Absolon

Absolon (Full Name: Sireus Absolon) is a high elven artificer and adventurer, that travels the land of Iya to uncover its secrets. He is a member of the Akutane Clan, though he was raised in the city-state Korolon. He is currently undercover as Hieronymus Absolon while he pursues his investigation into the Tiresian Society. He is the adoptive son of Hieronymus Absolon and adoptive brother of Caelum Absolon, and belongs to the Travelers of Othese along with the ranger Leopold Vanghiest, rogue Ghost, monk Leonor, and druid Tofor.

## Appearance

Absolon is a High Elf of regular height with a thin build and pale skin. Though his hair is naturally silver blond, he dyes it a deep blue color to imitate the half-drow appearance of his father. He has emerald green eyes which are often obscured behind his large silver-rimmed spectacles. He has relatively androgynous facial features and his hair is slightly longer than shoulder length and usually unkempt.

Absolon typically wears a black, leather, sleeveless jerkin with a collar neckline. Around his waist is a belt mad of thick, black cord, and he wears dark blue linen trousers protected by black, leather knee and shin guards. He wears tall black, leather boots with thick soles. Around his neck hangs a chain attached to a locket containing the symbol of the Korolon College of Artifice. Extending from his back are four black metal tubular limbs that suspend him off the ground.

## Biography

### Background

Absolon was born 20 years ago as the youngest child of the Akutane Clan, which at the time of his birth was one of the minor ruling houses of the Empire of Koshun in a distant continent. In Koshun, there is a traditional superstition that spirits of grave misfortune pursue the youngest son of a clan, and so it is tradition in Koshun for the youngest son to instead by raised as a daughter. And so Absolon, having no younger siblings, was brought up in his family with a traditionally feminine appearance, and he was given the name 悪種萎子 (Akutane Shinako). When Absolon was only four years old, his father was implicated in a rebellious scheme against the empire, and so the emperor purged the Akutane Clan. To prevent her children's slaughter, Absolon's mother hid him and his four siblings among the cargo of a departing merchant ship. The ship was bound for a rebel controlled province, but was blown off course by a major sea storm, and the ship was believed by the Koshunese imperial forces to be sunk somewhere in the deep ocean. The siblings, however survived, and the ship's crew was able to steer them toward and unknown landmass.

Upon arriving at port in the unknown landmass, the crew disembarked and Absolon was separated from his siblings, and he has never encountered them again to this day. After spending an extended time away from the Ginka Tree, Absolon's physical body started to deteriorate. Despite his frail body, Absolon raised himself on the streets of Korolon, using his wit and resourcefulness to survive. When his physical form deteriorated to the point he could no longer traverse the streets of Korolon, though he was still young, Absolon turned to a life of begging. While on a trip to Korolon, expert artificer and astrologist Hieronymus Absolon saw the young beggar's magical potential, and took pity on him adopting him as his own child. He gave the child the name Sireus, which was derived from the star under which Absolon was born.

Though Hieronymus's wife had been gone for years at the time of Absolon's adoption, he had another son from that marriage, Caelum. He was a few years older than Absolon and the two were constantly at odds. The three of them lived a conformable yet meager life in small workshop secluded in a forest far from the town of Korolon. Absolon took after Hieronymus and developed a deep fascination and skill for artifice, while on the other hand Caelum found the artifice tedious and preferred spending his time reading religious tomes. Although he never would have admitted it, Hieronymus favored Absolon over Caelum, a fact which became apparent to Caelum. This led Caelum to resent both of them, and eventually leave to live in the temple of Korolon when he came of age. When they were children Caelum often compared Absolon to the parasitic Cuckoo, invading the nest and stealing all of their father's time and love.

As Absolon spent more and more years without the magical sustenance of the Ginka Tree, his body continued to deteriorate physically, to the point of losing his ability to walk. He was bedridden for a number of months, a fact with deeply worried his father. Hieronymus worked tirelessly on a invention that would allow his son to move again. After nearly half a year, he brought Absolon his solution, the Natural Ambulation Tool, or NAT. The device consists of four enchanted, iron, tentacle-like limbs, which attaches to a plate on Absolon's lower back. The device worked exactly as Hieronymus expected, restoring Absolon's motility to a level that even surpassed that of when he was adopted. For the first time in his young life, Absolon could venture out of the workshop and explore the world as an able-bodied person might. His father took advantage of this new opportunity and taught Absolon many thing's about the outside world, among which Absolon's favorite was Riflery. As Absolon spent more time shooting targets with his father, he became more and more proficient with a rifle, though he never used it on any living creature.

Eventually, Absolon's adventurous spirit and greater freedom lead him to enroll at the Korolon Artifice Academy. Although Absolon held his father in high regard, he would soon learn that the scholars of the academy did not hold the same opinion. Hieronymus's reputation at the academy was that of a once mediocre but now washed up artificer that thought too highly of himself and was deluded into believing outlandish theories of artifice. The academy was also largely biased against him for his half-drow heritage. Absolon was shunned by his fellow students just for his association to his father. Absolon mostly despised his first months at the academy, but he did meet one other student with which he could commiserate, a second year student Hermesius Crowley, a human of Absolon’s age, who was also ostracized by the other students due to his interest in more taboo and theoretical fields of Artifice. His main focus was on the storage of human souls into mundane objects, an idea that disturbed Absolon. With no other choices for companionship at the academy, Absolon chose to keep Crowley as a friend while ignoring his research.

However Absolon would find himself alone, when he returned for his second semester at the school. Crowley had entirely disappeared, and stranger yet none of the other students or professors admitted to ever knowing him. To investigate further, Absolon scoured the student residences where Crowley kept some of his possessions. To his surprise, all of Crowley's things had disappeared along with him, except one, a locket which he often wore around his neck. He discovered it among the ashes in the main fireplace of the students residence. The outside of the locket was silver with ornate carving, and Absolon had never seen the inside of it. Crowley never showed it to anyone at the academy. Upon inspecting it, Absolon discovered that one side of the locket held a symbol of an eye crossed-through, and the other side held an inscription of the initials T.O. Absolon didn't recognize the symbol or initials, and his research into them turned up nothing of interest. With no other avenues of investigation, Absolon solemnly returned to his studies in social isolation.

Near the end of term Absolon received a welcome letter from his father. The letter invited him back to the artificer's workshop for the "grand unveiling" of a strange new technology called Phantasos. The letter mostly lacked detail on exactly what the invention was actually composed of, it did mysteriously describe its powers to "peer beyond the mortal plain, and glimpse the red strings of fate which intertwine our fortunes". The idea certainly intrigued Absolon and he, unlike his brother, returned home to witness the invention. Aside from Absolon, some experts in the field of Artifice were also invited to the event, including some professors from the Artifice Academy and a delegation of the regional Artifice Guild. Many of the master artificers were disappointed when Hieronymus unveiled Phantasos, which physically appeared to just be a large, clouded crystal orb, but Absolon could tell it held much more potential.

Despite so far disappointing results, there was an air of expectation among those present as Hieronymus began to power up the machine. In that moment disaster struck. The machine exploded in a powerful burst of arcane magics and flames. The shock-wave flung Absolon into the air and through a large glass window. He fell two stories, and although his fall was mostly broken by NAT's mechanical limbs, he was still injured and disoriented from the blast. Flames from the blast had severely burned his back, fusing his flesh with NAT's components. As the blaze burned down his childhood home and the pain from his injuries grew unbearable, Absolon closed his eyes and accepted that this might be his last moments in the mortal world. As Absolon lay in a semi-conscious stupor near the workshop that was now being consumed by the pyre, for a moment he thought he could see cloaked figures silhouetted against the calamitous flames.

Suddenly Absolon felt a cool breeze and opened his eyes to discover he had been transported to a lush garden. He also noticed that his body was now without injury, and he was able to move without NAT's assistance. For the moment Absolon truly believed that his soul had traveled to the celestial realms. The garden was silent save a gentle breeze that rustled the foliage, and it appeared that the whole world was bathed in the light a the full moon. However this place was not the afterlife. It was a dream world that Absolon would from then on return to when he slept. Eventually he would come to call the realm Phantasos. However for the time, Absolon was unaware of the true nature of this garden, and as the sun gently rose to his east, a deep drowsiness overcame him and he fell into a deep sleep.

When Absolon finally came to, all that lay before him was pain and grief. The ashes of his home mingled in the air with the finally dying plumes of smoke. With the help of NAT, Absolon scoured the ashes of his home for any evidence that his father may have survived. Among the ashes he found many corpses burned beyond recognition. Though he had no proof he believed that his father's corpse wasn't among them. In his investigation of the workshop, Absolon also discovered a single tome miraculously unscathed by the flames. The tome was entitled Compendium Tiresias, and the cover was emblazoned with a symbol of a eye-crossed through. The tome was filled with unreadable language and bizarre symbols from cover to cover. Scrawled inside the front cover was a message from his father:

> My dear Sireus, if you have found this tome, something disastrous has occurred. There are those in this world that may wish misfortune to come to me and our family. Old colleagues, who now wish to do me harm will stop at nothing to see my work undone. Sireus, if I am no longer, in this mortal plane, you must continue my work, and ensure that the development of Phantasos isn't for naught. Take this tome, which I have enchanted to be mostly indestructible, and seek out the Conundrous Mask that I have hidden in a private place far from my workshop, a place where it will not be found by anyone, save you. Don my mask and with tome in hand seek out the Tiresian Order. Only they can provide you with the resources necessary to preserve the knowledge of Phantasos. Introduce yourself to them with only the name Absolon, and they will welcome you into their ranks. Be warned however: Do not trust any member of the order. Each one has their own insidious motive with each member being more despicable than the last. Heed my words so that my life's work may not be in vain. Make haste now and good luck.
>
>

The message filled him with the will to survive. He began preparations to set off and accomplish the task laid out for him. No longer would he be known as Sireus. Now he donned the name Absolon which had until then only been used by his father. That night he tended to his wounds and then set off, both hoping to fulfill his father's legacy and he hoped to be reunited with him. He still held hope that he would find his father alive. Word spread among the citizens of Korolon of the events that had transpired that night. The magistrate of Korolon, Kredentius Flynn knew of Hieronymus Absolon's reputation, and he saw the disaster as the artificer's revenge on the master artificers that had scorned him. When he heard news of a strange elf roaming his kingdom using the name Absolon, he posted a steep bounty for his speedy capture. With the magistrate's guard and bounty hunters after him, Absolon was forced to leave Korolon. Though he didn't know exactly where it might be hidden, he figured that his father's mask was probably hidden in a nearby kingdom. And so The Great Artificer Absolon's adventure began.

## Powers

### Artifacts

A200X Natural Ambulation Tool - This is an artifact, often abbreviated NAT, created by Absolon's father and gifted to him at a young age. It takes the form of four long mechanical limbs which extend from a plate on Absolon's back. Though these limbs are powerful enough to suspend Absolon from the ground, they are no more powerful or agile than normal humanoid limbs. Absolon uses NAT as his primary form of motility since his legs are incapable of supporting him.

* Agility Module (Expeditious Retreat) - When Absolon activates this module, NAT's limbs glow with a faint light and make a slight buzzing sound. This improves NAT's overall agility, making Absolon quicker and more evasive in a pinch.

A400X Swarm (Magical Tinkering) - This is an improvised artifact created by Absolon on the spot. When Absolon's needs to quickly invent a solution to a problem, he is capable of tinkering mundane objects to transform them into useful tools. Frequently he uses this technique on a card produced from a deck of jokers that he carries with him. He can use them to produce several sensational phenomena.

* Mod A
* Mod B
* Mod C
* Mod D

A500X Buzz

A600X Carapace

* Absorb Module (Absorb Elements)

A700X Drone Mark I

A900X Stinger

* Frost Module (Ray of Frost)
* Crowd Control Module (Thunderclap)
* Grease Module (Grease)
* Acid Module (Tasha's Caustic Brew)

## Quotes

* (Catchphrase after transforming) "I am the winged guardian who fights for love and justice. I am Hieronymus Absolon. And now, in the name of my father I will punish you!"