Backgrounds: Mercenary Veteran

As a sell-sword who fought battles for coin, you're well acquainted with risking life and limb for a chance at a share of treasure. Now, you look forward to fighting foes and reaping even greater rewards as an adventurer. Your experience makes you familiar with the ins and outs of mercenary life, and you likely have harrowing stories of events on the battlefield. You might have served with a large outfit such as Bella-Rose's army or the Yogota, or a smaller band of sell-swords, maybe even more than one. See the "Mercenaries of Huldain" section below for a collection of possibilities.

Now you're looking for something else, perhaps greater reward for the risks you take, or the freedom to choose your own activities. For whatever reason, you're leaving behind the life of a soldier for hire, but your skills are undeniably suited for battle, so now you fight on in a different way

###### Equipment

A uniform of your company (traveler's clothes in quality), an insignia of your rank, a gaming set of your choice, and a pouch containing the remainder of your last wages (10 gp)

### Feature: Mercenaries of Huldain

Countless mercenary companies operate up, down and throughout Huldain. Most are small-scale operations that employ a dozen to a hundred folk who offer security services, hunt monsters and brigands, or go to war in exchange for gold. Some organizations, such as Bella-Rose's Army, Yogota, and the Cloaks of Vadare have hundreds or thousands of members and can provide private armies to those with enough funds. A few organizations operating in Huldain are described below.

***The Cloaks of Vadare.*** The cold and mysterious Vadare Wood serves as the home of numerous groups of vulpin that have banded together into one tribe called the Cloaks of Vadare. Unlike most of their kind, the Cloaks of Vadare refrain from stealing from the people of Huldain and maintains relatively good relations so that they can hire themselves out as mercenaries. Few city-states in Huldain are willing to field an army alongside the Cloaks of Vadare, but several are happy to quietly pay the Cloaks of Vadare to battle the coyouin, orcs, trolls, ogres and other threats to civilization.

***Whispered Thunder.*** Consisting solely of elves, Whispered Thunder is a legendary mercenary company operating out of Essapin. Caring little for gold or fame, Whispered Thunder agrees only to jobs that either promote elven causes or involve destroying orcs, gnolls, and the like. Prospective employers must leave written word (in Elvish) near their hideout, and the Whispered Thunder sends a representative if interested.

***The Monterey.*** Founded in Norfvice a millennia ago, the Monterey were originally a group of dwarves outcast from Norfvice by the elven Aestas belivers and chose not to hide in the mountains. They began hiring out as mercenaries to whoever in Huldain would pay them. Since then the mercenary company has broadened its membership to other races, but every member is an exile, criminal, or misfit of some sort looking for a fresh start and a new family among the bold Monterey.

### Feature: Mercenary Life

You know the mercenary life as only someone who has experienced it can. You are able to identify mercenary companies by their emblems, and you know a little about any such company, including the names and reputations of its commanders and leaders, and who has hired them recently. You can find the taverns and festhalls where mercenaries abide in any area, as long as you speak the language. You can find mercenary work between adventures sufficient to maintain a comfortable lifestyle.

### Suggested Characteristics

Use the tables for the soldier background as the basis for your traits and motivations, modifying the entries when appropriate to suit your identity.

Your bond could be associated with the company you traveled with previously, or with some of the comrades you served with. The ideal you embrace largely depends on your worldview and your motivation for fighting.

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