Tars

Name: Tars Landen

Alias: *The Haunt*

Age: 385 Years Old

Investiture: Boon and Bane from the Nightwatcher

Nationality: Southern Scadrian (Malwish)

Boon from Nightwatcher: To protect himself from the freezing cold of Southern Scadrial shortly after the Catacendre, Tars wished for immortality, which he was granted.

Bane from Nightwatcher: As a bane for his wish and also granting the boon he wished for, the Nightwatcher “made him as unnoticeable as a spren in the forest,” by permanently turned Tars into his own type of spren.

Special Skills and/or Abilities: Like windspren and flamespren, Tars is a spren that is fully in the Physical Realm, and does not appear in the Cognitive. Like inkspren, Tars cannot change his shape, but he can change his size. Like spren in the Physical Realm, Tars can influence things in the Physical Realm (like how Syl carries the blackbane or how Pattern unlocks doors). Through over 350 years of practice, Tars has mastered this skill, able to influence bigger objects, such as pieces of clothing he can hold to his body. Like a spren, he can float and fly around. Due to the fact that he is very old, Tars is knowledgeable of how the world changes, and is skilled at long-term master-planning (think like Preservation’s planning, though without the future-sight).

Weaknesses: The motive for the Nightwatcher turning Tars into a spren was to make him unnoticeable as his bane, so as a spren, Tars is invisible. He tries combating the fact that he cannot be seen by influencing the Physical Realm, using any material available to create an outline of himself that can be seen. When he does it, it looks a bit like the Mist Spirit. Basically a semi-detailed outline of him so he can be seen. It can be made of any material, but he can only do this with fine particles, such as dust and snow, and even then it requires a large amount of effort on his part and can make him exhausted. While Tars can communicate verbally, it comes out a hushed whisper no matter how hard he tries, so he normally communicates through messages written in a pile of dust, or on a foggy window, etc. Tars is desperate to be noticed, which can be exploited. More details of this are in the Psychology section.

Appearance:  Tars appears as a 28 year old Southern Scadrian man, with a fur coat and long pants. He is tall with a lean build and has a long face that is commonly in a frowning position. Normally, none of this is seen, due to Tars’ invisibility, but when he focuses himself to make a Mist Spirit-like outline (out of dust or snow or any other light materials) so that he can be seen, these details can be observed. As Tars can change his size, he can also change the size of his outline.

Family:  All of Tars’ family are long dead, either of old age or other means. Tars himself has not died due to his immortality.

Backstory: Tars was a regular Southern Scadrian of the Malwish nation. He was 28 when the Catacendre occurred, creating the Ice Death that almost killed his people. Searching for a method to survive, Tars found the Cosmere through an escaping Worldhopper and discovered the mystical Nightwatcher, who he was told could grant any wish a man could have. He thought that if he asked for immortality, and then shared the secret with his civilization, he could help them survive the Ice Death. So he took off his mask in defiance and stared the Nightwatcher in the eyes, and said: “Make me immortal.” The Nightwatcher did as he wished, giving him the bane that would rule his life, turning him “as unnoticeable as a spren in the forest,” permanently turning him into a spren.

From then on, Tars wandered the worlds, trying to be noticed, and trying to find a way to cure himself of being a spren. He did this for 341 years, until Era 2 Scadrial came around, where he looked around and found a Worldhopper travelling to some new planet he hadn’t seen. Following the Worldhopper, he came to the Alleyverse just at the end of the Seven Day War. He stayed and observed for 16 years. Occasionally, rumours can be heard of an odd message found in the snow, or of a particular whisper in the air no one can track, repeating two words, over and over and over again.

“*THE HAUNT*.”

Personality/Psychology: Mentally, Tars is a little shaken up. Before he learnt to influence the Physical Realm, he literally spent decades and centuries alone, unable to get anyone to notice him or see him. Even now, he has major issues. It’s not that he craves attention, but he is desperate to get people to notice him. He just wants to be acknowledged, and over the years the want has evolved into something far more twisted and depraved. It has gotten to the point where he would stab someone in the heart just so they would notice him (though that would be hard considering he can only influence minor things).

Tars has a perpetual existential crisis. He constantly tries to do worse and crueler things, just so he can validate to himself that he exists. He is terrified by the fact that he is forgotten to the world, and if he doesn’t continually get people’s attention he will be forgotten again.

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