THE WARHOUND
Kyon
Sex: Male
Place of Origin: Kothar
Appearance: Kyon is a towering brute of a man, standing well over two meters tall, with a dense, muscular body that weighs nearly twenty stone. Kyon's body is of a sturdy musculature, bronze skin, and coarse, dark hair. An extensive network of scars cover both his form and his face, lining his body with countless dark fissures. His features are rough and square, as though hewn from stone, and a particularly brutal scar along his jawline pulls his mouth into a near-constant sneer. Dark eyes peer out from deep, tired sockets, and while alert and predatory, they take on a true fire when Kyon is in battle. He keeps his hair- turned grey at the edges prematurely- cropped short, and does his best to stay clean-shaven. His dress sense is utterly utilitarian; riding leathers and sandals, save for the ring of tarnished silver he wears on the smallest finger of his left hand.
Psyche: Kyon is regarded by many as a hard man; a hard man to know, and a harder man to like. Stoic and introspective, he emotes little and says even less. When he does speak, he is utterly blunt- vitriolic, even. He is generally a man without artifice, with little patience for deception or decorum. He is pragmatic by nature, not prideful in the least, and while uneducated, possesses a particular low cunning. He is not without virtue, however, as he possesses a fierce and protective sense of loyalty (to those that manage to earn it), and detests slavers, rapers, liars, cravens, and others that prey upon the weak and vulnerable. His sense of personal honor extends to a general disgust for witches and monsters as a whole, and takes quiet satisfaction in their killing. In battle, he can seem to many like a different man, as what was originally his stony exterior explodes into a howling battle-fury, stopped usually when there is no more blood left to spill. In battle does his sheer willpower show through best, as he is as bendable as a mountain, often pushing well past the point where his body has failed and broken.
Skills: Kyon is an experienced and skilled soldier, a veteran of dozens of battles, and many more duels or common brawls. His command of the blade is admirable, as is his brutal efficiency with his bare hands. A mercenary by trade, he is generally self-sufficient, more than capable of hunting, camping, fishing, cooking, arms and armor maintenance, rough field medicine, and general navigation, and has some experience in horsemanship and bartering. Quite notable is Kyon's sheer physicality: stronger even than his size and musculature would suggest, and with perseverance that outstrips just about any man he's ever met.
Equipment: Kyon travels light, with a knapsack full of generally-useful supplies and tools for traveling on the road, and an iron hatchet. His armor is light, consisting of an unpainted bronze breastplate, greaves, gauntlets, and helmet. His primary weapon is a broad cavalry-blade, a meter and a half in length, meant for unhorsing riders at a distance; Kyon swings the blade around as though it were no heavier than an arming sword.
Bio: The origins of the man known as Kyon are hazy. His earliest memories are of his childhood in the war-camps of one of Kothar's many slave legions. His parentage is utterly unknown to him; he supposes he was some sort of war-orphan taken in by the slaves- possibly of the Baccum, given his monstrous size. Regardless, he was raised as a slave in his earliest memories, living on scraps, and silently enduring beatings and other brutality at the hands of masters and elder slaves alike. For this, the child was called "Kyon" by the other slaves, a crude name meant to evoke the scavenging gutter-dog he so resembled.
Pity was taken on Kyon by one of the oldest slaves, an elderly veteran known as Arcturus the Grey Wolf. In another life, Arcturus had been known as Arcturus Lupercalia, the Wolf Knight: a heroic kestaphos of Mennon, and a descendant of the mythic barbarian queen Regina Lupercalia, the She-Wolf. Captured in one of Mennon's many skirmishes with Kothar, he was prized as a trophy for some time, spent years in gladiatorial arenas, and was eventually sent to fight his own people as a slave-soldier. Knowing that Kyon had never known a life outside of suffering and slavery, Arcturus took the boy under his wing and taught him the sword. His training was brutal, but Kyon took to it, growing into a formidable warrior by the time he could grow his first chin-hairs.
Kyon fought alongside the other slave-soldiers for some years, cutting his teeth on the vicious and dangerous battles that the slave legions were marched into like so much fodder. It took particular prowess and determination to survive where their Kotharan masters dared not send their professional soldiers, and while Kyon was tested, he persevered. As this continued, he, Arcturus, and the other slaves plotted violent rebellion against their masters, which they enacted at their earliest opportunity. The slave rebellion was quick and bloody, and while it claimed the life of Arcturus, the man Kyon had come to regard as a father, he had won his freedom, and set off into the world.
Knowing no other trade but warfare, Kyon sold his services as a mercenary. In this field he gained a considerable reputation; a vicious warrior with the strength of ten men, some claimed. He could walk into a melee and slay a hundred men on his own, claimed others. Kyon paid little attention to rumors, focusing on honing his skills and finding his next battlefield. In time he was followed by a particular sobriquet: the War Hound. Kyon did not mind this, as it mostly replaced a different, humiliating designation that had also begun to built around him: the Slave Knight.
As years and battles wore on, Kyon's skill grew, and so did his scars. Not merely scars on his body, but on his soul. The loss of Arcturus was merely the first of many. He lost so much in those first few years. Comrades, friends, brothers, even lovers, all turned to ash in the fires of war. He grew cold, retreating to the silent perseverance that had kept him as a child. Kyon did not trust himself to feel anything beyond the rage of battle, fearing no man but he that called him friend.
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