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Description:
Zystra is a slender girl of about 18, standing at about 5’8.” She has silver, almost metallic hair and eyes of the same silver color. She has a pale complexion and sharp, elegant features. But she has something distant, almost ghost-like about her. Her body is covered from neck to too in a patchwork of thin, golden scroll-work tattoos. Enchantments in elven, draconic, sylvan, celestial, and abyssal verse intertwine with older and more esoteric symbols and shapes. Close inspection reveals a network of faded scars running throughout the pattern.
She is generally wears a simple robe and travelers clothing. She wears a number of powerful magical item, but closer inspection reveals that of these, a slim band of woven gold cloth below her hairline, a small amulet, and a small rose colored stone on the back of her right hand have been grafted directly into her flesh.
She is generally reserved and often speaks in esoteric and unrelated statements. She sometimes has visions, although she is not fully in control of these and it’s not clear how many of them are real.
Backstrory:
For many powerful mages, who spend their days reshaping the world to suit their needs, the ability to reshape bodies to their will and imbue them with great powers has long been great fascination. For the past ten odd years, one wizard has been has been making far greater discoveries than his peers. Azerkai the life-shaper had long been among the most accomplished enchanters in Clicheá, often sharing new and remarkable discoveries with his peers. When he began to research enchantments of the body in earnest, he quickly made a number of important discoveries. For years he pushed the boundaries of the art, travelling annually from his remote laboratory on a hidden cove in the Shadow Mountains. It did not take too long before mutterings began, no one can make so many discoveries so quickly without bending, and breaking, rules that are better obeyed.
But no one truly guessed the depths to which Azerkai had fallen. His quest had become an obsession. He would search far and wide for orphans and other children with specific markers, lineages, and parentages and soon after they would disappear. His laboratory became a tower full of broken subjects, broken minds and broken bodies. He searched the world, the heavens, and even the abyss for enchantments, power bindings, alchemical agents, and any manner of arcane trickery that would further his quest. He stole memories and skills from adventurers the world over, but trickery, by coin, and by force. Every talent, every enchantment, and every skill he imbued he interwove with layers and layers of compulsion. Build up over year to ensure his total control over his subjects. Zystra was the rare subject who mind didn’t shatter, who’ body somehow weathered the punishment. Over the years, her power grew until she was far and away Azerkai’s most valuable test subject.
But a wizard who seeks power as rapidly and as greedily as Azerkai did, eventually makes waves. Rumors spread, enemies are made. The defenses of his tower were strong, and many an interloper was dispatched. But Azerkai wasn’t the only big fish in his pond, and one day two intruders arrived who could not be so summarily dispatched. A great warrior who fought and defeated his assorted minions and defenses, along with a powerful wizard who pierced his wards and engaged him directly. A terrible duel of wizards began, the air full of immense power, spells and counter spells of flung back and forth. But such a duel takes an immense toll, and as Azerkai had to commit more and more fully to his fight, his hold over Zystra waned and waned. Until eventually it could hold her no longer. In a moment the compulsions were broken and in the space of a blink, she had crushed Azerkai’s throat. She now travels with the adventurers whose attack allowed her to break free.