Han'ya/Jard

Jard Skulltaker

Concept: Jungle Fighter
Motivation: Thwart the desires of the Carnelian King
Zenith Caste

Fluff

Jard Skulltaker was once the captain of a small but elite mercenary company famed for its skill and more so for its savagery. They were fighting a war that they thought was like any other, but it was anything but. The entire conflict was being staged and manipulated by one of the Fae, a being of infinite cruelty known as the Carnelian King. He was cut off from his men and wandered from the battlefield in a daze, until he managed to shake off the mind-warping magics of the Carnelian King. He attempted to rush back to tell his men what had happened, but the King, sensing that the mortal was no longer his, dispatched four hobgoblins to destroy him and took to the battlefield wearing the captain's shape. Skulltaker took the hobgoblin's skulls and made his way across the battlefield only to watch the Carnelian King lead his men to annihilation against their opponents. Shrieking his fury, he dashed from the trees to do battle with the Fae lord. As he crested a hill and found the King standing in his true form knee-deep in his men's viscera, he was momentarily blinded by the sun. At that moment, he was raised up as one of the Zenith caste. All afire with golden light, he leaped to battle with the King.

The Fae left him broken and defeated on the ground, laughing as it vanished.

When he rose again, he walked through the green hell of the South-East jungle to reach the next string of cities, wherein he began to read and consult every savant he could find, any and all who had knowledge of the Fair Folk. Slowly, he gathered around himself a nexus of men who knew and hated the Fae. Gods and ghosts and men whose tribes and cities had fallen to the Carnelian King's armies found him and pledged him aid if he should need it. He shaped them into an army. Not a mercenary company, though they charged for their services in supplies and shelter. Rather a nation of the dispossessed and disenfranchised, those who knew the terror of being a side character in their own lives. And his nation was at war. Always at war, with the Fae wherever they appeared.

At last, he caught word of the Carnelian King, now acting again from a hidden fortress deep within the jungle, beyond the edges of Creation. His army moved as one, picking up its attachments and going further from the pole of stability that was the Imperial Mountain, distant beyond easy conception now. They recruited local guides as they went, which was how they encountered "Crocodile" Seph and Sorrow. Unprepared for the shock of finding others akin to him, the Skulltaker at first shunned their company, even after they proved crucial in the defeat of an army of Wyld mutants they encountered. Only in time did he come to grudgingly accept their presence.

What nobody suspects, from the scholars and shamans that he employs to his circle of companions (with the possible exception of Hyant Lazanir), is that neither he nor anyone around him has ever left the King's influence. Even his circlemates have fallen prey to it, becoming loyal followers and friends, submitting to his blazing charisma, only fortified by the subtle influence of the Carnelian King. As he hunts his quarry, his depth of character and complexity is worn away, until he becomes nothing more than a blazing flame of vengeance who will shatter the King's palace, slay his legions, and rip his inhumanly perfect skull of lapis lazuli out of his head and make of it a crown. This is, of course, all according to the King's plan. His legions and machinations within Creation are all part of a beauteous and staggeringly gargantuan composition of interwoven stories that he has orchestrated for the sole purpose of presenting the finished performance to his lover. Even the Carnelian King, though puissant and sublime beyond the dreams of mortal man, is but a Gateway piece on the board of the Unshaped who shaped him and sent him into the world. The Rise And Fall Of The Carnelian King is a poem to drive men mad, dedicated by one more-than-a-god to another, for the sake of love.

Were Jard to discover that his quest to thwart his enemy is truly hopeless and that he can do nothing but serve his enemy's purpose, by virtue of his Exalted nature as a hero and a force, his wrath would be terrible indeed, and he might do things best not done.