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Fenic
The Hero...?
The protagonist of the story. Fenic was unceremoniously dumped in Market Square five years ago by her father, who promised to return one day. Over time, she made friends and grew into an All-Loving Hero, realizing she was a lesbian transgender girl in the process. Fenic is an anomaly in Market Square, as she is the only character who has human ears and no tail. This is because she is one of only three known hybrid of Wilder and Shades, and consequently the long lost princess of Tsul-Aset, kingdom of the Shades.
Her gift takes the form of Pankinesis, an all purpose form of Mind over Matter with a lot of different applications.
- Action Girl: The (self-appointed) Angel of Market Square who routinely beats up troublemakers.
- All-Loving Hero: Epitomizes the trope, though occasionally deconstructed. She has doubts as to whether her nature is too naive, or realistic.
- Also applies in a more literal sense: she's polyamorous and doesn't see a point in defining the difference between friendship and romance.
- Ambiguously Brown: Fenic tends to be drawn a few shades darker than white characters like Leo and Fran, but a few shades lighter than black characters like Louis. Flashbacks show that her mother had a similar skin color, that her maternal aunt was light-skinned, and that her maternal grandmother, the Empress, was dark skinned, indicating Fenic is likely multi-racial in multiple senses.
- Batter Up!: Her main weapon is a "baseball sword" named Slugger.
- Berserk Button: According to Word of God comments, calling her by her surname (L'écuyer) is a great way to piss her off. In fact, pretty much anything to do with her adoptive father makes her angry.
- Enae trying to take her away without explaining anything (just like Fenic's father) also triggers a massive blow up.
- Boss Subtitles: Gets them during especially cool moments, which has happened twice so far.
- Cannot Talk to Women: A rare gay example; Fenic's fine talking to women for the most part, but any time one starts flirting with her or acts romantic, she gets incredibly flustered and turns bright red.
- Color Motifs: Tends to wear red which matches her eyes and hair, and is an impulsive, energetic, and passionate person. Her scarf also associates her with yellow, which matches her upbeat personality.
- Dark and Troubled Past: Her time in Cloudport seems to have been friendless and miserable, with her depending on her dad for everything. By contrast, she absolutely loves living in Market Square and the people in it, even though it's a slum with homelessness and crime problems.
- Defeat Means Friendship: She tries to befriend everyone she fights.
- Disappeared Dad: Hasn't heard from her adoptive dad since he stranded her in Market Square five years ago. She's pretty mad about it too. Likewise, her birth father seems to have been completely absent in her life.
- Emotional Powers: Her halo only comes out when she's feeling strong negative emotions and given that Shades call them Goners... When Enae attempts to take her away, her halo becomes bright enough to rival the Sun.
- Fiery Redhead: Has a fierce defensive streak when it comes to her friends.
- Friendless Background: Prior to coming to Market Square, Fenic picked fights and was a problem child in Cloudport, but doesn't seem to have made any close friends.
- Half-Human Hybrid: Her mother was half Wilder and half Shade, while her birth father's identity is unknown.
- Heroic RRoD: Deconstructed. Halos are normally a Deadly Upgrade for Shades, and those who have their Halo appear are referred to as Goners, but Fenic doesn't have this downside for whatever reason.
- Holy Halo: Subverted. Halos are part of her (demonic looking) Shade heritage, and it only emerges when she's experiencing strong negative emotions. Peripheral comments by other Shades indicate the fact that she's able to summon a Halo at all and survive is extremely unusual. Regardless of her personal halo, her magic tends to make smaller halos appear on objects when she's moving them with telekinesis.
- Identical Grandson: Looks nearly identical to her mother, down to sharing the same maave (the mark under her eye), which shouldn't be possible, not even counting the fact that Fenic is transgender.
- Immortality: Her Mother's supposed Complete Immortality appears to have transferred to her.
- Important Haircut: Receives one from Enae mid fight.
- Like Brother and Sister: Friends with lots of people, but is especially close with Leo. Slightly subverted in that their relationship is queerplatonic, and they share their First Kiss with each other, but there's no romantic love between them given their orientations.
- Meaningful Name: Her name is seemingly derived from Phoenix, which fits especially well given that Fenic emerged reborn from the ashes of Joshua's life. One of her Boss Subtitles is even "The Sun". It's also meaningful in-universe, as Fenic is the name of the Lost Princess, sole survivor of the Empress' family and heir to the throne of Tsul-Aset.
- Her old surname, L'écuyer, is an actual French surname which originally meant "shield-bearer" as a rank below Knighthood, but in modern times is more often translated as Cook. Fenic is very defensive of her friends, and is a cook at Louis' restaurant as her day job.
- Meaningful Rename: Deliberately chose to start using her mother's name instead of her given name when she started transitioning.
- Dead Guy Junior: Played with, as her name was self chosen.
- Mind over Matter: The main form her magic takes. According to Word of God, her telekinesis is abnormally strong, even amongst Shades.
- Not Quite Flight: Levitating chunks of rock beneath herself to fly is second nature to her; she barely even pays attention when she lifts a chunk of a highway with her and Enae on it into the sky.
- In a Single Bound: At one point during the prologue, she channels her telekinesis through her body to leap after a would-be thief.
- Noodle Incident: Picked a lot of fights growing up in Cloudport, though what caused them is unknown.
- No Indoor Voice: Has a bad habit of screaming, according to Fran.
- Orphan's Plot Trinket: It's implied that her yellow scarf marks her as a child of the Empress.
- Parental Abandonment: Her mother died, her birth father is unknown, and her adoptive father abandoned her on her own in Market Square without explaining anything.
- Playing Possum: Unintentionally. After trying to using the Market Square gate she ends up unconscious on a beach. Xiaolei, not wanting to spend too much time exposing BB to a corpse, doesn't check to see if she's alive.
- Power Tattoo: The mark under her right eye, known as a maave. Unlike other Shades, Fenic's maave is identical to her mother's, which is impossible, according to Enae.
- Red Is Heroic: The Angel of Market Square, an All-Loving Hero who befriends everyone she fights.
- Scarf of Asskicking: A yellow one to be precise, which she wears at all times. It's the only thing she has of her mother's.
- Security Blanket: Implied for her scarf, as she is rarely seen without it, sometimes even holding onto it while sleeping.
- Shipper on Deck: Definitely wants Louis and Leo to date each other.
- Starting a New Life: After being stranded in Market Square for a while, she completely abandons her old life as Joshua L'écuyer.
- Stepford Smiler: Type 1 (Depression). Beneath her fun loving and bubbly persona, she harbors a lot of anger towards her father, wishes she could have met her mother, and angst about being the only person with normal ears and no tail. She even has a Room Full of Crazy in a mental image, full of self loathing, anger, and rage towards her father
. - Supreme Chef: Not to the extent of Louis, but pretty good.
- That Man Is Dead: Considers her life as Joshua to be this, outright stating she was born when she became Fenic.
- Terror Hero: the Intimidator type. See Victory Through Intimidation.
- Token Human: While not actually a human (she's part-Wilder and part-Shade) her heritage means she's one of about three people who might look like a regular human. Even then, she still has a maave under one eye from her Shade side.
- Tragic Keepsake: Her scarf is all she has left of her mother.
- Victory Through Intimidation: As an All-Loving Hero, she prefers to pressure her opponents into surrendering before any fighting could occur by showing off her superpowers, and generally hyping herself up.
- Wrong Context Magic: Played for drama. Fenic can have her Halo appear without becoming a Goner like other Shades. It's not entirely clear if it's because she's a descendant of the Empress of Shades, if it's because she's a Half-Human Hybrid, or because she's protected by God, but whatever the reason, it leads to some major misunderstandings.
Enae
Her gift takes the form of functioning as a Living Lie Detector, termed Aletheia.
- Aura Vision: Her magic lets her percieve someone's "aura of dishonesty" as a light around them.
- Bait-and-Switch: Her initial appearance makes her magic seem like it's some variety of telekinesis, since she fights with phantom knives, but in Chapter 2 it's revealed her magic is actually completely unrelated to her fighting style.
- Boss Subtitles: The Turned Star, Enae
- Calling Parents by Their Name: Refers to Tahmonai as Mona, though this could be because Tahmonai adopted her as a child.
- For Your Own Good: Her reason for trying to remove Fenic by force.
- Horned Humanoid: Part of being a Shade.
- Living Lie Detector: Her magic takes the form of this, termed Aletheia, an ancient Greek word that can be variously translated as truth, reality, or disclosure. It isn't flawless, though; it only detects intentional lies, so if someone truly believes a falsehood it comes out as truth. Additionally, Enae has to be able to see someone to determine changes in their aura."My gift does not show me the truth— only dishonesty."
- Mercy Kill: This is what she thought she was doing when Fenic manifested her halo, which usually turns shades into goners. She had no way of knowing the same wouldn't happen to Fenic.
- Multiarmed And Dangerous: Has four arms.
- Non-Standard Character Design: Her four arms and Third Eye are pretty atypical by the standards of the other Shades that've been shown so far, who tend to be more humanoid.
- Oh, Crap!: Has this reaction after seeing Fenic bat away one of her phantom knives so hard it becomes A Twinkle in the Sky.
- Has a much more serious one when Fenic's halo comes out, in part because a Shade's halo only appears when they're experiencing extreme emotions, but also because they become Goners and it's implied it's a Deadly Upgrade; while she starts sobbing mid fight it's made more clear later that it's not a Villainous Breakdown but more that she's broken hearted about trying to Mercy Kill the princess she's been searching for.
- Power Tattoo: Has two identical maave (marks) under her eyes, though her Third Eye lacks a maave.
- Rebellious Princess: Doesn't get much more rebellious than seeking out the true heir to the throne to depose your own parent.
- Scars Are Forever: After being attacked by God, her left horn is broken, beyond Sanva's ability to heal.
- Stepford Smiler: She affects an air of being fairly composed to others though it's apparent to readers that she has some serious problems, but Tahmonai seems to think it's inevitable that Enae will become a Goner in the near future.
- Third Eye: Has a third eye above her other two, and it serves as the conduit for her Living Lie Detector magic.
Clarissa Strong
A wolf Wilder who has been shown in promotional material and teasers. Chapter 2 marks her official reveal.
- Color Motif: Usually wears green clothes. Unlike Leo, whose association with green indicates his calm nature, she's seemingly more boisterous in teasers.
- Early-Bird Cameo: Made some brief appearances in Chapter 1 before Chapter 2 opened with a flashback to her teenage years.
- Dimensional Traveler: Unlike everyone else in the setting, she's able to travel between worlds with unrefined portalite stones, and can travel without using pre-made gates.
- Scarf of Asskicking: Has one that is a match for Fenic's in the modern day.
- Thinking Up Portals: Her magic allows her to create portals between worlds without needing to use the normal Portal Network and with a raw crystal instead of one tied to a specific world.
- Unique Protagonist Asset: She's the only Wilder known to have magic. Not only that, but her magic also allows her to ignore all the limitations of that gate-based travel between worlds has.
Market Square
Leo
Cute Gay Lion
A lion boy who found Fenic when she was first stranded in Market Square. Over the five year time skip, they became best friends.- Ambiguous Gender Identity: According to Word of God, he considers himself genderqueer, but still uses he/him pronouns.
- Camp Gay: Gay and dresses almost exclusively in feminine clothes.
- Color Motifs: Usually wears green, and is a peaceful, quiet person by nature.
- Like Brother and Sister: Best friends with Fenic. Slightly subverted in that their relationship is queerplatonic, and they share their First Kiss with each other, but there's no romantic love between them given their orientations.
- Little Bit Beastly: Lion ears and a long slinky tail.
- Parental Abandonment: Like most people in Market Square.
- Punny Name: Leo is a lion boy.
- Trans Equals Gay: Subverted, to an extent. He's not binary transgender, like Fenic, but is genderqueer.
- Why Did It Have to Be Snakes?: Has a huge fear of knives, implied to be due to an incident with his mother.
- Wholesome Crossdresser: Played with. He wears almost exclusively feminine clothing, but never tries to present himself as female.
Louis
One cool bunny
A bunny guy who is three years older than Leo and Fenic. He runs a restaurant in Market Square called "Lou's Whatever", and lets Fenic and Leo live in his spare room.- Big Brother Mentor: Serves as this to Fenic to an extent. With Leo, his feelings are considerably less platonic.
- Color Motifs: Usually wears purple and serves as a wiser, level headed figure to Fenic's impulsive nature.
- Hidden Depths: According to Jessica, Enae was also looking for him as well as Fenic, implying he's not just an innocent bystander in the greater political games around Fenic.
- In-Series Nickname: Tends to get called Loulou by people close to him.
- Little Bit Beastly: Has rabbit ears and a tail.
- Parental Abandonment: Implied, like most people in Market Square. Louis' story is currently unknown though.
- Pretty Boy: Very pronounced.
- Straight Gay: Tends to dress fairly conservatively.
- Supreme Chef: Runs a popular restaurant in Market Square, which he used to run entirely by himself, though he has Fenic and Fran to help him after the timeskip.
Fran
- Big Beautiful Woman: Has put on some weight after the prologue, hinted to be due in part to not having to steal to get by anymore.
- The Nicknamer: Tends to refer to people by nicknames derived from part of their actual names. Fenic gets "Nicky" and Isabella gets "Izzy".
- Polyamory: Is in a happy, loving triad relationship with Lia and Isabella.
Jessica
- Defeat Means Friendship: With Fenic, though they protest somewhat about it.
- Expressive Accessory: The button on their beanie occasionally changes text to match Jessica's emotions.
- Tsundere: the modern type; regarding Fenic.
Elly
- Satellite Love Interest: Brought up and defied. Leo asks if Fenic has a crush on her which leads Fenic to explaining her views on romance.
Tsul-Aset
Tahmonai
Tahmonai - The Unending, was originally an adviser to the Empress, but assumed the throne of Tsul-Aset after the sole surviving member of the Empress's family vanished. They have ruled as Emperor for 17 centuries.
Their gift is Paint Body, which functions as a stylized form of shapeshifting magic.
- Boss Subtitles:
- Color Motifs: Associated with a golden pearl and dark purple, which varies due to their magic and is an extension of the Solar and Lunar theme of Tsul-Aset as well as a Light/Darkness Juxtaposition.
- Early Installment Character-Design Difference: Their appearance in the prologue gives them more of a uniform grey color and a large lizard-like tail, while their appearances in Chapter 2 have a lion's tail and their color shifting magic is more firmly established.
- Evil Overlord: Portrayed as this by Enae, but it has yet to be seen if she was being an Unreliable Narrator.
- Evil Matriarch: While not female, they still fit a lot of the tropes to Enae.
- Immortality: Complete, as promised by God.
- Immune to Drugs: Casually mentions this, though atypically by the standards of the trope, it's due to their longevity and eventually just getting desensitized.
- The Lost Lenore: Was in love with Selin, the Dead Princess, and is motivated by trying to resurrect her, a goal that they've been pursuing for over 1000 years.
- Lovecraftian Superpower: Their Paint Body magic manifests as Tahmonai's body melting and shifting in an unsettling way.
- Meaningful Rename: Enae's narration implies Tahmonai is not their original name.
- Non-Standard Character Design: Their Paint Body magic allows them to flow and shift between panels, making them more like part of the scenery and color of the panels unlike other characters.
- Painting the Medium: Literally! Their text boxes are splotchy and paint like, just like their magic.
- Shapeshifter: Their magic is a variation on this, referred to as "Paint Body".
- Sketchy Successor: Far less kind than their predecessor.
Sanva
A Knight of Tsul-Aset, and Enae's Second. She has a complicated relationship with Enae.
Her gift is Healing Cryogenesis, a combination of Healing Hands and An Ice Person.
- An Ice Person: Her Healing Cryogenesis is cold-themed.
- Healing Hands: She can use her ice powers to heal people, and is introduced doing so with Enae.
- Smash Sisters: Her role means she's supposed to be this with Enae, but Enae has a tendency to run off solo since she's working against Tahmonai.
- Will Not Tell a Lie: It's unclear how hardline this is, but Enae says she's honest to a fault and that this is why she can't let Sanva in on her plans.
The Empress
The last Empress of the Shades, who ruled during the height of the Great War.
- Death by Despair: Prayed ceaselessly to God to reopen the portals so she could find her daughter and atone, ignoring her declining health.
- Flower Motifs: Her horns had several flowers sprouting from them and her tail ended in a flower, though they wilted after the death and disappearance of her respective daughters. By the time of her death, she was down to a single flower on her horns, which wilted and fell off the night she died.
- Scarf of Asskicking: White, in contrast to her daughters' blue and yellow.
God
- Eldritch Abomination: A Lighter and Softer version. God looks otherworldly and strange, but is ultimately benevolent.
- Everything's Better with Rainbows: Her color motif is rainbow. Her name is even written in rainbow when She appears.
- Eye Motifs: Tends to appear as a wheel of eyes; Her manifestations beyond the door in Tsul-Aset are even called a "Godeye".
- God Is Flawed: God breaks down and starts apologizing (saying She "didn't mean to") after She immobilized and wounded Enae in an effort to protect Fenic.
- God Is Good: Promises the Empress everything will be okay while cradling her in Her arms.
Sparrowden Surface
Xiaolei
A moth boy with a flair for theatrics and helping people. His introduction makes him seem very similar in personality to Fenic.
- Big Damn Heroes: His first appearance is vaulting over a large bird that's cornering Fenic, yanking the flower out of her hair, and chucking it away, which causes the bird to leave. Considering the speech he makes immediately afterwards, these sorts of rescues seem to be something he likes doing.
- Boss Subtitles: During his introduction he gets The Hero. Notably, he's the first person to get that subtitle without a question mark.
- Clip Its Wings: His left wing has a nasty tear in the side which can't be good for flying.
- Color Motifs: As his personality reflects Fenics, his colors reflect Fenic's color scheme. His antannae and shoes are yellow and his wings are mostly red.
- He and Fenic are even wearing similar outfits upon meeting - a white long-sleeved top with dark blue short legwear.
- The Exile: Xiaolei can't return to Sparrowden as the people of the citadel believe that anyone who touches the surface is cursed, and most people who hit the ground die anyway unless they can fly.
- Meaningful Echo: Fenic calls him 'dude' when they first meet and his reaction is very similar to the first time someone called Fenic 'lady'. The gendered terms in both pages are even colored-coded.
- After saving Fenic he starts to introduce himself the same way Fenic did as the Angel of Market Square, complete with bolding. Unlike Fenic, he hasn't had a lot of practice and keeps switching titles around.
Xiaolei: 'Cause I'm Xiaolei - the Angel of, uh... no, no, the Knight of... the knight who's... the Hero, uh... I saved you. Still workin' on the monologue. No need to thank me.
BB
A they/them non-binary slimeboy and Xiaolei's partner.
- Due to the Dead: They put a grave lily in a thought-to-be deceased Fenic's hair as they felt leaving the body without any last rites would be wrong.
- Persona Non Grata: It's unknown if BB comes from Sparrowden, but since they're on the surface now it's not like they'll ever be welcome there.
- Verbal Tic: Probably due to their being made of slime, they sometimes make bubbling noises between sentences. They also pronounce v's like b's.BB: Just didn't seem right... blbll... to leabe her like that...
Others
Asher L'écuyer
Fenic's adoptive father and the President of Cloudport. Kickstarted the events of the plot after a mysterious group came after Fenic, and stranded her in Market Square.
- Daddy Had a Good Reason for Abandoning You: Because Tahmonai came looking for her mother, and he apparently promised her to keep her away from them. He also couldn't retrieve them because he broke the crystal keyed to the Market Square portal and couldn't open it again.
- Parents as People: He's a well liked President, and his idea of greeting a foreign dignitary is an affectionate hug. But Fenic also has a lot of hate directed at him for (as far as she's aware) abandoning her in another world.
Fenic, The Lost Princess
Fenic's mother, also named Fenic. She died giving birth to Fenic.
- Death by Childbirth: Died giving birth to Fenic. This is despite the fact that she was immortal.
- Defector from Decadence: Why she left Tsul-Aset before Partition is completely unknown.
- Immortality: Seemingly Complete Immmortality, as God told her mother she would never be harmed or die. The fact that she died giving birth to Fenic is a major mystery.
- Tragic Keepsake: Fenic's yellow scarf was originally hers.
Selin, The Dead Princess
Selin, sister to Fenic, was once an heir to the throne of Tsul-Aset, but was killed over a thousand years ago by Wilder when she refused to defend herself. However, in the modern day, a girl who looks identical to her has also been seen multiple times, including traveling with Clarissa.
- Actual Pacifist: Selin held by her convictions to never hurt anyone and died for them, refusing to defend herself against invading Wilder.
- A Glitch in the Matrix: Her first proper appearance has her appear as a soundless apparition covered in pixels along with Clarissa.
- Dull Eyes of Unhappiness: When shown directly, she always looks exhausted or on the verge of tears.
- Early-Bird Cameo: Her eyes appeared during a page transition in the prologue.
- Half-Human Hybrid: Like her sister, Selin is a hybrid of Wilder and Shades, and lacks a tail, horns, or animal ears.
- The Lost Lenore: Selin is one to Tahmonai, who hopes to resurrect her by finding her sister.
- Scarf of Asskicking: A blue one, once again matching the dead princess.
Animal Girlfriends
Isabella
- Grew a Spine: Learns to stand up for herself when she needs to, while also enjoying being submissive at other times.
- Pink Means Feminine: Has a brief cameo in the comic proper, where she's shown to have partially dyed her hair pink and is wearing a pink top.
- Polyamory: She's in a happy, loving triad relationship with Fran and Lia.
- Shrinking Violet: A very shy and timid person at the start, but Fran and Lia get her to come out of her shell a bit more.
Lia
- Polyamory: She's in a happy, loving triad relationship with Isabella and Fran.
- Statuesque Stunner: Noted to be noticeably tall and very pretty.
