Askr, the Glass Prince

Gender: Transmasc Nonbinary (He/They)

Age: 101 years old (he looks and acts as though he is in his mid-to-late teenaged years, however.)

Race: Homunculus– a synthetic, alchemically produced human.

Nationality: The Ash Lands

Appearance: Askr is one of those individuals who could easily be described as uncannily beautiful, almost to an eerie extent; they stand at about 5’1 in terms of height, with a lean, muscular frame– gently strong shoulders and long legs, definition to every line of their body mimicking the gentle attention a sculptor gives a statue, though in that same care there’s an overattentiveness, too much dedication to perfection. They look the part of a fighter, and yet, their face tells a different story– their eyes are a vivid gold, burning with the intensity of the dying rays of sunlight over the dusklit horizon, and their hair is the silvery-gold color of moonlit sand, long and feathery in length and texture, bangs falling over their right eye in an artfully disheveled arrangement. They wear it half-up and half-down, partially-ponytailed and partially left to flow around their shoulders. Their skin is as fair as chalk, and is as eerily unblemished as porcelain– not even their pores are easy to see, and if one looks carefully at their face, they’ll see a strange scar that seems to resemble a crack splitting down from their right eye, carefully covered by their hair. Their body bears more cracks just like it, merely hidden by their clothing. They wear clothes that cover every inch of their body, save their face– anything to conceal the remnants of this wretched vessel they walk as. They wear silver ash branches in their hair like a crown, the last trace of their mother they have.

Personality: It is difficult to describe the personality of an entity who was never created to have his own; as Askr was merely created with the intention of being a body to inherit another soul, developing a personality of his own was the last thing his “mother” intended for him. His mannerisms are mechanical, expressions understated, all the signs of inhumanity plastered across his features as openly as possible. And yet, there are traces of something; at a glance, there is stoicism, the unflinching expression of a person who has never learned how to shape his face around a feeling, but beneath it lies a muted curiosity about the world and all within it– deeper than that lies traces of sorrow, of anger, shadows of things he doesn’t know enough about to fully comprehend and is apprehensive about contemplating too deeply. He believes himself to be content with perfect stoicism, with the stillness and indifference of a fighter, of someone versatile enough to be anything the world may demand of him, but there’s still so much he doesn’t understand, and still so much he’s struggling to wrap his mind around. Though the language of his blade is the first one he was taught, the capacity for gentility lingers within him– though anger and despair are the feelings he knows best, no matter how distantly, there is some part of him that yearns to understand what it means to know that human thing known as joy. All in all, beneath every blank space that’s been carefully molded onto him, there’s a desperation to understand what it means to be human– and furthermore, a desperation to become human, himself, whatever it takes and whatever it means to achieve it.

History: Askr was never brought into the world with the intention of being a person.

His story begins with that of a fallen goddess– Vithar, formerly known as the Goddess of the Woods, a minor, oft-forgotten storykeeping deity who watched over a strange and ever-shifting oasis glade within the Zeinav Desert. She lived amidst those strange, impossible elm and ash trees with her daughter, a demigoddess by the name of Embla, born of divine and human blood, the product of a romance with a man long-lost to time. Even so, despite the cloying thorns of that old grief, mother and daughter lived happily in their mysterious little oasis, wanting for little beyond each other’s company and all the stories they kept together, their own little secret garden well-maintained, carefully concealed, their wisdom and knowledge only ever offered to the travelers who were lucky enough to happen upon their strange little grove. They never yearned for mortal recognition, happy to give their little blessings to the few people who did find them, merely content with their obscurity and the safety that came with it.

Of course, though they were largely unknown, it is only natural that word would one day spread of the goddess who bore the power to bend the sands to her will, and only more natural that some would covet that power– especially a rival minor deity of flame. On an especially hot afternoon in the desert, a minor god of some long-lost tribe wandered in search of that oasis, looking to claim that goddess’s power for themself, all for the sake of protecting their people; after all, what use did a goddess with no followers have for such strength? Was it not selfish of her to bear a power that could defend so many mortals when she had so little interest in protecting them to begin with?

When the patron god to that lost tribe happened upon the glade, hellbent on claiming Vithar’s power for themself, it is only natural that Vithar would do what it would take to defend it, to defend the only means she had to preserve her obscurity. But when a warrior god crosses blades with a mere storykeeper, it is only natural that the former will win out– especially when Embla wound up caught in the crossfire, intent on protecting her beloved mother as their grove burned around them. That god of flame walked away a victor, Vithar’s space-shaping powers in their hands, and Vithar was left with nothing.

In the too-quiet ashes of her beloved glade, holding the cold and lifeless hand of her still and silent daughter, Vithar made a promise to herself and Embla alike– death would not be the end, and she would have her vengeance.

And so the newly-powerless goddess left the desert behind, only taking with her a handful of sun-bleached sand as she disappeared into a deep, spiraling cavern well-hidden deep beneath the Ash Lands, and she set to her new work– though no more divine power flowed through her veins, she would learn to create divinely anew, with the power of chalk and sand and the ashen branches of her beloved forest, and all the gifts of life she could forcibly take from the earth alone. She devoted years to learning of alchemy, of the art of the homunculus, resolving to spin a vessel with her daughter’s face, one with a glass heart that could recapture her daughter’s lost soul.

It took years to perfect her creation, years of prototyping and failures, years of trying to get every last detail just right– but eventually, she found success, producing a fair-faced, sand-haired divine little replica of a human, one with a heart made of glass sitting in its chest. Though it could not perfectly replicate her Embla, the details were close enough– the shape of the eyes, the color of the skin and hair, the darkness of the lashes, as many things as could be reproduced, they were. It would not be perfect, but it would be close enough, and it would feel as though they had never been separated in the burning of their grove, reunited as mother and daughter again; all that was left was for that little glass heart to channel Embla’s soul.

But as the vessel animated, springing to life in slow, mechanical movements, it did not take long for Vithar to realize that it was not her Embla residing within it.

This thing had a mind of its own, a soul of its own, if it could even be called that– its eyes burned gold instead of red, it lacked Embla’s sweet and earnest heart, and it was curious in ways that she never was, lacking understanding of the world and all its components. It seemed uncomfortable with the notion of being Vithar’s “daughter”, too, shying away from any notion of the identity it was meant to inherit. Though its body was shaped in Embla’s image, this was not, and never would be, Vithar’s beloved daughter.

What was there instead was a child who so clearly wished to be her son, and… Vithar could not bring herself to love him, not when her old hatred and grief still burned so brightly, not when she still yearned so strongly for her flesh-and-blood daughter. One morning, she knelt before her creation, giving him the name of Askr– for the ash trees that once grew beside the elms of her lost glade– and she asked him to wait for her, there, in that cavern beneath the Ash Lands, promising she would return. Askr looked back at her with wide, sickeningly golden eyes, one last reminder of the fact that he would never be her Embla, and nodded in silent agreement.

Vithar left, and Askr waited.

And waited.

And waited.

And waited.

He does not know how long it was. The sun could not reach him beneath the earth, the seasons untouched by the lingering heat of the Ash Lands, and his body did not age, forged from inorganic material as it was. He does not know, and never will know, how much time passed, but he does know that Vithar never did come back, and he does not know why her promise remains unkept.

It was only when the aching in his glass heart grew too unbearable that he rose to his feet, shaking off the plantlife that had grown over him in his stillness, and ventured upward, outward, into the open air he’d never before been able to see. He wandered across the Ash Lands for some time, unsure of what he was searching for– was it his mother? His “sister?” Something more? It was difficult to say what carried his footsteps forward, but it was certainly something.

However long he walked, he eventually stumbled upon a small mercenary camp– one that happened to be short a few men and up a few weapons, and… the story tells itself from there. Now Askr travels with a mercenary captain by the name of Oleeae and her men, unsure of what to do with his empty and purposeless life besides stand beside them, merely one more sword in a vast and solemn weapon rack.


Vithar - Askr’s “mother” and creator, the Goddess of the Woods, now stripped of all her old power, an immortal and powerless woman made to wander the world. She looks the part of a middle-aged woman with silvery hair, green eyes, and tan skin, with a harsh and unloving face. Askr has no idea where she is, but he thinks he is searching for her.

Embla - Vithar’s deceased daughter, who Askr considers to be their “sister,” and wishes to know more about. In life, she was a vivacious lady, with silver-gold hair and scarlet eyes, an easy smile, and an impossible range of knowledge, always bearing branches of the elm tree for which she was named in her hair. She is long gone, but her shadow hangs heavy over Askr to this day.

Oleeae - The mercenary captain currently looking after Askr. She’s a human woman with olive skin, deep black hair, and silver eyes, a merc’s strong frame and stature– she’s rough around the edges, but kind, clearly caring for the strange and damaged boy who’s fallen into her care. She doesn’t think mercenary life is ideal for him, and is hoping to find greener pastures for him.