Zira
Pronunciation: ZEER-ah
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| Age | 157 |
| Birth Year | NRC 374 |
| Gender | Female |
| Race | Dark Elf |
| Homeland | Raiden Woods |
Physical Description
A beautiful dark elven woman to most human standards, she’s an average beauty among her own kind. Her face is delicate, like most elves, with every feature fitting and complimenting the others and is set on a long, elegant neck. A firm, defined jaw with a delicate chin, full, but not too large lips, a elven nose—sharp and defined, but not obtrusive—almond shaped ruby-red eyes with long lashes, framed by arched blonde brows. Her skin is the color of dark honey; a warm, rich golden shade. Her golden blonde hair is worn long, falling low enough to brush her thighs below her skirt line. She keeps the bulk of her hair from being blown every which way by bundling it together near the small of her back with a green band, but it is still loose around her face, framing it well. Like many dark elven women, she has an ideal and seductive hourglass figure; busty, small waist, and wide hips. Her long elven ears are pierced three times, once in the lobe, at the end of the lobe and a the very tip.
| Height | 5’7” | Hair Color | Golden Blonde |
| Weight | 125lbs | Eye Color | Red |
| Build | Hourglass | Skin Color | Dark Honey |
Clothing and Armor
Zira wears a short, low cut, green dress with sleeves down to her elbows; over her dress, she wears a white bodice which laces up in front and conceals throwing daggers between the seams and a knee-length, green hooded cloak. She also wears green gloves matching her dress that reach up to her elbows and high heeled green boots made of the same cottony material her dress is made of, covering the leather that the boots are actually made of. Though she is fond of her green dress, she also has a pair of leather pants and a green shirt similar to her dress, which she wears when it is more practical. She is fond of silver jewelry and wears six silver earrings, and a silver and onyx circlet. She also wears a belt with her rapier and a purse. She carries only a small pack with basic supplies and other clothes. Zira’s cloak is her first line of defense; shielding her elven features from fearful humans. The hood is low enough to shadow most of her face, and long enough to reach the top of her boots.
Weapon DescriptionZira’s rapier is of elven style, a long slim elven steel blade, about three and a half feet long with a simple and elegant hilt design. The hilt is silver plated, etched with leaf designs, the grip and hand guards are green-painted wood and at the base of the hilt is a green glass ball set in silver.
| Class | Shamanist Fighter |
| Occupation | Mercenary |
| Guild Membership | Mercenaries’ Guild (5) |
| Weapons | Elven Steel Rapier, Throwing Daggers |
| Armor | None |
| Equipment | Traveling Gear; change of clothes, weapon and armor care supplies, water skin, bedroll, pack, money |
| Horse | Thunder |
| Magic System | Shamanism |
| Special Summons | None |
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Abilities
Zira was trained from early childhood in shamanism like all elven children. Not only did her parents mentor her, but so did nearly every member of the village, first in the dark elven village she was born in, and later in the Raiden Woods. However, it was her father who drove her the hardest, intending to make her a superior summoner and swordswoman. At the age of fifty, Zira was prepared for a dark elven right of passage, summoning the dark spirits. She succeeded on her first try, though it’s not something she’s proud of. Zira does not recoil from summoning any spirits, not even Salamander. She only summons dark spirits in the defense of herself or others, but not maliciously. She’ll even summon light spirits, even though most dark elves don’t. At any rate, she is a good shaman for her age—maybe not as good as her father would like, but she’s skilled enough for her own tastes.
Not only was Zira trained hard as a shaman by her father, but as a swordswoman as well. He made sure she had a mastery of the rapier before she even left home. And besides training her in melee defense, he taught her a ranged weapon of her choice. Zira decided to go with throwing knives, and having a naturally good hand-eye coordination of an elf, she picked up the skill quickly. Eril was far too arrogant in elven swordsmanship that he never taught her more than the basics of hand-to-hand combat.
PersonalityZira is proud of who she is, and wouldn’t change it for the world, but sometimes, being a dark elf in Lodoss is just damn hard. She hides her dark elven features—long ears and red eyes—begrudgingly to avoid conflict. Despite this, she is determined to travel and above all else, stay away from home. She still bears some ill-will toward her father, and he never supported her interest to become a mercenary (making that money from those humans is far below a dark elf). She is not an evil creature, like many humans seem to think dark elves are, Zira is actually quite a good person. A skilled fighter and shaman, she only implements those skills against people and creatures that would harm her, or anyone in her protection.
When it comes to love, she’s certainly over Kiran, but he left some deep scars. Zira is still afraid of commitment and fears being hurt, not to mention she picked up some of Mia’s traits for promiscuity and a fear of maternity. Deep in her heart, Zira would like to one day settle down and raise a family, but her fear of being betrayed and her pride borrowed from Mia keeps her from acknowledging it. She is determined to enjoy life, but she is also on the run from the hearts she’s broken, and likely will leave more behind her.
Alignment: Chaotic Neutral
Quotes: “...”
HistoryZira was born on Marmo, to parents Eril and Karia, in a dark elven village within the Forest of Darkness. She spent the first sixteen years of her life there, but her parents desired to leave Marmo, especially Karia. Zira’s mother had an encounter with some of the original settlers on Marmo when she was young that changed her views on what she had been taught. Eril was arrogant and proud, like most dark elves, and some how Karia fell in love with him. She convinced him of her own feelings about humans and brought out a compassionate side in him that was normally only reserved for those of the pointed-ear persuasion. As they raised their daughter, they began to yearn for a better place to live, one that wasn’t always shrouded in darkness, where they could escape from Kardis’ corrupting influence.
So, when Zira was sixteen, Eril and Karia finally decided to go to Raiden once they had learned of the options there. Raiden, the City of Anarchy where anyone could find a niche. To the north of the city was Blue Dragon Island where a few generations back, an entire clan of dark elves settled. Just outside of the city on the mainland was another forest where dark elves had taken up residence. They bought passage on a merchant vessel bound for Raiden and investigated the city, and it’s local forests. They found that the Fairy Woods on Blue Dragon Island were inhabited by dark elves who were just as arrogant as those they left behind. However, the Raiden Woods contained more than just arrogant dark elves, but families with half-elven children, half-light and dark elves, and anyone else who would be ostracized in elven forests and human cities. Here, they could live close to nature, and they would be accepted. Karia made the decision to build a new home there, and that is where Zira’s family settled.
Zira’s training in shamanism continued under her parents—more particularly, her father’s—auspices, and she was aided by other elves. One of which, Liora, the eldest elf in the forest in her eighth century and the unanimously declared elder of the forest. Eril was relentless in his training, utterly determined to make Zira one of the best shamans for her age, perhaps to make up for being raised away from "normal" dark elves. Eril never once objected to moving to Lodoss, he wanted Karia to be happy, but at heart, he was still convinced of dark elven superiority. He wanted to be certain that Zira could prove herself worthy to Marmo dark elves, however, Zira felt his training was excessive.
When she was fifty, Eril insisted that she go through the dark elven rite of passage, summoning dark spirits for the first time. Dark Fairies are malicious spirits, and if their summoner doesn’t have enough will power to control them, they will turn on him or her. To convince them that one is worthy, a shaman usually must draw upon a source of anger or hatred, and wield the dark spirits with utter confidence. Zira had built up an impressive reserve of such emotions toward her father, which Eril knew. So, despite the risks, he volunteered to be Zira’s target. On her first try, Zira was able to summon the spirits to drain her father’s strength, drawing up years of pent up anger. Eril was left unconscious for the rest of day, and when he came to the next day, he was proud of her, despite having been left exhausted and weakened for the rest of the week. Zira on the other hand, felt miserable for having lashed out at her own father with such anger. It felt wrong to her, to give in to such vicious emotions and hurt others. She still will summon dark spirits, but only in her defense or the defense of others, not out of malice.
At the age of ninety-six, Zira met her first love. He was a dark elf from Marmo, who had been recently banished from his tribe. To be banished from a dark elven tribe, one has to be very good, or very bad. Kiran was the latter, but while he traveled Lodoss, he’d come to acknowledge his wrongs and sought to lead a better life. He made a complete change from who he had been on Marmo. When he decided to move into the Raiden Woods, he only expected to be there for a few months, maybe years, but definitely not twenty. He fell in love with Zira, who at the time, was such a bright and optimistic young woman. She was just what he was looking for.
Zira and Kiran were a couple for twenty years. In the first few years, they began to consider marriage and children and making a life together. Eril never fully trusted Kiran, but Zira attributed that to just a father’s protective nature. Kiran had changed after all, he wanted a new life after all, to do things the right way. Maybe he wanted them more to fix his life than to really satisfy his heart. Whatever the reasons, Kiran started losing interest in Zira. Other women caught his eye, but the one who was the final nail in their relationship’s proverbial coffin was Mia. Kiran met Mia in Raiden, they got close over a few drinks, and finally spent the night together in an inn. However, it was no one night stand. Mia was a mercenary by trade and a wanderer by heart, and that enchanted Kiran at a point when it seemed he would be spending the rest of his life in the Raiden Woods with a wife and kids.
Mia decided to take a break from the mercenary life and enjoy a little elven life. She was a rarity, half-common elf, half-dark elf, a little of both worlds, not really welcome in either. So she found acceptance in the human world, but she still liked to indulge her elven nature, sometimes she needed it. Now she had a new boyfriend who was residing in the Raiden Woods, so she decided to move in for a little while. She took a room in Liora’s house and Kiran would come and see her. At the time, he was living with Zira, though as far as she knew, when he wasn’t home, he was just spending time with his friends, elves that Zira had known for years and trusted. If Kiran was being unfaithful, they would tell her, right?
Between the filters of Kiran’s friends, both Mia and Zira were shielded from Kiran’s double life. Mia had no idea he was betrothed to another woman, Zira had no idea he was with Mia. Eventually, Liora realized what was going on with the little love triangle and informed both Mia and Zira of the situation. First, the two women met up to confront each other, only to join forces to hunt down Kiran with the intention of nailing him to a tree. Kiran caught wind of the plot and escaped before he was found.
Zira was devastated, but Mia was there to comfort her. The two women became close friends, and Mia stuck by Zira despite the deep depression she was going through. Zira convinced herself that she would never be happy again, that she couldn’t trust any man. Her entire world had be shattered, and as long as love takes to grow between elves, it takes a long time to recover from a lost love as well. Mia was patient and did all she could to help Zira recover. She encouraged Zira to join her in becoming a Raiden Ranger—mercenaries hired to patrol Raiden and protect it’s citizens, a sort of organized vigilante force. After Zira grew into that job, she and Mia began to take Merchant jobs, guarding caravans, and sometimes local monster slaying jobs.
After thirty years spent with Zira, Mia learned of her dark elven father, whom she had always been interested in finding. She offered for Zira to accompany her, but Zira was apprehensive about going back to Marmo and chose to stay behind. So, Mia left, and Zira continued working as a mercenary on her own. During her time with Mia, Zira took on some of the habits of the "gray" elf, and became more promiscuous. She had a few partners, mostly humans, a couple other dark elves, but she avoided relationships. The most relationships she had were one night stands or lasted only as long as the mission she was on. If any of her partners tried to find her after their mission completed, Zira made herself disappear.
Down the road, she was hired for a job in Raiden, guarding a merchant’s train to Blade. Employed with her was a young blue-eyed man named Lance. During their journey, it was painfully obvious that Lance wanted to be with Zira, but she denied him and tried to focus on her job. Half-way into their journey, the War of the Destroyer’s Resurrection broke out. Zira and Lance got their charge to Blade, then made their way to Kanon where they heard the Free Army was making progress. Yet when they reached Kanon, the battle was almost over and the Marmo almost driven out completely. Zira and Lance caught a ship to Marmo with King Kashue’s Flaim forces to find the action.
When Kardis was resurrected, death hoods, dark spirits that stole the life out of whatever they touched, swarmed the armies on Marmo. Lance was hit by one of the spirits and nearly died in Zira’s arms, then when Marfa resurrected all those killed in that battle by Kardis’ evil powers, Lance came back. In the pure ecstasy of the moment, Zira declared her love for Lance and they finally became a couple. Yet, the relationship was short lived. After the excitement wore off about two months later, Zira couldn’t take it any more. Lance was asking her for things she did not want, he wanted to marry her and have a child with her, but the whole concept was extremely unappealing. Zira wanted adventure and Lance wanted to settle down. Zira told him what she wanted, said goodbye and walked out. That was the end of that.
In the last few years, Zira has remained single as she travels Lodoss, taking mercenary jobs with whoever will hire her. Though a dark elf, her beauty and impressive physical assets have quite helpful when some hires her basically as eye candy. Zira has had a few flings but her commitment issues have kept her from being tied down to anybody.
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