Baldur's Gate : The Sword Coast Chronicles : NWN2 Persistent World

Race: Human
Age: 18
Height: 150 cm
Weight: 40kg

Personality Profile/Physical and Mental Characteristics (Tarsakh 1356):
Lucia looks like an average-looking young human woman, albeit a bit short and skinny. Upon closer inspection though it becomes abundantly clear that her demeanor is that of a frightened child, or an animal of prey. She reacts to interaction by an intelligent being defensively and with extreme caution.
She is easily distracted and whilst highly intelligent will commonly not comprehend things obvious to an average person.
If one were to somehow spend time with her despite her great reservations they would notice that she is quite dexterous and strong, despite acting as if she is not able to lift a heavy rock or capable of walking along a narrow path.

Deity: Tymora
Initial Alignment: Chaotic Good
Profession: None (aspiring to become a Candlekeep Acolyte)
Base Class: Warlock
Habits/Hobbies: Reading, learning about the arcane (especially divination magic)
Languages: Common, Sylvan, Luiric
Weapon of Choice: Quarterstaff: Lucia’s Redemption

Background:
Lucia was born in a village outside Baldur’s Gate, in a family of lower-middle-class merchants. Her father traded in the various good the village produced, mainly animal products and crops that the farmers produced. He was well-regarded and respected by the village, a fair man with impeccable morals. Her mother was a bit more of a free spirit, but loved and respected her husband, and focused on bringing up Lucia and keeping her household a nice place to live in.
She was brought up to value and respect all life, and to be charitable and understanding with others. Like many youths she was a free spirit and was commonly scolded by her father for playing pranks on her friends. Her mother supported her the best she could, understanding that a young girl needs some space and the freedom to discover herself. She was taught to worship Tymora and understand that all things in life are due to fate, a power out of her control that can offer both good and back luck in the blink of an eye, a power that should be respected and accepted for what it is.
Throughout her childhood she was a bright student, albeit forgetful and easy to lose focus, she had the incredible propensity for learning. When she was not out playing pranks she would spend her time learning about subjects that peaked her interest, commonly arcane matters. Overtime she came to enjoy the topic of divination the most, the idea that fate itself can be nudged in one direction or the other, with the right knowledge and understanding.
As part of the upbringing she ended picking up the basics of two strange languages: Luiric and Undercommon, as her father used them more often than not when trading with various outsiders. Until this day she has not questioned why her father would be dealing with being that knew Undercommon.
As she reached her teenage years, she decided (along with her family) that she should train to be a Wizard. She knew that her free spirit would have to be managed for this to happen but decided that on balance it was well worth the effort for the knowledge she would be able to gain.
And then fate struck.
And then everything changed in the blink of an eye.
It all started just past midnight on the first of Tarsakh 1356. As Lucia slept, she heard a loud noise coming from downstairs. She got up from bed and quickly headed down to see what had happened. At first she noticed her mother on the floor with blood around her neck, and then she saw them. She saw four armed figures, around human height surrounding her father. “Lucia run, now!” Those are the last words she heard that night, before she was knocked unconscious.
When she came to, she could smell burning wood and could hear birds and other forest critters around her. She slowly opened her eyes and tried to get up. She could not move. Glancing around, she could see that she was tied to a tree, with a small campfire burning nearby. Lucia panicked, she tried to scream but could not, she had a cloth over her mouth. Looking around she saw three, no four figures standing nearby the fire facing away from her. They did not seem to have noticed her being awake. So she prayed. She prayed to Tymora. She prayed for her freedom and for making these people pay for what they had done, for killing her parents. Nothing. Nothing seemed to happen, the only sound heard was the birds chirping (as she was gagged). So she prayed again, begging Tymora for a sign, for anything to give her hope that it was not all over, that she was not as good as dead. Nothing. She sobbed. About to give up and accept her fate, she gave one final desperate prayer. She prayed to the forest, to nature herself to help her. She prayed for vengeance on these figures, on retribution, for them to suffer for what they had done.
And then it appeared. She heard a loud noise coming from her left. Looking she saw a cloud of smoke with a shadowy figure in its center. She could not see the figure clearly nor understand what it may be. As she could not talk, she just thought, hoping that the figure could understand her: “Help me. Make them pay for what they have done”. In a mysterious voice it replied, in a language that she had no right to even begin to understand: “I cannot help you, you need to help yourself”. Lucia replied in her mind: “How, I have no power, I have no strength or arcane magics to use”. “Pledge yourself to me, to chaos itself, and you will have that power and more”. Without hesitation, without thought, without reason, Lucia replied: “Anything, anything to make them pay, anything to avenge my parents”. “It is done”, the figure vanished.
Looking back towards where the four figures were standing earlier, they were still there, still facing away from here, somehow oblivious to what had just happened. Lucia thought to herself: “I must be imagining things, I must be greatly hurt by these people and my mind is playing tricks on me in order to survive”. She closed her eyes and tried to relax, to center herself, to think.
And then her entire body shook, she screamed to loudly that even the gag was not able to restrain her screams. Chaos itself was running rampant throughout her entire being. She could not think, she could not understand, she could not feel. She just was. The figures immediately turned to her, hearing the commotion. As they came to her she saw them to be humans, all four of them, all male. One of them spoke to her: “If you don’t stop yelling we will have to knock you out again little girl”. Furious, without reason, without remorse, without feeling, Lucia yelled (seemingly through the gag itself) “You will pay for what you have done, you will regret the evils you have brought upon my family and anyone else, and I AM NOT A LITTLE GIRL”.
When she had finished her sentence she started to glow in a feint purple aura. The men, taken by surprise stepped back. “What, what are you doing” one of them exclaimed. “If you don’t calm down we will put you down girl” another sneered. “She will fetch an entire pouch of gold at the slave market, but not if she is dead” the first one replied. Lucia could hear none of this, all she could see were the murderers of her parents, evil incarnate that had to be stopped. As the energies around her focused and intensified the ropes binding her disintegrated. Her gag became dust. She was free. She stood up, staring daggers at her former captives “You will pay for what you have done”. “What will you do little girl, draw us a pretty picture?” said one, drawing a longsword from its sheathe.
“I told you, I am NOT a little girl!” Lucia exclaimed, and pointed her arms towards them. Without understanding how, she started uttering an incantation in Sylvan. “What the…” one of the bandits yelped. With the final syllable uttered, a purple ray of pure chaos erupted from Lucia’s hands. It hit the sneering bandit right in the chest and immediately chained to another and then another. In an instant three of the bandits yelled in pain and fell to the ground. The last bandit, seeing what had just happened whispered in fear “Mercy” and turned around to run. “I will show you the same mercy you showed my parents” Lucia sneered. The bandit started to run to the woods, but before he could get out of her sight, Lucia finished incanting another invocation, this time one that resulted in a dark green ray that hit the bandit in the back and burned his flesh, as if he was thrown a large vial of acid.
Silence.
Only the birds could be heard in the distance and the fire crackling lightly.
She fell to her knees, exhausted. She collapsed next to the fire to recover her strength…

Goals:
Learn more about herself and her pact and understand the powers at play: find out which Fey offered it to her and its motives
Learn to control her chaotic energies, gain the ability to control her powers herself, instead of being guided by impulse
Try to re-integrate into society after running away and being frightened to approach others after her transformation
Long term and volatile: decide on which path to take (wrt good/evil)
(Does not know this consciously) seeks forgiveness from her parents and her deity for what she has become and will not be able to be at peace until she gets both (unless she becomes evil)

1) The Aftermath

Waking up in the early evening, Lucia stood up, confused. For a moment she did not remember where she was and what had happened. Then it all came back to her. She fell to her knees and wept. She wept for her parents, she wept for what she had become, for what she had done. She uttered a quick prayer to Tymora, more out of habit than anything, and got up to leave, understanding that she may still be in danger.
As she reached her village it seemed like everything was normal, no commotion, no one outside her house, nothing had changed. She entered her house without hesitation without caution, without any logic or reason to back her actions. And there she saw them, the bodies of her parents, her mother where she remembered near the stairs, and her father near the northern-most corner of the downstairs main living area. Before she could think, before she could mourn, panic kicked in. A pure, primal, unconstrained, unmitigated panic was all what she felt. How would anyone understand what she had become, how would anyone care to listen. He knew of her kind, she knew the superstitions, she knew the tales she had grown up being told. More importantly she now knew that it was all true, it was not some fantasy made to scare little children into obedience, Warlocks were real, they are powerful and they are dangerous.
She knew what she had to do, she had to run. Both for her own safety and the safety of others she had to run. These powers were powerful, too powerful for her to even begin to understand and too chaotic for her to control. She had to run. The final moments before sprinting outside her house to head to the wilderness a part of her brain managed to bring some basic survival logic forward: if she left like this she would surely die. She turned around and headed to the hidden room in the basement of her house where her father kept any unique goods, family heirlooms and other valuables he had collected over the years. She hoped that the bandits had not found it, otherwise she felt it would be over for her.
Entering the room everything was there, it was undisturbed. From a little child she remembered some of the things here, mostly of sentimental value but there were several items that were of clear use to her venturing alone in the wild, the most important of which was a mithral chainmail her father inherited from his father. After putting it on, as well as grabbing various other trinkets, she went upstairs and got ready to leave. Then it dawned on her, she needs to do something with the bodies of her parents. Out of respect. But what can she do. She cannot hide them, as that would be despicable, she cannot bury them as that would be seen by the villagers, and she cannot ask for help because that would endanger anyone she is with. She hastily wrote a note: “Please bury my parents with the respect they deserve, I am sorry”, intentionally left the door to her house open to ensure someone would notice, and she ran.
She ran south and kept running, past the Friendly Arm Inn, past civilization at the Gate, into the wilderness. And there she hid, for days, weeks in the wilderness letting the chaos within her erupt, decimating any wild beast or evil being that dared approach her menacingly.
It was time without thought, without reason, without logic, a time of pure chaos, a time of loneliness and fear…

2) Hope

Then fate’s coin was tossed again, this time landing favorably to Lucia, even though this was not apparent at first…
It all started on the 22nd of Tarsakh 1356, around the early afternoon, not that Lucia would know as she had been inside a cave for days now. It started when she came across a curious item on a fallen adventurer, a crossbow that was glowing with magic. Lucia picked the item up as it may be of use to her should she need to rely upon more mundane methods for self-defense. From the moment she picked it up her knowledge of arcane lore kicked in and she felt something very wrong. It was cursed. She panicked, she had heard of items cursed by mischievous or evil beings, disguised as powerful magic items for foolish adventurers to come upon. Items that could curse the wielder with a myriad malicious curses. Instinctively she tried to drop the crossbow. Nothing happened, the item seemed to be magically bound to her, and she was unable to get rid of it.
For the first time in days her mind managed to partially contain the chaos within her and start to briefly think rationally. Self-preservation required thought instead of fight-or-flight response. She had to make a decision, should she venture back to civilization and look for a powerful mage to aid her in ridding herself of this curse, or should she remain hidden and bear the consequences. She pondered this for some time, hiding in the shadows of the cave without being noticed. Finally she made a decision, she would risk going back to the Gate to rid herself of this curse. She had to. She had no choice.
So she made sure that none of her chaotic magics were apparent on her, she enabled her invisibility spell and headed back. Passing the Friendly Arm Inn, crossing the southern bridge out of Baldur’s Gate, just outside the East gate to the city, she noticed a group of individuals sitting by a campfire. She approached them, still invisible, terrified, and stood there for a moment. They seemed friendly chatting about something she did not understand, and importantly they were made up of a variety of different races, evidently that not mattering at all to the group. Two of them even had horns! Giving her some confidence that this group of adventurers would hopefully not immediately shun her, she dropped her cloaking spell while in their midst. One of the Tieflings looked up at her in surprise but just smiled. The others did the same. Still terrified Lucia tried her best to ask them for help regarding her cursed item and to her astonishment one of them held an item of incredible power, a pair of boots capable of removing a curse from such an item! What is more this individual was even willing to help her, a stranger, just like that!
As she sat with them for some time, they started inquiring about her and her whereabouts, something perfectly normal and innocent. Something terrifying to Lucia. She quickly tried to make up a story about being from Candlekeep, as it was apparent she was capable of arcane magics, appearing out of thin air and all. To her surprise, one of the tieflings, Pyotr by name quite quickly saw into the ruse but instead of being angry or dismissive, he went to bring someone who was nearby. He came back with a woman, Isabella by name, who was apparently the current Guide of Candlekeep itself! Lucia panicked, this was it, they would discover who she was, WHAT she was, they would not understand, they would hate her, they would fear her, and they would kill her.
Her instincts kicked in immediately, she uttered a quick spell in Sylvan and vanished from sight.
“I knew it!” Pyotr exclaimed.
Lucia stood up and started running, but mere seconds afterwards, as she ran, she heard nothing. They were not getting up to chase her, they were not preparing incantations of protection or destruction, they just sat there, calmly.
Lucia stopped. Then and there she made a decision. A decision that took moments in her mind but one that would likely follow her for the remainder of her life. She turned back. She headed back to her seat, dispelled her invisibility and just sat there motionless.
On that fateful evening Lucia met Isabella, she met Edelgarde, Pyotr, Kellip and several other adventurers who ended up being understanding, kind, caring.
For the first time in weeks Lucia felt safe, she felt loved, she felt at peace. To an outsider none of this was easily understood as her reactions were those of panic, fear and weeping in deep emotional distress. Yet the strangers welcomed her, and finding solace in the presence of not one but two incredibly cute familiars Betty and Woofsey, Lucia managed to stay with them that evening.
Isabella in particular showed a great interest both in comforting her and offering help with her unique situation. She mentioned that the knowledge in Candlekeep may offer answers to some of her questions, and that with time, practice and more importantly will, she may be able to better understand and even control her powers. That all she needed was to have faith; maybe Tymora had not forsaken her after all.
There was hope.
There was hope for her after all, she was not doomed.
Lucia went to bed that night (as much as you can call a makeshift camp in the middle of the forest a bed), overwhelmed but at peace. Civilization had not forsaken her, there are people out there who care enough to help a stranger in need, even if this stranger possesses dangerous and chaotic powers that are almost always linked to pure evil itself.
Lucia slept clutching in her hands a quarterstaff, a present from Isabella herself! An item she swore to herself she would never forget or get rid of. An item she would use to ground the chaos in her mind and in her soul. An item that would remind her of this day, which would remind her of the good in the world. Lucia’s Redemption…

3) Conviction

On the 1st of Kythorn 1356, in the most somber moment in Lucia's life, she was offered the honor to become Seeker of Candlekeep. With her lover and some of her closest friends by her side, she stood there, inside the Candlekeep Library, in the shrine dedicated to the Avowed that fell, reciting her vows.

At that moment nothing else mattered, not the pain of her past, not the losses she suffered, not the uncertainty of the future, just this.



The way forward was clear and nothing would distract her from her vows, her new family, her friends and her love.

4) Lost

It is just before midnight 3 Tarsakh 1357, Lucia opens her eyes, it is daylight, she is in the middle of a lush forest. She stands, apparently in her nightgown and blinks a few times to get used to the sunlight.

In front of her are two figures, two figures she has not seen for over a year.

"Dad?"


5) Found

Dusk 5 Tarsakh 1357. Lucia opens her eyes, looks around and smiles, a look of tranquillity and peace. She gets out of bed and heads out of the Avowed quarters, not really noticing she is dressed differently.

6) Life