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Threadbare's Family
Threadbare
Threadbare, first of his name, King of the Basement until they find somewhere else to go
One of many of Caradon's attempts at creating a Greater Golem, he was the first (and almost only) one to survive Caradon's ignorance as to what a Greater Golem actually is. He started with much, much lower stats (almost lethally low) than normal golems, but unlike them, he has the ability to learn and grow.- Achievements in Ignorance: In a couple of ways.
- His job choices look really strange to most outside observers, because they weren't really choices. They showed up, and the rather dim little bear just said "Yes!" to get the annoying words to stop blocking his vision. Turns out they actually stack really well together and make him an amazing leader and survivor.
- He finally saves the kingdom because he looks at a thing that looks broken, says "That looks broken" and casts Mend to try and fix it.Melos: ...what.
Melos: My gods. You can't tell me it was that simple.
- All-Loving Hero: Threadbare really, really just wants to help people, and hates hurting or killing them. He's ... mostly okay with killing monsters, if they're really bad monsters, but not people. And he has a pretty broad understanding of "people".
- Badass Adorable: He's literally a teddy bear. And being adorable is one of his natural abilities. Also, he's a bear. With bear claws. And a golem. With golem damage resistance.
- Beware the Nice Ones: Threadbare always tries to talk things out instead of fighting. Except, when someone attempts to assassinate Celia, starts a rebellion, and people die as a result, the first thing he does is ask for a piece of paper so that he can write down who needs to die. His friends are seriously concerned.
- Combo Platter Powers: Largely due to being a borderline idiot for quite some time and then due to not having had the education most people get as part of growing up, Threadbare accepted every job that came his way, giving him some odd combinations. Turns out, they work really, really well together.
- Cuddle Bug: When he finally gets Cecilia back, Threadbare loves cuddling with her. It just feels good for his little girl to hold him again.
- Golem: An enchanted teddy bear, with the ability to learn and grow as a person. In fact, as a Greater Golem, he has more job slots than most "real" people.
- Hat of Power: Cecilia gives him a toy top hat early on, and it sticks with him for the rest of the trilogy. It gives him some minor bonuses.
- Heart Is an Awesome Power: Everyone scoffs at the fact that Threadbare ended up with the job of "Model"... until they find out that it's giving him +40 to all his pools, plus bonuses to social skills and the ability to influence enemies (actual or potential) in his favor.
- Jack of All Stats: Thanks to his grab-bag of jobs, Threadbare has an incredibly well-balanced portfolio of stats as well as a huge selection of skills and abilities to draw from. Combine this with spending his entire existence struggling to survive in a hostile universe and you start to understand why a teddy bear can be a genuine threat to the kingdom.
- Killer Teddy Bear: Definitely a teddy bear. Somewhat reluctant killer, because he's a very sweet boy. Well, not a boy. Very sweet individual.
- Lethal Joke Character: He's a teddy bear who's a fashion model as one of his jobs. Turns out fashion models get serious bonuses from watching what they eat... and teddy bears don't eat. This is just one example of how Threadbare's Combo Platter Powers and Achievements in Ignorance turn him into a character capable of overthrowing a kingdom.
- Level-Up Fill-Up: Because golems can't sleep, this is one of the few ways Threadbare has (apart from just waiting) to refill his pools. It's one of the only things that keeps him from being destroyed during his early, low-luck adventures.
- Magnetic Hero: By the end of the trilogy, in addition to the largely unnamed near-worshipers of his army of teddy bears, he also has a coterie of more than a dozen personal friends fighting alongside him, many of them recruited from former enemies.
- Defeat Means Friendship: Madeline, Glub, Kayin, Mopsy
- Fire-Forged Friends: Pulsivar, Missus Fluffbear, Graves, Garon, Zuula
- Recruitment by Rescue: The former cultists of Outsmouth
- Thicker Than Water: His original family - Cecilia, Missus Fluffbear, and Emmet (Pulsivar would go here, but that was slightly more complicated)
- Necromancer: He accidentally unlocks the job by having peaceful intercourse with the dead, namely a tea party with the cat lady ghost. This comes in handy when he learns to harvest soulstones and use those stones to bring his friends back to unlife as golems. He also has no compunctions about raising zombies to take the hits for his friends.
- No Biological Sex: He's a teddy bear and that's all he's ever been. He has absolutely no understanding of anything sexual (or biological, really) and frequently drops unintended innuendos.
- Pint-Sized Powerhouse: He's all of a foot tall, but has immense strength thanks to an unlife of adventuring.
- A Protagonist Shall Lead Them: One of his earliest job unlocks was Ruler, and he uses it to good effect, even leading a small army in the third book.
- Messianic Archetype: He brought his followers back from the dead and is now leading them to war.
Celia
Cecilia Ragandor-Gearhart
Caradon's granddaughter, Melos and Amelia's daughter, Threadbare's girl.- Become a Real Boy: During the second trilogy, Cecilia is suffering extreme body dysmorphia with her ceramic body, to the point of considering suicide. It's implied that this is a potential issue for all Doll Haunters as their mortal spirit chafes against an immortal, and unchanging, golem body. Unlike most cases of this trope, the series ends without her finding a way to regain her humanity, although opening up about her feelings at least reminds her that there are others that she can talk to.
- Brought Down to Normal: After being killed by the Inquisitor and brought back as a doll by Threadbare, she keeps most of her jobs but loses most of her levels.
- Magic Knight: Enchanter and Animator as well as Knight and Steam Knight. She can't throw fireballs, but she can enchant your clothes and give you the nutcracker special.
- Modest Royalty: Largely enforced by Melos forcing her to train to be a warrior. Her only concession to anything is her specially designed unicorn armor. It's cute and she wants cute dammit.
- No Biological Sex: When she's resurrected as a Doll Haunter, she becomes largely asexual and aromantic.
- Royals Who Actually Do Something: Melos brought her in to rule a kingdom desperately struggling not to collapse. He needs someone capable of handling war and demons and literally an existential, reality-consuming threat. So he trains her as an incredibly competent fighter and tries to make her a ruler in his own image. She ends up being a very different kind of ruler.
- Spoiled Sweet: Sheltered and a little privileged, but a friendly and approachable girl.
- Wrench Wench: In order to be a Steam Knight, she had to become a tinker, then build and enchant nearly every piece of her mecha herself.
Caradon
Caradon Gearhart
The enchanter, animator, golemist, and tailor who absconded with a princess to the middle of nowhere, joined the rebellion, and began experimenting to create a king among golems.- Mentor Occupational Hazard: He finally comes to the realization of what a Greater Golem truly is just in time to be murdered by his son in law and pass on his classes to Threadbare.
- Twerp Sweating: He never liked Melos, even before everything went to hell. Even as we pick up more of the backstory and Melos becomes more relatable, their strained relationship remains understandable, since Melos was a Demon Knight who relied on fear and had a history of occultism that included unsavory elements.
- Struggling Single Mother: Rare male example. He's a little beleaguered trying to help the rebellion and raise Cecilia.
- Wizard Classic: Doesn't wear a robe and use a staff, but a tailor's apron and tools. Still, he's an older man living in the woods, a little eccentric.
Pulsivar
Pulsivar
Caradon's cat, roughly the same age as Cecilia.- Cats Are Mean: He starts off as an antagonist to Threadbare, but soon accepts him as part of the family and the two become regular Back-to-Back Badasses and Heterosexual Life-Partners. Even so, he never stops being a terrifying threat to lots and lots of animals and monsters.
- From Nobody to Nightmare: We see him as a tiny kitten in a flashback. Ten years later he's a badass Tomcat, able to take on a horde of rats in pitched battle, the master of his house. Five years after that, he's leveled up as a Bobcat and is the unholy terror of the entire valley the home was located in. A few months later, thanks to constant adventuring, he's leveled up to a Misplacer Beast and is one of the most powerful monsters in all of Cylvania. But he's still a sweet kitty. Except Cats Are Mean...
- Used to Be a Sweet Kid: In a flashback, we see him as a fluffy kitty, terrified of Melos and hiding under the sofa. At the start of the trilogy, he's a standoffish and mean cat threatening to Threadbare. Come the second book he's leveled up to Bobcat and is the terror of their little valley. By the end of the trilogy he's a fully leveled up Misplacer Beast capable of taking part in the final battle against Melos.
Fluffbear
Missus Fluffbear
Caradon's final attempt at a Greater Golem, the one that let him realize just what a Greater Golem truly is, as he happened to see Missus Fluffbear's luck tick up after her first nearly lethal encounter.- Badass Adorable: Like Threadbare, she's a Toy Golem, with adorableness as a skill. She is also a knight, a cleric, a paladin, a necromancer, and a tamer with her own mount...
- The Beastmaster: Thanks to her job as a Tamer, though she only ever adopts Mopsy.
- Golem: Like Threadbare, one of only three greater golems in the kingdom.
- Killer Teddy Bear: Again, like Threadbare. A little bit less lethal, being a little younger than him, a little less wise in the ways of the world.
- Lawful Stupid: Early on in her career as a knight and a cleric, the group ends up in a town controlled by cultists who worship one of The Old Gods. Garon pauses mid-word and considers very carefully how to describe the situation to her, as he fears she'll jump out of the cart and start smiting everyone. (She was young and naive.)
- Necromancer: Accidentally gained and accepted through speaking with Zuula's ghost. Chiefly used as a backup plan should Threadbare fall.
- No Biological Sex: Like Threadbare, she's only ever been a teddy bear and doesn't really understand biology.
- The Paladin: Thanks to fighting simultaneously as a knight and a cleric, she opens up this job slot and gladly takes it, becoming one of the first in Cylvania since the rules change. She's a six inch tall teddy bear, and she will destroy evil. And feed her kitty on time.
- Pint-Sized Powerhouse: Coming in at six inches tall, she's half Threadbare's size, but also an incredibly strong badass.
Zuula
Zuula
"You fools, you come to kill an orc at night?"
A half-orc, wife to Mordecai, mother to Garon and Mastoya (among others). She was a very high level, well-ground shaman. Also loves destruction.- Blood Knight: Has a love of destruction and, despite her (formerly) high wisdom score, still loves a good fight.
- Brought Down to Normal: After being killed by Mastoya and brought back as a doll by Threadbare, she keeps most of her jobs but loses most of her levels.
- Do Not Go Gentle: As a shaman, she has the Dream Quest skill, which lets her see the future (weather forecast style, probabilities, not oracular definites). She was aware she was going to die, so set up a trap and intended to go down fighting. She made a damn good show of it.
- Interplay of Sex and Violence: Remember kids, it may look scary, but Mordecai likes it.
- Mama Bear: She hung around as an undead for years not because she didn't want to die, but because she needed to protect Garon and help him avoid an unlife as a vampire.
- No Biological Sex: After being resurrected as a Doll Haunter, she retains her love for Mordecai, but It's never stated or hinted that she resumed a sexual relationship with him.
- Who Wants to Live Forever?: She's clear-eyed and honest about the risks of golem immortality, and plans to end her life once the current mission is done and her family is safe.
Garon
Garon
One of Zuula's sons, he disobeyed her instructions to stay away during what she knew would be her Last Stand, which led to the rest of his afterlife.
- The Berserker: Half-Orcs get one racial characteristic from humans, another from orcs. He got Twisted Rage, which lets him go into a screaming, violent frenzy, at the cost of HP. He's spent his life resisting it, and resenting it, always on the edge of losing control.
- Cast from Hit Points: His Twisted Rage runs on hit points, and he built his class selection around it, choosing Mercenary because it gave him the option to refill his HP by spending gold.
- Hired Guns: His Mercenary class. He wanted to be more of a Punch-Clock Hero, maybe going to fight on behalf of the Dwarves against the kingdom.
- Horn Attack: Once he gets his minotaur body, he gets a racial ability called Ramit!.
- I Hate You, Vampire Dad: He spent five years chained to a bed and raging against Madeline rather than giving in and becoming a vampire.
- On a related note, he also hated having Twisted Rage, so on being given the opportunity to come back as another race as a doll, he did. First as a dragon, then as a minotaur. Zuula takes it personally, but accepts and understands the cost her son paid for a lifetime of having to always practice self control
- No Biological Sex: After being resurrected as a Doll Haunter, he loses the gonads that go along with that sort of thing. However, he does pursue a romantic relationship with Madeline.
- Our Dragons Are Different: His first doll body after the brief experiment that proves souls can hop in and out of golems. However, it's plush and tends to catch on fire, so when it gets destroyed at Outsmouth, he trades it for a minotaur.
- Our Minotaurs Are Different: His second body, after the dragon. He even wields an ax.
Maddy
Madeline
A vampire who made the mistake of trying to trick a teddy bear.- Always Chaotic Evil: As a vampire. Maybe not so much chaotic, but definitely evil. She ate people. She made no bones about it, never apologized for it either. Honestly, they don't really hold it against her, either. She didn't have many options, as a monster who was never human.
- Cute Little Fangs: her first new body is intended to be a vampire, so she specifically asks for these. Unfortunately, they don't let her drink blood, depriving her of some of the perks of being a vampire. So her second body is a dragon.
- No Biological Sex: She loses the gonads when she gets resurrected as a Doll Haunter, but she's still a vampire and being sexy goes with the gig. Even after she switches to a dragon body, she pursues a romantic relationship with Garon.
- Our Dragons Are Different: Her second doll body is a wooden dragon puppet. She can fly, she can breathe fire, she can boop snoots.
- Playing with Fire: After discovering she now has the ability to pick up jobs (which she couldn't as a monster), she goes after Fire Elementalist. She quite likes it. It lets her partner with Garon while he's a dragon, and then when she becomes a dragon it works even better for her.
- What the Hell Is That Accent?: With her behavior and her dress, she's probably intended to be a Jersey Girl, but the guy they got to read the books ...
Mopsy
Mopsy
A down-sized cougar the gang rescued from the evil undead cat necromancer ghost monster. She became Missus Fluffbear's mount.- Defeat Means Friendship: Missus Fluffbear beat her into compliance with the lion-tamer's whip Threadbare got from the Raccant dungeon, which unlocked the Tamer job, which let her turn Mopsy into a pet.
- Involuntary Shapeshifting: A very limited form. Once Missus Fluffbear tames her as a pet, she shrinks down a great deal from her original size as a mountain lion. After that, she only gets larger as Missus Fluffbear's Tamer level advances.
Emmet
Emmet
Initially a large and dangerous armor golem intended to protect Caradon's family, Emmet gets upgraded to a greater golem at the end of the first book. When we next encounter him, he has been given a lethal combination of combat classes and ground through dungeons, turning him into an absurdly powerful killing machine. Though his first priority is still to protect his family.- Animated Armor: His base form is the Armor Golem, which makes him tough to start with as that's a higher level golemist unlock. Later on, as a greater golem, he just gets tougher and tougher.
- Literal Genie: Emmet was created to protect his family. As far as Melos knew, that only meant Cecilia after the first book, so he never countered that order. However, early in the first book, Threadbare was added to that list, and of course Pulsivar also survived. This gave Threadbare a way to talk to Emmet and convince him to help.
- Obfuscating Stupidity: Melos doesn't want anyone to know how capable Emmet is, so he's been ordered to stay silent and pretend to be an ordinary armor golem. Well, a very very dangerous ordinary armor golem.
- Unstoppable Rage: He combines Juggernaut and Knight with Berserker... He's more or less a living siege engine.
Glub
Glub
The fishman who left his home to go on an adventure, only to find himself working as a sex toy in the town of Outsmouth, thence to be rescued/killed Threadbare &co.- Abhorrent Admirer: The townsfolk, from his perspective. They looked nothing like the fish people he'd normally like, and he found sex with them really gross, even with the bags over their heads.
- The Bard: He left the Mediocre Old One's underwater home partly because he wanted to go explore, but also because his parents were pressuring him to get a real job, and didn't accept that music totally is a real job, man!
- Magic Music: One of his primary skills as a bard. Can buff friends or debuff enemies.
- Omniglot + Cunning Linguist: Which is fortunate, because he didn't speak any of the languages beforehand, which is how he ended up with a lot of half-fish kids. And also dead.
- Defeat Means Friendship: He didn't really have anything to do with the cult and only fought the toys because, wtf, man? Creepy tiny toys are attacking! Also, he didn't speak the language. He was happy to join up (after death) when he learned what the real score was.
- Making a Splash: In addition to his job as a bard and an explorer, he goes with Water Elementalist.
- Surfer Dude: Totally just wanted to play his tunes, dude. But this is kind of ironic, cuz he was a fishman who lived under the waves; he didn't ride them. Whoa.
- Walking the Earth: Why he left home, really, and what he wants to do once all this is over.
Kayin
Kayin
A former member of Cecilia's squad of knights who traveled with her to Outsmouth to deal with the cult, she also had levels in assassin. Killed by Madeline during the battle, she was brought back as a doll haunter.- Cat Girl: Asks to be brought back as a cat-girl for the racial bonus of Nine Lives. It comes with the side effects of also being The Ditz and Kawaisa.
- Cuddle Bug: Part of her catgirl thing; she likes curling up in your lap and/or getting her head scratched.
- I Work Alone: She may have become a knight and then part of Threadbare's family, but the fact is Kayin started as an assassin. Once all this is done, she'll still be friends with everyone, but wants to go her own way.
- The Mind Is a Plaything of the Body: More than the other doll haunters, she gets a whammy from her new form. Basically, turning into a catgirl gave her severe ADHD.
- Professional Killer: Before being recruited by the Crown, she was part of a Murder, Inc..
- Token Minority: It's mentioned in passing that her former lover was a woman. Cecilia (still a bit naive) is surprised. Kayin shrugs it off. "What? I used to like girls, when I had the parts." Given the overwhelming majority of the cast is sexless or de-sexed puppets, it's not surprising it doesn't play a large role.
- Verbal Tic: She adds "desu" to the end of her sentences after she becomes a catgirl as a way to help level her race.
- Take That!: Everyone else finds it kind of annoying. note
Graves
Graves
A necromancer prior to being transferred to the knights, Graves immediately defected alongside Cecilia when she did.- Animate Inanimate Object: The only way he's able to move after his De-power; by animating his pants and letting them walk for him.
- Creepy Good: He was a necromancer before he became a knight, and is well aware of how that is generally viewed. The general view is well earned, though, since a lot of necromantic powers involve doing unpleasant things to people against their will. On the other hand, you can use it to let people speak with lost loved ones, so...
- De-power: As a result of the climax fight of the second book. The Inquisitor gives him a succubus kiss that reduces his strength to 3, making him too weak to move.
- Drama-Preserving Handicap: If it weren't for his crippling weakness, Graves would be an incredibly potent force, having lost none of his levels in Knight and Necromancer (unlike Cecilia and Kayin). This is resolved before the final battle, when the dwarves cure the curse.
- Token Human: Graves is the only thinking and speaking being who isn't a doll or golem in the main group.
- Undying Loyalty: No, nothing to do with necromancy. Cecilia earns his when she forces him to open up about what a Necromancer could do with a soul in a soulstone (unpleasant necromancy stuffy), then to reveal that information to the rest of the squad, after Graves offers everyone the possibility of going into a soulstone and wrapping up their final affairs with their loved ones if they fall in battle. Thus he learns that his squadmates still trust him even with that additional information, and how awesome Cecilia is as a leader (and how different from her father).
Karen Mousewife
Mousewife
She's a great big mouse. She's also the sweetest-eetest of the cuddly-uddliest of the toys and she takes care of the babies! Then she becomes Celia's right hand Mousewife, helping her be the bestest Councilor she can be. Then Thomasi takes her under his wing and teaches her to be the new head of security for Cylvania.- Bitch in Sheep's Clothing: It was an accident, but choosing the name "Karen" gave her the Karen Job, which lets her be the absolute Alpha Bitch, professionally. She's still a good person, but... she likes to pretend maybe some day she might couldn't be if she really wanted.
- Took a Level in Badass: Thanks to Thomasi's training, she learns to use her Karen powers for good.
Melos's Loyalists and The Hand
Melos
King Melos
A former cultist who became one of the greatest heroes of Cylvania before finally becoming its king.- And I Must Scream: When you're in the DM column of a dungeon, your pools don't regenerate unless you sleep. But when you sleep, you can't control the DM avatar and it goes around doing evil things in the dungeon while wearing your face. Melos spent a decade fighting to stay awake and struggling to live with the atrocities "he" committed every time his need for sleep overwhelmed him. One of your pools is sanity, meaning Melos did all this while barely able to function mentally.
- Bad Powers, Good People: He's a Demon Knight. He's literally clothed in demons and powered by terror. But still one of the kingdom's greatest heroes.
- Heroic Willpower: See what Melos put up with for a decade under And I Must Scream.
- I Did What I Had to Do: Melos's mantra, generally. He's barely in control of a kingdom in chaos, doing what he has to to keep it all from collapsing. Later on, we learn that that's just the tip of the iceberg.
- The Lost Lenore: He lost his wife during the collapse and never got over it.
- Off Screen Moment Of Awesome: In the immediate aftermath of the fight against the Lich that used to be Grissle, Melos found himself in the damaged heart of an impossibly complex dungeon construct put together by a genius, completely bereft of allies and facing the possibility that an entire kingdom was about to be destroyed in the most thorough fashion imaginable. And even in his weakened state following the fight, he managed to stabilize the dungeon and summon five powerful demons capable of mimicking his dead friends while binding them thoroughly enough, on the fly, that they could only undermine him very subtly over the next decade.
- Sleepwalking: When Melos sleeps, his GM avatar acts like the monster it's supposed to be, but with his face.
- Terror Hero: As a demon knight, not only are his armor and weapons imbued with and empowered by demons, but he has abilities that attack Moxie and make enemies run away, or just become weaker.
- Tragic Flaw: Not trusting anyone. If he'd just told everyone (or even just literally any single person besides a daemon) what was going on from the beginning, then everyone probably would have rallied around him and helped him, so he wouldn't have to try to bear the burden of being the dungeon's master alone. Instead he resurrected all his dead friends as daemons and then ground on for years with almost no sanity, making it impossible for him to make the right decision.
- Tragic Villain: In fact, almost an Anti-Villain. The kingdom has been sealed inside a Dungeon and there's no way out, because this situation was engineered by a desperate, dying genius who became an evil Lich when it started, and the effort to remove him damaged the weird central control of the Dungeon. Letting the dungeon collapse would destroy everything with catastrophic consequences, and Melos is trapped as the Dungeon Master, but he can never sleep. Any time he does, his DM avatar does all the sorts of brutally horrific things a DM does, and he's been blamed for all of it. And he's completely alone. All his friends are dead.
The Hand
The Hand
A group of five demons, the remains of all of the Seven apart from Melos (now king) and Grissle (who turned lich and was killed by his former comrades). After the five died killing Grissle, Melos brought them back as demons to help him rule the kingdom.
- Boss Battle: The demons of the hand have been installed in the Cylvania dungeon as Mid-Bosses, which is why they never stay dead.
- Came Back Wrong: As should be expected of demonic possession. In addition to being evil bastards, they also don't have the actual powers and abilities their hosts had. Instead, they're demons with abilities as close as Melos could get, and then they get souped up as mid-bosses. For example, the Lurker never displays any of Graham's Grifter or Gambler abilities, and is just a shapeshifter. The Ninja and the Cataclysm come closest to their human counterparts in terms of powers.
- Conservation of Ninjutsu: The Inquisitor is the first member of the Hand we encounter, and she very nearly scores a TPK against Threadbare &co. The second is the Lurker, who has to be taken down by multiple groups cooperating. But in the third book, Threadbare's team is able to take down three of the Hand cooperating in the massive battle at the border of the dwarven kingdom. Justified, since Threadbare's team have all taken a number of levels since they first encountered the Inquisitor and have been preparing for this particular battle.
- Demonic Possession: Creating a humanoid demon requires the heart and brain of a dead person, along with the words of the Pact spoken by the summoner. The demons don't have the personality or soul of the deceased (demons don't care about souls), but they have their memories, and those memories can fight back...
- Resurrective Immortality: Thanks to being mid-bosses, they come back after they've been killed.
Anayse
The Inquisitor/Anayse Lay'di (Amelia Gearhart)
The demon with the face and memories of Melos's wife, Cecilia's mother, and Caradon's daughter, Amelia Gearhart. She works most closely with Melos and her manipulations both of Melos and of the Pact he bound her with are the cause of much of Cylvania's suffering.- Exact Words: How she gets around the loopholes in the pact binding her to Melos's service. Kind of a thing for all daemons, but she has the advantage that Melos was never able to iron out the flaws in their contract.
- It's Personal: At the end of the trilogy, she has decided that Cylvania needs to burn for what it did to her. She spent fifteen years working on that plan, only to be foiled by a goddamn teddy bear.
- Non-Indicative Name: Whatever else "she" is, the Inquisitor absolutely positively is not A Nice Lady.
The Ninja
The Ninja
The demon wearing Jane's corpse.- Exactly What It Says on the Tin: A goddamn Ninja. Disappears in a puff of smoke, strikes from nowhere, does massive damage, disappears again.
- Ninja: Just Jane was able to do this, and so is The Ninja. Poof, smack, poof!
- Stock Ninja Weaponry: She favors a knife through the head, but also wield throwing stars.
The Legion
The Legion
The demon wearing the remains of Rezzak the cherub summoner.- Flunky Boss: Has the ability to summon a horde of minions to fight on its behalf.
The Cataclysm
The Cataclysm
The demon wearing Sabi, the fire elementalist.- Names to Run Away from Really Fast: Of all the demons in the Hand, the Cataclysm has to be the most ominous sounding.
- Playing with Fire: It throws around fireballs with wanton abandon.
The Lurker
The Lurker
The demon wearing the remains of the conman Graham.- Con Man: Graham was a grifter before the rest of the Seven convinced him to change his ways and shift to heroics. The Lurker inherited that role, in addition to shape-shifting.
- In Name Only: Some of the other members of the Five more closely resemble the heroes whose faces they wear. The Lurker only resembles Graham insofar as it's a good liar.
- Voluntary Shapeshifting: In addition to its high charisma and ability to convince people of its legitimacy, the Lurker has the ability to change its shape to mimic potential and former victims, a skill which isn't limited by the size of the target.
Other
Hatecraft
Reverend Elpy Hatecraft
The lead cultist in the town of Outsmouth. He worked as a janitor in the library until Glub showed up, then converted much of town to his version of the cult.- Dirty Coward: He never really cared about the cult. He was in it for the kink and the money. When the Mediocre Old One actually showed up and his cult rebelled and killed the local garrison, he knew the kingdom would come down with a heavy boot, so he started loading all the treasure he could on a boat so he could vamoose.
- Expy: Of H.P. Lovecraft.
- Naughty Tentacles: This is his kink. It's not all he thinks about, but it's most of what he thinks about. Such that when he has his followers have sex with a fishman, he conjures up tentacles to make it more his jam.
- The Peeping Tom: After he takes over the town, he has his female followers have sex with a fishman, and builds himself a peephole so he can watch.
- Sick and Wrong: His old apartment in the library's basement was wallpapered with his hand-drawn art... which was so perverted it drained the sanity of people who saw it. If they knew what sex was.
The Seven
Once upon a time, The Seven were the greatest heroes of Cylvania. Then a mysterious tragedy struck the kingdom, all but one of them died, and he became a monstrous tyrant...
The Seven were:
- Grissle: An old and incredibly knowledgeable wizard. Turning Cylvania into a nested dungeon to protect it from foreign threats was his idea. His transformation into a lich led to the fight that killed most of the rest of the Seven.
- Graham: A conman who was convinced to change his wicked ways and join the side of the angels. He was a Gambler and Grifter who used his charisma and ability to lie and manipulate chance to help people.
- Rezzak: The group's healer and buffer, he also summoned cherubs to help with the fight. Oh, and as a holy man, he was really, really useful against the undead.
- Just Jane: A ninja. She tended to snag the loot and share it out later. She was the group's big damage dealer. As for her name, it's Jane. Just Jane.
- Sabi: A fire elementalist, Sabi was good at crowd control and handling some of the nastier monsters out there.
- Amelia Gearhart: Another spell-slinger, though not at the same level as Grissle. What she lacks in experience, she makes up in being able to get out there and fight the fight, what with not being an old man with stomach cancer.
- Melos Ragandor: A Demon Knight, a fearsome figure cloaked in nightmare and wielding pain. But he's a good guy. Though he didn't used to be.
Tropes associated with the Seven:
- Bad Powers, Good People: Melos is a Demon Knight, Graham is a Grifter and Gambler, Jane (just Jane) is a Ninja who crits the fuck out of people and steals all the loot. And they're the greatest heroes in Cylvania.
- Heel–Face Turn: Both Melos and Graham were former bad guys (the former a demon summoner and cultist, the latter a con man grifter and gambler) before being recruited to the Seven. Melos even ended up being the leader of the group after Grissle retired from active heroing.
- Living Legend: They're so famed and beloved (even Melos) that their group's title merits a capital letter. The Seven.
- Meaningful Name: Several of the Seven have these. Grissle is an old, grizzled veteran campaigner. Rezzak is the cleric, a job that in ordinary MMOs would include rezzurekting dead team members. Amelia Gearhart is, among other things, a tinker and animator.
- Posthumous Character: With the exception of Melos, every member of the Seven died a decade before the events of the first book. In fact, their deaths were caused by the birth of the crisis still engulfing the kingdom a decade later.
- The Smart Guy: Grissle was a genius before the changeover. Then he took twenty-five levels in four different smart guy classes, unlocked the Experimenter class, and went to town. Nobody has been able to replicate his research in the fifteen years since everything went to hell because he was just that smart.
Chase's Team
Chase Berrymore
A Halven who isn't particularly good at being a Halven. She doesn't want to stay safe at home cooking and eating and gossiping and eating. She wants adventure.
- Interspecies Romance: Nothing ever comes of it, but she has a huge crush on Thomasi.
Greta Berrymore
Chases's older sister. She's not quite the derring-doer that Chase is, but she's a firecracker! (Watch out, Apollyon!)
- Interspecies Romance: She never really intends to do anything about it, but she lusts after Apollyon something fierce and takes every opportunity to flirt with him.
Thomasi Jacobi Venturi
He's a Player. He joined Generica Online for the RP. Now he's trapped, like the thousands of other players. Fortunately for him, he has a few revive tokens left, so at least he can touch grass.
The Muscle Wizaard
Bastien always wanted to be a wizard. Unfortunately, in Disland, that meant you either had to have a lot of money or be born into the right family. So instead, he became a wrestler in Thomasi's circus.
- Interspecies Romance: Ends up in a relationship with beastkin Cagna.
Cagna
She's a bloodhound (actually, probably more of a Rottweiler) who will always get her man. An undercover cop, she's got Knight and Scout levels and she'll hunt the bad guys.
- Interspecies Romance: Falls for the Muscle Wizaard, Bastien.
Renny
Originally a Greater Toy Golem trained in the Rumpus Room, he came to Disland thanks to yet another disastrous expedition to the Forest of the Final Boss. He joined up with Chase as she struggled to save her village from Players and the Camarlengo. Then he stuck with her as she tried to save the world a few times.
