Valeria Wyrd (VUH-LEER-EE-UH WEE-UR-D)
Hōkyō Valeria Wyrd- Valdis
Physical Description
Identifying Characteristics
Although Valeria occasionally changes the secondary characteristics of her species to suit her whimsy - horns, wings, and so on - she always appears blonde, with green eyes, and never changes her facial structure.
Special abilities
Yogen-sha of Kageshima
Although the island sank several years ago, as the Yogen-sha - the Prophet - of Kageshima, Valeria maintains the right to summon and manipulate the spirits of the naturally dead in and around Sakura province. She is also the default gatekeeper to Enma's Hell, Jigoku, and maintains a gate to that realm somewhere within the confines of Sakura at all times to facilitate travel for Oni tasked to roam the creative world. In the past, under this duty she has been seen to solve or manage the problems of Shinigami, even Shinigami from other pantheons, who wander into the confines of her jurisdiction. If a soul passes on to Yomi, however, it passes beyond her power to manipulate. She is restricted to souls still wandering the mortal plane, or to those wishing to return to it, and cannot pry them away from the clutches of gods otherwise.Juo of the 13th Dan
Upon her death and ascendancy she was invested with the provisional power to listen to appeals cases as they relate to sins, particularly carnal sins or sins made out of the desire of lust. While she does sit the bench of the Cauldron and takes an active hand as one of the several Juo-shinki - Kings of Hell, subordinate to King Enma - she does not do this alone and is instead part of a seasonal rotation on a particular seat, as even an immortal oni-demon (perhaps, especially an immortal oni-demon) can only take so much mortal idiocy before going insane, and she does not bear that responsibility when she is traveling as a Hōkyō - a 'Bridge of Law'. Nevertheless, as either a Juo or a Hōkyō, she can listen to and intercede in cases where gods have interfered in mortal affairs as a representative of Enma - so long as the plaintiff submits to Enma's justice. This is typically a risky endeavor, especially if the plaintiff's request is frivolous or based in blind personal desires, as she will sometimes hand out harsher punishments than the originals if she thinks they are more appropriate or warranted.Mental characteristics
Personal history
Most people, upon meeting Valeria, eventually comment or question why a foreigner has become one of the primary advocates of a Sakuran god and religion. The answer is both complex and simple. The short version is that she converted from the worship of Istus, a Goddess of Baklunish for whom Valeria was a prophet.
Valeria Valdis is, in essence, a Suloise refugee - an original inhabitant of the Suel Imperium, prior to the destruction of her homeland following the Invoked Devastation and Rain of Colorless Fire in -422 CY, Flaeness. Originally an orphan born near the end of the Baklunish-Suloise wars, her parents were slain and she was purchased as a slave-acolyte into a Baklunish temple and placed into a position of complete subservience: A slave-priestess bound by a geas to the Bakluni king and her Oracle. Despite this, she eventually earned her place as a bound prophet, and along with her sister priestesses she spoke the future under trance and wove together strings of fate as she was bid to, until the time came for the end of their world - a time which they themselves predicted.
The Oracles of Istus escaped the initial destruction of the magical cataclysm through a divine intercession which cast them hither and yon through the tapestry over both space and time - though the intercession did not remove the geas.
Each priestess seemed to end up in a different place, as far as Valeria has ever been able to tell. Her path led her to Kageshima, placing her at the feet of the Mezo-oni Akanma, the Lord of Kageshima and a gatekeeper of Jigoku. Seeing that Valeria was still bound to tell the truth when asked, Akanma made use of her as a prophet and a priestess, eventually landing her in the position of diplomat and court advisor. Many things could be said about her time in Kageshima, but few of them would be important or appropriate; in the end, she became a worshipper of Enma by default, as the local god who shared the domains of Law and Fate with her original. Even now, she still speaks about merit and causality using the terms that she learned from the Bakluni, and from the worship of Istus.
She met her husband, Magenta, in Kageshima, and upon touching him saw his entire fate from birth to death - and though it seems entirely too perfect, such is fate, sometimes. She knew that she would marry him. At the time he was one of the spurned lovers of the Lady of Kageshima, but Valeria claimed him and the two of them afterwards became both inseparable and unreservedly in love - a love which continues, even now that they are so often separate from one another. As an orphan himself, Magenta lacked a surname for Valeria to take when they married, so they came up with 'Wyrd' together - a word that is part of the Suloise Wyrd bið ful aræd: Roughly translated, it is 'Fate will do as it likes.'
That particular bond would become very important to Valeria, serving as a springboard for quite a few of the things that happened afterwards, and would lead to the formation of an entire extended family of Kitsune - the Wyrd family became one of the major families of Sakura, not two years after their marriage.
As a diplomat, she moved in with one of the Sakuran locals, who later became her second partner - Gwen - and it very quickly became apparent that in addition to a complete inability to lie, when pressed, Valeria also possessed a very pronounced inability to say 'no', or to draw any personal boundaries. The 'Fox Den' quickly turned into the site of an ongoing, weeks-long orgy, which at some point roped in most of the major personages of Sakura barring the actual Lord Ichigatsu, who mistrusted her for the same reason Lord Akanma put faith in her, and for the priestess Yukiko of Izanami, who was largely celibate. This eventually culminated in disaster when it was revealed to Valeria that both Magenta and Gwen had been using her as a requirement for their own relationships - as though someone had to sleep with her to be a part of their circle - a prospect which cast the entire affair in a different, much more banal light than she had seen it as.
Realizing what they had done, they afterwards treated Valeria with extreme care and it became important to the family to find some way to free her from the Bakluni geas.
Meanwhile, despite her best efforts, the rift between Kageshima and Sakura continued to grow wider. Meeting with other prophets and priests in Sakura, Valeria determined the path to restoring the mountain spirit Kazan-no-Ryu, the chief guardian spirit of the village, slain during a previous war. In order to restore the area's protector, Valeria led several individuals on a path to reforge a sword which could not cut - but the final piece of the ritual, that of Kazan-no-Ryu's blood, held by Lord Akanma, was denied to them.
He had sworn never to part from his sword, and yet his sword was necessary - there was an impasse no plea or reasoning would bridge.
Kazan-no-Ryu stayed dead.
His refusal ended up being the last meaningful diplomatic exchange between the two villages, and also the last time Valeria ever truly advised the Court on its affairs. Instead, she withdrew to a side-office in Gwen's 'Fox Den', sidestepping Lord Ichigatsu's mandate against her residency, and she took a position more general to the area rather than specific to Kageshima.
There, she began to work on something she nominally calls a 'Lust Reservoir', and collected the residual spiritual energy of the kitsune who regularly engaged in fluff-romantics around the house, until eventually she had enough surrogate power to enter Jigoku without passing through the gateway guarded by Akanma. As she had gone through once before at his behest in the company of a higher priest, she is notably one of the few people to enter that realm twice as a living person - although the third time she approached the bench, Enma slew her.
What exactly it is that she gave up in exchange for her reincarnation as a Muma-oni isn't something she has ever shared publicly, but whatever the case she was parted from both her curse and her mortality and assumed duties as a Juo, a rotational judge of the damned with regards to infidelity, rape, sexual abuse, and other similar sins. Kageshima sank into the sea, and shortly thereafter Valeria was appointed as Sakura's Minister of Justice - a position which she sits only occasionally, as her duties often call her elsewhere.
Gender Identity
Valeria is almost certainly feminine. Although a succubus could be any gender, Valeria is most comfortable with the gender she was assigned at birth.
Sexuality
Valeria is largely demiromantic, though she is otherwise non-discriminatorily pansexual and polyamorous.
Personality Characteristics
Motivation
In general, Valeria is motivated by her family, her religious beliefs, and a sense of cosmic justice. Though she is a lawful evil creature by creation and is often a harsh judge of character, it is only the rigid hierarchy of Jigoku that makes her so. In life, she was a kind and compassionate woman. In afterlife, she is a distant soul mostly consumed by her work and her calling as a rotational Judge of Hell.
Social
Religious Views
Valeria is the chief local priestess of Enma, referred to by the formal title of Hōkyō.
Relationships
Alignment
Lawful Evil
Current Location
Species
Honorary & Occupational Titles
Yogen-sha of Kageshima
Hōkyō
Juo no Juu-san
Age
Ageless
Family
Spouses
Magenta Wyrd
(Husband)
Gwen Wyrd
(Wife)
Siblings
Children
Current Residence
The Fox House, Sakura
Pronouns
She/Her
Gender
Female
Eyes
Green
Hair
Blonde
Height
5'7"
Belief/Deity
Enma
Aligned Organization
Other Affiliations
Comments