Backstory: Sarangerel was born in Othard, the oldest child in her family. Her father was a simple fisherman, and he and her mother lived on the Dalamiq clan lands in the middle of one of the great rivers. Her mother helped defend the clan and its territory, often assisting the elders when other nomadic Xaela clans came to trade. There were occasional rumbling from their Garlean overlords, but for the most part, life in the Azim Steppes was peaceful.
That ended when Garlemald, not content with its conquest of Ala Mhigo, set its sights on the continent of Eorzea. The clan watched as the Garlean flagship Agrias set off and never returned. (It flew over their little fishing village.) Sara was but twelve; her sister Irves younger still, and neither of them understood precisely why that lost airship disturbed their mother so much. When a tribe of Borlaaq warrior-women came through their village later that year, their mother left with them. Their father despaired of ever teaching the adventurous duo anything; luckily, the village shaman took them under his wing as well, laying down the basics of magic for both Sarangerel and her sister.
When Dalamud fell, Sarangerel and Irves were chosen to go to the lands of the city dwellers (in this case, Eorzea), in the hopes that they would be able to provide the tribe with answers as to what had happened. Neither girl was much of a homebody, and really, both were sort of troublemakers. Sarangerel, at least, promised her father that she would send letters back--if he could not read them himself, at least the shaman could tell him of any exploits. The sisters traveled to Ul'dah, where Irves immediately applied herself to thaumaturgy, while Sarangerel worked to support them both. She enrolled in the pugilist's guild in Ul'dah and for a time, worked the bloodsands to keep them in food and clothing. Adventuring soon proved a better prospect, however, and Sarangerel applied to the guild in Ul'dah often for whatever odd jobs they had. (Most times, this involved investigating dungeons or other abandoned ruins/assorted holes in the ground. Hey, it was a living...) It also drew the attention of one of the Scions of the Seventh Dawn, Thancred by name. Since he often had a line on better, more lucrative jobs, Sara agreed to work for them and further their ends.
Upon first journeying to Limsa Lominsa, Sara fell in love with the city. (Irves likes to tease her that she just missed the smell of fish.) She quickly fell in with the rogues' guild, liking their philosophy--especially that of policing the pirates when the Yellowjackets, Limsa Lominsa's police, couldn't handle the job. She progressed through their ranks rapidly--and eventually was instructed to head to the jungles of the Lominsan rainforest, to learn new techniques.
It turned out these 'new techniques' were taught by a clan of Hyur. Sarangerel didn't mind that; she had quickly adapted to the mix of races in Eorzea, but the ninjas' claim to be Doman refugees troubled her deeply. When more refugees landed in Vesper Bay, led by another Au Ra, Sarangerel put away her daggers and turned her back on being a ninja despite all her success. The horror she felt at the Empire's razing of Doma prevented her from carrying on with that tradition. And the question of what had happened to her village rose in her mind. She had sent letters back, and even got a few back in the shaman's scrawl, and the village was not terribly near Doma, but...
She fell back on old habits--magic still stirred within her, and she threw herself into study at the Arcanist's Guild. The same focus that served her well in the tasks her father and the tribe's shaman had set her to again served her well there. She quickly learned all she could there, and was directed to a scholar of ancient Allag named Y'mhitra. For the first time, under the Miqo'te's studies, she learned what Dalamud had been, truly.
The moon her clan had so revered was nothing short of a prison for the primal dragon Bahamut. This greatly disturbed her; more so because since that point, nothing had been heard of him. More personally, it disturbed Sarangerel because her sister Irves was practically obsessed with dragons as it was. She chose to send this information back to her clan--and not breathe a word of it to her younger sibling. There was, of course, a good chance of Irves catching wind of it anyway--but it would not be due to Sarangerel's actions.
Working for the Scions, Sarangerel had cause to come into contact with--and defeat--the beastmen gods called Primals. Ifrit, Titan, and Garuda were all being summoned with alacrity by their respective tribes, and the Antecedent often had her adventurers on the front lines. This furthered both Sarangerel's studies of Allag, and Y'mhitra's ends, as it seemed that the ancient Allag had magical techniques that allowed them to summon aspects of the primals called egi--and to do so required the prospective summoner to both put aside their Carbuncle, and defeat the Primals to channel their essence into these new summons.
Her studies and and Y'mhitra's guidance had her traveling to Mor Dhona, the site of the Crystal Tower, a storehouse of ancient Allagan technology--the former seat of its power. It took a team of individuals working together, Sara amongst them, to work up a set of elemental fangs to work through the ancient magical protections that had been set in place centuries before. Among them were a pair of clones created from the last Allagan princess, as well as a Miqo'te named G'raha Tia, a rakish scholar and bard with a fascination for Allag that rivaled Sara's own.
Upon unsealing the first part of the tower, the scholars in attendance found a labrynthine den of monsters--and a single individual augmented by the technomagical power characteristic of Allag at its height. During her investigations, she learned that Dalamud had been used to actually power the seat of the last Allagan Emperor, Xande, as a sort of solar collector. It was more than simply that, however, encapsulating Bahamut as it did. It had been intended to keep the Allag Empire's power at its height by opening a portal to a world that was a dark reflection of their own--but with the help of a number of other adventurers like herself, Sarangerel dissipated that plot.
To Sara's sorrow, G'raha chose, as the last bearer of Allag royal blood, to seal himself in the tower--the Princess Salina, whose blood he carried, had intended the Crystal Tower to be sealed until it could be a beacon of hope for all peoples; since it was still a danger, it fell to him to be its silent, slumbering caretaker until it could fulfill its intended purpose.
Returning to the Rising Stones, news arrived that the Warrior of Light had been framed for the murder of the Ul'dahn sultana, Nanamo ul Namo, and that the Scions were being rounded up as accomplices. Along with a number of others still loyal to what the Scions stood for, Sarangerel fled. Scattering to keep themselves safe, she went north to Ishgard, in the hopes that she could catch up to her friends. Luckily, she met one Haurchefant Greystone, bastard of House Fortemps, who promised to help them hide out until their names could be cleared, somehow.
Perhaps foolishly, Sarangerel journeyed again to Limsa Lominsa in the hopes of gathering more information on what had happened to the other Scions. With her penchant for changing her hairstyle, it altered her appearance just enough to stay ahead of any mercenaries who might have been on her trail. She had no luck there, but she happened to meet a young Roegadyn arcanist by the name of Dread Thunderstorm, beginning a flirtation with him. She thought it was going to be a passing thing--she hardly wanted to endanger anyone with the trouble that would inevitably follow her--but both the Hellsguard himself and her heart had other ideas, one of which culminated with their marriage in Gridania's Sanctum of the Twelve.
Ishgard had been keeping itself back from the Eorzean Alliance (of the city-states of Gridania, Ul'dah, and Limsa Lominsa) due to troubles of their own. Due to the hidden treachery of the Elezen, the Ishgardian people and the dragons had been embroiled in a war for a thousand years. Called the Dragonsong War, its major proponent was a dragon named Nidhogg, bent on revenge for the death of his brood-sister Ratatoskr. While investigating the history of the war in an attempt to help Alphinaud and the Warrior of Light defuse the tensions, she met another old 'friend'--a woman named Ysayle, who also possessed the Echo as Sara did herself. Unlike Sara, however, Ysayle had the ability to summon a Primal herself--Shiva, goddess of ice and lover of one of the dragons, Hraesvelgr. Despite their uneasy friendship, Sara refused to come to blows, and left the heretic to her dreams of peace.
As the reason for the Dragonsong War became known, tensions in the Holy See of Ishgard ran high. Archbishop Thordan VII, having tried to keep the truth hidden, imprisoned his bastard son Aymeric, commander of the Temple Knights, to keep Aymeric from spreading the truth. Sarangerel was tasked to accompany the Warrior of Light once again, using her scholarly healing magic (instead of her destructive summoner abilities) to free Aymeric.
It was not enough, however, to save Haurchefant. One of Thordan's knights attempted to assassinate the Warrior of Light as Thordan fled; Haurchefant saw the aetheric spear, and pushed the hero aside, taking the blow for them. He died in the hero's arms, as Sarangerel looked on, helpless. In her grief, she swore that she would do anything to crush Thordan's heart in her fist.
"Anything" meant trailing the fleeing Archbishop through the Sea of Clouds, to the last remaining Allagan city--something that normally would fascinate Sara anyway, but the chance to get even with Thordan was an even richer draw than the city's technomagick. While the adventurer worked to find a way to break the city's shield, Sarangerel helped prepare for the journey. She rode with the hero to Azys Lla, and watched in horror as Ysayle sacrificed herself, hamstringing the Garlean empire's massive airship so that the Warrior of Light could reach the city first.
Accompanying the hero within, Sara helped them to bring down Thordan and his knights--while not quite crushing his heart within her fist, she saw him slain, and in the end, that was enough.
Sarangerel Dalamiq | FFXIV (OC) (3)
That ended when Garlemald, not content with its conquest of Ala Mhigo, set its sights on the continent of Eorzea. The clan watched as the Garlean flagship Agrias set off and never returned. (It flew over their little fishing village.) Sara was but twelve; her sister Irves younger still, and neither of them understood precisely why that lost airship disturbed their mother so much. When a tribe of Borlaaq warrior-women came through their village later that year, their mother left with them. Their father despaired of ever teaching the adventurous duo anything; luckily, the village shaman took them under his wing as well, laying down the basics of magic for both Sarangerel and her sister.
When Dalamud fell, Sarangerel and Irves were chosen to go to the lands of the city dwellers (in this case, Eorzea), in the hopes that they would be able to provide the tribe with answers as to what had happened. Neither girl was much of a homebody, and really, both were sort of troublemakers. Sarangerel, at least, promised her father that she would send letters back--if he could not read them himself, at least the shaman could tell him of any exploits. The sisters traveled to Ul'dah, where Irves immediately applied herself to thaumaturgy, while Sarangerel worked to support them both. She enrolled in the pugilist's guild in Ul'dah and for a time, worked the bloodsands to keep them in food and clothing. Adventuring soon proved a better prospect, however, and Sarangerel applied to the guild in Ul'dah often for whatever odd jobs they had. (Most times, this involved investigating dungeons or other abandoned ruins/assorted holes in the ground. Hey, it was a living...) It also drew the attention of one of the Scions of the Seventh Dawn, Thancred by name. Since he often had a line on better, more lucrative jobs, Sara agreed to work for them and further their ends.
Upon first journeying to Limsa Lominsa, Sara fell in love with the city. (Irves likes to tease her that she just missed the smell of fish.) She quickly fell in with the rogues' guild, liking their philosophy--especially that of policing the pirates when the Yellowjackets, Limsa Lominsa's police, couldn't handle the job. She progressed through their ranks rapidly--and eventually was instructed to head to the jungles of the Lominsan rainforest, to learn new techniques.
It turned out these 'new techniques' were taught by a clan of Hyur. Sarangerel didn't mind that; she had quickly adapted to the mix of races in Eorzea, but the ninjas' claim to be Doman refugees troubled her deeply. When more refugees landed in Vesper Bay, led by another Au Ra, Sarangerel put away her daggers and turned her back on being a ninja despite all her success. The horror she felt at the Empire's razing of Doma prevented her from carrying on with that tradition. And the question of what had happened to her village rose in her mind. She had sent letters back, and even got a few back in the shaman's scrawl, and the village was not terribly near Doma, but...
She fell back on old habits--magic still stirred within her, and she threw herself into study at the Arcanist's Guild. The same focus that served her well in the tasks her father and the tribe's shaman had set her to again served her well there. She quickly learned all she could there, and was directed to a scholar of ancient Allag named Y'mhitra. For the first time, under the Miqo'te's studies, she learned what Dalamud had been, truly.
The moon her clan had so revered was nothing short of a prison for the primal dragon Bahamut. This greatly disturbed her; more so because since that point, nothing had been heard of him. More personally, it disturbed Sarangerel because her sister Irves was practically obsessed with dragons as it was. She chose to send this information back to her clan--and not breathe a word of it to her younger sibling. There was, of course, a good chance of Irves catching wind of it anyway--but it would not be due to Sarangerel's actions.
Working for the Scions, Sarangerel had cause to come into contact with--and defeat--the beastmen gods called Primals. Ifrit, Titan, and Garuda were all being summoned with alacrity by their respective tribes, and the Antecedent often had her adventurers on the front lines. This furthered both Sarangerel's studies of Allag, and Y'mhitra's ends, as it seemed that the ancient Allag had magical techniques that allowed them to summon aspects of the primals called egi--and to do so required the prospective summoner to both put aside their Carbuncle, and defeat the Primals to channel their essence into these new summons.
Her studies and and Y'mhitra's guidance had her traveling to Mor Dhona, the site of the Crystal Tower, a storehouse of ancient Allagan technology--the former seat of its power. It took a team of individuals working together, Sara amongst them, to work up a set of elemental fangs to work through the ancient magical protections that had been set in place centuries before. Among them were a pair of clones created from the last Allagan princess, as well as a Miqo'te named G'raha Tia, a rakish scholar and bard with a fascination for Allag that rivaled Sara's own.
Upon unsealing the first part of the tower, the scholars in attendance found a labrynthine den of monsters--and a single individual augmented by the technomagical power characteristic of Allag at its height. During her investigations, she learned that Dalamud had been used to actually power the seat of the last Allagan Emperor, Xande, as a sort of solar collector. It was more than simply that, however, encapsulating Bahamut as it did. It had been intended to keep the Allag Empire's power at its height by opening a portal to a world that was a dark reflection of their own--but with the help of a number of other adventurers like herself, Sarangerel dissipated that plot.
To Sara's sorrow, G'raha chose, as the last bearer of Allag royal blood, to seal himself in the tower--the Princess Salina, whose blood he carried, had intended the Crystal Tower to be sealed until it could be a beacon of hope for all peoples; since it was still a danger, it fell to him to be its silent, slumbering caretaker until it could fulfill its intended purpose.
Returning to the Rising Stones, news arrived that the Warrior of Light had been framed for the murder of the Ul'dahn sultana, Nanamo ul Namo, and that the Scions were being rounded up as accomplices. Along with a number of others still loyal to what the Scions stood for, Sarangerel fled. Scattering to keep themselves safe, she went north to Ishgard, in the hopes that she could catch up to her friends. Luckily, she met one Haurchefant Greystone, bastard of House Fortemps, who promised to help them hide out until their names could be cleared, somehow.
Perhaps foolishly, Sarangerel journeyed again to Limsa Lominsa in the hopes of gathering more information on what had happened to the other Scions. With her penchant for changing her hairstyle, it altered her appearance just enough to stay ahead of any mercenaries who might have been on her trail. She had no luck there, but she happened to meet a young Roegadyn arcanist by the name of Dread Thunderstorm, beginning a flirtation with him. She thought it was going to be a passing thing--she hardly wanted to endanger anyone with the trouble that would inevitably follow her--but both the Hellsguard himself and her heart had other ideas, one of which culminated with their marriage in Gridania's Sanctum of the Twelve.
Ishgard had been keeping itself back from the Eorzean Alliance (of the city-states of Gridania, Ul'dah, and Limsa Lominsa) due to troubles of their own. Due to the hidden treachery of the Elezen, the Ishgardian people and the dragons had been embroiled in a war for a thousand years. Called the Dragonsong War, its major proponent was a dragon named Nidhogg, bent on revenge for the death of his brood-sister Ratatoskr. While investigating the history of the war in an attempt to help Alphinaud and the Warrior of Light defuse the tensions, she met another old 'friend'--a woman named Ysayle, who also possessed the Echo as Sara did herself. Unlike Sara, however, Ysayle had the ability to summon a Primal herself--Shiva, goddess of ice and lover of one of the dragons, Hraesvelgr. Despite their uneasy friendship, Sara refused to come to blows, and left the heretic to her dreams of peace.
As the reason for the Dragonsong War became known, tensions in the Holy See of Ishgard ran high. Archbishop Thordan VII, having tried to keep the truth hidden, imprisoned his bastard son Aymeric, commander of the Temple Knights, to keep Aymeric from spreading the truth. Sarangerel was tasked to accompany the Warrior of Light once again, using her scholarly healing magic (instead of her destructive summoner abilities) to free Aymeric.
It was not enough, however, to save Haurchefant. One of Thordan's knights attempted to assassinate the Warrior of Light as Thordan fled; Haurchefant saw the aetheric spear, and pushed the hero aside, taking the blow for them. He died in the hero's arms, as Sarangerel looked on, helpless. In her grief, she swore that she would do anything to crush Thordan's heart in her fist.
"Anything" meant trailing the fleeing Archbishop through the Sea of Clouds, to the last remaining Allagan city--something that normally would fascinate Sara anyway, but the chance to get even with Thordan was an even richer draw than the city's technomagick. While the adventurer worked to find a way to break the city's shield, Sarangerel helped prepare for the journey. She rode with the hero to Azys Lla, and watched in horror as Ysayle sacrificed herself, hamstringing the Garlean empire's massive airship so that the Warrior of Light could reach the city first.
Accompanying the hero within, Sara helped them to bring down Thordan and his knights--while not quite crushing his heart within her fist, she saw him slain, and in the end, that was enough.