Lechies Delrio
Lechies is an adventuring wizard of the Greendawn Academy who spends her days either hunting the realm for knowledge or providing assistance to beleaguered citizenfolk. A demon is bound to her soul, its power serving as a battery to bolster the weak body she was born with, thus allowing her to live a relatively normal life where she was once expected to die young.
Appearance
Lechies is a fair-skinned woman with a mage’s typical slender build. Her hair is a deep red, straight and long; she ties it back with a simple length of cord. A prominent scar runs down her right eye, courtesy of a bandit’s knife. Other small burn scars litter her hands, reminders of accidents during her wizard training.
Her attire tends toward the simple and practical, well-suited for long days of travel. Lechies prefers her clothes in some shade of blue or white. Her cloak’s clasp is wrought silver with small sapphires in the shape of a Metisan hammer.
She wears no armor, though her gloves are woven with protective sigils that grant her hands minor magical resistance. Her staff is ash wood reinforced by a lightweight metal alloy and alchemically treated for durability. It serves as her conduit for spellcasting.
A large magic seal composed of a complex pattern of sigils is tattooed across her chest, centered over her heart. A second, smaller seal is located at the base of her neck.
Her attire tends toward the simple and practical, well-suited for long days of travel. Lechies prefers her clothes in some shade of blue or white. Her cloak’s clasp is wrought silver with small sapphires in the shape of a Metisan hammer.
She wears no armor, though her gloves are woven with protective sigils that grant her hands minor magical resistance. Her staff is ash wood reinforced by a lightweight metal alloy and alchemically treated for durability. It serves as her conduit for spellcasting.
A large magic seal composed of a complex pattern of sigils is tattooed across her chest, centered over her heart. A second, smaller seal is located at the base of her neck.
Skills and Abilities
Formal education
Lechies was privately tutored at home during her childhood and later completed her wizardry training at the celebrated College of Elbion. She knows her letters and numbers well, has a robust understanding of the cultural, social, and political workings of Liadain -- though less so of other regions -- and can navigate most academic and arcane texts without too much headache.
Outdoorsmanship
Years of travel up and down the continent have furnished Lechies with the knowledge to survive days in the wilderness. She is accustomed to sleeping outdoors, foraging safely, reading the weather, conducting basic first aid, and defending herself from wild beasts as well as highwaymen.
Lechies was privately tutored at home during her childhood and later completed her wizardry training at the celebrated College of Elbion. She knows her letters and numbers well, has a robust understanding of the cultural, social, and political workings of Liadain -- though less so of other regions -- and can navigate most academic and arcane texts without too much headache.
Outdoorsmanship
Years of travel up and down the continent have furnished Lechies with the knowledge to survive days in the wilderness. She is accustomed to sleeping outdoors, foraging safely, reading the weather, conducting basic first aid, and defending herself from wild beasts as well as highwaymen.
Lechies specializes in a branch of College magic that relies on geometric arcane arrays to give invocations their structure and purpose. These arcane arrays are supported by mathematical and scientific calculations for maximum efficiency, relieving some -- though not all -- of the burden of spellcraft from the wizard. Upon shaping a spell, glyphs form in midair in bright, glowing designs of size and power best suited for the magic in question. The glyphs dissipate upon the spell’s release. Given their flashiness, geometric arrays are a poor tool for subterfuge.
As with most common schools of magic, the spells Lechies wields feed off of her stamina. Much like how strenuous physical activity can injure even a trained soldier, too much strain on her magic reserves can cause Lechies to collapse from exhaustion or suffer internal bleeding.
Her known arcane arrays are documented in a tome that Lechies keeps among her belongings. She doesn't need her tome in most situations, but may consult it if tasked with solving a particularly unusual problem.
Transmutation: Changing the physical properties of target objects or persons. This can be temporary or permanent, depending on the spell. As examples of temporary effects, Lechies can grant skin the hardness of steel; alter one’s throat and lungs to allow for breathing water; turn the ground so soft that enemies feel like they’re moving through sand. For permanent effects, Lechies might deconstruct a portion of brick wall into its base materials, or twist a lock so that its intended key no longer fits.
Conjury: The creation of something out of naught but raw magic. Typical uses include arcane rope for binding foes, shooting arcane missiles, or the shaping of barriers to guard against physical or magical assault. Such spells require Lechies to actively channel them, else the effect ends. For this reason, conjury is especially draining on her.
As with most common schools of magic, the spells Lechies wields feed off of her stamina. Much like how strenuous physical activity can injure even a trained soldier, too much strain on her magic reserves can cause Lechies to collapse from exhaustion or suffer internal bleeding.
Her known arcane arrays are documented in a tome that Lechies keeps among her belongings. She doesn't need her tome in most situations, but may consult it if tasked with solving a particularly unusual problem.
Transmutation: Changing the physical properties of target objects or persons. This can be temporary or permanent, depending on the spell. As examples of temporary effects, Lechies can grant skin the hardness of steel; alter one’s throat and lungs to allow for breathing water; turn the ground so soft that enemies feel like they’re moving through sand. For permanent effects, Lechies might deconstruct a portion of brick wall into its base materials, or twist a lock so that its intended key no longer fits.
Conjury: The creation of something out of naught but raw magic. Typical uses include arcane rope for binding foes, shooting arcane missiles, or the shaping of barriers to guard against physical or magical assault. Such spells require Lechies to actively channel them, else the effect ends. For this reason, conjury is especially draining on her.
Lechies is host to a lesser demon. She does not know its name, its face, its voice, or any other relevant details. Even the demon’s presence is barely tangible, present only at the far edges of her senses, beneath the beat of her blood. It has never once communicated directly with Lechies in all the years it’s been bound to her soul. At most, she’s been aware of her demon influencing a stray thought or pushing a sudden instinct.
The magic that sustains the link between Lechies and her demon is powered by the seals tattooed over her chest and at the base of her neck. These seals were cleverly designed to mimic the bond a summoner might have with a tethered spirit or familiar. The demon is buried beneath multiple layers of complex enchantment; it should not be apparent that the extra presence clinging to Lechies is demonic in nature without intense and invasive scrutiny.
Primary seal: The larger of the two seals, this pattern of sigils both imprisons the demon within Lechies and draws constant energy from the creature, feeding its life force into Lechies’s heart and then ferrying that strength to the rest of her body through her bloodstream. The magic of this seal fortifies her normally weak constitution and allows her to enjoy the good health of an average human her age.
Secondary seal: The smaller of the two seals behind her neck holds a two-part contingency plan in case the demon ever breaks free.
The first part is a binding spell primed to fire upon utterance of a keyword. When activated, Lechies is rendered immobile until the release keyword is spoken. If she ever suspects she’s lost control of her body to the demon, this will be her first counterattack.
The second part is a geas -- a magically binding contract. Lechies must never take the life of another sapient creature, or else her own life is immediately forfeit as well. This restriction counters the worst case scenario: Lechies is all but gone and the demon has possessed her body entirely. If the demon should attempt a murder spree, it will die after the first victim.
As intended by the human wizard who crafted the geas, this spell protects all living beings who can be considered members of the “civilized” races. The eligibility of Arethil’s lesser known races occupies a gray area, as do species not considered “civilized” by human standards. Regardless, Lechies will know for certain the moment she even thinks about killing her intended target; an immense foreboding overtakes her senses.
Benefits:
The magic that sustains the link between Lechies and her demon is powered by the seals tattooed over her chest and at the base of her neck. These seals were cleverly designed to mimic the bond a summoner might have with a tethered spirit or familiar. The demon is buried beneath multiple layers of complex enchantment; it should not be apparent that the extra presence clinging to Lechies is demonic in nature without intense and invasive scrutiny.
Primary seal: The larger of the two seals, this pattern of sigils both imprisons the demon within Lechies and draws constant energy from the creature, feeding its life force into Lechies’s heart and then ferrying that strength to the rest of her body through her bloodstream. The magic of this seal fortifies her normally weak constitution and allows her to enjoy the good health of an average human her age.
Secondary seal: The smaller of the two seals behind her neck holds a two-part contingency plan in case the demon ever breaks free.
The first part is a binding spell primed to fire upon utterance of a keyword. When activated, Lechies is rendered immobile until the release keyword is spoken. If she ever suspects she’s lost control of her body to the demon, this will be her first counterattack.
The second part is a geas -- a magically binding contract. Lechies must never take the life of another sapient creature, or else her own life is immediately forfeit as well. This restriction counters the worst case scenario: Lechies is all but gone and the demon has possessed her body entirely. If the demon should attempt a murder spree, it will die after the first victim.
As intended by the human wizard who crafted the geas, this spell protects all living beings who can be considered members of the “civilized” races. The eligibility of Arethil’s lesser known races occupies a gray area, as do species not considered “civilized” by human standards. Regardless, Lechies will know for certain the moment she even thinks about killing her intended target; an immense foreboding overtakes her senses.
Benefits:
- A moderate resistance to possession and mind control, as the demon already shares occupancy with her soul.
- Extra sensitive to arcane signatures of objects and persons, especially demonic ones, leading her to be a particularly effective tracker of such things.
- An innate talent for ice/cold magic. At her current proficiency, Lechies can freeze about a bathtub’s worth of water or generate half a dozen sword-sized projectiles. She is also immune to the effects of cold, no longer shivering in low temperatures or worried about losing body parts to frostbite. This power did not manifest until a year ago, does not follow the rules of her geometric arcane arrays, and does not require her staff as a focus. For these reasons, Lechies believes that this magic originates from her demon, and may be a sign that the seal is weakening.
- An aversion to holy and light magic. Simply being near the invoking of such spells causes her to feel dizzy or short of breath. A direct blow would harm her greatly. Lechies can still be healed by restorative arts that derive their power from non-holy sources, and she can generally pass through wards and barriers crafted to keep demons away, though not without suffering from nausea that can linger for hours.
- Lechies has now lived well past her estimated years thanks to the demon’s power. Her life force is inextricably tied to that of her demon’s; hindering or blocking the demon’s connection to her soul puts Lechies in mortal danger. If the demon is ever removed or destroyed, Lechies would certainly die in short order.
Personality
Lechies is even-tempered and gentle, polite and quick to smile. Most people would assume her a kind and friendly person, and she genuinely tries to be one, but the constant worry that her demon will be discovered and result in her execution -- or worse, retaliation against her family -- compels Lechies to keep even friends at arm’s length.
In the face of looming conflict, she tries for peace if possible, but if the situation turns violent then Lechies is more than willing to defend herself. She does not frighten or anger easily, and retains a clear mind during times of peril or crisis.
While Lechies is a law-abiding citizen on most fronts, she can’t help but feel a little sympathetic towards people who commit wrongdoing only out of a desperate desire to live. It reminds her of her own circumstances -- sickness should’ve claimed her as a child, yet she continues to survive in this world.
That said, she has no forgiveness for criminals who act only out of greed, malice, or twisted pleasure, and will gladly labor towards bringing such villains to justice. Lechies appreciates that she lives by the grace of borrowed time, and hopes that her footnote on Arethil’s history is ultimately a positive one.
In the face of looming conflict, she tries for peace if possible, but if the situation turns violent then Lechies is more than willing to defend herself. She does not frighten or anger easily, and retains a clear mind during times of peril or crisis.
While Lechies is a law-abiding citizen on most fronts, she can’t help but feel a little sympathetic towards people who commit wrongdoing only out of a desperate desire to live. It reminds her of her own circumstances -- sickness should’ve claimed her as a child, yet she continues to survive in this world.
That said, she has no forgiveness for criminals who act only out of greed, malice, or twisted pleasure, and will gladly labor towards bringing such villains to justice. Lechies appreciates that she lives by the grace of borrowed time, and hopes that her footnote on Arethil’s history is ultimately a positive one.
Biography
Lechies was born to two powerful and respected wizards with the expectation that she would someday follow in her parents’ footsteps. However, her constitution was terribly weak. As she grew older, Lechies would often be bedridden for days at a time from fever or lethargy. It became apparent that some mysterious ailment plagued her, but no healers or doctors could identify a cause or a cure. Her parents were told she would die before adolescence.
Desperate, her parents hired the services of a dark wizard. His solution: bind a demon to Lechies’s soul, and let its life be a battery to power the continuation of hers.
The ritual was lengthy and complex. Dozens of enchantments were incorporated to ensure that the demon would not break free, and that contingencies were in place if it did. In the end, the ritual was a success, and the wizard left the Delrio estate handsomely compensated.
Lechies’s health saw astonishing improvement. Just as miraculously, there did not seem to be any serious side effects from the demonic seal. Her parents were hopeful that she might grow into a distinguished wizard after all. They tutored her at home and cautiously prepared Lechies to enroll at the College of Elbion when she came of age. Her acceptance was never in question, not with her mother and father both alumni and her two older brothers already in attendance.
Allowed to travel for the first time in her life, Lechies’s years at Elbion came to be some of her fondest memories. She had never realized the world was so full of knowledge and joy, so rich with life and wonder. After tasting this freedom, she couldn’t imagine going back to her parents’ estate, or even spending the next stage of her life shut up in libraries or workshops. So, Lechies graduated at 21 with fresh resolve: experience as much of the realm as she could with the time that she had left.
A year later, Lechies joined the Greendawn Academy, finding the guild’s guiding principles well-aligned with her own. The organization was dedicated to furthering society’s understanding of the world around them, as well as taking steps to protect the world from forces that endeavored to destroy it. The Greendawners were happy to accept the passionate, talented young Lechies into their fold, and soon had her deployed on regular missions across the continent.
Here she has carved her place in Arethil. Her work has been dangerous at times; when Lechies visited her parents with a new, ugly scar on her face, her mother wept and tried to make her quit the guild. Lechies knows her parents would be relieved if she simply conducted research within the confines of civilization and safety, but there’s a wanderlust now in Lechies that won’t allow her feet to be still.
Desperate, her parents hired the services of a dark wizard. His solution: bind a demon to Lechies’s soul, and let its life be a battery to power the continuation of hers.
The ritual was lengthy and complex. Dozens of enchantments were incorporated to ensure that the demon would not break free, and that contingencies were in place if it did. In the end, the ritual was a success, and the wizard left the Delrio estate handsomely compensated.
Lechies’s health saw astonishing improvement. Just as miraculously, there did not seem to be any serious side effects from the demonic seal. Her parents were hopeful that she might grow into a distinguished wizard after all. They tutored her at home and cautiously prepared Lechies to enroll at the College of Elbion when she came of age. Her acceptance was never in question, not with her mother and father both alumni and her two older brothers already in attendance.
Allowed to travel for the first time in her life, Lechies’s years at Elbion came to be some of her fondest memories. She had never realized the world was so full of knowledge and joy, so rich with life and wonder. After tasting this freedom, she couldn’t imagine going back to her parents’ estate, or even spending the next stage of her life shut up in libraries or workshops. So, Lechies graduated at 21 with fresh resolve: experience as much of the realm as she could with the time that she had left.
A year later, Lechies joined the Greendawn Academy, finding the guild’s guiding principles well-aligned with her own. The organization was dedicated to furthering society’s understanding of the world around them, as well as taking steps to protect the world from forces that endeavored to destroy it. The Greendawners were happy to accept the passionate, talented young Lechies into their fold, and soon had her deployed on regular missions across the continent.
Here she has carved her place in Arethil. Her work has been dangerous at times; when Lechies visited her parents with a new, ugly scar on her face, her mother wept and tried to make her quit the guild. Lechies knows her parents would be relieved if she simply conducted research within the confines of civilization and safety, but there’s a wanderlust now in Lechies that won’t allow her feet to be still.
Lore
Balfur’e is a lesser demon, a soldier from the Rime Wastes who was captured by a mage during some ancient forgotten war and imprisoned in a soul jar. Their prison changed owners throughout the ages as a prized magical artifact until, one day, the soul jar landed in a certain dark wizard’s personal collection. This wizard would eventually perform a ritual to seal Balfur’e inside the body of a human child.
Their new home of flesh and arcana is still a prison, but undeniably a better one. While Balfur’e still can’t interact with the outside world directly, they receive the same sensory input as their host -- the sweetness and saltiness of food; the din of chatter when walking down a city street; the thrill of an afternoon breeze over bared skin. Deprived of freedom for so long, Balfur’e feeds eagerly on whatever stimuli their host can give. Their desire to experience is so strong that it has manifested in their host as a yearning to travel as much of the realm as she can, and pass that precious stimuli back to Balfur’e.
Balfur’e is currently unable to break the seal tethering them to their host. The bindings are powerful, and Balfur’e is weak after centuries of imprisonment. But as with all magic, the seal is slowly fraying. Every year that passes, Balfur’e feels a stronger connection to the world beyond their host. It is only a matter of time before the enchantments degrade completely, and they can once again live by their own whims…
Their new home of flesh and arcana is still a prison, but undeniably a better one. While Balfur’e still can’t interact with the outside world directly, they receive the same sensory input as their host -- the sweetness and saltiness of food; the din of chatter when walking down a city street; the thrill of an afternoon breeze over bared skin. Deprived of freedom for so long, Balfur’e feeds eagerly on whatever stimuli their host can give. Their desire to experience is so strong that it has manifested in their host as a yearning to travel as much of the realm as she can, and pass that precious stimuli back to Balfur’e.
Balfur’e is currently unable to break the seal tethering them to their host. The bindings are powerful, and Balfur’e is weak after centuries of imprisonment. But as with all magic, the seal is slowly fraying. Every year that passes, Balfur’e feels a stronger connection to the world beyond their host. It is only a matter of time before the enchantments degrade completely, and they can once again live by their own whims…
References
HospitalityLechies and her partner, Dakota, mean to ask local farmers to provide them with shelter for the night, but discover that the farmers have been abducted by bandits. The two Greendawn agents form an alliance with the lich Darkensand to assault the bandit stronghold within the forest. The farmers are saved, but Darkensand warns Lechies that her demonic seals may have been damaged in the fight.
Stray Beast Strut
While on a quest to find a client’s lost pet, Lechies encounters a hunter-warrior named Garrod. By their combined efforts, they rescue the man’s pet and triumph over an attempted ambush by bandits, but their budding friendship is spoiled by Lechies’s careless words. They part ways without Lechies mending the rift between them.
Greenwrath
The forest itself is terrorizing the village of Tathholm, roused by some strange magic. Lechies follows its source to nearby elven ruins, and together with the merry masked bard, Zakarias, descends in search of secrets. However, what she finds there is not salvation for a beleaguered village, but a tale of misery and betrayal…
Champion of the Perished
(in progress)
A Conversation at The Fools End
Coincidence sees Lechies reunited with Garrod in the midst of a quest to help an undead man. The night before they set out on their journey in earnest, the two have a long-overdue conversation.
Fortune Turned
A soiree hosted by the noble mage Damelin is the last place Lechies expects to find Garrod, but her friend is here for his own reasons. His investigation brings them beneath the manor, where an encounter with the demon Daranthii drags Lechies’s secret into the open. And yet, perhaps this is truly a turn of fortune, for in overcoming their shared trial, Lechies can at last share the other secret hidden deep within her heart.
Candle in the Window
(in progress)