Separated from the Goddess and Summon Spirit Martel, the Yggdrasill sibling is once more alive. Though not entirely certain of the reason behind her revival, Martel hopes that it is to aid in quelling the rising animosity towards half-elves once again.
Heart pained by the familiar issue, she still determinedly stands for the equality of all races. This sometimes causes strained moments between her and Mithos. Though her love for her brother will never change, Martel acknowledges that he is not the boy she knew.
Having been conscious but unable to move while connected to the Great Seed, Martel partially blames herself for Mithos’ fall, considering she was not able to guide or comfort him through his life. Also, she is not happy with Kratos and Yuan for not following her last request to protect her brother.
Seeing this new life as a second chance, Martel has found her brother - similarly resurrected - and has pleaded with the Sage siblings in order to be of assistance to the cause. Both of them currently reside with their fellow half-elves.
[The blue haired man had spent the last four years rather peacefully, guarding the Great Tree with the Guardian Spirit, and keeping an eye on Lloyd for Kratos. It wasn't very eventful most of the time, but compared to the last four thousand some odd years, it was definitely an improvement. He was finally able to give a definitive goodbye to his fiance, and to the boy who had almost become his brother... It had hurt. The entire fight, and the conclusion, hurt beyond words. But Martel wasn't suffering anymore. Both of them were done suffering. That alone made it worth it.
That was what he believed. That was how he got by. The world was slowly heading towards what the Yggdrasill siblings had striven for. Slowly, but Lloyd and his group were working hard, and Yuan resigned himself to planned on seeing how far they'd come.]
[That was one of the reasons why the rumors of a half-elf extermination group stirred the ex-renegade leader into action. He couldn't let something like that threaten the world Martel had envisioned. So he had planned to set out with a small group of ex-renegades and find out what he could.
That plan, however, had been interrupted by an even more important, and shocking, mission. As the man was getting ready to leave, the Guardian spirit had approached him. According to her, the very people he had fought to kill were back.
Martel..... Mithos..
He had been charged with finding and watching over them. And while the man was skeptical, he had no reason not to trust the Guardian Spirit.]
[So Yuan's quest began. It didn't take him long to decide to set up a meeting point and headquarters of sorts in his base in the Triet desert. It was much less out of the way, and the situation wasn't dire, so the use of both bases wasn't necessary. He was sure he'd be able to get information about the 'Exterminators' rather quickly. His concern was finding the Yggdrasills.
But he had to start somewhere, so after sending some of his people to the base ahead of him to make sure everything was still operational, he went there himself.
And, of course, like the busy body he was, he was running around in a matter of minutes of arrival. Instructing the handful of people he had, confiding in the ones he trusted most to keep an eye out for Mithos or Martel, setting up communication points and divvying up locations.]
[He had been well at work for at least a couple of days when one of his half-elves approached him. Informing him of a girl who was at the gate for him, saying something about 'I saw activity around here, so I was wondering if Yuan was home!'
Already the man had a feeling he knew who the woman was, but he went to greet her regardless.]
[Yep. Colette.] "Chosen." [There was a small sigh. What in the world did the girl want at such a time?] "Is there something you need?'
After Lloyd and his group defeated Mithos and planted the seed for the great tree, Yuan officially dissolved the Renegades and resigned himself to guarding said tree with the guardian spirit. Though, of course, Yuan never gave up complete contact with those who worked beneath him. He often heard from them regarding things ranging from their own lives to the state of the world. Which was how he started hearing about what at first seemed to be random hate crimes against half-elves. But as rumors and gossip began to circulate, it started to seem more like these crimes were actually due to an organized group. A group that could threaten so much of what the world was working towards.
It didn't seem like a huge threat at the moment, but it was still disconcerting. So Yuan scraped together a small group from the half-elves that used to be known as the Renegades in order to gather information and hopefully put a stop to it before it grew too large.
However, before he himself could set out in search of concrete evidence that the group existed and information regarding it, the Guardian Spirit approached him with a request.
Well, needless to say, he was completely floored by said request. The Yggdrasill siblings had been revived and it was his job to watch over them. In which, of course, a ton of questioning occurred, but no real answers were given. Oh well. Yuan accepted the task, if only to see Martel again and keep an eye on the boy.
The only catch was: He had no idea where they were.
Without much of an inkling as to why (though there is most assuredly a reason), Mithos is alive and well again along with his beloved sister. His relief and elation upon being reunited with Martel was short-lived, however, as the siblings soon caught wind of the rumors surrounding the so-called “Exterminators”. Bitter and outraged that the world Lloyd killed him and wrecked his plans to build had only somehow become a worse place for half-elves, Mithos resolved to take care of the extremist group in whatever way necessary. He would not lose Martel again, and he would not allow his race to live in a place of fear any longer.
Managing to make contact with Kratos, who'd recently returned from Derris Kharlan after the solitude proved more trying than he'd expected, Mithos explained the situation as best he could with the information he had. The two formed an alliance of necessity, and Kratos agreed to infiltrate the extremist group under his old, familiar guise as a mercenary.
Once this was done, Mithos took Martel to the outskirts of Iselia with a plan to more or less leave her at the Sage siblings’ door with a request to offer her a safe place to stay. The seraph thought he would not be invited in along with her, but he was wrong.
For the time being, all four half elves live under the same roof; an awkward foursome, to be sure.
Hopefully one of the last updates before we begin:
Good afternoon, Halfbreed-Arc followers and participants!
Time to crack the whip, you guys! So far we've had a lot of paragraphs posted, and that's great, but we still need about seven of our players to crank theirs out!
If it makes you feel any better, I'm still finishing mine up right now. We're not going to boot you if you don't have it up relatively soon, but we'd really like to have almost all of them up before we make our first event post.
The characters we have listed who still need to write their paragraphs (word used loosely) are:
Aster
Black Rock Shooter
Martel
Mithos
Raven
Sheena
Gemini
I'll be tagging this post with your usernames just to light a bit of a fire under ya, but don't take it as the mods calling you out or trying to embarrass you. We really just want to finally get started! All sorts of interesting plans (including weapons, plot-points, and espionage, oh my) have been crafted and are still in the works, and it'd be a shame to never get around to using them.
Jump on those paragraphs, ladies and gents! And remember that it's never too late to recruit or to join as another character (so long as it doesn't exceed the two cannon character limit). Once the arc kicks off, we'll just be asking that newcomers have their paragraphs up within a week of joining.
Thanks for your time, everyone! Let's get this going!
An autobiography is not exactly my ideal idea of time well spent. But I suppose this wouldn’t hurt too much.
My name is Janette Flare. I’m 22 years of age. I deal in information. I was born and partially raised in the slums of Meltokio, my mother being an elf, and my father a human. We also lived with my partially elven Aunt and cousin.
I’ll start my story with my mother’s; which I managed to learn somewhere during my life:
Until her and my mother became teenagers, and started sneaking visits to each other without dear grandpa’s knowledge.
Somewhere down the line, Grandma found them. And from what I hear, it didn’t take long from there to find out the entire scandal. Which, in turn, led to a firestorm amongst the elves. And that caused Grandpa to blame his Mistress, effectively getting her and her half-elven child banned from Heimdall.
But my mom wouldn’t take it. Finding out that her best friend was actually her sister, and then the village trying to separate them. She chose to go with her sister.
Which is how an elf ended up in Meltokio. Most of what happened after that, however, I don’t know. The only thing my father told as a kid about how he met my mom went something along the lines of “It was a meeting on a starlit night fated by the Goddess Martel herself!”
I never heard the full story of what happened to my uncle, either. It’s hard to get information from the dead, and none among the living pay attention to those from the slums.
As for the slums. Living there wasn’t completely terrible. After all, there’s little discrimination in a community full of people all equally desperate for food and shelter. We managed not to starve. My Aunt couldn’t get work because of her race, but the other three adults managed for the five of us, and when I was about four my cousin, Kiohs, was born. His birth was an important time in my life, I was excited, ecstatic even. But in retrospect, at least from my blurred memory of the time, my cousin’s birth was the start of my family’s true pain.
I don’t remember how long my mom had been sick, but at some point, she stopped being able to work. And at some point, we had to choose between eating for a week, or finding a doctor who could treat elves. With the baby, my mom wouldn’t let us choose the latter.
It felt like we had to trade a life for a life.
I don’t remember my mom’s death. In fact, I barely remember my mom.
Memories of my father aren’t much stronger.
We tried for a few years without my mother, but with the eventual mysterious disappearance of my uncle it become rather difficult. My dad couldn’t see any other option than to find work somewhere else. So he told us he was setting off to work in Altimira. Though, to this day, I’m not sure if he ever even went there. I haven’t seen him since. And after eventually traveling to Altimira myself, I’ve not found anyone else who has either.
But this isn’t to say he abandoned us. He found a job somewhere, and sent money and letters when he could. After a while, we saved enough to move
One of the… Least intelligent choices the adults in my life ever made.
My mother had been the most knowledgeable of them, she knew about the world, she knew tons of history. And while she never got to teach me all she knew, it was her who instilled the love of knowledge in me at a young age. She loved learning, so I loved learning. I heard countless stories from my aunt about my mom going through great lengths to teach her, or learn herself. And while my aunt didn’t retain much she’d learned from her time around Heimdall, she made sure Kiohs and I had access to as many tools as we could to grow our minds.
But I digress.
We had enough money to move from one hell to an even worse one: Ozette.
I would rather not speak of the majority of our time there. Use your imaginations.
We lived there until my early teens. Until my cousin started trying to go to school regularly. That was the point the humans couldn’t put up with our partially elven family living in their midst. They set fire to our house as Kiohs and I were out. When we returned, our home in a blaze, it was as if the entire village was standing around, watching, throwing rocks at us, mocking us, telling us our ‘mom’ was still inside, and laughing.
We couldn’t even confirm it. We couldn’t get near the house. We ran around the village, screaming her name, searching for her. But we found nothing.
We had nothing.
No home. No food. No money. No family.
All I can remember of my thoughts was how dare they. How dare those humans destroy our life. Just because a little boy wanted to go to school, wanted to learn. I had gone to school, and had since we moved there. But I learned quickly that people there hated us. I stayed withdrawn. I made sure not to stand out. I made myself as invisible as I could, so I could learn and live in peace.
Kiohs, however, was much younger than me, and much more outgoing. He tried to make friends, he tried to stand out. And he did. It earned him the attention, and hatred, of the adults.
I’m sure our outward appearances played a part as well. I’m a half-elf, but I look almost human. The only thing that points me out is my hair color. Which I’ve learned is more acceptable than having pointed ears. Kiohs, however, looked more like an elf than my aunt did. So he was the most obvious target.
I still can’t forgive them. For taking away my aunt. My best friend’s mom. Our only remaining guardian.
We left a few days after we lost our house. Long enough to allow us to steal the supplies we’d need and get out without being chased.
We planned to go to Altimira, to find my dad. But as I already stated, even after surviving long enough to get there, we couldn’t find a trace of him.
We needed to learn how to survive. So that’s exactly what we did. But Ozette wasn’t the only place that discriminated against half-elves, and quickly the fact that I looked almost human became very useful. I learned how to dye my hair, at least temporarily, to more human-esque colors, and that allowed me to pick up little jobs. Working for rich lords, or churches, or for shops, or on the street, or travelling. We moved whenever things started getting bad for Kiohs, or when we couldn’t stay anymore. We heard, and saw, a lot. Kiohs especially. While I was working, he liked to pretend to spy on people. He was actually really good at it. Occasionally stumbling on very valuable information.
Once we found out how to apply the information he gathered, we realized how useful it was, and I quickly followed suit, gathering little bits of information from my jobs.
Some people will pay a lot of money to get their hands on little bits of information.
But we had to keep travelling, and learning. And we had to be extremely careful not to make any mistakes while continuing to learn about the world and the processes of it, the inner workings and the scum.
It was about two years before the reunion of the worlds where we made our first big mistake. Rather, it was quite a stupid mistake.
Kiohs got caught.
But not for spying. Not for selling information.
He got caught for stealing.
He got caught for stealing a relatively expensive sword from a Meltokio shop.
The law stated that the punishment for any half-elf caught committing a crime was automatically death.
I made it as the guards were dragging him away, kicking and screaming about how he didn’t do it, about how he paid! But they didn’t listen to him. They didn’t believe him. A half-elf? Having that much money? Ridiculous.
Walking onto the scene, after I had gotten out of my job, it took me a moment to realize what was happening. It took me a moment to realize that it was my family that they were carrying away.
My only family.
I called out to him. I chased after him.
But I wasn’t fast enough, another guard came to stop me.
All I could do was scream. Scream that I loved him. Scream that I’d come and save him. He was only fourteen!
They took him away and threatened that they’d do the same to me.
But even with the threats, as soon as I was released, I tried and tried to save him.
I failed.
Even though I promised him I’d save him. Even though I spent days trying to. I tried bribing, I tried blackmail, I tried infiltration, I almost tried fighting. But even so, I failed.
All I could do was watch him fight in the arena. Watch him beat down monsters until he couldn’t anymore.
During our travels we learned how to fight. We had to, with how much we were attacked. And through our information gathering, we learned about and acquired exspheres.
So Kiohs wasn’t going to lose easily.
He fought, and fought, and it took a few days for him to finally lose. As I watched, I could see his spirit dying. As I futilely fought for his freedom, my own hope withered.
When I saw him fall. When the monster jumped on him. When I heard his scream of agony. I couldn’t even cry. I could only watch. I could only stare as the humans around me cheered and applauded in joy.
He didn’t do it.
Kiohs didn’t steal the sword.
As I was about to leave the city, completely alone for the first time in my life, I heard the shop keeper brag. He was bragging about getting another half-elf off the streets, about how that was the third one he had lied about, about how he was doing a public favor because we shouldn’t be allowed to have weapons. ”Look how long he lasted in the arena! Imagine how much destruction he would have caused in the streets of Meltokio!” As if we attacked people on random. As if our existence was a menace.
I left and didn’t look back. One day that man will pay. One day I’ll kill him myself. But then wasn’t the time, unless I wanted to end up like my cousin.
But after that, I couldn’t put up with humans. I couldn’t handle them. I didn’t want to see them.
I’m not sure what spurred me on, but I tracked down the village of Heimdall; the village of the elves. I knew they hated half-elves too, and that they’d be able to tell I was one instantly, but where else was I to go? There was Exire, but it would have been even harder to get to than the elven village. So I went to the place my mother was raised.
They denied me on the spot. Half-elves were completely forbidden. But when they heard who my mother was, they let me through. They hadn’t heard from her since she left, and my grandparents were still very much alive.
So they took me in. If only to hear the fate of their daughter.
The surprising part was that they allowed me to stay for a few months. Allowed me to learn magic and things about the world my mother never got to teach me.
I can only imagine how loved my mom was. That the elves made an exception to their age old rule for her daughter.
I stayed there for half a year, learning, accepting the cold love of my grandparents. It’s where I found out about my mom and aunt. And where I learned the true story of Mithos the Hero.
Of course I had learned about the story of him and the great war, and the Goddess Martel, and we had even found out about the two worlds. But the elves were the ones who knew the full tale, and when I learned that his name was forbidden in the city, I worked to learn why.
A fallen hero. A half-elf. Betraying his pacts with the summon spirits, splitting the worlds, trying to revive his deceased sister. Deceased because humans killed her. Because during his journey for peace he was betrayed for his race.
I wanted to learn more. About Mithos. About the world. About how it all came to this. I didn’t have any particularly strong desires to change this world. What could be changed? But I wanted to know about it. So when I finally left Heimdall I went back to my trade, wandering the world, selling what I knew, searching for information and reasoning, with a focus on Mithos and his group.
Sometime after I turned twenty, the worlds were rejoined. And in time, I learned how it happened. A group of humans killed Mithos. Lloyd, Colette, and I heard even some of Mithos’ old companions helped; Kratos and Yuan. Mithos had desired to create a world without discrimination. I’m surprised he didn’t just desire to kill all of the humans. It was their fault. Their fault Martel got killed. Their fault Kiohs got killed.
I wish he would have succeeded. If he would have succeeded early on, maybe my fourteen year old cousin would have lived.
But it was too late now. All I could do was continue on the way I have been. and that’s exactly what I did for the two years following the reunification. Trying to avoid Lloyd and his companions. Continuing to hone my information gathering techniques.
Alexandra, having remained hidden for all the years she had, had caught wind of an extermination movement. It was to eradicate all the half-breeds from existence. Fearing for her life, she remained hidden until she started to think about how awful it must have been, trying to summon the courage to go out and confront them. Realizing that it would be dangerous, Alexandra had to think more about it. Coming to the conclusion that there was no other way to save her fellow brethren, Alexandra posed as a human wanting to eradicate the half elves with a fake personality that wasn't her own to do so, thereby making her a 'double-agent'.
Nevertheless, the life of a double-agent is hard. Alexandra has been keeping her real identity a secret from those she was backstabbing, the group called the "Exterminators".
-
Full bio can be found here. This is just the excerpt I wrote for the Halfbreed Arc for her.
Jade Curtiss currently makes his living as a member of the Tethe’allan military. With a title equal to Colonel, he has a high level of authority within the noted armed forces, though denying any further ascendance within the ranks.
Perpetually curious and extremely capable, Jade studied up on magic and various forms of it. Being human, he could not use magic unless he found a very rare substance of extreme magical properties. Hypothesizing that this material, the Aionis, might be found in places where mana flowed more readily, he ventured near the area of Celsius’ seal. Having always been fascinated by monsters, he had been known to travel the area - though for what reasons in particular it was unknown.
He found the stone and upon utilizing it’s power, gained the ability to wield magic. Around this time, Jade met Peony - the son of the King of Tethe’alla hidden away in Flanoir for his safety. They became fast and close friends, frequently teasing Saphir and exploring the city together.
Jade researched and developed multiple theorems and applications of magic during his time in Keterburg, still a young boy. He created a glyph to apply directly onto his eyes, allowing him to see magic and magical reservoirs such as the seals, not to mention that this allowed him the ability to see the type of mana produced.
Around the age of nine, Jade developed a method of replication via magic that he deemed “fomicry”. This process combined the different magics and utilized his own mana signature to create a clone of an object or monster. One of the first to see fomicry performed was his sister, Nephry, when he replicated a doll she had broken to help calm her down. The girl was instead quite terrified by her brother.
When a spell gone awry fatally injured the Professor that had changed Jade for the better, he attempted fomicry for the first time on a human being. However, he was not prepared to replicate a human, no less a half-elf. Though Jade attributed the failure to lacking a major component of the mana, he also concluded that the half-elven traits reacted differently to the magic. The replica he’d created as a result of these complications was not the Professor he and Saphir had loved, but a monster. He had no choice but to use his power to lock her away.
A few years passed and Jade was adopted into the Balfour family - an esteemed military family in the service of the King of Tethe’alla. There he was trained as a Knight while still researching fomicry and magic at the Sybak Imperial Research Academy. Jade forbid fomicry research years later after urgings from Peony and his own misgivings with the magic’s ethical issues. Because of this, a way to use it without Jade’s personal mana signature was never recorded.
Presently, he is assigned to Peony’s personal guard detail and is quite a powerful caster. Despite having given up fomicry, he still is known for dissecting cadavers on the battle-field, giving him the nickname of The Necromancer - this is simply a rumor, however - pay no attention to it.
