<div class="floatright">(https://elliquiy.com/elluiki/images/5/54/Tumblr_lhosv3PeM11qgd7rdo1_1280red.jpg)<br/>(https://elliquiy.com/elluiki/images/c/c2/Gasmask_534267.jpg)<br/>(https://elliquiy.com/elluiki/images/1/19/Fallen_Colossal0001.jpg)</div><strong>Character Name:</strong>Valentine Karskaja<br/><strong>Race:</strong>Skirov<br/><strong>Sex:</strong>Female<br/><strong>Sexual Orientation:</strong>Lesbian<br/><strong>Faith:</strong>Menite<br/><strong>Archetype:</strong>Intellectual<br/><strong>Careers:</strong>Investigator/Alchemist<br/><strong>Connections:</strong>--<br/><br/><strong>Damage Capacity</strong><br/><em>Physique:</em>5<br/><em>Agility:</em>3<br/><em>Intellect:</em>5<br/><em>Power Field:</em><br/><br/><strong>Feat Points:</strong>3<br/><br/><strong>Appearance:</strong><br/>Height: 5'7"<br/>Weight: 147<br/>Hair Color: Chemically bleached blonde<br/>Eye Color: Toxic black-ringed hazel<br/><br/>She cuts a trim, tightly contained island in a world she cannot control, a sea of the unknown which infuriates and compels her. Back from eyes patterned after poisonous flowers, she draws her vainly bleached and styled hair sharply away from her alchemical work, and when it isn't billowing like a feather boa about her shoulders, it's bound in a runner's ponytail. Chemical resin and ozone cling to the striking red of her protective leather like a midday perfume. A gentleman's cane aids her balance to crouch down in the firm Rimeshaws snow and unearth what has long lay buried. She is cat-like more than muscular, in build, in motion, in her fierce independence. But genius has many quirks, some of them physical, some of them nervous, and not every movement is graceful nor intentional.<br/><br/><strong>Personality:</strong>Magic is not a thing of beauty - that is a fairy tale for little girls. Magic is a wild, voracious, man-eating beast. From the stony wood of the Rimeshaws Papa Karskaja fashioned many resolute and breathtaking things which would endure the years and its culling winters, but Valentine was his finest work. With the mettle to brave the strange and mysterious, the acuity to sort truth from fiction, and the cunning to protect her own, she will thrust a scholar's hand into the beating heart of the occult and tear free that which is worthy, for the glory of the Khadoran Empire.<br/><br/><div class="spoiler_container"><div class="spoiler_header" onclick="hideSecond (this);" role="button">STATS</div><div class="spoiler_body">PHY: 5<br/><ul class="bbc_list"><li>SPD:  6</li><li>STR:  4</li></ul><br/>AGI: 3<br/><ul class="bbc_list"><li>PRW: 5</li><li>POI: 4</li></ul><br/>INT: 5<br/><ul class="bbc_list"><li>ARC: - </li><li>PER: 4</li></ul><br/>WILLPOWER (PHY + INT): 10<br/>DEFENCE (SPD+AGL+PER+Race Mod+Equip Mod): 12<br/>ARM (PSY+Shield+Other): 10<br/>+3 vs blast, corrosion, and fire; +4 vs cold<br/>INITIATIVE (SPD+ PRW+PER+Equip Mod+Other): 15<br/>COMMAND RANGE (INT+Command+Ability Mods): 5<br/></div></div><br/><div class="spoiler_container"><div class="spoiler_header" onclick="hideSecond (this);" role="button">SKILLS</div><div class="spoiler_body">Hand Weapon (Prw) 2<br/>Pistol (Poi) 1<br/>Thrown Weapon (Prw) 1<br/><br/>Alchemy (Int) 1<br/>Detection (Per) 1<br/>Forensic Science (Int) 1<br/>Interrogation (Social) 1<br/>Law (Int) 1<br/>Medicine (Int) 2<br/>Sneak (Agi) 1<br/></div></div><br/><div class="spoiler_container"><div class="spoiler_header" onclick="hideSecond (this);" role="button">BENEFITS &amp; ABILITIES</div><div class="spoiler_body">Astute<br/>Genius<br/>Grenadier<br/>Hyper Perception<br/>Language (Khador, Cygnaran/Sulese, Khurzic)<br/>Poison Resistance<br/></div></div><br/><div class="spoiler_container"><div class="spoiler_header" onclick="hideSecond (this);" role="button">WEAPONS</div><div class="spoiler_body"><span class="bbc_u">Ranged</span><br/><table class="bbc_table"><tbody><tr><td>Name    </td><td>RNG    </td><td>RAT    </td><td>POW    </td><td>AoE    </td></tr><tr><td>Pistol, repeating</td><td>48 / 240</td><td>7</td><td>11</td><td></td></tr><tr><td>Bola</td><td>48 / --</td><td>5</td><td>5</td><td></td></tr><tr><td>Acid grenade    </td><td>48 / --</td><td>7</td><td>13 + Corrosion    </td><td>3</td></tr><tr><td>Knockout grenade</td><td>48 / --</td><td>7</td><td>(Unconscious)    </td><td>3</td></tr><tr><td>Fear grenade</td><td>48 / --</td><td>7</td><td>Terror (14)    </td><td>5</td></tr></tbody></table><br/><span class="bbc_u">Melee</span><br/><table class="bbc_table"><tbody><tr><td>Name    </td><td>MAT    </td><td>P+S    </td></tr><tr><td>Sword cane    </td><td>8</td><td>7</td></tr></tbody></table></div></div><br/><div class="spoiler_container"><div class="spoiler_header" onclick="hideSecond (this);" role="button">EQUIPMENT</div><div class="spoiler_body">39 gc<br/>Greatcoat<br/>Alchemist's leather<br/>Gas mask<br/>Traveling alchemist's kit<br/>Sword cane<br/>Bola<br/>Pistol, repeating<br/>Grenadier's bandolier<br/>Alchemical grenade, acid bomb (2)<br/>Alchemical grenade, ashes of Urcaen<br/>Alchemical grenade, fear gas<br/>Alchemical grenade, knockout bomb<br/>Alchemical ingredient, crystal alchemical waste (7)<br/>Alchemical ingredient, liquid alchemical waste (5)<br/>Alchemical ingredient, mineral acid (5)<br/>Alchemical ingredient, mineral crystal (2)<br/>Alchemical ingredient, organic acid<br/></div></div><br/><br/><strong>Background:</strong>She had been a fresh-faced girl, still finding her shape and with a rifle slung across her back, when her unit was stationed in the Scarsfell. It was a quiet duty, made for clear-eyed fledgeling girls and rich boys who oughtn't see combat. Without a clear idea of her identity beyond<em>pretty girl </em>and only an inkling that the future held no satisfaction, she crested the alloyed spine of a decommissioned colossal and felt the pride of her heritage travel up her willowy legs. Birch trees had grown through the grill mask of the silenced behemoth, its motile parts had all been fused shut with welding torches, its soul stolen by the Fraternal Order of Wizardry, and its innards reeked a pall of liquor, but her mind was opened to new vistas. That same summer, one of her brothers had been bit by a pig back in Nynsk, and that anecdote was the story which defined that year for the rest of the Karskaja family.<br/><br/>Valentine had returned to that place one last time at the end of her tour to share a wool blanket, thirty-two candles, and a night of stories with a Khard sous-chef from Cherov-on-Dron. When the dim stars and the low-burning candles had framed them as the center of the universe, her company had asked her why such an irreproachable workhorse as the alloyed hull beneath their bodies had been allowed to be betrayed, and why Khador had allowed itself to fall so far. No answer could satisfy. In the morning fog she had scrounged the fused wreck for a single piece of memento, and come away with only a small tooth of metal which would later become the clasp of the book which would hold all her discoveries.<br/><br/>Over a butcher block table in a tanner's shop in Nynsk she had cut open her ninth bog toad to harvest its single small store of acid, and with the chemical smells of formaldehyde, bile and animal decay all competing to disgust, all she could think about were the old stories of the Old Witch and the songs she'd croak as she deposited vile ingredients into her cook-pot. So many stories came back to her in the delirium of the fumes. A single small flask held her first successful alchemical acid, and with perfectly neat penmanship she recorded her method in a leatherbound tome.<br/><br/>The old master of rites had enlisted her help ridding the Rimeshaws of a restless ghost. Though she believed the old priest to be merely testing her faith, still she went into the unknown with bated breath, a brand new color of mystery cast over the woods of her birth. At her own considerable expense she had brewed ashes of Urcaen, just in case the tales were real. Even though they had come away empty-handed, the investment of the ashes had been worth the price for all she'd learned from the venerable sage. That winter he had passed on, and Valentine spoke at his funeral. It was the first time she was something other than a Karskaja.<br/><br/>The new Sul-Menite master of rites had taken her aside after Father Caragiale's service and asked her if she were interested in reopening the old unsolved inquiries of the church. The answer, unequivocally, was yes.