Player: Scarbearer
Concept: Haunted Gunsmith
Nation: Sarmatian Commonwealth
Religion: Curonian Paganism
Wealth: 0
Languages: All continental Thean languages, and very bad Patawa Haragwen
Secret Society: None

Arcana

Virtue: Adaptable (Coins) - Activate your Virtue to take your first Action before anyone else in a Round.
Hubris: Foolhardy (The Hero) - You receive a Hero Point when your brash, cocky, or reckless actions cause trouble for you and another Hero.

Traits

Trait	Rank
Brawn	3
Finesse	2
Resolve	3
Wits	2
Panache	3

Skills

Skill	Rank	Skill	Rank
Aim	2	Perform	1
Athletics	2	Ride	1
Brawl	1	Sailing	1
Convince	3	Scholarship	3
Empathy	1	Tempt	0
Hide	0	Theft	0
Intimidate	0	Warfare	2
Notice	1	Weaponry	2

Advantages

• Masterpiece Crafter (3)
• Direction Sense (1)
• Time Sense (1)
• Sorcery: Sanderis - Cold (2)
• Sorcery: Sanderis - Knowledge (2)
• Linguist (1)
• Survivalist (1)
• Academy (4)

Sorcery: Sanderis

Mechanics:

The deivas only known as Biting Chill has entered into a contract with Kestas. This allows him to accept bits of his power in the form of Favors. He can invoke a favor on a Risk he has taken if he expends 1 Hero Point, 1 Raise and is able to complete the deivas conditions to grant the favor. Each Deal allows two minor favors that cannot be refused but he must still pay a cost that is trivial but galling. The cost for other minor and especially major favors might be far more complicated and compromising.

Deals:

Cold: Kestas can perform the following minor favors, but must toast to Biting Chill to acknowledge his gratitude.

• Cause a character or object the losejas touches to be frozen solid, encased in a thin layer of ice. While encased, the character or object cannot be harmed or destroyed directly.
• Create a hand-held object made of solid ice, such as a sword. The object functions as a normal item of its type for one Scene, then it melts harmlessly away.

Knowledge: Kestas can use his Deal with Biting Chill for the following favors, but he must write the following, in old Curonian, in a book, ledger or document: 'The Biting Chill comforts old bones.'

• Find the precise location of any object you wish, with exact accuracy both as to the object’s location and the object itself.
• Uncover some scrap of knowledge, even if it is otherwise lost—anything from an ancient alchemical formula to a map that would guide you to a hidden nautical retreat.

Backgrounds

• Engineer — Quirk: Earn a Hero Point when you use your technological savvy to solve a problem.
• Zynys - Quirk: Earn a Hero Point when you use something evil for good.

Reputations

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Stories

Vendetta: I Looked Evil in the Eye

Goal: Hunt down the monster that killed Ully
Reward: The Nerves of Steel Advantage (3 points)

• Find another survivor of the same monster.
• Step 2
• Step 3

Experience

Total: 0 | Spent: 0 | Unspent: 0

Description

IRC: A stocky man with muddy brown hair, beard and eyes and fair skin weathered by wind and sun. Typically dressed in plain clothes and either a red and black sash or leather smock.

Full: Kestas is not a short man, but neither is he particularly tall being just a dash over average height. He has the stocky build of someone used to labor, and big meals. Sad brown eyes and rounded features common of sons of Curonia give him a friendly face, if not a handsome one. His muddy brown hair is mid length and wavy, and his beard and moustache are full, but groomed neatly enough to not be overbearing in the Jaraguan heat.

He almost always dresses plainly, wearing loose linen shirt with the sleeves rolled up, and sensible brown trousers and boots. If he's working he'll be wearing a heavy leather smock with tools stuffed in pockets, and loops. Otherwise, he wears a sash around his waist bearing the same red and black of the young Jaraguan flag. Tucked into the sash are a brace mid-caliber pistols, and a weapon that appears to be the blade of a Mawon machette and the hilt of a Sarmatian szabla. One has to be ready to do Hero shit at any moment after all.

History

The Story of a Boy and His Deivas

In the nation of Curonia, on the where the Sanderas forest ends and the marshlands begin there is a small village, it is rich in clay, and with bogs perfect for a summer cranberry crop. The winters though? The winters are brutal, seldom does snow fall, but the heavy damp air and harsh winds and hard patches of ice create a biting cold that penetrates to your bones. In this humble little town was born Kestutis Kleiza, Kestas to his friends. Son of the village village smith, and his wife the Zynys that placated the most dangerous deivas and spirits that wandered the land.

Kestas started learning the smiths trade from his father as soon as he was old enough to help in forge, he was a bright child and picked up the more technical aspects. When he was old enough to learn to fight they worked together to forge his first blade, a Sarmatian szabla, and before long he was assisting his father with more precise work like forging gun barrels. From his mother he learned about spirits and Deivas and how to deal with them. How to pick his words carefully and speak with measure and meaning, and when best to speak plain and when to obfuscate. From her he learned that Curonian Paganism was less about ritual, and more thinking on your feet. He was a clever lad, so much like he helped his father, he helped his mother deal with and placate the small deivas, but there was one she told him to never try and deal with. Biting Chill she called him and she told Kestas he was too dangerous to deal with and he never should.

So that’s exactly what Kestas did, but he swears it wasn’t his fault!

The Cold Never Bothered Me Anyway

One spring day a snap of bitter cold came upon the village without warning. As Kestas helped everyone take refuge from a driving sleet he realized that his little sister was nowhere to be found. His father, mother and he all searched, but his mother’s worst fears were realized when Kestas found her first. She had crawled inside a gnarled tree that she and Kestas used to play together at for shelter, and there in the murk two crystal, blue eyes stared at her and offered her a bargain to survive. Kestas stopped her just in time and offered Biting Chill a better bargain, one that would allow him to escape this bog, “If you corrupt me abroad, think of how many places your chill can creep into?” The deal was struck and Biting Chill made the storm abate.

His mother found them next and was furious with her idiot son. Both because she said they should have just run, and because she knew he was right and that they’d never have outrun that storm. She scolded her son and tried to make certain he was ready but he told her, “Don’t worry, I have a plan.”

And that’s how Kestas Kleiza became a Losejas. Now he was going to take Biting Chill away from his home.

Academy Days

Kestas, though now that Biting Chill was bound to him the best thing he could do is take him far away from her. Exploit his desire to be more than just the cold hearted deivas that tortured a lonely bog, while taking him away from where he was strongest to get the upperhand. His father was scared for him, but proud when he said he wanted to take what his father taught him and learn at one of the Eisen Military Academies, while his mother was annoyed with him but conceded that there was wisdom in his idea if he intended to see this battle of wills with the deivas through to it’s end. With the cleanest travel clothes he had, the szabla he forged with his father, and some provisions the village helped him put together he traveled west towards Eisen.

He made a stop in Budorigum first where he made another bargain with his deivas, for knowledge of where to find a skilled forger, and with their aid had a letter of admittance to the Gelingen Academy drafted. He thought their motto of ‘Know by doing’ would serve him well in helping his industrious peasant upbringing blend with the noble and merchant class children that attended the academy. It worked, and with his clever mind, and cheating a bit with knowledge stolen by Biting Chill he excelled. He focused on learning the role of a military engineer, and would go into town for the public forge and work on applying his lessons in geometry and trigonometry to improve his gun smithing and before he long he was making pistols and rifles for his fellow students and especially to bribe his instructors and faculty when needed.

He completed 4 years at the academy, using his bargains to get ahead but resist the urge to lean on them too much, but a deivas always gets it’s due. Graduation was nigh, and two best students of his class each asked him to make them a pistol. Kestas was friends with them both and knew that they could be allies that would help him the rest of life. One was the daughter of Montaigne nobility, the other the son of an Eisen baron. They had danced back and forth between bitter rivals to passionate lovers over the past 4 years, but as their education neared its end and each battled to be their classes most prestigious graduate they were back to bitter rivalry. Kestas felt he needed their pistols to be perfect, and so he sought to make a bargain to make certain these were his best work yet. Biting Chill had only one request, “I know you plan to use one of these contraps on me someday. I only ask that you let me quench your metal, so that I might learn more of them.” Give and take is the way of the Losejas, and so Kestas gave this.

Graduation came and went, and the knight of, when the Baron’s son, was not recognized with the same honors as the Montaigne noble woman, he challenged her to a duel, and they bucked tradition, they would duel with the pistols their good friend made them, without permission of the Dueling guild. Kestas tried to talk them out of it but neither would hear it. And when they drew, and fired, the pistols, subtly sabotaged by Biting Chill exploded and the shrapnel killed them both. Kestas knew full well, that sole blame of this horrible tragedy would fall to him, and so he had to move on. He first went north to Vendel, and from there he soon was boarding a ship to a place called Jaragua, where the ATC said it had much work for engineers.

Too the New World

There were actually several choices that Kestas could have made, but ultimately he decided to go to Jaragua for two reasons. During his time at the academy he had read many publications and essays by explorers that spoke of the region. The references to Kap-Sevi fascinated him, many of their traditions sounded familiar to the Curonian Paganism he grew up with, and while their relationship with the Lwa, seemed more cooperative than a deal with a deivas, he thought perhaps they might have wisdom that would help him defeat his devil one day. Also when he read about the balmy winters and hot humid summers he reasoned that Biting Chill would be miserable there, and this made him happy.

It did not take long for Kestas to start thinking of Jaragau as his new home. The people were hard working, kind, but also guarded and slow to trust. Kestas respected this as he found a kindred spirit with them. He quickly saw the ATC for what it was and realized that they wanted engineers to fortify their holdings against the rebellion. Kestas was all to undermine their efforts. Eventually he met a woman named Uluthando, and he was instantly smitten with her. She was a dangerous fighter, as deadly with a machete as any Thean swordsman. He called her ‘Ully’ telling her, “I have to earn the right to say the rest.” She found him annoying and exasperating, especially when he would try and get her to dance with him to drums despite his embarrassing lack of rhythm. Still there was something sincere about him that she started to find charming in spite of herself and she told him, “Well, maybe you’ll eventually earn the right to say my name.”

Once Ully learned of his education at an Eisen academy, she convinced him to go into the inland mountains with her, where he taught war orphans the tactics and knowledge he gained at the academy, as well as helped forge firearms for the resistance. But one night evil came to the camp. Just as they haunt the wilds in Theah, so too did monsters haunt the Jaragaun jungles and mountains. In the night something attacked and Ully and he went to fight it. All Kestas remembers is darkness and teach and claws, and black scales, and the world moving faster than he could follow, and then darkness. He doesn’t know how long it was, but he remembers the haunting echo of Biting Chill’s voice, “We’re not done yet.”

When he awoke, there were melting bands of ice holding his wounds closed, and Ully’s lifeless form lay atop him shielding him. Devastated, he held her and wept. Many in the camp perished that night, but enough survived for them to move and rebuild. Kestas wanted to leave, pack up his guns, his and Ully’s broken blades, and go hunt this monster down. He knew he could not honor his love that way. The liberation of Jaragau meant everything to her, and so he stayed true to her cause, supplying, training and fighting shoulder to shoulder with the rebels when they needed. When they drove off the ATC and Jaragau gained its independence. Finally he could dance for her with those graceless, rhythmless steps she came to love.

As time slowly moves on, and the Provincial Oligarchy tries to form the ties to be a true nation, Kestas often looks at the broken pieces of his Ully’s machete and his szabla and thinks of the plans he has for them. “I still have to earn your name.”

Notes

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Bringing Your Hero To Life

1. What Nation is your Hero from?

• The Sarmatian Commonwealth, a small Curonian Village near the Sanderas Forest.

2. How would you physically describe your Hero?

• Kestas is average height, and stocky, peasant build, like he grew up doing hard work. His skin is sun and wind weathered, and his hair and eyes a muddy brown. He dresses practically, usually in plain trousers, a loose shirt, sensible boots, and a red and black sash the colors of the Jaraguan flag.

3. Does your Hero have recurring mannerisms?

• Kestas tries not to stand out, but the observant might notice him pat a little salt onto any seat before he sits in it.

4. What is your Hero's main motivation?

• He is a Losejas so some day he must conquer his deivas, but what is most important to him right now is protecting his adopted home Jaragua. Its what Ully would have wanted.

5. What is your Hero's greatest strength? Greatest weakness?

• Kestas is nothing if not adaptable, his Curonian pragmatism serves him well in adapting to wherever and whatever he is doing. He fits in with the working folks of the world because that's his heritage, and between his military academy education, and his ability to pretend he knows what he is talking about, even when he doesn't lets him blend passably with the upper crust when he has to. This even spills over into how he solves problems in general and he's rarely afraid of trying something different. Sadly this adaptability can also be his greatest weakness as he seldom approaches anything with a plan ahead of time. Why make a battle plan when no plan survives first contact with the enemy? The fact that he is constantly making things up as he goes is the weapon his deivas wields against him more than any other.

6. What are your Hero's' most and least favorite things?

• His favorite thing is easy for Kestas to pick. It's a sauerkraut and dumpling soup he learned to make from his mother. It's easy to make, hearty and healthy, reminds him of home and travels well. He doesn't make it near as well as she did though. As for his least favorite thing? The chaotic nature at which he approaches live means this changes frequently and he is prone to declaring something new as his 'least favorite thing' at least once a week.

7. What about your Hero's psychology?

• Kestas is a man that feels his feelings, and he thinks denying them stoicly is a weakness not a strength. Of course he adapts to fit in when he must, but when he feels at home that guard comes down. Opera makes him cry, drink makes him happy, and by the prophets, drums make him want to dance even though he is terrible at it. Jaragua's earnestness is part of what made him fall in love with life on the island.

8. What is your Hero's single greatest fear?

• He will tell you that is greatest fear is loosing his battle to his deivas. He is lying to himself and others when he says this. Kestas has a deep and visceral fear of fish. From the perfectly terrifying, massive reef shark, to the tiniest pond blue gill. On a plate they are perfectly fine, but swimming around in the water and when they get close to him just fills him with a dread he doesn't understand and his HIGHLY embarrassed by.

9. What are your Hero's highest ambitions? Her greatest love?

• His greatest desire create masterwork firearms and other military innovations. He firmly believes that is the only way people can be free of the aristocracy and their sorcerous bloodlines they use to hoard over the commons. His 'greatest love' is something that shifts frequently, much like his 'least favorite' depending on how his mood strike him. Right now he is very into depressing Eisen Opera, because it lets him have a good, cleansing cry.

10. What is your Hero's opinion of his country?

• Kestas is both proud and frustrated by the home of his birth. This great Sarmatian experiment sounds great on paper, and he hopes it works. In his heart of hearts, he already sees how the the old aristocracy is getting it's hooks into this new Sejm in which everyone has an 'equal' vote and he fears it'll end in disaster. He's happy to have found a new home that he hopes won't break his heart.

11. Does your Hero have any prejudices?

• Kestas likes to believe he is free of prejudice, but he has a deep distrust of Vodacce, just everything about, the Princes, the people, even the culture he thinks breeds mistrust and arrogance that just makes his teeth grind. Especially their Sorcery. Fate, bah, there's no such thing.

12. Where do your Hero's loyalties lie?

• Kestas' greatest anxiety comes from the fact that his loyalties are becoming increasingly divided. Is he loyal to his duel with his deivas? Is it to his new home Jaragua? Is it to the friends he's made here in his new life? These are all things he cares about and he dreads the day that he has to choose between them.

13. Is your Hero in love? Is she married or betrothed?

• Kestas has loved and lost more than once, but that one that affected him the most was Uluthando, though he called her 'Ully' for short, which she hated. She was an Enspekte, and hunted monsters in the jungle, and Kestas would always bother her to teach him how she fights, but she never would because she always told him, "You rely to much on your guns. Like a pussy." There's was a relationship of playful teasing hiding deeper passions. When she died during the revolt, Kestas was devastated.

14. What about your Hero's family?

• They are still back in Curonia, his mother is still the Zynys that guides their village, and his father still is blacksmith keeping farriers supplied with horseshoes, carpenters with nails and local hunters with shot. They have accepted their son is across t he world and are happy to see their family grow through his little sister.

15. How would your Hero's parents describe her?

• Well, Kestas' father would say that his son is smart, and a gifted smith, better than he is if not as disciplined. His mother will tell you that he's a nincompoop who made a bargain before he was ready and is pretty certain his deivas is going to kill him someday.

16. Is your Hero a gentle?

• Even though he's from a country that even has it's own special breed of being a gentle called Sarmatism, Kestas puts little stock in being a gentle. He think it's just a way for the rich and powerful to impose their sense of superiority on everyone else and finds the whole thing to be very insincere.

17. How religious is your Hero? What sect of the Church does she follow?

• Kestas knows just enough Vacticine doctrine to fake being a believer if he's talking a fanatic. He has the pragmatism typical of most Curonian Pagans as he believes, gods, spirits, devils whatever you call them are just a part of the world you have to learn how to deal with. He is very curious about other religions. The Numanarian Pantheon fascinates him, but Kap-Sevi and wanting to learn what about the Lwa is what brought him to Jaragau in the first place.

18. Is your Hero a member of a guild, gentle's club, or secret society?

• While there are guilds and societies that perhaps he thinks have some good ideas, and others are absolute fools. He's not sought them out, nor has he joined one.

19. What does your Hero think of Sorcery?

• Somewhat hypocritically, Kestas doesn't think much of Sorcery. Despite being a 'heretical sorcerer' as far as the devout Vaticine would be concerned he sees Sorcery as just another tool to survive an unjust world.

20. If you could, what advice would you give your Hero?

• Don't be so jaded, the world is beautiful place and the devil doesn't live in every detail.

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