Description
Ideals
Bonds
Flaws
Personality Traits
Motivations
Backstory
Arioch was born to Eyvindur and Ashar Cathmor Sephtis, each of them a respectable members of the drow city of Niflheim. His father held a good position in the city guard, while his mother was a priestess of the main temple of Lolth in the city, meaning Arioch was born with a status not many young boys has the privilege of holding.
Despite this, he was not spared the gruelling and bloody culture of the drow matriarchy, if anything it gave him front-row seats to the most gruesome of it. He was taught the ways of Lolth and
However, thanks to his status, while most of his male piers were trained from birth to fight, Arioch was given access to books and reading, letting him discover a talent for magic within the books of his mother’s library. His curious mind and skill with basic magic instantly landed him in the city’s magical academy, where he would be trained in the arcane. While no-one jumped of joy at this, it was met with approving nods and the occasional pat on the shoulder. “A young man with a good future in front of him. He will serve the city well.” (Arioch gains his first level)
And to be fair, that was plenty enough for Arioch. Praise was rare in Niflheim, so just the slightest bit of approval was enough to make Arioch work harder, especially when it came from his mother, who insisted his intelligence came from her. His father never objected.
And so, Arioch spent much of his teenage years and early mature years (his 20s onwards into his 30s) as a student, learning the ways of magic. The school was highly competitive, as drow society always was, and boys were cut regularly for not living up to the teacher’s standards or falling behind. Arioch did well though, always laying comfortably in the upper half of the class.
Drow society didn’t particularly encourage building relationships, but Arioch did end up getting closer to one of the boys in his class, Teague. The two of them would study together and hang out when not in class, but remained highly competitive. The 2 things that kept the friendship from falling apart in bloodshed was probably that Arioch was always the better of the two of them and if Teague was to create a fuss about it, Arioch’s mother was higher ranked than Teague’s family.
Arioch did make it all the way to graduation, where he and his remaining classmates were to prove themselves true drow by taking part in a ritual to Lolth. Showing not only that they would use their gifts to aid Lolth, but swear an oath to her in the blood of a ritual sacrifice. Arioch noted he was given a half-elf, which was an honour just below full elves, to whom there were 2, which were given to other classmates. Teague was given a halfling. (Arioch grows to level 2)
After graduation, Arioch was given the role of Archaeologist, tasked with searching the various ruins in the underdark and search to artefacts and places of historical and religious significance. It was a very respectable position, and though it wasn’t as grand as becoming a personal assistant of one of the higher priestesses of an archivist in the grand library, Arioch loved it. He loved the freedom it gave him and the opportunity to learn more from outside the walled city he had been so used to.
It also gave him an excuse to bring back small gifts for his now little sister who was born during this time. Despite familial love not being highly regarded, his devotion to the future heir of his house was seen as a good thing, if anything to make him a great match for a future wife.
For his job, Arioch was sometimes accompanied by guards, while other times, he was sent alone if the trip was deemed safe enough to traverse by himself. It was during one of these trips that alone, when Arioch discovered someone else at the ruins he was investigating. A small band of dwarves, accompanied by someone clearly marked as a devout of Tyr. While Arioch wanted little more to slit the guy’s throat, the entire group was armed and he was an Archaeologist, not a fighter. And so, he followed the group from the shadows. While they didn’t do anything of note other than scout the area, Arioch knew having enemies this close to the city was bad. So when he got back to the city, he presented himself to one of the priestesses and told her what he had seen.
It did not go as he planned. The fact that Arioch hadn’t even attempted to kill the group was apparently bordering on treason and Arioch’s attempt to explain his actions was met with “You’re not supposed to think. You’re supposed to do what you’re told. And if you can’t do that, we will do it for you.”
Arioch was terrified and practically threw himself at the priestess’ feet, begging for forgiveness. And his prayers were apparently heard, though he was never sure if the priestesses saw it as wasted potential to kill him or if his mother pulled some strings, but he was just given temporary reassignment, rather than execution.
It was clear he needed to learn how to fight if he was to be led outside the city again, and they needed to make sure the next time he encountered a threat, he would not hesitate to kill. And so, he was reassigned as a dungeon guard for the prisoners under Lolth’s temple, watching the captured overlanders and bring them to where they needed to go, whether that was the torture chambers, their new existence as slaves, or to sacrificial chambers. (Arioch grows to level 3, becoming a Bladesinger).
Arioch took well to his new role, but shrunk himself down to ensure he wouldn’t step another toe out of line. The dungeons were dark and dirty and miserable and Arioch missed his trips outside the city walls. But if he could just make it through his time there, he would be let out again. Everything would go back to normal and he wouldn’t make the same mistake again.
But one day, Arioch found a familiar face in one of the cells.
Teague.
While they hadn’t seen each other much since their school days, they had written to each other about their life to keep in touch. While Arioch had gotten a respected job, Teague had been assigned to inspect and transport goods from the city gates. He had apparently gotten wrapped up in an investigation leading to the reveal of a smuggling ring that had happened under his watch. While Teague hadn’t known about it, he was judged just the same for high treason and sentenced to death.
And that little connection still between them tugged too hard at Arioch’s heartstrings.
It was supposed to be quiet and unassuming. Arioch even had a plan to ensure someone else would take the fall when this inevitably got discovered. A key in an unassuming place, kicked carefully under a gate like it was accidental, walking down the hall and around the corner and act like he didn’t see anything. Teague would get out, escape down to the sewage tunnel and out of the city. Somewhere. Anywhere.
But Arioch had clearly not learned his lesson.
For a moment, Teague looked up at him, a smidge of hope in his eyes. And then, he jumped for Arioch, tackling him to the ground before getting a hold of Arioch’s blade, holding it to his neck.
“Have you grown soft since our graduation, Arioch?” Teague asked. “Releasing prisoners? That’s high treason.”
“What are you going?” Arioch tried. “I am trying to help you. They were going to have you killed?”
“They were,” Teague agreed. “But if I catch someone committing high treason against our lady of spiders? I’ll finally get the position I deserve.”
And then he leaned close to Arioch’s ear.
“They’ll finally see I’m better than you.”
And Arioch’s fear finally turned productive. Grabbing onto Teague, he swung himself hard into the bars, knocking Teague’s head against the metal, knocking him out. He grabbed his sword back from the drow and was about to finish the job, when he hesitated.
Teague was thin and beaten and bloody and desperate. He had been Arioch’s friend, no matter what they were now. His people would expect Arioch to kill him. Drag his corpse in front of the priestesses and declare him a traitor. One of his own people. Someone he had grown up alongside.
Was this really what his life would be like?
He tried. He wanted to so badly. The only good enemy is a dead one, right? He could get away with it, serve the rest of his time as a dungeon guard and then go back to being and Archaeologist. Go back outside the walls like he longed for. But how long would that last? Until he got caught up in something like Teague? Until one of the priestesses didn’t think he was doing good enough? Until Lolth demanded something of him he couldn’t deliver. He could practically hear her in his ear, ordering him to plunge his sword into Teague’s heart. To shed blood for her. But he knew Lolth’s teachings. It would never stop. And the fact he was even hesitating like this, meant he knew what fate awaited him.
He isn’t sure if it was bravery or cowardice that made him take the route meant for Teague. Through the tunnels and out of the city, he looked back at his home one final time before he ran with nothing but the clothes on his back, his spellbook and his sword.
One can only get so far with that in the underdark, especially alone, and so it didn’t take many days before he was ambushed by a roper. Exhausted and practically out of spellslots, Arioch was ready to kiss his ass goodbye when someone came to his rescue.
Overlanders. They made quick work of the Roper, freeing Arioch, but he didn’t let them get closer than that. He had heard what overlanders did to people like him and he wasn’t about to let himself get taken hostage. However, as he was barely conscious, he didn’t end up having much choice in the matter, only managing to spit out a few threats that sounded much more desperate than he wanted it to, before he passed out.
When he woke, Arioch not only found himself mostly healed in a nice bedroll, he found himself restrained, with his sword and spellbook confiscated. Before he had the chance to panic, he was approached by the leader of the group, who didn’t even react when Arioch literally hissed at him like an angry cat. Instead, the human just sat down next to him, before speaking in perfect drow.
“We are not going to hurt you. What is your name?”
It took him a while to believe those words, but the group didn’t seem offended at his suspicion of them. Instead, they dressed his remaining wounds, fed him and even allowed him free of his restraints after a while, though Arioch suspected it was because they found out he literally didn’t have anywhere else to go. He wasn’t given his book and weapon though, so the lack of trust wasn’t entirely one-sided.
But then they told Arioch who they were. They were a group from an organisation that helped moved people from one place to another. People with nowhere else to go or who needed to disappear. People like him. And when Arioch tried to argue against it, they told him that he was far from the first drow they had helped. They had actually been in the area to help get someone out of Niflheim, but they never showed. Someone who had forsaken Lolth and now needed to escape. Arioch reflectively that was what they got for disgracing their queen, but was quickly shut up when he was asked “like you?”. And that was probably the point when Arioch truly accepted what he had done.
He was a deserter and a heretic. There truly was no going back for him.
He ended up taking the group up on their offer to take him to the surface, knowing he would just be a walking target if he stayed alone in the underdark. He kept his distance from the various members, staying especially weary of the leader of the group, who was obviously a follower of Tyr, but he managed to grow a polite relationship with them. They didn’t threaten him, gave him food and a decently warm place to sleep. At some point he was even given back his book and sword when there was a chance they had to fight a small group of monsters, but even when they managed to avoid it, he was allowed to keep his things.
And soon enough, they made it to the surface. The group brought him to civilisation, letting him borrow a cloak to hide his drow features, and Arioch tried very hard not to look like complete idiot staring in awe at the colours and nature and people of the surface. While Niflheim and his world in the underdark was beautiful in it’s own way, the way the world moved on the surface was fascinating and where the drow prided themselves on their aloof nature and restraint, people here seemed to have no such need.
He was brought to an unassuming office building, where he was presented to the person in charge. And although he had had what he believed was a healthy amount of fear towards the fighter who had lead the group he was with, the terror he felt as Morrigan Fallward stepped into the office adorned in her paladin armour and looking him directly in the eye with little emotion could’ve rivalled the worst of the Lolth priestesses.
However, despite her intimidating appearance, she was patient and understanding as Arioch explained his story, shakily sharing his reason for escaping. The words felt disgusting in his mouth as feelings of regret and guilt started swirling in his mind, but Morrigan silenced them all with a quiet, but firm statement. That Arioch had been brave. Not only in his attempt to rescue Teague (reckless though it may have been), but also in sparing his life when Arioch knew he might face Lolth’s wrath for it.
And so, Morrigan gave him an offer. The Silver Syndicate, whom were the ones he had been saved by and whom she lead, was a smuggling ring specialising in transporting people from one place to another, or making them “disappear” completely. And they could use someone like Arioch. Not just because of his connection to the drow, but because bravery and cleverness like he possessed would be a great asset to them. In return, he would be protected by the Silver Syndicate, both from retribution that might come from his former home, but from the possible anger of the surface world who didn’t always take kindly to his kind. Arioch was originally unsure, but after being allowed to sleep on it, given a warm bath, bed and food, he decided to take Morrigan up on her offer. (Arioch hits level 4)
Thus began Arioch’s new life as a member of the Silver Syndicate. While he usually tried to keep to himself, he slowly became integrated in this family of misfits and runaways. He became especially close with a young human man working in the storage room at the Syndicate’s home base, named Phineas Moonblade. While others needed time to trust Arioch, Phineas greeted him with a smile from the very first meeting. And while Arioch didn’t think anything of Phineas at first, but when he had to get his rapier fixed after a scuffle and the two of them got to talking, they really clicked. And although it terrified him a bit, Arioch dared to call Phineas his friend.
Over the next couple of years, Arioch and Phineas grew very close. Whenever Arioch wasn’t working, he was always with Phineas, or at least nearby. Arioch could always count on Phineas to cheer him up and Phineas told him that he could always count on Arioch to make him laugh. They would take naps together in the back of the storage room where no one went and go on adventures around the city, and Phineas showed Arioch just how beautiful the surface could be. They could tell each other everything and Arioch is a bit embarrassed to admit how much Phineas comforted him about his past.
As the years went by, Morrigan sent him on bigger jobs. Whether that was into the underdark as a navigator for extraction teams (Arioch refuses to actively go near Niflheim to perform actual smuggle operations there) or across the island, Arioch had proved himself a reliable worker and a talented wizard. However, what finally made Morrigan let him completely off his leash, had nothing to do with either.
He was walking around the headquarters with Phineas, talking about an annoying waterleak that had happened in the office, when they walked by the kitchen. Inside sat a dwarven woman who Arioch recognised as having been brought in earlier the same day. She was sitting by a table in the corner, eating a small prepared meal, and Arioch would normally not have thought anything of it, if it wasn’t for the weird wet spot on the wall that was slowly leaning over her.
Arioch was not unfamiliar with the concept that the people the smuggled had enemies, and certainly not that they were powerful enough to send someone after their target. And while Arioch didn’t know exactly what he was looking at, he knew and ambush predator when he saw one.
Without hesitation, he screamed for the woman to move, before he put himself between her and the creature. He doesn’t remember much after that, the only sensation left on his mind being the suffocating ooze enveloping him and the nerve-wracking pain that went through his arm.
It had been a Slithering Tracker, but no-one knew who sent it, nor where it escaped off to, after Phineas managed to run for help. If it hadn’t been at headquarters, Arioch would most likely have died. But Arioch didn’t really care. What he had cared about when he woke, was Phineas crying at his bedside, blaming himself for letting Arioch fight the thing alone. And although Arioch spent over an hour saying that he was just happy Phineas was alright, Phineas vowed to pay him back.
After he had healed well enough, Morrigan called him into her office. She praised him for his courage, especially in defence of someone Arioch had no reason to care about, and told him that she had decided to send him on a new mission. Arioch was a bit surprised, before Morrigan explained that this would not be like any of his normal jobs. He would be going solo, representing the Silver Syndicate on his own for the very first time.
Arioch hadn’t realised how much he had longed for trust like that and he vowed not to let her down. And so a few day later, after packing his things and having a heartfelt goodbye with Phineas, Arioch set out. (Arioch is now level 5)
This is where we find him at the start of session 1.