Sz/AlternateSignatureCharacters

A Circle of Solars

Here's my shot at a challenge. This Circle is a Circle of revolutionaries and terrorists.

His-Eyes-Are-Forest-Fire, also called Iri, once known as Ienka Sowun, the Thrice-Annointed Hunter of the Soaring Sunfire

Background

Some kids are useless. Simply useless. Iri was a proof. Unlike his six brothers and sisters, Iri was a troublemaker and a delinquent. Since young, he was quick to swing his fists at others. Iri's father punished him, but after a while, he seemed to make a sport out of enduring his father's ordeals. Because he liked to fight so much, Iri was made to tend the sheep. Surely, he was good at fighting off the wolves and other predators, but it seemed that the safety of the family livelihood was not of the primary concern. In the end, his father gave up. He accepted that he had sired a delinquent and ceased to expect anything from this little hellion.

Now that his father's attention was elsewhere, Sowun was finally free to chase his dreams. Somehow, the first thing he chose was the bow. With the bow in hand, Sowun roamed the woods and hunted beasts. Archery came to him naturally... The bow, to this delinquent, was like the voice to a poet and the vision to a hero. It was a part of him, and through the arrow his will was expressed. Finally, Sowun has found himself. He had no more reason to rebel.

At first, he began with game animals. Soon he sought for vicious predators and ferocious beasts. Oftentimes his throat and his stomach would burst with blood, but Sowun was young and healthy. His passion for the hunt and the competition fueled his body, and by simply dreaming about the ecstacy of conquest, he would feel as if he had recovered from a fatal wound over a night's sleep. But soon enough, even the most exotic and the most deadly of the forest's creatured offered Iri no more of his only joy. If he couldn't find a worthy prey to stalk, he would have burst and die.

Exaltation

The kid's obsessession and ambition was pure. It was of the most delectable kind to the Fair Folk who valued courage and conflict. Many enjoyed his fiery passion as some of the more strange preys he sought to hunt. But, on one moonless night, a Fae decided that Sowun needed a truly worthy challenge--none of these mindless beasts will satiate his thirst now. With his Gossamer bow, Gossamer robe and Gossamer mask, the scourge entered Iri's hunting ground and stalked him in his sleep.

The Raksha and the hunter traded blows--close blows, that could have easily killed one another. To them, each slash and each shot were like the sound of a lover's name and his caress. The way the blades and the arrows moved, it was a lustful dance of two lovers to a primal beat, much like the beating of excited hearts. The maddening need to kill one another was overwhelming, like the ecstacy in the embrace of your love. Through the entire night, the couple loved for one another.

It was perhaps the most invigorating feeling he has seen in a Creation-born. He wished it would last forever, but the sun was rising, and he knew that, as love must end, their duel must come to an end. Sowun recognized the sudden increase in his hunter's aggression. For the first time in his life, he has truly feared for his death--and the joy of surviving it eclipsed the most sensual pleasures he has experienced. The arrows of the Raksha hunter became more and more wicked and the Solar's arrows matched his, each tip charged with burning Essence. As the first ray of the morning sun pierced through the forest, Iri's arrow pierced through the Fae's dream-robe and dream-heart.

Thus, that morning, Iri was thrice-annointed; with the call of the bow and the arrow, with the fire of the soaring sun, and with the blood of his only lover.

Personality

Iri is haughty, gallant and fearless in the utmost. He is neither afraid to laugh and to drown the others with the loudness of his laughter, regardless of the context or his position. If anyone's got a problem with him laughing when he wants to, they will have to silence him by slitting his throat--and he knows that that's just impossible, so he laughs.

His self-given nickname, Iri, refers to the noble wolf in the language spoken by his family and his tribe. It is possible that he chose this simply because this sounds cool--he was only 15 years old when he Exalted, after all. Perhaps, his personality could be said to be wolfish by some. When asked to verify this supposition, Iri would laugh a laughter loud enough to kill a man and wake a corpse. "That is a hilarious thing to hear," he would roar, "Because--Hah! How dare you compare me to a prey animal like a wolf? Child, I am no wolf. I am the champion of the Unconquered Sun himself."

When Iri loses control of himself, he suffers an irrational desire to cause suffering, either to his hunted prey or to his subjects. He realizes that this complicates things, but he simply can't control it. So he is learning to enjoy these fits of cruelty.

Appearance

Many people are disappointed by the sight of His-Eyes-Are-Forest-Fire. The popular imagination is that he is a hellish Anathema, half-goat and half-man, with a bow made of a forest god's bones and sinews. Sadly, he is none of these things (he might resemble the entities described in dispositions and tastes, however.)

Iri still looks to be 15 years old. As tall as a tall boy and as large as a large boy, his stature isn't exactly impressive. However, his relatively small frame is muscle trained and inured to the point of resembling an ancient oak. His body is tightly bound in strength and dexterity. His skin is of dark brown complexion, a hue between the hue of wet earth and dry bark. His hair is dull white-gray, with silvery tints here and there. Though he wouldn't say it, this is the color the blood that annointed him on the morning of his Exaltation. Iri keeps hair chest-length hair tightly bound with a string of brilliant white, which was once the string of his lover's Gossamer bow. To a mortal man, his eyes are perhaps the only unsettling sight. In the ires, shining red flame dances against his jade green eyes.

When Iri hunts, he covers his legs and lower torso with a folded Gossamer robe. He doesn't much care to protect his upper body, since nobody can even touch him anyways.

Current Status

Iri considers himself a big game hunter. Others consider him a disaster. When he is not conspiring with his Circlemates and helping them out, Iri spends his time in the forests, seeking a suitable prey to hunt. Ever since he murdered his lover, this hunter of the Dawn Caste could not quite enjoy hunting mundane creatures. He needed something more. He needed to fill this void their one-night affair created. So far, he has stalked many elementals and demons, making his name known to the elemental courts and the Yozi cults.

Motivation

Ultimately, he wishes to hunt all of the war gods in the Celestial Bureaucracy with his bow and arrows. He has realized that they may out of his league. For now, hunting a Dragon-Blooded of each Aspects and stuffing their bodies to be his trophy will satisfy his greed for glory. When that is over, he'll look for something more demanding, perhaps... a Lunar? Iri is aware that Lunars are tough, but he doesn't know how tough. He will have to find that out himself.

Desert Azalea, Favored Harlot of the Great Forks, the Shadow-Shattering Eye of the Sun at the Highest

Motivation

Azalea plots to kill every Terrestrials on the Blessed Isle. Her wrath is like the wrath of a desert sun. She will not cease until the Blessed Isle becomes nothing but an isle of sand.

Isaya, Destroyer of Sickness and Healer of Hopelessness, the Sunset which Sets Darkness Aflame

Background

Isaya's mother was an ambitious woman. Nobody lived to explain to Isaya why, but she was ruthless in her methods to acquire what she wanted--political power, thaumaturgical secrets, shameful secrets, and so on. Her career ground to a halt when the ghost of one of her many rivals, whom she often had assassinated, inflicted her with an inauspicious child and a foul disease. She tried all that she could to kill of the growing fetus--beverage brewed from sickly flowers, powders prepared from a dead animal, infusion of alien essence, and oh, so cruelly on. However, no matter the toxicity and spite, the child wouldn't die. For a half-dead baby, it had an extraordinary attachment to life. Finally, when the water broke, the mother chose death over shame. The child crawled out of her mother's cooling and stiffening body. Isaya lived.

The girl was taken in by her extended family, but now without her mother's political protection, they had to flee their hometown. In the wintry coldness of the north they wandered, from town to town, seeking a place where Isaya didn't have to inherit her mother's legacy. They found such a place, just far enough they would not be threatened with murder and violence, just far enough they were reduced to poverty. Though at first they fled for the sake of this newborn child, now Isaya's family despised her, for she was the closest thing to her witch of a mother.

Perhaps because of her deathly birth, many around her often fell ill and suffered sick health. Soon enough, the patients of Isaya's birth accused her of their misfortune. Her family protected her, but only in gesture--they were the one who suffered Isaya the most. This upbringing secluded her from the outside world, spending most of her youth inside her room. She could not quite understand why she was born with so much evil inside her. She had to find out. She became an avid reader of truths regarding death, sickness and health. Being a child, Isaya could not understand much of what she read. Eventually, her curioisity overcame her shame and fear and urged Isaya to talk to the village medicine man to explain the arts and science of death and life.

He was a wise and learned man. He soon recognized Isaya's sickly heritage, something which was kept a secret out of fear, and instead of fearing her, he pitied her. Zakeo gave this little girl more than what she asked and decided to take her in as his disciple. No matter how enlightened as a mortal he may become, Zakeo thought, he will not understand death any more than someone who it merely by living on. Surely, this girl is not a death-tainted child. Rather, she is a force of life that has fought her way out of death. With the basis of her inherent understanding of death, Isaya built for herself a sophisticated approach to medicine, to surgery and to well-being with the old medicine man's guidance. Zakeo taught her everything he could, and she learned--and so much more! He was glad that his unusual disciple has usurped him in his own practice, and with peace and contentment, he died. His last words to Isaya was that a good doctor should not merely cure sickness and fix broken bones, but also heal despair and remove ignorance.

On the night of her teacher's funeral, Isaya performed an esoteric ritual for the safety and wellness of Zakeo's soul, something nobody has taught her but knew from her own Essence. Others witnessed this ritual, fueled by Isaya's deathly knowledge and veneration for her savior. Despite the foul display, however, they did not fear her. They were instead of filled with respect and prayed for the dead medicine man's safety and wellness as well.

Exaltation

Isaya went on to prove herself as one of the finest healers the north has seen in decades. She recognized every diseases she set her eyes on and she cured every one of them. Somehow, even when she seemed not to recognize a sickness from the countless books she read, she ended up curing it anyways. Isaya's skills perplexed witnesses and patients--but unlike in the past, she was not condemned as a living affliction but as a gift from the gods. Soon, her name spread throughout the direction. Patients of all kinds came to her, and with uncanny precision, they all returned healthy and glad. Certain learned individuals or those with divine heritage recognized her true nature, that of a Ghost-Blooded, but none dared to admit it. She was a damn fine healer and she didn't call high prices.

The news of Isaya's rise to fame ultimately reached the ears of her dead parent. He captured the wandering lost soul of Isaya's mother, tortured her for a decade and cast her rent corpus into the Oblivion, but he was still not satisfied. Not only is his child not pursuing the goals of his Deathlord, she was in fact working against the clutch of death on Creation. So, he appeared to Isaya. With his dead magics she reminded her child of their heritage and identity. But Isaya persisted and rebelled. When her parent's necrotic Essence touched her body, it burned her living body and bloated the force of death inside her, but she prevailed, if only for the promise she swore to Zakeo. After a while, it seemed that the ghostly father has given up on Isaya. She grew sick and weak during the ordeal, but Isaya returned to her duties without a rest. In the time she could use to heal herself, she could heal countless more.

Because of the fatigue and the half-dead nature, it took months for Isaya to return to her normal condition. Her deathly complexion grew stronger over time and the number of patients she saw decreased. While this gave her time to think things over and continue her studies, it also gave her doubt as to a Ghost-Blooded person such as herself could possibly heal the living and contribute to Creation. By merely existing, she becomes a bridge between Creation and the Underworld. If her continued survival means sickness and ill health in others, then is there a point in healing them? If this is true, then perhaps, as the father says, she should embrace her death and depart this innocent world? Her doubts were answered when her father returned to her, with a black, steel sword that moaned with the voice of Zakeo.

When he impaled her stomach with the sword--when Zakeo screamed in mindless misery and helplessness--Isaya finally understood her mentor's last words. To truly heal someone, just healing one's body is meaningless. To heal someone means to restore wholesomeness and contentment, for sickness and foulness stems from flawed soul and mind. Therefore, a good doctor should not merely cure sickness and fix broken bones, but also heal hate and remove wickedness. Upon internalizing this principle, the Unconquered Sun's insight shined upon her. Despite her inauspicious bloodline Creation has found her worthy, and the Unconqured Sun gave Isaya the tools necessary become the good doctor Creation so desperately needs.

The moment of Isaya's Second Breath was so bright, it seemed as if the world has caught a wildfire that consumed and devoured darkness. Unable to bare the brilliance of his daughter, the spectre banished to the depths of the Underworld... and Isaya only hoped to help him.

Personality

Perhaps from her training or from her heritage, Isaya is capable of always maintaining a calm demeanor, no matter the travesity or atrocity laid in front of her. Instead of letting her instincts control her, Isaya allows her refined intellect to guide her actions. But this is not to say she is emotionless--she is anything but! This Twilight doctor's blood and heart burn with the fire of setting sun. Her fiery passion directs her to achieving her ultimate desire and her icy intellect guides her path toward her dreams.

Isaya does not talk much. When she does, she is very concise and succinct, making sure that none of her words are said in vanity or misinformation. Yet, when matters personally close to her are brought up, she is prone to lose her cool and speak in unusual quantity and volume. She may do so in either anger or glee, and sometimes both.

In conversation, when someone shows a sign of poor or maligned understanding of something--which is plenty in almost anyone compared to her--she immediately adopts a condescending tone and attempts to lecture the ignorant of the truth, often with poor regard to the context and the situation. Many people protested this behavior of hers, but Isaya always fails to understand why anyone would protest. She was just trying to help others out, after all. Is philanthropy so misunderstood? Should she bear the burden of further protest and inform them of the benefits of her disposition toward ignorance?

Despite her deep insight and forceful motives, sometimes she cannot help everyone. When Isaya witnesses meaningless suffering and pain inflicted on an innocent, she feels a... rage, or perhaps insanity... something older and more powerful than her very own soul... Most of the times Isaya is capable of protecting herself from acting on such an irrational urge, but... When she gives in, the only way she can communicate is through violence and vengeance. To some, it seems as if her ghostly nature flares and controls her, demanding Isaya that she inflict further death and destruction to those who deserve them.

Appearance

When the Unconquered Sun embraced Isaya's body, she was offered a chance to burn away her ghostly blood and restore her pure. With a conscious choice, Isaya refused. Had she not been born to an inausipiscious bloodline, she wouldn't have learned the things she had. She adopted her ghostly appearance as something to be proud of, and finding her decision proud and wise, the Unconquered Sun instead glorified her dark blemishes. Her skin is pale white, but not it is not the white of the bone or the white of cold marble. Instead, it is the white of the daylight and the white of compassion--and her eyes are brilliant red, but it is not the rest of the blood or the red of battlefield. Instead, it is the red of the cleaning fire and the red of sympathy. Isaya's silken waist-length hair is obsidian black, but from the chest down, her hair adopts a hue similar to the vermilion of a sunset, burning its way into the darkness of death and ignorance.

Isaya stands as tall as a robust man, though her frame is decidedly more fragile. Although she's not unpleasantly skinny, Isaya is definitely skinnier than pleasantly slender. The Twilight is aware of this, and would like to do something about it. Mortal or Exalted, everyone wishes to look beautiful, do they not? However, Isaya has realized that she cannot gain any more weight than she could as a Ghost-Blooded mortal. She is willing to lend her knowledge and understanding to those who can cure her of this ailment. Until then, she'll have to conceal her unseemly figure with flowing blue-white robes.

Current Status

So far, Isaya depended on her insight to practice medicine. Since Exaltation, her Charms. However, she recently realized that her methods of medicine is difficult for mortal doctors to learn and adopt. Her attention is currently on the study of mortal medical arts, especially with the focus of herbalism and surgery. When her first medical treatise is complete, the well-being of Creation will increase manifold, Isaya believes. But for now, she will have to study a mortal's understanding first, so she may know what is redundant and what is too abstract for them.

Motivation

In long term, Isaya wishes to destroy death wholesale. She is not sure how she'll approach this. On one hand, she could pursue the education of the masses, teaching them to heal themselves. On the other hand, now that she has the powers of a Lawgiver, challenging the concept of death may not be too nonsensical. Her affair with her dead father has taught her a lot about the Deathlords and the Neverborn and their vile agenda. If they are to be vanquished from existence, then perhaps achieving the former goal will be much easier?

In short term, she has three goals, one of which is being currently worked on. One another is finding her dead father and help him free himself from the graps of the Deathlords and reach Lethe. The last of her short term goals is to release Zakeo's soul from the Soulsteel sword she was stabbed with. The last one may be in vain, however. What she has learned about the properties of Soulsteel so far suggests that Zakeo's soul may never be consolidated. But, surely, that's just a poor understanding of the material. With the right knowledge and the right process, his poor soul could be freed, right? So Isaya still considers Zakeo's freedom one of her goals.

Hantan, who is the Eye of the Blind, the Voice of the Mute and the Might of the Weak, the Promised Inevitable Sunrise

Personality

Mosu maintains a nonchalant demeanor. He approaches all matters with a bit of humor, even the things that he claims infuriate him more than anything. This is because of his unconquerable conviction in the inherent goodness of the world. He sincerely believes that everything is going to be all right in the end. Therefore, the mission behind his crusade against all injustices of Creation is not to bring about a better world, but merely to reach it with the least suffering possible. This provided him a leeway with his earlier failures. Sure, he might have indirectly caused a few village to be systematically slaughtered, but they'll return to life one day, right? He only has to help them have a better life next time and then everything will be all right.

This inviolable optimism helped Mosu quickly acquaint with the people around him, but in turn, it also prevented him from forming any kind of deep friendship. He says that he cares for them, but one must admit that it is rather difficult to find any seriousness in his words. This, on top of his vagabond nature, has resulted in his Circle becoming the only constant companion in Mosu's life.

He is dangerously selfless. When questioned about this, he would say that his Exaltation has taken away his ability to derive pleasure from earthly things--but that is just a lie. He still enjoys fine delicacies of Creation as much as he once did (perhaps even more, thanks to his supernaturally heightened senses), and there is little more than fine wine he appreciates. However, perhaps because he enjoys them so much, he is compelled to share them with others. He follows by the mnemonic he memorized in childhood, which went something like "Joy shared is not joy divided, but joy multiplied."

And sometimes Mosu finds the fact that others do not share his opinion utterly jarring. Usually, his pleasant demeanor shields him from residing on such thoughts, but from time to time, it gets to him to such a degree he feels simply insane. From time to time, he lets this temporary insanity get the better of him. Whenever this happens, he resolves to get rid of greed and gluttony from this world, as it is apparent that they are the root of all evil.

What he is afraid of most is that, one day, he will direct the contempt to himself.

Current Status

A traveling judge for hire. The only currency he accepts is justice.

Motivation

Punish the evildoers! More precisely, punish those who exploit the weak and purify governments and organizations so the weak does not taken advantage of.

Amber Horizon, Uncharted Waters' Daughter and Labyrinthine Forests' Beloved, the Choirmaster of the Glittering Infinite Sky

Current Status

Scavenger Lord Extraordinnaire. She would like to travel the world more than loot it, but travel requires resource and information. For now, she will need to focus on gathering the appropriate materials and knowledge, so the future expeditions to the lost part of Creation will be of little trouble.

Motivation

Amber is the least ambitious of her Circle. Currently, she dreams of mapping the entirety of Creation to the tiniest of the details. To do so, she will need to see the entirety of Creation herself. Upon visiting Malfeas, she has thought about shifting her attention from Creation to the incomprehensible Demon City. She decided not to, though. Amber is much more realistic compared to her Circlemates.