Name: Mikhail Daemonborn
Nickname: Blade Daemon
Age: ???
Alignment: Chaotic Neutral
Race: Ironborn Daemon
Height: 5’10
Weight: 500 Lbs (rough estimate)
Occupation: Adventurer
Personality: Blunt, crass, rude. Mikhail is not happy with his current situation, and tends to lash out at slight provocations. He is incredibly callous as well, and will care little for angering others or hurting them, physically, mentally, or emotionally. He is sympathetic only with those who are bound or cursed in some way, and will treat them slightly better than others, as he sees in them a fellow soul in suffering.
History:
Mikhail is a being of iron and pain, hate and torment. Long, long ago an individual was misjudged within the Pyre, sentenced to torment unending within the Great Nether. But because he had been a simple smith, honest and true in life, he evaded at first much of the pain that heralds an arrival to the Great Nether – the curses that bound others here ignored him. But even though he was free of much of the pain that normally accompanied existence in the realm of damnation, he was not truly free. His sin had been pride, great and true in his work. Perhaps it had been this pride that made the Pyre judge him to be evil and needing punishment, or maybe the eternal forces working within made a simple error. But as this was his only sin, pride of iron, iron overtook him. It manifested within his being, dominating him completely, transforming him from a simple soul into a living mass of hellish metal, iron tainted by the forces of the Great Nether.
Gone was the simple smith, who forgot his own name in the initial torment of having iron pervade his being. Gone was the good and honest man who took pride in his work as a smith. In his place was Mikhail Daemonborn, forged in life anew within the Great Nether. The new being was but a babe in mind, the experiences of life ripped from him by the pain of his rebirth, a fresh slate waiting to be etched upon. Sadly for the new entity, his home was the Great Nether, the realm of never ceasing war and battle. Instead of learning to be a helpful and kind person, the new being only learned how to fight, how to survive. His iron form was forged into a weapon of pain and hate, instead of a tool to help others, to keep himself alive.
But being made of metal, knowing only to fight, helped the freshly born daemon live, and even thrive in his hellish home. When others would suffer as the unnatural heat struck them, he found himself to be more malleable, and learned to keep that as another advantage. When others would freeze from supernatural cold, he found himself hardening, becoming slow and ponderous, but even harder to damage, this too he learned to mimic. Where others had to rip weapons from their foes flesh to gain an advantage, he learned to form his own body into a weapon, rough clubs and sharp blades literally growing from his body as he fought to stay alive.
And while others would have to steal rest in the middle of the fighting and the hate, sometimes even burying themselves beneath the ground for a few moments of respite, Mikhail kept fighting, kept learning, kept growing. Living metal has no need for rest to recuperate. He learned to replenish himself by ripping the raw earth apart and consuming it, somehow gaining new metal to use for his form from the rough and rocky ground. He learned to fight at a distance by launching shards of metal from his hands, or larger spears from his palms, spears that resembled his bones, then reform them from the rest of his iron flesh. For many years – not that the passing of time meant anything to the battle born daemon – Mikhail only knew conflict and hate, battle and pain.
But even in the Great Nether, time passes, and unending conflict has an ebb and flow. Conflict would flow away from one area into another, creating almost lulls in battle in some places. In time, Mikhail carved out a place of rest, becoming so dangerous to all that many of the souls within the plane of torment would battle each other frantically to get away if they knew he approached. His iron form had become so much stronger, the constant war reforging the iron into something more, taking on more of the hellish metal and taint, becoming less iron and more… unnatural. Blows that would have once stunned others or knocked them away instead rent flesh, blades formed of his body took on impossible edges that cleaved through any defense they met. With his power, Mikhail grew arrogant not that he knew it, believing himself capable of facing any foe that could possibly exist within the Great Nether.
So he turned his interest inwards, waging a battle within himself. He knew now, by facing so many others, that he had once been something else, something less, and yet more. But what that was, who he had been, he didn’t know any longer. This led to introspection, and Mikhail slowing down on his chaos and carnage, instead only reacting when others attacked him, thinking him weak. Now he learned new things, he learned defense, to make a dwelling of his own within the Great Nether, a small keep of metal that he formed of himself, replenishing from the ground below, nearly impenetrable. No openings, for a being of metal needed no nourishment beyond what he could take from the blood stained ground at his feet.
In his house of metal, Mikhail regained himself. Days, months, years blended together as the ironborn daemon tried to rediscover himself. Others would assault the strange dome that had appeared in the hellscape, and dash themselves against it, for Mikhail would respond by ignoring, or creating spears and blades from the metal exterior if they grew too dangerous. As time passed for him, the blood red metal that made up Mikhail’s form altered, changing slowly to a fleshlike hue and his features changed, mimicking the form that was coming to him in his long forgotten memories. But more than just his appearance returned to Mikhail, he was also remembering just who he had been. The kind and simple man from before the Pyre, before his rebirth, was making himself known once more.
Eventually a new Mikhail emerged from his safe dwelling, and the newly ‘good’ daemon found himself disgusted by the conflict around him. When he had been human, he had helped make a town that was safe for those who came to it, a town of peace and prosperity. The devil of blades and metal took it upon himself to alter the plane of unending torment. Slowly he found those who were tired of their lives of pain and conflict, and worked with them to create a place of safety. Mikhail grew the walls and the homes for those who sought to be safe from pain and battle and wanted to rest, creating a ‘town’ called Haven within the Great Nether.
But the Great Nether is not meant to be a kind place, or a place of happiness at all. And when Mikhail and the others’ work was noticed, not an easy task amidst the constant pain and bloodshed that masked everything around them, and even happened on their walls as Mikhail and a few others defended those who sought an escape, the greater powers that had control and governance over the Great Nether knew something had to be done. Beings within his comprehension but so far above Mikhail in power had had enough of even a small place of peace within the plane of punishment, and so descended upon Haven to end its existence. And of course, to punish the one who dared to defy them.
Appearance: Mikhail is lean and lithe despite his incredible weight, thanks to the fact that his very flesh is made of iron. In addition to his body being made of metal, the clothes he ‘makes’ or rather, imitates are also iron, though he applies a higher level of flexibility to them than to his normal flesh in order to make them seem more realistic. In order to keep things simple, his iron skin forms a thin layer over his legs, taking on a darker black hue that seems to absorb light. On his torso is a ‘form’ fitting shirt which is in reality a very thin layer of his being that is a light shade of silvery gray. To top this off is a dark grey duster coat that doesn’t have any way of actually sealing shut if one is to look at it, and has a thin hood that normally rests on top of Mikhail’s head. His actual physical appearance is of a rather pale man with glowing green eyes, one of the few outward signs at first that he isn’t human. In order to keep as much of his form available for combative purposes, he also has long, thin black hair that reflects the light, ready to be manipulated in an instant if he needs it.
Skills:
Metallurgy: Mikhail has an innate and uncanny affinity for metals of any kind. Upon continued examination he can discern the make of a metal item, what efforts and metals went into crafting it. He can identify any flaws or weak points in the metal object, including possible stress/fracture lines, and will also be able to learn ways of being able to reinforce the metal in key locations, or if it is an ore, the properties of said ore.
Combat: The majority of the memories left to the being that is Mikhail after he is banished to the Firmament are focused on one thing, and one thing only. Bloodshed. While Mikhail is skilled at surviving, his fighting style is brutal and wild, more like a beast than a human’s. No fancy techniques lay in his arsenal, as he is about raw power and unrelenting attacks. This skill also affects his mind, as it pushes him towards conflict as a first option rather than a last resort.
Ability:
Ironflesh:
Mikhail has one advantage as he is cast into the Firmament, a world he has not trod in unknown centuries. His very body is still the body he was blessed and cursed with when he entered the Great Nether after being judged upon the Pyre, a body made of Nether-Tainted iron. Stripped of the advanced techniques he learned in his long time of suffering within the Great Nether, Mikhail is limited to basic metal, the Taint is weak, leaving his body nothing more than normal iron. Gone is the unknown amount of alloys that once made up his flesh, garnered from millennia of consuming raw earth and ore, coated in blood. However, in order to make him feasible for the Firmament, the grand powers within the Great Nether gave him a core in his torso, a hot molten core that is actually capable of being permanently damaged. The core is slightly larger than a human heart, and rests in the center of his chest instead of off to one side, and burns brightly within his chest to anyone with heat detection or a way of seeing magic. His body, thus, is harder than a human’s, retaining a surprising degree of flexibility for what feels like warm metal to the touch.
Manipulation:
Mikhail can alter his metal flesh to a frightening degree. Not only can he alter his appearance if he desires, but he can also change his attire (which is actually a part of his body). The limitations of this manipulation have yet to be discovered by him, he can usually form anything his mind can imagine. However, at this time, thanks to the binds placed upon him, his flesh can only take on a new shape within a few feet of his core, though if he launches something (shards of metal in an attack) they will retain their shape even after leaving his current zone of manipulation. Four foot range from the center of his torso. Takes one post per foot of manipulation attempted.
Shards can only be launched twice per thread, and take a post to form before they can be launched.
Smithing: Mikhail has the inherent ability to be a consummate blacksmith. A preternatural affiliation with smithing lets him, if he ever turns his mind to it, craft wondrous objects out of any metal he is given to work with, as he can utilize his inherent metal manipulation to aid in his smithing work. It won’t be as effective or as easy as manipulating his own form as he can’t risk taking in the metal and tainting it with his own flesh, but it will allow for forging of items and weapons in situations where molding and and altering the metal wouldn’t normally allow. (Temperatures too cold / hot, missing ingredients in the forging process. Requires a great deal of time to do - non-feasible for in thread writing, unless the thread is dedicated to it. )
