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| == History == | | == History == |
| | Heli has no idea where she originally came from. Through her life she has managed to piece together than as an infant she was pulled from the ashes of what was assumed as her human mother's home. Due to frequently starting fires by accident she had assumed that it was her that started the fire that destroyed the house. She was eventually adopted by a family of gnomes who were part of a crafting guild and thankfully stone and metal aren't as flammable so she didn't accidentally start any other town fires. |
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| === Infancy: ===
| | Thankfully as she grew up she learned to contain the flames. Accidental fires became a rarity as she came of age and started to grow the crystals on her wrists. But even though she had gotten control of herself, the stigma of her history remained. Being a, quote: "Oversized freak" made it extremely difficult to fit in. Which was fair as being 5' tall in a gnome community made it a little too literal. |
| Heli has very little idea where she originally came from. Through many of her adventures she has managed to piece together bits and pieces of her life. Growing up, there was no keeping it secret that she was adopted, and her gnomish parents had told her that she had been born in the town of [[Nestle]]. The identities of her birth parents are completely unknown due to her being found as an infant in the charred remains of an unremarkable home. No insurance claims were placed, and nobody ever came to claim the child so she was placed into an orphanage... Which burned down within the month with thankfully no casualties, and only a handful of injuries... This time, there were witnesses to link the dark skinned infant, in the throes of a crying fit, was the origin of the flames... Upon realizing what she was there had been much debate between the Stockmans as to what to do with her. Some had demanded her execution, as her very existence was a violation of Nestle's "No fire magic within 5 miles of the city limits" law. Many of the stockmans agreed that she was in violation of the law, but couldn't ethically condone the killing of an infant. Thankfully, a group of gnomish tinkerers from one of the other towns had been visiting to sell some of their new harvesting gadgets and heard about the lone infant and the controversy behind her. Being from the distant settlement of Gravel Peak they had offered to take the child far away and settle this dispute. So the very next day, they set off for home with a newly adopted child as part of their caravan... Their main carriage now inscribed with multiple fire-resistant runes.
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| === Childhood: ===
| | Years passed, and Heli built a name for herself as a craftswoman and magical tinkerer, and she decided that she wanted to turn her tinkering skills towards being an adventurer and began combat training... Which was where she eventually earned her moniker "Moltenshield"... During her training she had attempted to enchant her shield and made a few serious errors... The moment it was struck her inner fire flared, pouring more heat into the metal than she had ever realized she could and turning it into molten slag. Thankfully the crystals had managed to stave off the worst of the damage to her left arm, but as she tried to tear the molten shield free she severely damaged her right hand. Unable to get healing in time there was no saving the hand and she had to have it removed, derailing her plans for another couple of years as she constructed a new one, as well as her new best friend: Brokkr. |
| Thankfully, Heli's new home was significantly less flammable than where she had been born so she was actually given the opportunity to learn how to control her natural gifts, her parents teaching her that everybody's gifts have a place but they have to be utilized properly. Once she was able to speak they found her a sorcerer to coach her through controlling her powers, and although she never progressed much further than creating small flames, or just letting the fire all out in one large burst magic was beyond her reach.
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| Each year that passed made her less and less likely to wake up with charred spots on her sheets as more and more crystals started to grow from her flesh, and over time she realized that the more she kept her fire inside, the more crystals she'd grow, often time in unpleasant locations. Unfortunately, each year also made door frames harder to get through as she quickly outgrew most of the other kids her age... Such was the curse of being part human in a mostly gnome and dwarf settlement. Nearly every day she would end up with a new lump on her head either from walking into a low doorframe or standing up too far and smacking against a low ceiling. The constant need to duck her head led to her naturally developing a hunched posture and a rather drastic flinch response to anything brushing against her hair which her older fraternal twin gnome siblings loved to exploit. Beyond the occasional teasing, she had actually been a fairly popular child growing up. Her talent for making little trinkets and toys attracting a lot of attention from the other children <s>as did her skill for reaching higher caverns and cubbies to hide things they didnt want the adults finding</s>.
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| === Teenage years: ===
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| As she came of age she discovered her love for architecture and crafting in general. Her skills had started as little mechanical toys made from the scraps from her father's projects .Something about the way the cogs fit together, teeth linking with the next to rotate it... How every cog, no matter the size, had a purpose. Each piece having a vital role in making the gadget work and if even one cog didn't fit just right, the whole system would grind to a halt. The moment she was old enough she became a smith's apprentice. Entranced by the flames of the forge, her mere presence causing the flames to burn brighter, the metal became like clay in the roaring fire as she became engrossed with the act of making. It was as if she could see the creation that the metal was meant to be and all she had to do was release it from the slag that surrounded it. But as teenagers were prone to doing, she became too cocky. Her powers making her feel like she was invincible, prone to making the flames too high... the metal too hot... And her control too loose... until she finally learned the important lesson that starting fires was easy, but dousing them was much, much harder... It just took a slip of concentration, the oil too close to the flames, the coal not properly stowed... And the smithy was up in flames, the tools warped beyond repair, and the forge itself requiring extensive repair after the fire was extinguished.
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| The loss of the forge was an important life lesson of how easily flames can run rampant... And as an example she was informed of her origin, how the emotions of an infant had caused so much destruction... And to hopefully help her learn this fact, she was sent to the outskirts of the settlement to study with the carpenters, taught finesse rather than force for creation. No dancing flames to make the materials pliable and easy to shape, only her hands and her tools to sculpt her vision. It was here she learned to properly plan, "Measure twice, cut once" her mentor always preached. Unlike metal if she cut off too much she couldn't stretch the wood to meet her requirements. This taught her patience and focus.
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| === Early Adulthood: ===
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| By the time she came of age, she had mastered the professions of her youth. She had become known as an accomplished carpenter as well as smith... But she grew bored. There was nothing more she could learn of those crafts in her small town, and therefore she looked for new horizons. A period of dabbling in jewel working led to learning about enchanting. So many magical languages out there to study, and Primordial just seemed to come to her naturally. It was as if she could see the magic flowing through the letters as they were written, and while she couldn't use the magic directly, as she put the words on items she could create various effects. It took a good bit of trial and error, but eventually she thought she had it figured out.
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| The first attempt, was a simple steel buckler, one that she had smithed herself. A pattern she had done countless times for the town guard, or traveling adventurers passing through, or to send with her family as they visited Nestle. She etched into it many runes that she thought would help the tempering. That would strengthen the metal and make it unbreakable. So sure of herself, she forgot her many lessons and strapped the buckler on, pulling off one of her crystals and setting it in the center of the shield, feeling downright triumphant as the flames pulsed over it's surface, a dull glow emanating from it as she felt her inner magic enter the steel, flowing like a river. The river's power grew, and grew, turning to rapids as the steel turned orange, then yellow, and then a molten white as it began to lose it's form, droplets of molten metal falling from it to drip on her skin, dribbling between her crystals to scorch her skin. Blinded by pain, all she could think to do was remove the shield, leading to her frantically clawing at it, her fingers sinking into the molten steel and cooking the flesh as she frantically tried to escape the pain. By the time the buckles holding the shield on melted and the metal slag fell away her right hand was already mangled beyond repair and had to be amputated, her left arm had thankfully only sustained burns that could be treated, the crystals seeming to have protected her arm from the worst of the damage. Mockingly, many of the townsfolk had come to refer to her mockingly as "Moltenshield".
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| The accident had sent her into a deep depressive spiral as she struggled to do the tasks that had been so simple before. The stump of her right arm a constant reminder of her mistakes and failings. A few years passed with her barely able to pursue the crafts she loved, working instead as a designer rather than a creator and she hated it. But thankfully, a traveling group of adventurers passed through one day, and among their numbers was one of the storied machine men. She had heard of sentient constructs before but had never seen one, and she was absolutely fascinated by him. After significant persuasion, and a not so small donation the war forged allowed her to study him, and everything she had been attempting in the past suddenly made sense.
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| Her next project took significantly longer than it should have with her having to use her non-dominant hand, but piece by piece, she managed to use what she had learned from the warforged to construct a new hand. Crystal infused cables linking to the newly formed crystal of her wrist-nub allowed her to feel with the metal plates of the hand as if it were her own skin... If she could create this, what could she build next?
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| === Artificer's best friend ===
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| The next step on Heli's journey to become a master crafter was to attempt to replicate the mechanical man! Every bit of crafting skill she had learned up until this point, every book on magic she had read and memorized, multiple valuable gems cut in very specific arcane patterns, a mile of crystal embedded steel cables braided into thick metallic muscle and a few hundred pounds of assorted metal plates and bars gradually became the hulking metallic beast that she dubbed Brokkr, after a smith of legend from one of the many stories she had read.
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| After rebuilding herself and building a friend, she finally left to adventure on her own, primarily traveling to regions that had suffered natural disasters or monster attacks to help them rebuild, only rarely encountering the monsters herself. During one such adventure, she had inadvertently rescued a Djinni who granted her one of the greatest gifts any mortal could receive: A Wish. Not knowing what to use it for, she attempted to save it... Returning home to avoid accidentally saying the words "I wish" which just hastened her doom. Within an hour of returning to her adoptive gnomish parents home, she bashed her head on a doorframe, and in a fit of rage screamed that she "wished she wouldn't have to duck so damn low!" and in a blinding flash of light found herself suddenly standing at only 3 feet tall. | | After rebuilding herself and building a friend, she finally left to adventure on her own, primarily traveling to regions that had suffered natural disasters or monster attacks to help them rebuild, only rarely encountering the monsters herself. During one such adventure, she had inadvertently rescued a Djinni who granted her one of the greatest gifts any mortal could receive: A Wish. Not knowing what to use it for, she attempted to save it... Returning home to avoid accidentally saying the words "I wish" which just hastened her doom. Within an hour of returning to her adoptive gnomish parents home, she bashed her head on a doorframe, and in a fit of rage screamed that she "wished she wouldn't have to duck so damn low!" and in a blinding flash of light found herself suddenly standing at only 3 feet tall. |
