Vedka

Biographical information

Birthplace Ataxaticoatl, the underrealm Born Died Age 23 Home Sexuality Pronouns

Physical description

Race Tiefling Sub-Race Gender Female Height 5'6 Mass Athletic; dancer's physique Hair color Black Eye color Citrine Skin color Pale lilac

Political information

Affiliation(s) Occupation Complicated Clan(s) Caste Domain Masters Apprentices Alias(es)

Out-of-character information

Writer Feryke Created on Avatar https://www.artstation.com/kme

Vedka made changes to each and every aspect of her appearance as casually as one might change their clothes, having learned that there was rarely any advantage to be found in predictability.

Very little about her was immutable, and everything was subject to alteration on a whim.

In fact, the only aspect of her looks that usually remained constant was that she continued to be branded by her tiefling heritage. Not necessarily out of pride, mind you, but because her horns and tail were significantly more difficult to conceal through magic, and the degree of illusion or polymorphism necessary to maintain such a transformation always meant that it would be an exhausting, temporary endeavor.

But that was the only exception, as far as she was concerned.

Not even the pale lilac of her skin was spared this volatility; so often was her natural hue changed in an effort to render her a little more inconspicuous amongst the other races of the overworld. All the better to camouflage herself; to walk where she liked, without so many watchful eyes peering at her in equal parts scrutiny and mistrust.

She discovered very quickly in life that others treated her with less suspicion had she happened to look more like them. Even only by the virtue of skin color. It was certainly something she took advantage of.

Admittedly there were also times where she decided to eschew such magic, willingly flaunting her heritage in its entirety without reservation or discretion. Like with everything else about how she decided to appear, what mattered most of all was how she was feeling in that particular moment, and how she was feeling changed, often.

As concerned as she was playing chameleon when it suited her, she also possessed an arbitrary streak. At the end of the day her impulsiveness was ultimately the master of such decisions.

Just as how her unpredictability defined how she presented herself, so too did it rule her wardrobe.

Where most people had an evident sense of style and aesthetic that helped inform their choice of outfit, Vedka was often ruled by impulse; her clothing was an eclectic mélange of whatever happened to catch her eye in the moment, or simply whatever she had laying around.

There was rarely any deep, meaningful thought process to be found when she made these decisions. Aside from it being clear that she preferred dresses and skirts over any of the alternatives, finding it less necessary to make alterations to account for her tail.

With her hair parted down the middle and most often drawn into a relatively low-key ponytail, she rarely did anything remarkable with her hair or the way that it framed her face and pointed ears. She certainly didn't make a great deal of effort in dressing up during the average day, wearing any sort of cosmetics in moderation unless it was called for. She preferred her natural look and sharp features that complimented her citrine eyes to do most of the heavy lifting.

At the fairly average height of five-foot-six, Vedka hardly stood out in the crowds in that respect; nor was she thinner or thicker than most, instead maintaining a healthy and athletic figure. Mostly out of necessity as she was on the run more often than not - and it showed in the toned musculature of her glutes and calves that gave the immediate impression of a dancer rather than some warrior, complimenting the long legs of her otherwise proportionate body.

Not that proportions mattered when it came to catching the eyes of others, for her horns and tail were by far the most distinguishing aspects of her appearance. The initial thing that would've grabbed anyone's attention was atop her head.

And with good reason; the twin horns sprouting from her scalp and curving with a serpentine grace towards the back of her head were impossible to miss. They often had a way of dominating her profile, rendering her endeavors at fitting in amidst the crowds for naught.

The same could be said for the tail that trailed behind her whenever it was left unrestrained, free to wander as it pleased. It seemed to follow along on its own accord; another lithe, agile limb that danced to its own silent song.

Her tail often proved equally as expressive as whatever emotions flitted across her face, betraying her feelings without so much as its owner realizing it. It was the same tone of her natural skin and tapered in width from the base, terminating at about four feet in length.

Illusion (5/5): As someone who often needed to change identity on a semi-regular basis, Vedka has long since learned the intricacies of a school of magic she'd dabbled in for almost as long as she could walk. The utility of illusion in a life as fraught with complications as hers meant that her proficiency is almost unparalleled when compared to other self-taught magic users.

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Evocation (2/5): Vedka has a very tenuous grasp on the nature of evocation, albeit with most of the more dangerous spells being a result of her union with the stolen grimoire she'd spirited away from Ataxaticoatl when she finally fled to the surface. She is not particularly violent, and it certainly showed; her wielding of evocation leans more towards being a helpful tool rather than a weapon of destruction.

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Enchantment (5/5): The breaking down and construction of wards, runes, sigils and charms was always one of Vedka's talents - and one that she actually enjoyed, both as a source of occasional income and purely as a hobby that she'd only honed as the years went by. Her talents gradually became more essential as her enemies multiplied during her journey in the overworld, and who were more often than not of a magical persuasion.

• Apotropaic Charms and Runecrafting: As part of both her hobby and often her sole source of legitimate income, Vedka was not only talented at the making of fetishes to safeguard one's soul/harvest/firstborn child, but she was also rather talented at pretending she was in order to fleece the purse of unsuspecting villagers. Even if she had no intention of doing so, she could certainly put on a believable show.​

Abjuration (4/5): The suppression of other's magic as well as the spells that went into protecting herself from that magic in question was something that Vedka learned at an incredibly young age. Her childhood in a city so dangerously in flux made it necessary for her to protect herself from both seen and unseen threats that stalked the crumbling halls of an extinct civilization. She particularly excelled in both dispelling and premature warding, far more confident in defending herself from anything a mage can cast as opposed to the peril of a very real arrow.

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Conjuration (2/5): Despite her interest and investment in learning conjuration, it was a complicated school of magic that she was only capable of with the assistance of her grimoire. The vast majority of the time the best she could summon was a spirit more fit to a children's party rather than a snarling beast to head off all threats. Nonetheless, it's something that she frequently utilizes and attempts to better herself in. Even if it was mostly for personal entertainment.

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Transmutation (3/5): While there are many similar applications and crossover from Vedka's talent with illusion, sometimes a situation required a greater handling and degree of believability that only polymorphism and similar transformative spells are capable of. Mostly this is a means of concealing her tiefling heritage; her attempts at subterfuge were often more likely to succeed were she not sending the townspeople of some podunk village fleeing in terror at the sight of some devilish creature. And, rarely, was it also employed in a more defensive fashion. For example, hardening her skin to a scaled hide or transforming into some woodland creature in order to escape from immediate danger.

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Vibrant Transmutation (1/5): Most of Vedka's early life was spent amongst a cult residing in the underrealm city of Ataxaticoatl, so it was only natural that she gleaned some of their knowledge during a youth surrounded by academics and scholars. Having received tutelage from one of the members by the name of Masile, Vedka did indeed manage to learn a great deal of their more specialized magic throughout the years she spent as a less than enthusiastic student to an owlish teacher.

Vedka was much like an unwritten book in some ways, with blank pages still waiting to be filled.

Although to say that she was somehow incomplete as a person wasn't completely accurate, it was clear that the tiefling lacked in substance when it came to anything beyond the lifestyle that she'd adopted for herself.

The one that allowed her to float through life like a leaf loose upon the breeze, never grounded in one place longer than a few precious moments before being swept away once more upon the wings of her own fluttering sense of commitment.

She didn't even really try to hide it, seeming perfectly content to drift from day to day, place to place, without any guiding principles other than the same impulsiveness that defined everything else about her existence. As if the only things that ever mattered were the fleeting pleasures one could seek without effort or introspection.

And so the idea of long-term planning was rarely given any credence; the only thing that mattered to her was what she could find at her fingertips in a moment's notice.

But could she be blamed for the only kind of life she'd ever known? Without a nation, without a family, without a home, without any real sense of an anchor in a world so actively hostile to anything that was different and strange. How could she know anything different?

She was never given the opportunity to grow roots, so why would she bother planting seeds of personal improvement in a garden so barren?

The self-centeredness necessary to survive her upbringing in the undercity of Ataxaticoatl extended into adulthood, where selfishness was another synonym for survival. Where her cynicism served as a counterbalance to the very real danger that came with trusting others, surrounded as she was by the duplicity of practically everyone in her life.

It was difficult for her to make meaningful connections after a lifetime spent being taught that such bonds only ever existed superficially; they were only ever weaknesses to be exploited or betrayed at a moment's notice. Nothing in her life was ever genuine, so why should she give that piece of herself that made someone so weak over to another?

She wasn't born this way, nor was it inherently in her tiefling blood.

It had taken a lifetime in such an environment to sculpt Vedka into what she was today.

Despite the confidence she demonstrated in living a life of hedonism and deceit, she was still a young woman whose true nature was rife with insecurity and deep-seated anxiety. Her desire for deeper relationships drew her into short-lived relationships and casual partnerships, but rarely did they last for longer than a heartbeat before she felt the familiar urge to pull away. To burn the latest bridge before any commitment became a little too real for her tastes.

On the surface she was more than capable of bringing those anxieties to a heel, choosing to portray herself as confident and coolly insouciant in the face of whatever the world threw at her.

And rather than making her personal feelings too apparent, she instead adopted a laissez-faire approach to life as a whole; she was quick to laugh and even quicker to make light of the most serious of circumstances. In contrast, she reacted to those who insisted that she acted in any other way with detached, almost pathological disinterest. If not outright disdain.

As an entertaining friend, or a perfect partner in crime? She could be those things.

Anything that didn't require someone to be more than fair-weather or emotionally invested beyond the surface level, especially with how casually she crossed or cut off others in her life.

If people were books that needed to first be read in order to connect with them in any meaningful way, then please consider her illiterate for all intents and purposes. Her allegiances were built out of convenience, and her friendships crafted out of dry kindling; burning brightly, but consumed in a blink of an eye.

There was always someone else to cast blame upon, someone else to fault for her own personal failings and flawed character. Always another excuse as to how she kept coincidentally finding herself in such perilous circumstances, or besieged on all sides by enemies of every flag and disposition imaginable. From cultists to the inquisitors that hunted them.

Nor did it help that there was always another to help pick up the pieces that she inevitably left in her wake, allowing the cycle of apathetic indulgence to repeat itself, ad nauseam.

Vedka's grandfather had once referred to it as a microcosm. A reality that no longer made sense with the absence of the divine presence that once shaped their corner of the underrealm with its guiding hand. All that remained now was an imperfect imitation; like a broken puzzle trying to piece itself together, still trying to manifest an illusive past from distant memories and half-formed dreams.

It was a warped reflection, at best.

But it had made for fantastic adventures for a young tiefling with far too much curiosity and far too little sense of self-preservation. And why wouldn't it? Vedka had always marveled at how tenuous one's own perception of reality in Ataxaticoatl could be, growing up.

Like how a garden she stumbled upon could be meticulously tended to one day, but withered and transformed into something utterly unrecognizable the next. How an entire street could exist in the morning, yet somehow disappear into a wall of granite come the afternoon.

No doubt it provided a wonderful kind of mystery to a curious youth.

The same bewildering inconsistencies that would come to define her own outlook on life in the years that followed was an intoxicating challenge for her then; the constant state of flux, without rhyme or reason, was the strangest of playgrounds to her.

And Vedka had reveled in it, feeling a perverse kind of kinship when it came to her own disordered personal life.

After all, those that called the city their home were rarely indulgent of children, and they sought knowledge rather than anything as quaint as domestic bliss. They were outcasts and academics and cultists and occasionally even demons, served by their tiefling brood. Her family wasn't an exception to this trend.

Of course there were the other denizens of Ataxaticoatl; the unfamiliar faces that she encountered during her explorations, from time to time. They were usually friendly enough, and always seemed like such a curious contrast to the people she grew up with.

They laughed more often, they smiled freely, and they even gave her the time of day - telling her all manner of strange stories, and listening to her own in return. They were as eager to learn from her as she was them.

Obviously this was Ataxaticoatl, so she quickly learned not to be too trusting of strangers in a city that only possessed a handful of actual, living residents. But it was still a nice change of pace to talk to new people.

She simply learned the hard way to have a reliable method of escape, just in case. Oh, and not to stand too close to any of the chasms. That was always good advice.

One might've guessed how this affected her trust in others.

Ultimately though, her youth was left deliberately vague and undefined.

Of course she was happy to allow others to speculate, but rarely validated any of the explicit details. The only detail of her childhood that could be confirmed by anyone other than herself was the fact that she made her way to the surface at around fourteen years of age, escaping from the depths of the underrealm with nothing more than the clothes on her back and a few personal possessions.

And one of those possessions was a book - a grimoire to be precise - that would also go on to become a diary of hers. She was rarely questioned as to how she was still writing on it to this day, and it wasn't like she would've offered an explanation even if someone had bothered to notice. The most they'd ever get was a blithe, dismissive smile.

Anyway, from the point that she escaped from the underrealm, everything that came after was always a matter of survival; she rarely stayed in one place for long, nor was she often permitted to. Whether that was from very real prejudice, or as a result of her own actions, was difficult to say.

Probably a bit of both, if she were being honest with herself.

What little was known of her history after her emergence from the underrealm was that she had an odd way of attracting the wrong kind of attention. This, above all else, seemed to be one of the few constants in her life. And while those hunting her rarely had a singular name or physical description that matched, it was evident they were only ever after one person. From the Vakovfke inquisition to odd, moon-masked cultists.

Not that Vedka seemed to pay a great deal of attention. She enjoyed life. She lived day by day.

When it was time to move, she did so without the faintest hint of regret; familiar places and familiar faces were only ever a fleeting, abstract thing to her. They existed for as long as she cared to notice, and they could disappear from her mind like a morning mist as soon as she lost interest in them.

She was never a very sentimental person, truth be told.

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