IanPrice/CharacterTimeline

Character: Furiko. Nature: Thrillseeker. Description: At 4'5", she's short even for a female. Even more pronounced is the fine tan-orange fur with black stripes covering her entire body, with catlike ears, eyes, nose, mouth, claws, and tail. She has human head-hair as well, black with red-orange streaks in front, which is just long enough for her bangs to almost get in her eyes. Her breasts are often covered with a black leather bustier, well padded and tightly buckled, with a matching black leather skirt going down not quite to her knees, split in the middle for ease of movement. She doesn't wear anything else, seeing no need for reasons of decency or comfort. After all, she likes to show off her body, and if you look up her skirt and like it, she may be able to be with you. In situations of intense combat, however, she wears a white-gold suit of Articulated Plate, crafted finely to the contours of her fine body. Her pair of personalized silver wings are crafted simply and elegantly, with the title "swordwaltzer" engraved on each blade.

History: Sold into slavery when she was very young, Furiko never knew her parents well. She has only known the harsh realities of slavery, including sexual slavery since age 8. Most recently, she became part of an auction lot when her former owner went bankrupt, and was bought as a prank gift for the commander of the 7th Legion's Swordwaltzer unit. He was too courteous to give her up, but too honorable to use her in the expected way. Instead, he trained her as an apprentice, since she already had extremely keen senses and memory. She took to the teaching like her first taste of candy, and is now utterly devoted to her teacher. She is still officially his slave, but now it is a willing slavery. The enchanted swords and armor she bears were recent gifts from her master, signifying that she is ready, in his eyes, to learn the techniques of a Swordwaltzer.

1. Session 1.
   1. Commander Flamewhisper of Division 14 puts together a number of special, expendable, field teams. These are formed of eclectic members for eclectic jobs. Unofficial and relatively deniable, our job is to do things that need doing without worrying about approval beforehand. We are team #1, consisting of: Sai (Full Moon Lunar exalt, formerly a realm scholar who fled in disgrace, now leads a barbarian tribe in addition to consulting with the Legion), Kadessa (another Lunar, Changing Moon, parents were merchants ruined by the Guild, so she seeks revenge on them - working with the Legion is a convenient means to this end), Seriyan (God-blood, rich brat, well connected in the Legion due to parentage, along to save our hides... so he says), Gabriel (Solar, Night caste, formerly a fifth son of the V'neef household, fled to the legion as the only safe place he could think of after his disastrous exaltation. Parents died due to a plot framing them as traitors for supposedly helping him escape), and myself, little Furiko the Swordwaltzer. Also with our team is The Relentless Seeker, an Adamant-Caste Alchemical Exalted. He says he's here seeking the Well of All Souls. We have no idea what he means, but he seems willing to help us until he finds it.
   2. Mission briefing: the Guild has been stepping up their acquisition of slaves and hiring a lot of mercenaries. Our job, as a special ops unit, is to find out why.
   3. Cat-napping and martial arts training.
2. Session 2.
   1. Trip to Nexus delayed by pointless bureaucratic paperwork.
   2. Arrival in Nexus... but any actual doing of anything delayed by futile attempts at obfuscation of the true purpose of our mission.
   3. After managing to get a list of mercs recently hired by the Guild, some of them attacked us. Perhaps finally the pointless obfuscation will stop!
3. Session 3.
   1. Went with the rich half-caste to threaten the mercs who attacked us. I don't think they took the hint.
   2. Bored because the others are failing to gather enough information to move along with the real mission.
   3. Took matters into my own hands and seduced the contact nobody else would approach.
4. Session 4.
   1. Learned of a huge new market for artifacts. As in, actual magical artifacts of power had suddenly become common enough to buy and sell with money.
   2. Attended a HUGE Guild auction for said artifacts.
   3. Purchased several new toys, including a Starmetal Warstrider. This, along with other artifacts connected with it, apparently come from a factory called Bastion.
5. Session 5.
   1. Ambushed by immaculate martial artists and their goons after the auction. Wiped the floor with them.
   2. Reported home with our spoils. Received commendations and a couple of weeks off.
   3. Spent the time training with master.
6. Session 6.
   1. Strange message received by the Legion. Apparently the Haslanti League asked for assistance and wouldn't say why.
   2. Shipped out to nearest Haslanti city. Nobody there can tell us anything. Bureaucracy density is already appalling.
   3. Relocated to Icehome. Bureaucracy stifling. Hitting people proves an effective motivation. Official word is released to us that the request was not officially approved by the people who should have approved it.
   4. A committee is formed to investigate the source of the orders. Joy. We move on to greener pastures.
7. Session 7.
   1. Apparently "greener pastures" means "Wangler's Nob." Well, technically, first there's a journey along the river. At one of our stops, fair folk disguised as river boat men accost us. A bellows and iron filings prove to be very effective weapons in the hands of our least combat-capable team member.
   2. Arrival at the Nob is speeded by our newly-acquired riverboat, since its previous owners weren't real but it apparently is.
   3. Purpose at the Nob: discover why there are a shit-ton of Dragon-Blooded and Guild caravans headed this way. Discovery: this is another source of the artifact-glut. However, this is not Bastion. The Nob is the jump-off point for a great many of the expeditions which have returned with First Age artifacts recently.
   4. Several people in the team get a strong feeling we should be heading in a certain direction.
   5. One of our hired crew for the river boat is found dead with a note in his mouth. Note reads, "Servant of the Dark," in Rivertongue - sure to be understandable to all of us. Basic forensics show the body to have been dead for longer than is possible, given the last time we saw this man alive.
   6. Oh yeah, and I got drunk off my mind because the piss they serve here is more wood alcohol than grain.
8. Session 8.
   1. Our trek into the wilderness begins. By the by, I'm not one of the ones feeling this "pull," because I don't use Essence at all (not more than the natural way it exists that is; no channeling of it). So I'm not too keen on this journey.
   2. We decide to shell out the coin for the best guide in town, who makes sure we get the right supplies for the trek we'll have to make through an arctic wasteland once we leave the forest.
   3. Companionship with our guide leads to the revelation that it's not our imaginations, there's nobody over the age of 50 among the natives of Wangler's Nob. This is due to a deal with a Wendigo spirit; it gets to eat those over 50, but it protects those younger than 50 with all its power. Good crops, good weather, and good fortune (up to and including the destruction or otherwise averting of rampaging barbarians) all come with the deal. We agree not to interfere, though we also learn that the infamous Sesus Lahore (haha, lay-whore) has gathered the various Dragon-Blooded tourists at the Nob into a warlike hunting party, and will be hunting the Wendigo.
   4. The edge of the forest does indeed lead to an utterly barren arctic waste. Very abruptly. The influence of the Wendigo is rather obvious. Again I voice my dissent against this course of action, and am ignored in due course.
9. Session 9.
   1. The trek through the ice is briefly interrupted by yeti and then by demon bears. We kill no yeti (they run at the first sign of resistance) but all the demon bears.
   2. The demon bears appear to be the spawn of some very servile 2nd-circle demons.
10. Session 10.
    1. The demons say, in a jumble of Old Realm, Low Realm, and High Realm, that they were summoned by the Builders for labor long ago, and are waiting to be released back to Malfeas.
    2. They feed us horrible meat fromt the bears. We think they may be honestly trying to please us in a pathetic demon way.
    3. We are shown to a valley with a hidden manse in it, carved to look like a natural stone formation until you're close enough to be shot dead from the defensive locations.
    4. A cursory inspecion shows us a very impressive interior, if low on magical materials compared to your typical manse.
    5. The artifacts we recently acquired at the auction show symbols similar to ones in this manse, and one of the Solars depicted in frescoes looks like a female version of the Solar in our team.
    6. Various pillars in the central room of the Manse activate a variety of artifacts built into its design.
    7. The Hearthstone is missing.
    8. This Manse seems to be damaged. I fear explosions. Many accoutrements are damaged, as well as an arrow slit/window being rent to many times its original size.
11. Session 11.
    1. Some things activated seem to be automated servants. They serve us GOOD food.
    2. Something is being unpleasant at us from within mirrors. It can make them look damaged and do phantom lethal damage to us. It seems related to the female version of Gabriel. Grisly scenes were showed to us of her in some of the mirrors.
    3. A partially-destroyed library reveals much information, but not all of what we need. The basics of Terrestrial Sorcery are contained in some of the texts I am able to memorize.
    4. A partially-finished automaton attacks me, causing phantom damage and damaging my special orichalcum-alloy armor. You go to the trouble of getting something enchanted just right so that it's 10B/10L articulated plate with 8 hardness and no mobility or fatigue penalties, counts as orichalcum but can be used without attunement, and bam... this is not a good sign about this place. Also, a gem made of Adamant, a strange Magical Material from Autocthonia, appears to have been the mirror involved in this incident.
    5. The automated servants have disappeared and strange porcelain masks have taken their places.
12. Session 12
    1. The guardians of this Manse attacked us. We fought back. This place is messed up.
13. Later Sessions
    1. We established control of the Hidden Manse, then took a year off to pursue training and personal projects.
    2. The demons on our front yard posed a problem, so we decided to go seek out a Solar Circle one of our number met during our year off.
    3. Realizing that none of us has any money, we end up using the rock-weaving loom in the Manse to create beautiful rugs to sell so that we can pay our way.
    4. After flying to the South, we meet the Circle who helped one of our number before.
    5. Their Dawn is entering a great camel race; one of our Lunars offers him the gift of riding "his special racing camel," actually himself, for the race.
    6. The camel race turns out to be "by any means necessary," so the rest of us end up fighting off mercenaries hired by other members of the race.
    7. Things go poorly when a detachment of Wyld Hunt appears in the path of the third day of the race.
    8. We manage to avoid scrutiny and leave after the race, but then more Wyld Hunt checkpoints face us between the race location and Gem.
    9. Some checkpoints prove no problem, but when faced with a Fang of Immaculate Dragon Armor troops, we drop all pretenses and fight for our lives. (best fight scene of the whole game)
    10. Upon arriving in Gem, we discover that several of the airships that have been plying the trade route we came in on have been destroyed by an unknown force. We suspect the Dawn prince's rival clan, who we discover are led by a Lunar who was exiled from the Silver Pact.
    11. Other concerns are set aside as we find out that an undead invasion force (Deathlord unknown, but a Deathknight seems to be leading them) is headed for Gem. We dig in to fight, and call in all the favors we can.
    12. Chronicle culminates with the successful defense of Gem by an unprecedented cooperation between Lookshy's Skywolf airship, a Realm Legion led by Cynis Denovah Avaku and a Shikari of the Wyld Hunt, the local forces of Gem, and several Solars and Lunars.

Scorecard

Enemies faced: 25
Enemies defeated: 25
Non-Extra enemies faced: 2
Non-Extra enemies defeated: 2
Bar-fights decided by me: 1
Drinking contests won: 3
Strip-club performances: 18
Dangerous Mass-Murderers Seduced: 1
Free Allies dots obtained: 3
Unbreakable Artifacts Damaged: 1
Invisible Manses Discovered (and 0wned): 1
Terrestrial Circle Sorcery Spells Learned by Rote: 5
Solar tombs found: 12
Empty tombs for inexplicable reasons: 2
Solar tombs with broken Jade daiklaves and extra skeletons: 1
God-Blooded servants acquired: 3
Dragon-Blooded "advisors" (servants) acquired: 2