Azalahn Dél’Raguierá/Kaýrrhem/Inn owner

Name:
Azalahn Dél’Raguierá

Gender:
Male

Age:
223

Race:
Elf

Tribe:
Kaýrrhem

Occupation:
Owns an inn/tavern that he runs with some members of his former mercenary unit.

Title:
Dance of sorrow.

Portrait
None yet.

Overview
He is exceptionally gifted with swords. He became a fully trained elite Kaýrrhem guard and a good one before he was 200 years old. His unusually close relationship with his twin sister evolved into a romance neither of them can or will break. He leaves his homeland and and falls into a deep black pit. When he comes back up he is a changed man. He settles in a human city and runs a tavern/inn. Except when it comes to his sister Azalahn can be said to be seen like a cold and cynical man at least he never shows any public display of emotions, but he is haunted by his past, especially the separation from his sister is hard

Appearance.
Height: 2 Peds, 2 Fores, 9 Nailsbreadths

Weight 3 Pygges, 9 Hebs.

Hair Color: Jet Black

Eye Colour: Emerald green with light sparkles

Physical appearance:
Azalahn is a giant of an elf. He taller and much heavier built than most of his kin with sinuous muscle rippling under a layer of pale golden skin. He moves with graceful agile movements. There is a light scent of perfume in the air around him. His face is beautiful with fine features, almost to the point of being feminine. His eyes are vivid emerald green with light sparkles. When he looks at you it is with a painful and tortured expression. His long hair is usually tied up in a pony tail with a silver ring holding it in place. His voice is an unusually high tone for a male and has a melodious accent.

Clothing:
When not adventuring or expecting any kind of situation that could eventually be trouble he is almost always wearing an old green tunic made of the finest silk.
His sister made it for him. He wears a pair of black leather boots with metal covering the toes. When outside he usually wears a dark red cotton cloak fringed with furs. All chains and buttons are made of silver. He wears a heavy gold necklace with an elfmaid's face carved into a sapphire. He is rarely seen without his silver "bracelets" covering most of his lower arms, they are actually highly decorated vambraces. He often wears wide white trousers.

Personality:
Azalahn is a quiet man, he rarely speaks unless he feels he has something important to say. He takes care of his own business and lets other people take care of theirs. When someone says something to him he will answer back in a polite and friendly way, but usually a very brief answer and very rarely in a way that invites to a continued conversation. He is very loyal to the few friends he has. He claims to hate people with obsessions, but it seems like he is obsessed himself, he uses almost every spare moment he has to practice weapons or doing some work in the tavern.

On the surface he is cold and cynical, it takes a long time for him to trust people and he is rather paranoid. But very deep inside his hearth is a kind and giving man. He has a weakness for those who have a pure hearth although they have suffered in life trough no fault of their own, but often he will pretend not to care. Right or wrong, he believes that humans see compassion as a weakness and he has no interest in appearing weak.

Deep inside his hearth he knows it is in vain because she will never be happy without him just like he will never be happy without her, but that hasn't stopped him. He prays every day the the god of balance Ameros. He prays that the god will make sure his misery is balanced by the happiness of his beloved. Ameros is also the god of war so he also prays that he will be able to protect the people he cares about if the need should ever arise again.

He is a workaholic, not so much because he feels he always has something he must do, but more because he is at peace when doing something. The memory of old battles and his longing for his sister seem to torment him when he doesn't do anything. This makes him very lonely and sad. He likes to play the violin or to sing on the rare occasion that he isn't at work or training and his mind is somewhat at peace. He has an interest in history and is especially fascinated with the legends of the Krean and the Krath Empire. He likes jewelry, silk and bright colours, but tries to mix in some local customs sometimes with rather odd results, but generally it is a nice mix.

Strengths:

Weapon skill: Iurías.
He is using a pair of these slightly curved elven long swords and is a perfect master with them.

Weapon skill: Spear
He is good with the spear, but it is not his prefered weapon after "loosing" his warhorse.

Combat skill: Unarmed.
Highly trained in unarmed combat, according to a Tethinrhim friend then he is as skilled as a Kaierian Warrior but his style is different.

Combat skill: Blindfighting
In melee distance light conditions don't matter. This compensates for his sunlight problems.

Big and strong man
Azalahn is big and strong. He can load/unload a wagon in almost no time. He takes a box and lifts it up with little effort even one that 2 average men would struggle to lift. Today his big size and enormous strength make him almost impossible to wrestle to the ground on the rare occasion of a tavern brawl but even that is rare.

Former elite guard leader turned somewhat successful inn owner
He was a brilliant and very well educated military leader, and has a few contacts. Every now and then he can draw upon those qualities. He is averal bright with intuition and a special talent for business and he has a very good staff. In total this more than makes up for his lack of experience in running the inn.

Hunting
He can track a few animals and hunt with the horn bow. This helps with free meat every now and then for his place. He is a very good good marksman when time is not an issue. In battle time is an issue so he can't fight with it due to sunlight problems.

Stealth knowledge
He can teach others, if they are quick learners, how to move silently in the woods, although his sneezing prevents him from being completely silent himself.

Musical ability.
He has a beautiful and clear voice. When he sings then he hits all the tones from the very high to the very low perfectly. He only knows elven songs though, but every now and then they can be entertaining.

Dancing
He is very agile and graceful in his movements, this makes him a very good dancer and he has picked up a few of the local dances. This gives him another way to socialize with the customers (at least the female customers)

Weaknesses

Big and heavy:
A horse will tire easily when carrying this giant of an elf. He will not fit anything that is not custom made for his size. A standard human weapon just looks like it lacks a good part of it's size when he wields it so even weapons should be custom made if they are to be used to their full effect. He eats and drinks 3 times as much as a normal man (and pays accordingly)

Poor Tharian.
He has only been here for a short amount of time so his comprehension of the language is vague at best He can bark orders at soldiers, order a room and food, and tell a customer the price of a beer and say a few other simple things. But that's about it. Any kind of deeper conversation like explaining why a seemingly good deal is really a bad one would be too complex.

Stranger
His understanding of humans and the culture here in Bardavos or any other human town is also very limited. Fortunately he had the luck to know people that can make up for his shortcomings here and the wisdom to employ them

New Environment.
The environment here is different from the jungle he lived in and his body hasn't adjusted yet and with some problems (allergies) it never will. There are some minor nuisances but mainly 4 real problems connected with this.

a) His skin, and eyes are always dry and itchy and he is sneezing way too much. The bladeleaf helps with the dry and itchy skin though, but it isn't cheap and he has developed a medical dependency on it. Luckily it is a common plant, but it takes up much of his time to collect.

b) The bright sunlight around Bardavos is a problem for his sight. He is always looking down and squeezing his eyes into two very narrow slits, making him very nearsighted and with little peripheral vision when outside, unless stopping and shielding his eyes with with a hand while he takes a look around.

c) His skin burns easily when outside, so he has to be careful to always cover himself from top to toe when outside for any length of time.

d) The quality of air is low here in Bardavos, resulting in low stamina.

He is haunted by his recent past.
The images and sounds of past battles, the atrocities and slaughter he committed often haunt him. His memory fails him every now and then and he has problems focusing on things not related to combat and survival. He blames himself for not being able to save his men and surviving the hell they lived trough.

Emotional wreck.
He is utterly incapable of moving on from his past relationship, when not physically active or totally exhausted then she is in his every thought. This leaves him mentally drained and absent minded most of the time, not to mention unable to find a new partner in life or flirt with the female customers.

Always physically exhausted.
He seeks physical activity to escape from the pain in his hearth and will work or train preferably til he is passing out if possible.

Alcohol problem.
He drinks too much. This is expensive, the amount of work he gets done the day after is so so, and it really brings his soft side up as he often gives out a free meal to more than one of the street kids and beggars (making it really expensive) and he keeps mumbling in Styrash. (Until the staff gives him a "poisoned" good night drink and drag him out to the kitchen)

Perceived arrogance:
He is always too exhausted to really have much energy left to deal with people and quite absent minded when he isn't, some misinterpret it and think he considers himself better than the rest of them, he knows he should spend more time being social, but unless totally exhausted then the image of his sister or the battles up north are always there haunting him.

Sheltering a dark elf.
She is tolerated by the officials, military, neighbors (The neighbors like Azalahn and all his staff) and regulars for as long as she behaves. (and she does) But she is a dark elf, and everyone who has a problem with Azalahn, his inn or his staff will use it and try to spread rumors about him being an ally of the dark elves, a worshiper of Coór and that the dark elf is the one who is really running the show. These tales usually don't last long but they always come up again and this has cost him more than one business opportunity and more than one customer as well, and there are also those that stay away just because she is a dark elf.

Paranoid
During his 10 years as a mercenary he has crossed blades with many and stepped on quite a few toes. He is always afraid they will come after him or the people he cares about.

History

Early childhood
Azalahn was born in a small settlement in the Gaeldorioth jungle. Some say there was something wrong the night he and his twin sister were was born and that they are both cursed.

Azalahn and his twin sister were were inseparable already from very early childhood. One could barely take one of the babies away without the other starting to cry and keep on crying.

Azalahn had an interest in swords almost from the day he could walk, always picking up small sticks hitting and thrusting things around him, and his sister followed him around like a shadow. Sometimes they played mages, doing weird gestures and mumbling strange sounds. Actually Azalahn found it very boring, but he would gladly pretend to enjoy it for hours if his sister liked it, and so he did.

The parents and the rest of the community were puzzled and worried, it didn't take a genius to figure out that she was destined to become a mage and he was destined to become a warrior, and both had the potential to one day become masters, but they didn't seem to be willing to spend even a minute apart from each other. In the end it was decided that they would have to be separated. She was sent to one of the larger cities of to be tutored by the wise and powerful mages living there, while he was start training as a guard. Perhaps they would learn to live without each other as time passed. At first they were both impossible. They refused to do anything. They often ran away and even attempted to take their own lives, but in the end they learned that it was all futile, they would not be reunited for the time being. Their mentality took a dramatic change as the truth became clear or so it seemed. Indeed it seemed like the forced separation had finally worked.

They both focused very hard on their tasks, not taking a single moment to relax and enjoy life. However the reason was not that they had learned to live without each other, they had learned that the only way to be reunited was to finish their training as soon as possible. While she spent every waking hour reading magical theories and ancient lore he spent every moment exercising his body and perfecting every move he was supposed to. As time passed this obsession with perfection became a part of their being.

Warrior training
Azalahn was almost the perfect student. He had the basics with both sword and spear almost from day one. He also excelled in survival and tactics. With stealth and bow he was more ordinary though. But with time he became proficient enough. He had to learn how to use the shield, but by some reason he always disliked the shield. He soon found himself training with students much older than his age, training was hard, they were more experienced than he was and despite his strong physique their age more than made up for it. There were only two solutions. He had to work not twice but four times as hard as the rest of them or be smarter than they were. There were only so many hours in a day so he really couldn't work any harder than he already did so that left him with one solution. He started using dirty tricks, so Azalahn got into a lot of trouble and his tendency to run off started to come back.

One day he went really missing, his parents worried about him, there were many predators in the jungle and he was just a young kid. He had found his way to the city and was with his sister when they found him at last, many wondered how he had found his way trough the jungle and survived on his own. He was taken back, but a few days he ran off again ... One day he came back accompanied by a well respected mage from the academy of magic. Azalahn’s presence seemed to have a positive effect on his sister. The mage knew a famous weapon master in the city, perhaps the young boy would respect such a man and it would allow the siblings to see each other. Azalahn was exceptionally gifted with swords, so perhaps he would be worthy to be trained by such a master so it was agreed that he was to be sent to the city as well at the age of 17.

His teacher was impressed. It had indeed been a long time since he had seen such a talent A pair of Iurías seemed to be the best weapons and style for him. Training here was different from back home. His teacher was strict, even the tiniest little flaw had to be weeded out before continuing to the next level. But Azalahn respected him, and dreamed about becoming as good as his teacher one day. He lived and trained and with his teacher in the city. He also had to spend some hours at the military academy studying. Azalahn wasn't a big fan of the academy but his teacher was right, he had to learn how to take out a group of Coór'hém that were better or just more numerous than him and his group if the need should arise.

His sister had an interest in books. Azalahn was more interested in weapons, but he didn't mind looking at the pictures. She wanted to share the rich experiences from literature with him so she started to teach him how to read, and later how to write. At first Azalahn found it boring, but as always he would do anything for her including something boring like learning how to read and with time he also learned to appreciate literature. Azalahn liked the stories about great heroes and military leaders. He sometimes told her that one day he would also become a great military leader. She told him that being a great fighter wasn't enough, he would also have to learn about numbers and strategy (She was always the smarter of the two) "If you are told that we are invaded by an army of 1500 humans from the east arriving in 3 days, and 2000 Drow from the west arriving in 4 days and we get 1000 Kassite riders in reinforcement from the south arriving in 2 days, what will you do with your army of say 2000 warriors?" she asked him one day. Azalahn didn't know what she was talking about, what was 1500 and all the other strange words? She explained the concept of counting and numbers to him. Then the concept of addition. He had 3000 in total and the enemies would have an army of 3500 if they were allowed to join up. Azalahn was impressed and again he realized her infinite wisdom, so he asked her to teach him, and so she did, first counting and all the numbers, then how to do weird almost magical things with numbers (calculations)

As time passed he came to like it even at the academy. These were the happy days in his life. The days with training and study were long and demanding but he could spend the evenings with his sister except when his master took him out into the jungle to teach him various things about stealth and survival. Azalahn wasn't a big fan of these trips either, he saw it more fitting a hunter/ranger than a true warrior, but again he had to admit the wisdom of his teacher. In times of war, warriors could be cut of from the rest of the army and their supply routes, then they would have to be able to survive on their own and take care of their wounded, and sometimes war could take them beyond the jungle so he had to learn a lot about various animals, plants and other stuff both within and beyond the jungle, at least the stuff from beyond the jungle was taught in theory so he didn't have to travel to all the various realms of Nybelmar.

Azalahn and his sister were as close as they had ever been. Indeed during their spare time they were completely inseparable. The time passed, months became years and years became decades. Azalahn grew into a fine young man and was made the leader of a small unit of elite guards. He was unusually large and heavily built. He was a well known face among the young elves in the city, both for his enormous strength and his mastery with swords, some people jested that he had to be half dwarven because of his broad shoulders and big mussels. He could have lived happily for the rest of his life and eventually become a famous swordmaster himself, but that wasn't his fate.

The twins were close as one could expect, but they they were more than that. They were completely inseparable, just like they had been during their early childhood. They could be seen holding each others hands when walking trough the streets and when they looked at each other there was an expression in their face that wasn't quite normal, at least not normal when looking at a sibling. People started to ask questions and rumors started to spread. At first nobody wanted to believe it but in the end fact was fact and couldn't be denied anymore. Neither of them had ever been out on a date with anyone (except with each other) In fact they had never even been interested in anyone else, and the way the looked at each other clearly told that they were in love with each other. This was more serious than when they had been small children. Azalahn had to leave.

Start of his exile
He left the jungle and headed for the human empire of Korweyn at the age of 201. He settled there and started working with the human soldiers of the empire that had been their allies for centuries. His sister followed him a year later. They lived happily again for a few years but eventually the rumors and speculations started again. They both returned to the Jungle. He went to seek the advise of his old master. His master consulted with the mages and in the end he told Azalahn that he would have to leave to a place as far away as possible, staying where she could follow him would just mean that in the long run she would be condemned to exile as well. The mages told her a similar story. They had always been each others greatest strength but also each others greatest weakness, back when they were still students they had competed in tournaments for warrior mage pairs, and had always been the downfall of each other, taking fatal blows (if they had been for real) to save the other from receiving a little scratch. This was no different. They were both willing to live out the rest of their lives in misery to help the other. Azalahn left and headed for the coast. He boarded a ship heading for the eastern continent of Sarvonia at the age of 205

The deep black pit.
He traveled across the continent of Sarvonia with no direction for roughly a year. He lived as a hunter most of the time but had enough wealth to buy food when there was no pray. In Voldar he got in contact with some mercenaries and ended up signing a contract for 10 years. It was a human organisation, but they were preparing for something big and were accepting recruits from all races and no questions asked. In the start most of the work was as caravan guards in small units. After some months he was sent to the northern frontier as part of a big unit consisting of 120 warriors. This was a big unit and Azalahn was impressed, the leader who was titled captain had to be a very skilled man to lead so many into war. The war season passed, or at least the locals didn't want to pay anymore so most of the mercenaries returned back south, split up and became caravan guards again. But the leader told Azalahn and a few others to stay until the last year of Azalahn's contract. His last instructions were that Azalahn was to be the leader of this group of 30 warriors.

They traveled across the land looking for hire. His group was made up of the most bloodthirsty brutes and/or the most highly skilled mercenaries among the original 120 warriors that had sailed north. There was even a dark elf among them. At first Azalahn couldn't stand the sight of her, but she was part of his group and in the end they came to respect each other somewhat and she wasn't anything at all like he expected a dark elf to be. There wasn't much to live of and nobody wanted to hire them for the prize they were to take. After some months they got their suspicions confirmed, they had been abandoned by the captain. They were the most blood thirsty warriors or the most skilled and best equipped and thereby also the most expensive. There was little use for them in the peaceful south, but due to their contract they were entitled to payment, so it would be better for the human leader if he could just get rid of them. For now orders were orders. They traveled the north living almost like animals. In the end Azalahn lowered their demands so they could get work, low payment was better than none. The first few years they got hired by hired by various Kuglimz tribes battling orchs, asmarians and even other Kuglimz. The battles were many and the payment allowed them to survive.

Azalahn quickly earned a reputation as a crazed warrior, he fought with an animalistic fury and screamed like an animal. It was as if he was possessed by a demon. He cherished the battles, here he could strike out at the world with all his might and let his fury loose. He hated this world that kept him apart from his sister, he didn't care if he lived or died all he cared about was fighting, killing as many as he could and paying no regard to his own safety. It was indeed a miracle that he wasn't killed during this time. As time passed there was little left of the Kaýrrhem guard who had once been the pride of his teacher, in fact there was little left of the man at all. He started whispering a little prayer to the goddess of death before battles. Most of his unit feared and cursed him. The dark elf was an enigma though.

The elven mage scout Elyssia and the Serphelorian knight Aria were the only others who cared for him. They sensed some remnants of nobility and goodness left in his soul. Indeed he had his sense of honour that had saved men from certain death more than once and there was not a single man who was living worse than Azalahn. His sense of honour and responsibility was all that was left of him, but that alone was not enough to save him and he was spending a little too much time with the dark elf. It surely was because of her influence that he now was whispering prayers to the goddess of death before battles. What they didn't know was that he prayed to her in the hope that she would take his soul during the coming battle and relieve him from the emotional torture that his life had become.

His soul rescued
He was on the battlefield again, he has slashed and hacked his way trough a tidal wave of enemies, now at last they were defeated. One of them came up again. She looked at him with an empty expression. Then she spoke:” Why do you hate us so much " It was his sister. As he looked across the battlefield he saw everyone he had ever cared about. His fellow Kaýrrhem guards, his teacher, the knight Aria and the scout Elyssia. All of them dead or mortally wounded by his weapons. Behind him he could hear what had to be the remainder of his group praise his name. He took a look behind him. What he saw was, not men and women, but a horde of disfigured and terrifying creatures that could only exist in nightmares. Demons. They started feasting on the souls of his victims, they sank their claws and fangs into his sister. He turned on them with a roar of defiance ... he woke up in his tent outside the city. " What a strange dream " he thought. The days passed but he could not forget the dream. In the end he was convinced that it had to be a message from some higher being. Slowly he started to change his ways, clinging to his sense of honour and sometimes leaning on Aria and Elyssia’s sense of justice he climbed out of the darkness and into the light. A year later he was a changed man.

Mercenary life
Those who had admired him before now looked at him with disgust and called him a coward behind his back, while those that had feared him before loved and cherished him now. There was one thing though that many found outright weird. As his blood lust vanished he started to use poison on his weapons. When questioned about it he always answered with a reference to some Lillivear that started the Krath tradition of imbuing almost every weapon in with rare poisons. Most of his men took it as a byproduct of his fascination with this Krean empire of legends and myth. The dark elf was a mystery to him though, but he told himself he could count on her because she had nowhere else to go, and she was the one providing him with poison. Sometimes he felt sorry for her, the circumstances leading to her situation were different from his, but she was living in exile just like him.

She had been abandoned on the roads as a baby. A kindhearted human had found her, and raised her as his own daughter. Alas her adopted father died of old age before the long lived elf was out of her teens. After some time in confusion and sorrow and finding out that she was shunned everywhere she had headed towards the Paelelon forest to rejoin her people. She staid with them for a long time, learning their ways and trade, but in the end it became obvious that the damage was done, she was too human and would never really fit in and she would never really sincerely worship Coór. She left on her own before they would send her away. She had learned about poisons, stealth, hunting and combat with her people, so she started to make a living with those skills, but it was a thankless job, and she hated herself for what she had to do. As she got better in her trade, she became able to be a bit more picky about what job to take, she sometimes found that shortly after completing a job the authorities were looking for her. Her former employer had given them an anonymous tip. She became very good at her job, but experience had taught her that her employer could very well betray her shortly after completing jobs so she staid clear of the wealthy and powerful. One day in Voldar there were some mercenaries accepting members of every race and no questions asked, this had been her way out.

He got them a contract for the rest of the time they were to remain up north. They were to help the Injerin keep the orcs in check. The presence of a dark elf proved to be a problem though. She was not allowed into the city. As a result Azalahn and his group camped outside the walls.

Tales about the Centaurian mounted warriors and the Jhehellrhim with their crossbows inspired him to adopt a new tactic. An all out mounted force with crossbows, keeping their distance. It took a while to get the whole group mounted and trained, but it was well worth it. He didn't loose one man after that. In the beginning they were not as effective as they could be and quite a few battles ended in close melee especially when they encountered the warg riders. Then they started shooting the wargs first. With time they became better at shooting while mounted and they became a real menace for the orcs.
The time they were to stay up north came to an end and it was time to head back south. Azalahn knew that their leader expected them to be dead so he didn't lead them to Voldar but took a ship from the eastern shore heading for Carmalad, They ended up guarding caravans going to and from Carmalad. Azalahn had 18 warriors left out of the 30 his leader had left him with, he divided them into 3 squads and hired some replacements. He spent most of his time arranging jobs with for his men.

One day one of the squads reported back with wounded and people missing. The man leading them back was proud.
Despite being ambushed and outnumbered he had secured the caravan and only suffered minor casualties. Azalahn was furious. He canceled the contract negotiations he was in the middle of, took the available men and headed out while sending a courier with orders to the last squad about joining them immediately after reaching their destination. When they reached the site of the ambush the bodies of 2 of his men were missing. Azalahn and his unit followed the trail and after a few days the last squad joined them. His group was divided into 2 camps. With one side he was everything but popular, this was a waste of time and money. The other side admired him for caring about 2 missing men. In the end the scout found the highway men's hideout. The knight and the dandy were held prisoners, most likely for ransom. The camp was raided and burned down, and most of the highway men were captured or killed. Both prisoners were severely wounded. The young boy died a few days later. The knight Aria could be moved after a week. When they came back to town Azalahn spent most of their profit on medical care for Aria.

There were some of the other mercenaries that talked about getting their own tavern and quit the mercenary work, after some time Azalahn got hooked on the idea. The contract they had signed on for came to an end, some of them had been there for many years, but Azalahn had only signed on for 10 years. Azalahn and his original group went to Voldar to collect. The payout was poor indeed. Some of them let out comments about being better off as a beggars. Actually Azalahn didn't think the pay was that bad, but he had signed on as a leader, leadership had come naturally to him in fact this was easier than the theories his master had made him study and thus he got an officer's salary.
Azalahn was now 216 years old.

Retirement
Some of them staid in Voldar and the rest returned to Carmalad. Azalahn headed south, again living of the land and traveling with no particular aim. A year later he ended up in the city of Bardavos at the age of 217. He liked the place and decided to stay there for a while.

There was an old woman living on a farm just outside town, her husband had passed away a few years earlier, bad luck with the harvest had pushed one of their sons into seeking fame and glory as a mercenary but instead he had found death in a foreign land. Their other son had died from disease and she had never given birth to another child. Azalahn used to help her out every now and then. People said she was a witch practicing evil magic and that she had murdered her husband and son as part of a demonic deal. Indeed the old crone looked a bit scary, but there was nothing evil about her in fact she was a kind old lady. Azalahn parked his horse and staid at her farm when he was in town. In the spring he brought her seeds and in the late summer he helped her with the harvest. He liked working the land. At last it seemed he had found a home.

He ended up spending the next 5 years in Bardavos. He lived as a hunter and occasional mercenary/caravan guard. At first it was more mercenary but with time he learned what worked and what didn't work in this terrain that was quite different from the jungle he grew up in and after buying a Zeiphyrian Hunting Hound from the Quaelhoirhim elves he was able to live full time as a hunter. He had turned into somewhat of a zombie, his longing for his sister was tearing him apart, but he didn't sink back into the black pit he had crawled out of, instead he found peace in doing as much work as he could possibly get, the payment wasn't important but having something else than his sister to focus his mind on was.

One day he rescued a street kid from being bullied by some of the local ruffians, a few days later the same kid tried to pickpocket him. Azalahn decided to let the kid go, a few months later he caught the same kid again, this time Azalahn wanted to have a chat with the father so he dragged the kid across most of the town, in the end it turned out that the kid was an orphan.

The tavern
About a year ago when Azalahn was 222 the old woman died and she had made Azalahn the heir to all her property since she had no family to pas it on to and he was the only one that she knew. Azalahn was grateful but he had a problem, that turned out to put an end to his newborn farming ambition. He didn't know anything about farming at all. He thought about selling it but he didn't like that idea because in his head that would be the same as selling the kindness of the old lady. He squandered a few days away pondering what to do. In the end he decided to do nothing, about the farm but to go for it with the tavern and buy what was left of a small bar and warehouse, in what was supposed to be a bad neighborhood. It was obvious who the front of the local street gang was, but Azalahn was worried. What if this was only the enforcer of this area but part of a much larger and more powerful organization. Azalahn went looking for the little kid he had caught some time ago. This was just like a war he taught, and the two most important things to obtain victory were information about the enemy and an army strong enough to actually beat him. He didn't have an army but he had some ideas and first things first.

He got the kid to hire some other kids and gather information for him. It turned out that the local gang didn't have any true allies but only some live and let live agreements with other gangs, and they were only about 10 members, but one of them was a former assassin although never a good one. Azalahn went looking for some of the mercenaries from his former unit and that took him half a year, but time was the one thing he had plenty of. Most of them were still in Carmalad and Voldar. 4 of them ended up joining him. Thorgrim Blackbeard a dwarven veteran who wanted to retire to the quiet life, Elyssia Ilaról‘miés'efér the elven scout who had become quite disillusioned with mercenary life, Aria the Serphelorian Knight, whose respect Azalahn had won, and lastly the dark elf who simply had nowhere else to go. The dark elf had tried to get another contract but in vain then she had tried her luck in various shadowy jobs but with nobody wanting to hire her. She had been living of Petty theft in the city of Voldar for a few months then she had left the city. She had indeed been living like a hunted animal ever since, always on the run and living of the wilderness. They ran into her when leaving Voldar. Actually Elyssia noticed a ragged smelly creature following them. They had almost killed her. This wasn't the skilled assassin he knew but hunger had driven her into being careless. Azalahn had worked with her for years so he knew she could be trusted well enough and also when she should not be trusted. He took her in. Thorgrim, Elyssia and Aria didn't object they knew Azalahn would never turn anyone away, they were not exactly pleased with his decision but that sense of honour was a part of the man they had come to respect so much. Originally 3 more had joined him but they refused to work with the dark elf and left.

Azalahn opened the tavern and the gang made things really tough. Azalahn had intended to wait a few years before getting rid of them, but both Aria and Thorgrim insisted on doing something about it right away and they were both more than ready to chop of a head or two. In the end Azalahn got them to at least let him try to do it his way first. He had Elyssia talk with the officials and get him permission to clean the streets by whatever method he found necessary as long as it didn't cause any disturbance across the rest of the city. Human officials were indeed strange they took payment for allowing people to help them, Elyssia called it bribery. It wasn't expensive since everyone would like to get rid of them. Azalahn knew that the darkelf Elliane was a trained assassin and suspected she knew where to find one if not in this city then somewhere close. He gave her some money to hire one and take out the gang's assassin and abduct the little guy who was supposed to be the gang's only brain. Most people would be glad to get rid of them, but it was still killing and abduction so it would be best to have outsiders do it just in case. Azalahn had Aria beat the leader up and break some bones, the rest was easy.

Today
After cleaning up the streets business has dramatically improved, it is now a flourishing Tavern. Thorgrim stands in the bar and tells old war stories and he doesn't believe that Azalahn’s breastplate is made by elves, but claims it has to be made by dwarfs. Elyssia is the waiter and Aria is the bouncer, well occasionally there is a big fight and Azalahn has to assist her, but he normally lets her handle things alone since he knows she likes being the strong one who doesn't need help from any man. Azalahn has hired an extra waiter and has the street kid running errands for them, sharing gossip about the competition and general activity on the street that might be of importance to know. In exchange the kid has been promised a free meal every day. Usually it ends up with 3 meals a day and a place to sleep for nothing. Elliane works in the kitchen and once a year they travel to the Palelon forest, at least that is the plan, to buy the lucrative draw wine, Elliane has some business contacts there so they get it very cheap, well actually the agreement is that they return a good portion of the profit to the suppliers. If only looking at the wine sale and the expenses they have to go trough to get it then they barely break even, but the real profit is that it attracts customers. His dog seems to follow Elliane and Elyssia around most of the time, sometimes he isn't sure it is his dog anymore, probably because they feed it all the time.

Weapons:
Pair of Iurías. The pommel of both swords has the form of the head of the mythical unicorn covered in a thin layer of white gold. The eyes are a pair of gems. The blades have been inscribed with a prayer to the high goddess Ava.

Hornbow is plain looking, except that it is obviously very powerfull and made for an extremely strong man.

Platemail. The armor is not only top quality, it is also a beautiful piece of art. The breastplate has a poem engraved in ancient Styrash runes covering the whole left side and the face of a very beautyfull elfmad covering the hearth. The underarmor is made of Gossamer quilted in silk as the innermost layer, cotton padding and silk on the exterior.

My one and only
My first and my last
My eternal love

Avá has dreamed our bodies apart
Our soul and spirit to be shredded in two
But two parts of the one whole

To suffer
To bleed and weaken
To look into the abyss

One can not exist without the other
Together we triumph
Or together we sink into the abyss

Separated by thousands of miles
By hundreds of years
Our souls will always be one

Be it in life or be it in death
One day we will reunite
We will be one again

Even in separation.
Your hearth will be with me
And my hearth will be with you

Our hearths will guide us together again
They will heal our wounds
And sooth our pain

My one and only
My first and my last
My eternal love

Belongings:
Green Silk tunic made of the best materials money can buy, but really low quality tailoring. The tunic is his most highly prized possession. Pair of Jeweled daggers, tavern, violin, Farm and a some cash, cart, wagon and an old heavy warhorse that is living out the last years of it's natural lifespan. It is not the stallion it used to be, in fact over the last few years it has grown too weak to carry him in his full armor.

Familiars:
Draft horse.
He bought it a year ago, he doesn't really need it at the moment, but it makes things easier for both him and his staff to have a horse and wagon to help them when they need to restock.

Generally it is a gentle horse.

The horse is chestnut mare, is white around the hooves and a bit up the legs, and the mane is white as well.

The name is cór'jeín melór (night shadow)

A note for you on elves and aging. We have a wonderful little utility here called the Elving Aging Calculator which determines how old your character should be with relations to their appearance and skillset as well as how old they actually are. Elves stop aging the same as humans after a certain point but continue to learn.

So, you've got the age there listed as 45. Functionally this means you have the relevant skills and appearance of a 21 year old.

So, without further ado let's proceed to my favourite part: Disembowelment of your strengths and weaknesses Keep that figure in mind. 21, as well as the time you spend traveling around. You're not some hermit on a mountaintop to be practicing all the live-long day.

Quote

Strengths:
REMOVE SPACE

~~Important:~~ All strengths and weaknesses are technically important. If it's not important why are you bothering to write it down?
Extremely strong
SPACE
Very Agile
SPACE
He is exceptionally gifted with the Bastard sword and the ~~fighting style of paired swords.~~I hope you don't mean two bastard sword. A bastard sword (also called a "hand-and-a-half sword") is not the kind of weapon you should try to swing around two of at once. The reason they are called "bastards" is because they are not properly longswords (assume 40 inches or a meter in length of the entire sword) (which are shorter) but neither are they a two-handed sword (hence that "half" part). You could wield a bastard sword one handed (they've got a length of about 48 inches another fifth of a meter (121 cms) compared to a longsword), or use two hands to apply extra force but I think two of these swords at once would be impractical at best, dangerous to yourself at worst.

~~Hmmm wonder how good he would be after roughly 6 years in human terms.~~A human with six years of training would likely be floored by an elf taught by an elf. Elves take learning seriously, going much further in depth than a human student or teacher would. Keep the off-topic commentary out of the CD since it can get confusing.

Quite smart and has a tallent for making money.
SPACE
Has learned reading, writing, basic aritmic and knows a thing or two about logistics.

~~Not essential but I think they fit his background and I don't really want just the "Erwin Rommel on steroids in Santharia" concept~~Commentary not essential since it's not a strength or weakness. Save the writing for adding details to the strengths and weaknesses thanks.

Proficient with a pair of daggers, ~~he should have some training with more than just his weapon of choice, he can't use them all at once anyway.~~This one of the most vague strengths I have ever read. Here's the thing. Most medieval warriors would likely have trained with one, maybe two weapons. If you diversify your learning you do have the advantage of knowing less about more. That is to say someone who has only studied fighting with any ome weapon will know more than you, while you know more than one to a lesser degree.

Somewhat proficient with a bow.

Somewhat proficient with a an mace and shield. I've struck these last two off your CD for a reason. By this point you have added five weapons to the character (that includes fighting with two blades, though I've gone in-depth about that above).

He knows enough about hunting and herbs to at least survive in the wilderness most of the time. He spent some time in the Paelelon forrest so he would most likely pick up the basics of a skill or two. So, you wish to imply that because you were in a forest you suddenly know how distinguish poisonous plants from edible ones? Is this magic forest located in Santharia? Sarcasm aside, you're very vague about how you came by this skill and you need to explain more. Please don't say "but it's in the history". Strengths and weaknesses are supposed to have details, this does not.

~~Speaks Eophyrim fluently, and knows how to mix the poison normally used by the Eophyrim. His mother is Eophyrim~~ The Eophyrim do not have their own language. Elves on Sarvonia (that's the great big continent in the middle of those maps) speak a language called "Styrash". There may be individual variations between tribes (like the difference between french in Canada, french in France and french in Belgium or between Queen's English and American English) but it is the same language.

~~Is always wellcome in the Paelelon forrest.~~

His brother gave him juvels worth a small fortune when he left home.

Warhorse. See familiars and history/departure. See below

Hunting Dog. See familiars. Not going to fly I'm afraid. It doesn't matter if it's explained somewhere else, if you count it as a strength or weakness you have to explain how it is a strength or weakness in this section. No exceptions.

Weaknesses
Low self esteem, except as a military officer.

Doesn't quite have the wealth and income one would expect from a lord’s son. As a result most nobles would be most likely to consider him the spoiled son of a wealthy merchant or some other pretender unless they get the whole story (ain't gona happen)

Only a partial education and it is not very relevant to the life he is living now. He knows about tactics, formations and logistics, but he never learned the other and more peaceful duties of an officer, like how to train and motivate conscripts, the legal affairs that come up from time to time, social customs in the military etc and he knows next to nothing about politics.

He is considered a humiliation by his father and his sphere of influence

He is considered an obstacle blocking the romantic advances upon his sister, and quite a few young noblemen back home would like to get rid of him permanently. He knows it and as a result he is a bit paranoid.

Believes he has been separated from the love of his life forever, but she is the one he will love for the rest of his life, so he is incapable of starting over, as a result he is not truely happy and probably never will be.

He knows his father considers his mere existence a humiliation so he will never use his family name even when he could use it to gain some benefit.

If he should ever come into conflict with someone who knows his story back home then there is also the rumor about his romantic relationship with his sister.

He sticks to himself and has very few friends, the only true and long lasting friendships he has beyond the people at the inn are probably the draw hunters he used to work with, the son and daughter of house Ó'chón'cár’raín back home, who provided him with a master and a place to train with weapons.

He is dressed like a man of noble birth, but he is almost always wearing the same tunic and his armor clearly tells that he comes from a family with some resources. He also sticks to himself most of the time. The result is that many people consider him snobish and believe that he considers himself better than the rest of them because of his noble or wealthy family, so there are only a very few people in the middle class that really like him. Others consider him quite odd because he treats an old tunic almost like an irreplaceble treassure.

Has a drinking problem. Whenever life is just too much to bear he drowns his sorrows in a bottle and his taste for the drow wine can make this quite expensive.

~~His enormous size makes it almost impossible to disguise himself if he should need to do so.~~

He is easily remembered. Enormous Injerin with black hair and the build of an Eophyrim, so if he meets an enemy from 20 years ago he will be recognized instantly. You assume people have that kind of memory. I've struck out the "weakness" above because it overlaps completely with this one and wastes space. It's the same weakness.

~~Just in case we need some more weaknesses.~~Commentary is not necessary. And please don't try to pad out your strengths and weaknesses. The mods are literate people and this sort of thing doesn't get by them. See after the end of the quote for more details on this.
Generally reacts coldly towards mages. He considers them arogant and cruel unless they prove him wrong.

~~It is clear that he is a foreigner if that should come into play, and his command of the Entronian language is limited.~~Same as the elvish language, humans on Sarvonia (for the most part, there are some exceptions) and within Santharia (of which Enthronia is a province) as a whole speak a language called "Tharian" which we assume looks and sounds like english but has it's own sayings and indeed slang.

He is always carefull about not revealing too much about himself so otherwise potential friends will sence that his trust only goes soo far and in return their's will also be limited. In short it takes him longer than normal to get people's trust.

You might notice that I've ignored your weaknesses for the most part. This does not mean that they work. It means that I decided to skip to the bottom because I need to explain how this section works. Strengths and weaknesses are not balanced simply because you have five on one side and five on the other. If I put five feathers and five bricks on either end of a scale, it would topple like a badly built house of cards. Strengths and weaknesses have to be balanced measure for measure. If you have five really "strong" strengths you need equally debilitating weaknesses (it doesn't matter if it's four or forty- wait. Yes it does, forty weaknesses would be torture to go over. Don't go over seven.) to balance them. You're balancing so that your strengths and weaknesses come out even or with the weaknesses on the slightly heavier side.

So, how do you determine what is a "good" strength or weakness? We look at strengths and weaknesses based on the idea that they should be compared to the average peasant. This imaginary John Everyman does not know how to use magic, any sort of weapon, can't read, write or count higher than the number of fingers and toes he has. He probably lives somewhere and farms carrots or potatoes or something. A strength is therefore something that the average peasant could not do. This includes fighting. Especially fighting. A weakness is something that would even out against the average peasant. For obvious reasons weaknesses like "doesn't have a ranged attack" or "can't do magic" don't work because the average peasant can't do those things either.

Spell check! I can't tell you how important this is to CD mods and other people who will comment on this CD! Santharia has a lot of weird names in it (as you've doubtless seen) so if you accidentally write "juvels" instead of "jewels" (you've done this) someone might have to go look it up to make sure they didn't miss what on earth a "juvel" might be (I did this). It makes our lives easier which makes your life easier.

Last point: Strengths and weaknesses have to be elaborated upon. This is to make sure that the character remains balanced by placing things like limits on the strengths and making sure they play along with the weaknesses. You say you're extremely strong, but there's no indication as to what that means. Can you lift a car? Consider that for all of your strengths. Don't try to weasel your way out of it by using terms like "moderately and somewhat" and hoping that counts. At leasttwo sentences to describe it would be a good idea.

Hopefully this helps.