Tahjin

Tahjin, the Virtuoso, is a master of the secret art of magic manipulation through the mediums of paint and ink. After being blinded, he came into contract with a demon, who augmented his inks to terrifying capabilities to aid him in his lust for power.

## Lore

In the mystical mountains of Ocknuun, there exists a secret order of magic users. These magic users have dedicated themselves to practicing the ancient art of siphoning potentia through the mediums of fervorstone laced paint and ink in order to cast spells and utilize magic.

As a child, Tahjin was always enamoured with the legends of the ink masters, with how their artistic showcase in battle signified an exceptional rare mastery of magic. Born with a rare eye condition that meant his eyesight was doomed to fail, the prospect of wielding colours in such a graceful manner was too tantilizing for the young Gnilmir. Eventually he left in search for the temple; focused and determined to master the art, he threw away rest of his life to chase this goal.

He would find the temple and be accepted in the order in due time. A diligent student, Tahjin would spend day and night practicing, determined to master every brushstroke and movement possible. However, the more he practiced and toiled over the magic form, he noticed his eyesight was degrading at a faster rate.

Eventually it was all too much, and Tahjin's eyesight deteriorated to the point that he was announced as blind. He struggled to keep up to pace with other students, constantly falling further and furth behind. This caused much mental strain for Tahjin, with his dream being so close yet cursed by the gods to be unable to see. His lust for power began eating him out from the inside, suffering constant nightmares with own self doubts and insecurities that his whole life had been a zero sum game.

One day in his nightmares, he was visited by a strange creature. Misty in apperance - drippling ichor as black as the night sky itself - the creature spoke to Tahjin. They offered a way for Tahjin to achieve his dream, whispering sweet nothings into his ears. The creature then presented Tahjin with a vial of their own paint, a neon iridescent shine eminating from within, to signify their new deal. Tahjin accepted and woke up from his dream.

When he awoke, he noticed his vials of ink had be filled with the very same iridescent inks in his dream. The creature had augmented his inks, something that was in direct violation of the code of the master painters. The ink’s magical properties were extremely potent, Tahjin can sense their destructive potential purely on proximity. He then began mastering the ink in private with the aid of his non-corporeal companion, letting their voice in his head guide his actions. Tahjin then discovered that this new ink it is tailored extremely well for curses, and spurred on by the voice, begins practicing on fellow students.

Soon, the institution’s masters caught on to Tahjin's actions and interviened. For enacting violence on fellow students, and tampering with the sacred ink through augmentations, they attemped to subdue Tahjin, but his new ink was far too strong to simply subdue. He overwhelmed the masters in a frightly beautiful display of colours and strokes, and after his whole performance: the masters laid dead on the floor, with Tahjin clamining the temple for himself, announcing a change to the order where he sat as its new master. Many painters fled or at least attempt to, but were caught and taken into Tahjin's demonic embrace.

## Trivia

* Tahjin and "Wizard" are the same species, both being Gnilmirs. They do have distinct differences in their body characteristics as Gnilmirs having a wide range of apperances.
* The shadowy figurine in Tahjin's story is a demon of unknown name & description, showing the further spread of demonic influence in Ocknuun.

## Development Notes

* Tahjin started off as a character that would take the trope of eldritch horror into their story, emphasizing the eldritch nature of Abzulor and the World Inbetween The Walls.
	+ This was scrapped in order to have less characters directly intertwined with the big picture of the Grand Design and the Arklight, and he was changed to have a relatively isolated backstory in the Ocknuun mountains.