The Powers That Be (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
powersthatbe) wrote2014-05-01 09:27 pm
powersthatbe) wrote2014-05-01 09:27 pm
Infiltrator CR Meme: The Cursed Kingdom!
Once you've decided what role you want to play as an infiltrator, brainwashed to believe you belong in Dolorosa, this is the place to talk with other players about shared backstory and relationships you'd like to plan out for the plot. If you're playing a plot-important role, we'd ask that you not disclose any plot secrets here, obviously, and for ease of identification we ask that characters not change their first names unless absolutely necessary for suspension of disbelief, but otherwise everything is fair game! Just make a top-level comment below with your character's name in the subject line, fill out the little form, and then tag around as you like!
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Backstory/Description of new identity:
Born into affluence as the sole heir of a jeweler empire, Kaoru’s role in the world had been carved out long before he could fully talk. It was always understood: he was to be treated as a king, and his subjugates were to fall to their knee the moment he waddled (and eventually walked) through a room—he would hold his head higher than others, above them, better than them. He would be a leader.
So it came as something of a disappointment to his family when the toddler began to form a personality that didn’t quite fit into the haughty mold cast for him. He still recognized his subordinates as being such, but he was not so quick to dismiss them, and often left alone in the care of his parent’s staff, he grew with gentle affection for the people surrounding him. His wealth, he realized, did not elevate him—instead, it placed greater responsibility on him, for being a leader was not simply a matter of being above others, but of holding them up at the same time.
Despite his family’s concern that he was too “soft”, this quality didn’t make him less of a leader, only a better one. On nearly all fronts he was unmatched: from the first study session to the last, Kaoru distinguished himself from the pack of his peers in grades and attitude, aided by the nearly complete isolation from the other students. He found he profoundly disliked his peers—his young mind, so prepared for social dominance—could not understand immediately why the other students didn’t fall in line behind him as the rest of his world had.
Or perhaps he could, but he didn’t want to acknowledge it, didn’t want to think of his place in the world as unearned. It wasn’t fair for him to be an outcast simply by his heritage.
It wasn’t fair and it wasn’t kind. But the world had never been those things, really, and all that he was destined for mandated all that he would lose in childhood. No friends, no confidants who weren’t supported by his wealth—just the loneliness of being king. The more he stood out, the more he stood alone, all the while nurturing a deep jealousy for those other, freer children who never had to know the weight of carrying on their family’s legacy.
But he had an advantage even greater than that legacy. He was smart. Smarter than the lot of them, even, and with practice, he learned to ingratiate himself, wearing false smiles and burying his gentle demeanor under a much more conniving façade. For all the training and tutors his family had paid for, he learned the most from his peers, and by the ripe age of nine, he had come to understand people as strings that he could pull and animate at will.
Until he became bored. For people were always the same combinations, be they his fellow or his senior, and there was nothing in the world he couldn’t rise to with the barest of efforts.
Thus it followed that he found his way to magic. Magic wasn’t something his money could make happen, and the people involved were not such simple lambs as those he had known—it became a matter of character more than status for him, and he took a particular interest in Yellow magic. This venture, out of all his interests, earned the most ire from his family, reducing Kaoru to studying in secret and hiding from the servants more loyal to his mother than himself.
Until, in a streak of brilliance, he proposed a deal in true mercantile fashion. If his family would permit him to study magic openly, he would do so until the age of twenty, and at such time, whether he had failed or succeeded, he would return and take his place within the family business. It took convincing, but Kaoru’s guile, so trained as it was, and eventually won them over.
That, and signing a contract to solidify the terms of their agreement. If he did not honor his deal, he would forfeit all inheritance and live penniless.
Shortly thereafter, the Yellow Illuminant visited their hometown. Eager to meet a real Illuminant, Kaoru begged his parents to introduce him, hoping to land an apprenticeship. He managed to endear himself to the Yellow Illuminant enough to garner his attention, and after some testing, proved himself quite capable of magic—perhaps from natural talent, but more likely from his secret, ever diligent studies.
So he became an apprentice to Alcuin, and in that time, he almost forgot his cunning and remembered his gentleness. But the deal always lingered at his mind, as deals with the devil are wont to do, and when he was sixteen, news came from home.
The family was on the verge of collapse. Poor investments, dogmatic strife, and family politics had left their empire on the brink of burning. Deal or not, if Kaoru didn’t return, his wealth might well be an idea of the past regardless.
Kaoru returned home within the next season, assuming the role of head of the family and bringing them back to glory. All those years of studying had paid off: he made quick work of the family’s troubles, mending the broken bonds, paying off debts and breathing new life into the business by brokering new alliances. In jut a few months, the world was set as it should be, but Kaoru was not willing to relinquish control so easily.
In part, he felt responsible for maintaining it—if their business was threatened again, all of those relying on them for jobs would feel the repercussions sooner than his family. But more than that, he felt as if it was an unavoidable fate for him, and no matter how he had enjoyed his life with Alcuin, he didn’t belong there.
He belonged alone, at the top of his lonely hill, watching over those below.
So letters are traded, monies passed on, spells occasionally written, but he’s accepted that he’ll never return. Now nineteen years old and firmly cemented into his place as the head of the family, Kaoru watches the world devolve into chaos from afar, protecting his herd, and keeping himself sequestered right where he belongs.
tl;dr heir in training who turns to the light side, former yellow apprentice
Significant changes in personality/mannerisms: Not much. He’s just a little gentler and less jaded.
Kinds of CR/RP scenarios you're looking for with this plot: Any and all! He knows about the portals (has seen or heard of it, details unclear) and will spread the word to his contacts after he’s talked to Yellow.
Anything Else/: He’s going to be strangely obsessed with Green.