Lord Benjamin Alair

From SCross

History

Born on Odin 1, 1010 AH, Lord Benjamin Hadrian Alair, Count Ravliss had been both blessed and cursed to be born on a Night of Tears to Duchess Rebecca Alair and Lord Domnall Alair, Duke Brevlen. His christening was marked only by the Lady Taross Blackburn being named his godmother, and later being pacted with when Taross ascended into spirithood, becoming the spirit of Hearth and Family.

During his youth, Benjamin had been subjected to varying bouts of illness and plagued with seeing spirits. From an early age, he had been haunted with the various visions of death, destruction, and darkness that would lead up into a Night of Tears with the black, lightning, and air nexi that usually came into alignment to cause such a phenomenon and which came with more frequency during 1012 AH. It was during these times that Benjamin would go (and still does) completely mute on not only his birthday, but any occurance in which the three nexi aligned in the same pattern.

As he grew up, he inherited many of the same attitudes his parents had: distinct dislike of monsters and Espers, loyalty to the Emperor, and a loyalty to his own people. During his mother's illness and heart problems, Benjamin stayed with his youngest siblings in New Alair with their nursemaid Morgan, learning of all the other people who made up New Alair while it slowly formed.

As time passed and Benjamin reached the age of five, he had been enrolled in the Imperial Guild of Magi. Soon he came under the guidance of Madame Tiles, a time mage by profession. Instead of taking the destructive path of magic his mother had, or the healing magic path his father had, Benjamin wished to merely effect things rather than outright harm or heal. Madame Tiles, seeing his desire and ability, felt it best he learn the path of the Oracle.

As the scion of a wealthy and rather known noble house, Benjamin had soon been impressed upon the need to study what it means to be a noble. Madame Tiles, also a political advisor and observer, felt the need to add to young Benjamin's education with the approval of his parents.

In 1024 AH, Benjamin started a minor rebellion against his parents. Body piercings, smoking, and fighting started to take place with the youthful scion. During intermission between two classes at the Imperial Guild of Magi, Benjamin had seemingly snapped on another mage, tackling him to the ground and beating him relentness for no apparent reason at the time. It had been found out, with some investigation, that the student in question had the unfortunate magical heritage to have both black and night-affinity attached to him. His parents, baffled by this, could only remember one other time in which their son had acted this way had been the encounter with Gaton and his dragon companions.

In Phoenix 1025, Benjamin had announced during his parents' dinner party that he planned to join the settlement Highwind Point. Rebecca and Domnall, both livid, forbid their son from going. This, as with any time a parent forbids their child to do something, encouraged Benjamin to run away on his own. Packing with him a simple journal of notes from all of his studies, a few gil to his name, and a sense of self-worth, Lord Benjamin paid for passage on a freighter to Highwind Point, knowing his parents would send half the Imperial Army in order to drag their young son back home to the Capital.

Physical Appearance

• Hair: silver
• Eyes: mako, silver-blue
• Height: 6'3"
• Weight: 165
• Favored weapon: firearms, magic
• Hobbies: Geology, painting, being a pain in the ass
• Goal: To effectively wield Death Penalty, to regain the abilities he lost from his death, to control Chaos

Updates

• 21st Ramuh, 1025 AH: Helped prospect and found a copper mine. Donated 75% of the mine to the settlement of Highwind Point. Becomes unofficial geosurveyor for the colony.
• 6th Ifrit, 1025 AH: Copper mine opened for free mining. 25% of all profits go to the young lordling, the other 75% to the miners who work the rock.
• 23rd Ifrit, 1025 AH: During mining expedition in the depth of the Alair Mine, expedition party encountered an unnamed creature that had been identified by the Blue Mage Duster as being Shade-touched and a corrupted human being that feeds from the life forces of the living. Benjamin had been attacked and subsequently aged six years by this creature.
• 16th Shiva, 1025 AH: After an argument taking place between cousins and his love interest, the Spirit of Fertility, Gerna, had decided that Benjamin needed to learn a lesson; he was subsequently changed into a hermaphrodite and had grown a purple tail--the sign of Gerna to all other spirits.
• 2nd Leviathan, 1026 AH: With much hard work and help from both the Whitehand family and the Alair family, the Alair Mine is reported to be one of the safest mines in Highwind Point. Bracing, metal plating, and lighting have made it much easier for miners to ply their trade in obtaining copper ore.
• 8th Moogle, 1026 AH: Taken control of Highwind Point as Governor with the approval of the settlement's Council. Youngest known governor of any city or settlement in the Empire.
• 16th Chocobo, 1026 AH: After a long and difficult struggle, Benjamin lost his internal conflict to the entity known as 'Chaos'. At the taunting of a man named 'Marduke', the internal struggle was finally lost and Chaos had taken over the body of Benjamin. During this fight, he was gravely wounded and died shortly after the demon withdrew into hiding. He was taken home by his parents' airship and was named a hero of Highwind Point. He was later buried and the title of Count Ravliss was passed to his younger brother and heir, William Alair.
• 5th Phoenix, 1027 AH: A rather odd occurrence happened with the lifting of a plague that occurred just a year before. On a trip back to the Capital, Doctor Kagane had spoken with the Duchess Alair and Duke Brevlen. This discussion led to wishing to examine the shade-touched Benjamin's grave, and when the good doctor's chakratic and aural abilities had activated, it was found that Benjamin had not been dead all this time, but in a strange stasis while his body healed and repaired itself. After being pulled from the ground and welcomed back to his Capital City family, Benjamin's left arm had been biocrafted back to its original state (no longer the shadowed substance of Chaos). He returned to Highwind Point three days later, proclaiming to his parents he had a duty to perform to 'his people'.
• 6th Ramuh, 1027 AH: During the evening, Benjamin had been visited by the Greater Spirit, Hades. On this visit, the fabled and ancient relic 'Death Penalty' was given back to the youth, but he was also given a mission by the Greater Spirit. That mission remains unknown.
• 3rd Bahamut, 1027 AH: A series of screams erupt from the Green Chocobo Pub that still remain a mystery. Doctor Kagane is called to examine an extremely ill Benjamin. Hours later, orders are left with the Green Chocobo staff that no Alairs are to be admitted into his room.
• 28th Ifrit, 1028 AH: A letter received a week beforehand comes to Benjamin and the Alair contingent in the north. It is an order to return home due to financial waste the northern contingent is causing on House Alair's coffers. Benjamin complies eagerly, wanting to return home to a place he's more familiar with. With him he takes the legendary Death Penalty, a firearm that is rumored to never miss when shot, always delivering a killing blow.

Description:

Raven's wing hair tops this youth's head, coming down to around his chin and displaced in a variety of ways. Startling russet and vermillion eyes peer under slender brows the same color as his hair, chilling, haunted, and contemplative, and are framed with thick black lashes. A thin blade of a nose rests above equally thin slips pale in color. His visible skin is very pale, almost translucent.

Black suede leather caresses his form with various lacings and bindings. Silvered buckles hold a crimson mantle shut about his shoulders, the mantle hiding the lower half of his face. The mantle’s cape runs down around the backs of his knees, ragged at the ends as though ripped from many encounters. Covering his torso is a black suede shirt, left sleeve bound tightly against his arm just below the armpit and the rest of the sleeve missing. The left arm is covered in a golden plate mail armor, double riveted on either side of his arm. Metal banding ends down into metal claws of the arm, glittering dangerously. The right hand is covered in a snug black leather glove.

About his waist are a series of belts, heavy and holding anything from ammunition to a holster strapped to his thigh, holding a firearm with a broken heart keychain on it. Black suede pants hug his shapely legs and tuck into thigh-high leather boots, more of the silvered buckles running along the outsides of his legs.

Chaos Description:

Gray skin stretches over this being's face, arms, and chest like a bloated corpse. Bluish lips rest against this skin, parting only slightly to show a pair of sharpened canines. From the corners of his mouth back to his ears are black silken ribbon stitches, as though having sewn skin back together. Reddened hair rises from the front of the man's head to form a half-mask around his left eye, highlighting the pupiless amber glow of both eyes. From the rest of the hair, ebony black spikes up, no more than six inches.

From behind, a pair of ragged bat wings spread from his slender shoulders, colors almost iridescant from crimson to midnight. These seem to match the vermillion and black colors well of his clothes, a mish-mash of leather and cloth wrapped tightly about his body with the cloth looking like a corpse's bandages. These bandages run down his right arm, loose and ragged toward the tips of inch-long claws, while the left arm sports jagged gold rings on his forearms and on the joints of his fingers.

In all, a rather fearsome sight to behold as this is Chaos, father of all shades.

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