🌑 Cordelia Nejem 🌑

the moonless mercenary

🗡️ 🎭 🐈‍⬛ 🌆 🌑 🌆 🐈‍⬛ 🎭 🗡️

🎵 ~ A life spent soaked in the muddy river
Isn't so bad if it's over after one round ~ 🎶

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🌆 basics 🌆

• name: Cordelia Nejem
• species: Therianthrope
  • ethnicity: African / Arab?
  • variant: Ailuranthrope (African leopard)
• birthday: November 20?
• age: 229?
• gender: Trans woman
• pronouns: She / her
• orientation: Biromantic gray-asexual
• profession(s):
  • Retired mercenary
  • Bouncer at a metal club

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🐈‍⬛ appearance 🐈‍⬛

• skin: Medium brown w/ neutral undertones
• hair: Rich, dark brown; wavy and curly; falls to her shoulder blades; gray at the temples
• eyes: Golden yellow
• height: 5’ 6” / 168 cm
• build: Muscular and heavyset; think “strongman”
• other characteristics:
  • Slitted pupils
  • Pronounced canines
  • Geometric tattoo down middle of back
  • Scroll tattoo reading “ Veni, vidi, vici” on left forearm
  • Various scars all over body, including a lightning strike scar on left side of torso

her shifted appearance is the same as above, except…

• fur: Pitch black
• height: 5’ 10” / 178 cm
• other characteristics...
  • Gains a more cat-like appearance (muzzle, claws, toe beans, etc.)
  • All scars and tattoos hidden under fur
  • Rosettes can be seen in fur in the right light

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🎭 personality 🎭

• alignment: Chaotic Neutral
• enneagram: 3w4, sexual variant
• jung / mbti: ENTP-A
• sloan: SCOEI (primarily Egocentric)
• temperament: Choleric / Melancholic
• zodiac: Scorpio? (w/ Sagittarius cusp)?
• positive traits: Charismatic, independent, resourceful
• neutral traits: Assertive, opportunistic, sarcastic
• negative traits: Cynical, pessimistic, vindictive

With her gift of the gab and her charming exterior, Cordelia has amassed plenty of friends. She has a sharp, snarky, witty tongue and can weave her way through conversations with ease. What most don't know, however, is that this social butterfly persona is mostly a mask. Cordelia expects the worst out of everyone and thinks very little of people as a whole. She is exceedingly resourceful and adept at manipulating others, and always seeks to have the upper hand. She also sees no problem lashing out if she feels she's been wronged. Cordelia seems to realize that while these traits saved her life while on the road, they're dragging her down now that she's settled, and actively tries to rein them in.

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🗡️ trivia 🗡️

favorites

• books: Thrillers, travel guides, true crime
• drink(s): Coffee taken black, very strong whiskey
• food(s): Meat lover's pizza, Angus steak done rare
• fashion style: Punk biker; grunge; dark palettes, leather, torn jeans, belts, and calf-high boots
• movies / tv: Horror, indie films, drama
• music: Classic rock, metal, folk rock
• hobbies: Geocaching, painting, parkour, woodcarving
• interests: Astronomy, astrology, traveling
• other likes: Long driving trips, horror games, motorcycles, nature hikes, rock music
• dislikes: Boredom, disloyalty, isolation, small spaces, storms

symbols

• animal: Panthera pardus pardus
• colors: Midnight blue, jet black, deep violet
• elements: Moon, Water, Metal
• flower / plant: Nymphaea lotus
• major arcana: The Moon
• mineral: Amethyst
• playing card: King of Hearts?
• scents: Coffee beans, paints
• sin | virtue: Wrath | Diligence

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🌆 stats 🌆

strength	⚫⚫⚫⚫⚪
agility	⚫⚫⚫⚫⚫
dexterity	⚫⚫⚫⚫⚪
constitution	⚫⚫⚫⚪⚪
intelligence	⚫⚫⚫⚪⚪
wisdom	⚫⚫⚫⚫⚪
willpower	⚫⚫⚫⚫⚫
charisma	⚫⚫⚫⚫⚪
magic	⚫⚪⚪⚪⚪
luck	⚫⚫⚫⚪⚪

powers

• Infinite Forge (Astral Manipulation) — Signature power. Most therians have a heightened connection to the Astral Realm, and some are able to cultivate this connection to gain psychic powers. Cordelia has instead turned her connection outward, and uses the realm's infinite potential to create any item she wants, as long as the item can be held in her hands. She has mostly made swords, daggers, and other bladed weapons, but she has since learned to create more harmless stuff, like hair pins and art supplies. The items usually last a few hours or until Cordelia de-summons them, but she can theoretically pour enough power into an item that it stays in the corporeal world permanently.
• Transformation — All therianthropes have access to an animal-based form, and they take on this form during the moon phase they were born / turned under. Cordelia takes the form of a bipedal melanistic African leopard under the new moon, and it gives her access to the rest of the standard therian powers — heightened senses, regeneration, enhanced strength — as well as a severe intolerance to silver.

inventory

• Assorted rings — Gathered on her travels. All are polished to perfection. Increases magic.
• Gold bracelets — Specially made. These simple metal bands hum with energy. Greatly increases magic and increases luck.
• Silver-infused piercings — Small, shiny studs that make transformations easier to handle. A must-have for any therianthrope. Increases constitution and willpower.
• Simple choker — A length of black string, tied to a coin with a hole in the middle and worn around the neck. Slightly increases luck.
• Simple necklace — A chunk of amethyst hanging on a thick black cord. Increases intelligence, wisdom, willpower, and charisma

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🐈‍⬛ history 🐈‍⬛

The being that would be known as Cordelia Nejem had a disorienting start to her existence. Her earliest memories are marred and muddled under a haze of pain and hunger, and she would not be able to tell you of her life before.

Her first clear memory is waking in a tent, swaddled in several blankets, and a man standing by with a warm plate of food. The man introduced himself as Felix Valentus, leader of a group of mercenaries, fresh off of finishing a job. After letting Cordelia eat her fill, he made her an offer. Stay with him and his group for a while, have some food and semblance of shelter, maybe learn a few skills from them, and if at any time she wanted to bail, they’d let her go in the next town, no questions asked. As Cordelia had nowhere else to go, she hesitantly accepted and became part of the group.

At first, she was just the decoy, distracting guards from their duties so the party could sneak in. However, she soon proved to be invaluable, with her penchant for sneaking and her keen eye for traps, and it wasn’t too long before she became a proper member of the party. It was far from ideal, but Cordelia grew a strange sort of content with her new life.

That was turned on its head with the arrival of the Peacekeepers. A vicious, militarized cult of the fallen deity The Exiled One, they were determined to finish their deity’s work of "purifying" the land, razing community after community to the ground, only sparing their fresh converts from their onslaught. The group took a job that resulted in the death of a high-ranking Peacekeeper, and unknowingly sealed their fate in the process.

The Peacekeepers’ revenge was swift and brutal, ambushing the group in broad daylight. With the cult’s eldritch powers and sheer numbers, the mercenaries had no chance. Cordelia and another mercenary, Chae, barely escaped with their lives as the rest succumbed to the Peacekeepers’ onslaught.

Knowing the cult would be out to complete their revenge, Cordelia and Chae kept their heads down while they plotted their own. Partnering with another group determined to bring the Peacekeepers down, they wore down the cult member by member, hideout by hideout until they came face to face with the cult’s elders. The elders’ powers had been weakened significantly by the group’s efforts, and Cordelia and Chae made quick work of them.

With their vengeance complete and the Peacekeepers’ infrastructure crumbling, the two parted ways with the group and each other, with Chae dropping off the map soon afterward. Cordelia remained in the area, selling herself as a hired blade while stomping out any remnants of the Peacekeepers she came across in her downtime. This continued for a few years until Chae contacted her out of the blue one day, inviting Cordelia to join her in the city of Zeniiith. Cordelia takes Chae up on her offer, but a combination of several snafus had her settling in Vivariiium instead.

Now working as a humble bouncer, Cordelia considers her past dead and buried. She puts in an honest day’s work, keeps her nose clean, and tries her best to stop looking over her shoulder.

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🎭 relationships 🎭

	Choi Chae-Hwan ★★★★★ Best friends; "sibs from different cribs". The other survivor from the ambush. They were each other's right-hand man while on the road. It's been ages since they've seen each other, though, and Cordelia misses her dearly.
	Keyshia Fields ★★★★★ Soulmate. Cordelia's mark filled in the moment she heard her voice. Now if the woman would stop trying to dodge her, they could talk... Friend, queerplatonic partner (eventually). Well whaddayaknow, once you actually get her to open up, Keyshia's a fucking delight. She's witter than she appears and sharp as a tack, and she as an admirable work ethic. There's also this little furrow she gets between her brows when she's thinking aaaaaaand you're falling for her, aren't you.
	Sterling Wishchaser ★★★☆☆ Charge. Cordelia's looking after them as payment for an old favor. She takes frequent trips out of town to check up on them.

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🗡️ miscellaneous 🗡️

• Her Pinterest board, for the curious.
• Cordelia often stays up all night playing horror games.
• She attempted to find out what happened any potential therian clan she was supposed to belong to, but came up empty.
• Cordelia has adopted several cats, most of which have some physical ailment or defect.
• Cordelia has various journals she kept during her adventuring days. Chae encourages her to publish them like she did, but Cordelia's still on the fence.
  • Also unlike Chae, who advertises her "historic adventurer" status every chance she gets, Cordelia keeps her identity and role in taking down the Peacekeepers private. She values her privacy far too much to deliberately put herself in the spotlight.
• Even decades after hanging up her adventuring gear, she still feels a potent rush of excitement and adrenaline when knocking out rowdy drunks. It's... kinda worrying.
• Cordelia can not cook. Like, literally unable to cook — there is some anomaly in her magic that makes her fuck it up whenever she tries. If she tries to boil water, it catches fire within seconds. If she holds ingredients, they will go bad in her hands.
• Cordelia did not know much about queerness until she settled in the city, so when transforming brought out her dysphoria in full force and caused her extreme distress, she didn't recognize it for what it was and just figured "welp, just one more reason to Never Transform, Ever", causing herself a lot of pain and health problems in the process. Once she started meeting other shifters, she started feeling bitter and resentful of them (especially other animal shifters) that liked or enjoyed their other forms. And since there really wasn't anyone she could talk her feelings out with, that resentment festered and lasted for a long time. It was only when she was able to go "wait, I'm what now?" that she found some sort of peace with it.