forum An Ancient Kingdom Dies (Small group, 2/2 ⎮ Mature, 15+)

Started May 12, 2023 by @lord-of-the-carnival group

tune

Name: Renier Isia Verlice
Age: 26
Ethnicity: Jewish, Latin-American (if this took place in a real setting, since obviously America does not exist here), Polish

Race: Halfhuman, half saltwater Saremar (SAH-re-mar)

Saremar are, in the most simple description, aquatic people. They have gills on their necks, over the area of the ribs, or both (in Renier's case, just the neck) as well as lungs. They can use both, but depending on how human they are, they may be better suited for either water or land (land in this circumstance). Since Renier is only half Saremar, these traits are dulled and he is more humanoid.

Gender: Male. I refer to him with he/him, but this is not always clear.
Sexuality: Bi

Appearance-
Hair Color & Length: Dark brown, but appears black. Just slightly below the chin, a little long and layered. Looks wavy when exposed to saltwater.
Eye Color: Black
Height: 5'5"
Weight: 130 lbs
Skin Color: Cool-toned brown, lighter on the underarms
Body Type: Does not look particularly feminine or masculine in structure, with shoulders that are slightly small. Not necessarily thin or skinny, but generally a smaller person. Unsure of how to describe hips but they are there.
Facial Structure: Sort of long and angular, but soft on the chin. His eyes are purposely kept half-lidded.
Markings (i.e. scars, tattoos, etc.): Being a halfhuman, there are marks around the ribs where gills would have been if Renier were fully Saremar. Has a long scar on the calf from falling off of a sharp rock.

Personality-
Basic Traits: Acts in a confident and boisterous manner. Flighty, making him somewhat unreliable. Wily. Despite this, though, he does have good intentions, and if he wasn't already, grows warm over time. Usually outgoing and (usually) polite. Talkative, though slightly eccentric.
Biases: Distrustful of anyone directly related with or to the law or military.
Flaws: Again, flighty, overconfident, and at times uncooperative. The eccentricity is sometimes off-putting, because he often says exactly what is on his mind. Sometimes pushes people out of their comfort zones without asking. Lets people get under his skin and has a short temper.

Hobbies: Will sometimes whittle wood if he has a dagger on him. Tends to collect or steal small things when bored, and will mess with, polish, or inspect these items in his downtime. If he has access to an instrument of any kind, he will try to learn it, but is best with percussion and is hoping to learn some kind of bard magic.
Strengths: Cunning and wily, something of an escape artist. Has a keen sense of hearing and smell. Can draw, divert or avoid attention if he needs to. Outgoing.
Weaknesses: Overconfident and uncautious. Restlessness quickly becomes recklessness. Holds hard grudges. Stubborn and petty. Quickly loses his temper.
Fears: Commitment, (strong) magic, being seen as lesser or weak
Hopes: Hopes to be able to learn music-related magic at some point. More than that, he wants to see the world start anew, but doesn't vocalize either of these desires because he doesn't to sound boyish or naïve.

Power(s)-
Basic Outline: Amphibious (can utilize gills in freshwater and saltwater, for about one hour before coming up for oxygen), Transformation (can adopt a semiaquatic form in saltwater for about an hour straight), Tempo (While playing a percussion instrument or improvised instrument, Renier can increase the energy of others around him)

Drawbacks: Transformation (The rubbery skin will burn away and damage the human skin, taking on the effect of a first-degree burn) Tempo (The energy given to others is taken from Renier's own)

Inherent Limitations: Amphibious (This only lasts for about an hour before oxygen becomes necessary) Transformation (Also only lasts for an hour and requires focus to use) Tempo (Can't be performed- at least not well- if Renier is already very fatigued. Doesn't work with non-percussion applications)

(Sorry for the wait ahh also here is some art of renier cuz I'm not good at explaining things https://ibb.co/jgXpsgN
https://ibb.co/dPDFkrt
If I need to change anything I will!)

Name: Nimue Morwenna Zephyrine
Nicknames/Titles (Optional): Nimu ⎮ Admiral Nimue of the Bellepharen Navy; Naval Chief of Operations Nimue (CNO Nimue)
Age: 27
Ethnicity: In IRL terms, she looks Phoenician/Carthaginian with some aspects of Greek, Italian and Scandinavian blood.
Race: Quarter Nereid, the rest is actually grey elf
Gender: Female
Sexuality: Bisexual

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Appearance-
Hair Color & Length: Changes to match the weather; i.e. stormy weather, she'd have some shade of grey hair, while in clear weather she'd have hair that looked perfectly bleached of color, leaving it as clear as a spring
Eye Color: Her eyes actually change to reflect the color and depth of the water she's near or in, so if the water is very clear and deep her eyes will look midnight blue. This also applies to when she's overtop a large underground reservoir of water, such as an aquifer, or an underground river.
Height: 5'6 3/12"
Weight: 209.32 lbs
Skin Color: A deep, leathery brown color from all her time on the open sea
Body Type: Her body is made up of more water than the average person's, giving her a slightly rounder figure than average; her chest is about average, as is her ass, and she's covered with scars and whatnot.
Facial Structure: Round, short chin, low cheekbones and a strong jawline.
Markings (i.e. scars, tattoos, etc.): She's covered in scars from fishing lines, cutlasses, knives and even from fish that managed to put up a struggle before they got gutted.
Face Claim (Optional): N/A
Voice Claim (Optional): N/A

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Personality-
Basic Traits: She's a very pragmatic thinker, but don't let that fool you - she has a vengeant streak a mile long and an even longer list of reasons to add to it. She's an expert at getting the room to listen, and an even better commander on the water. When she makes a promise, she keeps it. And her threats are always promises. Despite being so pragmatic, she's also a very creative thinker, meaning if logic doesn't get her through something? Well, she always has the side of chaos to back her up. Due to the ammount of time she spent near or at sea - even as a child - she has less than optimal patience with those who dance around with words or who can't read her very well (she's very open with her emotions, as a matter of fact, so you'd have to be very ignorant to not see what she's feeling). Think Lawful Neutral with a slight tendency towards good and an ocassional lean towards chaotic.
Biases: Working on a ship, she's learned to get over biases.
Political Lean (Optional): She's closely tied to Bellephar, the nation to the west of Emarusia, seeing as she has full command of all naval matters regarding their military.
Motivations (Optional): She knows her history as a descendant of a servant of one of the old gods of Emarusia and wants to learn more about her past, and along the way she wants to see if she can bring back what Emarusia once was.
Flaws: She can be very harsh towards people at times, due to her distance from most people for more than half the year at sea (besides her crew). This tends to give her a very gruff and annoyed seeming attitude towards people when in reality she's forgotten how to talk to anyone normally.
Hobbies: Fishing, sailing, drinking, gambling, cartography.
Talents: Fishing, sailing, cooking, gambling, fighting, wayfinding
Strengths: Deep water (well, water in general), and she's actually a pretty good smooth talker despite her innate dislike of people who dance with words, so if nothing else she can talk her way out of a fine. She's also good at intimidation, if nothing else. She's amazing with daggers and certain types of polearms like spears and tridents, and is also decent with swords of any type. She knows when a storm is coming just by the way the air feels as well, even on land.
Weaknesses: Since she's so used to the open water, her land senses are slightly skewed, so she has trouble discerning what is what. Also, she absolutely hates fire, as it will actually deal more damage to her than it would anyone else.
Fears: She fears that she'll never reach her own goals for herself and constantly strives to be better and better. This is what's lead her to where she is right now in life, actually, but it might also be what causes her downfall.
Hopes: She hopes to learn the truth about her family and her family's history, and hopes she can finally put her forefathers to rest.

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Power(s)- Riptide, Rehydration, Invigorate, Stormcall, Form of the Ocean Goddess, Fisher's Luck, Armaments of the Ocean Goddess, Sailor's Instinct, Oceanspeak

Basic Outline: Riptide gives her some control over the currents around her.
Drawbacks: Large currents take a lot of energy to control, meaning if they're caught in a large tidal vortex (a.k.a. a whirlpool) it would nearly kill her to slow it so the crew can get the ship clear of the influence of its pull. Smaller currents require less energy, but it will still quickly exhaust her to control them.
Inherent Limitations: She can't control any more than two or three small currents at once, or one big current. This is usually enough, but there are times where it nearly wasn't. She hasn't run into a time where it wasn't.

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Basic Outline: Invigorate gives her a certain ammount of strength and/or stamina whenever she touches water.
Drawbacks: It works best with saltwater.
Inherent Limitations: She can't replenish more strength/stamina than the least powerful member of whatever crew/team she's on.

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Basic Outline: Rehydration works much the same way as Invigorate, but with hunger/thirst.
Drawbacks: It works best with saltwater.
Inherent Limitations: She can't make herself completely full or hydrated as long as everyone else on her team is hungry or slightly dehydrated.

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Basic Outline: Stormcall does what it sounds like it does - it calls a storm.
Drawbacks: It works best on the open ocean, where moisture and wind are unobstructed by anything, though she can produce tamed versions of storms on land.
Inherent Limitations: If the conditions aren't already there for the storm to happen, such as migh moisture in the atmosphere and/or clouds, she can't call a storm. It also relies on her endurance, so it doesn't work when she's asleep or anything.

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Basic Outline: Form of the Ocean Goddess is a special power from her descent from the ocean goddess' nereids. It allows her to take the divine form of the ocean goddess, though for a heavy price. It gives her enhanced control over currents and even allows her to manipulate the water itself, calling down waves of todal wrath upon her target and giving her enhanced control over storms as well.
Drawbacks: Due to the nature of the energy her body is conducting when using this power, and the fact that she is only mortal, it will literally slowly kill her if she stays in the form for longer than 1 minute due to oversaturation of water in the cell walls of her body and the extreme ammounts of divine energy she's trying to control. Even staying in this form for thirty seconds raises her chances of getting skin cancer considerably, since the divine energy comes out as heavy UV light mostly. (This power is one of the reasons why her skin is so dark, actually. She's used this power once in her entire life before, and she stayed in the form for 2 minutes 2.3 seconds.) This power may also have a mind of its own, meaning it could potentially come out and do whatever it wants, though this is just speculation on her part.
Inherent Limitations: She can't stay in this form any longer than 3 minutes. Because she dies at that point. Also, she can only use the power once every 5 years.

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Basic Outline: Fisher's Luck is a passive skill that simply increases the ammount of fish in a net.
Drawbacks: It can only multiply smaller fish. Anything larger than a Bellepharen Conger (which can get up to lengths of 9 feet and 209 lbs, mind you) and this passive doesn't work.
Inherent Limitations: To restate what was said in the drawbacks: anything longer than 9 feet or that weighs more than 200 lbs won't be multiplied.

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Basic Outline: Armaments of the Ocean Goddess gives her a dagger and a trident; the dagger she keeps summoned at all times, while she only summons the trident in truly dangerous situations.
Drawbacks: The dagger poses no drawbacks besides a slight desire for more water intake. It has no real power on its own and serves as a focus for powers such as Stormcall or Form of the Ocean Goddess. The trident, however. . . well, that's a different story. It relies on its weilder's physical and mental strength to be weilded. Nimue only barely meets its base requirements and she can only call out about 3% of its total power (though that's more than she'll ever need). The trident enhances the output of powers such as Stormcall or Form of the Ocean Goddess, and allows for more versatility in each. When used in conjunction with Form of the Ocean Goddess, strange things happen to the world around her. To this day, she has yet to use the trident while using Form of the Ocean Goddess, though maybe something in Emarusia might force her to. . .
Inherent Limitations: She can't summon the trident unless she's fully hydrated as it uses whatever water is in her body to manifest. The only reason why she keeps the dagger constantly summoned is so she can call minor demonstrations of power to keep new members of her crew in line. The dagger only requires a minor increase in water intake.

Dagger-

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Basic Outline: Sailor's Instinct is another passive ability that she was born with, giving her advanced knowledge of sailing and sea maneuvering. It also allows her to innately know how fast her ship is going and gives her an overall view of if she needs to make repairs or not.
Drawbacks: If it's a ship she doesn't know, this power's influence will either lessen or won't work at all until she learns the basics of the ship.
Inherent Limitations: If it's a ship she doesn't know, this power's influence will either lessen or won't work at all until she learns the basics of the ship.

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Basic Outline: Oceanspeak allows her to communicate with ocean creatures, or creatures that favor the ocean as their habitat.
Drawbacks: It's a passive ability, meaning she lower the volume of the noise, but she can't turn it off. When she was younger this caused lots of issues, since she would be constantly found whispering to animals.
Inherent Limitations: The smaller the creature is, the more difficulty she has actually communicating, meaning small creatures such as shrimp can only give her basic info. She tends to gravitate towards bass and tuna for this very reason, since they're abundant near her home of Bellephar. However, the more intelligent the creature, the more difficulty she has determing which thoughts are hers and which ones are the creatures, so she needs to be careful, since the ocean spirits like to play pranks upon those like Nimue.

The ocean air near the docks was a delight to Nimue's skin, and smelled much better than whatever foul stench was coming from where she was.

And where would that be?

The capital of Tÿr, Irnhal. Quite possibly the foulest city in the entire kingdom, the looks of it alone were enough to keep even the most hardened of adventurers away. The thick smog that hung over the city obscured light with a hunger, so that what little light was visible was wan and a slightly sickly green color.

Not only that, but there were stories. Stories of the Mad King Halik, who was once one of the world's brightest and most dangerous scientists, back when he was only interested in learning in his homeland of Feh'xe, all the way in the south.

They say he was revenant possessed, or possibly demon possessed, but both scenarios were highly contested by everyone, so it was mainly conjecture.

Nimue knew of both the smell and the looks of the city, and of the Mad King.

But never did she think things would be this bad, as she watched cartloads of bodies get dumped into the harbor every few minutes, each one claimed by the poisons of existance that come with inhabiting the fetid pit that was Irnhal.

She grabs her mask and tosses it on, her clothes - each of which she'd had custom made by a master seamstress and reinforced by both a blacksmith and a mage - protecting her from weather and sickness alike, keeping her form obscured while allowing some ammount of breathability.

She strides towards one of the bars at the edge of the city, confidently - albeit a bit wobbly.

Looking at it - the bar - the sign would be weathered by the rain and wind that came off of the sea, and the words barely visible as "the Grey Hound's Rest."

She pushes past the doors and makes her way to the counter, her aura that of a person who was unused to anything more than a handful of people and the ocean, and whatever resided there. The usual hubbub that crowded her head was dull and distant, and she was greatful for it. She didn't think she could handle the voices of the sea creatures slowly being poisoned in the harbor's water.

"Gallician white rum." she orders. Her voice was rough and craggy, like a series of spiked ocean rocks near the base of a cliff. She looks around, her eyes devoid of most color besides a slight brownish blue color, reflecting the distant ocean. She knew once she was further into the city, her eyes would be basically purely white and her hair, which was already pretty dark, would only grow darker.

She looks around, and, to her surprise, recognizes a creature, though it wasn't quite what she was used to.

It appeared to be a Saremar, but with less of the race's defining features. She decides to wait until it either a) smelled the ocean's stench coming off of her or b) noticed her scrutinization.

The bartender slams the mug of rum on the bar and Nimue pulls down her mask, reaching a calloused and dark hand out for it and taking a large quaff of the rough, bitter liquid inside, the leathery skin of her face and neck now visible and clearly as weathered as her hands.

For the past few hours, Renier had been in the Grey Hound's Rest, hiding. The air outside is putrid and leaves a burning feeling in his gills, which he keeps concealed in cloth as protection. It doesn't work as well as intended, but it's better than exposing himself to the smog and getting sick. Renier hopes to get out of Irnhal at the first chance he gets- but, it being the capital, is well-guarded and armed. Just walking in front of a patrol would guarantee his arrest.

Instead, Verlice lingers in the bar, his inhibition slipping slowly. The Saremar is not by any means a lightweight, but alcohol is among the only clean thing to put down the throat. Alcohol poisoning is better than whatever is outside, and the bar is better than prison.

It was as Renier watched the sun sink that he felt himself watched. He glances around, looking over the area; the place is a melting pot, to say the least. There are not many men or women of the sea. A few elves, and what Renier believes to be… a human? Strange.
But there is a familiar, salty smell that most landfolk do not possess. It was as if pure water had walked through the door, he thought.

The pale-eyed woman is a few vacant seats over. Renier looks right back at her, nails clicking against his shotglass. A small smile creeps across his face as he turns to the stranger, legs crossed with his chin rested on his wrist. He glanced at her daggers- and, for a moment, considered how he might get his hands on them. But he shakes the thought from his mind, then speaks up, clearing his throat.

"Evening," Renier says to the Nereid, hoping to gain her attention. After all, it's been days since he's spoken to another human- or non-human, for that matter.

Nimue looks over and chuckles.

"No need fer pleas'ntries. Jus' no'iced yeh look a li'le off fer a normal human. Saremar, righ'?" she inquires, taking another swig of her rum. "I qui' like your kind. Efficien' sailors, the lo' o' ye. Good swimmers, too."

She turns to face the man fully and crosses her legs, pulling off her tricorn cap and revealing her close buzzed hair, as well as her pointed ears.

"Name's Nimue. Nimue Morwenna Zephyrine. From Bellephar." she introduces herself, holding her hand our for the man across from her to shake.