Posted by Narev on May 14, 2000 at 23:55:19:
In Reply to: A very long role posted by Dyrlyln on May 12, 2000 at 18:36:28:
> Heh. You think you people who delete at level 10 have problems? I rolled up Dyrlyln, got him to level 2, wrote this huge honking pile of crap I call a role, and haven't played him since. And after all that work, too - I just couldn't stop adding adjectives. Pitiful, isn't it? > > > > > > > > > > > > > > > > > >
> <100%hp 100%m 99%mv>
> # Log file open.
> l self
> Dyrlyln is a tall, slender man, dark-haired and dark-eyed, wrapped in a
> rippling cloak of coal-black feathers. Bowing, he greets you, and his
> cloak flares and unfurls behind him, revealing itself as wings, and Dyrlyln
> as one of the bird-men, the arials of the mountainous north.
> Though without a fighter's build, Dyrlyln is lithe and quick, and his armors
> are arranged professionally, to allow the maximum of protection with freedom
> of movement. The wariness in his glance, the caution in his stance, and
> the calluses on his slight palms seem to show definitively his training
> in the guild of warriors.
> Having examined his build and armors as best you can, your eyes now return
> unwillingly to Dyrlyln's drawn face. He might once have been a handsome man.
> No longer. Twisted scars, black and seared, writhe up from his thin chest
> like blistered serpents, twining about his throat and leaving vivid lashes
> that streak up his face to vanish underneath his hair. They are old scars,
> but most likely still pain him, as they remain despite the existence of
> healers who defeat death itself.
> But, if these ancient wounds are not considered,
> Dyrlyln, a male arial, is in perfect health.
> <100%hp 100%m 100%mv> role
> Your role is:
> Added Fri Apr 28 22:30:57 2000 at level 2:
> Dyrlyln LLyliiran was once a transmuter, and an excellent one. He studied
> alone, in a small village south and west of Udgaard in the mountains, and
> was content, for he loved knowledge for its own sake. Spells of slowing
> maintained his youth, so that he seemed as a youth of eighteen when he was
> twice that and more.
> It was not that he was evil, no. In fact, in that little village, Dyrlyln
> was most beloved, always among the first to assist with injuries or natural
> disaster with his knowledge of magic and healing herbs. But he did nothing
> outside that tiny, insular valley. In fact, Dyrlyln cared little for his
> his fellow men, and often wished they'd pack up and go, leaving him to his
> studies. He was never happier than when he could take a day or three to
> examine the way a bird's wing guides air around it, or wander in the forest
> gathering herbs, or mixing reagents previously unconsidered with each other
> merely to discover what new magics would spring forth. That latter tendency
> would bring an end to his self-absorbed, solitary existence.
> There was sulphur in the mixture, and sweet-smelling cedar bark, and a
> shaving from a mandrake root, and half a dozen other elements and compounds
> of perhaps magical properties. Dyrlyln muttered a few words, infusing the
> heavy glass beaker with mana, and then, to watch the reaction better, he
> held the container up to the sunlight shining through the open window.
> The sun's light reacted somehow with the conflicting elements, and with a
> sharp crack, the beaker exploded. Liquid fire cascaded down upon the hapless
> mage.
> The freakish brew seemed to burn into the soul as it ravaged the body. Unable
> to move, seared to the bone and stricken with pain that was more than merely
> physical, Dyrlyln lay helpless on the floor. Every breath was an effort
> beyond the sheltered sorcerer's previous ability to conceive. He knew he
> was dying, but he could do nothing. Nothing but lay there on the wooden
> floor and think about the emptiness of his wretched life.
> There's a certain indefinable something about the absolute fact of impending
> death that serves to concentrate the mind upon the past. One obsesses over
> the sins and regrets of the past. All hope of repayment, of making up for
> your misdeeds, is gone. All that you can do is repent, and that Dyrlyln did.
> He looked back on his life and saw how his selfish devotion to knowledge
> had emptied it of worth. How, instead of giving love to other souls, he had
> devoted it to cold, impersonal magics. How he'd hoarded both to him like
> a miser with his gold, clasping what he had learned to himself instead of
> sharing it freely as he should. And most bitter still was the knowledge
> that there was nothing, nothing at all, that he could do to make amends,
> because he was going to lie in his own blood until he died.
> It was five days later before a village child, seeking herbs for her sick
> mother, saw Dyrlyln collapsed on the floor and ran for the healer.
> Added Fri Apr 28 23:02:06 2000 at level 2:
> Dyrlyln LLyliiran's recovery was long and traumatic. The cleric avowed that,
> had he been left two more hours alone, his soul would have moved on to the
> next turn of the Wheel. For the last day, Dyrlyln had been delirious with
> the pain and injury, unable to think of anything beyond the current breath,
> keeping him alive at an agonizing cost. And then the next breath, and the
> next. It was a full month before he became conscious enough to do anything
> more than breathe on his own. Another week, and he was able to feed himself.
> Two, and he could stagger to the privy and back with the assistance of his
> devoted caretaker, an old woman whose daughter he had saved with his herbs
> and magical medicines.
> For Dyrlyln, as he slowly grew in strength, the woman's presence was a constant
> reminder and a constant rebuke to him. He'd not forgotten the remorse and
> sadness that had filled his mind when he had finally accepted that he was
> going to die. When he looked at the old woman, he didn't think of the life
> he'd saved. He thought of those like her, the people all over Thera whose
> sons and daughters had died, dead, perhaps, because of his selfishness. He
> knew that had he used his herbs and magics as he now believed they should
> have been, to help those in need instead of increasing his own store of magic
> and knowledge, hundreds of people in the wider world could have been saved,
> and regret was like a burning coal in his heart. Soon enough, though, as
> his recovery progressed, regret turned to determination.
> Three months later, Dyrlyln was prepared to depart. He was weaker than he
> had been before his nearly fatal accident, and the cleric had told him that
> that weakness would be permanent, along with the blistered black scars that
> covered his face and chest. They had festered for too long, she said, and
> were part of him. Not even death and resurrection could remove them. But
> to Dyrlyln, that was of little consequence. His packs filled with notes and
> magical equipment, his mind filled with the determination to rescue others
> as he had been rescued, the mage prepared to work the thautamurgy that would
> whisk him off to Galadon. In his damaged, rasping, but still precise voice,
> he called forth his power for the first time since his maiming. With calm
> confidence, he whispered the words of command...
> ...And nothing happened.
> Later, Dyrlyln determined that the wild magic within the terrible beaker
> had somehow overloaded his own talent, burning it out completely. A man
> can gaze at a torch for hours without injury, but only for minutes at the
> unshrouded sun lest he lose his sight. Something of the sort had happened
> to Dyrlyln at the instant that the brew had melted into his chest. But at
> the time, all he knew was that there was fire pulsing in his head, his hands
> were trembling uncontrollably, and his magic was gone, apparently for good.
> Added Fri Apr 28 23:18:02 2000 at level 2:
> Dyrlyln LLyliiran remained in his little village for another month, testing,
> praying, hoping against hope that he would recover from his mental injuries
> as he had his physical. But to no avail. He brewed strange and noxious
> potions of his own devising - though with the greatest caution indeed. His
> caution was unnecessary. While most of the philters made him sick to his
> stomach, none had the desired effect. He chanted spells over and over again,
> hoping that where reason fails, stubbornness will prevail. But the wild magic
> was more stubborn still. After twelve hours of shouting, then speaking, and
> then whispering the same word of power until agony flared through his head
> like the impact of a dwarven hammer with each beat of his pulse, Dyrlyln
> went to sleep and slept for two days. When he awoke, he was resigned to the
> apparent fact. His magic was gone beyond return.
> And that, more or less, was that. With his meager savings, Dyrlyln bought
> an old, ramshackle cart and an equally old, ornery mule, and simply walked
> his now useless scrolls and spellbooks down through the mountains and along
> the roads to Galadon. Upon arrival, he sought out the Guild Master of the
> transmuters, an old man who he'd studied with on occasion, and there sold
> his magical artifacts for the price of a membership in the Guild of warriors.
> The lessons he learned during five days of suffering were still with him.
> With whatever life, strength and skill was left to him, Dyrlyln intended to
> use them as they should have been used from the beginning: in the defense, and
> for the protection, of those unable to protect themselves.
> Added Fri Apr 28 23:53:46 2000 at level 2:
> Dyrlyln LLyliiran views his life not as a right, but as a gift. Having
> escaped death by the thinnest of strings, he considers each day a blessing
> as it passes, and while he fears death, he will risk it, and even embrace
> it, to protect another. Darkhearts he views with pity and sorrow, for in
> them he sees, not what he was, but what he would have become as his thirst
> for selfish knowledge came to overwhelm him. Though seeking to redeem them
> whenever possible, he will kill when need be, and with only the slightest
> hesitation. He would far rather accept the guilt of murder than the guilt
> that comes from watching another die through his inaction.
> Ironically enough, Dyrlyln is sometimes taken for a darkheart himself, with
> his dark coloration and savage scarring. His somewhat flippant nature and
> sardonic wit, the result of his complete fatalism - as Dyrlyln once put it,
> "I suffered a week of unspeakable agony, three months of humiliating weakness,
> and the complete loss of my magical talent. I had to start from scratch in
> a guild my entire life had left me completely unsuited for, surrounded by
> pupils half my age who'd been training for years. I've been mocked, reviled,
> scorned, and I haven't had a date in years. What are you going to do, kill
> me?" - tend to reinforce that impression. Beyond the self-mocking jokes,
> though, and beyond the low, ominous rasp which is all that remains of his
> voice, people who take the time to listen can sense Dyrlyln's true empathy
> for those in danger or pain. In moments of stress, as well, he reveals his
> private but passionate devotion to the god Selric, who, though unknown to
> him until he came to Galadon, he credits for his repentance and conversion
> during those five dark days when he was alone with his pain.
> <100%hp 100%m 100%mv>
> And if you've read this whole thing through, congratulations. You must have an incredibly high tolerance for boredom. Commments, anyone?