Daniel Idris Valhen -profile-

I added his full history below!~ <3

My Muse-baby, Daniel. 8D And like it says in his name, yes, he's the descendantheir/whatever I call them to Valhen Lionwrath, one of the three heroes of ancient times.

-His power is teleportation. If he can envision himself there (seeing the place helps) he can teleport there, and take someone with him if they're smaller than he is.

-His greatest love is the WORLD. As ambassador of the Nightlings, he spent a great deal of time using his power to TRAVEL. He stopped being an ambassador when he set out to map the Desert Wastes. He was gone for eight years. He hopes to cross the ocean at least once in his life, and make a complete map of the world based on his own observations.

-And while he was gone for eight years? He was stuck in a magic-deprived area of the desert in a verge-of-collapse society-city thing known as Vascada. He could not use his power to return home or even leave the city once he accidentally entered. It was sheer chance that led to his escape, and he managed to find and rescue a strange Highflyer who was also a captive in the city, albeit in a more literal sense than Daniel.

Dey be biffels?

-He has this need to help anyone he sees in danger. A gentleman first, he will try to resolve conflicts peacefully before resorting to to other means. (He sucks at fighting. K.)

-His only Muse is Emianthar; she was part of a roaming flock of Miarons, but had been separated from them and set upon by poachers. Daniel went to great lengths to save the little green pup, and afterwards the two were inseparable until Daniel bid Emianthar stay in Mythica while he attempted to traverse the wastes.

-His age is equivalent to a man in his early twenties; his hair is, in fact, graying out early.

-He wears glasses because he ruined his eyes with years in sunlight.

-He loves life. He is usually happy and smiling and refuses to wear sunglasses/etc in daytime in case he misses something.

-He has been set upon by Eziers several times not only for his relation to Valhen, but because his particular branchoff of the family tree is known for several Hea'art leaves. (He's about one-eighth or one-sixteenth hea'art.)

- Fun Facts!

-The ambassador who took over his job when he vanished/failed to return/was presumed dead was Rhea.

-Everyone assumed because he was dead (to them. SO LONG HE GONE AND NO NEWS. D: ) that Emianthar would beome a Heartbroken. She said FUKYEW to society and waited for him.

-Daniel speaks broken Vascadan with a funny accent. Not that it matters. No Vascadans here to complain!

-Emi.

Daniel? He, Mightlings, Miarons, Emi, Chrys, Highflyers, Vascada... all of this shit. It's miiiine.


Full profile below:
Image:

Name and Statuses:
Name: Daniel Idris Valhen
Race: Nightling
Rank: Cartographer; heir of House Valhen
Blood: B-
DOB: July 18th, 962 Blessed (year system is based on 0 Blessed being the year Aurich was killed.)
Bounty: None
Sexuality: Straight
Martial Status: Single
Job: Cartographer

Appearance:
Age: 38
Age Appearance: A man in his mid-twenties
Gender: Male
Weight: 178 pounds estimate.
Height: 6’3”
Eyes & Hair:
Eyes: Dark red
Hair: Black, with gray striping around his temples.
Hair Style: Generally in disarray, he keeps his hair to the middle of his neck in back and has bangs that are generally to eye level depending on how long he has gone without a haircut. He has sideburns (also struck with gray) and a goatee.
Skin: Pale with yellow tones.
Scars and Marks:
-Scarring on the palms and backs of his hands; he will not speak of them/dodge questions about them, and wears white linen gloves to hide them.
-Light scarring on his forearms, left over from a knife-fight he was caught up in when younger. Completely comfortable with their existence, and if asked he will relate their cause.
Clothing:

Every Day: He is still a Nightling even if he runs about in the daylight more than is generally considered acceptable; he is usually found in a Victorian-esque getup, with the vest and coat pictured being common aspects of his daily wear. May or may not have a neckerchief, color ranges for other aspects of clothing is shades of brown to red-brown. Always. Includes. His gloves.

Dressed up: [link] Something akin to these gents. Any color range that is close to black or gray.

Armor: None; he could probably do with some though.

Underwear: Boxors. Which they have in Muse.

Equipment:

Glasses: These thick-lensed monstrosities are made out of crystal rather than glass (common in Mythica) and, while heavy, they do not scratch or get dusty easily. Their purpose is simple and nonmagical; to allow Daniel to see past his nose.

White gloves: Their purpose is to hide the scarring on his hands and deter questions from thus. He will always be wearing them unless they have been stolen from him in day-to-day work; he can replace them easily if that happens.

Notebook: Always kept in some pocket of his coat or another, he writes important things there to remind himself of later. He does not allow others to see this; the design of the book is unusual, from a city across the sands of the Desert Wastes.

Abilities
Nightling Magic: He is attuned to different kinds of minor magical healing, always involving physical ingredients. This talent must be trained extensively to even be used, but it eventually worked for him for a while in Vascada.

Teleportation: He is able to transport himself and whatever he is wearing or carrying to a place detailed in his mind. This power is easiest to use if the place is in his line of sight; after years of using this power it isn’t too physically taxing, but teleporting with others in tow still requires a great deal of concentration and energy.

Personality: Inquisitive, Generous, Kind, Cheerful

Attitude: A man who loves to learn and appreciates all he sees. He is quick to be a gentleman and meet new people, and is generally cheerful and amiable. When he has a goal, he will doggedly pursue it until it is finished, and if he makes a promise he will fulfill it.

Dislikes: Ink on his clothes, losing his glasses, forgetting something important

Hates: Poachers, cruelty, hopelessness

Fears: Ezierktza; if he’s caught unawares he can easily be killed. Vascada; his fear of the place does not run as deep as Chrys’s, but the eight years he was trapped there affected him profoundly.

Likes: People, learning new things, helping others

Love: Sunlight, color, and writing

OMG YES: Emianthar; she is like his sister cum best friend. Friends, family, and the art of cartography

Weaknesses: Bad eyesight from years in the sun, lack of decent fighting instinct, NEED to help those in peril or defend those he loves DESPITE this, low tolerance/defense of offending magic

Strengths: Mastery of teleportation, strong moral code, attracts allies easily, persuasive when it comes to morale.

History: Born the heir to House Valhen of the Nightlings, he grew up in a structured household where much was expected of him as per Nightling tradition. Daniel, from a young age, knew he’d had well enough of tradition and strict rules, and sought to make his own path in life rather than just relying on the family fortune. He took an interest in learning, and sought to know as much about Mythica as he could; for his knowledge, when he came of age he was chosen to become an ambassador (read: errand bitch) for the Nightling’s governors to the other two territories within Mythica. After some time at this, he was still just as elated with his position even if he ran himself ragged far too often.

He met Emianthar when she was just a pup, bawling over getting separated from her parents. He was about to assist her when the two were set upon by poachers - they would use Emianthar to bait the parents into a trap so that they could be killed and their hides sold to the Southern Tribes (yet another race, separate from Highflyers, Nightlings and Wind-Kings) while Daniel would be sold into slavery there in order to keep the witness count of the crime at zero. Daniel, bruised, battered and beaten as he was, plotted quietly with Emianthar and convinced her that all hope was not lost. So that her flock would not be drawn to the trap, Emianthar gave herself up to the Muse’s magic and fell to sleep as all placeless Museling children did, and Daniel then woke her (forming a bond between them) and barely escaped form the poachers with her.

The two, over the years grew inseperable. When Daniel finally decided that he needed a project besides ambassador duties (he’d made the position a great deal more respectable with his efforts) he bid she stay behind, for her own safety, while he mapped the Wastes. He promised his return in six months.

For several months, it was good going. He met several Desert tribes in his travels (and may or may not have seen Chrys as he was before he ‘died’), mapped the locations of several Oases and save access to the ocean, and would have kept his promise and mapped more and returned on time if he had not encountered Vascada.

The city was circular with a high stone and metal wall for defense against the desert; Daniel came near to investigate, but the city’s location on a magical dead zone prevented him from escaping before the city guard found him. A lucky find of a small shard of Black Crystal allowed him to escape the guard, but he was lost in a city he did know with people who spoke a language he did not understand. He couldn’t find a way to get outside the walls and nobody seemed inclined to help him; he spent a frenzied year trying to learn the language and blend in as best he could to protect himself. He was a stranger in a strange land, surrounded by coldblooded and ruthless people brought up in a hell desensitized to the violence around them. And, much to his dismay and horror, he became used to it too, after a time.

The scars on his hands were from accidents while working as a doctor in the slums of the city and run-ins with the city guard; the nature of the torture the guards used left deep gashes on his hands, and some of the tools he used to try and help the people of the slums (who were responsible, most of the time, for saving him from the city guard) left more wounds on his hands if he slipped while using them. Seven years of being trapped in the city did not dull his cheerfulness as much as it had to others; he was considered the kindest man in the Slums by those that knew him, and this infamous (and not very Vascadan) behavior won him supporters that used their unique knowledge of the grittier parts of the city to aid him where they could.

In the midst of what would be the eighth year, some very different guards came to his clinic’s door. Rather than arresting him (for which he as glad; the horrors of the massive underground prisons haunted him long after he escaped) they requested his services for use at the Weapons Research Facility.

Daniel knew that the Weapons Research Facility was just a fancy term for the only clean part of the underground prison system, but he knew he did not have a choice in the matter, as the men before him were armed and he was not. Thankfully, the guards had not lied and he was informed that he was allowed to leave after his duties were finished. His job was to attempt to recuperate a certain prisoner; since he could do a remarkable job with so little in the Slums, the Vascadans reasoned that with the right tools he could do what their surgeons could not.

The prisoner in question was a half-dead-looking scrap of a boy - gray skin, black circles under his bloodshot eyes, scars all over and red tinted gauze binding most of his chest and arms, and his entire left hand. He did not respond much at all when Daniel spoke, so while the Nightling worked he talked to himself (and in Vascadan rather than Illuric, so if the boy ever felt well enough to speak he could answer). Even if the young man was all but dead and Daniel was hard pressed to even do as asked and revive him, he did his best and after a week of Daniel helping him along and tending his wounds he was improving a bit. So, Daniel kept up hope, and continued with his work trying to bring the prisoner back from whatever brink he’d been pushed to.

It did not occur to him until after the Boy spoke that he wasn’t Vascadan; he’d learned, in all his years of living in the hell, to ignore differences for one’s own safety and not to notice the little things for fear of angering someone’s crime ring. But his charge was not cold-blooded and was lighter than his other patients, and when Daniel (in his optimistic ramblings) quoted a piece of Music poetry in Illuric, the young man croaked out the translation in perfect, accentless Vascadan as his first words to Daniel. It was then that Daniel recognized the boy (and his oddly pointed ears for the race) as a Highflyer rather than a strangely mutated Vascadan.

As Daniel helped him further to recovery, the young man gradually began to talk more and more. The Nightling learned that he had no name, did not know of anything before the prison, and had long given up escape from the hellish place; he was the favored toy of the weapons development division, he claimed weakly, and they would not let him leave alive. And the boy, in turn, listened to Daniel tell his own story; of the beauty of his home, of how he came to be here, of other Highflyers, of the language he spoke that the boy could understand. To help the young man’s emotional state (Daniel was a firm believer that happiness aided healing, and this boy was fairly dehumanized) the Nightling gave him a name - Chrystopher, an elegant bastardization of a Nightling name. The young man - Christopher - gave no comment, just a pained look, but he did reply to the name and seemed the better for it. Daniel promised Chrys that he would show him the things he spoke of in Mythica one day, in spite of the fact that the young man genuinely believed he would die in this hell. (Not that this was unfounded; despite everything he was still incredibly sick and Daniel had no indication as to the severity of the wounds beneath the gauze on Chrys’s chest.)

After a month of attempting to help with the recovery of the dehumanized prisoner, the Vascadan officials heading the Weapons Research Facility grew tired of waiting and informed Daniel that ‘the project would be terminated’; in short, Chrys was going to be put to death and probably in an unpleasant way. Hoping that he might be able to try and help him one last time, he requested one more day with his patient but was thrown in the cell next to the dying Chrys’s for his trouble.

Luckily for Daniel, the Vascadans were doing a scientific investigation on the black crystals growing beneath the city; there was an ample amount of cut Black Crystal in the cell, and Daniel took this as a sign that the Muse had not forgotten her children here in this hell.

Using the magical power stored in the Crystals - goodness knows how much they had stolen of his energy over the years - Daniel teleported into Chrys’s cell, took the drugged and dying man from the hell he knew as life, and started a powered journey back into the sunlight he’d missed so much and towards Mythica. The journey, which would have taken weeks otherwise, took a single day using the power stored in the black crystals; when Daniel took the last step of the journey, draining the crystals of the last of their power, he found himself in a familiar hospital in Vamont. Being home was like waking up from a nightmare; Chrys was dead to the world and did not witness Daniel’s happy whoop and his brief but elated greeting to the Wind-Kings who sort-of remembered the dead man.

The young man he had rescued was patched up (his midsection and chest had been a nasty sight of neatly shorn muscle and broken bone, and few wanted to think of or ask what had happened to him) and seemed shocked and afraid to wake up, and did not know how to react to the new freedom he had (but was elated that he could move properly now, being barely able to walk or function without use of his left arm or abdominal muscles). Emianthar found Daniel the day after he returned, having by this time grown into a full and beautiful Miaron, all the while never having forgotten the Nightling that saved her and swore to protect her. Seeing her was the final thing that proved to Daniel that, no, this was /not/ too good to be true, and he was home at last.

The scars hidden by gloves and Chrystopher recovering well (and with the help of a fierce Fawke he recognized as a former Alpha of one of the northern Tribes, to the surprise of many) Daniel was able to continue his life in Mythica, albeit not where it had left off, but it was a start. He began by publishing his maps, and leaving the latitude where Vascada was located as a blank hole on the map; it would collapse under it’s own corruption eventually, he knew, and did not want others trapped there as he had been. He began looking up legends and tales as soon as he noted the year - 999 Blessed - with his only crime being curiosity; it would be the thousandth year since the legendary fall of Aurich. Wasn’t one thousand a notable time marker…?

While continuing his studies (with Chrys still his occasional companion) Daniel met many people who had been just starting their lives when he left; the girl Rhea, who was his replacement as ambassador, Tyro, heir of House Ilura and Rhea’s constant companion, Fathia, a clever Wind-King with bright eyes and a Fawke and Sugarbunny at her side, and many other people who would become important players in what was to come.

/Ending history here to prevent spoilers. 8D