Reifa

Reifa

"Reifa, dear, would you pass the rice?" Paya's gentle voice was warm and comforting. Reifa's spine tingled, and she couldn't help wincing. They were getting more than enough attention that she didn't want anyone to under estimate her.

"Dare you ask, snow-haired daughter of the mainland, a favour of the Child of Darkness, Princess of the Eternal Void?!" With her usual affected wicked glee the pink-haired girl asked the question, and she immediately felt a little calmer. Those eyes on her were narrowing, probably from fear. She did not in the least bit entertain the thought that those could be squints of confusion or vicarious embarrassment. As Reifa stood proudly, arms crossed beneath the small swell of her bust, her fairy partner chimed loudly as she pushed the bowl of rice toward their mutual friend.

A short, unaging girl with a poor memory, Reifa has a deep love for the dramatic. Her journey began decades ago, though she cannot remember its beginning. Along with her friends, Tenebelle, Paya and Kelia, she was shipwrecked on the eastern coast of Tellanor. She seems adept with magic, and while she can use sorcery, her penchant for drama outweighs her actual arcane skill.

History

Hmhmhm... You wish to plunge into the darkness of my past? Are you sure that your mind will not fall to pieces? There are things in this world that ought to remain secret! Dare you resist destiny? The gods' will?! What? Uh... You... You will? Guh... I wasn't prepared for this.

Mysterious Past • Darkness Drifting on Fate's Waves • A Stranger's Kindness

In which the girl is tossed about by the whims of the gods, and after struggling against pain, finds succor in the tutelage of a stranger.

Reifa cannot remember her past beyond the day she woke up in The Crockpot, the rustic little inn on the rustic little Aja Island. She had been found on the shore, waterlogged and unconscious among the wreckage of a small boat. There were no other survivors, and the only hint to her past was a wooden bracelet on her right arm that was impossible to get off. This bracelet was core to the girl's mystery. A single, continuous, unbroken bit of wood with no device to open it, it was at the same time, too small to move past her hand. Engraved with the word 'Reifa' in a variant of the mainland script, it was otherwise plain and smooth. She wears it to this day, and it is from this bracelet that she drew her name. She was a quiet girl at first, disoriented and without direction. Rambolgorags, the Goron chef who ran The Crockpot, allowed the girl to stay there indefinitely. He was a rough-cut perfectionist chef with a foul mouth and a good heart. He taught the girl the basics of cooking, and though he encouraged her to play with other children, the children of Aja Village are an insular lot, and an outsider is wont to remain an outsider. Reifa was a sensitive girl, and her perception was that the children were uncomfortable with her, and this discomfort led to a hatred of her. It only manifested in physical violence twice, but names such as 'Driftwood' or 'Fishy' were commonly sneered at her.

Though these attempts at interaction were ill-fated, they shaped the girl's niche in the village. She would ever be an outsider, and how not? There were several tribes on the Island. The Island Folk are relegated to Aja Village, the Gorons to the Two Brothers, the Deku to the Northern Swamp, and the Zora to their domain off the eastern coast. Rambolgorags, like Reifa, was a person out of his place, but he had chosen to shoulder this burden, and among the Village people, he was celebrated for his culinary brilliance. Reifa had no claim genius. For three years, she remained quiet. In her first year, the first violent incident happened, though this was an accident. At this point in time, Reifa maintained hope that she might somehow find a way to fit in with the Aja children. They dared Reifa to go closer and closer to the edge of Poe's Bluff, closer and closer, closer and closer... And then one of the children ran up and shouldered her to the ground. She almost fell to the rocks below -- a certain death -- and she was cornered as the children laughed at her, kicked her down, threw stones and dirt at her. It was a childish display of power, but Reifa was at this point very much a child. There was a silent acknowledgement by the children that they had gone too far, but there was no apology, and Reifa did not tell her guardian about it. She afeared he would tell her that her problems were her own to resolve. Uncertainty was better than that responsibility, and so she lied. The injuries were from stumbling into the overgrown undergrowth of Aja Forest.

The second attack was one that was one that ended her life in The Crockpot and began her first steps into the darkness within which she claims to still walk. Two years had passed since that first attack, and in those two years, Reifa had come to terms with the fact she was different. The children of the village were aging, growing in body as well as personality. Some of them had even apologised to her, but there was something still that kept Reifa distant from them. She was not growing. She was still the roughly teenaged girl that had washed up on the beach three years ago. The only thing that had grown was her hair. She was different to anyone on the island. She had seen the other parts of it, traveling here and there with and for Rambolgorags to get ingredients. She was not a zora; she had no scales. She was not a goron; she had no rocks. She was no deku, either; her skin was flesh, not bark. And though she resembled the island folk, she was not one of them, either. She had to embrace her difference or it would break her. Thus it was that she started thinking about her past, conceiving fabulous stories of her origins, which she would tell to any visitor to The Crockpot who would listen. She was the daughter of a dragon, or a princess, or the reincarnation of one of the goddesses. She was from the far-off lands of Holodrum, or from the continent of Demia, the land of Hyrule or Andor. She was a child of destiny!

A child of destiny though she was, fate ever conspires to place in the path of those destined for greatness hurdles which they must surmount. On Aja Island, the villagers cultivate chubby round pigs for their meat, milk and companionship. Cute those these pigs are, their charming exterior hides a foul temperament that seemed to particularly target Reifa. Perhaps they feared the glimming darkness that was on the horizon of her destiny, ever approaching. The pigs would chase Reifa relentlessly when they cought her scent on the wind with their piggy noses. Their little trotters would stumble after her, ferocious oinks filling the air as they charged at her, trampled her, and flopped on her. This provided an amusing spectacle to anyone who was not Reifa. A number of villagers who really ought to know better found the sight of the fat little pigs chasing the panicked girl an adorable picture, and betimes these villagers would machinate situations in which the pigs would be able to chase the girl. Most of these situations were not mean-spirited. The general consensus among the villagers was that the pigs liked Reifa, and they could perhaps prove friends to the girl. This was the rule, but there were exceptions. One such exception was engineered by the children who had bullied her. Instead of running, she pushed Termel, the ringleader, out of frustration into the pigs. This was a mistake, perhaps. With a stream of foul words, he descended upon her, and the pigs were grunting, jumping, jostling. The world was a spinning ball of pain and fear, and that's when something happened. There was a flash of magic, a squeal of alarm from the pigs and Termel, an astonished gasp from the onlookers.

A voice that sounded like the rigging of an old ship creaking in the wind spoke, somehow clear over the ringing in Reifa's ears. "It finally happened..." The old witch who lived in the pot-shaped house on stilts a ways outside the village was staring at the girl, rheumy eyes peering from behind her dark glasses into Reifa's soul. "Get up, follow me. Hurry to it, girl. We have much to cover, and a bath to draw."
Thus began Reifa's journey into the realms of magic.

Scion of the Witch • The Chrysalis of Darkness • Unfurling Chaos

In which the girl grows, understands some of her mystery, and embarks on a journey with a friend.

Life with Daime the witch was not too different from life with Rambolgorags. Reifa learnt and attended to tasks assigned by a strict but caring teacher. Daime fostered the girl's resilience in a way Ramolgorags could not. What use is the acceptance of fools, she would ask whenever visitors to the island would give her terrified looks, or when the people of the village whispered about her or her student. If it comes to a choice between purchasing acceptance with stupidity or hermitry, the wise choose the latter. In what were her most formative years, Reifa was all but a recluse, visited only by the chef who had taken her under his rocky arm when she first arrived on the island. This was not to say she never left Daime's hut -- Daime often sent her on errands to comb the beach for knicknacks or venture afield to procure reagents for potions or spells -- but Reifa withdrew from society, finding solace in alchemical and arcane experimentation. While she would never reach the level of her teacher, Reifa had a knack for potions, an intuitive imagination that lent the girl a madcap creativity. Daime lacked this, and was very much a believer in following tradition. Perhaps this is why her potions caused less explosions than Reifa's...

Following one of these explosions, the witch dubbed her soot-covered apprentice a child of darkness. It was an exasperated, tongue-in-cheek title, but it was one her pupil embraced. Yes, the dark mysteries of Reifa's past, yet unlit by the revealing light of knowledge, made the epithet veracious. She was a poor fit for those who were born in the light -- no wonder they feared her so! They years went by, a decade, two... She focused on her studies, focused on being a good apprentice. Daime was strict, but she could also be doting. She knew how hard it was for a young person to be on the outer edge of society. Slowly, the people that were once Reifa's contemporaries in appearance grew into adults, and one by one they came to apologise to her. They had their own children, that would one day resemble Reifa's body type.

The mystery of what Reifa was remained unsolved. Daime puzzled it often, peering at the girl as she mixed potions. Among her tomes were ones of continental lore, which the witch perused while her student learned. "Kokiri," Daime sussurated one day as Reifa was stirring a resistant, viscous pink sludge in Daime's cauldron. Reifa assumed it was an incantation of some sort, and ignored it, continuing her quiet, effort-filled grunts. "Go to the forest and find a fairy!" The witch snapped, impatient and excited. There were many things that did not make sense; if she was one of the eternal children of the ancient magical trees that once were common on the continent, Reifa should not be able to leave the area under her tree's protection. She should be dead, or she should be aging.

Reifa had been to the Aja Woods many, many times. In the woods there were dangers, but it was a source of mushrooms, herbs and moss that Daime needed often. The deku tribe from the north sometimes drifted through the woods as they carried their wares between the swamp and the village, and there was a reclusive swordsman who had his home in the woods who she had sometimes seen and spoken to. Like her, the swordsman was an outcast, brought to the islands from across the vast seas. There were, too, the fairies that Daime had her seeking, the little flying folk that made their home at a spring deep in the forest.

It was the first time that Reifa had interacted much with the swordsman, but he guided the girl to the fountain. "A swordsman must use his sword to protect others," he said. Reifa thought that was pretty cool... Could a witch use her magic to protect others? This question, though important, was not the most vital at that stage. When Reifa got to the fairy fountain, she realised she had no plan, nor any clue of what she ought to be doing. After trying five times to summon the courage to introduce herself to the collective of fairies, the swordsman hissighed in frustration, and demanded the attention of the fairies. When none seem interested in Reifa, the pair decided that there was no fairy to be found for Reifa at this fountain. Consolatory, the swordsman suggested to the dejected girl that there may be other fountains on the island. He was ever ready to test the sharpness of his blade against the unknown. Reifa managed a smile as they arrived at their hut, and she pulled her wide-brimmed hat back on her head. They would see. For a time, Reifa resolved to avoid thinking about fairies.

At about this time, a zora man constructed a hut on Poe's Bluff. An oddity, to be sure. The zora of Aja were a proud people, and insular. They welcomed trade with the islanders, and visitors, but would suffer few to stay, and the thought of living outside of their palatial, shellous domain was foolish to the zora. All save for Vivor, the mysterious squid-headed spearman. He, too, was an outsider, and Reifa took it upon herself to investigate him and his circumstances. Ravens of a feather ought stick together among a flock of doves. This man was a recluse, however, and his foul mood was rival to Rombolgorags' legendary humorlessness.

That said, some ravens have had their wings weakened by years of bondage...

On the Winds of Fate • The Scion Spreads Her Black Wings • And the Ocean Roars

In which the girl discovers her talents and soars across a raging ocean that shipwrecks her once more.

Life On Tellanor

After finding herself in a strange land, it took a time for Reifa and her friends to orient themselves. At the recommendation of a friendly innkeep, they registered as adventurers with the Fidiran Adventurers' Guild. Their first few tasks were simple -- finding lost objects, helping an old man with his shopping, a bit of urban pest control. As they became comfortable with their professional identity as Adventurers, Kelia noted that it was strange that they had no one with big muscles in their group. Were it not for the requirements of a lucrative task on offer two months after their beginning as adventurers, this would have posed no issue. The necessity for a designated Fighter led them to collaborate with the swordsman Kamubutu.

Life as an Adventurer

Skills & Abilities

Reifa brings a flair for the dramatic to every situation. Her party values this less than her generalist magical knowledge and her deep understanding of herbal and alchemical processes. Reifa, though styled a damsel of darkness, is relentlessly tenacious and believes in herself and her friends. She has an ineffable charm that draws people to her and makes them want to believe in her. This could be the simple fact that she looks rather childlike.

Relics

Staff of the Thousand-Eyed Tyrant: Reportedly recovered from a deep cave beyond the seas, this staff of humble appearance contains the essence of a tyrant king of eld. No Guild Identifiers have been able to detect more than a faint magic within the staff, however.
Horns of the Dark Goat: These horns were reportedly hewn from the skull of a great marine goat demon. Why they are so small, even Reifa herself does not know. Nor does she know why they appear to be carved from wood... Nor does she know why she wears them, glued to a headband. No Guild Identifiers have been able to detect any magic within these horns.

Guild Record

24 Frostmoon 218CC: Adventurer registered.
26 Frostmoon 218CC: Job no. EST07251809 Assisted an old lady in finding her cat. Employed unlicensed use of magic during the investigation (first count -- warning). A portion of the reward offered to adventurer and her party was withheld by the Guild under Stipulation 51, and the adventurer and two party members were supplied with arcana licenses. Job completed. Client reported adventurer to be 'adorable.'
27 Frostmoon 218CC: Job no. EST07241802 Undertook a request by the Guild to create healing ointment as per usual Guild methods. The Adventurer excelled at this, modifying the formula slightly and explaining her method and reasoning simply. Recommended to Alchemy Division. Job completed.
30 Frostmoon 218CC: Job no. FID07221800 Undertook request by the Guild to locate three adventurers who set out to the western mountains on 14 Duskmoon. Job ongoing.

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History Part 1 Part 2 Part 3 Skills & Abilities Relics

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Relationships

A short, unaging girl with a poor memory, Reifa has a deep love for the dramatic. She brews potions, has a flexible -- if basic -- intuitive grasp of magic, and a tenacious heart.

View Character Profile

Reifa

Race

Unknown

Age

Unknown

Homeland

Aja Island

Alignment

Darkness Incarnate!

Sex

Female

Eyes

Green

Hair

Pink, black stripe

Skin

Peachy flesh

Height

142cm

Weight

42kg

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Spouses

Siblings

Gender

Female

Adventurers' Guild Statistics

Designation Race Gender Age Rank Affiliation Jobs Accepted Jobs Completed

Magician (Witch) Gnome (Assumed) Female 13 (Assumed) E Crescent Moon Cradle

Relics

Staff of the Thousand-Eyed Tyrant Horns of the Dark Goat

Metrics

Charm Celerity Constitution Luck Magic Strength

B C E B A E