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Widow of the Red Path

Deathlord

Unlike many of her fellow Deathlords, the dead spirit now known as the Widow of the Red path remembers everything of her life in the first age, she remembers her exaltation and her great adventures as a chosen of the unconquered sun and she remembers her death at the hands of the Terrestrials in the usurpation. And what she remembers consumes her with a dark rage that would cover the gods themselves if unleashed.

But for now the widows waits and plans for the moment when she will strike and all of creation will tremble and fall.

Background

The girl who would one day become the Widow of the Red Path was born into a lesser noble house in some city to the east, now long lost to time. Her father, although a lesser nobleman had gained some fame from his skills as a healer and was well liked by both rich and poor.

At the time, peace reigned in the region with men like the girl's father holding great respect, even among the more unruly segments of the local population. The father saw the expansion of the city, building better roads and sewage systems as the key to the city’s future and felt that as a nobleman, it was his duty to help and guide those less fortunate or entitled. Several local crime boss and residents brigand commanders opposed the nobleman’s initiatives, fearing that better living conditions would weaken their hold over the poorer and more desperate parts of the city’s population. Even some of the Father’s fellow noblemen opposed his designs, feeling that the lower classes should stay poor and in squalor. And so the father and his adversaries would fight on for years and even decades.

As the girl grew older, she grew to worship her father and the principles he embodies and came to detest and even hate those that would oppose his noble cause, lashing out against those of the nobility that didn’t see things like she and her father did and act with great arrogance toward those, less fortunate that didn’t show proper gratitude for her father’s work on their behalf. At times she would even suggest acting more directly against those that opposed the great work, but her father would always caution her back on a more peaceful path.

One time after such a discussion, her father expanded on that advice by telling her a singularly adversarial nobleman had been won over and would meet with the father and his family at the city’s best tea house. Going there with only a few servants as a sign of good will, the father never saw the trap spring, when assassins, most of them the very poor the father had tried to help, descended on the father, his wife and servants and butchered them. Whatever good deeds the father had promised to perform, the crimes bosses, brigand leaders and a few of the noblemen promise of gold and rank now proved stronger.

The girl stood there and watched as the blades broke through her father’s body, spattering her with his blood and for a heartbeat she tried to scream, before a red rage overcame her and she threw herself toward her assailants, howling at them at the top of her voice.

And then time stopped.

And the roof fell away and the girl was bathed in the searing rays of the burning sun. A voice like a thousand storms exploded in her mind, speaking a language where each word was like staring into the sun itself. And the voice made her a promise and an offer. And she accepted.

Time began flowing again and the assassins began moving with it, closing in on the last survivor, an easy mark, an orphaned daughter driven mad by her loss.

And then the first assailant exploded in a fountain of blood. And then another one and another one. And as the assassins died, none of them saw the girl move. They did however see the burning shadow that began expanding from her like, the wings of a dark gold bird of prey, shining like the sun.

Not one of the assassins survived. And the hours that followed every one of the conspirators, boss, brigand and nobleman died equal horrible deaths. And when morning broke all of the city knew it had a new ruler, a crow queen with the power of a god and a taste for bloodied justice.

Exaltation and years as a dark protector

From that day on, the girl would rule the town and countryside around it, patrolling it tirelessly from the shadows and striking down with furious anger on any who would violate her code of conduct. Although they feared her and worshipped her like some goddess of the dark, the townsfolk never the less prospered, as their town became known as a safe haven in the wild east, drawing settlers and traders from all across the direction, swelling the rural town's size to that of a city in the course of a few years. And as the city grew with new quarters being added outside the old town's walls, the girl would

At first she balked at the idea of working with others, but soon saw the wisdom in having agents and henchmen across the city and the districts around it, acting as her eyes and ears, making her privy to all the went on from the bedrooms of the mightiest trader to the street corner of the lowest thief.

Crimson Mountain Poet and the Righteous Lords

One day, as the Crow Princess rested after a night of hunting evil doers, she heard cries in the street outside her hidden lair. Grabbing her weapons and armor and concealing herself with a charm of secrecy and deception, she slipped through one of several hidden doors and skipped unseen across the roofs of the city toward where the cries had come from, the city's western gate. Throwing herself through the air with the might of the sun, she landed soundlessly and invisible to the mortals around her and gazed beyond the city walls.

At first, it seemed like a trick of the eye, red dots dancing in the heat daze of the noonday, but a quick charm of unerring vision, quickly showed the Crow Princess the red specks for what they really were: crimson war banners, all bearing the sign of a red mountain. Drawing back from the essence fuelled vision, the crow princess began to hear the first murmurs of fear as the citizens began to grasp what she already knew: that an immense army was descending upon the city.

And at the head of that army rode four figures, whose immense power the crow princess needed no essence fueled vision to detect. Each clad in a magnificent banner of the sun’s power, each a banner proclaiming their nature and purpose. One was a regal man with dusk colored skin like those of the southerners, clad in beautiful robes of lushest green, around him a golden vision of great towers, bristling with fortification and banners of the sun blowing in the wind. One was a broad figure, his face hidden by a hood, the reddish skin on his hand betraying his heritage in the east One was a tall regal woman clad in golden armor, a warrior general surrounded by a luminous host of armor clad warriors chanting the sun’s praise, thrusting their weapons to the sky. And finally came the one that rode in front, a single strong looking man, with his head shaved bald and carrying no armor, no weapons. And yet all eyes were drawn to him for the peaceful look on his face and the raw power he radiated, appearing as a single red mountain surrounding him on all sides, dimming out even the spectacle of his three companion’s banners.

Power Achieved

For decades, the lords ruled their lands

The Beginning of the End

The Crow queen saw it before anyone else and although for years, she refused to acknowledge it, eventually she had to face the fact that all of her companions, her fellow Lords were going slowly but irrevocably insane.

The crow queen never tried to reason with her fallen companions. Years of discussing how to rule or guide mortal men had taught her where her fellows stood; the the chosen of the sun stood above all others and that theirs was the duty and the right to rule and punish the mortals as they saw fit. So she withdrew into the darkness and began planning. First of, with the lords spending less and less time on actually ruling and protecting their realm, she needed something that would protect their mortal charges, not realizing that her own growing madness would turn that protection into a reign of terror, all for the good of the mortals themselves of course.

So she began to study ancient tomes and soon found

The second part of her plan dealt with her companions. Though she loathed what she had to do, the crow queen knew that her companions would have to be checked and eventually stopped, should they slip too far into madness. So for each, she designed a trap, a scenario tailored to counter their power and prey on their weaknesses. For the Emerald Builder, she created a scenario where most of the populace of one of his client cities would attempt a mass exodus while and outside force, mercenary fae hired by the crow queen would attack, causing untold chaos. At first the Emerald Build thought only to keep the fae out, something he had adequate power to do. But when the citizen

(Notes: m

The Fall (Falling into the Underworld) On the eve of the usurpation, massive forces descended on the temple

Darkness falls As she lay on the dark rock of the underworld, her form broken and mangled, the great rage that had driven her all these years finally welled up into her and she screamed and roared into the suffocating darkness of the dead lands, trying futilely to raise her broken form from the ground, her mangled legs ignoring her commands.

After what seemed an eternity of futile attempts to move and wrath born blasphemies, she regained some of her senses, and with that she felt something watching her. She could not see anything and all attempts to call up the essence fueled abilities of her long past merely wracked her body with pain, but she felt something in the dark, something monstrously big slowly descending upon her, like had the unseen ceiling of the vast cavern come alive and now moved closer to her, as if to inspect her closer. As the giant entity came closer to her, she began to make out shapes in the dark above, faint faces and bodies swimming in and out of the black

They would pay for this, they would bow to her and her vision of order. No longer would petty rebels do as they please. She would return, break all that was down and build a new world order. And with that, a sense of dark purpose rushed into her very soul, like a dark river

Across the underworld

Building a secret empire

Name: Widow of the Red Path

Concept: Revenge crazed widow, terrorist mastermind, mistress of assassins, assassin of Nations

Motivation: To destroy all civilizations of creations and beyond from within

Strength 1, Dexterity 1, Stamina 1, Charisma 1, Manipulation 1, Appearance 1 Perception 1, Intelligence, Wits

Dusk Archery 0,Martial Arts 0, Melee 0, Thrown 0, War 0

Midnight Integrity 0, Performance 0, Presence 0, Resistance 0, Survival 0

Daybreak Craft 0, Investigation 0, Lore 0, Medicine 0, Occult 0

Day Athletics 0, Awareness 0, Dodge 0, Larceny 0, Stealth 0

Moonshadow Bureaucracy 0, Linguistics 0, Ride 0, Sail 0, Eclipse 0, Socialize 0

Appearance

The Widow of the Red Path appears as a tall regal woman, gaunt to the point of being skeletal. Her pale skin appears drawn tight across her skull, making her appear more as a walking skeleton. Most of her body remains covered in a beautiful midnight black robe, tied with a wide blood red Obi scarf. The blackness of her attire is only broken by what appears to be drops of blood but actually are tiny red pearls

When the Widow moves she does so with a deliberate slowness as one would expect from an old woman, but soon onlookers will detect an odd swaying motion in her gait. This is from her ghostly form remembers how her most of her body was crushed in the final days of the usurpation.

To the untrained eye however, the Widow of the Red can appear to be a small elderly woman, perpetually hunched over by age, with pale parchment skin and small deep set eyes. Her White hair is drawn back from her face and tied into a ball, held by several black pins. In stark contrast to her pale skin and white hair is her night black robe, tied with a wide obi scarf. Across the black robe is spread what appears to be tiny red pearls, shaped like running drops of blood.

Court of the Red Path

Dust and Bones of Seven Monkeys is the widow’s primary sorcerer and weapons manufacturer, a bestial Daybreak caste savant combining bestial behavior and appearance with an uncanny knack for making dangerous devices and deadly tools for the widow and her followers. Dust and Bones fights using Hungry Ghost Style constantly gibbering and jumping around like some strange and terrifying monkey demon.

Prince of Poison (Hidden Beast, Master of the murder pagoda) the Widow’s primary agent, a large heavy set Moonshadow caste exalted, appearing much like one of the nomadic traders that cross the mountains around the secret kingdom.The prince, a large and powerful man uses Hungry Ghost Style becoming almost feral when fighting, moving much faster and agile than most opponents would think a man of his size could.

General In Shadows , a Day Caste Abyssal was once an “adviser” for several rebel armies, plaguing nations around the realm, with the express purpose to create unrest, thereby destabilizing nations that might threaten a weak realm. Betrayed, he was left dying behind enemy lines, where the Widow took him and made him the general of her hidden forces. A large man with a mutilated body, his white bone mask hides a face partially devoured by carrion eaters while he lay dying. The General uses Ivory Horde Style with great efficiency.