Cloudtiger » Hibernal Den » Zero

Zero

(#28284036)

Level 1 Skydancer

Energy: 50/50

Personal Style

Apparel

Skin

Scene

Physical Attributes

Battle Stats

Measurements

Length

4.24 m

Wingspan

5.12 m

Weight

753.13 kg

Genetics

Orca
Tiger

Orca
Stripes

Orca
Thylacine

Hatchday

Nov 05, 2016
(7 years)

Breed

Adult
Skydancer

Eye Type

Lightning
Common

Level 1 Skydancer

EXP: 0 / 245

STR

AGI

DEF

QCK

INT

VIT

MND

Lineage

Parents

Loki
Luna

Offspring

none

Biography

((Stat as a possible Spellslinger trainer? https://www1.flightrising.com/forums/gde/2603416))

ZERO, The Chessmaster

Clan Leader, Tactician, Usurper

"Why does anyone do anything? To prove that we can. Remember that next time you question me."

One of the more unpleasant dragons in Clan Echecs, Zero is known mostly for her callous disregard of life and cold demeanour. The only thing that rivals her chilling aura is her icy stare, devoid of warmth and compassion. There are rumours that the Skydancer wasn't always this way, but are mostly disregarded. How could someone so thoroughly distant from the simple respect for life have ever been anything else?

However, these rumours do have basis in fact. From the day of her hatching, Zero had been exposed to the horrors and harsh reality of war. She was taken from her home clan at an early age with her brothers and sisters in the hopes of finding a safe place for the hatchlings until the war was over, but that was never meant to be. Zero was separated from her siblings and guide as they travelled through the warzone, and once she lost sight of them, she never saw them again.

A battleground is no place for a hatchling, as Zero soon learned. Death was all around her, and permeated her every breath with air tainted with the stench of blood and the screams of the fallen. It was days before the fighting died down and the victors could pick through the corpses and count their dead. Amongst them, taking shelter under the rigid wings of a dead Guardian was Zero, shivering in a combination of fear, cold and shock. The small band of dragons hurried her to their clan, but the damage was already done. Her young mind was scarred beyond repair.

For days she neither ate nor spoke, she simply sat and stared into space, vivid memories of the battlefield playing out before her unseeing eyes. It took a lot of coaxing and gentle words to bring Zero out of her daze, and when she again saw the world and not the nightmare in her mind, she had listened perhaps too closely to what some of her saviours had told her. 'Death is a part of life'.

After that, Zero gradually became more responsive, but at the same time more distant. She seemed to lack the ability to love or even care about other dragons. To her, they were simply walking corpses who hadn't fallen over yet and there is no point in getting close to a dead man. Without any friends, Zero turned to study. She voraciously devoured any knowledge she could find on battle; tactics, common weapons, elemental magic, everything. Her first memories were of battle and had shaped her into who she was, so it was only natural that the Skydancer gravitated to it. The clan that had saved her noticed this, and hoped that it meant she was learning to care again.

They were fatally wrong. In the dead of night, a clan of bandits raided their lair, tearing through the surprised warriors with terrifying ease. Zero watched the massacre with a cold, calculating eye as everything unfolded as she predicted it would. The feeling it left was giddy, knowing that she could predict and calculate exactly how a battle would proceed. With her home a graveyard of broken corpses, Zero moved on to find another fight to observe, and another, and another. And then when there were none, she started them. Petty squabbles, bloody battles and all-out wars; nothing was too brutal for the cold-hearted tactician.

Eventually she found her way to the Echecs Glade, where she learned of a battle that can be predicted, but never won. It felled the weak and the strong without any regard for either. The thought of such a thing scared her, so she stayed to learn more of this 'Great Plague' that left Clan Echecs a husk of what it was. Realising that only six dragons were there during the Great Plague, and one of them had no memories of the event, Zero took to working with the clan's warriors, watching their battles and giving them advice to manipulate the outcome. She has learned much, and is a tactician without peer, but she does nothing out of a desire to keep her clan safe. After all, it is far easier to manipulate allies than enemies.

One of her ways of controlling the variables was to simply erase the mind of her soldiers. She pitched the idea to Alexandra and the Council of Six, but was met with a unanimous 'no', and was forbidden from attempting this inhumane experiment. Like she had ever let something as petty as that stop her. She chose the strongest hatchling from the nursery, an Imperial by the name of Casalain, and waited until she had opportunity to steal him away into her lair without anyone immediately noticing. She had chosen a hatchling for two reasons. One, this parasitic fungus she had discovered was better able to take over its host when said host was still developing. Two, one is far more likely to notice a strong adult dragon going missing, hit a hatchling? They're probably off playing somewhere.

For months Zero worked, ensuring that there was no way for Casalain to fight off the invasive infection. She opened cuts in his flesh, smearing spores into the open wounds so that it would grow deep and spread quickly. It was slow going, as every day Casalain would scrape off the surface growths as best he could. Then one day he didn't, and never again did he try to purge the parasite. Zero knew this was the first step of success, and the parasite was already assuming control, destroying Casalain's memories, thoughts and feelings. She would have her perfect warrior.

Much to her annoyance, her plans were set back when Casalain was discovered. That white Imperial, Myco, was the one at fault. She knew it. She had heard the little runt begging for his nest-brother to be found. If it weren't for him, then Casalain might not have been found until it was too late. Aerin would use his healing magics to keep the infection at bay. This Zero knew. But she also knew that it wouldn't be enough. The parasite ran deep, and there was no removing it without killing Casalain along with it... the infection was too far advanced for him to have any hope of survival. All she had to do was wait.

And wait she did, until the day finally came. The day when Casalain passed his true test and finally became the perfect warrior. "Kill Myco." The one command that he had so far refused to obey, clawing his way out of nothingness to resist that one order that was so against who he was he could never carry it out. So Zero knew that when he finally did it, there was nothing left in him. No soul. This husk would obey her without question, not fear for its life and not let pain hinder it on the battlefield. She relished Myco's screams as she watched Casalain tear into his nest-brother with teeth and claws.

While somehow Myco survived, likely a miracle of Aerin's healing magic, Zero knew that Casalain was ready, and so was she. She would take control of Clan Echecs, and finally have a plaything under her command, rather than just her guidance. First, she ordered Casalain to slay Maia, the gentle Tundra who served as a mother to all of the hatchlings in the clan. Her broken body was found and buried the next day. Without her, Zero would have unopposed access to the hatchlings, and as leader none would question her as she turned more children into mindless soldiers, lest they be executed for treason. All that was left was to take over the clan itself. It was easy, really. Almost laughably so. Alexandra was really far too trusting of the warped tactician. Some hope that she survived, as her body has never been found, but Zero knows that there is no body to find. Beasts can be savage creatures when starved and faced with fresh meat.

With nothing in her way, and none strong enough to oppose her and the perfect being that followed her every command, she named herself leader of Clan Echecs. At first, it was but a title. The Council of Six thought they could keep power away from her, and those of the clan refused to obey. But Zero was patient, as always. She had waited years for the empty shell that was Casalain to be ready for action, she could wait for the clan to fall under her command. First though, she had to see to it that the Council of Six was fractured from within. She lured some of them in with promises of things they couldn't refuse. Of family for Axiel, of light for Aerin and of memories for Ceru. And so was the clan fractured, as more and more of the clan allied themselves with Zero, clinging desperately to her promises that seemed almost too good to be true, and yet they couldn't bring themselves to doubt her. After all, she had done something that none had been able to do so far. She gave Rora the ability to feel emotions, for the first time in her life. What doubt could there be?

The only problem was those who would not follow her, although they were easily appeased. With the Council of Six still intact, they had hope. Hope that the Council would take power from her, that the Council would save them from this new age of darkness. Too bad for them half of the council is under her thumb.

She now wages constant war, both with other clans, and with those within her own clan who still refuse to follow her. There is a rift, which she has called 'The Chessmaster's Divide', the clan split cleanly down the middle between those who fight for her and those who oppose her. Again, Zero will wait. She knows that she has the stronger pieces on the board, and the tactical advantage. No matter how hard her opponents fight, she knows that they will lose.

Theme songs:
Aurora of Darkness
Wicked Flight
A Dark Fall

Name Origin: The number '0'

Headcanons:

FeelinFloral wrote on 2017-03-22:

Terrible whispers circulate through the clan of what Zero does to hatchlings who she cannot turn. Experiments, beatings, wounds, inflicted on newborns who can barely open their eyes. Without the protection of Maia, nobody is left to safeguard the clan's most helpless. Mika is barely able to ease the pain of the hatchlings that make it to their exaultion (is that a word? it is now). He's seen hatchlings beg for death, some less than a week old, and done nothing but tell them to get back on their feet before Zero returns.

Text Colour: [color=]

Art by Quinineer

Art by BittytheKhajiit

Possible completed outfit:

Poisonous Rose set.
Familiar pets: Black Wolf

Iridescent Scaleback

Dunewind Manticore

Deepmine Aardvark

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Exalting Zero to the service of the Arcanist will remove them from your lair forever. They will leave behind a small sum of riches that they have accumulated. This action is irreversible.

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