Vesper
Fighter Information
Name: Vesper Ardina
Actual Name: Richard Shirley
Ranks/Titles: None
Gender: Male
Race: Human
Realm: Mittelmarch
Unit: None
Primary Fighting Style: Preference for two-handed swords but currently trying out all fighting styles
Fighting Since: March, 2023
Events Attended
Gathering of the Clans 2023, 2024
Mittelmarch WAR! 2023
Lore
Early Years
Born into a prominent merchant clan, Vesper’s life began quietly in the kingdom of Delte . Growing up in clan Kyria meant traveling with his family, learning of the outdoors, and training to become a sargent in the clan’s private guard.
Growing older and journeying to the farthest reaches of the land provided Vesper with an understanding of the harsh realities of life. Yet as the world revealed itself to him, Vesper always tried to leave it better than he found it.
Through this deep desire to brighten the world, he strayed from the path of a merchant guard and wandered into contact with the followers of Elysium. Elysium is a force, a presence, that all their followers attest. However, their nature remains hidden, and their power unknown. The only proof of their existence is the power that their followers possess and a drive to bring all things to harmony. Vesper recognized kindred spirits amongst the followers of Elysium, and so learned from them the binding of wounds and the restoring of the soul from corruption.
The Call
One dark night, as winter crept towards spring, Vesper awoke to the sound of a great war-horn. Though the call rang through his ears and woke him from his sleep, no one else seemed to have heard the resonating noise. Vesper’s soul, however, could not rest. The sounding of the horn could not be unheard, and sleep did not come easily after it. The very next morning, Vesper packed his belongings and left the homestead of Elysium, now searching for the source of the distant war-horn.
Mittelmarch
Throughout his journey, Vesper traveled through many lands, most familiar, some not. Over the months of searching, he never found another soul that had heard the beckoning call. One day, as he traveled through a dense wood, a great fog enveloped him. Unlike any kind of fog he had seen before, Vesper felt something change in the world. The air became different, colder than before, and the ground before him now seemed well-worn from countless feet. While he had been deep in the Western Wood, now Vesper stumbled out of a strange and well-harvested tree-line, and a great castle could be seen in the distance. In this moment, Vesper realized that his connection to Elysium had been severed, and, to his despair, a battle raged in the plain before him.
Thus, Vesper Ardina arrived in the Land Between the Lands and found a place in the halls of Mittelmarch. As he has set out on this strange world, he has been quick to seek allies, quick to relearn his previous skills with the blade, and devoted to fulfilling Elysium’s task for him. For, in each waking moment, Vesper can still hear the ghostly poem whispered in his ear:
Elysium walks with the warriors
She waits in the halls of the slain,
Forever searching for the worthy,
For those who fought through the pain.