Hez'rod

**Hez’rod** is a Merfolk (chaotic neutral alignment) who survived the destruction of his community, and now lives alone in the wild places of the deep sea. He has a close affinity for nature, constantly studying the savage purity of the predators and natural disasters around him. In the years that followed the destruction of his home, he has become increasingly feral, and now regards disasters as things of unparalleled beauty. He has deep blue-gray skin, with a paler color along the front of his body, pocked with small corals, barnacles, and various other ocean detritus. His teeth have been filed to points and his pale eyes swell to inky black when engaged in combat or gleeful destruction. Using his Destruction Domain abilities scars his flesh with spiraling geometric patterns reminiscent of teeth or spines, centered on his torso but spreading to his extremities, and though he often uses those same abilities to heal his wounds, the scars remain (and continue to grow over time).

Biography: Hez’rod was living among the reefs with his community when disaster struck. A mighty earthquake followed by a terrible tsunami laid waste to his people and dragged him into the depths of the ocean. As the sea floor shook and bellowed, the waves thrashing and tearing at everything beneath them, Hez’rod saw something amidst the chaos and destruction, something beautiful and terrifying. The carnage called to him, intriguing him with its savage truths.

     There was no malice in destruction. It wiped away the weak and left only the strong, cleared away the old to make room for the new. Everything existed so that one day it could be destroyed.

    After weeks in the depths, marveling at the shifted, broken landscape of the sea floor, he made his way back to where his home had been. Nothing was left, nothing of his home or the people he shared it with. No sign that anyone had ever been there, or that his home had ever even existed. He understood the power of destruction, the purity of its purpose, the way it remade the world around it in the spirit of chaos and change. It was almost noble.

    Over the months that followed, he traveled far along the coast, scouring the depths and shorelines, desperate for a glimpse of the truth buried in destruction. He watched as massive, thundering typhoons lashed the shores, dragging broken ships and broken sailors into the darkness of the deep sea. He witnessed lava flows on the sea floor as they ate away the earth around them, raising up new forms in their burning wake. He felt the faint echoes of power stirring within him.

     In time his innate magic grew stronger, more violent. As he experimented with his growing power, he felt the way it marked him, slowly scarring his flesh as he unleashed the noble fury inside him, basking in the destruction he wrought. He filed his teeth to points, seeking to emulate the essence of the sharks he swam with. These sleek, vicious predators also acted without malice, unleashing furious violence from nothing but their nature. Where nature’s wrath was vast and indiscriminate, sharks were sleek and focused.

      Eventually, his gaze moved towards the surface, where he would watch the sun sink below the land and for a brief moment, consume the world in a halo of fire. This vision of conflagration spoke to him, drawing him towards land with the promise of even more wondrous calamities. So he obeyed it’s summons, and left his watery seclusion behind, wading from the black waters of the sea and into the streets of Nock.

    After wandering the surface for some time, he fell in with a mountain of a man named Anas who wore a spectacular duck hat into battle. Together they scoured the hills around Howlerton for undead, destroying them wherever they were found. One day, while pursuing undead through the deep woods, they were ambushed. Anas was slain and Hez'rod nearly died as well. Someone saved his life, returning him (and Anas' duck hat) safely back to Howlerton.

    Back in Howlerton, Hez'rod was healed by Golradir. Now without friends, and feeling indebted to the skilled Elvish healer, Hez'rod accompanied Golradir, Fionna, Erik, and Avran as they left Howlerton.