Veross the Pyre-Hearted (Common; /vɛrˈɑs ðə ˈpaɪər ˈhɑrtəd/)
Servant of the Abyssal Sun
"He is a strange fellow... I know I have no reason to trust him, shouldn't trust him, but... he let us free, Kanla. I know you don't believe that, but he gave me the password. Tapped it on my leg, even though I was choking him to death. After all these years keeping us there... he let me go. Let us go. Even though it mean the destruction of the Cult. And I don't think it was just... a ploy to get power himself. Part of me... part of me wants to believe that somewhere, somewhere in that smoldering heart of his, he found kindness."Veross is the current leader of one half of The Cult of Embers. Veross believes he has been given a task directly from the Cult's god, and that it shared a vision with him of the future on his ascention. He acts with no fear and a uneasy sense of calm, dead sure in what his god showed him.
Description
Appearance
Veross is a human man who appears to be in his mid 30's, with tanned skin and wavy, shoulder length black hair. His eyes glow a unnatural orange-yellow, as does a light from within his heart that is visible in low lighting or when he has no shirt on. He is a somewhat gaunt and perhaps poorly nourished looking individual, with sunken cheeks and a unhealthy posture. A scar wraps the length of his neck, as if someone pulled something tightly against it. His body is unnaturally warm.Personality
Veross is unnervingly calm and collected. He does not panic or fear, or show hesitation or second-guessing. He is certain in his destiny and in the play of things, and his attitude reflects this. He is incredibly detatched from everything around him, or more specifically from his relationship to it outside of being a tool. Veross does not have much opinion of things outside of how they aid in his destiny, and he cares not on how things will ultimately affect him - or those round him. He sees his path ahead of him as a already done deal, and that he himself is meaningless outside of being a instrument to fulfill that purpose.Powers & Skills
As the leader of his section of the Cult, and the holder of the Sun Censor, Veross is capable of adding to his cult and making worthy followers into Ember-Hearted. That said, Veross has not once done so since he and his followers split.History
Veross was born in a small town in the region of the modern day Bronzegrave Confederation, a son of a simple carpenter an his wife. He grew up following in his father's footsteps, uninspired to pursue other work or a life outside of his home village. He married young, and he and his wife lived a simple but lackluster life together. The two eventually moved to a larger town in search of a better life, but Veross was a distant and uninterested husband.In his 30's, his town became the target of a sect of the Cult of Embers. The townspeople were rounded up, and given their options - join, or become a Sheep. Veross's wife stood firm in resisting with much of the town, but Veross caved and submitted to the Cult as a follower. He spent the next few years as their follower, below the rank of full Cultist but better then the Sheep they'd turn the rest of the town into - including his wife. His life was a miserable, uncertain blur, until he had earned the right in the eyes of the Leader to join in proper.
Veross was terrified at the beginning of his initiation. He had only joined to follow to stay alive, but knew that ultimately his trudging around was not doing him any better than being the mindless Sheep the Cult harvested from. Guilt had chewed at him ever time he saw his wife standing blankly in the crowd with the rest of the Sheep, and some days he wondered if he had made a mistake trying to survive otherwise. As he was tied down naked to the altar in a room of chanting cultists before the great brazier that held the Sun Censer and the Embers, Veross knew he'd made a mistake perhaps worse than death. He tried to fight it, escape, but it was of course to no avail. No matter how he cried and squirmed, it didn't stop the Leader from cutting a hole into his chest and pushing the carefully-placed ember into his heart.
But everything made sense then, in sudden clarity through the pain. He saw it - the next years of his life, decades, perhaps centuries, laid out in quick succession. When the Ember of the Last Leader's Pyre had been burned into him, he had been given a purpose and a destiny by the Abyssal Sun itself. All fear, all hesitation, all uncertainty melted away as he forsaked his humanity. He knew what had to happen, what would happen, and what his role was. There was no longer anything to be afraid of.
Veross emerged from his initation as the Pyre-Hearted, given a rare, meaninful Ember to burn in his heart for eternity. Gone was the uninspired and meek man that had inhabited his body before - Veross had been born anew, with new purpose and reason, and the drive to see it completed no matter the cost. He took to his new role in the Cult with ease, quickly climbing the ranks to become one of the Leader's two most trusted. His old home was drained of everything it was worth, leaving it and his wife to dust and ash, and so the Cult moved on to another town - then another. Veross bid his time, patient. He would know, when the time came, and he knew what he would have to do when it did.
Several centuries passed until Veross met The Shepard†. Though he could not immediately place it when he met the woman, as the days went on he began to realize the potential she held - what her purpose might truly be. The way she could shake herself from their enchantments, fought against their spells... the way she and her fellow Sheep conspired when their minds were their own... When the day she finally took the chance came, Veross did not resist. Even as she strangled him to near death with a loose length of thin chain, he did not resist. He could have - he could have stopped her when he first realized that she was fully lucid in front of him and his fellow high priest, not a mindless Sheep as the other priest assumed, and as she should have been. He could have picked up the chain when he first entered the room, keeping her from ever having the chance to use it as a weapon. But he didn't. He had been shown this, and so it would happen, and so it had to happen. He gave the Shepard the code to the seals on the gate of the walled-up village. He let her awaken the Sheep and gather them, storming through the village and destroying all that stood in their way. He let them slay the Leader, and escape.
The Shepard seemed aware of that, even when Veross dragged himself to the small encampment the former Sheep had made on the outskirts of town. Though her people cried and begged for her to slay him, to finish him off, she took him in and helped heal the injury she gave him that took his voice. He only ventured out again when he saw the pyre of the Leader burning in the distance. When the last of the flames had died and left only the Embers, Veross had approached. Though his once fellow high priest berated him and threatened him, Veross wordlessly took the Sun Censer, the Ember of the Last Leader's Pyre, and left - and with him, more than half the remaining cult followed, leaving the others for dead.
The new Cult of Embers lingered on the fringe of the Once-Sheep's new encampment for under a month. Veross and the Shepard mingled, until it was clear the Cult would be tolerated no longer and the Shepard's involvement would only turn her people against her. Veross left, taking the Cult with him. He knew it would likely be the last time he saw the Shepard, but in time fate would bring their offspring to find him.
Extra
- Veross is almost entierly mute. After being strangled by the Shepard, his voice box was badly damaged. While he can manage some very soft speaking, he often chooses not to and resorts to other methods of communication. He refuses to have this injury healed.
Alignment
Lawful Neutral
Current Status
Alive
Species
Conditions
Ethnicity
Currently Held Titles
Year of Birth
9292
323 Years old
Children
Sex
Male
Gender
Male
Eyes
Ember Orange
Hair
Wavy, shoulder length, black
Skin Tone/Pigmentation
Tanned
Height
6'
Aligned Organization
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