App for Animus

[culbutiri]

Player Information

Name: Katy
Personal Journal: adala_albahar
Age: 23
Contact Info: AIM: Jipaltara, Plurk: damua
Other Characters Played: Suzaku Kururugi, Shion, Taiki, Romeo

Character Information

Character Name: Nesir Aeser

Character Age: 15

Character Gender: Female

World Description: Nesir's world is as large as earth with cultures as vast and different as our own. It is a world locked in a never ending war of good and evil, a war started by gods and continued by humans. To the ordinary person that is the end of it, you either follow the teachings of the gods of light or you follow the god of darkness. To them it is simple, living a good life being kind to those around you, working hard and resisting those who try to tempt you is sufficient to follow the bright gods. To those in the shadows its a bit harder, remaining secret while finding those who share your beliefs, small pockets of darkness most often involved in petty crime. Secret shadowy organisations infiltrating the leaders of the lands, or bands of bandits. All have the same aim; to spread chaos and fear. To pave the way for the shadow lord.

Of course things are a little more complicated, because the gods have, since the beginning of time granted their powers to those they govern. All living creatures in the world have power, power to be tapped into and used but for most of them it is locked away. They have no way to channel it. That is the difference between power and magic.

Generally speaking only humans have magic, of course there are exceptions. Every so often you hear tales such as cats that can shoot fire from their eyes destroying whole villages. But such happenings are rare and magic is generally considered to be a human trait.

There is no rhyme or reason as to which humans manifest magic, children of nobles or orphan street children. The magic tends to manifest around the age of fourteen and can be dangerous if they are not found and trained. Though some are trained personally by other magic users most are sent to a temple in the mountains; the only one of its kind and home to all magic users and those that serve them.

Once trained these magic users are priests and priestesses, sworn to serve one of the gods of light. Each god encourages different specialities in those that serve them.

These are:
Healing: looking after the sick, using magic to help the injured in battles and every day life. Many go out into the world to provide care to those that need it.
Knowledge: Most those that serve the god of knowledge remain in the mountains teaching those that come to learn, some also go out into the world.
Justice: They try and bring light to the world, either by settling village disputes or advising Queens, or vigilante crime fighting.
Discovery: They deal with all things powerful and magic, be it taking down those cats with fire spouting eyes, finding old items containing power or searching for children capable of magic and ensuring they get trained.
War: The most martial, for they are completely preoccupied with the fight against the shadow god. They aim to bring peace to the world by fighting evil everywhere they see it, going out to hunt down those that follow the shadow god and wipe out all evil from the world.

Of course there are also priests who follow the shadow god, they live among the others; often pretending to be servants of one of the five bright gods. They seek to spread chaos and pave the way for the shadow god to consume all.

But priests and priestesses are not the only ones to whom the temple is home. A school of warriors, from all around the world live there. Their duty and calling is to protect those with magic, lending the inherent power that lies within them to serve their priests. Though there are other places where fighters can be trained this is the most diverse, accepting people with no training; where sons of kings train next to peasant children and all are forged into the greatest warriors of all time. Seeking no honour for themselves but only that the priests can fulfill their destinies.

As mentioned before their are many countries in Nesir's world, the temple is apart from all of them; those that train there priest or warrior give up their nationality and swear to serve the world as a whole. Gauig is warm, dry and dusty. The capital being known for it's ales and meads. A country wracked with war with its neighbours, petty land squabbles that swelled every so often. The capital where Nesir grew up is on the coast; they have a heavy fish diet and are the largest producers of honey. They are ruled by a Queen and inheritance is the choice of the current ruler; the throne sometimes going to distant cousins if the rulers children are not deemed worthy.

The only place in her world that Nesir has gone to is the mountains where the temple was, though she traveled though a few different lands to get there she didn't stay long and had very little contact with those that lived there. Temple life was very rigid and she struggled to come to terms with the much colder climate, where snow lay on the ground for at least half the year.

Character Background:
In general it is assumed that everyone in the world is born good, if they grow up in a good family with strong values they will remain good and work for benefit of others.

It doesn't always work that way, sometimes people go bad. They begin to serve the shadow lord; humans and humans they are easily corrupted. But as the ranks of the shadow found often; that which could be corrupted could be redeemed. However much you tried someone who grew up believing a way of life to be correct will struggle to adapt to a new one.

These were the findings of a small group of shadow priests one of whom was an ambitious woman called Elena. If their main issue with finding new agents of the shadow to remain loyal to them was that the light always pulled them, then surely the solution was to bring a child up believing that the shadow was correct.

So she sent her warrior Kant to father a child; he came back with two and she handed them over to a small band of shadow agents; at an inn in the capital city of Gauig to raise in the darkness.

So Nesir's life began, she wasn't called Nesir at the time. When she was ready to go out to the world she had to be untraceable. Humans are humans and make mistakes and mistakes were costly when made by a shadow servant. So her name would be given later, when it was her only name; traceable only to the person she was meant to be.

From an early age the girls lived double lives. In the daytime their mornings and evenings were taken up serving customers in the inn, scrubbing dishes, doing whatever jobs were given to them. It would have been easy work if the tavern had been a friendly clean place. However the Apple's Heart in Gauig was the sort of place light fearing men avoided. The inside was a dank dark place, with shadowy corners where drunken men gambled their lives away, where thieves met and plotted.

The afternoons were the girls time to do what they wished, the inn was quiet, before people arrived for the evening, and the keepers would rather the girls were out from under foot. So in the afternoons the girls played in the city, they were friends with the street children and thieves. They were soon prized among the children as the two girls proved to be good thieves, quick and good at hiding. Such activities were permitted and encouraged by their guardians, after all they were useful skills.

Once the inn began to quiet, in the early hours of the morning the children were woken from their sleep for their lessons; some lessons were the same as any other children of traders and innkeepers. Reading, writing, how to count and reason. Others not so common; how to walk silently, move in shadows, how to fight and how to kill.

When the girls were deemed old enough to understand they made their pledge to the shadow god, becoming servants of the shadow officially. They knew it was something to be kept secret and rarely even spoke about it among themselves. By the time the girls were eleven they were sent on their first missions.

Nesir found the tasks given to her exciting, each one a little bit more risky, the fear of being caught igniting the adrenaline inside her. She didn't mind killing, after all it got her praise. She knew she was serving the shadow god and above all it was fun. She had speant her life learning how to and it was good to put those skills to good use.

Her sister though did not take to such things as well. She had always felt things deeply and one day things seemed to have changed. She had been on a mission and Nesir wasn't sure if her sister had met someone who had put ideas in her head or if she had come to the conclusion herself but one night Nesir walked in on her crying in the small room they shared. She confessed that she thought the shadow god was wrong and made Nesir promise to never tell a soul.

She promised but her promise never even had to be tested for a few days later she was summoned by Tawin; one of the innkeepers. She never learned fully what happened but her sister had failed. Been deemed a failure and a danger to them all. Their guardians; worried that the taint had spread they ordered Nesir to kill her sister to prove her loyalty to the shadow god.

Of course Nesir did so; she loved her sister but obedience had been drilled into her and if her sister was truly a danger... She didn't expect the sadness though; unlike the satisfaction that usually came when she completed a mission she was hit with loss and grief.

Left to her own devices for a few days but barred from leaving the inn Nesir worried, had they decided she was to be killed as well? Did they not want her anymore? When she was finally summoned it was Elina she faced. The priestess informed her that she was being sent to a far off temple; a place where she would train to be a warrior like Kant. To serve a magic user when she became strong enough. There was a large faction of shadow servants there and they would continue Nesir's training.

And so Nesir left her city of dust and honey and travelled North, the journey took a few weeks and at that time she learned all their was to know about her new role. She was given a name for the first time; Nesir Aeser. An innkeepers daughter whose family was murdered by shadow servants a few weeks before, acting on her parents final wishes to go and train as a warrior.

She knew to keep her training secret. Nesir was to know some basic unarmed fighting but that was it. Arriving at the citedel Nesir initially struggled. It was much colder than her home had been and she had the unfortunate luck to be put in a room with a girl from a neighbouring country, one that had been at war with Gauig on and off for years. The girl; Kes, picked on her accent and they fought. Before her first day had even began Nesir found herself in the trainers office in trouble.

Things continued as they began, Nesir's accent got her teased. Her small stature and young age; for there were not many recruits who were only twelve. She continued with unarmed training and began to learn daggers; how to throw them and fight with them. However she didn't settle. She was angry all the time, angry with her life, angry at Elina for sending her to this stupid cold temple where everyone picked on her and she was supposed to be at the beck and call of magic users. It didn't take very long to sneak out of the grounds. As a basic trainee she wasn't allowed to leave the temple at all but after a week of watching the guard routines she snuck through and down to the nearest town.

It was there she found some companionship. In the roughest inns where no one cared if her rough cloak hid a temple uniform, if she was young and spoke with an accent so thick people struggled to understand her. She had fast hands and a good eye and though she had no money to gamble with she sought out those that did, lending her skills for a cut of the profits.

Back at the temple she continued to be constantly in trouble, including one awful time where she turned up to training drunk. After a weak of extra chores that made her feel like every bone in her body was going to shatter with pure exhaustion Nesir made sure to sober up before turning up to training.

Her first year in the temple was marred with fights and trouble. She almost got kicked out a few times but the temple truly did believe that everyone had potential. So the punishments continued and Nesir grew more sullen.

She did manage to make a friend though, a young boy named Ral who stood up for her and watched her back. Nesir thought he was an idiot, he wore his heart on his sleave and tried to be kind to everyone. But for a light fearing fool he wasn't too bad and Nesir liked the company.

However the two of them attracted the attention of a group of mid ranked bullies who tried their best to make their lives a misery. Holding them in hostage to the other they held them under their thumb and Nesir's days became long dreary ones of pain and training.

After she had been in the temple about six months she met Lotte, a noble girl who she clashed with initially. She was a magic user who had came to the warrior training yards to learn woodcraft. Nesir laughed at her skills and Lotte laughed at Nesir's accent and fighting.

But a week or so later on one of her missions for the shadow cell of the temple she was paired with Lotte; the young priestess in training was also destined to serve the shadow god and slowly but surely their friendship grew. It was not an ordinary friendship, they bickered constantly but they taught each other; Lotte teaching Nesir the valuable skill of talking in a neutral voice, masking her accent and way of talking. They were often paired together, the shadow cells of the temple pushing them together in hope of creating a powerful team for the future. Among the shadow god sworn Nesir was known as Culbu Tiri, a name she had even less connection with than Nesir but it was hers nonetheless.

When Nesir was thirteen, after about eighteen months in the temple she got into a fight; nothing unusual, after all she was dragged to the training masters office on a weekly basis due to fights or misbehaviour. This one started much the same as usual; an arrogant priestling throwing his weight around, clashing with Nesir who as usual couldn't control her tongue or her fists.

However instead of punching back the trainee priest merely set Nesir on fire. They were found quickly, the boy stopped; Nesir healed and them both punished. The trainee for misuse of magic and losing control of his temper. Nesir for daring to strike a magic user. Life she decided was grossly unfair and Nesir carried with her a real fear of fire and a much bigger respect for the magic priests and priestesses wielded.

There was an attack on the temple and Nesir saw for the first time the real damage that the forces of light and darkness could do to one another. She fought on the side of the light for she had to and watched the execution of her siblings in the darkness. Everything she was taught by the shadow servants she found to be true in her lessons of the light and what she saw around her and became more determined that the shadow god should win this war.

However she wasn't so sure of her own place in the world. As young people often are she chafed at the directions she was being pulled in, a student of the temple, a child of the shadow. Promised to vow with Lotte when they both were fully trained; to give her life and power to her for ever. A daunting idea but part of a temple warriors life. Her loyalty to Lotte clashed with her loyalty to Elina. Her hatred of the light clashed with her loyalty to the temple. She struggled pulled in many directions angry that her life was not hers to control.

She was almost fifteen when she was finally deemed ready to pass out of basic training. She had taken longer than most trainees because of her age and her temper. But by this time she had learned to curb her temper, to say the right things in the right voice. She was sent into the wilderness to survive and find her way back, a test of her abilities.

A test she passed albeit very narrowly. Limping back to the temple the required ten days later she was half starved with a badly twisted ankle and a low grade fever. But she had survived, she reached the ranks of acolyte.

However the test had been more than just a physical and mental test. For the first time in her life Nesir was out of reach of those who controlled her. She could run, run and run and never stop. Find a place where she could be herself. Where she didn't have to worry about offending Elina, or bringing disgrace on her upbringing. On being caught by the forces of the light or accidentally betraying the shadow.

In the end she returned though, because something drew her back to the temple. Lotte, Ral, friends she had never wanted. People she had been planning to use and leave behind. She made her decision, she would return she would work hard and become a warrior. The greatest the shadow had ever known. Then she would destroy the temple and everyone who had ever dared hurt her.

An acolyte and her inner turmoil settled for now she threw herself into training with new vigour surprising her teachers who praised the training master; it had indeed been the pride the rising up in rank and the responsibilities that came with it that had been needed to settle the unruly trainee. Everything went well; she turned fifteen without much fanfare and for the first time in a while things were going well for her.

Until mid winter that was. In the midsts of celebrations she was sent on a mission that would shake the temple. It went wrong, horrifically so; a kid she had been training in the ways of the shadow turned on her. After a fight where she killed the boy Lotte was not where she had agreed to be. Hiding the body Nesir left her post and went to look for her, there were far too many people around; despite the fact they should be all inside celebrating. She ran into a drunk Kes and they fought, matched in strength they dealt each other blows with their full force before a friend of Kes' turned up; a priest friend of Kes' who threw Nesir into a tree knocking her unconscious.

The days after midwinter were holiday and so no one noticed Nesir missing. In fact it was her who saved her own life; for if the body of the boy hadn't been found they would have never been a search for any other victims of the awful attack.

In a lot of ways Nesir got lucky, if they had waited until after the holiday she would have been passed saving but magic managed to save all of her save two fingers on her right hand. Taken by frost sickness her index and middle finger had to be cut away to stop the sickness from spreading to the rest of her hand.

To make Nesir's anger even worse she overheard Elina and Kant speaking whilst she was half delirious with fever; learning that Kant was her father. When she woke she never gathered the courage to ask, but it is something that makes her wonder. Did she dream it or was it real? It adds to her anger.

Which fed her frustration; those months of learning to use a dagger again, the loss of strength. Learning to write in her left hand, the sickening feeling she would be cast away by Lotte, or deemed a failure by the rest of the shadow circle. She wasn't; she was punished of course for her failure but they deemed that the missing fingers were a lesson for her to be more careful in the future.

And that is the canon point she is taken from.

Personality:
The most important thing to remember about Nesir is the difference between what she should be and what she is. In theory Nesir should be both Nesir and Culbu. Nesir being a polite young girl who keeps her head down, works hard; who lost her parents to the darkness and wishes to fight for the power of light. Culbu being a talented assassin, wreathed in shadows and secrecy, completely loyal to the shadow god.

In reality she doesn't quite hit either of them head on. Arriving at the temple was a shock to her system and Nesir doesn't do change well, still wracked with grief from the death of her sister she lashed back in the only way she could; against innocents who really had done her very little harm. This made her unlikable and though that is not an excuse for the bullying she experienced it made her much less able to deal with it in any productive way.

She had no allies in her teachers whose lessons she skipped or ignored, the other trainees saw her as rude. Ral was in no position to help and so she became more sullen and more angry; a vicious circle that even as an acolyte she had not quite gotten out of.

Even as Culbu she isn't able to completely be the loyal mindless follower she was supposed to be; she resents being told what to do if she sees no gain from it, she hates being used as a pawn though she is aware that that is what she is. She might harbour dreams of revenge and absolute power but she knows them for what they are; dreams.

So who she really is is a girl who is getting slowly better at acting. Once she became an acolyte she was able to fool her teachers she had had a change in heart, she can keep her face blank and her tone neutral. She can mask her accent so no one knows where she comes from. They are all tools that she uses to get what she wants.

But she still slips, when she is confronted with new situations, when she is scared or worried. She can be rude; not because she doesn't know how or why to be polite but because she doesn't really care about most people. If they follow the light gods and have no power to punish her then she sees them as stupid mindless puppets. Ral is an exception; but he was the first person to show her kindness since the death of her sister and so won her loyalty.

Because Nesir is loyal; it is tremendously hard to win. True loyalty that is; she will profess loyalty to the shadow god, the shadow circle and Elina but the only two people who have her true respect and loyalty are Ral and Lotte. She is starting to learn how important it is to have allies, those that like you well enough to help you in times of trouble.

Nesir's beliefs are another thing that effect her personality and the way she deals with people and situations. Coming from a world where good and evil have lines and rules and are starkly contrasted to one another Nesir truly believes that they are merely two sides of the same coin. She was brought up evil yes, but she ran the streets with pick pockets who burned sacrifices to the gods of light.

Stealing was considered an evil action but if your motives were good then you could still be a follower of the light gods. Murder was a much bigger crime in the eyes of those gods yet Nesir has witnessed those of the temple killing, in self defence and to bring the world to light. But what does she fight for if not the defense of her and her brothers and sisters of darkness and to bring the shadow over the world.

She's not stupid she would never argue these points; the shadow circle would worry about her turning and the light addled would know she was not one of them. The fate of a captive shadow servant is grim; more evidence to support her beliefs.

But it does mean she sees the world a little differently; separating it into those that actively fight for their side and those that sit back and do nothing. To Nesir there is nothing so pathetic as the light addled peasant in his field, worshiping the gods of light yet barely understanding what needs to be done to keep the balance of the world in the bright gods favour.

Nesir can enter a meditative state called the emptiness. This is normal in her world, and there is nothing magical about it. It is merely a mindset where you close yourself off from the world, helping you to fight, bare pain or think clearly. The way you reach it differs between people and says a lot about their personality. For Nesir she imagines a storm sucking everything into it and devouring it all. All the bad, the good, everything around her; every part of her life before it finally devours itself leaving Nesir in calmness.

I have mentioned that she only truly respects Lotte and Ral, she does however have many who she respects through fear or necessity. The shadow circle, Elina and magic users. Even before her run in with the priest trainee she knew magic users were to be obeyed and respected. It had been drilled into her from an early age; which didn't stop her thumping the those in training when she thought they were being idiots. She does obey though; if reluctantly and show respect; if begrudgingly.

Nesir is a girl who knows how to use her skills and talents wisely. She looks younger than she is; something that she found useful as an assassin; who suspects a child after all? She looks weaker than she is; which helps her in fighting. It is easier to beat an opponent who underestimates you. She knows she is not great at making allies and so unless it's necessary she finds other ways to bring people around or force them to do as she wishes.

Above all Nesir keeps her true feelings deeply hidden; sometimes they escape but she makes sure to mask them. Grief for her sister came out as agression, the guilt is locked away and probably will never be examined. Fear is shoved into dark corners of her mind; she plunges into the emptiness whenever she feels threatened. Pain is to be weathered for showing it is weakness. And weakness leads to death; Nesir doesn't want to die because despite it's pain and dangers she enjoys her life; it is a thousand times better than a safe life of fading into obscurity.

And she will punch anyone who tries to convince her otherwise.

Abilities:
Like everyone in her world Nesir has power that comes from within her. However she is not magic; she has no way to channel the power inside her and so it just lies dormant unless drawn from her by a priest or priestess of her world.

She is a capable fighter, fighting with two daggers, able to throw daggers also. Though she is still learning to cope with the loss of her fingers she pushes herself hard, trying to maintain her dual wielding fighting style whilst glad she decided to learn to fight with both hands in the first place. She has a working knowledge of poisons and is a talented assassin. She knows basic field first aid (albeit very outdated in modern terms) and the basics of how to survive in the wilderness for short periods of times. (Just don't let her try and forage mushrooms or berries...) She was pretty decent at forgery but this is a skill lost to her until she becomes better at writing with her left hand.

Sample Entries: Written here and Threaded here