Leorius the Proud

From his youngest days, Leorius would bow to no man, beast, or monster. He was possessed of pride and independence so fierce it often proved maladaptive, but he could no more rein in his nature than he could stop a pride of lions from roaming. When he became a Skinwalker, nothing changed. The Skinwalker curse can strike any time a mortal being takes the life of an animal, regardless of circumstance. Certain Skinwalkers can also pass cursed animal souls into a victim. Leorius was struck by one such carrier, a feline Skinwalker so laden with cursed souls as to be utterly feral. The Skinwalker traveled with a pride of lions who looked after him as one of their own, and when Leorius came upon them, they wounded him and he himself transformed into a lion-like, two-legged creature. When Leorius recovered from the shock of gaining his new form, he resolved to lead a ‘pride’ of his own, without losing himself to savagery. He became a mercenary leader, preferring to recruit Skinwalkers with ferocious battle skill and who were ready to embrace the pack mentality he was cultivating. Leorius the Proud accepted only the most prestigious and highly-paying contracts, never wasting the might of his warband on anything he considered beneath his dignity. Success bred success and recruits flocked to his banner, but he kept his organization small and rejected huge swaths of disappointed would-be warriors. His elite force was kept on call by barons, wizards, and burgermeisters all over east-central Anhelt. Even certain high priests of the Sacred Order were rumored to have called on him despite official injunctions against Skinwalkers. But then, from the west, came the war-fleets of the Gaellen Pact, and armies of Orcs, Ogryn, Lizardmen, and Skinwalkers poured across the land, eager to cause destruction and hungry for plunder. Overnight, Leorius found his band of mercenaries being strong-armed by a dozen different clients, each demanding his service in this time of desperate need, with payment to be deferred until the catastrophe subsided. Their sense of entitlement rankled his legendary pride. Meanwhile, the invading Gaellens reached out to him. In particular, the Skinwalker armies saw him as a misguided potential convert to their cause. Playing on his vanity, they reminded him that he had been serving mere Humans all along, feeding their corrupt war machine, and solving their petty disputes. Instead, the Gaellen Skinwalkers offered him a chance to carve out his own domain under a new regime that would replace the rule of the Telerian League, and thus put an end to what they called centuries of decadence and cruelty. But Leorius saw accepting the Gaellens’ offer as capitulation. Just as the lords of the Telerian League were using the war as a chance to erode his long-guarded independence, the Skinwalkers were trying to turn him into a manageable asset in their burgeoning state apparatus. Leorius was determined his path would always be guided by himself alone, and so he rejected all belligerents of the Gaellen War. He served only his own whims and the demands of his personal honor, and protected his brothers and sisters in battle from both the forces of the Telerian League and the Gaellen Warclave. None would die pointlessly in this war because Leorius himself was pressured into taking one side or another. Perhaps Leorius was right to feel as he did. But the fact of his decision was that, in the midst of one of the most apocalyptic wars Teleria had yet witnessed – a fifteen-year conflict spanning nearly the entire globe – he had made enemies of all. It was a situation that, for once, his pride could not overcome. Harried by every faction, each of which believed his gang was a dangerous wildcard and no better than outlaws, his storied cohort was gradually whittled down until Leorius the Proud fought on alone. The end of Leorius’ tale changes with every teller. Some say the Gaellens finally forced him to bend the knee, or slew him for his defiance. Others say Kaerok did likewise, or that the Sacred Order burned him at the stake. Some say he endured the carnage of the Gaellen War and escaped, having somehow shed his old identity. Some even say that Leorius swore he would bow to none but the Arbiter herself, and when she appeared to him in a dream and accepted his offer, he left the borders of the known world to wander in search of her.