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Cynis Belar Ara'mia

Background

Ara'mia is the personification of everything bad about the Dragon-Blooded and the Realm in general. She is vain, arrogant, overbearing, more than a little megalomaniacal, promiscuous, violent, vindictive, narcissistic, and cares not one jot for anyone other than herself. To make her even more loveable, she is totally convinced that one day she will become Empress (because Hesiesh told her so in a dream when she was five!), uniting all of Creation under her divine and glorious rule; all will worship her and cower in awe of her majestic presence! She acts, much of the time, as if this 'prophecy' has already come to pass.

Ara is the only Exalted daughter among 11 siblings of a very prominent line. She is the youngest, and born long after most of her relatives; some of her childhood playmates were her grandnieces and grandnephews. Miamar and Seba, her parents, regarded her birth as nothing short of a miracle; as a result, Ara was spoiled rotten throughout her entire childhood, and it only got worse after she Exalted at a very young age. Her parents' miracle, however, was tainted; by the age of 11 Ara was already responsible for the deaths of two siblings and several of their descendants due to 'accidents.'

Ara was a tyrannical child who virtually ruled her home. Her mother, whose health was never good after bearing her at the advanced age of 246, eventually died when Ara was 9. Her father treated her like a virtual deity afterwards, a perfect little angel who could do no wrong. Ara had shown skill with martial arts, and so he used his not-insubstantial monetary holdings to secure her a position at the Cloister of Wisdom.

Bad. Idea.

Ara'mia did not take well to the lifestyle of the monks, the pre-eminence of the Immaculate Faith (which she regards as hogwash, except the parts about Dragon-Blooded being better than everyone else), nor the discipline to which she had never been exposed. As a result, she was dismissed in her second year at the Cloister. Thanks to her father's connections, her official record reads that she was dismissed "without reason"; rumors fly about what it was she actually did to be thrown out, and range from "She seduced the entire population of monks!" to "She burned down half the library!" The following year, her father, by flexing his bank accounts, managed to gain Ara'mia entry to the House of Bells, figuring that she would do better there than at the Cloister.

Nope.

As at the Cloister, Ara did not adjust well to discipline (are we seeing a pattern emerge here?) and was thoroughly insubordinate to everybody who dared to think themselves better than her. Her father's connections with the faculty and longstanding contributions to his alma mater are all that enabled her to withdraw "for medical reasons" after a near-psychotic reaction to military discipline which resulted in the deaths of no less than 7 servants, one of the younger security personell who tried to stop her rampage, and the gutting of several barracks by an Ara-powered inferno.

At his wits end, financially crippled, and in failing health due to stress from having to clean up after his beloved little angel Ara'mia, Seba finally called in one of his last favors, gaining her entry to the Resplendant Southern Bonfire School of Martial Arts, a minor secondary academy run by one of his old comrades, Cathak R'lawa. R'lawa took Ara on as his own student and began to teach her the Crimson Pentacle Blade style. Unlike at the Cloister or the House of Bells, Ara did not snap under discipline; R'lawa's methods are the only ones that have ever worked on Ara'mia. He let her do whatever she wanted, and also made sure that he got laid regularly, mostly by himself. While there was a certain amount of collateral damage resulting from this laissez faire approach, R'lawa found that it was minimal compared to the fantastic progress Ara made in CBP style martial arts. She quickly became one of the school's finest students, enthralled with the movements and acrobatics of the Southern Scythe Style.

When Seba finally died, he went happily, knowing that his daughter had found her true calling. To her, he left most of what remained of his treasury, which was heavily depleted from 24 years of cleaning up Ara's rather spectacular messes. He also left her his heirloom scythe, Rotschreck, a powerful and old artifact weapon that engendered absolute terror in those who faced it on the battlefield. Ara, never much one for downers like funerals, took the money and ran with it, debauching herself on a hedonistic orgy of truly epic proportions. In the midst of this, however, she truly crossed the line; she even pissed off her own Family, the Cynis, which speaks to the truly gargantuan proportions of her debauch. Ara herself isn't quite sure what it was that got everyone so mad at her, as she was up on about 3 barrels of ale and probably at least three different psychoactives at the time, but she seems to recall mentioning Mnemon's "nice rack" and slapping her ass in public....or was it the orgy in the Immaculate Temple..?

In any event, Ara'mia's associates (those few who weren't massively inebriated, anyway) realized what was afoot and deicided to get her the hell out of the Realm until things cooled down for her. That's how she ended up on a boat to a filthy rathole of a tributary kingdom in the Threshold where they probably don't even speak LOW Realm, let alone HIGH Realm....*sigh* Life is hard...

(and this is where the game starts!)

In The Game

First Session

Ara arrives on a boat with Sesus Chenow Wing (who is 6'2", sexeh, and the new General of the 23rd Imperial Legion). Ara is not assigned to the Legion; in fact, Ara is not even in the Imperial Military. She only vaguely remembers getting on the boat, and regrets her inebriated state at the time, because she has no sea legs to speak of. This is why, when the gangplank is finally extended, she barrels down it, shoving sailors out of the way, and probably overboard as well.

The other Dragon-Blooded stationed with the Legion (all two of them, since the ones who could swing the influence to get reassigned to somewhere OTHER than the asshole of Creation are long gone) come to greet their new General, and Ara just kind of tags along. What, you expect her to hang around mortals, let alone these provincial hicks? So Wing goes to meet the ministers of the local puppet government, and one of them has the audacity to sit while there are Dragon-Blooded standing! Ara decides to teach him manners by seizing him by the hair and dragging him out of the chair. Wing tells her to stop. Insert witty banter. Ara finally lets go of the Minister of Backwater Hick Provinces.

Oh, did I mention that this society is heavily, heavily patriarchal? Most of them have never seen a woman's face uncovered, and Ara is considerably less, erm, modest than the local women.

Well, it turns out that the Legion has been parceled out to the fringes of the kingdom for the last 10 years by dragons, so Our Glorious General decides (in typical laid-back fashion) to ride out and collect them. No horses. Ara is forced to walk. Ara hates the Threshold. What makes her hate this place even more is that they don't know what liquor is, apparantly.

Thankfully, Ara laters meets the Colonel in charge of the 6th Dragon, who gives her bourbon. She loves him.

Ara, being drunk and having a knack for making an ass of herself, is sent by Wing to investigate a wretched hive of scum and villany along with the two DBs who were left behind. Ara agrees, since she's drunk and is happy, and because she kind of has a crush on Wing. So they walk and they walk and they walk and they walk and finally come to the wretched hive of scum and villany, where Ara has to set a very rude guard on fire before she is welcomed intot he court of the guy who runs the place, who is very tall and good looking and stuff. With him is a very pale woman wearing a veil.

[OOCly I know that Good-Looking Man is a Solar and that the Goth Wonder is Keeper of Unspoken Promises, a character from a previous game with my group. ICly, however, Ara could care less, because they give her absynthe.]

Anyway, long story short, Ara gets seduced and then mindfucked by Keeper. She wakes up in the morning with a hell of a hangover and the urge to kill something, however she does not consider this odd because Ara wakes up most mornings with a hangover and an urge to kill something.

Second Session

Oh lord, where to begin. Well, Ara convinces the other two DBs (whose names I still can't remember, grah) to go out drinking with her. Yes, in the morning. I know. Anyway, they find a bar, and Ara demands the strongest stuff they've got, as she is wont to do. The old lady bartender, who is about 40, makes a snide remark about Ara being a lightweight. Ara socks her as hard as she can.

(At this point, I feel obliged to mention that when the ST said "40", I didn't think he meant "70-80", which is apparantly what he meant. This is why, when Ara socks the woman, her neck snaps like a twig.)

Okay, so the old woman is dead. Ara could give a shit, honestly. Damn uppity mortals. But now there's about 20 mercenaries who really loved that old woman who want to kill Ara. Ara says "Flame on!" Insert butchery here. Insert exploding bar here. Insert Good-Looking Man from last time coming in and kicking Ara's ass. Fucking Solar Melee Parry tree. Ara did hit him once, though! Three health levels! Woo!

Well, skipping the part that Ara isn't involved in, we finally see her again when they dump her out of the gates of the wretched hive of scum and villany, after the Legion has taken up siege positions around it. Ara is taken to the infirmary and bandaged up. People completely miss her being concious for a while after she wakes up because she's essentially catatonic. She's never been beaten in a fight before. Certainly never gotten her ass pwnt like that. (Yes, pwnt. It's a very technical and specific term.) Now, once this gets figured out, everyone is like "Finally, maybe now that bitch will shut the fuck up." The Colonel of the 6th Legion (or Scarface, as I like to call him) shows up with bourbon; Ara refuses.

Okay, now we know something is seriously wrong with the girl.

Wing eventually comes in, because she wants to take the wretched hive of scum and villany and burn it to the ground, but she's only got 3 dragons, one of which is a complete joke, so she kind of needs Ara's ability to shred people wholesale. Ara is uninterested...at least until Wing (whom I'm sure you recall Ara has a bit of a crush on) starts saying things like "I need you." Wing, like Ara, is a Fire-aspect. Social and Combat Monster all in one! So of course, she rolls a ridiculous number of successes on the Socialize roll. Hey, guess what Wing? Ara is madly and passionately in love with you now. :D

So with the newly revitalized Ara, the Legion attacks, smashing down the gates and firing the city. Ara herself probably guts at least 75 people before the Solars show up; Mr Dawn from before and a Twilight caste sorceress who likes to fly. So let slip the dogs of war; Ara contributes massively to the Legion not dying horribly by leaping up, catching the Twilight's gut with the point of Rotschreck, and flinging her to the ground. Owie. Of course, then the Dawn takes up position right over her, with his damn persistent defenses running, so Wing and Ara set to smashy-smashy him. After about two turns of getting knocked clean through buildings (and yet, somehow surviving), Ara decides she needs to get fancy on this bastard. She climbs a nearby building, leaps off, feints at the Solar (thus activating his parry), lands on the flat of his daiklave, grabs and locks his arm, and swings Rotschreck around, burying it in his chest. Not lethal, but it took off about half his health levels. Of course, this was far, far too much luck for me (the player), so as Ara was dismounting the Dusk caste Abyssal who was supposed to monitor the situation flung her daiklave across town, burying it in Ara's side. And lo, there was heard a mass utterance of "wtf, mates? ^^;" Ara would have been toast had not Wing rolled obscenely well (we're talking like 18 post-parry successes here, I shit you not) and bisected the Dawn.

At this point, Lament of Unwilling Compromise (my Abyssal :D :D ) got fed up with the whole farce, walked over, and soul-flayed the not-quite-dead-yet Twilight, dragging her off to give to his Deathlord. This is like the third time he's done this. He's like a Solar-capturing machine, this guy.

Stats

To just give you an idea of what you're dealing with here...

STR 3 DEX 5 STA 3 CHA 2 MAN 4 APR 5 PER 3 INT 2 WIT 4

Most Relevant Skills: Martial Arts 5 (Crimson Pentacle Blade style), Athletics 4, Socialize 5, Dodge 4, Presence 3, blah blah blah

Charms: Graceful Tortise, Speardancer Concentration, CPB Form, Northern Lotus Petal, Sprinting Stag Defense, Loquacious Courtier, Flicking Candle Defense.

Weapons:

• Rotschreck: Opponents must make a Valor check to attack her. Can go Elsewhere. (Artifact 5)
  • Dice Pools with Rotschreck
    • To hit: 11 (14 with CPB active)
    • Damage: STR + 12 Lethal
    • Defense: 11 (14 with CPB active)