Sigil: City of Doors

Basic Information
Name: Ceszar
Aliases: That piking sod, The Kingpin
Gender: Male
Race: Tiefling
Age: Unknown
Profession: This n' That
Accent: Intimately familiar with cant, though prefers to speak as they do in the prime.

Physical Information
Body build: Somewhat Strong, Very Agile
Facial Features: Angular



Personality and Other
Alignment: True Neutral
Faction: Transcendent Order
Class: Self- Described Assassin, though no actual levels in the Assassin class

Personality:

Exceedingly Polite: Ceszar goes out of his way to make all around him feel comfortable, even those he resents. He will never cuss, instead find subtle ways to insult those who need insulting.

Outgoing: Will try to talk to anyone and everyone, loves making new friends.

Shamelessly Cheeky: Loves to get under people's skin (though not make them feel uncomfortable, simply a little annoyed). With a couple of rare exceptions, Ceszar will not bother people via rudeness or direct insult - he will remain verbally polite no matter what. He does, however, enjoy testing people's reactions to his antics (eg. likes to run with drawn weapons in the great Bazaar, and Festhall. Draws the ire of the locals - always pretending to forget to sheathe them or fabricating some elaborate story to explain his attachment to his chivs).

Ambitious/Calculating: Constantly planning for the long term: will manipulate people and events to acheive his ends. Often has selfish plans that turn out to have unforseen munificent side-effects (eg. his syndicate destroys a rival assassin's band across town, and makes the streets safer in that whole neighborhood).

Unrivaled Fashionista: Sports the latest fashions, quite the trendsetter around town. Ceszar will often start conversations with phrases such as: "Darling, you are ROCKING that vest-skirt ensemble," or "Babe, you are making me look like last decade's beauty queen with threads like that." Has been known to annoy people by often sporting a "pimp-hat" (whatever that is).

Biography next

There is a notion amongst the general population that assassins are a brooding, furitive, and uncultured lot who live only for jink and the thrill of feeling someone's life being sucked away via the hilt of their blades.This notion may, or may not be accurate... yet there remains at lest one exception to it.

Enter Ceszar.

The man is undoubtedly a ruthless killer, but unlike the majority of the practitioners of his trade, he is not defined by it. There appears to be cognitive dissonance when Ceszar, a man of vast paradoxes, is asked of his trade. Claiming to be but a humble merchant with a predilection for fine clothing, Ceszar disarms many of the strangers he comes across: something that tends to make his job considerably easier. An ambitious cutter with an inclination for stealth, trickery, and tiefling women, his tale is as intriguing as it is eclectic.

Here are but a few excerpts.

Antipeak settled rather suddenly upon the Hellgate district in the Lower Ward, bordering the Hive. A lone figure runs through one of the more secluded back alleys in the area. Here, the hardhead presence is inconsequential – power is the law.

The lone figure is covered by rust-colored, spiked armor and a helmet with an inverted triangle face-shield. He carries a massive greatsword of dark power at his side, though that wonÂ’t help him tonight. Jach Sensbane, the faux Sinker, has seen his fair share of decay: his masked face is covered with wrinkles and scars that recount countless battles and near-death experiences.



He is about to have another one, for looming above the balconies, atop the canopy of roofs in the alleyway watches a set of glowing red eyes.

Panting and wheezing, Jach stops to catch his breath, thinking he is safe for the moment. He bends down in great fatigue, his body unable to accomplish the feats it might have decades ago, gasping for a reprieve. He gets none. Right as Jach least expects it, a massive, winged gargoyle swoops down from the rooftops, roughly onto the dirt of the alleyway that he stands in. An ironic soft thud contrasts with the gravity of the situation.

JachÂ’s eyes widen in an uncharacteristic display of terror. He instinctively starts chanting the beginnings of an evasive spell, when a massive claw slams into his chest, interrupting his concentration, and knocking him backwards onto the ground. Wheezing as the wind is knocked out of his lungs, he attempts to parley.
“Wh-why do you chase me so, W-Watcher?” Jach’s voice betrays more fear than he would have liked, and the gargoyle, The Watcher, can sense it. His stony maw opens into a vicious sneer as he stares down Jach, profoundly intimidating the old man. A gravely, slow voice emerges, dangerously low: “You…did….not…come…to…me.”

Jach’s labored breathing and profuse sweating do not bode well for his position in any verbal fencing that may take place. Instead, he simply admits: “I-I haven’t found Ceszar yet!” The red eyes simply glower at him, burning into his very soul. Jach continues to speak while he still can, in an attempt to distract the terrible presence before him: “I have asked around the Cage as you told m-me to, hired assassins, to no avail!!” He nearly gulps for air as he finishes, his body trembling both as a result of his fear and his old age.

Again, the terrible voice rings into his ears: “Your…failures…are…becoming….taxing.” Jach has no response but to continue to breath so that he doesn’t faint. His mind goes through various spells that he could cast quickly to escape the scene, but his body remains frozen in fear, unable to do anything but comply to the presence before him.

“Give m-me some more time, I will find him!! I swear it.” The rasp in Jach’s voice belies his dry throat.

The Gargoyle simply stands there, glowering at Jach, not saying anything. The old man tentatively gets up to leave, waiting to see if the creature will attack him again, bracing for another blow. To his relief, no retribution is taken as he gets up to leave. He first backs away slowly, then breaks into a run, away, far away from the presence into the open structures of the Lower Ward, far away from Hellgate, far away from the eyes of the Watcher.

As the old man vanishes out into the distance, the gargoyleÂ’s features begin contorting, molding themselves into that of someone different. The wings retract into the body, which no longer is made of stone, but black-dragon scale mail. The glowing red eyes dim to a purple, and the stony maw morph into a handsome, angular face. Within ten seconds, the Watcher is no longer the watcher, but a tall, dark-skinned fellow in dark clothing and a feathered hat.

Mirthless laughter fills the empty alleyway as the dark skinned man blends into the shadows.

The Watcher is Ceszar.

Enter Mercuria.

Amongst the gorgeous trees, birds and sunlight; amongst the peace and security afforded by the glorius mountainside, amongst all that is right in heaven: A disturbance.

A Cornugon with a orange distinctive glow around claws in the thick of battle. Four of MercuriaÂ’s finest Defenders surround the beast, desperately hacking away. A little distance away, an Eagle-Eye and a well-warded Archmage hurl spells and arrows.

Unbeknownst to anyone, A Gargoyle perched atop the upper face of the cliff watches with interest – blending inconspicuously into the surroundings.

The Cornugon puts up a good fight, striking down two Defenders with a flurry of swipes as well as energy blasts originating from the orange glow on its hands. Nonetheless, the Archmage’s plethora of spells is too much to handle – and the creature first is paralyzed, then blasted by the Archmage. A sitting duck – finally finished after much abuse.

A good fight. But not good enough. Ceszar watches the Defenders catch their breath, then sees everyone rush to revive their fallen companions.
The perfect opportunity.

The Archmage is nearly torn in half as the Gargoyle hands on her back, driving her flat onto the rocky ground, and then using its maw to drive her head deeper yet into the hardness. His claws wrap tightly around her neck – which now has the hardness of stone: a result of one of several magical wardings. Without too much trouble however, Ceszar’s claw finds and crushes the trachea. He knows the thrashing, facedown woman will be dead within seconds.

The Eagle Eye and Defenders are still in shock – still flatfooted. They both lunge, rather awkwardly towards the Gargoyle, but Ceszar easily sidesteps one, while the other’s skull is impaled by one of the Gargoyle’s maws that suddenly extended outwards. The Eagle Eye flees.

An archmage dead, a defender dying, and one more prone on the ground – Ceszar makes his way towards the fallen defender, still in Gargoyle form. Yes, he could easily have killed all of them by now, including the fleeing Eagle Eye- had he been in his original form – had he those deadly twin scimitars of his on hand. But what fun would that be?
A few moments later, four dead defenders, a dead Archmage, and a dead Cornugon lie under him. He quickly removes a scroll of “Raise Dead” and begins reading it – performing the necessary movements which are only known by a select few outside the community of priests and necromancers.

The Cornugon rises, slowly, spitting out green blood. Even as it coughs, the numerous wounds on its physique are rapidly being healed by its intrinsic devilish nature.

Ceszar lets out a cold chuckle and bows:

“Ahhh, Maelphaxerazz. I had expected you to take out the Archmage first.” He taunts – his voice and appearance unfamiliar to the Cornugon – nonetheless Mael has no doubt who this is.



Ceszar morphs back into his original form. After some verbal fencing, a threat is identified and a plan laid out: The Artificer must be killed. In order to kill him, his close associate Jach Sensbane will be interrogated then also killed. Of course Ceszar doesn’t inform the Cornugon what he really knows about and possesses of Jach Sensbane – Jach IS the Artificer, and Ceszar owns his soul. All that is unnecessary to the plan – and Ceszar’s Cipher intuition tells him such. He doesn’t fret about the fact that he saw Jach only a short time ago and could have killed him there and then: No. It wasn’t meant to be – no need to dwell on this, he only needed to take action. A powerful, influential mage like Jach has many allies who would help him in his search for Ceszar. Indeed – Ceszar didn’t need to find Jach, he knew Jach would come to him.

Nonetheless, he goes along and agrees to play this game, without giving it a second thought. It was meant to be.

Right as Ceszar and Mael turn to leave, the Cornugon inquires: “What of those who seek to undermine our plan?”

Ceszar draws a shiny scimitar and absentmindedly examines the reflection of the Mercurian landscape behind him on the side of the blade. He then suddenly turns and plunges the blade right into thin airÂ….or what appeared to be to Mael.
The Eagle Eye who apparently fled the scene... is now kneeling, fully visible, and lets out a muffled scream as the scimitar goes deep into her torso. A look of disbelief and horror on her beautiful face is met by that of a sweet smile on CeszarÂ’s. He allows the blade to remain impaled in her chest as he turned back to answer MaelÂ’s question:

“I will deal with them.”

With that, he removes the blade swiftly and lets the Eagle archer fall to the ground – her eyes rolling upwards, revealing the whites, as she rests eternally.

With a cordial bow and a cold chuckle, Ceszar walks away, leaving the Cornugon slightly shaken and more than slightly confident that JachÂ’s death would not be far off.