A singular chilling howl of a wolf broke Tesselth's thoughts as he pulled his gaze away from the fire to look around him. Squinting, he peered into the now seemingly black undergrowth around his camp but found nothing, the small amount of light from the moon failing to aid in revealing anything of note to the ranger. Nothing stirred in the forest shadows, and the usual noise of the night was suddenly gone, leaving the crackle of flames as the loudest sound in his ears. Furrowing his brow and growling under his breath, the wolfish Cimmerian returned to staring into the fire, only to find it had gone from orange, to blood red.
"You have betrayed the Dead Heart, Tesselth Featherstride...." hissed a man's voice from behind him.
An wave of intense heat seemed to engulf him as he turned to find three robed figures standing before him, the trees around them burning in the same unnatural red flames. From a distance, one would easily mistake them for pilgrims, or perhaps clergy, or even fragile wielders of the occult powers. The wickedly curved greatswords sheathed upon their backs, with an all too familiar rune etched upon the metal of the blades, marked them as heralds... of the demon lord Xotli.
"So the soulless puppets think they're what remains of our old order... Truly the world is filled with fools at times," replied Tesselth finally, folding his arms across his chest.
"Sssilence!" screeched the woman of the trio, "You do not have the right include yourself among us anymore! You-"
"Oh shut -up- you shrieking harpy," muttered Tesselth as he unslung his crossbow in one quick motion and fired a bolt right smack into her head, the force of the blunt tipped bolt stunning her, sending her staggering backwards and unable to avoid the second bolt that impaled her throat. The next escort, hooded and masked, yelled something underneath his disguise and charged at Tesselth, greatsword swinging forth in a full forced lunge. Sidestepping, Tesselth dodged the attack, swiftly bringing his crossbow up to block the followed swing, the heated metal digging deep into the crafted wood of his weapon. With a grunt, the Cimmerian twisted his arms hard, wrenching the sword free from his Stygian foe and tossed the embedded steel away with his crossbow.'
Grinning wolfishly as he observed the man's momentary shock, Tesselth wasted no time putting all his strength behind a knee to the groin. As the Stygian doubled over, sound of steel leaving the scabbard was the last thing he heard as a sword separated head from body. Looking up, he found the first herald frowning deeply, yet having not moved from his original spot.
"Looks like you'll need a new dog," said Tesselth as he kicked the rolling head toward the remaining herald.
"And you will need a new heart when I'm through with you, northerner! Xotli, grant me strength oh great lord!" yelled the Stygian in reply, his arms raised to the sky in worship.
"Shit!" cursed Tesselth as he recognised the ritual, flinging his short sword with all his might at the herald. A small explosion filled the ranger's vision however before he could witness the impact, and as the light faded, he found himself swearing under his breath once more for his damned luck. The Stygian was gone and so was his blade, in his stead was a dark teal skinned demon. The original weak human flesh replaced by demonic muscle, as strong as an ox and as tough as rock. Gurgling in a foreign and most likely occult tongue, the demon lumbered forward, scaly mutated hands working the greatsword with uncanny grace in a series of fanciful flourishes.
Glancing at the trees around him, an idea came to the Cimmerian once again in his time of need, a need to escape death's cold clutches and fight another day. His crossbow was out of commission but he still possessed his bolts. Pulling two from his belt quiver, he rushed the demon, letting a wordless battlecry roar forth from his lungs. Caught slightly offguard by the Cimmerian's courage, or perhaps stupidity, the demon halted it's advance and brought its blade up to defend itself. Tesselth jumped forward, and appeared to be ready to strike downward with the two bolts clutched in his hands, but had timed the jump so that he landed early and slid beneath the menacing greatsword and past the demon's feet, slamming the two bolts into one foot. Trustng in fate, Tesselth spared no glances back to even check if the demon had truly been pinned by his attack, but kept moving, running around the edge of the camp and gaining speed. Then, without warning, the ranger leaped onto the side of a tree, pushing himself off the trunk in a mad horizontal lunge.
Time seemed to slow briefly as Tesselth flew through the air toward his enemy, arms outstretched and ready to end this confrontation. His heart beating just a little less quickly as the demon was indeed struggling to remove the bolts pinning its leg to the spot, its weapon laying discarded on the ground near it. Too late did it notice the flying Cimmerian, its arms flailing madly as Tesselth's connected with its head, grasping it; fingers bleeding as they tried to tear into flesh that broke arrows and often swords. The combined strength and momentum as Tesselth curled his body in an arc, at first cracked the demon's neck, and then proceeded to tear it clean off its shoulders.
The ranger lay there for a while afterwards, breathing hard in his exhaustion. "Fucking godsdamned demon bootlickers... Bah!" he muttered outloud and to no one in particular. Pushing himself to his feet, he surveyed the carnage and eyed the sword still embedded in his crossbow. Placing one foot on the ruined weapon, he pulled the blade free and looked it over. It was time to start anew.
"I tire of this nonsense," he thought outloud as always did. He pulled the scabbard off the headless man it once belonged to and wore it, sheathing his new weapon slowly. As he turned to leave, he was again faced by people, this time, clad in the familiar style of leather armour Cimmerians wore. They were shamans, all of them, most of them grim faced aside from who appeared to be their leader. He knew her well, they often fought, with him running in fact. She was smiling now, arms folded across her bosom. Without a word, she signaled for the rest of her party to move out. She remained, speaking quietly, her voice reminding Tesselth of a gentle stream beside his home village in Cimmeria.
"What will you do now?" she asked.
"I don't know to be honest," he replied, shrugging. "Find something worth fighting for I suppose. Something not involving crazed Stygian cultists perhaps."
The woman smiled faintly, "Whatever, or whoever it is, Tess, I wish you luck. Try to stay out of trouble hm?"
"Hah, I will try, old friend, I will try."
With that, she turned and left as quietly as she had come.
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Okay! Sorry about the little scene, just thought it'd be nice for you guys to see how I roll in RP?
This is Tesselth! He was once, yes, a Ranger, and also part of an order... a cult even, of the demon Xotli! They were like minded individuals who had encounters with the demon in their lives, and served him willingly. Their goal? To pull the kingdom out of chaos by elimnating who they believed to be the culprit: King Conan. Order out of chaos was their motto. Though funnily enough, they would go to great lengths and commit atrocities if need be to create that order, such as murdering a hero like Conan. (If anyone's familiar with the Forgotten Realms series, they are most akin to the followers of Bane in terms of behaviour and dogma)
How did Tesselth come to follow Xotli? Well, I think it's best if I leave SOME stuff for you guys to find out ingame via interaction with the wolfy Conquerer
I can explain however that he signed up with the Dead Heart cult because he felt Conan had betrayed the Cimmerian people by remaining in Aquilonia to aid foreigners by becoming King instead of returning to help vanquish the Vanaheim invaders plauging his true homeland. He would rather see Conan dethroned and sent back to Cimmeria rather than killed, but he knew it was a slim chance that Conan would agree so readily.
Of course, there were many in Cimmeria who did not place so much blame in Conan, and felt Tesselth's actions as... misguided? A group of shamans, led by an old friend from his village began to hunt him and try to "persuade" him to change his course of action, by force if necessary. Tesselth put up with it however, for he saw no fault in his beliefs. On one occasion though, as he dueled with the shaman leader, she managed to get him to realise that he too was betraying Cimmeria by following Xotli and his little cult. He had left Cimmerian lands to join a band of demon possessed Stygians and hunt down another Cimmerian... How was he so different from a man who left to become king amongst outsiders? Not very much really, perhaps even worse. That same day, news of the cult's mistress's disappearance spread like wildfire amongst the Dead Heart members, and even their enemies. Infighting erupted through the ranks and the cult was thrown into chaos over who would lead. Tesselth took this chance and left, disappearing into the dark forestry of the Lacheish Plains, a lone wolf once more. Feeling pangs of guilt, regret and having no purpose to define his existance. He's determined to not just be another mindless killer however, and continues to search.
The young Cimmerian is soft-spoken for the most part, but prone to sudden bursts of anger, be it from jealousy, witnessing injustice in the world or sometimes even in pride that he is different from those around him in some way that he has trouble explaining to others. He's often found muttering to himself, thinking outloud or simply staring off into the distance, lost in his thoughts. Otherwise, you may catch him glancing at you with his unsmiling and grim face. He is however quick to smile at amusement or upon seeing friends and allies. Described as being "dark" by childhood friends, he retains this air of solemn and seriousness to this day, yet behind what appears to be a cold, unfeeling warrior is the warm, beating heart of someone who would pledge true loyalty to one who he respects and deems worthy of his trust.
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Now for the player, haha
Name's James, I'm 18 and currently living in sunny Singapore, though I study overseas in the UK. I'm only half asian as I've got English blood from dear old mum, which may explain my use of English at times. XD I'm an aspiring writer though I'm planning to do a degree in Archaeology because I love history and love even moreso the idea of hands-on work involving history
I do love my games though and am passionate about them!
Won't post pics for now but maybe in the future
Sorry, somewhat shy when it comes to that.
Anyways! Glad to be part of this guild and hope to have fun RPing alongside all of you! See you ingame!
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Subject: Tesselth (James) 
Sun Jul 26, 2009 3:49 pm
Great story.