With every "!!" I get, I'll introduce you to an OC!
Today's blorbo thoughts are all about my Final Fantasy 13 OC, Riona Cassel!
(riona cassel, 14 years old; during ffxiii; art by @eldritch-goth)
So Riona's super tragic, as is to be expected of a Link OC (TM). At only 14 years old, she's a minor alcoholic and a major swordswoman, though I wouldn't say major in terms of how well-known she is. She's just unusually good for her age (due to immense amounts of practice to cope with a family loss).
She loves bonfires, candles, and playing rough with/teasing friends, but is also terrified of thunderstorms, crowds, and graveyards. She used to have a pretty good relationship with her parents until above stated family loss occurred, at which point there was a familial rift.
She's paired with Hope Estheim, but does not travel with him during most of the events of FFXIII. Instead, she goes on her own journey as a Sanctum L'Cie, tasked with ending the Pulse L'Cie 'tormenting' Cocoon.
(art by bakawomans @ DA)
More info below the cut!
This is the history I wrote for her on her Toyhou.se profile:
Riona was born to Ayla and Renast Cassel in early spring, five years before her brother Eythil. She was a quiet child, often considered shy as she stuck to her mother's skirts and avoided contact with anyone outside of her family. Even her father struggled to get close to her. When her brother was born, she took to him more than she had anyone else. She was quick to learn how to hold him and was instrumental in raising him, despite how young she was. Her mother was so proud of them both, especially as they grew and grew closer, often finding ways to work at home just to be with them.
Their lives were remarkably mundane for years. The most excitement came from Ayla's job as a military engineer, but even that seemed far removed from the family's suburbanite days. Things were good.
And then the accident happened.
Riona was only twelve, left alone at home with her seven year old brother. Their father was, as usual, at the office, their mother called away for work on a confidential project. It wasn't the first time the two had been left alone, but there had never been an issue before, so no one expected one now.
Eythil was a curious boy, though, and prone to finding trouble. More often than not, Riona had been able to deter him, but she was distracted. She no longer remembers what it was that held her attention, she only remembers turning back to see her younger brother reaching for a pan of boiling oil. She remembers the moment it started to tip.
They'd called her little rabbit as a child, quick and jumpy. She proved it that night, leaping at her brother with such speed that she was able to knock him away before the boiling oil ruined his face. Little splotches hit his neck, his shoulders, but most of the oil fell on Riona's arm, burning it horribly. She was too busy screaming to realize where her brother had fallen, and it took her a few minutes to realize he wasn't moving or responding to her distress.
Eythil had hit his head on the way down, pushed so hard that his skull fractured when it hit the ground. When Riona finally came to her senses, arm burning and tears flowing freely, she scrambled for a phone, calling emergency services and then her parents, as she'd always been told to. It wasn't enough. Eythil died in the hospital shortly after arrival.
Things between Riona and her parents were never the same. Her father was home less than before, which hadn't been much, and her mother became a shell of a person. Any interaction Riona had with the two was hollow, lifeless, and often sprinkled with "it should have been you." Eythil had been the light of their life. It was all too easy to blame his loss on their remaining child, the one who should've kept him safe.
Everything started to fall apart. Riona was left home alone more and more, and soon she found her way into her mother's liquor cabinet. She'd seen enough media to know that alcohol made things feel "better", even if it was unpleasant to drink. She was desperate enough to try it, and...and the cabinet had been left unlocked. It was if the universe was daring her, seeing how far she could fall.
Between the binge drinking, she threw herself into swordplay, her first and only love. There was something about the gleam of a blade, its easy movement as it sliced through the air. Nothing else could replicate the powerful feeling it gave her, and god, did she need to feel power in a life as powerless as hers. She was good at it, too, and only getting better. She had to be good at something, she told herself. She had nothing else to live for.
It's been two years since her brother died. She'll be getting on a train to Bodhum tonight, to see the annual fireworks festival for herself. She's not sure if she'll come home again. But maybe she'll find a reason to live.
(Riona full outfit ref during the events of ffxiii; art & outfit design by LockeOculus @ Twitter)
Long story short, after her younger brother dies in a tragic accident, her parents blame her for it. At twelve years old, she remembers that her mother always 'feels better' when she drinks, so she delves into her mom's liquor cabinet to 'feel better'. She practices her swordplay. She avoids going home.
None of it works.
At the Bodhum fireworks festival, Riona meets Hope Estheim and his mother, Nora. Both take to her immediately for different reasons, and Rio remembers what it feels like to be cared about by a maternal figure and what it feels like to have friends.
When the Pulse fal'Cie is discovered and the Purge begins, Rio narrowly escaped it unwittingly by leaving during the fireworks. She sees the news of the Purge on television but doesn't believe what the government of Cocoon says it is, unlike her parents, unlike everyone in town. She tries to go to what remains of Bodhum, but never makes it, instead making it to the outside of The Sunleth Waterscape, chosen by the fal'Cie in control of weather conditions, and inadvertently pushed into a group of Sanctum military folk with little instruction but plenty of imagery of unnamed folks dying beneath her hands.
She learns later that these unnamed folk are Hope Estheim's new friends, and that he is one of her targets as well. By the time the Pulse l'Cie group reaches Palumpolum, Riona has chosen to work against her Focus, despite the fate that her choice entails. She joins Hope and his group and fights against the Sanctum government and Sanctum fal'Cie to the end of that story (not given here for spoiler reasons, though you can go look it up yourself if you're curious!).
When the events of the game are over, Hope is returned to his father's care, but Riona is mysteriously missing. He wonders about her, but it isn't until Lightning goes missing (events of FFXIII-2) that he starts to search for the two women and try to bring them back from wherever they have ended up.
In truth, Riona hadn't disappeared like Lightning. She'd simply run away, in fear of having to admit to Hope or any of their friends what guilt she lived under (her brother's death and her initial Focus, now wiped clean by the events of game one), and chose to wander the world of Pulse alone. Throughout her teenage years, she occasionally gained new allies and worked with them for short periods of time, but the only person she consistently spoke to was Snow Villiers, living in New Bodhum on Pulse's surface. He kept her existence secret from Hope at Riona's insistence but constantly needled her to go to her friend.
Finally, one day, she did.
I've yet to finish writing this story to completion due to not finishing FFXIII-2 or Lightning Returns, but I do know that she and Hope end up marrying and having two children: Eythil Jr. and Nora, named after their deceased loved ones. Rio never makes up with her parents, who still choose to blame her for what happened to her brother, but she also develops a strong familial bond with Hope's father and Hope's friends.
(Riona during the events of ffxiii-2; art by @eldritch-goth)
ty for the ask sadie!!!
and to anyone who made it this far: ty for reading!! I hope you enjoyed! <3
