Victoria au Saguntum

## Victoria

Art by @sushiwestern

Ikram au Hakam (friend, crush)

Anastasia au San (friend, former crush)

Narcissus au Saguntum (brother)

Maria au Saguntum (mother, deceased)

Karpus au Belii (father, deceased)

Sabina au Belii (cousin)

> *"I want to prove myself and carry the Ash Armada to victory. Those slaves need to be reminded who is truly in charge. I want to make them bow to the Dictator, bow to us Peerless. Bow to Society. And bathe in the blood of those who dare defy us."*
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Victoria au Saguntum is the Primus of House Saguntum and the oldest of the three Saguntum siblings. She's the Legate of Legio Rosmarinus.

## Biography

### Childhood

Victoria is the oldest child of Maria au Saguntum and Karpus au Belii. Ever since she was born, Victoria knew she would become a Head of the House. But as her mother told her so, sacrifices must be made in order to prove her worth. During her childhood and most of his teenage years, Victoria became her mother's shadow and tried to accumulate as much information as she could about the family business and endeavors such as the manufacture and manipulation of anti-aircraft and defense artillery, possible enemy routes and which weapon could be used in every case, as well as starting to learn how to fight with a razor on her own.

### Two new family members

Just before she left to the Institute, Victoria's mother Maria got married to Antoninus au Saguntum (formerly from House Baetulo, now extinct), who she had been fancying for years in order to get his fleet. Victoria didn't agree with the new marriage: Antoninus was a reformist and he had a child from his previous marriage, Heron.

Victoria began seeing Heron as a threat because she was afraid of him becoming Primus before her. This lead to her often teasing him and calling him names, manipulating her twin brothers to join the bullying to the point of calling Heron "impostor", "outsider" and "usurper".

She began threatening and physically abusing Heron just after the Institute.

### Institute

She was in House Mars in the Western Institute of Earth and a good strategist when it came to defending the stronghold and fend off attacks. Despite of a fairly good performance and earning the Peerless Scar, she did not get enough merit bars to become Primus. This took a toll on her mother, who soon focused on instructing her younger brothers instead and even investing on their education to become Praetors.

Victoria's pent up rage forced her to pressure herself as much as she could, training relentlessly with the razor on her own until her arms were sore, often overseeing her family's industries when her mother wasn't around and bossing her brothers around to get what she wanted.

### Firestarter

In the late 730s PCE, Victoria went through a violent phase where she would start fights with the sole purpose of feeling the thrill of the battle. She often went to lowColor bars to stir the blood and rile people up expecting a huge, all-out fight. This strategy, however, didn't always work, such as the time she went to The Roadkill with her brothers and met Anastasia au San, and sometimes even backfired like the time she crashed House Trivalia's funeral.

### The Schism

During the Fall of Luna, Maria was the first one, followed by Victoria and her twin brothers, to advocate for support to House Falthe and converge in Mercury with the rest of the Society's forces, hoping to help the House controlling Western European regions regain the honor lost. Antoninus refused and Victoria thought it was a golden opportunity to cull the family's weakest link. After he fired at Maria's ship and sank it, Victoria took the reins of the House and commanded his brothers to open fire at their step-father's ship. She went to the site of the wreck and finished the job herself, making sure the man who became a parasite to her family lay dead before evacuating.

For a whole year, Victoria's thirst for war and her hatred towards the Republic only increased. The shame her mother felt when she came back from the Institute without being Primus still lingered after so many years and weighted heavy in her heart. It was time for her to quench that thirst, prove her worth, support her allies and fall in the Iron Rain. And if she ever crossed paths with Heron again, she would make sure that Antoninus's seed and influence disappear completely, as if they never dared to taint their family with their beliefs.

### Terran Campaign

#### The Bone Brigade

Victoria volunteered to fall in the Iron Rain alongside the Morning Knight and other Falthe legions. However, heavy incoming fire from the Republic made her deviate from her LZ and made her land in Khartoum. Away from her Legion and with her communications down due to the jammer clusters around the city, Victoria had to find a way to the Society forces. While scouting around, she spotted the search party sent by the Curse Knight to look for Leonius au Celeritas and followed them to join the battle just as the Societal legions were taking the airfield.

After failed attempts to call for Legio Rosmarinus's aid, Victoria had to adapt to fight on her own. After a chasm opens on the ground and fails to cut a ripWing in a half, she joins the team descending the chasm to gain control of the Khartoum airfield. Once the airfield is secured, Victoria joins the Bone Brigade to the Bikku Bitti fortress. During the trip, she grows closer to Elia au Nyx, who she rescues after a Republic ripWing attack.

As an enthusiast of anti-aircraft artillery, she requests a tour alongside Elia and takes it as an opportunity to get to know her comrade better. Just after a demonstration of the railCannons in action, they both have a heart-to-heart conversation that makes Victoria's trust issues resurface. As an attempt to figure out if Elia is someone safe to share her weaknesses with, Victoria kisses her briefly and deems her as temporarily safe, since the Nyx Legate also shared some of her insecurities with her.

#### Under the Raven's wing

On 18 May 744 PCE, Victoria reunites with Legio Rosmarinus at Bikku Bitti and with the Morning Knight. Since she doesn't want to discuss her shenanigans with the Bone Brigade, she interrogates Agraivaine au Falthe for her Legion performance and about getting herself a cloak. He suggests the possibility of taking an Aspirant if she proves herself worthy in battle.

Later that day, after receiving another report by her Dux saying that the Legion isn't happy with such a drastic change of training, Victoria meets up with Elia au Nyx. She trusts the younger Legate enough to finally share some of her inner thoughts and insecurities, such as her lack of experience in war and her hatred towards Heron, and the topic about their mutual feelings resurfaces. Victoria first thought that Elia's crush was momentarily, provoked by the heat of the moment after some innocent flirting, so she asks her the question about if her love will last one day or it will last the rest of their lives. She is taken aback with Elia's answer, since she chooses the second option, and Victoria swears to fully focus on their relationship once wartime is over.

#### Battle of Cairo

On 20th May 744 PCE, Victoria carried the Falthe banner in the Battle of Cairo. With joined forces of Falthe's troops and Legio Rosmarinus, she and Thalia au Falthe fought in the North of Cairo, at the back of Republic lines. The Saguntum Primus, alone at first and soon after alongside Thalia, engaged a fight with the Republic Obsidian Strilfrig, while the Rosmarinus snipers swept the battlefield for enemy fire. However, not even the trained snipers could stop Kaya au Strigo's bullet, which cracked her visor and sent pieces of glass to her already scarred face.

Thalia au Falthe, seeing her bannerwoman's state, put Victoria into cover to remove her away from further sniper fire. This simple gesture was interpreted by the Lady of Levant as mildly insulting, as if her liege was treating her like a misbehaving child or a dog, and decided to lunge herself towards Strilfrig again in a last vertical surprise attack. The Obsidian, however, charges against her and the Rosmarinus soldiers and severs her sword arm off at the elbow. Due to her severe wounds and missing arm, Victoria is forcibly removed from the battlements by Sabina au Belii, her Dux.

##### On the Falthe's good side

Two days after the Battle of Cairo, Victoria meets again with Anastasia au San in the medical facility and they catch up. The Love Knight mentions a vacant Legate position for the Hussars, one of Falthe's legions, since their Legate Selene au Falthe is on maternity leave and, supposately, won't continue her career with the large European House, which peaks Victoria's interest. She tells Ana about her ambitions for the war on a walk around Cairo and the possibility of earning an Olympic cloak herself, but to do so, she would need further razor training with her left hand. Anastasia offers herself for the job.

They later discuss the details of their political move. The plan consists in rising in the Falthe ranks while secretly working for the Love Knight and weighting her in their private conversations, war councils and decisions, since they are drifting away from Grimmus. Victoria thinks the smartest move is to get on the Falthes' good graces, starting for the one Agravaine appointed as her babysitter during the battle of Cairo: Thalia au Falthe.

Victoria formally introduces herself to Thalia with the promise of comradeship, even sisterhood, to try to get her to appoint the older woman as the Legate for the Hussars, only to find out that the role is taken by Thalia herself. This rains on Victoria's parade, but she proceeds to try to convince Thalia to consider her using the soldiers trained in Saguntum ludii and loyalty as her bargaining chip and gaslighting her into believing that she's wasting her time by babysitting the older woman when she could be a key tool to become unstoppable. In the end, Victoria lets Thalia think she can bribe her by requesting an ARC-9000 railGun to continue her bloody crusade and spill slave blood in the name of Falthe.

The Saguntum Primus updates the Love Knight on the situation during a secret training session disguised as a booty call, but all they can do at this point is speculate. The session with Anastasia makes Victoria become aware of her lack of formal razor training and how she almost has to relearn absolutely everything.

### Second part of the Terran Campaign

#### Alexandria

Before leaving Cairo, Victoria buys the contract of Centurion Ezra au Icelos, who she met a few days prior training combat with his wings and had been casted aside by the Rage Knight. She told the Centurion that he would be training with the Rosmarinus Dux Sabina and hold a position in her House Legion, but Ezra had to get rid of all his carvings in exchange. Victoria, in a spark of mercy, allows him to only keep his trans carvings.

Later, after conquering Alexandria, Ezra reveals that he had disobeyed Victoria and kept at least some of the aesthetic carvings. Victoria takes it as outright defiance, especially in front of the Olympics Curse and Joy. She threatens to blow Ezra up with her railGun if he doesn't take all of them off.

#### Iberian Tour

After being attacked by House Trivalia during the cross of Gibraltar, Victoria reunites with her allies House Hakam in Iberia. During the feast they held in Alcázar Palace, Ezra au Icelos comes up to Victoria again to negotiate keeping his carved blue tongue and wings, carvings he had removed beforehand. She once more says no, and brings up Ezra's contract to threaten him with termination if he dares to bring up his carvings once more. After Ezra has gone, she proceeds to preventively terminate the contract, unwilling to have the very same conversation over and over away and risk her reputation with the Centurion's actions.

Then, Lady Fatiha au Hakam invites Victoria over a midnight stroll through the Royal Orchards, where she updates the Lady of Levant on the last year in Iberia before bringing up the negotiations Maria au Saguntum left hanging before evacuating Earth: Victoria's marriage with one of the Hakam children. Since what she feels for Elia au Nyx is a wartime crush, she agrees on continuing with the marriage plans and the wedding to be held after getting Portugal back and unifying Iberia again. She is later interrogated by Idris au Hakam about her connection to Ezra, which she denies by showing Ezra's terminated contract and deletes it before his eyes.

#### Battle of Lusitania

Victoria and Legio Rosmarinus participate in the conquering of the city of Faro alongside the Joy Knight, sublegate Fabian au Trigii and Nasr and Ikram au Hakam, the two oldest children of Idris and Fatiha. The city is conquered, but she herself is not so proud of her performance in battle: her legion underperformed, her gun melted and Septico au Trivalia, their objective, managed to escape right before her eyes. While recovering from her injuries, she used this time to get closer to Ikram and get to know him better to help make her choice.

## Appearance

Victoria is 210cm tall (6ft 11in) and she's curvy and muscular. Her whole body is covered in scars. Her jaw is slightly angular, her lips full and she has a few wrinkles on her eyes and mouth crease. There's a large scar covering her left eye, part of the forehead and cheekbone. The eye itself is whitened and bloodshot and she doesn't plan on getting a replacement due to her lack of trust in carvers. Her skin is slightly tan and her hair is honey blond, long and wavy. She usually wears it adorned with a golden rosemary hairclip. Victoria usually wears uniforms donning the colors of her house, navy blue and gold.

### Personality

A hard-working, bloodthirsty and merciless zealot. Ever since she became House Head, Victoria has been ruthless towards anyone who contradicted her mother's wishes, soon adopting them as her own's and repeating them for herself like a mantra. During the schism, she had gone far enough to manipulate, mutilate, threaten and even kill her own relatives to send a message to the others. However, she can be an utmost devotee and a great ally... as long as you're fighting on her side.

## Abilities and Stats

* Razormaster (+7)
* Legate (+8)
* Marksman (+2)

Victoria learned how to fight with a razor on her own, often using the facilities of the ludii her family owns to train and keep in shape. As for her position as a Legate, she was in charge to shape Legio Rosmarinus into a more specialized Legion, favoring snipers, scouts and personnel with medical knowledge to make up for her blind spot.

## Trivia

* Victoria wears the scar over her left eye proudly and claims that she got it in the Institute. That story is almost true, she indeed got scarred during a battle in the Institute, but she was blinded completely with a sharpened pencil while she was sleeping by a very angry seven-year-old Heron.
* She is bisexual with a preference towards women.
* Anti-spacecraft artillery is her passion and could nerd out about it for hours.

## Quotes

> "Glad to know I'm not too late to the party."
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> "Nothing like booze to lift up the spirits"
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> "To the blood of the Conquerors rushing through our veins and giving us strength to fight for our cause, for the Society."
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> "I’m finally free, I do as I gorydamn please."
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