Appearance

Physical Description

Thin with lean but undefined muscle.

Body Features

Aetherforged arm.

Facial Features

Smooth face, unable to grow facial hair.

Mentality

Personal history

Soot-stained cheeks were the norm for Aarken, even as a child. Gods, his mother had put together an archive worth of jokes and questionable anecdotes about her pregnancy and the boy's infancy, from how she'd feel him kick with every strike of his father's hammer against heated metal to the way only the glow of a lit forge could quiet his cries when he was restless. If fate hadn't decided his undeniable affinity for smithing, then his upbringing would have stepped in and shaped him in much the same way. Barring that, well, it would have been easy enough to assume that the apple-headed blacksmith would have stumbled upon his calling all on his own.




They say it's rare to find something you're naturally good at without practice and dedication, let alone to possess a talent for a craft that normally requires years upon years of honing to come as normally as breathing, but that was the case with Aarken and forging. As a toddler, all of the energy that should have been spent running amok and grabbing at anything left within reach was channeled into a trance-like calmness that usually kept his rear firmly planted in a stool not far from his father, eyes drawn to dancing wisps of smoke and steam and bursts of sparks and the tongues of flames.




On the off chance that the boy left his seat while his father was working, he'd return within the same minute toting a tool that he recognized would soon be required for the next step of the craft. A keen eye and studious note-taking had Aarken smithing alongside his father before adolescence was even upon him, and though his mother wasn't at all fond of her son being all work and no play, he constantly reassured her that, much to his luck, forging happened to be one and the same for him!




Aarken's teenage years were not all that different from those leading up to it. His days, to an outsider, would have been compared to being imprisoned in a cage of labor more suitable to a peasant on a farm than to the son of Ralvara's most well-renowned blacksmith. Between his job at the smithy, his classes at the academy, and his independent efforts to refine his art, the red-headed youth found little room for childhood friendships. Still, he made an effort to foster a few acquaintanceships on behalf of his mother, who, panicking over a teenage son that was spending increasingly large amounts of his time in front an anvil and a flame, scolded her husband and threatened to make Aarken an active suitor for several of the young women in their district if he didn't start getting out more.




There'd always been something different to his methods of forging, as was true of his father's process, too. He hadn't noticed it until he'd started at the academy and learned about the fundamentals and science behind what he did for a living, as well as basic and advanced geology. Pointing out flaws in literature detailing the intricacies of smithing had him ridiculed in the few instances he'd given it a go, but he confirmed his own theories after visiting the smithies peppered about the other districts and feigning an interest in taking on a part-time job under them; what blacksmith worth their salt would turn down such a request from the son of Edern?




"They fear the heat, keep their distance. They treat their tools just as such - like tools - not as extensions of themselves. Their forges do not listen to them, nor does the metal, nor the ore, nor the fire, nor the flames, and yet, they answer my beck and call. I.. understand now."




That nagging at the back of his mind always telling him to push harder with each new project, that insatiable yearning to create, to build, to refine, and to forge; he was more than a blacksmith. He was aether-gifted, no, not just that, he was one of the very legends he'd read about and once dismissed as a myth: he was an aetherforger! He kept the discovery quiet, of course. His father had never brought up any mention of aetherforging even though he, himself, had been doing it since the day Aarken was born! Feh! Fair was fair. Silence for silence, right?




Besides, if his father had kept it under wraps for a reason, the likelihood of Aarken being allowed to actively test the limits of his abilities was slim. If he'd been aetherforging all along without even being aware of it, the knowledge he now possessed could only bolster his strengths. And so did he delve into old literature after his classes at the academy and creeping down to the forge in the dead of night, committing himself to living with bags under his eyes during the day but refusing to allow his job or his studies to suffer. Years came to pass, and when his eighteenth birthday was upon him, he knew he was ready.




He would do what hadn't been done since just after the Calamity.




He would create an aetherbound artifact.




This was his destiny. This had been every aetherforger's destiny. Their legacy!




"No, Gods, no! No, not like this! I had it, I had it..! I HAD IT! N-NGH, GODS, WHY, MAKE IT STOP, MAKE IT STOP!!"




His screams echoed throughout the basement of their home where he laid in a pool of his own blood, clutching at a fleshy, tattered husk of an arm with skin, ligament, and bone slowly being unraveled by an unseen force. The forge in the corner of the room burned with a blinding hue of blue as it spat short-lived tendrils of aetherfire from its wide brick maw, vicious and hungry but eerily silent with its demands. All was quiet save for the boy's howls of agony as his arm was relentlessly devoured by the jaws of nothingness, the flames watching, waiting, their judgment cast.




"Gods, GODS, M'BOY, WHAT HAVE YE DONE?! WHAT HAVE YE DONE??!!?"




"AARKEN!! AARKEN! DO SOMETHING, EDERN, DO SOMETHING!!!"




The cacophony of a family coming apart at its seams broke the forge's vow of silence, sparks of jet hissing from the core of the fire. They multiplied in number until they created a steady, abyssal cascade that flowed freely from the hearth like a wicked fountain, the once royal blue steadily consumed by an infinite blackness. Edern slid to the floor next to his son and took hold of the shoulder attached to his son's decaying arm, eyes darting between the ravenous unknown and the blood and tear-stained face that was quickly draining of color and life of his son.




"Oh gods, oh gods.. I don't know what ta do! I CAN'T! I CAN'T!"




Elvari threw her arms around both men, eyes shut tight to dam the tears that so badly wanted to break through. When she spoke, her voice came from a tongue that cracked like a whip, her desperation and sorrow overridden by a bitterness steeped in regret.




"Do not you dare tell me you can't fix this, Edern. This was the day I told you would come. I begged you to keep him away from this, told you he'd push just like you used to! You promised to look after him. YOU PROMISED!"




"A-Aye.. I did, m'dear.. And m'sorry. M'so so, sor-"




"SAVE. OUR. SON!"




"..YE KNOW, I CAN'T, ELVARI! YE KNOW THIS!"




"You fool of a man. I loved you."




"I've always loved you."




"But godsdamn you for this, Edern.. godsdamn you."




Aarken's ears could hear a good deal before his eyes could see. His first few minutes of blind consciousness saw to a fair bout of panic and an equally understandable existential crisis. He.. he'd gotten himself killed, hadn't he? The last thing he remembered was the hilt of the sword he'd mapped out in his mind beginning to take form beneath his very fingers.




Everything had gone according to plan up to that point. All of the materials for the weapon's basic frame, the hilt, the blade - they all had their place on the physical plane. He'd been training for months leading up to that moment, and he knew, at the very worst, he might lose a finger, but it would have been worth it! He'd calculated every step so perfectly, so precisely! His aether had been attuned to every fiber of every composite, so .. why?! WHY?! What had he failed to do?! Why was he DEAD?!




Clink. Clink. Clink. Clink. Clink.




That sound.. he recognized it. Metal on metal. A hammer and anvil caressing and tempering a thing of beauty between themselves.




Clink. Clink. Clink. Clink. Clink.




The rhythm was all wrong. It would suffice, but that was it. Dim, blurry splotches of slate and coal invaded his vision, coaxing him into rubbing a pair of eyes crusted over with sleep and some sort of grime he didn't have the energy to identify just then. Mn? A few steps on practically gelatinous legs nearly had him stubbing his toe on the makeshift side table he'd been meaning to move for months. Impressive. He'd painfully stubbed himself on that damned thing at least once a week since he'd built it and hauled it up to his room, and that was when he'd had his wits about him! Having avoided it then instilled enough confidence to keep him pressing forward toward the noise that had wrested him from his slumber.




Clink. Clink. Clink.




His wobbly legs carried him through the shopfront portion of their home and down another set of stone stairs that led to the basement.. directly to the forge. Anxiety knotted up his stomach and brought a cold sweat to the surface of his skin. Visions of the previous day's failure came rushing back with each motion of his descent, causing him to recall and question the process all over, his mind obsessively scouring the returning memories for the faintest clue as to why his endeavors had turned on him.




Clink.




The shape, the framework - the materials had been there, the schematic perfectly mapped out in his mind.




Clink..




The hilt, the blade - just within his grasp, his vision transcribed into reality.




Clink...




All that remained was to contain the very aether of the world into it - he'd called upon the aether around him and sought to bound it to the blade where he'd intertwine its ethereal threads to the sword's corporeal form and create a weapon that neither time nor toil would be able to test.




Clink....




..Gods, that was it, wasn't it? The aether. He'd underestimated it. He'd grown so used to the forge's obedience that he'd expected the very same of aether. Borrowing from it and having it assist him in his crafting was what he'd been doing ever since he'd started forging, but trying to capture it, shape it, and imprison it for an eternity.. damnit! DAMNIT! Not only had he failed to source enough aether for such a feat, he hadn't even tried bargaining with it.




Which meant..




Clink.....




He'd arrived at an auction empty-handed and placed a bid on something he couldn't possibly have afforded. No bargaining chip, no limit set, save for the cost of the schematic he'd drawn up in his mind. The aetherfire.. those wrathful, expectant flames.. Aarken glanced down at his left arm as his foot fell upon the basement floor, his pale blue eyes widening in horror. It was gone, replaced with a limb of solid steel, indecipherable runic markings etched up and down its length. What.. even was this..? His entire arm.. he.. he'd lost it?! Would he even be able to forge with this?! COULD HE EVEN CHANNEL AETHER THROUGH THIS FAKE?!




"She's gone, boy. Walked out a week ago, said she'd go ta Hasumei and then along ta Eltyce to become a Priestess of the Light."



Edern's voice barely carried across the room, his back hunched over an anvil as one arm dangled to the side, hammer hovering a few inches above the floor. Aarken stumbled forward whilst clutching his mockery of a limb, eyes still wide, now glistening and wet. What was his father saying? Better yet, what was he doing. He hadn't yet processed Edern's words, only the hollowness of them, like the dirge of the metal meeting metal that had haunted their home and led Aarken down all that way.




"She was convinced ye were dead, boy.. hells, we both were. Didn't matter a bit, though. Mighta actually been a blessin', had ye died. She saw it - the Abyss. The Dark. An' when I communed with it ta stop it from takin' ye, ta save you an' yer gift.. she said I'd murdered 'er boy. Made 'im a monstrosity. An' so she left. Said she'd never forgive me. An' I don't blame 'er, boy. Loves you more'n you love forgin'. Thinks she'll come back, fix yer arm, make it right.."



The old man gave a bitter chuckle as he lifted his hammer high above his head and paused, his arm trembling for several seconds before he brought it down and struck a misshapen blade laid out across the anvil before him, the impact not even enough to throw sparks. A low grunt followed the clatter of his hammer being cast aside where it tumbled and fell still next to the forge. Tears rolled down Aarken's cheeks as he frantically shifted his attention between the discarded hammer, his father, and the malformed hunk of metal in front of him.



He should have asked about his mother, should have gathered his belongings and set out then and there with a mind to show her that he was fine and that she needed to come back home, but he didn't. The tears running down his cheeks and falling to the scorched brick below where the aetherfire had reached out for him weren't for his mother. They were for his father's sacrifice. Those untimely, off-rhythm strikes upon steel, the metal at his father's waist that refused to take shape, and the prosthetic now teeming with aether and ready to commit the same sin all over again..



His father had given up his ability to aetherforge so that his son's gift could remain.



"Dad.. you.. you didn't.. you can't.. You.. You're Edern. You're a legend.. Why? Why.. why would you do this for me? Why..? Dad, I'm sorry.. Gods, gods I didn't mean it.."
Edern didn't speak again after that. Not to Aarken, not to customers, not to anyone. Every so often, Aarken could swear he'd hear his father whispering to the forge, but the tinnitus of guilt that plagued his every waking moment made it far more likely that he was just hearing his own doubts and chastisements beckoning to him from the recesses of his wounded pride. The aspiring aetherforger abandoned his ambitions in lieu of taking over his father's shop. Day in and day out, he'd take orders from customers while Edern solemnly pounded them out, the quality a far cry from what he'd once been capable of.




Blades broken upon seeing their first battle and armor cracking during basic training regimens had their shop's and Edern's name dragged through the mud within the year. The regulars stopped being regular, and the "legendary" smith soon became a pariah whose wares were to be avoided at all costs unless you had an interest in investing in a weapon or armor shaped bauble that would turn to dust at the slightest touch. Try as he might, Aarken was failing to keep their shop afloat, but he couldn't bring himself to forge, not after the price he'd made his father pay with his arrogance.




The years to come would be many, and none would be kind. Debts would rise and the father and son's quality of life would fall. Forced to separate himself further from the passion he once held dear, Aarken would have no choice but to take up a sword and enlist in Ralvara's military to earn a steady income that would, eventually, fail to keep them from losing everything. It would, however, at least for now, be enough.




And that was all he could hope for.

Personality

Social