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Long ago, in a land far away, there dwelled a fierce and terrifying monster, a once beautiful maiden cast in the form of a hideous beast whose merest glance could turn the most stalwart of warriors into lifeless stone. Befouled in both body and mind, her thirst for destruction was insatiable, her once gentle heart twisted by madness and a lust for revenge well before the gods granted her the power to seek out those who had wronged her.
Her life, her struggles, her eventual regrets, and the death that followed, these are the things that legends are made of… However, these are not the subject of our story, merely a way of retreading its beginnings. For it was with her that came the birth of a curse that would span for generations, rippling down from mother to child and outward from places high and low, spreading and diluting itself until eventually we come to our protagonist: a young girl of decidedly humble origins, born in the ruins of a crumbling tower to the embrace of a loving mother and a full head of writhing, slithering locks.
Young Cecelia, or as she prefers to be called, Cici was kept sheltered from the world for the first four years of her life by her mother Cassandra, a practical woman and former adventurer who worried that the misapprehensions and prejudice of others might someday erupt in violence toward her and her little one. Unfortunately, her fear proved justified as come one terrible evening, she nearly fell to the knives of would-be heroes sent to take her head on the orders of a corrupt baron.
However, fate, ever a curious mistress, chose that moment to intervene, providing her with a savior in the form of an undead protector who put an end to the fighting via diplomacy rather than bloodshed. With but a few words and a tip of his hat, he saved her and her child, rallying her once attempted murderers to the task of seeking out the baron himself to put an end to his wanton malice. The result of this after several weeks was that Cassandra, who had never willingly sought any position of power, was suddenly thrust into the role of baroness of a new territory, a happenstance which would quickly force her and her little one out of the shadows of obscurity and into the light.
Her life, her struggles, her eventual regrets, and the death that followed, these are the things that legends are made of… However, these are not the subject of our story, merely a way of retreading its beginnings. For it was with her that came the birth of a curse that would span for generations, rippling down from mother to child and outward from places high and low, spreading and diluting itself until eventually we come to our protagonist: a young girl of decidedly humble origins, born in the ruins of a crumbling tower to the embrace of a loving mother and a full head of writhing, slithering locks.
Young Cecelia, or as she prefers to be called, Cici was kept sheltered from the world for the first four years of her life by her mother Cassandra, a practical woman and former adventurer who worried that the misapprehensions and prejudice of others might someday erupt in violence toward her and her little one. Unfortunately, her fear proved justified as come one terrible evening, she nearly fell to the knives of would-be heroes sent to take her head on the orders of a corrupt baron.
However, fate, ever a curious mistress, chose that moment to intervene, providing her with a savior in the form of an undead protector who put an end to the fighting via diplomacy rather than bloodshed. With but a few words and a tip of his hat, he saved her and her child, rallying her once attempted murderers to the task of seeking out the baron himself to put an end to his wanton malice. The result of this after several weeks was that Cassandra, who had never willingly sought any position of power, was suddenly thrust into the role of baroness of a new territory, a happenstance which would quickly force her and her little one out of the shadows of obscurity and into the light.
