Name: Grimm
Age: 14
Race: Elemental Guardian/ Manu - a humanoid species native to the moon that holds Eureka Academy. They are incredibly long lived beings that are all born with an affinity for one of the fundamental elements that holds the world in balance. to balance out their incredibly long lives they also have a very low fertility rate, their women ovulate much in a way similar to human females, but the eggs they produce have an incredibly high chance of being duds. As such, a child is conceived among their race on average once every 30 years. The 'guardian' in their name comes from the fact that in their culture they have come to see themselves as keepers of history and of the balance in the universe. The leading religion in their culture teaches that each elemental guardian (or 'manu' in their language) is possessed of a Will at birth. A Will, is a certain task that the Manu is to complete at some point during their lifetime through use of teh elemental powers they were given at birth, and completing this task will work to bring order to the universe in some way. Each Manu posesses their own unique Will that can be literally anything. As they observe such a great span of history, the Manu have culturally grown to appreciate how small actions can one day have great impact and change the course of history in unimaginable ways. As such it is not rare for a Manu's will to reveal itself as being an incredibly small action that however had to be performed within incredibly specific parameters (such as a manu with an affinity for fire lighting a specific stranger's cigarette at a specific time on a specific date, at a specific location, in front of a specific witness). Elemental guardians are encouraged to seek out their Will throughout their whole life, and are told that knowing one's Will is impossible until the moment the time to complete the task is upon them, such, they are encouraged to travel the worlds and experience as many things as possible so as to increase their chances of finding their Will quickly. For many Manu, the prospect of dying before completing one's Will is more terrifying that death itself. In fact, it is said that a Manu who has completed its Will can be expected to die soon thereafter, as they will have fulfilled their purpose for being born. If the Manu does not die, it is to be assumed that they have been granted another Will to complete. Manu who have completed many Wills are usually extremely old (though they would never look it as their kind ceases to age somewhere around late adolescence and early adulthood), and veneered by their own as incredibly wise. To call a Manu Willess is often the most grievous insult one can make to them as it is akin to telling them that they are an existence that has no meaning or reason to be in this world.
Class: Blue Mage
Title: Student
Sect Study: Magis - Yellow
Appearance:
Personality: Grimm is so reserved he is practically mute. His whole life he has been called Willess by his own so his personality is in constant shift between two extremes. At times he is borderline nihilistic, believing his life trully has no purpose and sometimes going on to extend that opinion of pointlessnes to everything that surrounds him. At other times he seems almost obsessed with his desire to find his will and prove his existence, becoming restless and forgetting all other priorities. He has a tendency to alienate those who spend much time around him, and generally reacts aggressively and sometimes violently when people try to approach him. This, however, is more caused out of fear both for himself and for others than out of malice or resentment. Somewhat surprisingly, he actually scores very well on tests and does great with most of his coursework. Perhaps due to his peculiar nature as a Manu, he finds it incredibly easy to absorb information, and rarely forgets anything he's seen, heard or read before.
Weapon(s): he files his nails into surprisingly sharp and effective claws to defend himself with physically, but else wise carries no weapon unless he picks on up to use a weapon kill.
Abilities/Magic: His abilities are almost exactly like those of the classic blue mage class. Grimm cannot use any abilities of cast any magic of his own, however, he possesses the capacity of learning the moves and spells of his enemies by studying them. Usually he must see a skill being used several times (how many depends on the nature and complexity of a the skill in question) in order to learn it, but if someone uses a skill on him directly, he can usually learn it almost instantaneously, provided he survives it. His ability manifests itself most strongly with magic. To date there has not been one spell cast on the boy that he did not immediately learn how to cast himself afterwards (though, in the case of one specific higher-end illusion, it was showed that while he understood the mechanics of how to cast the spell itself, the amount of power required to actually use the spell was beyond his capabilities to manipulate. In RPG terms, it;s like if the spell had been added to his command list, but the MP cost exceeded his max MP). He has been shown to be capable of copying physical techniques as well, but unlike magic he can't copy them to their full effect. For example, a spear wielder technique named '10 000 needles' may be downgraded to a lesser powerful variant named '1 000 needles' when he attempted to utilize the technique. not only this, but more complex moves will not be learned instantaneously even if they are used on him, requiring him to be subject to the techniques multiple times before he will learn it. Needless to say, the amount of times he must observe physical skills before being able to copy them is also higher than the number for magical skills.
It should also be noted that his ability is limited to copying. If an enemy fires a basketball sized fireball at him, he will learn how to fire one back at them, but if asked afterwards to create a baseball sized fireball, he will not be capable of doing so until he observes someone else doing it or the spell is cast at him. It also seems as if it is impossible for him to learn a spell or skill on his own, without seeing anyone else use it or being subjected to it himself.
He is currently impossible for him to copy skills that contradict his physiology (like learning how to fly by watching a bird for example), but it is suggested that this might not be the case as mastery over his power grows due to the unstable nature of elemental guardians which was further altered due to the conditions of his birth. It is theorized by some teachers that Grimm may one day learn to shapeshift in order to copy the form of those who surround him as well as their abilities. For now, however, this remains unproven.
History: Grimm was born to an elemental tribe that lived far to he south of where Eureka stands erected. The tribe's home was a permanent residence with no permanent residents. The small village served as a place for elemental guardians to come back to every few decades after they had busied themselves traveling the two planets that shared the moon. They would remain within the village for a few years, maybe up to a decade, while they relaxed before heading back out planetside when they felt they had rested enough. The only Manu who remained there more than a few years were those who were blessed enough to become parents. If a child was miraculously conceived between two of the elemental guardians, they would remain moonside in order to raise the child until it was ready to go out and search for its Will as well.
This should have been the happy life that awaited Grimm when he was born. A mother and father to love and care for him as he grew, listening to the adventurous tales of Manu travelers as they came to rest at his village in between travels, growing a desire to travel the worlds and fulfill his Will. However, something unheard of among the Manu occured during his birth. His mother underwent severe complications and died mid-labor, requiring him to be delivered via caesarian section.
This alone would perhaps not have been enough to ruin his life completely, but due to the traumatic birth Grimm had failed to connect with any of the elements at birth. He was the first recorded Manu to be born without any element inhabiting his body. An elementless elemental guardian.
He was immediately declared cursed by the others of his tribe and his father even refused to name him. Were it not for the intervention of his aunt it is quite possible they would have killed him even as a newborn.
His 'aunt' was, of course, not his biological aunt, as siblings among Manu were almost never heard of. She was, however, a lifelong friend of his mother's and, whereas everyone looked to the child and his blackened skin as the cause of his mother's death, Siscera as she was called saw the child that her friend had been so elated to bear, and had even died for so it could be born. She could not, in good memory of her precious friend, allow any harm to come to the child no mater what it looked like. She defended it from the accusations of her tribesmen and when Faeros, the father, declared he wanted nothing to do with the 'monster' that had 'killed' his beloved, Siscera opted to adopt the child into her care.
Siscera could not give the child a proper name, being his adoptive guardian, and so simply called the boy 'junior' so as to prevent the others from degrading him as an 'it'.
This did not do much to stop the other villagers however. While the water Manu did her best to raise the child away from the cruel gazes of the villagers, it was inevitable that as he grew he would encounter other Manu, and learn of the hatred they had for him and his state. He was but a young child when he first learned of how the villagers despised him, but it wasn't until he was eight that he was told of how he came to be. Siscera had sheltered him from the truth of his birth and planed to tell him only when he was old enough to handle the news, but a bitter Manu who still grieved the death of junior's mother cornered and beat the child one day when he was found alone, blaming him for her death the whole time.
He was made to walk home covered in bruises and cuts and Siscera was forced to explain to him all that had happened when she tended his wounds, Including of course the revelation that she was not his real mother.
After that, Junior retreated within himself and, despite Siscera's best efforts, began to share the villagers' opinion on his existence. She refused to let him out of her sight after the incident, fearing another bating or worse, but that did not deafen his ears to the hateful curses and whispers of his tribesmen. He came to grow like a living shadow, always at Siscera's heels, never saying a word in public and only speaking to her while in private.
The villagers came to talk of him as if he was the shadow of death and so 'Grimm' became one of the common euphemisms used to refer to him in conversation along with 'cursed' and 'willess'. Junior saw it as fitting, considering himself responsible for his mother's death, and eventually began using it to refer to himself as if it were his true name, all of this to Siscera's heartbreaking chagrin.
From that point onward, nothing great can be said about Grimm's life. Every day was simply more of the sane, living with Siscera, doing his best to not give up on his own self, if only for Siscera's sake. It was living for the sake of surviving and little else, or at least it felt as much to him.
The quiet monotony, and what semblance of peace it brought to Grimm's life, was shattered when he was twelve. The same Manu who beat him before broke into his and Siscera's home By this point he had already been revealed to be an old lover of his mother's who had never gotten over her, and it seemed that he had resented Grimm's existence from the moment he was conceived. The incident at his birth simply gave him what he thought was justification for his hatred.
Litris, as the Manu was called, had gotten himself into a drunken stupor and decided to take out his pent up frustration onto the boy and his protector. Having forcefully broken into their home in the middle of the night, he attacked the two as they came to investigate the disturbance.
Siscera, however, was an old and powerful Manu in her own right, and immediately defended herself. Yet still, she was eventually overpowered, she had been taken by surprise after all, and Litris' bondage to the lightning element gave him a distinct advantage over her water-based craft. A bolt of electricity caught the woman off guard after a short bout, catching her in the chest, resulting in her being thrown to the far wall and knocked unconscious.
Grimm had watched the whole exchange terrified, incapable of doing anything to help his aunt and adoptive mother. When she was knocked out he cried out for her, but wasn't given much time to worry about her before being himself assaulted by one of Litris' bolts. With grimm's protector out of the way, the resentful Manu was ready to carry out his revenge. He probably could have killed the child in one blow, but his cold hatred fueled by his drunken state birthed in him a desire to see the child suffer before he was disposed of.
He sent shock after shock into the boy, careful to keep each dose just under lethal levels. Grimm had never felt so much pain, and in between shocking, he couldn't help but keep looking over at the motionless body of his guardian who had tried to protect him. Siscera, who had been so kind to him all his life. Siscera, who had protected and loved him despite his state as an abomination. Siscera... who that man had hurt so much...
It was after the fourth or so shock, but something flipped inside Grimm. The paralyzing fear suddenly vanished. The repeated attacks had triggered his fight or flight instincts, and escape was impossible.
For the first time in his life, Grimm was angry, Grimm was furious. The rage overcame him, and his mind focused entirely on the fact that Litris had hurt Siscera, and how angry that made Grimm.
Litris was about to deliver his finishing blow, but as he launched the dazzling blue bolt of lightning at Grimm, the young boy held out his hand and copied the technique Litris used to gather ambient electricity, absorbing the bolt into himself. He glared furiously at Litris, sub-consciously sucking out all of the electricity surrounding him by continuously using litris's draining technique. Litris, further enraged by this, generated more attacks by drawing on his own bioelectricity, but all were completely absorbed by Grimm. When the young boy felt that he could contain neither his anger or his lightning any longer, he gave a mighty yell and discharged all his gathered electricity into a single azure bolt as he'd seen Litris do to Siscera earlier. The result was a burst of lightning so great it sent even Litris crashing through the house's wall and into the street outside.
Grimm wasted no time starting to gather electricity again afterwards, and would have gone after Litris to make sure the job was done if Siscerra's voice hadn't snapped him out of his blind fury. The woman had thankfully not suffered fatal damage from Litris' attack, as the incredibly pure water she used while fighting had partially insulated her to the final blow.
She came back to consiousness just in time to see Grimm fire off the massive lightning bolt and stood in bewilderment at how a child not blessed by the elements had returned Litris' own attack on him. Grimm, however, simply ran to her and hugged her tightly, sobbing at his relief in seeing she was not dead.
As can be expected though, no single bolt of lightning is enough to take down a lightning Manu, and Litris soon made his appearance in the archway of the very hole he'd been blasted through, ragged and hurt, but more furious than ever.
He charged up another attack, intent on frying the boy and his guardian alive this time. Siscerra reacted and tried to erect a barrier to protect them, but the wound she'd suffered had left her too weakened and her magic failed her. Realizing that his guardian was about to get hurt again, Grimm reacted on instinct and copied her barrier magic, raising a wall of water just in time to block the coming lightning bolt.
Even in his drunken state, this froze Litris in his tracks. A Manu being born without a blessing was unheard of, but a Manu somehow controlling two separate elements at once? That was outright inconceivable.
While Litris was distracted by his moment of surprise, Grimm copied one of Siscera's earlier attacks and converted the water wall into a floating sphere in front of his palm from which a powerful jet of water erupted and blasted Litris out into the street again, knocking him out for good this time.
Siscera could not understand what had happened to the boy she had raised so long but she knew one thing for certain. Protecting him was now completely out of her powers. The villagers would have been roused by the sounds of the battle, and she was certain the only reason no one had intervened yet was because many secretly wanted Junior dead as well. Many already called him a demon, and now that Litris had been taken out, they would come to investigate. If they discovered what Grimm had done, nothing she would do would spare Grimm their fury.
She knew what had to be done. Using her powers to manipulate the water in her own body, Siscera willed herself to move despite her injury and took Grimm by the hand, taking him out of the house and running away with him, fleeing into the darkness.
She took Grimm away from the village and moved north under the cover of night. She didn't say a word to the boy until the village was already well out of sight. The silence was only broken when she ran out of strength to keep pushing herself forward and collapsed. Forced to rest and regenerate, Siscera explained what was happening to Grimm.
She told him how he could never live in the village again now, how it wasn't safe for him anymore. She told him she was taking him far away from the village. Somewhere he would be safe and left to live in peace. Somewhere where he could begin his own journey and seek out his own Will.
Grimm didn't fully understand, but he didn't care either. He simply nodded and did as she asked. As long as he was with Siscera, nothing else mattered to him.
The two made their way north over the next few days until they eventually came to Eureka's doorstep. There, Siscera revealed to Grimm one last painful truth. She would not be able to accompany him any further. She had enrolled him in as a student, but she could be neither student or staff at the school, and needed to return to the village to ensure none came after the boy with a vengeance. Grimm did not want to be separated from his caretaker. She had been the only person to show him love his entire life. However, he knew that she had been hurt because she protected him. If he hadn't been around, Litris would never have attacked her. He felt she would be better off without him, and so he didn't make any complaints when she told him how things would be.
Tearfully, Siscera made her goodbyes with the boy, promising him he wold be safe here, and making him promise her that he would look for his Will while attending Eureka.
It has been two years since then, and Grimm has not heard a word from Siscera or any of the Elemental Guardians since. He lives in the school like a ghost, rarely talking to anyone, never getting involved in anyone else's business, completing all of his assignments dutifully so as to not disappoint his caretaker, even if some days he thinks she probably abandoned him here in order to protect herself. Every day he searches for his Will because of his promise with her. That promise has at times been all that pulled him out of bed on days when he truly felt he probably had no Will at all.
Other: Theme Song
