PERSONAL

Gender: None

Kit: Eldritch

Location: Kingsport Gateway, Khazan

AFFILIATION

Alignment: Hero

Team: Shallow Guild of Bleak Sunrise

VITAL STATS

Strength: weak (rank 0)

Agility: standard (rank 1)

Mind: standard (rank 1)

Body: weak (rank 0)

Spirit: (rank )

Charisma: (rank )

RECORD

Fame Points: 769

Personal Wins: 81

Personal Losses: 2

Team Wins: 0

Team Losses: 0

Tourney Wins: 0

Tourney Losses: 0

STATUS

Status: Active

Ivan

The truth is simple. If we fight the Halja, we die. Period. We still don't know who stole the Halja bell from the Shallow Guild of Bleak Sunrise, where they are, or how they intend to use it against us. It doesn't matter. Regardless of who has the bell, it will inevitably be drawn back here to the Guildhouse. It will seek us out and when it does, it will find and devour those who use The Voice. We have studied the contingencies. We have calculated the odds. The greater measure of force we bring against the Halja bell, the swifter our demise. Our traditional weapons and measures are useless. Magic, and magically resonant artifacts will only feed its power. Any use of The Voice against it will invariably draw it closer. In order to preserve the Shallow Guild (and the planet itself) I have proposed a gambit. We can't fight the Halja, and we can't ignore it, but it may be possible to push it off the physical plane. Unfortunately, none of the Brothers can interact with the Halja, which means we need a ringer. I told the Brothers, if magic can't save us, we must look to science. The Halja absorbs magic, is immune to physical force, but its makers had no concept of science. Our champion is a sentient mass of burning enigmatter, built to the specifications of Maxwell's Demon. It is capable of producing thaumically sensitive astral coke, which can evoke or inhibit change on a molecular level. I'm not particularly fond of the shape, to be honest, but Dereleth insisted on making it as inconspicuous as possible. (I've learned that, in Guild terms, that word has some incredibly disturbing connotations.) I can't imagine what the rest of the Guild thinks is going on, but the Brothers have gone so far as to spread rumors about my "new lab assistant." When they asked for a name, I thought "Maxwell" would be a fitting tribute. Apparently I know nothing of infernal naming traditions. It seems a demon must be name-bound to its summoner. I find this inelegant, but the Shallow Guild Brothers were adamant. Eventually we settled on "Silver's Hammer." Whatever you call it, this is the most advanced chemancy I've ever attempted. It is both elegant and complex, simulating life itself. I do wish I could get it to stop eating the curtains, though.

-Merle Silver

These things are done in threes, for obvious reasons, but Professor Silver takes the embedding a step farther than I've ever seen. That kind of devotion, craftsmanship, it speaks of an almost religious dedication to the art. In Cirran mythology, the giant Jmah'el impaled eleven and one thousand burning demons on hooks made from his own teeth, and drowned them to heat his bath water. What the myth reveals, (apart from the northern tribes ritualized obsession with steam,) is that even primitive people understood the importance of standard binary recursion in elemental magic. That number, one-thousand-eleven, is written 1011- binary for eleven. Recursively, 11 in binary is three, the elemental number. Truthfully, the weaving of the myth is far more complex than strictly necessary for a simple steam invocation spell, but one has to admire the Cirran reverence for simple tautological nesting. That kind of depth adds gravitas. Doctor Silver's work extrapolates this principle to the nth degree. The piezochemical complexities are so intricate they actually mimic cellular biology. It was an interesting process to observe, and if it weren't for the Guildhouse's extradimensional allowances, I very much doubt we'd have much of a building left. The result really is remarkably clever. It's apparent to me, of course, but even with my enhanced faculties, it was a week before I put it together. The thing he's building resembles an imp so completely, in appearance, in behavior, in psychic resonance, even in fecundity! I'm quite confident that observers will assume the Guild has simply bound a lesser demon to its service. What's inside that skin, however, is an unbound superchemical electromagic quite unlike anything the Guild has ever produced before. Allusion to a certain wooden horse would be an insulting understatement.

-Samas

Imp-penetrable

     Energy Body: superior (rank 2)

I hate demons. They're boring, and they taste awful. Why the Brothers are making a big to-do about this latest pet, I'll never understand. I've seen more impressive imps crawl out of my own… well, anyway, it's nothing special. Skin black as pitch, wiry limbs, stumpy horns- no barbed tail, no wings, and only one head. Pretty basic, even for an imp. You'd think the Guild Brothers had never seen a demon before, the way they go on. That crackpot is up to something, he's been working with this new demon in his lab for days, and every time they come out it looks exactly the same. About the only thing different with this one is that it doesn't quite smell like brimstone. (Trust me, there's not been a goblin born who couldn't taste the difference between biological sulfur and demonic sulfur. It helps when gorging yourself on rotten eggs to know whether or not a flaming salamander is going to burst from your stomach in a few days.) Whatever they're trying to do, it has consistently been a complete and utter failure. Eventually I think he gave up trying and just fitted it with a nasty-looking arcane control collar. Looks to me like the Professor is overcompensating for something. It seems that imp will never be anything but your fissure-variety lesser demon. It's a pity really, they let that chemist have his run of the grounds, and he can't even transmute impflesh.

-Brag

Imp-possible

     Polymorph: superior (rank 2)

• Ranged Attack
• Area Affect
• Multi-Attack
• Target Seeker

Being associated with the Shallow Guild of Bleak Sunrise, one tends to deal with the infernal rather more than one might like. Vampires and Lycanthropes I can handle, Deep Magic makes me a little uneasy, but I find nothing so irksome as lesser demons. I must confess I'm far more at home hunting and killing them than collaborating with them. Recently, the Brothers have managed to summon a Voice-resistant imp from some forsaken netherrealm I dare not imagine. This is why I was never entirely comfortable being a Guild Brother: The Feywild is full of a blessed variety of ferocious beasts, why is it so often necessary to tame things from Outside? I understand our need is dire, and remember well the loss of Brother Ospek, but trusting control of such an unpredictable entity to a man of science? The wisdom doesn't sit well with me. Nonetheless, it did give me an excuse to secure a Basilisk for the Guild, and I know Tramontane was glad for the exercise. Please understand I take no joy in watching caged animals fight, but I was quite certain that a simple imp, regardless of its arcane immunities, could not possibly last against the one of the Serpent Sons. I was wrong. That's no ordinary imp. When Professor Silver started the "test," the demon belched forth a plume of ash which blanketed the serpent. The poison skin of the Basilisk began to sizzle, then fester and bubble. Again and again the imp vomited pillars of jet, and the great wyrm began to melt before our very eyes. Typical of a scientist, Professor Silver was hurriedly scribbling in his notes. Circled at the top of the page, I saw "Arsenic to Arsine to Pyroxine to Thermite." That imp was doing some kind of alchemy, turning its opponent's very flesh into burning iron slag. I never thought it would be possible to feel sorry for a Basilisk.

-Crispian St. Crispin.

Impathy

     Empathy: superior (rank 2)

The collar was Brother Tchuuu's idea. Originally, the Septarine Circlet was designed to enhance emotive sensitivity a thousand-fold. Like most artifacts, it achieved the predictable result of killing anyone foolish enough to wear it. Silver's Hammer, however, has just the slightest spark of proto-life coursing through its electromagic. A thousand-fold augmentation was scarcely enough to make it a low-level psychic, although the breadth of this power significantly outpaces the depth. It is intuitive, displaying insight and deduction, a genuine understanding of the vagaries of the psyche. It reads body language, it senses emotional states, and it will seek out anyone who represents a threat to the Guild, although the selection process is not yet as finely tuned as we'd like. Turning the circlet into a collar was a stroke of genius, although the glowing runes are a bit ostentatious. The visual symbolism of control that a collar evokes is almost melodramatic in its efficacy, but one must admit it is far less conspicuous than a demon wearing a tiara.

-Brother Haver