Volio Via

Level 1 Aasimar/Elf Barbarian/Witch

### Relationships

Royari San Sarnax (Friend), Eriato Bati (Friend), Oddbody (Familiar), Axel (Victim)

## Campaign

### First Appearance

Extinction Curse Episode 01: Carnivals & Clowns

*"Uhuhu! It is best not to ask questions about anything Oddbody does."*

*-Volio Via*

Volio Via is one of the Player Characters in Extinction Curse, played by Ritz. They are a clown in the newly-created Circus of Wayward Wonders and part of the Wandering Three. A peculiar creature indeed, Volio embodies the strange and the unusual, accompanied by his fuzzy snake-like familiar, Oddbody.

## Description

Volio Via is a 7' tall Half-Elf Half-Aasimar who got the worst of the two ancestries. He stands at 7' tall, with white fluffy hair and hetero-chromatic eyes (one is gold with a goat pupil and the other is entirely red with no iris or pupil). He wears a ruffle around his neck which is often accompanied by his furry familiar, The Amazing Oddbody (a rather long, fluffy creature that has its own neck ruffle and a clown horn on its tail). Volio's body appears to have rubbery bones, since his form seems to follow cartoon logic at times. This is extremely disconcerting for everyone he meets. Volio is gay, grey aro, grey ace, and nonbinary.

## Personality

Volio has little to no concern for polite societal convention, and seems to go out of his way to disregard it. He has a somewhat mocking personality, taking pleasure in teasing and bullying people who cling to the concept of normality. Despite his offputting ways, it seems children get on relatively well with him; his role as a clown makes him an endearing figure to them, as evidenced by Summesh Kanbali waving to him before their first show in Abberton. Volio rarely shows genuine emotions, the closest seeming to be around the rest of the Wandering Three whom he usually encourages to do their best. He is, however, surprisingly intelligent, occaisionally showing flashes of genuine intellect from behind his goofy mask.

## Abilities

As a Barbarian, Volio is able to harness the power of Rage... or in his case, "Silly Mode". Unlike typical Barbarian Rage, Volio falls into manic bouts of glee that empowers him to hit harder and shrug off more deadly attacks. While functionally identical to Rage, it is upsetting to behold. When Volio hits people during Rage, it tends to follow cartoon logic, including sound effects and similar phenomena (such as smashing a rat into the floor with his maul and creating a perfect rat shaped crater).

This is not to say that Volio is incapable of harnessing the arcane anger more traditionally associated with a Barbarian Rage, as Mistress Dusklight's minions at the Celestial Menagerie discovered to their very great cost. It has been described as being the difference between the honking of a clown's nose and the honking of a speeding 18 wheeler.

Volio is additionally a Rune Witch, though little has been revealed about his patron so far. His familiar, Oddbody, is a fuzzy serpent with a beak, dopey eyes and chinchilla-like ears with a clown horn on his tail. Oddbody has shown the ability to fly, which is also very upsetting. Volio has very limited spellcasting, at first only being shown to cast only cantrips such as Detect Magic and Prestidigitation. He gradually gains more magic as time goes by, but mostly shows interest in spells with utility purposes (such as Grease) or spells that can be put to work helping improve performances (such as Favorable Review).

## History

Some time prior to the events of Extinction Curse, Volio was a member of Mistress Dusklight's Celestial Menagerie, a circus with cruel policies and poor treatment of performers. He departed, and was among those to join The Circus of Wayward Wonders in late 4719 AR. After a few months of training alongside the circus, the show came to the town of Abberton in early 4720 AR, ready to put on its first show. However, just before the opening act, Myron "Thunder" Stendhald, the Ringleader of the circus, was found dead. Volio banded with the other adventurers to quickly form a plan of action, and took on the role of the Opening Act, performing with Oddbody. He helped deal with other interruptions to the show quickly after, helping restrain a drunken couple during the Grand Finale.

Soon after the end of the show, Volio helped in investigating the murder. He ultimately aided in confronting and beating Nemmia Bramblecloak, the Halfling who murdered Thunder. Following leads after that confrontation, he and the other two members of the Wandering Three became entangled in a plot to destroy not only the town of Abberton, but the entire Isle of Kortos. Life has been a whirlwind of adventure ever since.

## Relationships

### Royari San Sarnax

Royari is one of the few people Volio seems to show genuine affection towards. Royari does their best to keep Volio in line, something which Volio takes great pleasure in avoiding doing. The more he can shock Royari, the better.

### Eriato Bati

Eriato shares a similar inclination towards chaos as Volio, something which the clown greatly appreciates. Volio goes out of his way to enable Eriato, suggesting she go through with her more unpredictable impulses, though at times Volio goes too far for even her.

### The Amazing Oddbody

As Volio's familiar, Oddbody and Volio are inseparable. Volio takes great pleasure in pretending he can understand Oddbody's bizarre whisperings, which he cannot actually. The two perform together as a team, with Volio and Oddbody taking part in a slapstick routine.

In private, and especially as he draws the attention of his patrons more and more frequently, Volio seems somewhat unsettled by Oddbody and frustrated with his inability to actually understand what his familiar says or is. As the party departs to the Isle of Kortos, his patrons decide to try and help ease his doubts about the future by sending him "guidance" to keep him from being alone. This results in Volio finally gaining the ability to truly understand Oddbody as it speaks. Volio is at first horrified, and then seemingly resigned to this new twist in his fate.

### Axel

Volio delights in tormenting Axel, seeing his anxiety and sheepish attitude as the perfect bullying target. He undermines and audibly doubts him whenever he can, something which Axel doesn't seem to actually mind any more than he minds anything else in the world.

Even so, Volio seems to start warming up to Axel over the course of their time in Escadar, to the point that he is the first to discover that Axel has been kidnapped after Mistress Dusklight's attack on the circus. When Axel is rescued, Volio is quick to check him for injuries and express how worried he'd been over the human's safety. Axel requires repeated reassurance that this concern isn't just another bit at his expense but, later on, the two of them share a quiet moment together where they talk about names and identity, and Volio convinces Axel to learn some self defense to minimize his chances of getting kidnapped again.

### Volio's Patrons

A bunch of long-nosed worms all coiled together in a strange sky that speak in many voices that all sound like one voice. They appear whenever Volio gains new magic, spiriting him away to a rainy, swampy forest to address him directly. He doesn't appear to know what their nature or purpose is, but they seem to know far more about him and his past. So far, their only instruction to him is "follow the others" - apparently, that is his fated path.