally, it seems she can age small inanimate objects even faster, having been seen turning a thrown dagger into dust even as it entered her skin - though whether it was an automatic response from her Ethos or simply lightning reflexes is unknown at the moment.
Magic: ?

Miscellaneous Skills:

- Audacity: If nothing else, and if all else fails, Chloe most definitely has the audacity.

Inventory: ?

Rio

Name: Rio H.
Race: Human
Gender: Male
Age: ?
Appearance:

[+]

Alignment: ?

Prime Essence: ?
Ethos: "Wake Svalinn." Appeared in a gust of wind, though it's unknown whether that was tied to his Ethos or some kind of magic. His Ethos' main ability seems to be the summoning of the upper body of a phantasmal giant wreathed in a glowing golden aura. This phantom wields gigantic circular shields in each hand, and seems to prioritize defense of itself, its master and those he wishes to protect. Despite its size and the weight of its shields, it flies with supernatural speed to protect its allies and repel attackers.

One of the giant's shields appears to halt and reflect those that strike it, sending them hurtling backwards.

Magic: Arcane

Miscellaneous Skills:

- Martial Arts: Appears to be trained in an unarmed fighting style that grants him supernatural endurance and stability, with strikes that seem capable of breaking bones on direct impact.

Inventory: ?

Davil

Name: Davil
Race: Human
Gender: Male
Age: 17
Appearance:

[+]

Alignment: ?

Prime Essence: ?
Ethos: "Linearic Liner." From what Davil claims, his Ethos is the ability to fly for thirty seconds per day. Ten of those seconds are burned on starting up the process, and ten are spent on landing safely. Five additional seconds are spent gaining balance over the sheer force of the initial boost upon takeoff, so in truth, Davil's Ethos is the ability to fly for five seconds under full control, if he wishes to land safely.
Magic: ?

Miscellaneous Skills: ?

Gulliver

Name: Gulliver Bronsteel
Race: Human
Gender: Male
Age: ?
Appearance:

[+]

Alignment: ?

Prime Essence: ?
Ethos: Phrase unknown. Appears to be the ability to give commands to wooden mannequins called "Mannekin" that seem to mimic living things. Whether they come dressed as a street punk with a baseball bat, an aged wizard with power beyond their years, a gallant knight leading the charge, or anything else, one thing is clear: they all obey their lord's commands.
Magic: ?

Miscellaneous Skills: ?

Valen

Name: Valen Leuvalt
Race: Human
Gender: Male
Age: ?
Appearance:

[+]

Alignment: ?

Prime Essence: ?
Ethos: ?
Magic: Arcane

Miscellaneous Skills: ?

Ozhiah

Name: Ozhiah
Race: Human
Gender: Male
Age: ?
Appearance:

[+]

Alignment: ?

Prime Essence: ?
Ethos: ?
Magic: ?

Miscellaneous Skills: ?

Faculty

Raja

Name: Raja
Position: Principal
Race: ?
Gender: Female
Age: ?
Appearance:

[+]

Alignment: ?

Prime Essence: ?
Magic: Arcane

Miscellaneous Skills: ?

Inventory:

- Sapphire Staff: A white oaken staff with a glowing sapphire at the tip. Emanates brilliant light on command.

Alto

Name: Alto
Position: Compact 3 Overseer
Race: Human
Gender: Male
Age: 22
Appearance:

[+]

Alignment: ?

Prime Essence: ?
Magic: ?

Miscellaneous Skills:

Inventory:

- Longsword: A humble longsword sheathed in a leather scabbard.
- Traveler's Bag: A leather bag with many pockets and pouches for storage.

Lumyr

Name: Lumyr
Position: Alchemy/Herbology/Decay Teacher
Race: Human (?)
Gender: Male
Age: ?
Appearance:

[+]

Alignment: ?

Prime Essence: ?
Magic: ?

Miscellaneous Skills: ?

Inventory:

Emelie

Name: Emelie
Position: Librarian
Race: Human
Gender: Female
Age: ?
Appearance:

[+]

Alignment: ?

Prime Essence: ?
Ethos: ?
Magic: ?

Miscellaneous Skills: ?

Inventory:

- Cane: A rather ornate yet sturdy wooden cane, used by the girl to walk at a leisurely pace.

Nicole

Name: Nicole Malthruse
Position: Girls' Dormitory, Head Advisor
Race: Elf
Gender: Female
Age: ?
Appearance:

[+]

Alignment: ?

Prime Essence: ?
Magic: ?

Miscellaneous Skills: ?

Inventory:

- Undermage Cape: The dark blue-gold cape of a Vaal Shaktan Undermage, said to grant its wearer enhanced precognitive abilities and an improved understanding of essence should they be found worthy of it. It's said that an Undermage must spend three decades bonding with their cape's essence before even thinking about applying for the promotion to Arcmage. Even then, most who learn more of the world through these capes do not take the final step towards Arcmage, understanding how little they understand and how unworthy they truly are for the position.

Michael

Name: Michael
Position: Janitor
Race: Human
Gender: Male
Age: ?
Appearance: A simple janitor in a tattered brown cloak. Dark, unkempt dusty blond hair peeks out from under his hood, and the rugged stubble gives an air of maturity to this otherwise easygoing, middle-aged slouch. The shoddy leather armor and dusty trousers under the cloak give the impression of a man humble in lifestyle - perhaps a retired adventurer or low-ranking mercenary. Overall, a very unremarkable person in appearance.

Alignment: ?

Prime Essence: ?
Magic: ?

Miscellaneous Skills:

- Sweeper: He's really good at sweeping.

Inventory:

- Leather Armor: The janitor's leather armor is scarred and cracked in multiple areas, though still held together well enough to endure a few more blows in its lifetime.

[ERode]

The Seeker

Otis Tan Arillo

_{5'6 | 97 lbs | Male | 16 y/o | Strigidae Beastkin}
⚒

Alignment: Neutral Evil
Personality

Otis is intense and obsessive, finding beauty in details and specifics. To others, the open-minded skeptic may be insufferable in the way that his questions sound like interrogations, in that he refuses to accept anything until he has exhaustively, personally, investigated it, but at the same time, there is something admirable about just how open-minded he is. He loves the Truth, find beauty even as his previous understanding of the world is crushed underfoot. To him, it doesn't matter what shape it ultimately takes: a myriad of beliefs are rooted in a single truth, and Otis wishes to reach the thread that is spun from the nebulous wool of mortal perceptions.

Open-minded as he is though, there are still things that he has no tolerance for. He's a perfectionist, and a perfectionist who wishes for processes that are always correct at that. Intuition and instinct, to Otis, is only guessing, and guessing brings forth unpredictability that can otherwise be controlled for. And if there’s one thing that he doesn’t like, it’s the inconsistency where there shouldn’t be any. If someone promises something, he expects them to fulfill their promise. If someone has done something once, he expects them to be able to do it again. That harshness is doubled onto himself. Though failure is alright, Otis does not ever want to let that stand. He’s not insane. He’s just stubborn and prideful, a child beneath that veneer of maturity.

Backstory

Upon the descendants may an unfinished sentence be fulfilled.

A rebellion extinguished was not a rebellion exterminated. When the Clockwork Queen's fist rose away from the carnage she had dealt, that had not been the end of her wrath. Those who survived, those who had surrendered and pleaded for mercy, were brought then to serve their sentences, imprisoned for their folly, then conscripted to the frontlines of a war that none could survive. Of the thousands sent off as flesh to feed the Seedspawn tide, none survived, leaving their sentences unfulfilled.

So, naturally, the burden of their great crime would fall upon their children. Mercy was not to be offered, not to the weakest, most helpless of the rebel lot. Treachery persisted within blood. The boot of the brass tyrant cared not for nurture, only nature.

And so, it was only when he was ten years old that the sentence of his great grandfather finally ended and Otis Tan Arillo was afforded the opportunity to step outside the five meter by ten meter cell that had been his world for the entirety of his conscious existence. The sun scalded him. The earth scratched him. The wind kissed him. The moon graced him. The World greeted him. And it was beautiful, enough to smother the legacy of hatred he had for that undying ruler, enough to silence the decade of propaganda that spoke to her infallible nature. He grasped it as easily as he grasped a leaf: the planet was born before Queen Everember, and would last longer than she. There, just five meters away from the prison that housed so many like him, the amber-eyed youth laughed and left it all behind.

But his footprints remained.

Given the freedom to learn, Otis became voracious in the pursuit of knowledge. He questioned all that he encountered, going so far as to voice his doubts with regards to the creation of the world itself. Humanity in its entirety did not peer into the notes of the Sacred Record, after all. Only a select few had that privilege, and there was no true way to tell who actually created the Sacred Tower. And even if one did create an ever-lasting tower...that, in and of itself, was still far and beyond what the planet itself was. Kazaar was no god, not in the sense of omnipotence. It was simply a creature like any other, a con artist that possessed power to back up their lies. What birthed this being? From whence did the Light come? Questions dogged Otis's dreams, an inquisition that at once charmed and harangued his professors.

His efforts were real though. Enough so that when High Bishop Verne gave his answer to the rising chaos that came with the fluctuation of leylines, the fading of essence, those who knew the child born in a prison, the child possessed the purity and flexibility to delve into the minutiae of Castalia's existence, responded by sending him to Wingram Academy.

The world didn't need heroes.

The world needed the Truth.

Otis, however?

What he needed was an experiment, one the size of a city.

Magic: Arcane
Prime Essence: Seeker
Ethos: "Show me wonders of this world."

The Seeker, reversed, becomes a workshop that grants Otis a place where all he needs will be within arm's reach.

Upon invoking his Ethos, Otis manifests a doorway that leads into a starry pocket dimension that appears near-limitless in size. Marble flooring manifests over the feet of those who enter, and a litany of tools swirl around him, always within arms reach. In this space, the Strigidae is able to create any substance he desires, before using any number of tools to process and transform those substances. Twisted inventions and perfect weapons are craft by his callused hands beneath the infinite cosmos, theory realized or proven false with no cost to 'reality'. Indeed, within this space, all is illusory: beyond the 'cost' of summoning this dimension-breaching door to begin with, nothing that Otis creates is real.

Until he gives that creation the Maker's Mark.

Once he does, an amount of essence proportional to the 'value' of the object is consumed, solidifying the 'concreteness' of the object, and from that point on, when Otis manifests the door to his Workshop, he can summon that object. It is limited, of course, in the amount of time that such objects can remain summoned, but at the same time, it is perfect too. After all, anything that can be brought out through the door can be replicated in reality. What Otis possesses, what his Ethos grants, is a dimension where prototypes can be made with no cost, where inventors that craft without worry of funds.

Curiously enough, a tertiary function of the Strigidae's Ethos is that once Otis enters his Workshop and closes the door, he can exit, reemerging from any door he has encountered in his life. Granted, that too comes with a cost of essence, but theoretically, he could cross to the other side of the world, so long as there's a standing door there.

Miscellaneous Skills

Strigidae Physiology
_{Rooted in genetics, Otis can see well in the dark, turn his head all the way around, and possesses a relatively light skeletal structure, giving him the sort of natural agility and acrobatic skill that heavier races could only dream of.}

Universal Craftsman
_{Did such talent come before or after he discovered his Ethos? Regardless, Otis possesses a fair amount of skill in any common craft, though he's particularly skilled at weaving and tinkering. His clothes and tools are both handmade, after all.}

Marksmanship
_{He's a good shot. It comes with having steady hands and an unflinching gaze. In a world so dangerous as this, it's foolish to not possess some method of self-defense. Even if it's often a lethal method.}

Huge Dork
_{What can be said? He loves learning, and he learned to learn fast.}

Inventory

A beautifully crafted break action revolver with a polished mahogany grip. When it breaks open, there’s the distinct ring of a sounding crystal.

A thick, but breathable coat embellished with the red-and-brown patterns of the Arillo family, patterns uncovered through visits to the parts of archives that a young child born of rebel's blood ought not to be. While it offers some protection against bludgeoning blows, its main function is the many pockets that Otis had sewn into it afterwards, offering plenty of different places to put his various knick-knacks. Of particular note is a tin box that contains all his most useful tools, as well as a half dozen hard candies to give him that necessary sugar rush.

We Love Casting Spells

"Fluid roots for living Earth.
The tides recede upon glassy flats.
Quickly flow, quickly flow,
And submerge with land what drowns at Sea."

Quagmire

_{Applies the essence of fluidity to the earth, creating a quagmire of dirt and stone to entangle and swallow the forms of those atop it. Efficacy ranges from making the earth 'muddy' to having people drop through the earth as if it were water.}

“Temples and pyres, embalming and cremating.
Whether buried or scattered, we remain beings of air and earth.
When the last leaves our lungs, our coffins are prepared.
But for the living? Return to her embrace, struggle in despair.”

Earthbind

_{Applies the essence of 'embrace' and 'binding' to the terrain, causing it to rise up and collapse upon a particular object, subsequently burying it. The more essence used, the thicker and harder this 'coffin'.}

[AThousandCurses]

The Doctor

Name: Chunji Yi
Race: Human
Gender: Male
Age: 18
Appearance:

Appearance

Alignment: True Neutral
Personality: A reticent young man who performs all tasks to the best of his ability. Chunji only ever responds to a situation but never initiates one. He's often quiet and carries a solemn yet slightly gloomy air. Because of this, people often find him cold and weird, given how non-committal his responses are. However, if there's one saving grace, it's that Chunji is sensible towards others' feelings and input. While he may not do as much, he'll, at the very least, listen to what others have to say.

Internally, Chunji is a filial son to his family. Whatever they say, he will uphold. Their hopes lay within him, and he wishes not to squander any of their faith. To achieve this goal, he's willing to follow instructions that would help him improve himself. Anything that he finds trivial, Chunji doesn't put effort into them. Friendships, hobbies, and any desires are perceived as unnecessary. To Chunji, what's the point of something that is going to end eventually?

His duty as a son also carries a negative connotation. If there's anything that he is unable to become efficient in, he becomes incredibly critical of himself. When he finds something he is unable to do, Chunji doubles down and tries to find alternate solutions to the problem. This is most apparent with his lack of skill in healing. Even though he follows the instructions, the healing is inefficient. It has gotten to the point where he has started to use drastic means to improve his magic.

Backstory:
The first generation of Yi to be born in the Vaalin Union.

His parents came from an island called Feng Huo that hosted a variety of factions that succumbed to constant war amongst each other. Seeking a life without danger, they defected from their clan and rushed out on a boat. From there, they landed near the Vaalin Union territory, where they would call their home.

Soon, Chunji Yi was born.

The first memory he had was when he was holding a pen.

Then, the next would be holding a training sword.

Every day of Chunji Yi's life was filled with practical knowledge taught by his parents. Swordplay, literature, mathematics, and any mundane study that they held were taught to him. Chunji was allowed to be a 'kid' in front of his parents but as a string of hope that would grant him and his family a better future.

They lived outside of the Vaalin Union, which often was subjected to a less favorable environment compared to the capital. It did not help with the combination of his foreign heritage and odd demeanor that Chunji was not received favorably by his peers. However, that didn't matter to Chunji. He needed to study, to learn, to breach the gap for his family's goal.

When the High Bishop announced the beginning of the Wingram Academy, it didn't take long for his parents to immediately send Chunji over to attend the academy. It was a long-awaited ticket to escape from the outskirts and enter the capital.

To abide by their command, Chunji followed.

Magic: Occult - Taught by his parents, Chunji mainly focuses on healing magic rather than the destructive curses of his homeland. Unfortunately, Chunji is incredibly unproficient in these arts, and their effectiveness is dimmed due to his incompetence.

Prime Essence: (To be discovered)
Ethos: "透过现象看本质" (Look Beyond The Surface)
The eyes are what behold the world and perceive the reality in front of them.

When invoked, Chunji is able to see in any physical object in front of him. From a human body, he's able to see the internal organs, skeleton structure, and more. From a building, he's able to identify all the cracks and tears that would naturally form along with age and the foundations that support it. To put it simply, he's able to observe all parts of an object.

Chunji's eyes also allow him to focus on parts separately from each other. He can willingly choose to only perceive the skeleton of a body, or switch to perceive the muscles of the body.

Miscellaneous Skills:
Swordsmanship -
Chunji focuses on a more nimble swordplay that relies on quick strikes, parries, and dodges to create an opening that would allow him to deal fatal damage to his opponents. Shockingly, Chunji displays a great amount of skill in comparison to his magic studies.

First Aid -
To compensate for his lack of skill in healing magic, Chunji supplies with medical knowledge instead. Bandaging wounds and alleviating the worst of injuries helps out when healing magic becomes inefficient.

Anatomy Knowledge -
Thanks to his ethos, Chunji has studied how anatomy works amongst a variety of organisms. The joints that allow the limbs to move, the location of important arteries, and the importance of all bodies are known to Chunji. His knowledge is well in conjunction with his medical knowledge and swordsmanship.

Nerves of Repression -
Due to his upbringing, it takes a lot of time to raise an emotion. The mastery to repress his feelings allows him to think logically in serious circumstances.

Inventory:
Yi's Short Sword - A weapon brought over from the war-torn island of Feng Huo. Chunji's been told that it was a family heirloom, but it looks like a normal sword to him. A floral pattern decorates the hilt of the sword.

Medical Kit - A basic kit filled with medical essentials. It carries bandages, scalpels, disinfectant, and more. Though it is seemingly lacking bandages at all times.

Random Bullshit

"猴子的眼泪流满了喷泉。(The monkey's tears fill the fountain.)
同情和怜悯油然而生。 (Sympathy and pity bare compassion.)
满溢的容器消除了痛苦。(Let the overflowing vessel, erase the pain)
11 日 9 月 1500 年" (Eleventh month, ninth day, one thousand five-hundred, year)
- 年轻化 (Rejuvenation)

无论是天堂还是地狱，都无法用夏天净化这诅咒 (Neither Heaven nor Hell can purify this curse with the summer)
罪恶之河继续在秋天下涌动和发酵 (The river of sin continues to swell and fester under the fall)
整个冬天，诅咒都在流淌 (All winter long the curse flows)
让这诅咒在春天永远绽放 (Let the curse bloom forever in the spring)
- 大莲蛇召唤 (Great Lotus Serpent Summoning)

公鸡的叫声在阳光下回荡 (The rooster's caw echoes in the sunlight)
反抗的号角，求救的呐喊 (A trumpet of defiance, a cry for help)
然而在星空下它却无能为力 (Yet it's helpless under the stars)
3 日 7 月 1381 年 (Third Month, Seventh Day, One Thousand Three Hundred Eighty-One Year)
- 停滞不前 (Stagnation)

Heal
- Heal

"消除污垢，消除触摸" (Eliminate the dirt and remove the touch)
- 序列服装 (Sequence Apparel)

[Psyker Landshark]

The Inheritor

Iraleth Kyrios

Race: Half-elf
Gender: Female
Age: 18
Appearance:

Hider

Stands at 6'3" thanks to her elf blood. Toned, athletic figure with good amounts of muscle in her limbs.

Alignment: Lawful Neutral

Personality:
Uncompromising determination and iron will. Iraleth is stern, strict, and brooks little dissent or resistance. If there's an obstacle in her way, it will move or be moved. When faced with the unknown, Iraleth tends to fall back on tried and true methods, reflecting her trust in the wisdom of those who came before her. Nero Leuvalt is her foremost idol, and she wishes to see the revival of the Wings of Nero as much as the High Bishop does.

Secretly, Iraleth is a hardline Neroite with severe anti-Shaktan sentiments. While she respects and likes her spiritual leader, High Bishop Verne, she cannot help but completely disagree with his stance on equality between Neroites and Shaktans. To her, Vaal Nero was a victim of conquest in an unjust war of aggression by Shaktis, and it continues to pay for that to this day, with the current power outages proving her point.

Backstory:
Whatever the truth of her birth, Iraleth has known nothing but the church's orphanage from her earliest memories. She was raised as a ward of the church within Vaal Nero's territory, but tragedy befell the outlying territory it was located in when a battle between a party of paladins against leftover Umbralists from the Apocalypse spilled into it, decimating the village and draining it of Essence. To this day, Iraleth has no idea how she managed to live through the ensuing battle when everyone around her succumbed, though the child was left was grievous injuries before the sole surviving church knight, Eltoras Kyrios, discovered her.

Filled with guilt over how the battle had decimated an innocent village as well as cost him his fellows, the paladin Eltoras took Iraleth in as his page, practically adopting her as he served the church in the city of Vaal Nero itself. As it turned out, he and his compatriots had been greatly inspired by the tales of the Wings of Nero, attempting to revive the organization themselves. Though with the death of the majority of the group, that effort was largely dead in the water. Nevertheless, he raised Iraleth to carry the dreams of himself and his fellows, training her in the arts of knights and priests alike. Iraleth took to both the training and the stories with gusto, dedicating herself to becoming a knight of the church.

Her new upbringing in Vaal Nero exposed her to the realities of her birth land's political situation, however. The hardships Vaal Nero faced were so obviously brought upon them by the Shaktans that Iraleth began to fall in along the same lines of anti-Shaktan resentment that many hardliner Neroites espoused. Her adoptive father had long since felt the same, which didn't help matters. Though this was tempered by the knowledge that the High Bishop was a moderate and wouldn't approve of their resentment, Iraleth's resentment of the capital never faded, though she learned to hide it better so as to not disappoint the kindly Bishop Verne.

By the time Wingram Academy was established and announced, Iraleth had just finished her squiring with her father and teacher, and he encouraged her to attend. While neither of them was exactly thrilled with its stated goal of equality, both of them respected the High Bishop too much to not at least attempt to do things his way. At the very least, she would be trained to master her newly-discovered Ethos should the worst occur and Verne's dream fail. So with her father's blessing and influence within the church, Iraleth was enrolled into Wingram, setting out on the next chapter of her life.

Prime Essence: Inheritor
Ethos: "On borrowed wings."

To invoke the Inheritor is to channel the powers of those who have come before. Formed of her belief in carrying on the ideals and dreams of her spiritual idols, Iraleth materializes the Inheritor's armor around herself, becoming an avatar of their living legacies.

When Iraleth invokes her Ethos, divine arms and armor form, replacing her current armaments with ones of immense strength, durability, and Essence. The manifestation augments both her physical abilities and her divine magics to the point where she can stand against the greatest mundane warriors and mages as a baseline. Furthermore, the armor grants limited powers of flight, as the greatest of Iraleth's inspirations is Nero Leuvalt himself. Thus, it stands as Iraleth's representation of the Wings of Nero.

The Ethos draws strength from those who Iraleth venerates. If she is aware of their specialities in battle, Iraleth can draw upon techniques and magics that they were known for, though this taxes her greatly.

Furthermore, the Ethos is empowered by Iraleth's awareness of others' belief in her. The more she is entrusted with the hopes of those around her, the mightier the manifestation grows. Its aura affects enemies and allies alike, reflecting their perception of her. The more one believes in Iraleth, the more the aura empowers them in turn. The more one fears or distrusts her, the more paralyzing the dread the aura instills in them.

Hider

Magic: Divine

Miscellaneous Skills:

• Unyielding: Through a combination of conditioning, armor, and sheer, unrelenting tenacity, Iraleth is hellaciously stubborn, able to power through wounds that would take lesser warriors out of a fight.
• Swordsmanship: Iraleth fights as a knight does, favoring heavy arms and armor and bulldozing through foes with sheer tenacity. Little grace or elegance is found in her sword style, only efficiency and sheer force.
• Sacred Tenets: As a ward of the church, Iraleth was raised within its halls and educated to the point where she can perform rites and sacraments of the Light as well as any priest. She can perform most roles one would require a priest for, including confession, preaching, funeral rites, and sanctification.
• Local Knowledge: Having grown up within Vaal Nero's territory, Iraleth is very familiar with the local area around Wingram.

Inventory:

• Bastard sword: A hand-and-a-half sword formerly carried by a knight of the church that fought in the Apocalypse. Passed down to Iraleth upon completion of her squiring.
• Full plate: A mismatched set of plate with components from several different suits and refit to her size. Cobbled together with what spare funds Iraleth and her teacher could scrounge up.

Additional Notes:
Voice claim: Kari Wahlgren
Character theme

[Estylwen]

The Hunger

Ciara Ventura

5’2 | Human | Female | 16

Appearance:

Alignment: Neutral Good

Personality:

Being treated a bit harshly in her early years caused Ciara to be somewhat of an empath. Without much regard for rules or society, Ciara is more inclined to help someone in a vulnerable position because she was there once upon a time. She has a slightly mischievous nature, being the type to break curfew just for the sake of it. Her Hunger sometimes causes her to question her own morals, but she has promised herself she isn’t what people might think she is, and she condemns any notion of Umbralism.

Backstory:

It’s not a long shot to say Ciara had a tough upbringing. Thrown out of her home at a young age at the thought of her manifested Ethos having anything to do with Umbralism, Ciara was pushed from one orphanage to another in Vaal Kastrix. This caused CIara to be somewhat of a recluse, finding more company in the essence she could feel around her than the other unwitting children.

This gave the Voices in her head more free reign, and she eventually conceded to her Hunger, tasting the essence of a plant. It was delicious, though the shriveled husk of the plant that remained… left something to be desired.

When she was old enough, she supplemented her studies with a part-time job, offering her services to clear away excess plant life that plagued residents’ homes at a fraction of the cost of official essence eradication treatments. This allowed her to move out of the orphanage and into her own run-down apartment at the ripe age of 12. Yes, she had to forge an ‘adult’s’ signature to get the place, but the landlord didn’t ask questions for someone to fill his vacant suite with holes in the roof, finally.

At the age of 14, she had evolved her part-time job to also include package running. She could manipulate and hop from shadows at break-neck speed and deliver packages faster than horses. This made her skills heavily sought after. She used these extra funds to move to the big city, Vaal Shakta. This city's overwhelming amount of essence caused her to lie quietly on the floor of her new apartment for some days before her Hunger adjusted.

It was soon after, at the age of 16, she received an auspicious letter of invitation from Wingram Academy.

Prime Essence: The Hunger

Ethos: "Fames". The activating phrase meaning "Hunger" in Old Rekordian.

Ciara’s Ethos can be broken down into fragments.
- The Voices
- The Light
- The Shadows
- The Night
- The Visions

The Voices

A voice in her head was one of the reasons Ciara discovered she could eat light and essence. It almost continuously comments in the background like a child, reminding her of her hunger. It gets terribly excited when she comes across significant sources of light that are within consumable distance (i.e., being able to ‘breathe’ it in.)

She thinks it is these voices in her head that emerge in physical form when she uses the Shadows.

The Light

A person, place, and thing all exude a bit of essence. Some have more than others. The essence, or light of people, can be especially eye-catching, appearing to Ciara as a warm, radiating, mouth-watering glow. The better a person is, the more light they naturally carry. If a plant is like warm buttered toast to Ciara, a person rich with essence and light is like a lobster or steak meal, with a dash of addictive qualities. Until now, Ciara has never given in to her Hunger cravings for prime essence from a living person.

Too much light can overwhelm Ciara. Standing under the sun is something she can manage. However, she doesn’t like it. She also can’t stand purifying magic due to its high amount of light.

If she consumes any amount of light, her eyes change to a deep scarlet surrounded by black sclera for a short time. This appears to be a cosmetic change.

The Shadows

Her own shadow can come to life when she embraces her Ethos, manifesting black tentacles or shapes that can reach up to 10-20 feet. They have enough strength to knock a horsedrawn carriage over on its side. However, they have nerve endings and can't be used as a shield with which to hide behind.

Any shadow that she can see can also be brought to life. She hasn’t yet figured out how to manifest tentacles or create shapes of other shadows. However, she can use her own shadow as a portal and hop from one shadow to the next as a type of shadow manipulation/teleportation technique.

Her emotions, unbridled, can cause strange reactions. Emotions like extreme agitation can cause dark mist to rise off her. Fear can cause her shadow to quiver visibly. Her Ethos may also react and manifest to a subconscious will, such as the repressed desire to strangle someone.

The Night

All shadows blend into one during the night, especially a New Moon. By extension, Ciara’s shadow becomes one with everything she sees around her, allowing her to create tentacles and shapes from further away.

The Visions

On occasion, whether she's walking through city streets or slumbering fast asleep, she'll get hit with vivid, unexplainable visions that usually leave her pondering in silence, a strange feeling in the pit of her stomach.

Magic: Primal

Miscellaneous Skills:

- Nimble dexterity
Ciara can move up and across buildings in a nimble, stealthy way that she developed during her years of package-running. This includes safe landings, such as breaking her fall with rolls.

- Silent movement
From the dislike of being seen when she came to and from the orphanage, she can move quietly, knowing how to feel out the quietest parts of the floor and how to keep her clothes from shifting noisily.

- Daggermanship
Ciara knows how to manipulate short daggers as a means of self-defense, which she has needed to use a number of times in the rough-and-tumble streets of Vaal Kastrix.

Inventory:
- Two leather-handled short daggers tucked away in the sheathes on her hips, hidden under her jacket.
- A small satchel of dried grass she keeps on her person to stave off her Hunger. She uses it as an emergency stash, preferring other, more rich sources.

Theme:

[Sifr]

Hildegunde Nachtnebel

The Marksman

Basics

Race: Human

Gender: Female

Age: 19

Alignment: Chaotic Neutral

Appearance

wip image

Hildegunde is a tall, lithe woman, with angular features, tanned skin, piercing green eyes, and short, brown, scruffy hair. Her attire tends to skew dark and neutral in coloration, and plain and unassuming in design, as if to help her blend into her surroundings. Curiously, her hands always have pen marks on them.

(I'll be drawing her or whoever is selected later, note that my styles tend to skew relatively cartoony but I can try to do a more anime-esque one)

Personality

Hildegunde is a fairly quiet woman, preferring to listen rather than speak for the most part. Let it not be mistaken, however, that Hildegunde is a polite woman, or that she is a reserved one. While she might not be much for words, she is by no means shy; her actions are bold, and her words, when spoken, are said without much shame or hesitancy. She's a bit of an eccentric, and has a disregard for rules ranging from societal norms to legal law. 'Quietly unhinged' might be the best way to describe her.

She's got a sharp eye, a sharp tongue, and a sharp mind, as well as something of a stubborn streak. Her people skills are somewhat lacking, thanks to her upbringing.

Speaking of people, she tends to keep people at an arm's length; not because she prefers solitude, but because she is afraid of two things. The first is being unable to use her Ethos freely in an emergency, and getting herself hurt or killed as a consequence. The second is accidentally getting someone she cares about hurt, or god forbid killed. Given the nature of her Ethos, and indeed, the history of its discovery, it isn't much of a surprise that she decided to keep herself from getting too attached.

Backstory

Born to a family of hunters in a small lodge not too far north from Seer's Loft, Hildegunde learned how to shoot a gun before she learned how to read or write. Fairly disconnected from society, Hildegunde's main source of social interaction outside of her family were visits to Seer's Loft, in which Hildegunde's family would shop, as well as trade and sell their wares; hides, furs, meat, sinew, beads of bone, and the like. In lieu of social connection, she became deeply connected to the natural world, in tune with the rhythm and cycles of the earth, and in time learning its magic.

That is not to say that she was a lonely child growing up. Indeed, she was quite close to her parents, as well as her older brother, Gunther, whom she was equal parts full of admiration and envy of. In classic younger sibling fashion, she felt slighted by her brother having more perceived priviledges than her, as well as his perceived unfair advantages. He was smarter than her, quicker than her, stronger than her...it felt as if he simply did everything better than her, with little room to ever surpass him.

That is, with one exception; marksmanship.

Gunther was by no means a bad shot; indeed, he was, at the time, better than her. But the space between them in skill wasn't as steep as it was in other areas, and Hildegun began to dedicate herself to becoming the best shot she could be. It turned towards obsession; she had to make her mark. She had to be better at this one thing, or she would live in his shadow forever. Perhaps it was this obsession with hitting her mark that manifested her Ethos. Perhaps she would be a happier person if it didn't.

It was an accident, of course. She became addicted to praise, to power. It wasn't as if she knew the ins and outs of her Ethos yet; all she wanted was for her to continue to hit with each shot. She knows her gun wasn't pointed anywhere near him when it happened. But alas, Gunther paid the price for her hubris, and in a way she never wanted, she was forced out of his shadow.

The two were hunting alone when it happened, and to this day she has not admitted to anyone the truth, instead framing her accidental murder as his intentional suicide. The guilt, along with the fear of hurting someone again, has made her a lone wolf. She became well known for her skills; skills that she now honed exclusively outside of the use of her ethos. But it lays there, in wait, of course. Her emergency button.

As her skills increased, she became more and more reclusive and her mental health deteriorated. Her parents began to worry for her. Eventually, the decision was made to abandon their fairly self sufficient and secluded way of life and emigrate to the Vaal Shakta, hoping to get her professional help, as well as hoping that a more social lifestyle may help her recover. This has had mixed results; if nothing else, being overwhelmed by city life has at least alleviated a lot of the guilt and gloom that once hung off her.

She has applied to Wingram since, in hopes to hone her primal magic, and maybe even her Ethos. If nothing else, the idea of being a hero of any kind appeals to her ego, even if her personality isn't quite yet worthy of such a title.

Prime Essence, Ethos, and Magic

Marksman - Freikugeln

It was said that, once upon a time, a marksman made a deal with the devil. He was granted seven magic bullets; the first six would serve the will of the marksman, but the last of which would be at the will of the devil. While Hildegunde has (presumably) never made such a deal, the concept from the fairy tale rings very familiar. Maybe she had made such a deal in a past life.

When Freikugeln is evoked, two bullets will meet their mark with pin-point accuracy. The third, however, is one that Hildegunde lacks total control over - but will always hit something. Perhaps, with time and dedication, she will be able to sway the devil's favour, and gain the fabled six shots.

For obvious reasons, she tries to avoid actually using this outside of emergencies.

Outside of her Ethos, she has primal magic, gained through a connection to nature.

Miscellaneous Skills

Marksmanship - Hildegunde's got a pretty good aim with guns, with rifles being her specialty.

Survivalist - She's also got a fair amount of general knowledge that has served her well when roughing it out outdoors. Foraging knowledge, how to set traps, fire making, knot tying, that sort of deal. And, of course, hunting.

Butchery - Likewise, she also knows how to butcher an animal, as well as use different parts of it for various uses, such as skinning, bone carving, etc.

Stealth - Hildegunde 's got a very good knack at keeping herself out of the sight and mind of people and animals alike, able to blend in, keep still, and keep quiet to alarming efficiency.

Discerning - Years of hunting has made her very attuned to slight movements, sounds, etc.

Endurance - Hildegunde can go a long time without getting tired, and is very good at handling hunger, thirst, and pain.

Inventory

Hunting rifle

Bullet brick

Pen and inkwell

Swiss Army Knife

Dried venison

Additional Notes:

-The Ethos is drawn from the folkloric figure of Der Freischütz, or The Marksman.

-The earliest iteration of what would become the fabled figured of Freischütz was actually an archer and not a marksman, making him an arrow ace. Hildegunde is, similarly, an aro ace. (You may now throw tomatoes at me).

-Hildegunde's biggest weakness is her pride. It's a quiet pride; she is not boastful or arrogant, so it might not even be apparent to most that she even has a massive ego. But she does indeed, and it fuels many of her actions; her refusal to ask for help, her belief that she can do it better than others, et cetera.

-Her biggest strength is, similarly, her confidence. Hildegunde is not one to doubt; she is decisive, quick to act, and not easily swayed or made to falter.

-The pen marks on her hands are to keep track of what metaphorical 'bullet' she is on.