@ Krimzonflygon 2 While I'm not familiar with Valkyrie Drive, I do understand the basic premise of it, so I think I'll give this a shot if you don't mind.

Reading the profile of two of your villains, Heimdall and Hel, I couldn't help but think that your short story resembled a Hideo Kojima game both with their personalities—such as they are—and their backstory and conditioning. Now, with the addition of Bankwell,it seems Resident Evil has joined the party.

Again while I don't know enough about Valkyrie Drive to comment on how well Bankwell fits within the narrative, I can say that from a purely storytelling perspective, he is a pretty good villain character. A self-righteous bigot who has convinced himself that he is morally justified in committing atrocities against innocent people is always someone the audience can easily hate and want to see taken down.

While it is nice to have villains you can root for or see their perspective, I also enjoy seeing an outright Hate Sink every once in a while.

Fear is a tyrant and a despot, more terrible than the rack, more potent than the snake. — Edgar Walllace

Valkyrie Drive is what you get when Senran Kagura becomes straight-up porn. It is a Panty Fighter down to its bones, in the vein of Queen's Blade, Ikkitousen or otherwise. Tonally, it can get pretty damn dark, what with attempted rape, torturous Super Soldier experiments, being sealed away from your friends and loved ones because of a disease, never knowing if you'll be hunted down by Charlotte, and that's Mermaid. Valkyrie Drive -Bhikkhuni- gets even darker.

All that being said, Bankwell and the rest of Ensiferum are as bad as it gets, especially when all that capital-Y Yuri Fanservice goes right out the window when they show up. Even Momoka, the Big Bad and Knight of Cerebus of the anime, is a Woobie, Destroyer of Worlds and singlehandedly hits about thirty fetishes on her own. Fighting Bankwell is less about avoiding Clothing Damage and more about not getting maimed.

Another villain from the same setting of Fear of Erth. In fact, it is one of the “Negative” Tyrens who serve Fear and her brothers. My apologies for his long backstory, but I hope it's worth it!

• Name Tyren the Blood Drive.

• Age 16

• Appearance: Blood Drive originally looked similar to the waking world's Tyren Aros at the age of 16. He was a wiry teenage boy with short Spiky Hair, a light olive complexion and blue eyes. He wore a short-sleeved hoodie and cargo pants and high boots with a heavy belt and pouches. After gaining his powers and new name, Blood Drive adopted a red and black suit of sleek steel armor with the severed horns of Ovettans embedded within the suit’s shoulders and forearms. The color drained from his skin, leaving his flesh snow-white and all of his teeth elongated into razor sharp fangs. A thin mist of blood always hovers around his body, shifting and vibrating with his every motion. This lends a disturbing and ghostly aspect to his already frightening appearance. The cloud is capable of speech, separate from Blood Drive himself, sometimes urging him to stop his actions or spouting nonsensical sentences.

• Personality: Blood Drive’s temperament was originally indistinguishable from the real Tyren Aros at the age of 16. Having just attained the holy sword known as the Master Key, he was terrified and awed by the responsibility bestowed upon him. He was determined to make sure he lived up to the legacy of the Locksmiths by protecting the mortal races from the Father of the Void and his Abyss. He tried his best to navigate the Deadly Decadent Court of the Solinri Empire and forge friendships where he could. When the Empire and his homeland of the Western Isles were invaded by the Ovettans Blood Drive's mind was broken by the destruction of all he loved as both nations fell to the horde. The helplessness to stop those he cared about from being killed or converted to worshiping the Father of the Void cemented a deep sense of hatred for the entire Ovettan race, and drove him to extreme measures. After forcibly absorbing the vampire Nico Vales and gaining her powers, Blood Drive reinvented himself as a living weapon against the Ovettans and dedicated his life to ending their race. His anger, despair and shame at being unable to save his people from disaster drives him relentlessly onward and he will destroy anyone who stands in the way of his crusade. That said, there are lingering traces of the plucky Kid Hero he was. Unlike the other three Negative Tyrens, he hesitates to harm anyone who isn’t an Ovettan or a “sympathizer”, and shows apprehension at the murderous excesses of his counterparts. Though his ultimate goal is the restoration of his world and friends, he also believes that he is giving hope to the waking world by taking out the Ovettan threat before it can grow into the horde that killed everything he knew.

• Abilities:
  • Tyren Aros was once the Locksmith and ownership of Erth's holy sword, the Master Key automatically gave him rudimentary sword-skills that he then trained to perfection. He had the ability to commune with the souls of the mortal worlds and create blessed seals that protected them from the Abyss's influence. The Master Key increased the damage he could do to creatures and people who wielded the power of Darkness. He was capable of emitting light-based energy blasts from the Master Key at will. His final power was the "Test Drive", the ability to temporarily fuse his body with the soul of a willing partner to create a short-lived but immense power boost, after which both would return to being separate entities.

  • After forcibly using Test Drive on Nico Vales, Tyren lost all his Locksmith abilities but gained enhanced vampiric powers with none of the weaknesses. Blood Drive can run at superhuman speed, able to run the length of a city and back within minutes. Combined with his enhanced strength and durability, this allows him to tear people apart simply by running into them or punching them while accelerated. His reflexes, agility and coordination allow him to make sharp turns, leap far distances and dodge attacks almost without thinking about it. His sense of smell is sharper than even an elder vampire, allowing him to discern someone's race, age and gender and the number of targets even if they are hidden from his eyes. The cloud of blood that hovers around him can be manipulated at will and can harden into razor-sharp droplets of blood and propelled to act like armor-piercing flechettes. Blood spilled from enemies only adds to this cloud. He can also heal wounds, ranging from cuts and bruises to severed limbs in minutes.

• Weaknesses: The abuse of the the Test Drive power cost Tyren his place as Locksmith and left his body corrupted and unstable. While Blood Drive can use Nico’s powers, there is always the threat of her forcibly separating from him. Using his Healing Factor worsens the situation, so any wound he sustains forces him to stop and concentrate on healing and not letting Nico “escape”. The mental trauma he endured in his home world has left him so determined to end the Ovettan threat that he has disobeyed orders many times, making him a liability to the Abyss Guard’s cause. Finally, Blood Drive is an entity of the Silt. His personality is set in stone, almost completely unable to be changed or corrected. Any change to his mind or psyche from its current state would invalidate his existence and cause him to disappear forever.

• Goals:
  • Exterminate the entire Ovettan race to protect Erth-worshiping mortals from any threat they may pose through being created by the Father of the Void.

  • Restore his world and loved ones to life so that he can have a second chance at being the protector and champion he failed to be the first time.

• Motivation: Blood Drive was chosen to be the newest Locksmith at an early age, and he was raised on wondrous stories about the exploits of all Erth's previous champions and their devotion to their faith and the people. He later helplessly watched everyone and everything he loved either be destroyed or corrupted by a seemingly innumerable horde, and his world literally collapse.

• Role in the story: Blood Drive is one of the Negative Tyrens, four warped and depraved versions of the the current Locksmith Tyren Aros who assist the Abyss Guard in their invasive return to the waking world. As a denizen of the Silt, he represents the real Tyren's fear of the Ovettans and their culture. He is the Token Good Teammate of the Negative Tyrens and the only one to undergo a Heel–Face Turn.

• Backstory:

Tyren the Blood Drive started his life similarly to his waking world counterpart. He was born the son of a fisherman in the Western Isles, an island nation that was a colony of the Solinri Empire. While not devout, Tyren's father raised him on the church's teachings and the legends and exploits of both the church and Erth's champions as they battled the very real threat of the Abyss that wanted to undo all creation. With his childhood friends Richard and Karel by his side, he lived an ordinary life. When Tyren was 12 he was chosen to be Erth's champion as the Master Key sword appeared in the terrified boy's hands. He was soon pulled into the whirlwind of politics as the factions within the Empire and the church of Erth vied for influence over the new Locksmith.

Years later as Tyren was just starting to adjust to his new life, a previously unknown race arrived at the Empire's borders in the form of an aggressive army. Called the Ovettans, they claimed that they had been created by the Father of the Void and demanded the inhabitants of Solinri and their colonies abandon their worship of the Bright King Erth in favor of their god. Diplomatic attempts soon broke down and war came to the Empire once again. The Ovettans' fighting prowess and natural control over the powers of the Abyss were unlike anything anyone had ever encountered and they soon overpowered the clerics of the other gods, and most soldiers who went up against them. Whole nations began to fall, their citizens either killed or placed in large "reduction centers".

Unlike in the waking world, Simon Travers had not yet risen to power or been able to form the Guild of the Triumvirate. Therefore various adventurers and heroes from different lands were still disparate and concerned with protecting their own interests and people. This division allowed the Ovettans to take even more territory. Finally war reached the Western Isles as well, and it fell almost overnight, the exhausted Empire stretched too thin to defend the colonies anymore. Tyren disobeyed the church's commands and went to defend his homeland personally, but for every Ovettan warrior he cut down, more appeared in their place. Helpless, he watched as his homeland was ravaged.

In desperation, Tyren set his sights on Nico Vales, a powerful but reclusive vampire he'd known about in his childhood. Finding her trying to help evacuate civilians, Tyren begged her to become his partner and fuse with him using the Test Drive so that he could at least save the Western Isles. However she refused, insisting on saving the few civilians that she could from the disaster. Enraged and at the end of his rope, Tyren attacked her and they fought. Knowing he could not hope to win fairly, Tyren let himself fall from a building and fractured his leg. Worried, Nico stopped to check on the wounded boy, but Tyren stabbed her in the heart with a combat knife. He then informed her that she had three seconds before the injury killed her, and demanded she fuse with him to save her undead life.

Nico's desperation to live counted as "permission" for the ritual and Tyren absorbed not only her powers but her entire body as well. With her powers at his command, Tyren dashed from one end of the Western Isles to the other, slaughtering Ovettans anywhere he found them with his bare hands. Not just their warriors but their civilians and children as well. With the severed head of an Ovettan boy in one hand, Tyren declared that he had saved the Western Isles, and would now save the whole Empire.

That was when the sky broke apart, releasing the raw chaos of the Silt. Horrified at what he was seeing, Tyren tried to use his Master Key to fix what he thought was a portal to the Abyss, but found that he had lost his place as Locksmith for abuse of the holy power. Broken with despair, Tyren fell to his knees. It was at that moment that the mage Gilbert Simms appeared before him. The man explained that all of this was the Dream Land known as the Silt, and that all dream-worlds within it eventually are destroyed and re-purposed. He then offered the confused and distraught boy a place on a team that served the Abyss Guard, his masters. He further sweetened the deal by promising that the Abyss Guard, as children of Erth, could undo all of this horror as a reward for his loyalty...and that their plan involved the destruction of the Ovettan race within the real, waking world.

At this last point, Blood Drive eagerly accepted and joined the Negative Tyrens as Tyren the Blood Drive.

• Relevant Tropes:

• And I Must Scream: Rather than enjoying a mutually beneficial fusion with both minds thinking as one, the coercive nature of Tyren's desperate Test Drive ritual turned Nico's soul into a cloud of blood that constantly hovers around Blood Drive's body and acts as a Shapeshifter Weapon at his commands. She has no control over any of this and can only watch as he uses her powers to kill and destroy to feed his lust for vengeance. All she can do is occasionally spit out desperate pleas for him to stop.

• Archenemy: To Leto Dragosaard, a priest of Verked the dragon god and member of the Guild of the Triumvarite. He was acting as an agent of the Guild brokering peace talks with the Ovettans when Blood Drive attacked and started killing people, and he oversees the Guild's efforts to aid evacuations of their civilians, putting him squarely in Blood Drive's cross-hairs.

• Battle Trophy: The shoulders and forearms of his armor are decorated with Ovettan horns torn from the skulls of their owners. They are far from indicative of the numbers he's killed, but they provide some personal satisfaction for him.

• Berserk Button: The Ovettan race. Anything having to do with them is enough to work him into a frenzy, and at one point it is only Compassion of Erth's calming power that makes him stand down from leaving a meeting to go out and attack a group of them. This is a large problem for the Abyss Guard and the Order of the White Wing which summoned them, since he has a habit of killing Ovettans rather than capturing them as needed.

• Body Horror: His body can't really decide whether it wants to be Blood Drive's or Nico's, especially when regenerating. If injured, the area of skin will change into Nico's skin tone or Blood Drive's. Limbs are even worse; if severed from his body, they will grow back as one or the other's and then rapidly change back and forth for a while before stabilizing. Beneath his armor it is implied that his body is a patchwork of Nico and Tyren's traits. Still, all of this is par for the course with the Negative Tyrens. See Evil Makes You Ugly.

• The Chosen One: Twice. Blood Drive was chosen at age 12 to be the newest Locksmith when the former one died fighting darkness-worshiping cultists. The stress of being a Kid Hero wore on him, but he embraced it as his destiny and just wanted to do a good job and protect his friends and loved ones. Later Fear of Erth saw the events unfolding in his world and chose him for his hatred of Ovettans, since the race played a big part in her plans for the waking world.
  • The Chosen Many: He is among four versions of Tyren Aros who were chosen to serve Fear of Erth, Wisdom of Erth, Compassion of Erth and Rage of Erth. The reason these four were chosen to accompany Erth's fallen children back to the waking world was because they were a perfect bend of hateful, powerful and willing to follow orders.

• Curb-Stomp Battle: Against the Ovettans in his home world. Later against Leto and the Guild and Solinri Empire soldiers who encounter him in the waking world.

• Cessation of Existence: When he realizes just how far he's fallen and lets go of his hatred. It invalidates the very feelings and sentiment at the core of his being and he simply fades away into nothingness.

• Evil Counterpart: To the real Tyren Aros. He is the Silt's manifestation of Tyren's fear and distrust of the Ovettans and their culture due to them being made by the Father of the Void—emotions he purposely suppresses out of a genuine desire to be a symbol of peace and coexistence. To a slightly lesser extent, he also represents Tyren's fear of one day failing to be the hero everyone expects him to be, and that weakness costing his loved ones everything.

• Evil Costume Switch: When he was still 16 year old Tyren Aros struggling to keep his home from being destroyed, he wore his hoodie, cargo pants and sword-belt. Immediately upon absorbing Nico Vale he changed into the red and black armor that defines Blood Drive. He later explains that he used Nico's knowledge of crafting and speed to create the armor for his new persona.

• Evil Gloating: When he has downed Leto in their first fight against one another. Since Blood Drive did know of him, though not well, in his own world, it adds to his satisfaction.

• Evil Makes You Ugly: He and his colleagues all bear some disfiguring mutation or deformity that resulted from their evil deeds or actions in their dream-worlds.

• Fallen Hero: The Negative Tyrens started off as heroic Locksmiths chosen in childhood and determined to fulfill their heroic destiny. Yet all of them have descended into murderous villains. Unlike the others, some small fragments of Blood Drive's heroic spirit seem somewhat intact.

• Heel–Face Turn: A small but important one. The real Tyren Aros is able to actually talk to his younger and hateful doppelganger and the two of them come to the realization that the one Blood Drive hates most of all is himself for his failures. From there he realizes the full scope of how low he has fallen, and this allows him to fade away.

• Humanoid Abomination: His fusion with Nico aside, Blood Drive is a Living Dream from a plane that creates whole situations and scenarios from the imaginations of people in the waking world. He and the other Negative Tyrens are worse than time-travelers in the sense that they should not be in the real mortal world, and cause tiny "scars" in reality just by existing there.

• Instant Expert: Tyren obtained Nico's knowledge of crafting and weapon-making, since she was both a maker of armor and weapons. He used this to make his own armor.

• Living on Borrowed Time: Even before disaster struck his home, it was on a ticking clock. The Silt creates whole places based on the brief imaginations from a mortal's mind. The moment the scenario is over, the Silt recycles it and turns it into yet another dream.

• More Teeth than the Osmond Family: His mouth is filled with razor sharp fangs like a shark's. While most vampires can switch between Cute Little Fangs and this at will, Blood Drive's mouth is stuck like this as its default state.

• My Greatest Failure: Blood Drive grieves constantly for the lives lost in his home universe and his failure to make a difference against the Ovettan invasion. Telling him that it was meant to happen due to the Silt's nature doesn't make a difference, he still believes that it was his personal failure that destroyed everything he cared for.

• No Body Left Behind: Upon his death due to the invalidation of his existence, he dissapears in a flood of glowing particles, leaving nothing of his physical form behind.

• Person of Mass Destruction: All but one of the Negative Tyrens count as this and Blood Drive isn't that exception. His speed and strength allow him to rip apart fully armored soldiers in seconds, while dashing away from automatic fire and bladed weapons alike. Worse, the blood cloud that shrouds his body can shift into a shield to protect him from anything he can't outright dodge or can be turned into a wide blast of razor sharp blood particles, tearing through body armor and walls to destroy anything caught in its path. During his attack on the Ovettan city of Wrothin, Blood Drive creates a miles wide cyclone of blood particles around the borders of the city, shredding anyone who tries to enter or leave, trapping the citizens inside at the mercy of the Order of the White Wing.

• Punny Name: His title, Blood Drive stems from the "Test Drive" power he used to gain his abilities and the blood he uses as a weapon.

• Super-Persistent Predator: Blood Drive pursues a group of Ovettans far from their home city and all the way to a Guid-controlled refugee camp, outright assaulting the base when his demands to let the refugees out to face him are denied.

• The Friend Nobody Likes: The other Negative Tyrens dislike him because of his constant nitpicking about their activities and the suffering they inflict on people, all while failing to follow orders from the Abyss Guard like they do. At one point Tyren the Steel Guardian breaks his neck, knowing that it won't kill him but will quiet him down for a while as he focuses on not letting Nico escape from his body.

• Thou Shalt Not Kill: Blood Drive's orders are ironically to spare the lives of the Ovettans he goes after. Rather he is supposed to assist the Order of the White Wing in capturing them so that they can be drained of their connection to the Abyss and it used to sink the waking world into the Silt as per Fear's plans. This does not sit well with him and he often slaughters his targets in determination to end what he sees as monsters undeserving of life.

• Token Good Teammate: Blood Drive greatly dislikes hurting innocent people; he feels that turning his powers on creatures created by Erth and the other gods (except the Father of the Void) goes against everything he stands for. He is horrified at the casual attitude towards murder exhibited by the other Negative Tyrens, particularly when Tyren the Gorgon allowed his "pets" to eat several of the Order members who opened the portal to the Silt that let them into the waking world. However he will destroy anyone who protects an Ovettan or tries to hinder his attacks against them.

• Talking the Monster to Death: How he is eventually killed.

• Unwitting Pawn: To the Abyss Guard, Fear of Erth most of all. Fear's plan is to sink the mortal plane into the Silt to trap all mankind within an endless and most of all safe dream. To accomplish that, she must stop the Silt from ever manufacturing its temporary dream-worlds, such as the ones all the Negative Tyrens came from. This goal automatically invalidates the promise of restoring his world and loved ones to life, something that the Abyss Guard couldn't do even if they were sincere in their promise.

• You Can't Fight Fate: Blood Drive's aspirations of protecting people as a hero were doomed to fail from the beginning and he was destined to become a rage-filled abomination. That is because his world is a figment thought of by the real Tyren Aros's mind and cannot be changed or altered in any way.

Edited by Swordofknowledge on Jan 25th 2020 at 7:48:02 AM

Fear is a tyrant and a despot, more terrible than the rack, more potent than the snake. — Edgar Walllace

There's a ton to go over, but here goes.

It was a little difficult to get the terminology you used completely understood, but I'll do my best. To begin with, new takes on vampires are always cool. If I had to compare Blood Drive to anyone, it'd probably be Deacon Frost's ultimate form or the true nature of The Witcher's vampires: giving them a healthy dose of Humanoid Abomination to make them even creepier. As for personality...yeesh. Being basically forced to be evil on pain of disappearing...that sucks, especially since he's basically (from what I understand) a fallen Chosen One. He seems to be trying to be good in a way, though, being a Well-Intentioned Extremist: genocide is evil, but if he does it for a 'good cause'...in a way that's remarkably realistic. History's monsters didn't twirl their moustaches and go 'muahaha, I feel especially EEEEEVIL today', after all.

The way he's defeated actually kind of reminds me of The Emptiness from The Neverending Story II, vanishing in a Puff of Logic and all, but what makes it particularly tragic is the fact that he accepted his fate as such, while The Emptiness had it forced on her.

In the vein of one of my earlier posts, I've got some more tropes to add to Thor, Bankwell's Number Two, here.

• Abusive Parents: A tragic version of this: he genuinely has no idea he's being abusive, and is doing all in his power to keep his daughter Akira safe and happy. Unfortunately, he believes following Ensiferum's cause will end with Akira safe and happy, rather than trapped back on Mermaid or dead. As she continues to resist, however, he slowly becomes more and more frustrated with her until he's entirely okay with beating her down and sending her to Mermaid in traction if needed.
• Final Boss: The final foe Mirei faces after Bankwell is killed and the Armed Virus Construct is destroyed. Thor intends to retreat with the remains of Ensiferum and watch over the world, waiting for the Armed Virus to make a resurgence. Mirei has none of that, though, and intends to see him face justice.
• Hero Killer: Was the one behind the destruction of Bhikkhuni, Ensiferum having gotten wind of the rebellion they were planning and deploying him there in response. Only the Kagurazaki twins survived, having been spirited away to participate in the Peach Beach Splash tournament. Mana, Momo, Viola, Manpukumaru, Koharu, the Pillar Gods, the unnamed students besides them, gone. All of them, and it took him fifteen minutes.
• Ignored Epiphany: When he has Mirei pinned in their final battle, she spits that he's carrying on Bankwell's legacy. Thor pauses for a moment, then shakes off his doubts and raises Mjolnir for the finisher.
• Just Following Orders: Will follow any orders Bankwell gives him...as long as he understands how it serves the cause. Genocide, for example, he would commit without question so long as he understands how it's for the greater good. As soon as he finds out how entirely self-serving Bankwell's actions truly are, he turns on Bankwell in a heartbeat, intending to depose him and continue Ensiferum as he sees it as meant to be.
• One-Man Army: Single-handedly slaughtered everyone on Bhikkhuni and was back in time for breakfast.

Edited by krimzonflygon2 on Jan 25th 2020 at 9:51:42 AM

Made a substantial edit to an old profile...brace for someone pretty depraved.

• Name: Wolfang Richler / Matsuno Kyonori "The Immortal".

• Age: He's easily multiple millenia old, not to mention how long he was trapped in that "universe full of darkness".

• Personality: It is important to separate Wolfang into two phases of his character; before confinement being more of an amoral Emperor Scientist and cruel, detached ruler, but with a definite Well-Intentioned Extremist vibe to him - he wanted at the time to save his people, the Aeolians, from their present course toward decay and stagnation. He actually experienced love, and wasn't entirely crazy. Then after his confinement; the result was more or less Gone Mad From The Isolation, turning Wolfang into a horrific, sociopathic hedonist who controls his newfound family on Earth and outright molests them - mind, body and soul. He's a gaslighter par excellence, talking to him at any length will lead to him trying to convince you that you're to blame for your own problems no matter what they are. When he took the name Matsuno Kyonori, he took advantage of local culture and problems to enrich himself. He has no problem manipulating, cajoling, blackmailing or extorting those around him to get what he wants. He identifies with the notion of a Paradise of Earthly Pleasures - more or less, To Create a Playground for Evil. He's still scientifically minded, but devotes it to bizarre and terrible "family planning" schemes that revolve around trying to create almost Habsburg-like and worse interminglings in the greater Kyonori-Richler House. He goes beyond just wanting to keep the bloodline pure, and possibly does all he does out of pure spite. As crazed as he can be, there are occasions where he can see when Evil Versus Oblivion is about to happen, and is still mature enough to set his plans aside when that is set to occur.

• Abilities: Owing to his unique status as an Aeolian Wingless One, and his later absorption of that whole universe he was trapped in, Wolfang has powers that are indistinguishable from outright Reality Warper powers. It's somewhat like a Compelling Voice, except directed at reality. He can revive the dead, empower the living, control peoples' minds, and more. He even still has Aeolian "World Music", powerful Magic Music that can achieve a lot of other effects. It is explicitly mentioned Wolfang changes forms likes clothes, and frequently chooses something suited for his current task.

• Weaknesses: However, he cannot willy-nilly inflict his will on people, because doing so would result in his half-brother Deverez getting involved. He can only warp peoples' reality when they want to harm him or if they put themselves under his power.

• Goals: Create his Paradise in the Sky, damn the consequences.

• Motivation: He went insane from the isolation, and decided if Deverez wanted him to be this evil Wingless scourge, he'd outperform every single estimation of what he was capable of. And he knows with his immortality he might well end up sealed away again, and thus wants to enjoy himself to the fullest.

• Role in the story: Big Bad, though mostly verging on Greater-Scope Villain. He makes the monsters and the threats and the circumstances, and rarely if ever directly involves himself.

• Backstory: Wolfang started out as the "runt" of a litter of 20 children, born Wingless and subject to the scorn and derision of his brothers and sisters. His family was typically Aeolian - his father and mother were both cousins and each others uncle and aunt (Aeolian society has some screwed up rules due to religion and a curse), and Wolfang seemed to be the only one to find it rather gross. He was arranged to marry Iolia Richler - a woman he despised - and when she found him disagreeable, his brothers blamed Wolfang for the marriage falling through...and thus decided he had no further use to the Richler family and schemed to murder him. Wolfang discovered this, and struck first, poisoning his brothers to death in the so called "Massacre of Eclei". He became head of his family shortly after, and, owing to being distantly related to the Aeolian ruler, ended up politicked into power. Wolfang commenced planning how to deal with the fact Aeolian children can only be made reliably through grotesque "in the family" marriages. During this planning, he met with a young Wingmate (basically a magical nurse) named Kylia Nyrahl...shortly after he had to get married to Almiria, a well connected and powerful Aeolian woman. Wolfang discovered a powerful world-hopping device called the Gells-Ghe Vortex just gathering dust, and decided to test it out. Seeing it could reach other worlds, Wolfang fixated upon it and eventually experimented, first throwing men and women into the Gells-Ghe, and then throwing Aeolian children into it. When he discovered his wife was plotting against him due to this, even as she was heavily pregnant by him (evidently thinking this would keep him from doing anything too bad to her if he figured it out), Wolfang...promptly threw his wife through the Gells-Ghe as well. Deverez was none too happy about all of this, and orchestrated a coup-de-tat that saw Wolfang threw into a universe full of nothing but insensate darkness by Deverez, and Kylia, the only woman he ever loved, murdered right in front of him when she tried to argue for mercy. He languished in this alternate universe for eons, until he absorbed the whole of it in a moment of madness. Emerging on to Earth, Wolfang ingratiated himself through odd, prophet advice to the Kyonori Family in Japan. However he ultimately usurped power over it, and started treating the clan like it was just an experimental bed for seeing how Human and Aeolian genes could mix and combine...

• Relevant Tropes:
• Abusive Parents: The victim of two of them, and one hell of an evil dad himself. In a recent RP, he's just addressed usually by his son Matsuki as "Father", usually with abject terror, and his nickname is Trash Dad.
• Affably Evil: He's nothing if not cordial, polite and talkative, which makes the kinds of things he does while maintaining this tone utterly disturbing. He also uses it against people, maintaining since he has no "tonal problems", they should not act in "undue anger", saying this demonstrates a sort of "selfish rage." He knows what he's doing.
• A God Am I: Notably he never says the exact words, but he carries himself this way. "Now, if you don't give me my relatives back, I'll have to see what happens. Me right now, I'm feeling like melting you into gross biological sludge."
• Anything That Moves: Nobody is particularly safe from him. Wolfang has a very, VERY predatory sense of sexuality.
• Arch Nemesis Dad: Let's just say few of his children particularly like him. The ones who strike out of the greater family utterly despise him.
• Back from the Dead: Add "sanctity of the dead" to the things Wolfang refuses utterly to respect.
• Badass Bookworm: At the start and, even after his isolation, he's still capable of being alarmingly scientific and mentally capable. As he puts it, "I abandoned any notion of morality. I didn't abandon what I had to get to that point."
• Bitch in Sheep's Clothing: Do not trust his Affably Evil appearance. Polite Villains, Rude Heroes may be the case, but Wolfang is not someone to trust. Also, don't trust that smiley and all positive, pretty face. The smile doesn't reach his eyes...
• Body Horror: Wolfang's power once he can use it on you can let him do fun stuff like literally explode people from the inside on out.
  • Some of the products of Kyonori "Family Marriage Plans" end up like this. Rina Kyonori / Sephine Richler is one tragic case; due to the blood going thin, she suffers from multiple organ failure across her life, and she ultimately dies horribly giving birth to Matsuki's mother. Her body is described as collapsing in on itself after death.
• Bolt of Divine Retribution: When pressed, he is capable of this with someone even far away if they've aggressed on him or are under his power.
• The Chessmaster: Owing to his role as "The Prophet", basically an oracle receiving prophecies, he is at times almost precognitive.
• The Corrupter: One prong of his activities; his plan for his son Taiyo Kyonori / Kenneth Richler is more or less predicated on two of his daughters being avid learners of how he treats people, and taking revenge on Taiyo's mother.
• Deal with the Devil: He's always the devil. Making these kinds of deals involve putting yourself under his power and then signing on to the terms of a deal. These rarely if ever end well. He's particularly fond of using Exact Words in the deal to give someone more and more of what they want until it kills them. Then he gets their soul to do with as he pleases.
• Enemy Mine: He's never the type to begrudge the need for this. He can't very well enjoy the world if its all gone. He's also remarkably keen on trying to get close to his new allies...
• Everyone Has Standards: Despite everything, he never actually kills any of his kids, and gets bizarrely protective of them all if something happens. He's also prone to going out of his way for revenge if something happens to his offspring.
• Evil Mentor: Lesser villains occasionally train under him. He's described by one of them as "harsh, cruel, and will make your climb for what you want arduous for its own sake."
• Evil Overlord: His ideal place in life.
• Evil Versus Oblivion: The Timebreaker Demons are way too much even for him, and he's not even sour about being the bearer of bad news when they show up. "Let me tell you about Yctrax, Demon of Destruction. He gets resurrected and regains his full power? I'm taking as many of you idiots with me as I can and we're leaving this planet."
• The Fair Folk: In line with the more elvish interpretation, Wolfang in particular could well be interpreted as a very spiteful, cruel Fae thing. Do not aggress upon him, do not put yourself under his power, and show respect.
• Fantastic Racism: A victim of it, and its telling that even with all the other stuff Wolfang does, he never invents a scheme involving fomenting racial tension. Wingless Aeolians were viewed with utter contempt and suspicion, seen as harbingers of ill fortune and "results of impure breeding".
• For the Evulz: An out and out connoisseur of vile experiences, Wolfang can and will do something just to avert being bored or to see what'll happen to poor Matsuki. "I don't need to give you a reason. I just need to tell you I wanted to do it, so I did it. That's the life of me; see, want, take."
• Gone Mad From The Isolation: To such an extent it changed the type of villain he was; before, he was an Emperor Scientist and coldly rational type. After? A nihilistic hedonist who ironically does the same things to his own new family as was done in his old one.
• Handsome Lech: The only good thing you can say about Wolfang is "he was good looking at least". He lives and breathes to indulge himself, and so he doesn't particularly care for any of his mates.
• The Hedonist: Wolfang cares only about enjoying himself through any means necessary. Morality never enters the equation.
• Humanoid Abomination: Looks human, usually. The things he is capable of doing suggest he's something far, far worse by now.
• Jackass Genie: His home business. Once someone arranges to meet him, he accepts payment in money or in...other things in order to fulfill someone's wish. This wish is almost never fulfilled in the way the wisher wants, or is fulfilled in such excess that it results in havoc and carnage. "I gave him what he wanted. It's his fault he didn't phrase his wish with limitations."
• Jumping Off the Slippery Slope: Or, shall we say, pushed into the planar gateway. It was after leaving that alternate universe that Wolfang became what he is today.
• Kick the Dog: His lesson to Matsuki; after 12 years of abject hell, he suddenly consented to his wife giving Matsuki a Flemish Giant Rabbit for his 13th Birthday. Matsuki loved that giant rabbit, and walked it, hugged it, and felt happiness for the first time in a long time. The very next day, Wolfang, using his voice, forced Matsuki to kill it, butcher it, slice it to pieces, and then eat it. Lesson? There is nothing my family has that I cannot take away at any time.
• Knight of Cerebus: Outside of some rare Gallows Humor incidents, when Wolfang enters a scene, the comedy withers.
• Mad Scientist: Originally, though for a good cause in trying to stop Aeolian status quo...problems, and even now he's still always up for a dangerous experiment in magic.
• Magic Music: Capable of a lot, including outright creating new life! Except when he does so, these creatures are described as "singing only dirges", indicating they inherit their creator's cruel streak.
• Manipulative Bastard: A Gaslighter and an expert in psychological warfare. By the time he's done, it can be made very persuasive that somehow your own problem is your fault wholly even or especially if he caused it.
• More than Mind Control: Very capable of plain Mind Control, but it seems he gets his jollies off of not quite controlling someone, but not quite giving them free will 100% either.
• Moving the Goalposts: He makes a sport of it - whenever Matsuki achieves something, Wolfang claims he did something else wrong and needs to course correct for next time. It creates an air with his son where he just tries to do anything he can to avoid Wolfang's ire.
• Our Elves Are Different / Our Demons Are Different: Aeolians, and what they are, depend on lore and local perception. To some, they're elite seeming elves who have a heavenly reputation. To others, they're horrible demonic figures who control fate and can control and command the world to an unbelievable extent. Wolfang disputes both perceptions, saying that ultimately, the Aeolians were not that different from humans, just having a notable magical aptitude.
• Parental Favoritism: Wolfang claims to love Matsuki the most (his definition of love is heinously distorted), and hates the more weakwilled or weak bodied members of the family.
• Reality Warper: Due to his restrictions he can't flaunt it openly, but half of the tension in a Wolfang scene is him holding this over peoples' heads. Such as staring right into Matsuki's eyes while holding his fingers up, just about to snap them, as some of Matsuki's schoolmates are being jackasses to both Matsuki and "Matsuno". He never does it, but you can tell he enjoyed holding the threat.
• Royal Inbreeding: The Kyonori Family in a nutshell, a Eurasian clan that takes the "keeping the bloodline pure" thing way too far. Though notably, people with too little Aeolian Blood in this family do not tend to have very fruitful or pleasant lives as the genetic consequences catch up with those people in particular due to the lacking magical bloodline.
• Screw the Rules, I Have Supernatural Powers!: How CAN you hold someone accountable when trying to force an arrest or deal with the issue can just lead to him being able to turn your head into mush with by whistling?
• Strong Family Resemblance: Matsuki and "Matsuno" look almost totally identical. And they are this trope for all the worst reasons.
• Tangled Family Tree: Owing to the number he did on it, the Kyonori Family Tree by the modern day is tangled and difficult to parse at times, more resembling a tumbleweed.
• Too Kinky to Torture: He certainly takes being tied up, beaten, dehydrated and tormented well. "You learned how to do this pretty well...my commendations. Now do you want to get to the really fun part?"
• Used to Be a Sweet Kid
  • Deverez: I remember you used to be kind, innocent, and more interested in watching butterflies fly than pulling off their wings.
  • Wolfang: That was before YOU tossed me in that hellhole, brother.
• Villainous Incest: More than just boning a relative, Wolfang interbreeds and subjects his family to his plan for building a set of children with traits he thinks will be advantageous. While this has produced magical prodigies, the Kyonori / Richler Family is infamous for being utterly, hopelessly inbred, and only the Aeolian blood in their family keeps them from getting traits that'd make the Habsburg Chin look normal. Even then, sometimes, the "blood runs too thin" and results in utter disaster.
  • To give an idea how gross Wolfang can get with this, it deserves to be mentioned Matsuki, Wolfang's great-some grandson is 98.9% genetically identical to Wolfang. Even the Aeolians never went that far. When asked why he did something so disgusting, Wolfang just shrugged and said, "I felt like it."
• Well-Intentioned Extremist: Originally. Then the isolation happened and corresponding Sanity Slippage.
• Your Approval Fills Me with Shame: When Matsuki is unwilling to commit to a relationship and keeps putting it off, Wolfang reads it as stringing the girl along, manipulating her into sex, and using her for pleasure...and he heartily approves. Matsuki calls his interpretation sick, and his liking for that even worse. It's pretty clear if Wolfang likes what you're doing chances are you're stepping into morally black grounds.

Edited by NickTheSwing on Jan 30th 2020 at 4:16:04 AM

He genuinely unnerves me and seems suitable for something dark. I'm not the most experienced at writing genuinely evil characters, but your character seems top notch and detailed!

~~ I've got two villains here that operate as a duo, so I'd like to hear your thoughts.

Name: Morgan "Omicron" Ocampo & Sacha "Gamma" Gamwell

Age: 16-20 depending on how long I run with this story. Starts at 16 though.

Personality:

Omicron: An energetic and a bit of a Large Ham when it comes to villainy. Acts a bit childish, and is a villain mostly for a good time and some money. A fun person to be around and takes the lead on schemes with Gamma. However, the Large Ham and enthusiastic side of them makes them serious on certain parts of villainy, such as making sure schemes get exacted properly, and having slideshows prepared for if/when the heroes arrive to their lair.

Gamma: The more quiet of the two. Will loom in the background ominously just so you feel like something's off. However, Gamma is rather down-to-earth at times, such as when dealing with the hero-villain-team-up arcs and putting differences aside. Rather protective of Omicron. Tends to just go along with whatever Omicron has planned.

Abilities: Has a lot of resources provided by the organization they belong to, Grecas.

Omicron: Has the imagination and pettiness to exact large-scale pranks and mischief on their town.

Gamma: Has more technical skills than Omicron, and is good with machines. Unrelated to their villainy is good baking skills (which they're trying to help Omicron have as well).

Weaknesses:

Omicron: Likes to schedule things out a little too much and will be upset by a ruined schedule if their schedule isn't empty/if the happening is less important than what is going on at the moment. Also can be easily thrown off from their groove if a twist comes around. Overall, wants things to go perfectly and can be easily hurt by mistakes and losses. Is also rather emotional, take that as a weakness or a strength, it doesn't matter.

Gamma: Has periods where they lack energy or a will do to much. Can have points of major self-blaming for failed schemes, so much so that their thoughts will linger on it for days. Tries to keep this stuff to themself, but really shouldn't.

Goals: A good time, a bit of chaos, and (later in the plot) friendships with their Friendly Enemies, the heroes. Even later in the plot, there's also their relationship with eachother.

Motivation: Omicron: Independent living? A job? Not only a job, but a job that is probably the most fun job on Earth? Literally just making chaos and mischief? Omicron jumped on that opportunity, big time. Gamma: Gamma just wanted to hurry up and leave home. After being acquainted with Omicron, they decided Omicron would be a good person to be around, and left it at that.

Role in the story: Protagonists

Backstory: It's a light one so far. Essentially, Grecas was looking for additional operatives, so Gamma and Omicron (who don't know eachother at this point) got interviews. It worked out well, so they both tried to get emancipated, then proceeded to get emancipated, took the jobs and know they're here. They got along well enough in their initial introductions, and it just got better from there.

Misc. Omicron: Could be evil in speech only? As in, likes to consider themself evil but is more of a prankster? Dunno. Is genderfluid.

Gamma: Again, could be less evil. Gamma is probably somewhere on the neutral scale, when it's from lawful-chaotic. Is nonbinary, though is majorly closeted (see Trans Tribulations below)

Gamma: General: I've got a lot of LGBTQ+ characters in it (including the heroes), so I've got that covered on the "Oh no, not more evil queer characters!" front. (Also, I'm nonbinary myself, so I'm not writing them to make LGBTQ+ people out as villains anyways, I'm writing them because I just really like villains)

Relevant Tropes:

Adorkable: Omicron, sometimes. Gamma can get smaller cases of this as well.

Big Guy, Little Guy: Played with, gender-wise. Omicron is 5'2" and Gamma is 6'0" exact.

The Bad Guy Wins: Occasionally. Happens a lot in the "team-up with the heroes" arcs.

Deface of the Moon: Gets played with during one of the arcs, When dealing with an enemy group during one of the "hero-villain-team-up" plots, Omicron has the idea to do more than just deal with the enemy, but vandalize their entire spacecraft. Gamma's up for it if they have the time.

Digital Piracy Is Evil: That's literally one of their schemes, although the heroes have no objection and they all just watch movies in that chapter.

Dress Coded For Your Convinience: There is a Greca uniform that Omicron and Gamma wear during villainy, at least when not trying to do things undercover.

Even Evil Can Be Loved: I mean, they aren't full-on evil, so this could be a subversion.

Even Evil Has Standards: There are boundaries neither of them will push, especially mischief that could be very permanent and devastating.

Evil Is Cool: You can't deny that at least one of the two are cool... right? At least the outfits are cool enough.

Evil Is Petty: Omicron's just petty, is all. Gamma is less petty than Omicron, but can still be rather petty.

Evil Virtues: Omicrom exhibits quite a few, such as ambition, determination, gratitude (at least toward Gamma), honor (occasionally), love, loyalty, passion, and responsibility. Gamma does as well on honor, humility, love, loyalty, passion, patience, resourcefulness, responsibility, and selflessness (at least when it comes to Omicron).

Harmless Villain: Usually, anyways.

It Amused Me: Omicron is definitely prone to this at times. Gamma is as well, but to a lesser degree.

Little Guy, Big Buddy: Gamma can be protective of Omicron at times just because.

Mattress-Tag Gag: One of Omicron's scheme concepts is just going and ripping mattress tags off at a mattress factory.

Trans Tribulations: Happens to both Gamma and Omicron. Gamma is barely out at school and is still misgendered quite a lot, and they know if they told their family, they'd be kicked out anyways. Omicron is out, but lives in fear of public bathrooms due to a certain harassment incident in the past.

Unholy Matrimony: Later on in the plot.(..?)

(I'll probably add more to this later on.)

Edited by FriedBaka on Feb 5th 2020 at 7:06:55 AM

Your villains seem to be pretty good! I would probably enjoy them if I saw them in a movie or read them in a book. I think they might fit in a story like Hackers, due to their pettiness and overall computer skill, as they kind of remind me of The Plague.

---

Sydney "Vicious" Hyde:

• Age: 27
• Species: Wolf
• Personality: As the name implies, she can be a rather vicious individual. She is very cold towards her underlings, and focuses a lot on keeping promises between them. Tends to assert dominance a lot, especially if they are eating. Don't imply that the Big Bad is her boyfriend—it's only professional, and that leg made of crystal means absolutely nothing. When she is visibly angry, run.
• Abilities: A skilled telemancer and aeromancer, and has enough finesse in her abilities to keep hold against the protagonist. When push comes to shove, she can also feed her anger into breaking things. Due to her crystal leg, her magical abilities are also amplified manyfold.
• Weaknesses: Due to having lost her foot in an unspeakable incident, she replaced it with a wad of crystal that ate her leg up to the hip—it is painful to move, and it is rather easy to run away from her.
• Goals: To return to Earth alongside her boyfriend—sorry, boss.
• Motivations: She feels tired of the novelty of Meredith, and would rather go back to a place with truth to it.

Backstory:

Born in Texas, raised in Red Hill. Not popular in school until she got into a relationship with star quarterback "Flashy" Floyd Leeds in 7th grade. In 11th grade, had to flee with Floyd after he bit off someone's ear during a football game. Got her right foot bitten off by a crystal monster in a cave, which Floyd replaced with one of the crystal monster's feet. Along with Floyd, she fell into Meredith after seeing a light in a cave, which she thought was a gateway to another town, not a whole new planet.

The novelty of the planet quickly wore off, and she started an organized crime ring, trafficking precious gemstones and illegal substances such as Bliss, a potion that gives instant gratification to those who drink it. Floyd, meanwhile, became a fighter known as the White Knight, who is well-loved across the board but is also physically and emotionally abusive toward her. She was sent to find a necklace that belonged to Floyd, which a certain vixen now has a hold of.

Relevant Tropes:

• An Arm and a Leg: Lost her foot to a crystal monster in the cave, which was replaced by one of the crystal monster's feet. The crystal leg is now up to her hip.
• The Mafia: Runs the Meridian equivalent of this, which reaches across the land.
• Enemy Eats Your Lunch: A favorite tactic of hers if she is spoken up against.
• Domestic Abuse: A victim of this by Floyd—hence why she tends not to say that he's her boyfriend, to the point of being scared of him.
• Even Evil Has Standards: Is terrified of some certain interrogation techniques that Floyd uses.
• Tranquil Fury: Very quiet, and never really expresses her anger—unless it has something to do with Floyd, his necklace, or money.
• Lawful Evil: Employs a strict code among her underlings, and will (ahem) reprimand them if the code is broken. She will never break a promise unless her life depends on it.

Edited by TheWhistleTropes on Feb 20th 2020 at 1:15:49 PM

she/her/they | wall | sandbox

Bump.

she/her/they | wall | sandbox

Ah, i'm not good at critisizing things or explaining my opinions, but she sounds okay. The crystal leg sounds cool.

---

I'm trying to create a Rogues Gallery for my superhero. The story's going to either be a webcomic or a Web Serial Novel with no definite ending. The other villains are somewhat unclear at the moment, but the hero's Foil is finished;

Elias Gotti / Gottschalk

• Appearance: Platinum blonde hair and dark eyes. The eyes glow with golden light when he's using his powers. He has a scar on his throat where his father choked him when he was a child, and a lightning scar on his left side, where a random metahuman with electric powers struck him.
• Costume: Invokes a teutonic knight, with a white and hooded, long shirt that reaches his thighs and has a black iron cross on the chest, black belt, black combat boots, and and white pants. He carries a rosary alternately around his neck or his wrist.
• Powers: Gotti himself is powerless, but because there's a ghost residing in his sword, he can use it to harness ghost energy, which manifests as a golden glow. The energy enbles Gotti to cut through lots of things with a single slice with no currently established limit (it has to hit edge first and with enough force, though), cut incorporeal entities, and makes the sword unbreakable.
• Personality: Best described as a genodical lunatic, his first trip to jail taught him to limit himself enough that his crimes as Gottschalk won't be immediately traced back to Elias Gotti. He sees himself as the sole defender of "Christian values" against LGBTQ+ people, atheists, other non-Christians, metahumans, and anybody else he perceives as evil (like people who use birth control or have abortions), thinks all his crimes are justified because of "greater good" or "the will of God". Despite his deranged nature, he can be disturbingly nice, loyal and unselfish towards people who share his beliefs or any Christian he perceives as pious.
• Backstory: He was born to a normal environment, but when his mother died, his already fundamentalistic father went off the deep end and decided the death was caused by Gotti and his sisters being in contact with the outside world. He isolated the remaining family to a cabin in the alps and "educated" them himself instead of letting them go to school or have any normal interaction. This was only found out when Gotti was 18 and his sisters 20 and 15, and their father was institutionalized. Gotti seemed fine to the psychologist, so he could go wherever he wanted. He moved to Munich and soon ended up in jail for assaulting a gay couple. After being released from prison, he went to a party with his former cellmate, tripped on drugs, and missed the last bus home. He stumbled homewards on foot, ranting to himself about getting arrested for "doing the right thing", and took a shortcut by tresspassing through a construction site and, because he was on drugs, stopped in the middle of the site to call for God to give him a sign. It was already thundering, and a lightning struck the ground near him. He went there to investigate, and saw a sword hilt. The sword had belonged to a knight templar who lived during the crusades, and had been dug up by the construction project but not found yet. When Gotti touched it, he heard a voice in his head, telling him to take it. While the voice actually belonged to the ghost of the sword's former owner possessing it, Gotti thought it was the voice of God and took it as proof his beliefs were right. Because the ghost wasn't able to fully possess Gotti, it played along and started giving him orders.

Edited by Nukeli on Apr 23rd 2020 at 12:27:27 PM

~ * Bleh * ~ (Looking for a russian-speaker to consult about names and words for a thing)

Bump

~ * Bleh * ~ (Looking for a russian-speaker to consult about names and words for a thing)

Damn. There comes a point where Freudian Excuse Is No Excuse, and it seems like he suffers massively from confirmation bias. Pretty interesting for a villain!

---

• Name: Fell Williams

• Appearance: Early 30s, tan skin, fit, brown hair, thick beard.

• Bio: A descendant of a long and successful line of hunters of the paranormal. His grandfather in particular was famous for slaying a powerful demon. His father, however, became a laughingstock to the public and a disgrace to the family after being exposed as a fraud. Fell chose to specialize in hunting wendigos, powerful, vampire-like creatures from Native American folklore with an insatiable hunger for human flesh. Fell learned of a particular set of woods notorious for being infested with the creatures, and so moved into the heart of the woods in order to hunt them down one by one.

• Story Involvement: Fell Williams gets introduced shortly after the protagonists get attacked by a wendigo. He brings them into his cabin for shelter and offers them food while explaining his story and insisting they stay until the day so he can take them out of the woods safely. However, the protagonists slowly begin disappearing throughout the night, being hunted by the wendigos, and it's up to Fell and the remaining heroes to fend off the monsters and hopefully find their friends.

• The Twist: Eventually the heroes learn a horrifying truth, that Fell was actually responsible for the disappearance of their friends by turning them into wendigos. Fell had purged the original wendigos of the woods long ago, only to realize that he would lose his funding if there was nothing more to hunt. Consumed by greed, Fell took advantage of the cursed woods by feeding people human flesh. Sometimes he'd offer them food and shelter, like he did in the beginning of the story, and other times he'd abduct people lost in the woods and force them to eat. Whatever noble qualities and goals Fell might have had in the beginning have long-been snuffed out, and now he's nothing more than a monster with an insatiable greed. (In other words, a parallel to the very wendigos he hunts, except his hunger is for money rather than human flesh.)

RIP KissAnime.

Hmmmmm... I definitely think the concept behind him is intriguing. He Who Fights Monsters has always been a favourite villain archetype of mine. The lack of any associated tropes does make me slightly leery, though only in a "not enough information to cast a proper judgement" sort of way.

---

Alright, here's the most prominent antagonist of a story idea I've had rattling around for a long while. The basic premise, to avoid going into enough detail to bore you silly before we've even reached the profile, is that it's a sci-fantasy story that's aiming to be something of a Darker and Edgier riff on both furry stories and the age-old concept of "adventurer's guilds", set in a far future where humanity is AWOL and our solar system has become... strange.

---

Name: "Hadley Elijah Morgenstern"^note By his own admission, this is an alias, but nobody knows what his real name is - if he even has one.

Species: Anthropomorphic Eurasian lynx. Ostensibly, anyway.

Age: Yet again, nobody knows for sure, but it's definitely a pretty huge number. Morgenstern's own stories are deliberately inconsistent as to how long he's been around for, with some of the figures he gives reaching Time Abyss levels. What's known for certain is that he's been active in the public eye for a few decades now, and he hasn't visibly aged a day in all those years.

Appearance: Morgenstern certainly doesn't look like the most feared creature in the whole small universe. His features are delicate and fey, with a short, soft-edged muzzle vaguely resembling like that of a housecat and large, bright blue eyes. By the standards of a human, he's almost cute; by the standards of his own kind, he's a dashing pretty boy. His typical outfit is an old-fashioned brownish tweed suit, clearly high in material quality, but on close inspection all his suits are covered in little gaps in the stitching where they've been sewn back together after sustaining massive damage. He's also fond of woollen scarves, typically in various bright, gaudy colours. The only overtly dangerous aspect of his appearance is the weapon he carries at all times - a cattle prod-shaped metal implement, literally falling apart to reveal the sparking wires within, covered in a combination of rust and slapdash, faded yellow paint. But on close inspection, further aspects of him are subtly off - the eyes never betray a hint of emotion, his smiles are slightly too cold and toothy to be genuine...

Personality: Don't let his dorky look fool you - Morgenstern is a monster, plain and simple. Gleefully sadistic to an extreme, he views all of reality as a plaything put there for his amusement, and the people living within it as the most fun toys of all. And much like a small child, he has no qualms with playing so viciously that his toys break into tiny little pieces.

Morgenstern is a highly unpredictable figure. He acts solely on his whims, frequently dropping and forgetting about his current tasks when something else catches his interest; to hear him say it, the only reason he can maintain such a consistent interest in torture and destruction is because mortals, fragile little things that they are, die or completely lose their marbles too quickly for him to lose interest. His personality is equally variable, with his manners depending mostly on his mood. At times he can be suave and intellectual, carefully picking his actions so as to manipulate those around him. Other times, he's a cackling, depraved bully, casually siccing whatever new cruelties he's come up with on anyone unfortunate enough to cross his path while spitting playground taunts the entire time. Interestingly for one so inclined to violence, genuine anger from Morgenstern is rare - he's generally too devoid of emotional connections to be enraged by anything you can throw at him. On seemingly arbitrary occasions, however, someone does succeed in making him irate. The results are invariably truly horrific, even by his standards.

Though Morgenstern claims to live by a complex personal philosophy, his unpredictable, arbitrary behaviour makes it difficult to determine what that philosophy is supposed to be. Asking him is unlikely to help, since it's hard to get the easily distracted Morgenstern to focus on holding a conversation even if you sum up the courage to find and talk to him at all. What little he has said about his worldview over the years suggests it's based primarily on extreme nihilism, with his primary goal being to expose life as pointless and all the standards and ideals mortal civilisation holds dear as arbitrary and transient. Even less is known of his origins, about which Morgenstern will tell frequent and self-contradictory Blatant Lies for his own amusement.

Abilities: Oh boy, did this guy win the Antagonist Abilities lottery. Morgenstern's most notable ability is his apparently Complete Immortality. Nothing can kill him - not cutting off his head, not melting or corroding his entire body, not even dropping the most powerful explosives you can find right on top of him. It may take a while, depending on the extent of the damage, but Morgenstern will eventually pull his body back together and continue on. Supplementing this ability is a powerful Healing Factor, meaning a beheading will impede him only as long as it takes the halves of his neck to knit themselves back together. Morgenstern has incorporated this unkillable nature into his fighting style, deliberately throwing himself right into an opponent's weaponry to attack them at close quarters, relishing in their fear as their most powerful equipment proves useless.

As if the above isn't bad enough, Morgenstern is also a highly skilled electromancer. Maybe it's an innate power of whatever he really is, maybe he's just taken advantage of having God knows how many years to practice - whatever the reason, Morgenstern's abilities are several steps beyond what your average electricity mage could manage. If it's powered by electricity, which many things in a Science Fantasy setting are, he can take total control of it, down to a fine level where he can manipulate the slightest movements of the machine in question. This technopathy is the source of many of Morgenstern's more esoteric methods of torture. If he's feeling less subtle, Morgenstern can simply blast whatever is in front of him into oblivion with a massive lightning strike. The ramshackle scepter he wields, which he "lovingly" nicknames Mister Shockley, is the conduit for all of Morgenstern's magic, so if you can somehow knock it away from him he'll be significantly weakened.

Weaknesses: Not many an ordinary person could exploit - this guy is characterised more as a force of nature than a villain, with the goal prior to some significant game-changing come the final act generally being to stay away from him at all costs. His fickleness is your best bet for survival, since if he can't inflict something horrible on you on the first try, he'll usually decide you're not worth the effort. Quickly inflicting a massively debilitating injury is another potential technique; you've got to be quick enough to outspeed his electromancy, which is a tough call, but if you can manage it you've got as long as his Healing Factor takes to repair whatever damage you dealt to get the Hell away. Last but not least, he's reliant on Mister Shockley to perform his most dangerous feats, so if you can get the scepter away from him somehow, you're golden. Directly touching it without significant electrical insulation is ill-advised, though, and there's still the problem where you have to be quick enough that it's over before he's even tried to make a move. Exactly one method of permanently killing him exists, and its nature would be a major spoiler for a work I plan to get out into the public eye someday, so... nope. Sorry.

Goals: Most would tell you his only goal is to fuck with everyone and everything for his own amusement. Morgenstern himself insists he has more complex goals than that, but good luck figuring out what they are beyond raging nihilism.

Motivation: See above.

Role in the story: Greater-Scope Villain of The Dreaded variety, for the most part. On occasion, he plays a more direct antagonistic role. The last story arc turns him into a Dragon with an Agenda to the true Big Bad.

Backstory: Morgenstern's origins are an enigma. He's definitely been around longer than his presence has been actively known for; if you believe him, he's been around since the dawn of time, or at the very least since the dawn of this universe. Whether that was in his current form or as something else entirely is getting into more details than he's willing to divulge, but rumours of a mysterious feline entity exhibiting strange abilities and behaviours throughout the history of the planet Mercury have since attracted a renewed interest. Whatever the case, consensus is that he is definitely not a regular old Terran, though as with most things to do with Morgenstern, what he really is is an open question.

What is known is that, a little more than 50 years ago now, Hadley Morgenstern established his existence. In the midst of a routine planetary sweep, the Black Star Adventurer's Guild space cruiser Cat's Cradle abruptly ceased all transmissions. Search teams quickly dispatched to locate it confirmed that the ship was still powered and airborne, but in addition to the lack of any broadcasts, they also noted mysterious energy surges from across the ship. Lacking a means to board without the ship's currently ungrantable permission, the guild was forced to sit there with bated breath.

Eventually, the Cat's Cradle renewed communications, but what transpired from there just raised more questions. Initially, all it sent out was a request for one-on-one communication with the guild leader, "Field Marshal" Isaiah Jarvis - a seemingly immortal entity himself, though one with a far longer traceable history. Attempts to ignore the demand and request regular contact with the crew elicited no response. Eventually, the guild relented, and the Field Marshal contacted the Cat's Cradle from within his private office, with not another soul present.

What was discussed that day is a mystery. The Field Marshal was reported to have left his quarters looking shaken, and refused to reveal why. The Cat's Cradle docked with surprisingly little fanfare, with only the Field Marshal there to greet the mysterious feline who emerged. None of the ship's original crew were ever seen again; their fates are just another of the myriad mysteries surrounding this event. That said, keeping Morgenstern's nature in mind, many think they have a vague idea what transpired overall.

Morgenstern was given a job with the guild right there and then. No training, none of the usual mental screening for suitability - nothing. As it quickly became apparent what kind of person he was, neglecting his duties in favour of pointlessly tormenting anyone unfortunate enough to be assigned to work with him, this decision - and Field Marshal Jarvis's abject refusal to fire him, or even meaningfully punish him, for his deeds - became massively controversial. Morgenstern's own guild both hated and feared him, and as the Field Marshal personally ensured constant, inexplicable promotions for him, the discontent only grew. Eventually, Black Star, once a dominant presence across all of Mercury, split into fragments, with the splinter guilds each staking out a part of its former territory. The "Empire of Mercury" had been torn apart, and one cat was almost solely responsible. Still Field Marshal Jarvis kept Morgenstern on, promoting him until he literally could not rise further up the ranks, going so far as to make Morgenstern captain of his own personal space cruiser - none other than a refurbished Cat's Cradle. Morgenstern decided that name was too cutesy for him, though, and he redubbed his new flagship the Insect Kingdom. Assignment to its crew is reserved as punishment for truly spectacular breaches of the Black Star Adventurer's Guild's code.

Our story begins here. From within the Light Brigade Adventurer's Guild, one of the Black Star splinters and the organisation our protagonists work for, Morgenstern has been reduced to a distant, unpleasant memory. But his presence still hangs over every action they take, and he only grows in importance as the story goes on.

Relevant Tropes:

• The Ageless: He's looked barely older than 20 for more than 50 years now, and is definitely far older still.
• Amoral Afrikaner: His years on Mercury have caused him to pick up the local's South African-esque accent, complete with occasionally speaking Afrikaans.
• Antagonist Abilities: An immortal with electric abilities so powerful he can take total control of entire power grids? Yep, sounds like the villain alright. His strength is so great that, before they're ultimately put in a position where they have to figure out how to defeat him permanently, the general response from other characters to the concept of fighting Morgenstern is "run the fuck away as fast as possible".
• Asexuality: More accurately, he's so alien the concept of sexuality isn't applicable to him at all. Rape is one of the very few crimes he won't commit, not because of any scruples, but solely because he can't tell what the point of it is.
• Attention Deficit... Ooh, Shiny!: After all, when nothing means anything, everything is equally worthy of your attention. This, more even than his sadism, is why Morgenstern is objectively pretty terrible at his job. That said, if he does have something he desperately wants to achieve, he can focus on a single task for gobsmacking lengths of time in aid of it.
• Ax-Crazy: An unpredictable wild card who thinks of wanton murder and havoc as an amusing game.
• Badass in a Nice Suit: Of the Doctor-esque tweed variety.
• Bright Is Not Good / Light Is Not Good: Even beyond his gaudy appearance, Morgenstern is associated heavily, by his electricity powers and otherwise, with extremely bright light. This is partly a very subtle hint to the existence of his spoiler-laden Man Behind the Man, who rocks the Light Is Not Good look even more flagrantly.
• Card-Carrying Villain: Deconstructed example. Morgenstern's embrace of the idea of "evil" is a result of his nihilistic outlook; one evil deed has the power of a thousand good ones, and one act of destruction can erase a million acts of creation. Why not pick the winning side? Out of universe, the creation of the Morgenstern character was inspired by the question "what would a cartoonish Card-Carrying Villain look like if you treated his actions and mentality as seriously and realistically as possible?"
• Cat/Dog Dichotomy: He's a lynx, The Hero Vanessa Voss is a fox. More info on their specific points of contrast goes under Foil. Overlaps with Heroic Canines, Villainous Felines.
• Cat Folk: A Eurasian lynx Petting Zoo Person.
• Cats Are Mean: Oh, yes.
• Cats Are Superior: Subverted. He's enormously arrogant, but it has nothing to do with being feline. In fact, he'd really much rather shed his lynx "prison" and become something else entirely.
• Combat Sadomasochist: An advantage of Complete Immortality is the ability to take this trope to new and horrific extremes. Morgenstern will often intentionally gore himself in combat, revelling in the sickened responses his terrible injuries elicit. Other times, he'll hack off his own body parts as a combat technique, sending his severed appendages in several directions at once.
• Complete Immortality: As far as anyone can tell, he can't die. And believe me, many, many people have tried.
• Creepy Blue Eyes: Large, bright, sparkling eyes that almost look like they belong on a stuffed toy. They're also exactly as devoid of feeling as a stuffed toy's eyes.
• Cute and Psycho: At first glance, he looks like the most fuzzy, dorky, un-threatening Cute Kitten imaginable. Looks, as they say, are deceiving.
• The Dreaded: Everyone who knows who Morgenstern is is absolutely terrified of him. His terrible reputation alone caused the Black Star Adventurer's Guild to rupture into numerous fragments.
• Evil Has a Bad Sense of Humour: As far as Morgenstern is concerned, horrific gore and misery is the height of comedy. He's also fond of peppering his speech with more conventional jokes and wackiness, which is all the more jarring when you consider the kind of situations he's cracking those jokes in.
• Face of an Angel, Mind of a Demon: He's downright pretty by the standards of his kind, but all it takes is a few seconds of interaction with him for the Mind of a Demon to become painfully apparent.
• Faux Affably Evil: He's a very jolly person most of the time, but he's also not even trying to hide what a monster he is. The combination of seemingly genuine cheeriness with acts of absolute depravity can get severely jarring.
• Foil: To Vanessa, the story's main protagonist. It begins with the Cat/Dog Dichotomy (lynx/fox dichotomy?), and goes further from there. Vanessa is Dark Is Not Evil, dressing primarily in dark-coloured punk fashion; Morgenstern is Light Is Not Good, with his dorky, gaudy suit and scarf combo. Vanessa's primary colour association is dark red, Morgenstern's is light blue. Vanessa is a pyromancer, Morgenstern is an electromancer. Vanessa is pansexual and proud, Morgenstern doesn't have a sexual or romantic bone in his body. Vanessa was left a Cyborg by a severe incident during her guild training that forced her to acquire prosthetics, Morgenstern literally can't be permanently injured. But perhaps most importantly, Vanessa is The Anti-Nihilist who believes that, in a world with no greater meaning, you may as well try to spread as much joy and kindness as you can, while Morgenstern is a Straw Nihilist whose belief that all things are pointless gives him an excuse to indulge his sadistic tendencies.
• For the Evulz: Why does he do all these horrible things? He's got lots of explanations of varying levels of pretentiousness, but at root, it's because it's his idea of fun.
• Greater-Scope Villain: Morgenstern isn't an active Big Bad - he's the reason for a number of important backstory events, yes, but the primary conflict in the present comes from unrelated sources. Nonetheless, he's there, important, and will occasionally drop in to take any given situation From Bad to Worse in a heartbeat. Even in the final arc, he's merely the Dragon with an Agenda.
• Healing Factor: A Required Secondary Power to his immortality. Given how he could be, and has been, blown apart on a sub-atomic level and still eventually reform, it's safe to say it goes a step beyond simple healing.
• Hero Killer: Just in case his backstory alone doesn't hammer home how dangerous Morgenstern is, he succeeds in becoming one of these in his first proper appearance.
• Humanoid Abomination: Morgenstern is not a normal Terran. That much is clear. Nobody has the slightest clue what he really is, though, and his purposely self-contradictory explanations don't help. Overlaps with Animalistic Abomination, since this is a World of Funny Animals setting.
• Knight of Cerebus: The Light Brigade is pretty tonally dark to start with, but whenever Morgenstern is involved the tone becomes full-on jet black.
• Lack of Empathy: He understands empathy just enough to be able to mock it as worthless.
• Manipulative Bastard: As fond of mental abuse as he is physical abuse, and he can be surprisingly subtle and devious about it. He even manages to manipulate people who know fine well he can't be trusted (which is most people by now), usually through the careful application of reverse psychology - he knows they'll assume he's lying, so he tells the truth and makes it seem as much like a manipulative statement as possible.
• Man of Wealth and Taste: Despite his fancy suit, subverted. Beyond his scarves ruining any impression of class the suits might give off, his attitude is as far from tasteful as can be.
• Meaningful Name:
  • "Morgenstern", "the morning star", is a German title for Satan himself. Subtle, no?
  • Elijah was the Biblical prophet who, when some children made fun of his bald head, had them torn apart by bears on the spot. This is far more than just a nod to Morgenstern's violent, temperamental nature.
  • "Hadley" notably lacks meaning. Its purpose is to be a misleadingly dorky first name, in much the same way Morgenstern's overall appearance evokes every Light Is Not Good adjacent trope in the book.
  • His decision to rename the Cat's Cradle the Insect Kingdom invokes this - the name "Insect Kingdom" plays on "lord of the flies", the literal meaning of the name Beelzebub. Comparing himself to Satan, jokingly or otherwise, is a major hobby of Morgenstern's.
• Omnicidal Maniac: Albeit one who finds taking civilisation out piece by piece, personally lapping up every individual's suffering on the way, far more enjoyable than simply snuffing all life out in one go could ever be.
• Only the Chosen May Wield: "Mister Shockley", the cattle prod-like sceptre through which he channels his electromancy, is an odd example. It's so beat-up and full of exposed live wiring that only someone with Morgenstern's combination of mastery over electricity and imperviousness to harm could ever touch it and live.
• Psycho Electro: An electromancer. The rest of these tropes should explain the "Psycho" part well enough.
• Psychopathic Manchild: For all his bragging about being a "higher lifeform", Morgenstern is ultimately just a pretentious schoolyard bully with some incredible powers on his side. His taunting of his victims can be downright childish, and his reactions when someone makes a fool of him can be best described as raging, spitting temper tantrums.
• Sadist: Big time. He treats his sadistic actions like an art form, constantly coming up with new ways to abuse anyone he comes into contact with both physically and mentally. Even if he doesn't immediately attack you, he's almost certainly analysing your actions so he can figure out how best to hurt you at a later date.
• Satan: One of his more audacious, but also more frequent, claims is to be the Big Red Guy himself. Despite this and his level of evil, however, he lacks the required traits to be a Satanic Archetype.
• Scarf of Asskicking: A mainstay of his dress sense. Don't touch it, he'll kill you. He was probably going to kill you anyway, but messing with the scarf makes it into a guarantee.
• Shock and Awe: Electromancy is his magical speciality, and he is very good at it.
• Slasher Smile: Has a tendency to pull the bug-eyed, slavering variety when he's getting really into his acts of depravity.
• The Sociopath: you don't say
• Straw Nihilist: The closest he's given to a real explanation of his philosophy is that it's a variant on this coloured by his absurdly long lifespan. He's been around long enough to see whole worlds form and collapse, so what worth is one person? Why does it matter if your life is cut a few years short when you're here and gone in a flash anyway?
• Stupid Evil: Of the "decent INT, low WIS" variety. He's powerful and resilient enough for common sense to never have been something he felt the need to acquire. This comes back to bite him by the very end - once the heroes are capable of taking him out, he proves incapable of handling a scenario in which he is in genuine danger.
• Time Abyss: Morgenstern is constantly changing his stories about how old he is, much like everything else. The one constant is that he is always old enough that counting the exact number of years is a fool's errand.
• Ultimate Job Security: If Morgenstern ever does his supposed job, it's by accident. He's also the worst co-worker imaginable. Despite this, he's not only never been fired, he's been promoted over time until he's in the de facto highest position a member of the Black Star Adventurer's Guild can reach. The widespread and wholly accurate belief is that he's manipulating Field Marshal Jarvis somehow.
• Unreliable Expositor: How much, if any, of what he says about the distant past is true is anyone's guess. Given the Ontological Mystery aspect of the setting, with the Terrans unsure just how they or the universe they live in came about, his unreliability is extra frustrating.
• Would Hurt a Child: Just a child? Try Would Hurt Literally Anyone. He has no qualms with threatening a severely mentally disabled young adult who cannot comprehend what's going on solely to get a rise out of their sister.
• 0% Approval Rating: There is not a single person aware of Morgenstern whose opinion of him is kinder than pure loathing. He knows this himself, and couldn't care less.

be nice to benjamin it's not his fault he got beat up by a microbe

Well...Morgenstern certainly is interesting, I will give you that. I do like the fact that you haven't answered the question of his origin or even the origination of his power-set and skills. It's just a personal thing, but him being (supposedly) a member of a Pettng Zoo People race originally took away a lot of his creepy, abomination nature...until your backstory for him put it right back...

Is it ever explained in-story as to how he has manipulated the Field Marshall so deftly? Either he has something the Marshall wants, has threatened him severely or he has some sort of mind-control powers.

Fear is a tyrant and a despot, more terrible than the rack, more potent than the snake. — Edgar Walllace

This is from a setting worked on by my brother and I for years. A bit of a change of pace, since this isn't so much an evil character as it is an evil force. Though since it's been used by several villains as a power source I thought it would be appropriate context for when I post those villains.

• Name: White Porzite

• Age: It has blighted the world of Kishlaith for over four hundred years.

• Appearance: White porzite can take many different forms. In its most basic state underground it takes the form of glowing white crystals that grow in root-like tendrils across the walls, floors and ceilings of caverns. When growing and spreading on the surface, it becomes large hexagonal pillars of white crystal, though the shape is affected somewhat by the landscape. When melted down into drinkable form, it becomes a glowing milky fluid with the consistency of water and can be stored in a variety of containers ranging from bottles to syringes. When a member of the Becker family is forced to ingest white porzite, their body instantly petrifies into a massive crystalline formation known as a "white porzite tree", named for its resemblance to a real tree but made entirely from the accursed crystal.

• Personality: White porzite doesn't have a personality as much as it has a distinct purpose—to combat the Father of the Void's Abyss and all dark powers that stem from it. Its method of doing this is to infiltrate the bodies of any living creature it can and slowly remodel the body and mind of the host into a Living Weapon against the darkness. White porzite spreads itself across the land like an infection and through its initially beneficial effects, ensures that its hosts will consume enough of it to make a successful transformation.

• Abilities: Unlike natural red porzite which can only enhance the magical abilities of mages, white porzite can enhance and magnify all powers from the supernatural to the mundane when ingested in liquid form or if its crystals are embedded in armor or weapons or even worn like a charm. The subject is also given greater mental clarity, confidence and a sense of well-being as long as they continue white porzite use. As time goes on, the subject begins to display increasing worry and paranoia about the dark powers, combined with heightened aggression. Later, the subject becomes even stronger, though their need for white porzite increases and glowing white veins appear all over their bodies. They become mentally compelled to fight against any sources of dark energy, no matter if they are friends or family. Finally white porzite crystals sprout from the subject's body. More crystals grow from the subject as the stage progresses. Their physical form withers and their minds fade entirely as the crystals form a demented parody of "armor" around them. At this point they are little more than mindless drones and can spread the infection of white porzite to other people, and even accelerate the process in those already tainted. On its own, white porzite displays the ability to rapidly multiply itself and can regrow from even small fragments if not properly destroyed.

• Weaknesses: Unlike red porzite, white porzite is alive. Thus magical spells that inflict instant death are capable of wiping out entire clusters of the sinister mineral. Dark powers inflict even greater damage on anyone using white porzite. It can be shattered or broken like any ordinary mineral. People in the late stages of white porzite infection are easy to detect with proper knowledge, allowing them to be killed before they can be turned into a truly mindless monster. Finally, the Hive Mind that once directed all the white porzite infected was scattered long ago, leaving any fully transformed individual with no real direction except the raw instinct to attack anyone or anything that has a dark aura of power. People who progress through the stages of corruption too quickly will die from the transformative effects before being converted into a useful pawn, thus drawing on too much of white porzite's power at once is mostly fatal .

• Goals: Eliminate all traces of dark abyssal power on Kishlaith.

• Motivation: It was expressly created for this purpose by the Abyss Guard, four corrupted Destroyer Deities who oppose the Father of the Void.

• Role in the story: A mysterious force of corruption that has been presented to the masses as a Super Serum or Fantastic Drug by several villainous characters and used to grant power, wealth and prestige to those villains at the cost of ruining and destroying lives and increasing the white prozite's influence within the Sister Continents of [[Crapsackorld Kishlaith]].

• Backstory:

427 years ago during a particularly nasty battle between the Bright King and his brother the Father of the Void, the dwarven kingdom of Orvudin found themselves called on by the surface nations of Kishlaith, the Solinri empire especially, to manufacture armor and weapons as fast as they could to combat the shortages due to the war against the Abyss. The Smith-King Krus, leader of the dwarven people at the time, responded by devoting projects in the realm to work on manufacturing weapons, joining in manufacturing weapons and armor himself. However it soon became clear that Orvudin itself was in danger as the forces of the Abyss entered the underground kingdom and began to attack.

Krus prayed to the gods to aid his people against the threat but received no answer until he prayed to the Abyss Guard, the dreaded "protectors" of mankind. While they could not aid him directly, they advised him invoke their name to bless the porzite stores he held in his private workshop to fashion mage weapons and armor. As he did this, the porzite became white instead of red. Krus rapidly forged this new white colored porzite into the weapons of his own kingdom's troops and their armor, and was delighted as it allowed the dwarven forces to almost effortlessly beat back the darkness.

However the men and women who wielded the weapons and armor slowly lost their minds until they forgot who and what they had been. Their armor fused with their bodies and they became monsters that infected anyone who came near them. White porzite crystals spread through the underground halls and cities of Orvudin, a worse threat than the Abyss. King Krus tried to call for aid but the surface kingdoms could not spare the manpower to help them.

Finally two adventurers, a human mage named Alan Becker and a Type 3 vampire named Isaac Marsden answered the king's call. Alan and Isaac, along with a thief named Rudolph Valtir and King Krus himself descended into the depths of Orvudin and fought through the corrupted hordes until Alan was able to defeat the infection through a complex spell to scatter its collective intellect into millions of fragments—-which he then sealed into himself and his entire bloodline.

With this selfless act, the white porzite lost its "intelligence" and was greatly weakened, slower to infect people and easier to route and break apart. Its drones defeated, King Krus ordered the tainted areas of Orvudin sealed from the world forever.

For a time it seemed that the corruption was defeated, until Rudolph broke the oath that the four companions made to never reveal the means with which they had defeated the white porzite. Using his knowledge of what happened that day, Rudolph was able to track down Alan's descendants and petrify them using white porzite to make use of its enhancement powers and sell them to the highest bidder...

Relevant Tropes:

• Alien Kudzu: Areas that have a heavy white porzite contamination will see the white crystals slowly grow their way across every available surface in hopes of infecting a living host.

• And I Must Scream: All descendants of Alan Becker and his relatives will instantly find their bodies transformed into a massive tree-like formation of the crystal if forced to ingest any quantity of white porzite, no matter how small. They are fully awake and aware in this form and indeed are unable to lose consciousness at all. Worst of all, pieces of them are regularly chopped off to be sold as military enhancements or a Fantastic Drug by Rudolph Valtir and later his chosen successor Elizabeth Mourner. They will never die unless completely broken apart and many have remained in this state for centuries. The good news is that there is a magical spell that can sucessfully to revert them back to human form...although it requires the caster to give up his or her life in return.

• Axe-Crazy: A symptom of mid-stage infection is increasing aggression. Fully transformed people go into a violent and permanent rage against anyone or anything related to dark powers...or anyone who simply doesn’t have a light aura.

• Body Horror: The end result of contamination with white porzite. Its most common manifestation is white crystals growing out of the increasingly withered and thin flesh of its host, but several divergent mutations have been seen, all of them quite nasty. Mercifully by the time these effects grow too grotesque to hide, the host has lost so much of their mind that they don't care how horrific they look.

• The Corruption: A sinister and infectious force that gives out several beneficial attributes...but those are simply the prelude to a downward spiral into madness and complete destruction of your body and mind.

• Deadly Upgrade: Soldiers who are enhanced by taking doses of white porzite. They may find their strength increased, their stamina extended and their skills with their swords or guns phenomenally improved, but they will become addicted to those white porzite doses and then turn into monsters.

• Evil Is Burning Hot: Crystals of white porzite, particularly the larger ones give off considerable amounts of heat.

• Expy: Heavily inspired by red lyrium of the Dragon Age games and the "Hunter Curse" from The Vampire Dairies.

• Fantastic Drug: Low doses of white porzite do not enhance powers, but they do give a sense of invincibility, boundless confidence and well-being. The lower dosage still produces corruption that will eventually consume the host, but it takes years and even decades to produce any negative effects. This is one of several reasons Elizabeth turned away from marketing it as a military enhancer after Rudolph's death, and instead presented it as a designer drug for the wealthy and powerful.

• Healing Factor: White porzite crystals that are not properly disposed of will repair themselves. It is one of the strongest traits it has, and even with its Hive Mind gone, this continues. A white porzite fragment that is broken in half will fuse itself back together if the ends are pressed against each other, cracked crystals will repair the fissures in minutes and chips will fill in within hours. This applies to Alan's family as well; the white porzite's intelligence considers them a part of its "body" due to the bond Alan created by sealing the fragments within the bloodline. This translates into the Beckers being able to reattach limbs, heal wounds within minutes to hours and even regrow vital organs, all without even a trace of scarring when finished.

• Heroic Sacrifice: How the original outbreak in the dwarven kingdom of Orvudin was stopped. Alan Becker used his magic to break apart the Hive Mind of the white porzite and deposit those fragments into himself, his current family and to all descendants of himself and his relatives. He did this on the spur of the moment, recognizing that there was no other way to defeat it, and without the consent of any of his relatives. This is because he knew what the outbreak could do to the world if left unchecked.

• Hive Mind: The white porzite possesses a singular consciousness spread throughout all "parts" of its body, whether that is crystals growing across the land, or those who have progressed to end-stage infection. In the time of the white porzite's assimilation of Orvudin, it could see through the eyes of those who had been infected and plan and make strategies to increase its numbers and fight not only against the dark, but anyone who would try to oppose its conversion of all life around it into weapons. Alan broke this intelligent mind apart into thousands of tiny "fragments" and sealed those fragments into each of his large family. Because of this, the infected act only on their own wild instinct with varying results.

• Human Resources: Alan Becker's descendants are used, first by his former comrade Rudolph Valtir and later by Elizabeth Mourner, to produce large quantities of white porzite to sell to their various clients to fuel their lifestyle of wealth and prestige. Elizabeth takes this view a step further to the point where she views the entire clan as an heirloom passed down to her from her mentor Rudolph rather than people she's hunting down and petrifying.

• Instant Armor: Not instant but late-stage corruption produces crystals that grow from the body and act as natural armor. Those with a degree of free will left or divergent mutations can exert a degree of control over these changes, playing the trope straight. See Lovecraftian Superpower.

• Light Is Not Good: In a world where the power of light is viewed as holy and righteous by nature (particularly since the god who fashioned most of the world uses the element of light) white porzite is one of a few chilling examples of this trope.

• Lovecraftian Superpower: End-stage contamination by white porzite results in hard crystalline growths sprouting across the entire body. Despite the visibly weakened appearance of the subject's physical form, this increases strength and acts as armor. Divergent mutations can expel globs of boiling hot molten white porzite to infect and burn enemies, or cause their crystal tumors to harden and sharpen, ripping through their flesh and acting like built-in razor blades.

• Locked into Strangeness: Becker family members who are turned back into human form from being a White Porzite Tree are left with the hair on their bodies permanently bleached snow-white. Elizabeth would use this as a way to locate more of the family to harvest—she would un-petrify a few and then let them run, whereupon she would have the now white-haired people tracked back to their loved ones so she could abduct the rest...

• Not Himself: White porzite slowly suppresses the host's personality and desires and eventually turns them into a drone to be controlled by its singular desire to destroy any dark powers. This increasing hatred affects even people who were neutral or ambivalent about the machinations of the gods or even supported friends or family who wielded dark-aligned abilities.

• One-Winged Angel: Again on the subject of divergent mutations, very rarely an individual will be able to survive a sudden heavy dose of white porzite. This always results in the person gaining all the traits of late-stage infection, along with unique features and explosive powers. These people rapidly lose their intelligence and sanity, but can be focused enough to ignore the white porzite instinct for a while.

• Puppeteer Parasite

• Sealed Evil in a Can: After Alan broke apart the Hive Mind and sealed the fragments into his bloodline, the contaminated areas of Orvudin kingdom were sealed off and left alone by the dwarves. This was in hopes that the white porzite would never progress further into their territory. This worked for some time . However...
  • Leaking Can of Evil: Rudolph and Elizabeth’s antics as well as those of their clients has allowed white porzite (minus its central intelligence) to flourish on the surface and infect many people. Worse still, there are signs that petrifying the Becker family members is starting to reassemble the Hive Mind one piece at a time...

• Super Serum: The power-enhancement properties of early white porzite infection have incredible military applications. Once he had started turning Becker family members into white porzite "trees" to mine them for stores of the crystal, Rudolph's first—and last—customers were the Solinri empire who used the porzite to empower their troops.

• Unwitting Pawn: Rudolph and Elizabeth's greed undid all the hard work to seal the white porzite within the depths of Orvudin and stop it from escaping to the surface. While the collective intelligence no longer directs the infected, white porzite now exists on the surface and has already worked its way into the land...

• With Us or Against Us: The Hive Mind of the white prozite would have everyone submit to its remolding process to fight against the Abyss. If you try fight against this or simply try to escape, it will view you as a threat to be killed or forcibly infected. This cost thousands of lives in the original Orvudin outbreak as many tried to save their loved ones who had been infected through wielding the tainted armor and weapons made by the smiths under King Khrus.

Edited by Swordofknowledge on Jan 16th 2021 at 11:33:11 AM

Fear is a tyrant and a despot, more terrible than the rack, more potent than the snake. — Edgar Walllace

Um...bump? Just wondered what anyone thought of my "character".

Fear is a tyrant and a despot, more terrible than the rack, more potent than the snake. — Edgar Walllace

I can't see a [Color] [Mineral] name without thinking of Steven Universe anymore. Anywhoo, you linked to Sealed Evil in a Can when you mentioned the Abyss Guard, so I'm guessing this was a Deal with the Devil thing considering the White Porzite turned around and started infecting the users after accomplishing it's initial purpose. That or this actually what happened when deities share their cocaine stash. I'm curious why the WP was sealed in Becker to begin with. Why not just scatter them to the four winds? Or lock them up in various safe places under guard? Putting them in a single dude seems asking for trouble. Admittedly, this is something that always puzzles me in stories where evil is sealed in a person. What is it about someone's squishy body that's a better container for evil than an actual container?

I am very intrigued at the idea that a magic war steroid have been retooled in the current era as a recreational drug. I'm vaguely reminded of a book I once read that had an interesting ending where the shadowy cabal of Military-Industrial Complex leaders trying to start a world war were defeated in part by the CEO of a cosmetic company because war is bad for the lipstick and mascara business. Elizabeth is making me think of that CEO, a competitive businesswoman getting with the times and pushing the old guard who are threatening her success out of the way. That does make me wonder if the WP she gets from the Becker family is different from the stuff that grows naturally. Seems a lot of effort to go track someone down and turn them into a tree when you get get the WP growing off some dead junkie. Maybe it's a more potent strain?

---

• Name: Alexis Chang
• Age: 31
• Personality: In normal circumstances he was a bookish and chatty fellow. Now he's bitter, desperate, and hate-filled. If he's talking, he's talking to himself. Lack of sleep has made him unhinged and paranoid.
• Abilities: Extensive knowledge of the security systems and digital infrastructure of the capital city and the layout of the royal palace in particular. His hacking capabilities let his take control of drones, cars, the energy grid, and the death traps that make up the royal palace's security. He can also practically make himself invisible to electronic detection long enough to plant crude bombs and bail from wherever he is before the authorities get there.
• Weaknesses: Exhaustion. He's running on energy drinks at this point. As a lone wolf terrorist, he's handling an expansive plot all by himself and needs time to get anything done. Also, he's just a gangly computer nerd. Kick him in the shins and he down for an hour or so.
• Goals: In general, overthrow the government by killing the queen. More specifically, he wants to humiliate and eventually kill the Five Heroes who restored her to the throne in the first place.
• Motivation: To the rest of the Empire, the Five Heroes were a scrappy band of misfit commoners who stumbled into a seemingly minor situation that exploded into a planet hopping adventure that ended with them restoring the rightful heir the throne of the Empire. But that adventure came with costs, and the ensuing fights between the Five Heroes and the security forces got a lot of innocent people killed. Many people close to Alexis were sacrificed to get the queen on the throne. A throne Alexis doesn't think she deserves and needs to be removed from. And if commoners can install a monarch, then a commoner can overthrow one.
• Role in the Story: Alexis isn't so much an antagonist as he is a goal. His wife and the pro-democracy organization he used to belong to are desperate to stop him before he can carry out his worst plans. Her because she doesn't want her husband to spiral down into a murderous terrorist, them because his actions could cost their cause popular support. The difference between them and the Five Heroes is that they want him safe and alive, while the Heroes want him dead.

Backstory:

Alexis was born to the life of the simple and common. Growing up on the capital world, he went to school, made friends, got a part time job, the usual stuff. Things did change a bit when he went into higher learning. There he studied advanced cyber engineering and also got into radical politics. And by radical, we mean they got together to talk anti-monarchy stuff at the local coffee shop. He met his wife, got married, and despite his politics, got a job working for the government.

Then, through a friend of a friend, he somehow would up hosting the Five Heroes. Granted, they were the five at-large criminals guilty of treason at the time, but Alexis was sympathetic to their plight and kept them safe while they plotted their next move. What brief conversations they had gave Alexis the impression they were sympathetic to his own views and maybe restoring the lost princess to the throne really could bring about reforms to their society.

Then they left. And then the killing started. The usurping government brutally cracked down on anyone suspected of helping the Heroes. Alexis nearly lost his life. Everyone around him actually did. Maybe the grief and trauma wouldn't have been so bad if the Five Heroes had lived up to his expectations. Something to justify the bloodshed would have gone a long way. But years have passed and nothing changed. The nobles scheme and enrich themselves, the commoners are shut out of everything. Alexis felt used and betrayed. If that was how they were going to be, then Alexis would show them was a real revolution looked like.

Relevant Tropes:

• Must Have Caffeine: When you spend practically all day on the run, you might need a pick-up or twelve to keep awake too.
• The Insomniac: Even the slightest slip up might reveal him, so he's constantly on the move and rarely sleeps. On one hand, this just makes him more irritable and paranoid. On the other hand, his sleep schedule is so unpredictable it's gives the impression there are more than just one person carrying out the attacks.
• Well-Intentioned Extremist: At his core, he wants the Five Heroes to accept responsibility for the bloodshed their quest caused and move towards are a republican form of government. Now if only he wasn't blowing up buildings to make his point.

First of all, I genuinely appreciate your detailed and thought-out comments. You seem to have some questions so I will try to provide answers.

• 1. It wasn't a Deal with the Devil when it came to the Abyss Guard and King Krus. it was just a bad idea. The Abyss Guard are well-intentioned in terms of opposing the powers of the dark and the Abyss, but they are the type of deities who will destroy an entire country just because a subset of darkness-worshipping cultists have set up shop there. Thus them being sealed away for the protection of mortal-kind as a whole. White porzite's behavior is just a reflection of the nature of its creators.

• 2. You have a good point about sealing evil inside people lol. This example does involve logic, at least I hope so. Becker didn't seal the WP inside himself so much as he sealed its intelligence. WP is a magical super-organism that has a single mind spread out across all of its "parts", whether those are crystals growing on the ground or people transformed into monsters. Just ripping out the Hive Mind and sticking it in a container(s) wouldn't have worked. Its disembodied mind had to be broken up and moved into many living containers, just like was spread out among its many hosts. Alan volunteered himself and his entire bloodline, knowing he could contain it inside of all of them and future generations of the family with minimal effects.

• 3. Yes the WP from the Becker family is much more effective and potent than the stuff that grows from an ordinary person in the last stages of WP infection. The reason is that every member of the Becker bloodline has a "fragment" of the original Hive Mind inside of them, but too weak to effect them in any way. However when that fragment is reintroduced to a piece of its "body" (i.e. when a family member is injected with or forced to ingest a piece of white porzite) the mind fragment tries to grow a new physical form, forming the infamous "trees". The difference between the effects of Becker WP and crystals from ordinary people is like night and day, thus allowing Elizabeth to have a monopoly on her grisly trade and build her empire.

• 4. Not an answer to a question but I confess I also had thoughts of what WP would look/act like as a Steven Universe character. On another note, I'll have Rudolph and Elizabeth on here eventually so some stuff should be cleared up then.

—-

All I can feel for Alexis is sympathy, really. He's an interesting villain, not just because of his status as Well-Intentioned Extremist (those are always fun to read about) but because of who he represents from a character/story standpoint. We always see the collateral damage done either by heroes or through the indirect actions taken by our protagonists. But we are rarely treated to the longer term effects that damage has, especially from a human standpoint.

While it's hard to comment on this without knowing whether the Five Heroes are villains in their own right or not, I can say that I can see it from both sides, which makes it better. They worked their butts off to restore the rightful ruler only to have a disgruntled terrorist interfere. I can understand wanting him crushed like a bug, particularly if his hacking abilities are as potent as advertised.

Adding to that, the "pro democracy organization" that wants him to stop tarnishing their image and you have a good story with many shades of gray involved.

Edited by Swordofknowledge on May 15th 2020 at 12:43:03 PM

Fear is a tyrant and a despot, more terrible than the rack, more potent than the snake. — Edgar Walllace

That does clear things up. Cool. I'm looking forward to seeing Rudolph and Elizabeth. Not often we see villains who are drug lords. Well, one seems like an opportunistic dealer while the other is the head of organized crime. It'll be interesting seeing the evolution from one to the other as the two collaborate over the years.

Now that white porzite has been introduced, time for Elizabeth's Evil Mentor, the original oath-breaker and cause of white porzite's use on Kishlaith's surface.

• Name: Rudolph Valtir

• Age: 75. He was 34 when he was turned into a Type 2 vampire and lived for 41 years afterwards until he was assassinated by the Solinri Empire.

• Appearance: Rudolph stood 5'11 with broad shoulders and a lean muscular build. His eyes were gray and his shaggy unkempt hair and beard was brown, streaked heavily with white. After becoming a vampire, his skin became pale and corpse-like and he developed tiny fangs in place of his upper and lower canine teeth. When using his powers, he would develop a mouthful of shark-like teeth and his formerly gray eyes would glow bright crimson. He rarely wore shirts, and he always favored short hooded cloaks, regardless of whether he was wearing a shirt. He wore lose pants of coarse material and heavy leather boots made for combat. After earning the short-lived favor of the Nine Noble Houses of the Solinri Empire, Rudolph exchanged these clothes for a variety of expensive, fashionable outfits such as luxuriously tailored frock coats, top hats and formal pants and soft leather boots.

• Personality: Growing up in the impoverished city-kingdom of Aradel, molded Rudolph into a cunning and street-smart man. However it also left him with bottomless greed, and a selfish short-sighted mentality that often led him into trouble. Rudolph's sole aim in life was to rise above his station as a homeless street-urchin and reinvent himself as a wealthy gentleman. This desire superseded any attachments he had to the people around him, making his relationships shallow at best, and often grounded in abuse and manipulation. As befitting a thief, Rudolph viewed both people and objects around him with an appraising eye, always calculating how useful they could be to him and how to take them for himself. Despite making various acquaintances and allies over the years, Rudolph never forged any true friendships not even with Alan Becker. Despite fighting alongside the mage and witnessing his sacrifice to save the dwarven kingdom of Orvudin and all of Kishlaith from white porzite's corruption, Rudolph hunted and petrified his former comrade's relatives and descendants without mercy or restraint, and even mocked captured Becker family members about Alan's "mistake". Rudolph's personality changed little after becoming a vampire; he simply added the condition and its powers to his "arsenal" of tricks and skills, and enjoyed the assurance of endless time to make his dream come true. The closest thing to a tender relationship Rudolph had was his fledgling and apprentice Elizabeth Mourner. Even then, their bond was almost one-sided and based on Rudolph's urgent need for her analytical mind to aid his operation at the time.

• Abilities: Rudolph was an adept thief, with particular skill in burgling homes and buildings. He excelled at memorizing the layout of a building and evading guards, sanctuary enchantments and the owners while leaving with valuables. His fighting style mostly involved his fists or a pair of long knives he carried, and any improvised weapons he could think of on the spur of the moment. He often kept his movements purposely quick and ever-changing to throw off his opponent enough for him to get in a fatal strike. Despite his harsh upbringing and profession, Rudolph could be superficially charming, enough draw in clients when it came to selling stolen goods and later white porzite. Upon becoming a vampire, Rudolph gained many new powers to add to these skills. He could move so fast the average person could barely track him, his strength was sufficient to punch through walls and rip people apart like dolls, and he could control the minds of others by gazing into their eyes while commanding them to obey. Rudolph could heal from any non-fatal wound, to the point of regenerating limbs within minutes. Anyone he killed by drinking their blood would rise as a Type 0 vampire under his absolute control unless their head or heart was destroyed shortly after death. By draining a person of blood while concentrating with all his might on making them an equal vampire, he could create another Type 2 like himself. Allowing or forcing another human to drink his blood would grant that person immortality and healing powers, but at the cost of being completely under his mental control at all times. Due to being a walking corpse, he was immune to being corrupted by the white porzite he surrounded himself with, even the highly powerful “Becker strain”. While he had the favor of Solinri’s aristocracy, Rudolph was free to steal, feed and kill without being hunted as a monster or criminal by the Empire’s authorities.

• Weaknesses: Rudolph's greed often overcame his self-control. He took unnecessary risks during his break-ins due to a compulsion to reach his desired prize or out of fear another thief would reach it first. This led to his imprisonment and near-death many times. He was terrible with money or any other valuable resource, burning through it within days and forced to once again scrounge for a living. As a Type 2 vampire, Rudolph had a number of weak points: direct sunlight and garlic burned his flesh like acid, and extended exposure to the sun was fatal. Anyone who had recently ingested garlic was immune to his mind-control powers for hours afterwards. Being stabbed by a wooden object would result in full-body weakness until it was removed. Religious symbols of the Corpse Hound would repel him and cause his body to temporarily show signs of decay. Finally, any major injury to his head or heart was instantly fatal. Once Rudolph had secured his position as the supplier of white porzite to the Solinri Empire's military, he grew complacent and his broad ignorance of the plots and intrigues within the Empire's high society led to his downfall and death.

• Goals: Use anything, whether it was stolen treasures or The Corruption thinly disguised as a military enhancement catalyst, to secure money and power, and to enjoy that wealth for all eternity.

• Motivation: Rudolph grew up in grinding poverty and his early years were filled with books depicting colorful tales of affluent and sophisticated nobles and other members of the gentry.

• Role In The Story: The Predecessor Villain to Elizabeth Mourner, one of this world’s Big Bads. He was Elizabeth's Evil Mentor and in many ways shaped her into the person she was at the time of her ill-fated conflict with the Guild of the Triumvirate. Rudolph was one of the four companions who faced the white porzite threat when it first appeared, and a deliberate aversion of the Loveable Rogue trope. Narrative-wise Rudolph functions as a Posthumous Character since he is long-dead in the modern day and only appears in Elizabeth's Whole Episode Flashback to her origin story, and Isaac Marsden’s explanation to the Guild of the origin of white porzite and his long vendetta against Elizabeth's organization.

• Backstory:

Rudolph was born in 1560 in the city of Aradel. He was one of many young children orphaned in the Silver March, a bloody civil conflict that left Aradel in physical and financial ruin. Like many homeless orphans, Rudolph was taken in by a local monastery under the control of the Bright King's Church as it attempted to provide aid and religious instruction to the remaining citizens of the city. Rudolph hated life in the monastery. The children were expected to memorize the religious texts and failure was severely punished. The only thing Rudolph appreciated were the meals given twice a day and the stories about the brave knights and elegant nobles told by their caretakers in order to provide some entertainment. From early on Rudolph clashed with the stern priests and priestesses who staffed the monastery and his punishments and beatings only deepened his desire to escape.

Rudolph eventually escaped the monastery at the age of 11, forging out on his own in Aradel’s streets. He was almost entirely unprepared for the harsh and unforgiving nature of the world outside the Church’s care. Many days were spent barely surviving on scraps taken from those younger or simply weaker than he was—and he learned to fear being preyed on as well. By the age of 14 he had already committed his first murder, stabbing an older boy who had wanted the bits of moldy bread and meat he’d managed take from the gutters. Rudolph was eventually rescued from this life by a mysterious elderly man called Old Valtir. Old Valtir was a cunning and patient hermit who lived in Aradel’s flooded underground waterways and “collected” numerous street kids to act on his behalf in a number of ways throughout the city. Under the tutelage of Old Valtir and his more experienced minions, Rudolph perfected the art of breaking and entering, and other tricks and skills that made a successful thief. Rudolph’s ambitions grew without the constant struggle to stay alive. He thought about what he wanted to do with his life and the childhood stories of the nobles and wealthy elite called to him, beckoning him to become one of them.

As he grew older and more skilled, Rudolph was tired and resentful of being Valtir’s lackey. The eternal old man only gave his subordinates tiny fragments of the profits on what they stole for him and Valtir never even seemed to sell most of what he received anyway. At last Rudolph simply left him, content to forge his own path in Aradel’s streets. However without a gang to back him up and check his impulsive behavior, Rudolph found himself chased by the city guards and imprisoned more than once. He narrowly escaped death several times and his growing notoriety in the city made it hard to operate let alone survive. His chance for a fresh start happened when the Father of the Void began his latest attack upon Kishlath and armies of creatures from the Abyss stalked the land once more.

Aware that the dwarven kingdom of Orvudin was opening its gates and being flooded with requests to smith weapons for the surface kingdoms to fight the Abyssal hordes, Rudolph took it as a chance to plunder its ancient treasures. He killed a young human blacksmith and took the man’s identification papers in order to infiltrate the dwarven stronghold. Upon arrival in Orvudin Rudolph began to steal from the underground kingdom in the grip of chaos, but his unfamiliarity with the place and impulsive ways got him locked up once more. However as he awaited punishment, the white “blessed stone” given to the dwarven army by the Smith-King Krus went wild and consumed its users, spreading through the kingdom like a plague. Order broke down over a period of months and soon the prisoners were abandoned to starve.

Things grew worse when the building was stormed by monstrous creatures that had once been dwarves, their armor fused to their misshaped bodies by glowing white crystal tumors. Rudolph watched in horror as his fellow inmates were pulled from their cells and forcibly infected. Rudolph was saved by the dwarven Smith-King Krus himself along with a human mage named Alan Becker and a Type 3 vampire named Isaac Marsden. The mage and vampire were wandering adventurers who had answered King Krus’s call for aid against the horrors now rampant throughout Orvudin. Alan insisted on nursing Rudolph back to health since he was the only survivor. It soon became clear that Rudolph had no choice but to stay with the trio, since the city where he was imprisoned was now deeply within infected territory. Thus for the next three years, Rudolph aided Krus, Alan and Isaac with their fight against the white porzite and its thousands of infected drones.

During this time Rudolph got to know the powerful mage, the apex vampire and the dwarven king better. While he never became a true friend the way those three did to each other, he did his part to help them survive by using his skills to navigate past enemies and steal supplies they needed. Finally Alan implemented his plan to draw out the white porzite’s Hive Mind and seal it within his family’s bloodline. Not exactly understanding what that meant, Rudolph still helped the others keep the infected dwarves away from their mage while he readied the words of power that were needed to cast the spell. The battle was long but as Alan completed his work, the infected lost their cohesion, allowing them to be finished off. Over the next few months the dwarven military was able to destroy the remaining monsters and the companions prepared to go their separate ways once again.

Rudolph was pardoned for his thefts of valuables within Orvudin due to his role in helping end the white porzite scourge. However, because he had been a thief, he was not given material rewards the way Alan and Isaac were. Irritated at this, Rudolph resolved to keep a few small pieces of white porzite, as a souvenir of his ordeal. As they were leaving, Alan caught him examining one of these small shards. The mage explained to Rudolph that he must never take these pieces to the surface because they still retained sinister power. He also mentioned that his method of defeating the dwarven kingdom's infection had left his family vulnerable to a terrible fate if their members were ever exposed to white porzite.

Though he outwardly agreed, Rudolph kept the rest of the pieces, determined to take some of his adventure back with him. With nowhere else to go, Rudolph returned to Aradel and to Old Valtir, and begged the old man to take him back as a subordinate. However the old man refused, sensing that Rudolph was a different man than the one who had left him. At this point, Valtir revealed to the stunned Rudolph that he was a vampire and offered Rudolph an eternal place as his second in command of the ever-changing band of children he used to steal from Aradel’s citizens. Having brushed close to meeting his end so many times over the years, Rudolph agreed to become the old man’s fledgling as a way to insulate himself from death.

For the next twenty years, Rudolph served as Old Valtir’s eyes and ears within the city while he learned to live as a vampire. It was during this time that he met a member of the Becker family, Louis Becker who worked as a fence for stolen goods. One night during a discussion of what Old Valtir was willing to sell, Louis asked about the tiny white crystals Rudolph carried with him at all times. Thinking little of it, Rudolph handed some over to Louis to examine, only for Louis to cut his hand on a sharp edge. The room was filled with brilliant white light and Louis screams as his body distorted and petrified into a giant tree-like formation of white porzite.

In that moment, Alan’s words so many years ago now made sense to Rudolph, and his mind went to the reasons the white porzite had ravaged Orvudin in the first place. The military enhancement properties the crystal had granted now seemed like an excellent product to sell to the highest bidder.

Rudolph tracked down Louis’ family, killed his wife and forced his two children to swallow the remaining white porzite crystals, creating more “trees”. Shortly after this, Rudolph set sail to the Solinri Empire’s territories, since it was embroiled in a difficult war with the powerful kingdom of Nuren, and could use the white porzite’s powers for its troops. Because he knew that he would not make it far within Solinri without a surname, Rudolph “stole” Old Valtir’s name, calling himself Rudolph Valtir. He knew the path to greatness and prosperity would be difficult but he was not afraid. He had faced far worse odds.

In time Rudolph did successfully manage to market white porzite to the military of Solinri and gain the favor of at least three noble houses, but he was a victim of his own success. Rudolph began to use up the white porzite trees he’d made from Louis and his children. He knew that the nobles only tolerated him as long as he was useful, and his eye fell upon Elizabeth Mourner, a young and idealistic field knight. Watching her analytical and strategic mind at work gave him hope he could use her as a way out of his situation. He planned to forcibly make her his servant, but opportunity presented itself when Elizabeth faced betrayal and execution by her own forces. After rescuing her and transforming her into a vampire, Rudolph took advantage of her gratitude to put her to work solving his white porzite shortage. Elizabeth did not disappoint him and came up with inventive ways to track down other members of the vast Becker family line.

Unfortunately Rudolph and Elizabeth both found their new lives shattered when the nobility had no more use for them once the war with Nuren was won. Rudolph was targeted by a specialized squad of Solinrian soldiers, armed with anti-vampire weaponry. The hit squad stormed Rudolph’s mansion during the day and found him slumbering. Without mercy they slaughtered him, giving him time only to send the terrified and heartbroken Elizabeth away to escape. Thus ended the life of Rudolph Valtir, but not the hunting of the Becker family or demand for white porzite upon Kishlaith’s surface…

• Relevant Tropes:

• And I Must Scream: Turned Becker family members into white porzite trees, which dooms them to this fate for all eternity unless the entire structure of their tree is disrupted (i.e. the whole damn thing is destroyed to release their soul.) Granted Rudolph didn't actually know this, but probably wouldn't have cared if he did.

• Arch-Enemy: Isaac Marsden, Alan's old friend and a Type 3 vampire never liked Rudolph, but this was because of his own aloof nature than any real conflict he had with Rudolph himself. However when Isaac later tried to honor Alan's dying request to occasionally check up on his family and found them being actively hunted and condemned to a Fate Worse than Death as white porzite trees, he immediately went after Rudolph in a rage, knowing that he was somehow behind it. Unfortunately Rudolph had been dead for decades at this point, forcing him to instead spend his time hunting the illusive and well-connected Elizabeth. Despite his determination to slaughter Elizabeth and destroy her organization, Isaac considers this a pragmatic move, with his hatred reserved for Rudolph alone.

• The Artful Dodger: Averted. Rudolph's childhood on the streets was a miserable one, and he faced death and abuse at every turn, struggling to survive. Even being rescued and trained as a "proper" thief by Old Valtir's gang didn't really help his situation, just kept him from starving to death.

• Aristocrats Are Evil: At the time Rudolph made his entrance in Solinri with white porzite, the ancient noble houses of the Empire were treated as above reproach and viewed the common-born citizens (rich and poor alike) as inherently lesser beings. This is why they granted a vampire free reign to kill as he saw fit as well as property and protection as long as he provided a way to make their military stronger. Even when the horrific side-effects of white porzite use began to surface in soldiers, We Have Reserves ensured that those who succumbed were replaced with fresh pawns. This trope later turned against Rudolph when they realized they no longer needed him and he was far too big a liability to let live.

• Arms Dealer: He went from being a petty thief to being one of these when it came to selling white porzite to the Solinri military. Understanding that it really had been used as a military enhancement catalyst in Orvudin, Rudolph enthusiastically praised its value in making the Empire's military strong enough to easily overwhelm Nuren, while leaving out its more...unpleasant side effects.

• Asshole Victim: Rudolph went through some pretty terrifying situations in his life, part of what drove his decision to accept Old Valtir's offer of vampirism, and his death was definitely a betrayal by the Solinri empire. However Rudolph's greed, his career as a thief and his ultimate disregard for the lives and well-being of others put him in the path of many of those horrible events, even the one that finally destroyed him. See Kick The Son Of A Bitch.

• Avenging the Villain: The villain being avenged in this example. Elizabeth's shadow-war against the Solinri Empire was waged for the sake of avenging Rudolph's death, as she saw his destruction as a horrific injustice against both him and her, since it destroyed the life she had just started to build after her own near-death at their hands.

• The Bad Guy Wins: Not in the way he would have wanted at all, but Rudolph's actions invalidated the efforts and sacrifices to contain white porzite in the depths of Orvudin, keeping the dwarves' mistake sealed within their stronghold. Worse, despite Rudolph's death at the hands of Solinri, his fledgling and successor Elizabeth was able to make white porzite into a drug for Kishlaith's wealthy and powerful elite, cementing a practice of hunting down Becker family members and petrifying them.

• Been There, Shaped History: Rudolph played a key role in preventing the complete assimilation of the dwarven kingdom of Orvudin and its citizens by white porzite through his actions helping Alan Becker. Later he provided white porzite to enhance the strength, speed and magical powers of the Solinri Empire's forces against the kingdom of Nuren, turning a bloody stalemate of a war into a near ethnic-cleansing in Solinri's favor. That said, the events in Orvudin were so heavily covered up by the dwarven high authorities that in the modern era only four of the royal councilors at a time are allowed to know the truth, and any record of white porzite use in Solinri is completely lost to the ages by order of the imperial court.

• Complete Monster: Rudolph was utterly self-centered and willing to steal and kill to move just one step closer to his childhood dream of wealth and prosperity. Despite fighting alongside Alan, Isaac and King Krus to save Orvudin and the world and seeing what white porzite did to people, Rudolph did not even hesitate to sell it. Worse, his first reaction to realizing he could use Alan's family members to create more of it was to hunt down and petrify every single one he could, only showing concern and panic when he temporarily ran out of Beckers to crystalize. He thought nothing of condemning innocent people to addiction, death, mutation and petrification in order to make himself wealthy and earn Solinri's favor. He mocked and physically assaulted several of his Becker family victims when they tearfully pleaded to be killed rather than turned into white porzite trees, and his rescue and Emergency Transformation of Elizabeth happened only because of circumstances—he fully intended to abduct her and force her to become his servant. The moment he had made her his flegling, Rudolph wasted no time in using her vulnerable emotional state to corrupt the once-honorable and moral knight, and the two often went on killing sprees of innocents under the protection of the nobility. Even after his true death, his legacy haunted the Becker family for centuries afterwards via Elizabeth's relentless hunting of their bloodline, reducing them to poverty, isolation and violent rejection of anything beyond their squalid domain. .

• Confusion Fu: When in battle, Rudolph preferred to use unpredictability as his greatest asset. He would dodge and weave and throw objects at his enemies and sometimes even throw himself to the ground and roll, just to confuse and irritate any potential enemy—-lowering their guard and allowing him to get in a single fatal stab to a vital point.

• Cruel and Unusual Death: Inflicts one on the wife of a Becker family member he had captured when the woman insulted him. Rudolph tied her to her husband and then forced the man to swallow white porzite, so that when he turned into a white porzite tree, the "branches" impaled the wife's body and killed her. Even Elizabeth is horrified by this and demands to know if he felt anything while carrying out this act.

• Game Face:: Type 2 vampires generally look like they did when they were living, albeit with a pale or grayish complexion in the case of dark-skinned individuals. However when they use their powers, their eyes glow blood red and their mouths fill with razor sharp teeth resembling those of a shark. Rudolph was no exception and exhibited this nightmarish visage several times to scare enemies or intimidate those who tested his patience.

• Exact Words: Rudolph, King Krus, Isaac Marsden and Alan Becker all swore to never reveal how they had brought down the white porzite menace. Rudolph is regarded as The Oathbreaker by Isaac due to his atrocities against the Becker family, but indeed Rudolph actually did keep his promise. He never told anyone else, not even Elizabeth why the family can be turned into white porzite, just that they could. Whether this is out of some sense of honor or something else remains unknown.

• The Fagin: Rudolph was saved from starving to death by the agents of Old Valtir who was one of these. Valtir was a vampire of indeterminable age who collected children and molded them into thieves before sending them to steal valuables for him, not to sell but to collect and admire. He only sold them when his "wards" needed food and supplies. Rudolph chafed under this system and it is what eventually caused him to leave Aradel and head to Orvudin.

• Fully-Embraced Fiend: Rudolph's familiarity with hardship, violence and death allowed him to easily embrace being a vampire. He thought nothing of murdering people and drinking their blood or putting them under his mind control in order to rob them or force them to do his bidding. His nonchalance at these atrocities was passed onto his fledgling Elizabeth.

• Gentleman Thief: Very much averted. Rudolph was a coarse and brutal man, much the opposite of a gentleman in most ways. However after he turned Elizabeth into a vampire, he purposely romanticized his desperate and harsh existence in Aradel to present himself to her as a dashing rogue who sharpened his wits and skills on the streets from childhood. It was part of a manipulative ploy to deepen her respect for him so that she would be even more willing to bend and eventually break her morals and knightly vows for his sake.

• Hero Worship: He was the object of it through Elizabeth Mourner's eyes. Rudolph saved her from an excruciating and cruel death and made her a vampire when she would have died of her injuries. She wasted little time in becoming a part of his operation, even if her conscience rebelled at first. Long after his death, her prime motivations are driven by Rudolph, especially her desire to bring suffering and chaos to Solinri to avenge him.

• He Knows Too Much: Part of the reason Rudolph was assassinated. By the time the war with Nuren had been concluded in Solinri's favor, rumors of superhuman warriors who mutated into horrible monstrosities had circulated within the Empire's territories and outrage had begun as more and more soldiers succumbed to the white porzite blight. Now that they no longer desperately needed a victory, Rudolph and his product were a liability that could undermine any deniability the imperial court had. .

• The Immune: As a vampire, Rudolph was impervious to being corrupted by white porzite, despite being surrounded by it much of the time as his career within Solinri prospered. The reason for this is because the cursed mineral can only infect and transform living hosts, thus undead beings can neither draw on its powers or be affected by its harmful properties. This is one of several reasons Elizabeth would later maintain a heavy vampire presence within the part of her criminal empire dedicated to selling white porzite.

• Kick The Son Of A Bitch: Rudolph's betrayal and death at the hands of the Solinri Empire is partially to demonstrate how duplicitous and ruthless the nation's authorities were before its reformation and modern status as The Atoner for many of its ancient crimes against its own people and others. However the man was such a vile individual that it's clear those who destroyed him did the world a favor.

• Knife Nut: Rudolph's weapons when making his living as an ordinary thief in Aradel and later Orvudin were a pair of long knives. He used these as a "finisher" of sorts, having thrown his opponents off-guard, he would then lash out with these to target their throats or eyes.

• Lack of Empathy: Rudolph was genuinely unable to empathize with other people. At one point Elizabeth, who was still mostly in possession of a conscience, asks him whether or not he feels any remorse after he inflicts a horrific death on someone simply for annoying him. Rudolph is genuinely taken aback and a little amused that she would ask such a silly thing.

• Laser-Guided Karma: His marketing of a corrupting and dangerous magical substance that was created using innocent people directly led to his death.

• Lovable Rogue: A purposeful aversion. Rudolph was a criminal who was drawn into a heroic struggle against an evil force. In many stories that would make him a hero with rough edges, but his sociopathic nature ensured he would never become friends with his allies and he quickly made use of this same evil power the first chance he got.

• Orphanage of Fear: Downplayed. Rudolph's early years raised in a monastery of the Bright King's Church were not pleasant but they were not exactly abusive. Life there was strict and regimented and the children were expected to memorize religious texts or face beatings, but they were fed as well as they could be in Aradel's ruined state. On the other hand, the reason the Church had adopted so many orphans across Kishlatih was to push the boys and girls into becoming paladins to prepare for the Father of the Void's next attack on the world...

• Our Vampires Are Different: Rudolph was transformed into a Type 2 vampire by Old Valtir. They are the most common vampires on Kishlaith and possess a number of physical and supernatural enhancements that allow them to kill or dominate their prey, at the cost of requiring blood to stay strong and keep the appearance of life. However they pale in comparison to the rarest of all, the Type 3s who are near-impossible to kill and have very few weaknesses.

• Rescue Romance: Rudolph carried out one, of a sort, with Elizabeth Mourner after saving her from being burned at the stake and turning her into a vampire to save her from her fatal burns and smoke inhalation. It was mostly one-sided on Elizabeth's part, though Rudolph did feel a certain fondness for her on the level he would feel for a particularly loyal and useful henchman.

• The Sociopath: Rudolph lacked remorse for any of his crimes, apart from those which negatively affected him, was able to put on a facade of politeness and charm, and believed enriching himself was paramount at all times. He had no qualms about using violence and aggression to achieve his aims and would resort to it without hesitation. He had little to no sentimental attachments to anyone, even those who genuinely extended the offer of friendship or love, and he saw these overtures as opportunities to get what he wanted from those people.

• Stupid Evil: When working as a white porzite supplier to Solinri's military, Rudolph gained the same rights and privileges of a wealthy, if low-born, citizen of the Empire. Rather than quietly enjoy his ill-gotten status, he used this opportunity to indulge his worst impulses and stretch the protection of the Nine Noble House to its absolute limits. He would feed on innocent people without discretion, break into houses to steal valuable and kill or maim the inhabitants if they got in his way, and used these treasures to add to his personal coffers or simply flaunt them in public. This was because he knew the nobles who back him would cover it up. While he still would have been targeted for death eventually, these actions certainly didn't help matters.

• Superior Successor: Elizabeth ultimately was one to Rudolph. She was smarter than he was, had far more experience with the politics and nuances of high society and had an analytical mind that was only sharpened by her slow abandonment of her morals. She advanced what had been simple arms-dealing of white porzite into an entire criminal empire with white porzite at its center, but by no means its only product. Elizabeth made connections throughout Kishlaith's nations, becoming wealthier than Rudolph had ever dreamed...all while evading both any suspicion from authorities, and the powerful Type 3 vampire who wanted to end the white porzite scourge and hunting of the Becker family. She attained complete mastery over the physical and supernatural aspects of her vampiric nature and incorporated it into her strategies when chasing her goals. In fact, Elizabeth's own downfall and death only came about through trying to extend her reach into politics to cause a war, which attracted the Guild of the Triumvirate.

• The Tooth Hurts: Rudolph's early methods of petrifying Becker family members was to force them to swallow white porzite crystals to begin the process of conversion into white porzite trees. If they resisted, he would simply use his Super-Strength to shatter their teeth by flicking their mouths or break their jaws if the mood struck him. While still horrific, Elizabeth's patented method of a quick and methodical injection of liquid white porzite to the jugular vein is far less brutal.

Edited by Swordofknowledge on Jan 16th 2021 at 4:00:24 AM

Fear is a tyrant and a despot, more terrible than the rack, more potent than the snake. — Edgar Walllace

@ Rudolph:

Sounds like Oliver Twist took a sudden sharp turn into vampirehood, and I'm entirely okay with it.

He definitely is a well-developed villain: I'd plant him firmly in the camp of Freudian Excuse Is No Excuse: sure he had a rough childhood, and his hedonism and desire for power and wealth are clearly linked to his misery as a poor starving kid, but he's just too twisted to really feel sorry for him. He had every chance for prosperity when he was fighting for the forces of good, but it seems like his inner nature won out. Even if he hadn't had a miserable life growing up, I doubt he'd have turned out alright: he'd likely have come up with another excuse for indulging in evil.

Now then, here's mine: who said a Slice of Life story about Cute Monster Girls can't have a villain?

• Name: Tiamat 'Tia' Arthur-Camlann
• Age: 25
• Appearance: Tall, slim, short red hair in a Karen cut. Humanoid for the most part, though she has horns, reptilian wings, and her arms and legs shift at about the joint to be more reptilian, with dark-red scales and long, clawed fingers and toes. Her smiles reveal a mouth full of sharklike teeth.
• Personality: Manipulative, smug, sadistic. Can put on an act of a Cool Big Sis, and even when her facade cracks she can easily play it off. An effortless liar: it's probable she doesn't believe half the biases and bigotry she instills in Praline, only doing so to keep Praline paranoid, bitter and dependent on her.
• Abilities: Immense strength, flight, superior reflexes and speed, scales are nigh-bulletproof, though large calibur, FMJ or heavy impacts like shotgun blasts can crack them.
• Weaknesses: The unarmored parts of her body are entirely vulnerable. Her reflexes require undivided focus: if she is distracted, she can't react in time.
• Goals: To indulge her whims, wherever they may lead her.
• Role In The Story: Greater-Scope Villain, such as it were. Praline likely wouldn't have ended up as the Gayngst-riddled wreck she was at the beginning of the story if she had chosen anyone but Tia to confide in. It may be more accurate to describe her as an Allegorical Character: the representation of all of Praline's weakness and misery.
• Backstory: When Praline LaCroix realized she was a lesbian, she had no idea how to react or who to turn to. Figuring the internet was a nice, anonymous way to get advice, she had the supreme misfortune of contacting Tia, who wasted no time in regaling Praline in horror story after horror story of unfortunate LGBT youth. Some of it was, to Tia's credit, true. A number of other stories had, shall we say, creative liberties taken with them, and others Tia simply pulled out of her ass. It all did the trick, unfortunately, and in about a month and a half Praline was too scared to leave her home. Although Praline slowly came out of her shell after meeting Jackie and Saoirse when her parents moved to Vermont, and she began drifting further and further away from Tia as she did so, a Moment of Weakness brought her right back to Tia. Praline, who had held strong feelings for Jackie, was turned down by the anubis, and Tia offered to...convince Jackie to be more open-minded. In her heartbreak and desperation, and not really understanding what Tia truly intended, Praline accepted. Fortunately, Praline's better nature won out after seeing how uncomfortable Tia's advances were making Jackie, and she told Tia to back off, hoping that it would be the end of it. Unfortunately, Tia had other plans: she broke into Jackie's house, attempting to assault her, and was fortunately stopped by the intervention of Praline and Saoirse. While the two of them were unable to injure the dragon, they distracted her long enough for Jackie to line up a killing shot.

Relevant Tropes

• Always Chaotic Evil: Dragons and their various subspecies are said to have a powerful, species-wide drive to dominate and control. While most either learn to control it in polite society, or channel it to less-destructive pursuits like sports, business or politics, Tia embraces it wholeheartedly, being a manipulative, sadistic rapist who enjoys breaking couples, sleeping with the girl by flirtation or force, and then discarding her.
• Boom, Headshot!: How she meets her end.
• Cool Big Sis: Incredibly charismatic with larger-than-life confidence, Tia presents herself as this to Praline. Such is her gravitational pull that Praline easily writes off the bullying and emotional abuse Tia heaps on her, though it's just as likely another manifestation of Praline needing someone, anyone to talk to.
• The Corrupter: To Praline, feeding her paranoia, stoking her bigotry and giving her self-destructive advice that ensures Praline stays miserable and dependent on her.
• Expy: Take Draco from Daily Life with Monster Girl, take away her Butt-Monkey status and make her a serious villain about twenty orders of magnitude worse than what Draco was ever like, and you have Tia.
• Famous Last Words: “Who knows, once you’ve got the taste for it…”
• Oh, Crap!: When she realizes Jackie has a 9mm pointed right at her head, and her concentration was too shaken by Praline attacking her to put up a defense.
• Psycho Lesbian: Predatory in every sense of the word, Tia has made a hobby of breaking up couples, seducing the girl, and then tossing her away like a rag when finished.
• Serial Rapist: If the girl she has her sights on doesn’t swing this way or plain isn’t interested, it’s no skin off Tia’s nose. In fact, she almost prefers it that way: she likes to earn her ‘meals’.
• The Sociopath: Puts on a convincing act as a ‘big sister’ for Praline online, and feeds her toxic advice to keep her dependent on her. Skin-deep beneath her ‘cool’, friendly façade is a calculating, predatory fiend who lives to conquer and crush the spirits of others
• Super-Reflexes: Her reflexes are acute enough to block bullets with her armored scales. She needs immense concentration to do so, and when Praline attacks her from behind, it opens up the moment of weakness Jackie needs to score a headshot on the evil dragon. Even then, Tia is able to recognize the oncoming danger in the split second after Jackie has fired and react accordingly.
• Vile Villain, Saccharine Show: She’d be this by virtue of being the only truly antagonistic force in what’s otherwise a subdued slice of life anthology, but Tia goes above and beyond in her depravity, being a sadistic, manipulative, violent serial rapist. Even before her official appearance her shadow looms over the story through Praline’s emotional issues.

Edited by krimzonflygon2 on May 29th 2020 at 6:10:55 AM

Krimzon beat me to this, but since I had already written this I'm going post for both Rudolph and Tia.

---

Rudolph

At this point I'm wondering why you're limiting this dude and his contemporaries to flashback characters. You seem to have enough fleshed out to write a whole story set earlier in the timeline.

Kinda confused by his age. You list it as 104, but he lived for 41 years after being turned into a vampire at age 34. So he's 75? That's still old, I don't see 30 years making much of a difference one way or another, but I'm wondering if I missed something here. Also Rudolph's taller than me, so I disapprove of him on principle.

Troubled youth, petty burglar, constantly arrested but somehow getting out, charming, escalates to murder, escalates to even more murder. This guy sounds like a fantasy version of the serial killer Paul John Knowles. Looks like I was right about him being an opportunistic bastard. I just didn't realize how much of a heartless monster he was in both senses of the word. It's interesting that that are glimmers of sympathetic backstory in his childhood, but it's always his choice to go from bad to worse, just like Knowles seemed to always desire to steal and kill. I can't help but think he would have screwed up with Elizabeth had that relationship not been cut short. Despite the veneer of civility he's still a selfish brute, whereas it seems she's the real classy criminal.

That said, I'm wondering if there's any room in the story for him to doubt the path he's on. It would be cool for him to at least consider going on the straight and narrow when he's a companion of Alan and Isaac, only to reject it in the end because he wants to indulge in his baser desires.

I do find it amusing that in this mostly classical fantasy setting the ol' garlic and wooden stake tricks from vampire folklore still work on our villain here. I'm just imagining the anti-vampire weaponry the Solinrian used to kill him was just some garlic and chopsticks they borrowed from the nearest Panda Express.

---

Tia

I like how we have this group of magical beings and their complex relationships all taking place in a place as mundane as Vermont. Kinda hoping a curmudgeonly old senator makes a cameo. Also, I'm curious how often large calibur, FMJ or heavy impacts like shotgun blasts show up in this Slice of Life story - [reads last sentence of Backstory] - Oh. Nevermind!

This character got darker and darker as I read on. Tia reminds me of JD from Heathers. First glance it looks like you're being taken under the wing of someone who just gets you, but as time goes on you slowly realize you're dealing with a monster. The psychological manipulator who twists the minds of others through their confidence, charisma, and sensuality. Those who make it seem like they're the protector, confidant, or big sis in this case, are fun to read about because while the reader can catch on that this person is trouble probably sooner rather than later, the other characters don't. We're treated to a journey of the mind from those being manipulated to some horrible situation, then on to the point where they realize the truth and how far down the rabbit hole they are, and finally the victorious march out of the darkness when they expel this person from their lives.

I almost want to cut her some slack since you mentioned that dragons are inherently domineering control-freaks, but at the same time she willingly chose to channel those traits into abusing others. That's totally on her. Though I am curious what led to this in the first place. Were any of those horror stories about her?

I'll admit I'm rather wary of the Serial Rapist deal considering the sensitivity of the subject. Done poorly it could come across as a lazy way to show how evil Tia is, and with everything else she's got going for her that's hardly needed.

---

• Name: Amelia Dex Ducis
• Age: 18
• Personality: Gentle and kind, Amelia is reserved with people she is unfamiliar with but people close to her know she is curious and can read people like a music sheet. She is plagued by crippling indecisiveness and will often follow the lead of others more forceful than herself, resulting in her swinging wildly from one action to it's opposite in a matter of days. Amelia tries to see the best in people but never forgets when someone wrongs her.
• Abilities: As a Noble she was born with enhanced physical capabilities courtesy of the genetic modifications that all aristocratic ancestors underwent long ago. Not being much of an athletic or outdoors type of person, she never actually trained these capabilities though. You wouldn't even notice she was a Noble if not for the slightly elongated and pointed ears that most aristocrats are born with. Mentally, though she has a vast array of knowledge thanks to expensive tutors, she's slightly above average. Politically? Amelia is the Queen of the Empire, an old and powerful interstellar nation. As the absolute monarch and supreme ruler she wields the power of over 30 inhabited worlds.
• Weaknesses: ... Or she would if the Revolutionaries didn't control almost half of them. That aforementioned vacillating nature of hers made her incapable of preventing rebellion by dissatisfied subjects who had grown frustrated with the corrupt and oppressive nobility and to the indifferent monarchy of her father or keeping it from spreading. Easily swayed by those close to her, she is often unwilling to abandon a plan even if it is clearly a bad one. Her feelings get hurt easily and this is something that makes her bitter, petty, and judgmental as time and war weariness drag on.
• Goals: Defeating the rebellion and preserve her throne.
• Motivation: As the last direct member of the royal family, with its pure noble bloodlines and heavenly charge, it's been drilled into Amelia by her father that it is her right and duty to rule over the empire. Did not the Undying Queen herself choose Amelia's house to rule in her stead? Did not the Five Heroes rise against the usurpers to restore Amelia's great-great-grandmother to the throne? Never mind that as the youngest child of the king she was never meant to inherent the throne. She didn't ask for this, but it's her responsibility now.
• Role in the Story: One of the viewpoint characters and the primary antagonist for those she has labeled insurgents. To them, Amelia is a distant despot who swatted down all their attempts to reform the nation and then spilled their blood over peaceful protests. To the Imperial old guard, she is the young and inexperienced child they must shepherd to preserve the conservative policies of her father. To the younger nobility, including her friends, she's the frustrating dupe of the old guard and she could win the rebellion if she'd just listen to them instead.

Backstory:

Amelia is the last of the three children born to King Hemad. Her mother died from childbirth complications during an attempted assassination and the circumstances surrounding her birth led to her father, already a cold person, shunning her for most of her life. Amelia grew up half afraid of her father and half craving parental affection. It didn't help that Amelia was remarkably unexceptional. Whereas her brother, the crown prince, was bold and active with the people and her sister was a brilliant mind among the Empire's top scientists, Amelia was shy and kept to herself. She was more concerned about not crossing her father than to try anything that would catch attention. And frankly, who cares about the third princess anyway? Send her to kiss some babies or cut some ribbons when the important people are too busy. Marry her off eventually.

Things changed when her father's health took a turn for the worse. It was obvious that the time had come for her brother to begin taking the reigns of power. Amelia was fine with that. She got along well with her eldest sibling and he was smart, charismatic, and full of bold ideas. He would make a good king. Too bad their father didn't think so. Almost immediately the two clashed over everything. What began as debates of policy devolved into shouting matches that shook the palace and had everyone on their toes when father and son stormed off it opposite directions. Amelia's older sister, the king's favorite child, tried to play peacemaker with limited success. Amelia was kept out of "family discussions" and for once she was glad for that.

Then her sister died in a freak accident. Then her brother died in a freak accident a few months later. Amelia wept over the loss of her siblings, but also was filled with the dread that came with the knowledge that she was now the heir apparent. That dread was shared by most everyone in the palace with the realization Amelia had never had any training to be the ruler and her father was rapidly approaching death. A lifetime of astropolitical lessons and training was fitted into a year, supervised by her suddenly attentive father. She never stopped being afraid of him, especially when in his bad moods he would go on rants about this official or that noble family and how they were always ready to undermine him and they'd do the same to her if she wasn't careful.

Then her father died a year after her siblings. So began the reign of Queen Amelia Dex Ducis. A reign immediately encountering civil strife as protesters across worlds angrily denounced the rampant corruption that had grown under her father and the lack of political power for commoners even as the nobles increasingly abused their power, besides collect taxes. Things come to a head when a student protest results in hundreds of deaths, leading pro-democratic insurrectionists to storm the capital of an important world. Amelia had to respond. Negotiate? No, her father's advisors told her. The King would never negotiate with the rabble. She was the sovereign. She was the queen. Her word was law. And so she did what her father would have done. What would have made him respect her finally. The revolt was crushed. There was finally peace. Amelia could go to bed with the knowledge she had preserved the empire her father had charged her with.

And then she woke up to find rebellion had exploded across the Empire. Too late did Amelia realize how little she knew about the Empire she was ruling, how angry people were, how organized resistance to the monarchy was, how unprepared her own forces were. She had not snuffed out the flame of dissension, she had thrown gasoline on the fire. For the first time since the Undying Queen had bequeathed the throne to her house so many generations ago the Empire was at war with itself.

Relevant Tropes:

• Big Bad: The people who would become the Revolutionaries were cautiously optimistic when she came the throne. But any hopes that she'd be more open to reform than her father were cruelly disillusioned when she cracked down on any resistance to her rule. Made worse by the fact that she almost always doubles down on the most destructive policies, up to burning most of a planet to deny it's use to the Revolutionaries.
• The Coup: The Imperial Hardliners attempt to overthrow her after she finally becomes disillusioned with their advice and starts managing the war on her own.
• Despotism Justifies the Means: She'll fight to the bitter end to preserve the monarchy, even when her closest allies have already resigned themselves to losing the war.
• Disproportionate Retribution: As the war drags on Amelia resorts to this to prove she's still in control. An opera singer belts out a tune known to be favored by the Revolutionaries? Enjoy your life on a frozen prison planet.
• Evil Chancellor: Much of the bad advice Amelia takes is from her uncle, who constantly goads her into hardline stances because he gets to direct those policies.
• Freudian Excuse: Her refusal to negotiate any terms that would weaken the power of the throne is because they're what her father would have done and she's desperate to prove she is worthy of the royal legacy.
• Genetic Engineering: Amelia, like all nobility, is a descendant of genetically engineered humans and inherited their improved physical capabilities. This is part of what factors into her insistence that she maintain the throne; she genuinely is genetically superior. Of course she has the right to rule!
• Grew a Spine: With the war dragging on, it slowly dawns on her that the Hardliners have been pursing one failed policy after another. So why should she listen to them? From then on she becomes more forceful in affairs of the state.
• Lawful Pushover: Between the older hardliners and youthful reformers, Amelia will often do something based on who made their case before her last. This can lead to serious policy whiplash such as when she agrees to do television interviews to win over the public, but then arrests the reporters when the aired version isn't sufficiently fawning.
• Overly Long Name: Legally her surname was changed to just "Dex Ducis" upon her coronation, but for most of her life she was Amelia Kirrin Johnson Ortega de Suvia y Moreno Bakerson Kittale. If she was a normal person, then we'd know her just as Amelia Johnson. Not very regal, is it?
• Sheltered Aristocrat: It wasn't until after she took the throne did she realize how pissed off the commoners were at being denied any political power. Heck, it wasn't until she took the throne did she even have a conversation with a commoner that wasn't on the palace staff. And even that proved difficult because the dialect on the nobility is very hard to understand for commoners.
• Spare to the Throne: Third in line to inherit the throne and nobody ever planned for her to do so.

[Though I am curious what led to this in the first place. Were any of those horror stories about her?]

Nope.

Okay, sure, a couple of kids made fun of her in her freshmen year at high school. Rather literal case of Bullying a Dragon, that. Seven years later one of them still walks with a limp. Got herself expelled, but school's for sheep anyway.

Tia's been in thrall to her domination instinct from the moment she hatched. I mean, ALL dragons start off like that, but nowadays there's been a culture shift where dragons consider being able to suppress the instinct or harness it productively a sign of strength in itself. Tia simply enjoys throwing her weight around, crushing the wills of others, sowing discord, harming the people who annoy her: her being a Serial Rapist is simply another way for her to impose her will over others, another way to 'win'.

Had she been born five centuries earlier, she'd have been considered a dragon's dragon.

[I'll admit I'm rather wary of the Serial Rapist deal considering the sensitivity of the subject. Done poorly it could come across as a lazy way to show how evil Tia is, and with everything else she's got going for her that's hardly needed.]

True enough. I'll attempt to make it a matter of Fridge Horror mostly: the intended reaction will be that as she attacks Jackie will be the reader thinking back to some of her seemingly innocuous lines and realizing with dawning horror that this is no spur-of-the-moment Villainous Breakdown from her being spurned. It can't have been the first time she's done something like this, with her mannerisms showing her as someone who knows exactly what she's about to do and then putting it into action with practiced efficiency.

Edited by krimzonflygon2 on May 30th 2020 at 7:56:08 AM

@ Krimzonflygon 2 and Parable: Thank you both for the replies. I'm going to try to review to both of your characters, but I apologize if it gets jumbled. I've never mastered the art of separating things using horizontal lines on this site .

About Tia...oh boy. You are exactly right—Vile Villain, Saccharine Show barely covers how awful she is. It may sound strange, but the part that sticks out to me the most as vile and appalling on a personal level isn't her Serial Rapist tendencies (don't get me wrong, they're bad!) but the idea that she slowly but steadily drove Praline into such anxiety that she was afraid to leave her house. As someone who has suffered from severe anxiety, the thought of someone purposefully cultivating that in someone else is just horrific. Not that it's a bad thing from a story perspective! It makes her more monstrous and easier to hate in a way that's closer to home.

I'm not sure if you have played Skyrim, but I have to admit that is the first thing that came to mind when you mentioned the inborn dragon instinct to dominate and control the lives of others. Again what I like is that you made Tia solely responsible for her actions—that instinct could have so easily been used as a Freudian Excuse or just a hand-wave to explain her behavior, but you went out of your way to highlight that her way of channeling this aspect is 100 percent on her.

I'm a little curious as to how the rules of law and order work in this world or if there is some sort of cover-up of supernatural beings going on. Did killing her draw negative consequences or was it somehow swept under the rug or (best case scenario) accepted as reasonable self-defense?

---

@ Parable: I'm genuinely conflicted about Alexis. I suppose it's common with most sympathetic villain types, but on one hand she seems like a lost kid who was thrust into a scenario she was never remotely ready for. It shows with how easily she is manipulated by her Evil Chancellor uncle and her lack of confidence in herself and her decisions. That being said, her harsh and genuinely cruel actions are inexcusable. It's funny, because if you had "tone down" her retaliations against the rebellions, just a little bit, I could actually see this as a situation in which neither side is good or evil, just fighting for their own ideals. Burning an entire planet, the opera singer incident...wow. Disproportionate Retribution seems to be one of her defining characteristics as a ruler (thought whether that is something that exists as a part of her personality or is solely due to her seemingly sadistic uncle isn't exactly clear). Either way, from just looking at real life history and from what you've said about her she is viewed by resistance, nobles and the like, her tactics don't bode well for the longevity of her reign. I'm not sure if you are familiar with it, but in a way she reminds me of the child emperor from Akame ga Kill. She's less helpless, but the overall concept remains the same: a naive and unsure puppet in the hands of a black-hearted advisor who is slowly leading their nation to ruin through indecisiveness and weak will as much as tyranny.

---

To answer your observations about Rudolph: I kind of goofed on the math with his age, thanks for pointing that out! You were right, he should have been 75.

Also thanks for the compliment on his backstory, that means a lot. I try to make sure that my characters (even flashback people) are well...people. At first I wasn't sure who you were talking about when you mentioned Paul John Knowles, but then I remembered listening to a documentary on him some time ago. In a strange way I suppose they are somewhat similar. You are right though; Elizabeth and Rudolph's relationship wouldn't have lasted, even if Elizabeth eternally grieves over him. I'm actually glad you mentioned that to be honest. Part of Elizabeth's character is the tragedy of how much of her undead existence revolves around Rudolph even after his death. Most people can see that the two of them wouldn't have lasted, except for her, and it's even sadder that she died trying to avenge him when she could have enjoyed her wealth and connections indefinitely. Of course she's a monster almost as twisted as he was, but I still find it sad.

One more interesting thing about Rudolph that I just thought I'd put in, though it doesn't really mean much: the Guild of the Triumvirate that I have mentioned several times in these profiles was created for the express purpose of killing people like Rudolph. People and monsters who are either so powerful or well-connected that they cannot be touched by ordinary people, so they need specialized, hardened killers to swoop down and take them out without a care for their friends in high places or powers they wield.

Edited by Swordofknowledge on May 31st 2020 at 7:25:21 AM

Fear is a tyrant and a despot, more terrible than the rack, more potent than the snake. — Edgar Walllace

What does she do for a living anyway?

Sounds like a good plan. The implications are horrific enough.

---

I'm going to write this into the story. That Amelia's so uninspiring that people keep getting her name wrong.

She keeps doing it even after she imprisons her uncle for launching a coup against her, if that clears anything up.

The cruel irony is that once she grows into a more capable leader and surrounds herself with competent advisors it's too late to actually accomplish anything besides prolong the war.

"Honey, you need some grief counseling. Well, you really need a jail cell, but also some grief counseling."

I'm going to take a shot in the dark and guess the G of T was somewhat inspired by Night Raid from Akame ga Kill?

[What does Tia do for a living]

She works on her dad's boat: they're commercial fishermen.