Xaia

Xaia
Player: @AlwaysAPrice
Biographical Data
Real Name:	n/a
Known Aliases:	Xaia
Gender:	Female
Species:	Maradur
Ethnicity:	Rathaiur
Place of Birth:	Marad
Base of Operations:
Relatives:	Anthrak (father)
Characteristics
Age:	27
Height:	6'11"
Weight:	320 lbs.
Eyes:	Hazel
Hair:	Black
Complexion:	Sun-bronzed
Physical Build:	Towering, musclebound
Physical Features:	Exposed skin heavily marred by faint scars: blades, bullet grazes, claw marks. Scars not usually noticable without close inspection.
Status
Fame:	██ ██ ██ ██ ██ ██ ██ ██ ██ Unknown
Alignment:	LG LN LE NG TN NE CG CN CE
Identity:	Public
Years Active:	New to Earth
Citizenship:	None
Occupation:	Xaia
Education:	Xaia
Marital Status:	Single
Known Powers and Abilities
Profoundly stronger and more resilient and athletic than baseline human potential. Extreme martial prowess.
Equipment and Paraphernalia
Breastplate, gorrik furs, bone knife, war mask, herbal stimulants.

Physical Attributes
	Strength			Weapon
	Durability			Armor
	Speed			Reflexes
	Resistance			Stamina
	Dexterity			Agility
	Combat			Regen

Non-Physical Attributes
	Energy			Psionics
	Telepathy			Willpower
	Sorcery			Tech.
	Intel.			Knowledge
	Charisma			Bravery
MaekadaBoxSlim created by @Maekada

The Maradur are an alien race best known for their ruthless aggression. Theirs is a society defined by the arrogance of conquest, who have built an empire spanning multiple star systems surrounding their native Marad. Their belief in the righteousness of their expansion is driven by deeply engrained tradition, a conviction in the superiority of their race that has been tested and proven in battle for centuries.

There are those among the Maradur who remember a different interpretation of their ancient codes and traditions. They are students of Marad's ancient ways who long for the return of the age when the Maradur were revered for their honor, instead of feared for their cruelty; when the Maradur used the might and tactical cunning bred into their race by their society to defend worlds weaker than their own, rather than subjugate them.

These pacifists, if any group of Maradur could ever be considered such, live in the shadows of Marad's empire and seek to undermine their bloodthirsty expansion through a return to the ancient ideals of nobility and justice today's Maradur shirk. They show their disdain for their fellows by subverting the most sacred of Maradur traditions, believing their kin today have perverted its function and brought shame on all who now adhere to it. They are the Xaia, the Nameless, in open and taboo mockery of the names the Maradur so proudly aggrandize through their warmongering.

This Xaia is the daughter of Anthrak, one of the Maradur's most dominant and calculating generals. In his youth, he was far more open to the ideals preached by the Xaia, and his secret dalliance with one of their number bore fruit. Their ways parted, and his daughter was raised to be what her father would come to hate as he ascended the ranks of the military. Now she has come to Earth, where she believes her father's ambitions will soon lead him, to stand alongside its people as a defender and help to prepare them, should the Maradur set their sights on Earth.

Armor & Equipment

War Mask

Those unfamiliar with the Maradur often mistake them at first sight for a primitive race, but they are very technologically advanced, centuries at least ahead of human engineering; it is just not their engineers who stand at the front lines of the wars they wage. The second rite of passage into adulthood for all Maradur is the crafting of their caste's war mask, a device that aids them in tracking and predicting the movements of enemies in combat, translates speech and text between the myriad tongues of the empire, and in the case of the Xaia especially, conceals their identity.

Breastplate

Maradur warriors of old relied on armor that covered only the chest, to protect their most vital of organs, and the shoulders, to keep their arms attached to their bodies and capable of swinging a weapon. All else, it was expected, would be protected by a warrior's agility and presence of mind. The shoulderplates of Xaia's armor are adorned with the fur of a gorrik, a great Bloodlands tiger, killed with her bare hands.

Bone Knife

The summer of a Maradur's 10th year is known as the Summer of Proving. In this rite, they are deposited by dropship into the heart of the Bloodlands of Marad, a lush equatorial jungle rich with hostile life. The Bloodlands are an ecosystem of unforgiving savagery where everything, even the plants, thrives on the blood of its other inhabitants. If the child has been raised well and made strong by its parents, it will survive the ordeal and hear its name in the death of the first creature it triumphs over and kills with the bone knife that is the only possession the child enters the Bloodlands with.

All xaia undergo this same ritual, but never complete the rite of naming. They carry their unproven blades with them throughout their life, never parting with it, as a sign of their refusal to take names, until the true honor of the Maradur is restored to their people and the rite is made meaningful again.

Personality

Xaia is a woman of few and precise words.

Her personality is a blend of conflicting drives. As Maradur, she lives to find the thrill of combat and challenge in every aspect of her life, a drive that is only moderately tempered by her upbringing. As Xaia, she is intensely ashamed of how that drive ultimately misled her people, yet also intensely proud of the idea of the "true Maradur" that she strives to represent.

I am Xaia!

Three words* uttered with a mixture of reverence and rage, the phrase is equal parts battle cry, affirmation, oath, and punctuation. A warrior's announcement of self to the battlefield is one of the Maradur's oldest traditions, and one the xaia hold as dear as any other subset of Maradur culture.

* -- As translated into English by her mask. In her own language, it is two: "axa Xaia"

OOC Notes

• Xaia is the Champions Universe reinvention of the VirtueVerse's Anthrak II, who was originally known as Xaia.
• There, the Maradur are an honorable society of benevolent warriors more in line with what the Xaia of this universe wish their people were.
• Conversely, the Xaia of the VirtueVerse are an assassin cult of rejects and reprobates who reject their names out of disdain rather than shame.