Post by heather927 on Sept 26, 2011 17:32:34 GMT -5
Name: Jasmine Sera
Age: 388
Race: Elf
Occupation: Assassin
Allegiance: Herself
Physical Description: Jasmine has wavy brown hair and brown eyes. She's of around average height and slim yet, even at a first glance, there's something predatory about the way she moves. Often with a confident grace even when she's walking on rocky terrain. If she wants to, she can move in almost-silence and does so frequently, either when working or just when she doesn’t want to be found.
As an assassin, Jasmine’s typical outfit is deadly, protective and practical. She tends to wear brown trousers and a white top with warm, well-fitting boots. A sword tied across her hip and several daggers in different parts of her outfit (a long thin one in her boot, a smaller one up each sleeve for throwing, a large jagged one on her belt with her sword, a miniscule yet poisoned one on a chain around her neck and occasionally others hidden elsewhere). The poison on the one around her neck is lethal if not cured although Jasmine has become immune by way of taking the poison in small doses monthly. When fighting she tends to have her hair back in a loose bun with several lock picks holding her hair in place, she often wears all black but, depending on the time and place has been known to do assassinations in dresses, her standard clothes or a more appropriate garb. She has several different outfits in her dresser; all for different occasions should the need for them arise. This allows her to blend in with different groups of people with ease.
Personality: There are many ways to describe Jasmine. The easiest would be as practical. The truth is that Jasmine is a woman who understands risks and prefers to, gracefully and with dignity, run in the opposite direction when they prove too great. While some would call that cowardice, those who know Jasmine better would be forced to admit that she simply knows how to stay alive. Jasmine would be perfectly willing to help another but not at the expense of her own life. Her friends - a scarce, yet previous few - are the only ones she'd even consider risking death for and even then she'd have to take some time to think about it. That's probably the most important thing about Jasmine, and the reason she's been alive for so long, she knows when to quit, when to give up and when to compromise.
If there was no risk, or she was being paid enough for risks not to matter, Jasmine would do everything in her power to help as many people as possible, regardless of who or what they are. She'd sooner save twenty average citizens than one King, although, given her strong dislike for any and all authority, she'd probably let a monarch suffer even if she had the option to help them.
Her greatest flaw is probably her pride. Jasmine is too proud to admit she's wrong, even when she knows she is. While yes, she would run to save her life, she prefers to call it "tactical retreat" or "the only practical and non-suicidal option". She would never ask for help although, if she needed it, she wouldn't say no - at least while she still required the assistance. It's mainly her pride that led Jasmine to perfect the poker face; she can keep the impassive, calm stare up even when she's scared, hurt or incredibly angry. Although it's possible for masters of body language to look past the confident stare and see the true emotions, Jasmine has yet to meet someone who can.
For an assassin, Jasmine has a strict sense of moral. The first is that she never breaks her word. Although she might twist her words and find ways around them, she always keeps her promises. As well as that, the contracts she selects always involve, at worst, quick, painless death, she never backs out of a contract once she's accepted, she never kills except on a contract and only accepts a contract when she's being paid. Even in self-defence the worst she'd do would be to injure them, or, if they were incredibly persistent, spend a little time hunting down a contract for them, naturally she might accidently kill someone when defending herself but mistakes are mistakes. Of course, there are exceptions to every rule and Jasmine's exception is when someone she cares about is in danger. Then nothing can stop her. If someone tries to blackmail or threaten her with a friend or family member's life, they die.
Perhaps the most unusual thing about Jasmine is her hobby - mushrooms. She loves them. The taste, the smell, everything. Even as a child she'd spend time learning their names, learning which were edible and what dangers the others held. In the back of her garden she grows several different types, some of which are brilliant for cooking and others which would make you die instantly. Occasionally she goes on trips to collect more mushrooms and more often than not returns successful. When she was living in the forest (see the history), Jasmine traded for some paper and, using ink and a brush, wrote her own notebook on mushrooms. It was crumpled and tattered but the writing was beautiful and it was very, very detailed.
Being an assassin, Jasmine's trained in several fighting arts, namely sword-fighting, knives - throwing and fighting - and unarmed combat. Her blades are often poisoned, although never with any both life threatening and incurable in case of accidents. Jasmine's greatest weakness when it comes to fighting is magic. She's just not good at it. She'd never had time to learn it and, aside from a few basic tricks, the things she's learnt have almost all been forgotten.
As far as fears go, Jasmine’s main one is her claustrophobia. It’s not just small spaces but large crowds, basements – anywhere she can’t either leave instantly or see the sun. She prefers being outside instead of inside and will often go out of her way to avoid the busier places.
History:
Jasmine’s childhood isn’t something she likes to dwell on, and with good reason. She was never as good as her parents or siblings in magic and, for her family at least, that was all that mattered. Instead of wasting her time learning something she’d never be any good at, Jasmine trained in fighting with her uncle, a man who, like her, had never really grasped magic that well. He was a brilliant swordsman and even though Jasmine’s parents ignored her in favour of her brothers and sister, he was always there for her. Like her siblings, Jasmine attended school in Ilirea until she was 75 but, in her spare time she learned quickly and by the time she was one hundred could beat her uncle in every three of five fights.
She was an adventurous woman and, after another couple of decades there, deciding to trek out and leave. She wasn’t completely sure where she was going to go and so she did what she always did when she was stuck – went to see her uncle. He tried to talk her out of it but once he realized that it was futile he gave her several of his old contacts and told her to speak to them when she left. She left two days later and never once looked back.
It was with surprise that Jasmine learnt who her uncle’s contacts were. Humans she had expected but not a group of assassins. She slowly learnt that her uncle – an elf who had always seemed so at home in the forest – had used to be an assassin and worked with the humans. Mainly out of love and respect for her uncle, Jasmine agreed to the decade of training offered by the group, if she succeeded then she would be allowed to join them. She passed with flying colours.
As the only elf there, Jasmine’s previous prejudice against humans quickly faded to curiosity and then to indifference. It was hard to hate the people she worked with and killed for. For the next century and a half, Jasmine served in the group and watched her friends and co-killers die one by one. Out of the seventy-eight she met in person, none grew old enough to retire. The only close friend Jasmine had out of the whole group was a woman called Lilly Fray. The two often joked about both being named after flowers. Despite their occupation, Lilly was a bright, cheerful and occasionally too-optimistic woman. At around thirty-four years she was nearing the average death-age for an assassin, although she looked barely thirty. Jasmine had tried to convince Lilly to retire several times but Lilly had simply smiled and she would ‘next year’. That was a year Lilly never reached.
When her best and only good friend died, Jasmine wanted to blame someone. She started blaming the group they worked for; she left the city to live in the wilderness and morn and she spent almost one hundred years living there, alone. Sometimes she left to speak to travellers and trade with a nearby inn but, for the most part, she spent time by herself. Jasmine would probably have stayed there longer if it hadn’t been for a man called Jonas.
Jonas was in his twenties, coming onto thirty when the two met. He was a merchant, not a very skilled merchant but a merchant none the less. After hearing rumours about ‘that crazy elf in the forest’ he’d decided to investigate and got himself nearly killed by Jasmine. After a brief yet tense standoff, the two got talking and found that, although they hadn’t got much in common, they got on well. Well enough for him to return the next day and the next, for five whole months. They spent most of their time talking and, eventually, Jasmine found herself telling Jonas everything. While she omitted the part about her being an assassin, and about how Lilly had actually died, she didn’t lie to him. Not once.
Slowly the two became friends and Jasmine moved back into the city. She found it a little hard to adjust and Jonas gave her a room in his house while she sorted herself out. One thing led to another and, although if anyone asked they were ‘just friends’, it soon became more than that. They were lovers briefly but never really fell in love. Although they were definitely closer than just friends neither of them had a name for what they were so, after a while, they decided to go with partner. When Jonas hit hard times, about four years after they’d met, Jasmine traced her old contacts to find their most recent replacements and became, again, an assassin. Except this time she was freelance.
She never told Jonas about her job; instead she gave him some elusive answer and changed the subject. He wasn’t one to pry so it was all good. Even when the two adopted a daughter – Jonas’s recently-deceased sister’s little girl – she didn’t tell him. Not because she thought he’d turn from her, she knew better than that, but because she didn’t want to put him in danger. With Jonas’s friends, family and colleges aside, most of the neighbours though Jasmine was a human, this was simply for the benefit of them all – less questions asked and less prejudice against her. Those who did know either didn’t mind or acted that way.
Roleplaying Sample:
Jasmine Sera padded softly down the road, her steps soundless against the cold cobbles of the ground. It was a bright morning and people lingered nearby, some walking casually while others sat or stood talking to one another. All of that was captured in Jasmine’s sight and deemed unimportant in an instant; the only important things were herself, her target and the distance between them.
Approximately five metres. The man still hadn’t given any indication that he’d noticed her and Jasmine preferred it that way. Ignorance meant less fear, meant less running which overall meant more chance of success. Taking another step towards him, Jasmine didn’t slow down as she walked straight past him, brushing by with a quiet, gentle “Pardon”. She continued to walk in the exact same pace before sidestepping into a nearby clothes shop and examining the wares there. There wasn’t any need for Jasmine to watch the man die, she knew what would happen. The dagger she’d cut his hand with when she’d brushed past – such a small cut, it wouldn’t even have been noticed – had been coated with a poison that both lessened the pain, making the action unnoticeable, and slowly stopped the heart. The man would be dead in eleven minutes sixteen seconds without even noticing there was anything wrong.
Twelve minutes twenty seconds after entering the shop, Jasmine paid for her items and headed back home, pausing only to throw a casual, curious glance at the crowd gathered nearby. She arrived home without incident.
