i am asking about your ocs
give me a yap about one of your favorites >:3
i’m gonna tell you about Prince Lucien Aetheart. i figure you’ll appreciate this, because he’s from the cometverse like Knight-Commander Novus and Vela, whose fight i yapped about all those months ago
so, Prince Lucien. he’s an aethling, one born of noble blood in the kingdom of Extola.
now, the line of royal succession is a curious thing in this kingdom. you see, a thousand years ago, comets fell to earth. comets are eldritch horrors. they’re kaiju, natural disasters, CR 20 monsters. they’re unnatural. just being around them causes some Color Out of Space type shit.
as you can image, the cometfall invasion was an apocalypse for humanity. in the midst of that war for existence, there was a minor lord who would later rename himself Cyrex. he fought (survived, rather) the worst of the cometfall. Cyrex was an enchanter of mediocre skill, and he should have died like thousands of his betters.
but Cyrex had a wife: Uluna, a descendant of the moonsingers from a distant isle. she awakened a innate enchantment seemingly purpose-built for fighting comets. so Uluna became the hero of humanity, banishing the comets with moonsong
and Cyrex capitalized on his position as the husband (owner, almost) of the Uluna. he declared himself a king, and waged war through the post-apocalyptic medieval wasteland until his kingdom encompassed Extola.
with access to the greatest enchanters of a whole continent, and with all the worshipful gratitude directed toward Uluna, the king and queen were blessed with the finest boons of lifecanting there was.
but Cyrex had seen the worst of the cometfall. not only did he cling to life, he needed to become more, push beyond the limits of humanity until he might bear to think of a comet without trembling.
and, to make this long tangent short, he became more. so much more.
you see, the king of extola cannot die, and has ruled for over a thousand years.
thus, Lucien Aetheart was born his great, great, great (dozens omitted) grandson. he had the finest tutors — because refinement and sophistication is all a prince can aspire to. one of the first things taught to him is that, like some forty odd prince and princess before him, he will never sit on the throne.
Lucien’s parents died when he was six, and his aloof, dismissive tutors are the closest thing to family he grew up with. his parents died, and he would die, and what would any of it matter in the end?
he looks at the throne adorned with sanctified skulls, and decides no. he will be immortal, one day. he will be king. and if that means treason — well, subtlety and sophistication is what a prince can aspire to.
as a sidenote, i’ll briefly mention the Heirs of the Mother Void. this is a cult borne of the insight of Brother Lychon. Lychon was a cunning enchanter tragically cut down in his prime by his former best friend and burried in the ground. then he saw the light of the mother void, and rose again. “Death ain’t shit”, as he always says
you can understand why Lucien would be interested in a group — but lucien doesn’t, not at first. the heirs are secretive. in Book One of Aurora Moonrise, Lucien will be traveling the land in search of leads for the Heirs’ operations
this is how he crosses paths with the protagonist, a girl named Aurora. a few years younger than him, with no skill at enchanting worth speaking off — and yet she wields a masterwork crystal sword with perfect attunement. suffice it to say, Lucien’s interest is piqued.
throughout the second arc of the book, Lucien would training Aurora, as well as teaching the peasant girl noble manners. this puts him at odds with Morri, Aurora’s first friend, a girl born to a bandit with nothing but disdain for the nobility.
i wont recount what happens in detail, because this isn’t about them :p
but i will spill some ink discussing what the arc reveals about Lucien’s character. first of all, his personal enchantment is called ⸢Three Pledges Under Fire⸥
you see, he has an enchanted ring. with the hand wearing the ring (or any tool held in the hand, such as a weapon) whenever he touches something, he can ‘tag’ it.
- he maintains a sense/awareness of all active tags.
- these tags are otherwise undetectable and have no effect on the tagged object.
- (in fact, tagging an object cannot have an effect — weapons will deal no damage)
- each tag is one third of a spell. he must decide the spell when the tag is placed, and cannot change it later.
- he can only have 3 tags at a time. if he already has 3 tags, he may choose one to revoke at will.
- an object can only have one type of spell tag.
finally, the upshot of all of this. if he manages to place three tags on an object, he may snap his fingers and the spell takes place, exponentially more powerful, or with a dramatic new effect.
some examples of use: - he lands a sword swing against you — yet it’s oddly dull and light, as if you were simply hit with a big stick. then again nothing, and finally come the third, you think you have nothing to fear from his blade. then he snaps his fingers and your arm falls off - he throws himself out the way of your attack, falling to a crouch and tapping the ground. circling around, he overcommits to an attack, swinging downward till his hand touches the ground. you think nothing of it. and one last time, he taps the ground. still, nothing at all happens! you laugh and press the offense, swords clashing and sparking. when he maneuvers you over that spot, snaps his fingers, and the ground explodes beneath you - he’s trying these above strats, and others. he parries your sword and there’s a telltale glow of him placing a tag. what’s he planning to do with your sword? in between placing other, he taps the bracer on his arm. but you’re pressing the offense hard enough he can hardly afford the distraction. he fumbles, you get an opening, and he tries to block it with his arm (ha. it’ll hurt regardless) — and he snaps his finger, and his arm resists you as solidly as a brick wall
as you might gather, the intent for him is to be something of a hypertactical chessmaster.
he’s prideful, though. do you recall the infodump last time about gravitas loci and how powerful it’s supposed to be? surely something like that would be uncontroversial tool in everyone enchanter’s toolbox. lucien disagrees:
Gravitas isn’t the culmination of enchanting in the slightest; it’s a dead end, a distraction. It’s a terrible idea, through and through — you’re relying on something outside of yourself as the source of your power. Something completely callous and inhuman, on top of that. Do you think the earth cares about you? Its only will is for all things to fall. Do you know what happens to people who lose themselves in earth-resonance? We call them gemfiends.
so, what does Lucien think the real pursuit of enchanting is, then?
this quote is a bit of a chonky one, so i’m hiding behind a expandable thingy.
Lucien’s Yap
Out in the gardens, Lucien walks with a rapier held out, gesturing as he lectures. “No doubt, you’ve come to understand that the bedrock of enchantment is will, the intent to use a tool with vigorous effort. The common enchanter will tell you the key to refining your will is understanding your tool, even going so far as to urge you to craft it yourself. After all, latent within the tool itself are those qualities an enchantment can amplify, or spells provoke. I cannot call them fools for this, but this parochial wisdom neglects what constitutes true, powerful enchanting.”
Aurora frowns. “Will, intent, and focus. My teacher said all enchantment—”
“I’m sure she was well-intentioned. But it’s common advice for a reason. You can sell foci. You can teach mere intent to anyone. But will? What is will?”
“Great enchanters have great wills,” Aurora echoed lamely.
“People speak of it as if it were innate, as if the masters were born with willpowers inscribed in their destiny. The reason no one instructs will is because at its core, improving the will is painfully introspective, and terribly philosophical. Your will is what drives you. When you swing your sword, it is not enough to want to swing it. It is not enough, even, to want to cut your opponent. Cutting your opponent down must be the culmination of the very essence of your being. The most powerful enchantment is woven with a will that would falter no sooner than your will to live itself would fail you.”
“You have to give it your all,” Aurora summarizes. “But then, you’d never want to run from any fight, if your will never ever faltered.”
“Power is knowing yourself. You must know why you fight, and pick only those battles you must fight. There is a untold strength in being unfaltering. Have you heard of the Ultima Canto, Aurora? It is the greatest spell an enchanter can ever weave. The distillation of their will into one absolute truth, so powerful even eldritch spirits cannot violate it. But there is no way to ever speak the Ultima Canto without knowing oneself. So tell me, Aurora, what do you stand for?”
another thing worth knowing about lucien is that, like all nobles, he is a lifecanter, capable of healing the sick. this drives some of Aurora’s initial interest in him; she wants to know about lifecanting because Aurora’s first teacher had a terminal case of fantasy mentor disease and died in the first arc bc they couldn’t cure her.
(it turns out lifecanting wouldn’t have been able to save her — the disease that killed the mentor was also anime mom disease what took Lucien’s own parents from him, even though they had all the riches in the land.)
anyway, after some climatic drama, Aurora and Morri run away one morning before the break of dawn, just ahead of a court ruling that they are wanted as accomplices to a spirit enthralling humans unlawfully.
in the process, though, the pair wind up killing a baron, and this is how they cross paths with Lucien.
King Cyrex (he insists the prince call him ‘father’) knows that Lucien was there with the baron was killed and let the girls get away with it. so the king tells him to fix his mess, and bring them to justice
by now, the dryad maiden Kheimon has bound Aurora with her vines, and she is en route for the capital — but Morri still remains at large. so Lucien sets out on horseback to track down this wannabe bandit
i don’t think i’ve laid the ground work to properly hype this fight up. Morri is a cute character, i think. sidekick/rival vibes, Aurora fights her in one of the early chapters, defeats her, realizes their both grieving dead parents, and so she asks her to join the party.
she spends the rest of the first arc terribly unsung; Aurora’s mentor dislikes and is suspicious of her, refusing to teach her anything. we get some hints that Morri has unrevealed depths to her — she has a strong affinity for communing with spirits, and knows a thing or two about brewing potions. also, she has a hunting dog familiar made out of tree bark. a timberwolf :3
(actually, have i mentioned she’s a wolfgirl? cuz that’s a thing. dog ears, fluffy tail, and claws)
but there’s something big i’m glossing over. why is aurora’s mentor suspicious of her? how is she so capable of communing with spirits? is killing one random baron really enough to get a warrior-prince sent to hunt you down?
who was Morri’s mother, anyway?
she was a witch, and she taught her daughter bloodcanting, a vile art considered a high crime by the crown — treason against human flesh.
you see, Morri uses blood sacrifice to commune with spirits and empower her attacks. she was sandbagging in her fight against Aurora, and after that she didn’t use much of her true power, at first first because Aurora’s mentor was always watching, and then once she came to care about Aurora, she didn’t want to offend her heroic sensibilities.
but now? Morri’s on her own, and Lucien really pisses her off.
so just this once, we see Morri go all out. using blood magic to tap into her canine nature, with magic claws and fangs and windswift speed.
it’s not enough to instantly win — Lucien has studied the blade all his life — but it’s close, and isn’t that embarassing? Lucien is a prince of the realm, and here was a lowborn bandit girl keeping pace with him.
a major reveal happens in this fight. remember how bloodcanting is treason against human flesh, but every noble is a lifecanter? what’s the difference between the two?
what’s the difference between Lucien and Morri?
Lucien says:
The difference? You’re right, it just comes down to wants in your veins, I suppose. I’m allowed to do anything, because I’m noble. You aren’t, because you’re nothing.
there’s character development for morri here too, but again, this isn’t about her. without that, it does make the conclusion to this fight feel a bit on the nose, but hey, i’m just yapping here
Morri goes:
Remember what you told Aurora, about will? Who do you think has the stronger will, between the two of us? To me, mister prince, you are everything I despise. But to you?
I’m nothing.
all of this serves to give Lucien his first major character development. on the verge of being killed by a demihuman and witch, he awakens.
with rapier-blade he slashes a circle in the ground and expands it. truly, he’s been reduced to chosing one embarrassment or the other — or was it an embarassment? what foolish pride it was to think he could ever achieve power without relying on anyone else.
after all, what’s a king without a kingdom?
with that thought, Lucien casts his Gravitas Loci for the first time.
…and he still doesn’t capture or kill Morri ;p
she escapes — she’s forced to run away — so at least he spares himself the embarassment of being bested by her.
Lucien drops from the narrative mainstage after that; this is Aurora’s story, after all. the climax of book one happens, and then there’s extended epilogue chapters showing what happens to various characters.
namely, it’s revealed that, after failing to capture Morri, the disappointed king strips the prince of honors and sends him down to fight on the frontlines fo the ongoing war to colonize the southern continent, Tinen.
thus kickstarting Lucien’s pov arc, “Salvation by Fire”. now, the notes i have for this section don’t hold up (originally, he was going to be placed under the command of Novus, but what happens here doesn’t line up with Novus’s later characterization, specifically his refusal to use ⸢Meteor Heart Explosion Pulse⸥ until Vela forces him too.)
but i should probably get on with what happens this arc
some hardass commander (not Novus) is trying to whip Lucien into shape, and failing. the prince has been sent to lead a squad of rookies to wet their feet attacking an enemy site. they venture into a forest; Lucien is scouting out ahead while others from his squad makes camp.
in the woods, Lucien encounters a girl younger than him. the girl spots him, and runs away scared, hiding a nearby bush. one of his soldiers, also scouting, comes to him, asking if Lucien saw anything. he thinks, and choses to say he saw nothing.
Lucien keeps scouting till he finds the enemy site his superior told him to raid. except he looks closer, and realizes it’s not a military base at all — it’s just a village. it’s just civilians.
he returns to camp and tells his squad he had no luck finding the base. while he’s keeping watch, he’s almost nodding off, but catches movement — it’s the girl, so desperately hungry she’s willing to raid a soldier’s camp for food.
Lucien’s confused. don’t they have farmland or whatever peasants do?
they did. then the extolan bastards burnt and salted it all.
luciens feeds the girl and tells her to be careful out there.
she laughs. there’s no way to be careful with extolan soldiers this close.
anyway, lucien returns to his superiors claiming he completely failed the mission assigned to him. the disappointment and discipline that results is obvious. worse, he soon overhears a crystal ball conversation between the commander and the king. king straight up doesnt care if Lucien lives or dies at this point. if he keeps being more trouble than he’s worth, just kill him lol.
as you can imagine, instead of sleeping that night the prince just stares into space, gripped with despair. his life’s forfeit. ‘immortal one day?’ ‘king one day?’ what a joke.
it’s his turn for night watch before he gets a lick of sleep. an hour or two in, he smells the acrid stench of smoke. the forest is on fire. he makes no effort to warn anyone to evacuate. what would be the point? what does any of this matter?
maybe it’s the sleep deprivation, maybe it’s the callous disregard of his “father” upseting him more then he realizes, but Lucien sees the distantly approach flames coming to consume the forest, and envies it. envy for the flames, or for the forest?
either way, he approaches. skin-slicking heat, suffocating smoke, but he marches through it.
(if he dies here, what does it matter?)
a chapter would end there, followed by pov of the the girl. recounting how she had overheard lucien lying to his squad about her and helping her, intercut with impassionated rants about how much her life sucks and it’s the fault of the evil kingdom. after Lucien tells her to be careful, she instead keeps poking around — there’s almost nothing left in her village to go back to.
like that, she gets captured by soldiers. taken to a secret tent far from the main camp, and interrogated with spilled blood and screams. she contemplates whether starving in the dirt would be better than this.
and then the commander enters the tent. the ignorant girl was no use to their information-gathering efforts — but the girl will give them information. in the form of experimental data. you see, in secret the commander’s been working to achieve something big
as the commander takes a knife and inscribes runes deep into the girl’s flesh, he makes small talk. rants, rather. one of the things that particularly vexes him as of late is the prince. the sheer lack of ambition in that boy is an insult. content to be a pampered prince, unwilling to put in the work to achieve true greatness. he can’t imagine living life in the shadow of giants and not trying to shine larger
which brings us to why this guy is vivisecting this girl. as you can imagine, he’s stuck in a shadow of his own — Knight-Commander Novus is the metric by which all commanders are found wanting. this is its own insult. the spell that made Novus so great is one that man refuses to ever cast again.
thus, the commander has been attempting to replicate what Novus was afraid of — ⸢Meteor Heart Explosion Pulse⸥. he’s going to turn her into a enchanted object.
the commander knows Novus’s spell is one that somehow uses lifeforce to fuel an explosion, but the details elude him. by the time he finishes carving, it’s all quiet; he’s run low on rants, and she’s run low on screams.
now, all that’s left is for the soldiers to plant his new bomb near the enemy base, detonate and watch the lightshoq. he regard the girl with smile. “thank you, dear. this might be the most help any of you people have ever been. you’ll go down in history for this.”
and in that moment, with those words and that smug smile, all of the hatred for Extola comes rushing back in a maelstorm. and then…
it’s incorrect to say that this commander turned her into an enchanted object — life itself is spell, and every beat of the heart enchants the flesh and every breathe in a incantation. sure, it was the commander’s enchantment now carved onto her body — but it was her body.
fear shines bright in his eyes now — not fear, fire. the spell had activated, under her will, and blazes out in a deadly wreathe of flames now. his flesh is first so much sweat and then so much bubbling fat. he’d run low on rants, but he still had plenty of screams left.
and although the girl had no screams left, she had plenty to rant about. every indignity forced upon her people. every brag and whinge the commander spoke now twisted againsts him. every insult he had for Lucien, and yet that boy might be the most help any of you bastards has ever been. “you wouldn’t have less of a heart if i ripped it out of your chest.”
hatred crackles around the girl, and power newly awakened and surging. she’s cackling mania, and she hardly notices that her tormentors had become piles of ash. years starving, helping, clawing at the dirt, and now she can feast on all the raw energy of conflagration.
the forest goes up in flames — and in the end, she becomes exactly what the commander hoped to create.
her village lay in that forest. as she becomes an elemental of ever-spiraling flame, she can’t stop burning any more than you could stop shivering in the cold.
she’s all intuition and knee-jerk associations of thought. so when her village erupts, when everyone she knows and loves is a chorus of screams, she thinks of the soldiers she’d burnt to a crisp and how they screamed.
ultimately, she’s but crackling hatred and exhilerating power. the maddening part of becoming a weapon to destroy her people is that it’s so fucking satisfying.
and then so much of the forest is alight that there’s so little left to feast upon. she’s peaked and coming down. she’s hatred — not crackling but crumbling like wood ashes in horror of what she’s done: self-hatred.
and then that boy is standing there, staring into her flames, into her.
if she could immolate her own flesh and blood, she could certainly burn another extolan bastard who’s sole virtue was not being the literal worst.
except her family screamed and fled like her tormenters. Lucien doesn’t scream nor move.
he stares, and his visage of despair looks so much like the expression on that face she once had
the girl-turned-elemental burns herself out, and at length, she discovers that she does, in fact, still have a body: a skeleton disfigured by runes and caked in ash. she’s not human, anymore, but nor is she a fiend. she’s something known in theory and legend.
comet spirits were the light of stars caged in ice. nature spirits were the light of one sun sprouted from air. (elusive weather spirits were but nature spirits with monk-like abnegation)
a wildfire spirit is the light of lives lost to the pyre.
(the first life, of course, being her own)
Lucien had lost everything; his king forsook him, his squad is dead, and soon he’ll be too, if he reports back admitting he let this all happen. when the wildfire spirit speaks to him, tells him who she was and what was done to them with a numb voice, he’s outrage.
in that moment, his despair wanes, eclipsed by an emotion he’d never felt before, and never this strongly. once again, the wildfire is pained to see his visage mirror her own; he hates.
but he won’t hate face down in the dirt. the general thought he lacked ambition? no, he had a goal.
he looks back at the wildfire spirit, and holds out his hand.
“let’s burn that kingdom to the fucking ground.”
so, after all that payoff, i’ll end with more teasing.
remember how i said i wanted to talk about Lucien Aetheart? yeah, i lied. i actually wanted to talk about Myrka of the Mother Void, but, when i’m 4k words in and this isn’t even what i planned to do today, i think i can be excused. before getting from here to Myrka, we’d need to talk about Lilianna and Kheimon and Erato.
if it makes for a better defense, there’s also the fact that Book Two is a mess and needs a rewrite, or at least some kind of organization, and what ultimately happens to Lucien is deeply entangled with that plot.
if you read all that… wow, you really did want the yapping. thanks for bearing with me. sorry and/or you’re welcome
<3