Ruven Liafiel

Ruven Liafiel (1641), painted by Enania Fenynore as an interpretation from stories

Ruven Liafiel is a half-elf from Enmalin on Conder Isle, 135 years old. As a trained and proven ranger, he brings many necessary skills to the table, making up for his spaghetti arms.

Appearance

Ruven is tall, yet still light enough to hush over branches and leaves without a sound. He looks quite old for his age, which must be because of all the time spent in the sun. His hair is dark blonde, with green eyes. He travels with his normal ranger clothing and a hooded cape, to cover up his ears if needed.

Backstory

Childhood

Ruven Liafiel was born in Enmalin on Conder Isle, on 14. March 1386. His parents were Selphie Liafiel, daughter of a trader from Enmalin and Cornos Zumven, a human from Adwick in Evorgos. Selphie's Family didn’t approve this relationship, so they fled to Cornos' hometown. There Ruven grew up to be an average young man, with the only difference that he had to hide his ears from time to time. He started to train and work as a ranger for the Ranger Commission of the Empire.

On the 29. September 1435, his parents died by the hands of the Garlar. Ruven himself was one of the only ones who were able to escape with their life. During the process, he cut off a finger of one of the Garlar, right in the moment when it teleported away to safe himself. During the period of grief Ruven was surprised by his uncle Luthais Liafiel, requesting from him to return to his elven heritage, as the unclean leaf in the family tree has now turned brown. Ruven moved back to Enmalin with the rest of his family, which he barely knew from stories, but he didn’t really have a choice.

Young Adulthood

Luthais' elitist and anti-Semitic way to view the world influenced Ruven for the next few years of his life. He became convinced the greed of humans to live a longer life brought the wizards to become lichs. He was convinced humans would all be able to do such a thing, due to their inferior race, wanting to have what they can’t. His hatred for humans grew from day to day, while totally forgetting that the reason of all this hatred was his father, a human. Together they would train the human out of Ruven, his uncle promised him. It Is here where Ruven started to use his mother’s name instead.

Ruven started working for the Elvish Academy, collecting samples of plants and animals all around Conder Isle, later even leading whole expedition groups through forests and caves. Their work in archaeology fascinated him, but never to a point of wanting to study for himself, Ruven preferred to roam around without having to spend too much time in one place.

Ruven wore the Lichs fingerbones on a necklace, to remember the love and compassion his parents had for him, but over the time it turned into a symbol of hate.

Time at The Army

In the year 1475 Ruven joined the Elven Forces, at a relatively high age of 89, thanks to his family’s connections. Some believe there were even bribes involved, which could to this day not be proven. Because of the leading nobility and their views of mixed elves he was never assigned to neither the Protectors or the Militia, yet many high ranked officers recognized his talents and assigned him to do intensive scouting work outside of the Democracy. Ruven himself would have liked to join the Protectors of the Trees, but the opportunity never seemed to arise, ironically due to the same reason which lead him to live a hateful life. While travelling outside of Conder Isle Ruven had to live undercover to not be recognized as an elven informant. On a visual level this was quite easy, as he resembled a human very much, except for the ears. On the other hand, he had to hide his racism in the presence of other races, knowing for himself that he is superior had to be enough. While biting on his tongue he blended into most taverns without much attention.

First Nightmares

By the time of November 1520, 85 years after the massacre, Ruven experienced his first nightmare. He saw a pale face with thin skin stretched over the skull with hateful eyes, almost dried up. Ruven remembered the face, it was the one Garlar whose finger he cut off in battle. Over the next weeks the nightmares became more and more frequent, with the sight of a dark place with a high tower becoming more and more frequent. Ruven was led to believe that a connection between him and the lich allowed him to see what he is up to, and he starts to search for any lead in his dreams.

The Garlar probably thought he was human as most of the other survivors from Adwick, and only now realized their mistake, after Ruven didn’t die as expected. To correct it, they now start to monitor what Ruven is doing with scrying. The closing portal while cutting the finger must have made it possible for Ruven to use the finger’s power, which is still dangling around his neck. With this power he can see what the Garlar is seeing during his nightmares.

Ruven realized that he had to changes his way of life to fulfil his one and only purpose: kill the Garlar. If they didn’t want to outwait his death, he shouldn’t wait for theirs either. The moment he delivered his last report he quit the army and started to take every opportunity to further his cause, to fulfil his self-proclaimed prophecy. As the information from his dreams proved to be mostly worthless he started traveling around, looking for clues and familiar places. Starting to believe the lich knows about his abilities, he starts questioning every single bit of information he gets in his dreams.

This Day

Ruven did not care about anything happening in politics and was not interested in any war. No message from the army ever reached him, as no one even knew where to find him. He just so happened to be around the unfortunate party while travelling the dwarven lands, he joined them to be safer on his travels, but who knows for how long?

Ruven loves blueberries, he would do anything to eat them in masses.

The next Day

After traveling with the group further west for some weeks he decided to leave the group again. The world wasn't ready for a self-hating racist, always in pain, haunted by both his past and his future trying to find salvation, it was just too much edge.

Where he went is not known, but some say that Jack saw him sneak along the shore in the direction of Dostrait.

"This surely is not meta." - Editor