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[goldenrod]

Character info

Character name: Kalvaxus
Canon: Fantasy High
Canon point & release date: post-Sophomore Year; spring 2020
History: Here
Powers: Noted here, but I'll write out the most relevant:

• [inherent] He's a Huge (as in, occupies a 15ft x 15ft space) red dragon with tough scales that function as natural armor. Note that he'll be downsized to a Large (horse-sized) creature so that he can more comfortably interact with the setting.
• [inherent] He is immune to harm from fire.
• [inherent] He is extremely perceptive, with much more powerful senses than a human. He can see perfectly in the dark and can even sense nearby movement when blinded.
• [skill-based] He can attack with his bite, claws, wings, or tail.
• [skill-based] He can climb and fly with incredible skill.
• [skill-based] He can release fire breath that consumes a 60-foot area.
• [skill-based] He can inflict "dragon fear" on creatures in his presence; those who succumb must mindlessly flee from him for up to 1 minute before the effect fades. He can't scare the same creature twice in one day
• [skill-based] Unlike most dragons, he took an interest in economics and investing, and worked with human-run banks to leverage his wealth.

Personality

What is your character most afraid of? How are they defined by this fear? (200-300 words)

In canon, prior to his death and torment in Hell, we see Kalvaxus' greatest fear: it's an image of him in Dragonborn (humanoid) form, turning out his empty pockets.

In his world, dragons are extremely proud and well-respected beings; it's common for dragons to be worshipped like demigods, especially by draconic humanoid races. Being bound to a humanoid form strips him of this presumed inherent power and dignity. To his mind, it renders him lesser and forces him into inescapable, "natural" subservience. As a profoundly hubristic and self-important character, this is terrifying to him; Kalvaxus is constantly trying to deny the possibility of his own inadequacy.

Kalvaxus is motivated by power and greed: he ties material wealth not just to success in the broad sense, but to his inherent value and identity as a dragon. He claims that gold is "very spiritual to his people," and the most comforting afterlife would be to swim in a vast expanse of riches. To lose his wealth isn't just a material loss, it's a loss of control and an indictment of his ability and value as a dragon.

In Hell, Kalvaxus is not only denied the ability to hold any possessions, but he's denied his autonomy and personhood in full: he's remade into an object and referred to as a possession of humans. The only thing more distressing than no longer being a dragon, with nothing to his name, is to no longer be a person, with no capacity to ever own anything.

Now that he's suffered in Hell, his greatest fear is that he'll be sent back, or that it will happen again-- that he'll become an object and lose all control. (This makes his downscaling into horse-sized, for the cowboy game, hilariously significant. Someone will ride the dragon, and he'll have to contend with his reflexive terror and fury that they plan to take his personhood in the process.)

What is your character's greatest desire? How are they defined by this desire? (200-300 words)

Burn towns get money.

For a while, Kalvaxus was succeeding at all of his goals: he dominated and oppressed much of the world prior to the main story of canon. He installed himself as emperor over the many races of Spyre, sent armies over land and sea to plunder everything beyond his reach, and struck deals with the likes of the Nightmare King to further increase his power.

When we meet him in canon, Kalvaxus is disgraced and bound to servitude, but scheming to regain his former glory. His success requires regaining control of vast riches, having humanoid maidens bound at the mouth of his lair as offerings or sacrifices, and regaining his true dragon form-- breaking free from the "lesser" form of a humanoid.

Kalvaxus is, in the end, very straightforward. He wants an immense degree of control over his environment and the people around him, but mostly as an outgrowth of fearing anyone else's control. He wants respect, ideally won through fear, and he wants to hoard the material signifiers of that respect. In the cowboy town, the only difference is how this will manifest: in the absence of gold coins, he'll take whatever is considered valuable here. Without kobolds and lizardfolk to boss around, he'll have to pick some other category of people to subjugate.

He'll still probably try to collect beautiful virgins as offerings. Not because they appeal to him in any sexual or aesthetic way, but because everyone knows beautiful virgins are supposed to be valuable, and he wants to control all valuable things on the map. Surely this will go well.

What is your character's most defining memory or relationship? How are they defined by this relationship? (200-300 words)

His most significant relationship is with the mad wizard Arthur Aguefort, and their bond is largely defined by a single memory: Arthur was the wizard tasked with punishing the freshly defeated Kalvaxus. He's the man who bound Kalvaxus into humanoid form, stripped him of his ability to hold wealth, and tasked him with serving the adventurers' academy as its eternal Vice Principal.

Kalvaxus hated Aguefort. The wizard was chaotic, whimsical, and petty, which paired badly with Kalvaxus taking himself very seriously at all times. To a degree, Kalvaxus constantly rebelled: he poisoned the tea that Aguefort forced him to serve, complained about most everything, and took immense satisfaction in Aguefort's eventual death.

In other ways, though, Kalvaxus fell into line and stumbled into embracing his role. He enforced school rules (even when no one else seemed to care), worried aloud about whether his punishments were just (such as when he gave detention to a girl having a panic attack), and offered more than was required of him (like reassuring imprisoned students or realizing he would have to play grief counselor to children after Aguefort's death).

In Well, Kalvaxus will remember the day-to-day banalities of serving at the wizard's side, but he will not remember the man's name or how they knew each other. He will be entirely baffled as to why he hung around a high school comforting distressed teens, but because of his immense and fragile ego, he'll rationalize it into something he must have wanted to do.

How will not having memories change your character? What core personality traits, if any, will change? How? (200-300 words)

There are three parts to this:

First, we the audience don't get to hear many specifics of Kalvaxus' rule or his backstory, so in many ways, the loss of these memories saves me a lot of headcanon legwork. He retains only the day-to-day mundanities of being emperor: bossing around lizardfolk, burning villages, snacking on human maidens. He does not even remember that he awoke the Nightmare King for magical aid.

Likewise, he'll retain the day-to-day mundanities of running a high school, first as Vice Principal and then as Interim Principal. He'll retain his frustration with children, his constant struggle for respect, and his brief moments of pride and satisfaction at being in charge of something again.

Secondly, though, he will retain only partial memories of his most important relationship: he knows that he worked at the side of a mad wizard, but he cannot remember that he was bound. The fact that he was forced into humanoid shape is fuzzy and unclear to him. All he really knows is that he felt spiteful resentment toward the man, yet spent centuries upholding the institution they shared.

This is where interesting gaps start to arise. Without memory of his defeat and binding, Kalvaxus will fumble for a new explanation as to why he went from emperor to principal. Depending on how game events and CR shake out, he might throw himself defiantly into the care of children, put himself in charge of whatever first occurs to him, or otherwise try to prove the worth of his unexplainable actions to himself.

He remembers only one key event: his gory transformation into a boat in Hell. Without the memory of how or when he died, he will be snappish and defensive, unwilling to accept his defeat. This gives us a Kalvaxus much less confident and more willing to work alongside others than he'd otherwise be.

Thread samples:
Here

Memories

Minor memory: 1 point.

He remembers his routine as a conquering evil dragon, back when towns would offer him gold and beautiful virgins as appeasement. That was great.

Minor memory: 1 point.

He remembers his routine as an authority figure at an esteemed adventuring academy, where he tried to maintain some semblance of dignity and control. Among packs of teen heroes, this largely never worked out for him.

Minor memory: 1 point.

He remembers taking control of the academy as its sole leader. He can recall giving speeches, ineptly comforting distressed teens, and taking pride in his ownership of a fantasy high school.

Major memory: 2 points.

Kalvaxus remembers his undead body being hollowed out for use as a ship by zombie pirates. It was very bad. He's going to pretend he can't remember this one.

Relationship core: 2 points.

He remembers his day-to-day spite, fury, and begrudging respect for a man he spent centuries at the side of. He cannot begin to understand why he would've stayed in that relationship.

Player info

Name: Rona
Pronouns: she/her
Age: 27
Contact: ochrona and Rona#7132
Permissions: here

Link to invite: Invite
Character in game: N/A