Exsilium Application

[springserpent]

» PLAYER INFORMATION
Player NAME: Shuu!
Current AGE: 22.
Player TIME ZONE: GMT mountain something or other...
Personal JOURNAL: cthulhucat.dreamwidth.org. Nothing there but a muselist though :x
IM & SERVICE: Zettazorched @ AIM!
Player PLURK: cthulhucat
Current CHARACTERS: Zilch! Hoping to change that today.

» CHARACTER INFORMATION
Character NAME: Mihli Aliapoh.
Canon & MEDIUM: Final Fantasy XI. It's a game!
Canon PULL-POINT: Some unspecified time during the Serpent Generals many defense operations in Al Zahbi
Character AGE: Estimated 23.
Character ABILITIES:

♦Balance/Flexibility Naturally from birth, Mithra possess an enhanced sense of balance and flexibility. They're extremely dexterous, much like their four-legged ancestors, and while they may not possess the same level of 'bonelessness' that actual cats display, a Mithra can still be rather lithe. Obviously, this helps in combat and as such members of the Mithran race make wondrous thieves, assassins and ninja just to name a few professions.

♦Speed Going hand in hand with their natural balance and flexibility is a mithra's speed, which is obviously somewhat higher than the norm of a human's. On top of this, Mihli has displayed speeds great enough to leave afterimages in her wake. She's also capable of moving completely soundlessly and apparently weightlessly as proven by how effortlessly she stands upon the flat of Rughadjeen's zweihander once it was swung at her. From this we can gather that Mihli's training has pushed her beyond the limits of her mithran sister, leaving her both faster and quieter as a result.

♦Assassination Training Due to spending her childhood in the Freedom Fighters, Mihli has been trained as a thoroughly skilled assassin. Not only that, she's incredibly, almost super-humanly precise and has a vast working knowledge of the human body and how to disable it - for example, during one of her assassinations she cleanly beheads a man at night whilst he was moving, and from a great distance at that - even more ludicrously, it splits his spine perfectly through two vertebrae. She's also demonstrated enough speed to effortlessly slice out another victim's kidney with a single stroke while descending upon him soundlessly in the night. Another time she'd strangled a man more physically imposing than her with a vine, choking him out before he could even call for help. Despite all these murders of extremely high ranking officials, Mihli was never officially caught, and even when cornered the only reason she didn't kill the Empress was because her emotions got in the way. Even so, the deaths were so gruesome and frequent that Al Zahbi developed a curfew in an attempt to stop them.

♦Knowledge From the outside looking in, one would only think that Mihli's knowledge ended strictly at book-smarts, though this is completely false. As aforementioned she's survived on the streets on her own for an extended period of time, and while one may believe her near peerless grades only serve to help her in school, her brilliant mind has aided her in eluding the authorities through several different occasions. One of the largest examples of this would have to be when she faced off with the Serpent Generals and was able to slip by all four of them at once without breaking a sweat. She's also displayed an aptitude for alchemy, specifically the development of certain poisons to more discreetly eliminate a target. She also excels at improvising in a scrap, using her acrobatic skills to bounce from walls and stay out of harm's way whilst devising a plan to overthrow her opponent. All in all, Mihli isn't a combatant to be taken lightly.

♦Armor The armor that Mihli, as well as the other Serpent Generals wears is magically enchanted despite appearing to be made of simple metal and leather decorated in crimson, black and gold. While sturdier than normal armor crafted of the same material, it also enhances her health and mystical capabilities, granting her both increased stamina in both the physical and magical sense as well as bolstering her combat abilities overall. With it, she's naturally quicker and more accurate, she has the ability to weave her spells in less time and her attacks pack a bit more magical 'oompfh' All in all, it heightens her spirits in a fight, escalating her already impressive capabilities. Her club and shield, while crafted partially of the wood from her homeland, also possesses magical qualities. On top of being sturdier to prevent breakage in a fight with things of supernatural strength and/or quality, the items are also more dangerous than normal weapons - as with her armor, they're enchanted to allow Mihli to cause more damage to her foes, as well as take more of a beating without dropping easily.

♦/WHM While she's primarily an assassin and even carries hidden blades on her person as well as her trademark club and shield, Mihli has been trained as a White Mage and is very adept at her job. She'll have the working knowledge of all of the abilities/spells listed Here as well as the signature skill named Scouring Bubbles a technique that conjures up a massive torrent of water along the arc of her club's swing.


Character HISTORY:

Al Zahbi is a fortress city besieged constantly by war - it's also the western Capital for the vast Empire of Aht Urhgan, and not a day goes by when either side, west nor east, see much peace. While her Eastern half is currently locked in battle with the "Far East" (Vana'diel's version of Japan) Al Zahbi is locked in perpetual combat with the Beastmen Hoards, in particular, the Mamool Ja Savages, Troll Merecenaries and the Undead Swarm. Nearly each week Martial Law is declared in Al Zahbi, leaving the fates of her inhabitants in the hands of both the Serpent Generals, as well as brave Mercenaries hired for the cause of repelling the Beastman threat, and all of this is for the sake of safeguarding the Astral Candy Astral Candescence, a mystical artifact that seems to bolster the lives of those in its possession - for this very reason do the Beastmen continue to attack. But the story of Mihli Aliapoh doesn't quite begin there. To understand her, one must comprehend the state in which one of the Empire's many Vassal states lives in.

Mihli was a Mithran female born in Tsahya, an island nation that has been granted autonomy and its own independent defense force, even if they're still underneath the watchful eye of the Empire. They have an Imperial Governor-General, plus they've been given the same rights as imperial citizens, but that's only on paper. The Empire has a long history of toying with these vassal states, meaning that the corruption runs as deep as the pockets of the impure officials whom manipulate these states as they see fit, often to the dismay, or even demise of the people who inhabit these lands. Mihli's family is one such example of this injustice - once a wealthy farming household, Mihli and her Mother lived peacefully until a drastic and sudden new law required they completely rework their farming habits, forcing them to grow Pamamas in lieu of their usual crops, depriving them of money - and making matters worse was the fact that no one in Mihli's village had any sort of experience in growing this fruit, the same fruit supposedly favored by her people. What dumb luck. Because of this, the first and most vital harvest of pamama failed, and the people slowly starved, including Mihli's mother who died in the place of her daughter. Mihli hit rock bottom from there, with no-one to support her and no real clue of what to do next, she lived day to day unsure of what to expect or what she'd even be able to eat, but even then she survived on the streets, alone and no doubt afraid, doing whatever it took to stay alive.

And she did. Though we have no real details of this time and what she must've done to keep herself going, Mihli was able to keep alive despite the harshness of the streets and without the protection of her mother, though in time even this wasn't enough, leaving her with only one alternative: to join the "Tsahyan Self Defense Force" (by admission, she says she does this solely because they feed their own well) She was only thirteen at the time and lied about her age in order to get in, but it worked! For a while at least. Once they found out her true age, Mihli was thrown into another organization known as the "Tsahyan Freedom Fighters" a secret operation kept far away from the prying eyes of the Empire and built for the sole purpose of overthrowing Al Zahbi's control over the vassal states in the hopes of gaining true independence from the Empire's reign, but the Freedom Fighters' methods are (somewhat understandably) extreme as they specialize in raising young children as assassins. Mihli describes being put into this organization as "trading one hell for another", insinuating that the training she endured was both thorough and merciless, and once there was nothing more to teach her, they gifted her with her new name (As beforehand we're not really told Mihli's true name) and sent her off to Al Zahbi to complete her true assignment under the guise of a Tsahyan philosophy student.

Mihli studied in the Walahra Temple, a sort of cross between a philosopher's school and a religious following studying the teachings of Walahra, an individual whom claimed to know the path towards finding the meaning of life. While she used this as a guise for remaining in the Capital, Mihli went out night after night, moving up a list of wealthy (corrupt) imperial officials to assassinate, and she did so effortlessly, dispatching her targets in various and gruesome ways, leaving both the Serpent Generals as well as the Immortals clueless as to who could've been orchestrating these assassinations. Their only clue lay in the pamama peel splayed out like a blooming yellow flower over the face of the corpses of those assassinated...

Mihli rose to the top of her class, her studies quickly developing to the point where she became the representative of her peers despite being a foreign student as well as the fact that she remained quite standoffish and abrasive towards others, shielding herself from them and her true identity. As her assignments continued, Mihli was informed that her next biggest assignment would be the assassination of the Empress Nashmeira during the Graduation Ceremony for the students of the Walahra Temple as the Empress was known for preceding over the speeches of the event. (A task that would no doubt see Mihli killed as this was a suicide operation and she would be given no chance to escape, even though her overseers admitted to themselves after Mihli had left that there was no way she'd complete this task and was merely doing this to drive a message home and act as a lowly pawn) Unfortunately for Mihli, the target she had assassinated the night prior finally shed some light on the entire situation for both the Serpent Generals as well as the Immortals - Mihli had targeted and dispatched the Grand Vizier, the very same Imperial Governor-General responsible for the Pamama incident in Tsahya, leaving the only targets left for assassination members of the Royal Family, the Empress herself, or another Vizier who was currently away from the Capital at the time. Seeing as the Serpent Generals and Immortals don't get along well for various different reasons (Primarily for the fact that the Immortals are corrupt and secretly believe that the Empress isn't fit to rule while the Serpent Generals are endlessly loyal to her) the Immortals claim that this is out of the General's hands and order them to leave the matter at hand to them, though Rughadjeen, the Skyserpent General and leader of the Serpent Generals has other plans.

During the ceremony Mihli notices a number of Immortals guarding the Empress' veiled throne and is able to slip out from under everyone's noses in order to secure a better position to eliminate her final target when she notices passed the throne that there's no-one sitting there. Left with no other choice, she smoke bombs the area to escape when her name is called to give her exit speech.

It is revealed to us that the reasoning behind Mihli's position at the Walahra Temple is twofold - to live in the same land as those she needed to kill as well as to secure herself a place to stay close by the Empress, who had actually been attending schooling in the temple underneath the guise of a young woman named Aphmau, the same girl who, despite Mihli's abrasive nature, had defended her (from the classmates who made fun of her peculiarrrr purrrring accent) and attempted to befriend her time and time again. During her time in the Temple, despite knowing it herself, Mihli had allowed herself to grow a little soft and so despite outsmarting the Serpent Generals en route to the Temple where Aphmau had been concealed, she still couldn't kill the girl when it came down to it - and because of her hesitation, where normally the dagger in her hands should've been buried deep inside her target's neck, she hesitated and was blown into an adjacent wall by the Immortals.

She was to be killed by incineration and braced herself for this fate when Aphmau's voice stilled the orders before they were carried out on the spot, sparing Mihli while simultaneously instilling her with hope for the first time in what felt like ages. Aphmau explained that Mihli was her friend and that there must've been some sort of mistake, leaving the Immortals unable to act out on their execution and placing Mihli's fate firmly in the grasp of Aphmau and the four Serpent Generals.

For a unspecified time after that, Mihli worked for Aphmau through General Rughadjeen, who placed her in the role of counter espionage due to her unique skillset, and since then she's proven her worth to the Empress by thwarting a number of serious assassination and sabotage attempts. Because of the steady trust and friendship that kindled between Mihli, the Empress and the Generals alike, she soon found herself escalated into the ranks of the Serpent Generals and was given the title of the Springserpent General as well as her signature shield and spiked club, both crafted from trees belonging to her homeland of Tsahya as a sign that regardless of what has happened, she's still the hope of her people.

After having learned that the Empire isn't solely one shade and that caring people such as the Empress and her brotacular brosquad allies in the Generals do indeed exist, Mihli has devoted her life and her blade - or club, in this case - to Aphmau's cause, and while she's been deemed a traitor by her former peers in the Freedom Fighters, she still refuses to disclose their identities.


Character PERSONALITY:

OK, so.

Mihli is a cat.

No, really.

Even amongst her fellow Mithra, an already humanoid-feline race, Mihli is impeccably catlike. She's sassy, tsundere to a T, excellent at putting on a different visage when she needs it (she even fakes crying to get you close so she can threaten you with a hidden dagger!) and only skulks around others when she wants to, but despite the facade she's able to put up without even a moment's notice, she really does enjoy the company of other people, especially close friends. To the other Serpent Generals, Mihli is tomboyish and cocky bundle of energy - she's seen openly joking as well as taunting Rughadjeen's skills whilst the Empress appoints her as a Serpent General no less, proving that she enjoys a good scrap as well as a bit of friendly trash-talk. Towards random Mercenaries, she scowls and berates them for getting in her way, even if she works her best to thin the Beastmen hordes to ensure their safety and reduce casualties to a minimum, and when Aphmau defends her from her peers in the Walahra Temple, she returns the favor later down the road, protecting the shy and meek girl in a big sister-like fashion even if afterwards she acts as if she wants nothing to do with her, preferring to stay to herself and her studies while watching the others from a high place. All in all, even though she wouldn't admit it easily, Mihli really does enjoy the company of other people, and in some way, shape or form she'll generally show this in time, though not without putting on her standard tough-girl attitude the whole way through.

Mihli's go-getter, rough and rowdy attitude can be attributed to her time alone on the streets in which she had to defend herself as well as possibly steal and fight to secure her next meals, a feeling of hopelessness she wouldn't wish on anyone, which is a strong part of why she continues to fight for the Empress now, though despite this heartfelt determination as well as the rough facade she wears, Mihli can be very girlish and lighthearted as well - though this is an attribute one won't see often, nor all too easily. While the tears she sheds upon recalling her past and sharing it with the [Player Character] may appear fake initially, she still does go through the trouble of divulging her life story, as well as thanking the PC afterwards for listening (though in the same breath, she threatens to kill you should anything slip from your lips) and after befriending you, rather than regard you as another "stupid mercenary", Mihli will actually acknowledge your existence in a more friendly fashion, if still a little stand-offish to assure her reputation is in-tact.

Though she's already been gifted as an assassin, Mihli is also no slouch when it comes to philosophy and general book-smarts - after all, she rose to the top of her classes despite originating from a foreign land and even before becoming a General she was well known for this fact even though she refused to share her discoveries with her fellow pupils as Walahra's teachings proclaim one should. It's never outright stated how much general knowledge and philosophy she learned while under the 'care' of the Freedom Fighters as a part of her training to blend into the Empire, but it's something she kept and continues to keep despite fighting as the Seaserpent General - upon becoming which, Mihli was also trained as a White Mage, or healer. Because of her combat skills and impressive knowledge of the human anatomy, she's also extremely talented in this craft, afterall, who better a combat medic than the same person who knows exactly how to stop the heart in the most efficient way possible? In this way, she can stay one step ahead of the enemy, knowing just where they might strike as well as knowing exactly how to dispatch them in the swiftest way possible.

Despite her intimate knowledge in the arts of concealment and killing, Mihli also possesses a code of honor in lieu of complete hatred for those that have wronged her - she understands that not all of the Empire is corrupt even after growing up in most dire of circumstances, evidenced by her explanation that she cannot change the whole of Aht Urhgan by strictly killing since others that are corrupt will just fill the void left by her murders, and that to change the people as a whole, their hearts must first be changed. It's this method of thinking that allowed her to break free of the Freedom Fighters and is exactly why she fits in with the Serpent Generals so easily - they share a similar way of thinking, and so instead of blindly killing for Tsahya, she opts instead to fight for Aphmau so that one day her people can know freedom.

As one may have guessed already, she's also not a heartless killer, as Mihli also understands that while she may not be able to atone for the deaths she's caused, she can still make a difference for others, and so in everything she does, Mihli acts for that sole purpose. To remind herself of the darkness of herself and of others, she secretly carries around a tuft of multicolored hair kept from those she's killed. It could be said that above all Mihli treasures and protects her friends as they act as the hope she'd lost when her mother had died. Before then, the nightmare of living in a world without hope left her scared and drove her to action, but because of the newfound friendships she's made she has a reason to forget those dreams as they're replaced with the warmth of her allies instead.


» EXSILIUM INFORMATION
Chosen WEAPON: Mihli's weapon in Exsilium will be her trademark club and shield, combined as a pair. The shield serves to bolster her defensive abilities in combat, giving her reign to expand her magics so that she can protect more people at once with them. The transition will be very slow, however, with the shield behaving more as a well of magic for her to tap into in order to use her spells longer and more effectively at first. Her club is the opposite, completely offensive and will evolve to bolster her strength and agility in much of the same way that the shield does with her defensive magics. The main caveat behind both club and shield is that the ability for one cannot be used at the same time another is activated.

Character INVENTORY:

♦ Serpent General Armor and Turban.
♦ Club and Shield.
♦ Two beefy daggers stored behind her shield.
♦ One Megalixir and two flasks of Echo Drops just in case of emergencies.
♦ A multicolored tuft of hair composed of various shades and textures.


» SAMPLES
First PERSON:

[A small *click* precedes the feed's sudden transition from empty blackness to a no doubt familiar mixture of crackling static and unintelligible movement as the camera turns over in the newcomer's lap, lens finally angled properly towards her face. Though humanoid, she's impeccably catlike - it's obvious in the shape of her nose and the slant of those half-lidded eyes of hers. Her turban is nearly overturned, cheeks smeared with grime and dirt... She looks tired, but pleased.]

S'this thing finally on? Grrreat.

[A tiny sliver of embarrassment flickers across her features once her accent slips, but she continues nonetheless, confident in her ability to mask such an emotion. Afterall, there's some serious business to attend to...]

Perhaps this inforrmation will find a number of you of you indifferently, but lately I've been dabbling in fixing up some of the junk laying arround here. Hell, if no-one's cleaning up, we may as well make it work, right?

[The camera shifts again as she sets it upon a nearby table in order to recline a touch more lazily than before, legs kicked up over what appears to be an engine of sorts as she begins to idly roll a small screwdriver amongst her fingers.]

That's wherrre you come in. See, in my haste I maaay have accidentally~ fixed up everrything I've been able to get my paws on over here, more or less... And wouldn't ya know it, like clockwork, suddenly the borredom begins to set in! So here's the deal.

[She angles that screwdriver in the general direction of the camera, leaning in a little closer now.]

So long as you're not too attached, brring me whatever you can find that's broken and I'll take a swing at settin' it back into shape. I can't promise it'll sparkle or anything when I'm done or that I won't end up breaking it any more than it already is, but who's afraid of a little Russian roulette?

[A smirk.]

'And what about the dough' you ask? Relax-- my services are a hundred percent free, of course... Granted you're sure to keep my interrrest. This means absolutely NO toasters. You brring one anyway and I'll be taking a fingerrr. No, you don't get to choose which. In any case, by this point I'd hope y'all know where to find me.

[And with that, the feed cuts again to static, then blank once more.]


Third PERSON:

Wandering the streets of the secondary cluster had become a sort of tradition enjoyed by Mihli whenever she could manage the time to do so. The buildings, however crumpled and broken, were unlike anything she'd ever seen on Vana'diel. Many times she'd chanced climbing one - sifting through junk and debris, braving sunken stairwells and cracked passages just so she could pull herself atop one of the mighty structures, losing hours at a time simply watching the charred landscape from her perch, lost amongst her thoughts. As it turns out, getting away like that? Well, while doing a lot in the way of helping you think, the time alone only serves to feed the homesickness something fierce. Still, it's not as if her reasons for being here away from the others wasn't unwarranted... She was pulled here into Exsilium for a reason: she was needed. Everyone was, that much was made abundantly clear from the moment she'd arrived, even if she still couldn't see it quite like the others.

It didn't take very long for her eyes to open like the rest.

The fight against the United Earth wasn't merely a battle waged within the borders of this dimension. It threatened everyone and everything, including not only her people back home, but the world in which they resided in. Admittedly, taking in the scope of such a battle was frightening - even for someone as well versed in strife and warfare such as she, but if she was pulled into such a fight, it had to have been for a reason... And that much served enough to give her pause, or it would, at least for now. So long as she could pour her efforts and continually fight, she could keep the others safe. It mattered not that she'd been pulled from her world or that the other Serpent Generals would've undoubtedly been searching for her - in being here, she could watch over them, and help to cull the threat that had been building from beyond any Empire's sight.

It was a noble goal. One she had learned to accept with time. She only wished there were some way to let the others know she'd been unharmed...



» ADDITIONAL NOTES
I'm super hungry. Like. Really really hungry. Is there anything good to eat in Exsilium?