I probably should have done this before I debuted this character here, but I guess it's not too late to seek feedback on her. I expect there to be issues with the whole Decima thing and also my connecting her with figures from the past, something that I promise to not do much from this point on. Anyway, I need to work out some kinks with this even though she's just a supporting character. I wonder if I might be better off leaving her past unexplained.
Name: Khariklo
Species: Dridder
Chrono/Bio Age: 3346 / 30
Sex: Female
Height: 95 ft (29 m)
Skin complexion: Very Pale
Hair color: Black (and very shiny)
Eye color: Emerald Green
Exo-skeleton color: Black with white stripes
Other Characteristics: Facial characteristics reminiscent of someone hailing from Asian descent. She typically wears hooded fur coats when outside. Has a large tattoo of a dridder’s web on her right shoulder signifying her status as a Decima, or “puller of life’s strings.”
The Rundown: Khariklo is a very long lived dridder who has been residing with her husband Cheiron, who happens to be a minotaur, on Iracal Island for quite some time now. She is currently known among many on Iracal Island as "the gentle dridder" because of her kind disposition and ability to assert herself non-violently. Those who take Khariklo's warm-hearted temperament for a weakness find out that the former Vicereine has no qualms about inflicting severe pain via physical combat, or primordial magic, when diplomacy fails. She is responsible for casting the "curse" that brought sentience to a well-known frost beast; she later named the angry and resentful beast "Oukami."
Khariklo’s passions are collecting antiques from different cultures-- the older the better. Perhaps this is due to a yearning for a time gone by. She devotes a few hours each day to sharpening her talents in primordial magic. She also tries to keep her combat skills from dropping off too much by actively hunting large creatures utilizing archery. She then skins and cooks them. She will occasionally eat sentient creatures, such as humans, if she catches them while hunting, but not if she just haphazardly runs across them. To those lucky individuals, Khariklo can be extremely hospitable; she may even provide them with useful tools or information.
Decimas: Khariklo belongs to a very limited group of dridders called Decimas, and may very well be the last of them. While not precisely determining the events of a person's life, Decimas can influence their fortune. Based on the dridders' beliefs that they all have "life threads," Decimas take the concept one step further and apply it to all creatures and things. They are able to see and grab those threads, and once they've touched a thread they are forever able "pull" those threads to varying degrees. There are many strata for Decimas to ascend; Khariklo is of the upper echelon and can actually bring about the worse kinds of misfortune, typically ending in fatalities.
History: Khariklo was born a noble in 1278 BU. Ever since she could remember, Khariklo could see very faint strings of light dangling from the bodies of others around her. The strings were not very long and seemed to fade into thin air at their ends. When she realized no one else seemed to notice these threads, she simply began to ignore them. Besides, there were more pressing matters that demanded her attention-- she was a gentle dridder by nature but during that time of war, the young dridder was forced by her extremely demanding father to take up weapons and fight on behalf of the Dridder Empire. Her father was fervent about her training, citing that he had sworn an oath to Queen Sheeana that he and his family would give their all for the Empire. Khariklo found a friend in her sparring partner, Apholybane. The peculiar Apholybane was always thinking, thinking about any and everything. She spent more time thinking than she did doing. But it was Apholybane's perpetual state of deep thought that piqued Khariklo’s curiosity. In their late teen years, the two dridders often fought beside each other against invading nagas. In order for Khariklo to fight as the warrior her father raised her to be, she had to “disconnect herself,” mentally and emotionally. Before long, she had landed the nickname “Killer Klariklo.” This was a moniker the dridder was uncomfortable with because she often did not remember her actions on the battle field.
There came a day when the abnormal Apholybane approached Khariklo with a secret that she had been afraid to tell anyone else; she could see faint threads of light dangling from the bodies of others around her. After Khariklo picked her own jaw up off the ground, she revealed that she could see them as well. After giving the “threads” careful thought, Apholybane gathered that they were “life threads” and proposed a different outlook on the prevalent dridder faith in the Weavers. She proposed the idea that the Weavers were not responsible for creating the threads of all dridders, since they were able to see like threads in nagas as well; instead these threads were spun by something or someone greater. Apholybane suggested that the Weavers might have been like them in that they were able to see the threads of dridders, but went a step further by touching and influencing those threads in ways that they saw fit. To Apholybane, the true test of this theory would be to touch and influence someone’s thread.
Khariklo and Apholybane practiced their “thread pulling” on non-sentient creatures for a brief while and saw modest results. They at least gained some idea of how to positively or negatively affect a life. But the ultimate test would unfortunately come a lot sooner that they could have ever expected. The life of the Queen was in danger. After the antidotes and blessings failed to stop the poisons from rapidly destroying Queen Sheeana’s body, it looked as though she wouldn’t make it through the night, but Apholybane came forward and offered her help— granted she only did so after much coaxing from Khariklo. None of the royal family were buying Apholybane’s theory on “positively pulling the Queen’s life thread,” but those were desperate times so few dridders were going to stand in her way. She seemingly grabbed thin air with her fingers and gently drew her hands back. When she said she was done, the royal family inspected the Queen. To their amazement, the Queen’s condition had improved. It appeared that she might have even been on track to make a full recovery. Sadly, that optimistic vision never came to fruition as Queen Sheeana passed away two years later. In spite of sadness over the Queen's death, Apholybane was credited and praised for buying the Queen two more years than it seemed she was fated to have.
Hundreds of dridders begin claiming to have the gift of pulling life strings, Khariklo and Apholybane put them to the test and only three passed, their names were Gitta, Algoman, and Eamon. Khariklo and Apholybane shared their knowledge with those dridders under the conditions that they swore an oath of silence, and promise never to pull threads negatively for one's personal gain. This was the birth of the Decimas.
Nearly one year after Sheeana’s death, Khariklo watches with tears of joy welling up in her eyes as her friend Apholybane is coronated and takes the throne of the Dridder Empire. Khariklo is appointed by Apholybane to the position of Vicereine over the southern territory shortly after. They promised each other that together they would lift the Dridder Empire to a stratum of glory never before seen in Felarya. Khariklo and Apholybane fought for their vision of the Empire on and off the battle field for over six decades until an assassin’s bullet strikes her long time friend down. Khariklo later realized that Apholybane might have survived the gun shot if it had struck her a bit to the left of her heart. It vexed Khariklo so deeply because it seemed like her dearest friend could have been saved by a little good fortune, and the assassin was someone from within the Empire of all things. In the end, all that mattered was that she needed to continue fighting for the Dridder Empire. The anger in her heart fueled Khariklo as she shed as much blood in as many savage ways as she could think of. "The gentle dridder" turned “Killer Khariklo” reached new heights of graceful brutality in her battles against Nagas and the Sagolian Empire.
But the Dridder Empire struggled to maintain its grip with more unfortunate deaths befalling the succeeding Queens in the following years. In time, Khariklo began to suspect that someone might have been “pulling strings,” but the thought scared and hurt her so much that she had to suppress it. Around the year 956 BU, Khariklo’s fears are realized as she discovers a society of Decimas with up to 20 members. Led by Eamon, they had been pulling any and all strings that they could to put the Dridder Empire in a better position to thrive. Realizing the Decimas weren’t going to just let her walk away and report their activities, Khariklo had to fight her way out. She barely managed to escape with her life, and as far as she could tell no one had gotten a hold of her life thread, but if she stayed in the Kingdom any longer it would just be a matter of time before the Decimas got to her. There was nothing left for her to do but run. Khariklo reluctantly left the dridder forest behind then traveled out west for as far as she could go. It tore her up inside knowing that the fate of the Dridder Empire was no longer in her hands. All those years she spent working towards a bright future amounted absolutely to nothing. She had failed her father and her dearest friend Apholybane miserably.
Many years later, word of the Dridder Empire’s collapse reached Khariklo on Iracal Island. Emotionally, she was lower than rock bottom. Khariklo was constantly fighting the thoughts of taking her own life if nothing else came along to kill her soon enough. In those dark days she had a vision; Apholybane’s spirit had come to encourage her, telling her that the fate of the Dridder Empire meant nothing next to the happiness of her friend. She continued to speak hope-filled words that lifted the guilt, shame, anger, and sorrow from Khariklo’s heart. The rejuvenated dridder tried once again to rebuild her life. She began making many new friends and even gave love a chance. For the first time in many, many years Khariklo was able to smile and truly mean it. The “gentle dridder” has never stopped smiling since.
(I know that age is nothing to sneeze at. I can't wrap my mind around living that long either.)
Subject: Khariklo (better late than never) 
Fri Jun 24, 2011 12:00 am
