Life was good.

He held up the glass of whiskey to the light, admiring the lovely shades of the vintage. The bottle cost the same as a farmer would earn in a year, and he was already on his third glass. The book in his lap was a leather bound first edition that chronicled the life on an ancient known as Shadryn and on the open market would go for the same price as a small mansion. His silk shirt, his leather boots in silver inlay, his stylishly cut trousers, his lavishly etched swept hilt rapier, everything spoke of the money he spent with such a casual air. But he wasn't some brute with it, he had the taste that he could savour his extravagant trappings.

A psionic message whispered into his mind. "Tango protocol."

He issued a sigh. He longed for nothing more to sit and read all day and he considered ignoring it. Unfortunately, the money he spent, the clothes he wore, even the bed he slept in did not belong to him, but to his guardian, a gruff brute with no airs or graces to speak of but surprisingly wielded his business empire with the same delicate mastery he did a blade. Whilst Athan had no idea who his parents were, his guardian knew and constantly had him training to fight or running these stupid emergency drills making sure he had all twentysix protocols memorised should anything happen. He hated it but they must be tolerated until he found out who his parents were or at least got some financial independence. With a second sigh, he scooped up his rapier from beside his seat, ruffled his curly red locks with his hand and stood up.

The house lurched, and he instantly steadied himself against the chair.

 It was about 11am, maybe he shouldn't have started on the whiskey so early. Or perhaps he should have had breakfast first he mused,as he strapped the rapier to his waist. He glimpsed his reflection in the mirror, and winked at the fine man who was staring back at him. His stylish curls resting above such piercing emerald eyes, the strong jawline and cheeky lopsided grin. under the shirt the slender lines of muscle showed - whilst he favoured artful laziness, his guardian still pushed him hard enough with rapier practice that he maintained a trim figure, a fact he'd appreciated more once he was old enough to start taking notice of women.

The house lurched again and faint crash echoed. A second psionic message reached him, hitting him like a sledgehammer. "MOVE!

His mouth suddenly went dry. It had to be some new type of drill his guardian was running. Some new test. That had to be it. Tango protocol was to go down the seond stairwell, through the office,across the grand hall to the waiting room then into a hidden passage under the table, through some tunnels that emerged by a little raft. He took off, taking the carpetted stairs as fast as he could without making any noise. As he entered the office he heard a commotion getting nearer, and he picked up his pace, pushing open the office door and gazing carefully about the great hall, and taking a step into it.

 The entrance doors smashed open, and his brain struggled to interpret what he saw. Marilith. They were a six armed reptilian demon, master swordfighters in lifeand even greater in death. Even master swordsmen feared to face them, for they were truly formidable. Even with his natural skill and training with the rapier, he'd be hard pressed to survive over a minute in open combat with one.

His guardian was fighting four of them. And smoking a cigar.

"Get out of here you arrogant shit!" he bellowed, his five foot blade dancing an elderitch blur as he twisted and span through a dozen masterful parries before flicking a cut onto the jawbone of one of his foes, millimetres away from it's throat.

He got the message. Athan turned and ran, straight back through the office, turning left onto the servant entrance and speeding down the narrow corridor. The fourth door looked more solid than the others, and he pulled it open then locked himself inside. Gasping for breath, he paused and took in his surroundings. It was a cleaning closet. Brooms, dustpan and brushes, buckets, mops and other cleaning utensils he had no idea what purpose they served.He paused to consider what the hell was going on. Demons attacking. What. The. Fuck. Seriously, what? And his guardian, fighting them on his own like it was just another day in the office. Athan had read books were men had struggled to hold them off whilst others used banishing spells to get rid of one Marilith, whilst his guardian could fight four of them? He honestly looked like he was winning too, before he'd shouted abuse at Athan.

He'd got the message. Arrogant shit - exit compromised. Use emergency route. Don't wait for me.

He reached into the back of the alcove, pulling out a crystal, and it suddenly occured to him how ever time his guardian had barked a command he'd followed it to the letter. A voice said he should turn back, use the crystal once he'd got back to his guardian and they could escape safely together and he would thank him, owe him. He'd stop being so callous and distant, acknowledge him as his step son and not just his guardian and together they would take on the world.

And with a shake off his head, he rid himself of that fantasy and the last teenage impulses of a child. He was alone. He needed to act like a man. Uttered the words he had been taught, he activated the crystal jumped into the portal.

****

A chill breeze whispered the length of his arm. His fashionable boots sank into the soft mud as he started to look around, taking in the forest around him. In his hand, the ash of a burnt out crystal crumbled and fled upon the wind.

The spell hand been a randomised dimensional shift. The world he was abandoned in was completely different to his own and he couldn't even begin to comprehend it. He had seen forests of his own land in the training his guardian had given him, the lush, all consuming greenery of summer and bare, snow burdened limbs of winter. He had hunted wild boar for food and roasted its flesh over a fire to survive. But what he saw here was so alien in comparison. The leaves were a mixture of hues, the richness of gold to a deep red, and they seemed loose, dry, occasionally one would fall from the tree. Using the sleeve of his shirt, he picked a fallen leaf up, staring at the veins that seemed to run the length of it. He sniffed it experimentally, but couldn't detect anything that might be poisonous. Carefully, he touched it, only for it to crunch and crumble away from his caress.

Was this was tea leaves looked like in nature? The crumble did resemble the mix that he put in his tea at home, but he'd never wondered exactly where it originated. Did tea grow on these golden red trees?

His musing was interrupted by a light crunching noise of something approaching. With what little stealth he could muster, he leaned into a tree trunk, cautiously peering out to see what approached.

A creature, four legs. It was similar in shape to a horse, but far, far more slender. It appeared to be a far meaner beast with it's evil black eyes, and unlike the mean boars of home with their short nasty tusks, this beast grew them from the top of its skull, a pair of massive twisted morass of horn, similar to a tree's roots.

A stag, he thought he'd heard them referred to as. He knew nothing more of the horrific beast that lingered only metres away from him. Could he defeat it with a rapier? Did it have his scent? Would it hunt him mercilessly until he had him gored upon it's immense horns?He wished for the survival kit he'd always been given by his guardian on his trips, for the powerful crossbow he could defend himself at a distance with.

He just wished his guardian was here to protect him still. 

[OOC: Decent start for my first 3rd person post with this character. It should be enough to work with.]
 
Rarely does the human concept of nobility mix well with the savage visage of nature. Those born to wealth are prone to distance from the methods of production, and so, while they may familiarize themselves with the higher arts and the finesse of good business, they often learn little of what it means to truly survive. They are given their food by their servants, but to see them actually farm for that food day in, day out to experience how much work goes into obtaining and preparing it? Absurdity is the only word to describe such a scenario.
 
Yet that was exactly what happened to the Ataiyan native, Natsumi, when she fled Nisshoki. The transition had not been kind for a girl of her stature, and it certainly sculpted her personality into something less than expected of aristocracy. Her once fancy clothes had long since been torn, now reduced to thick, mundane pieces of cloth that only covered her bosom and hips. Scars littered her once flawless arms and legs, while calluses sat on her feet and hands as trophies to her tenacity. Even her hair was far from the presentable sheen and smooth contour expected of a noblewoman. She was, for all intents and purposes, no longer what people would expect of a fair maiden to be courted by men of stature, even if she still possessed her own, savage version of beauty.
 
Despite this change of appearance, the girl had survived her transition far better than other nobles might have. The animals and plants of the world had helped her tremendously, no doubt due to her unique nature.  It was them that had guided her away from patrols looking for the thief that had been stealing supplies from local merchants; them that had helped her find a way to Canelux so that she might nurse her wounds from her home continent. For the three months prior to the beginning of Venti, she had been living amongst the wilds in Virens Forest, gradually setting up camp and keeping a watchful eye on the portals that had recently been appearing in the sky.
 
It was on one particular afternoon after Natsumi's camp had neared completion that a dimensional shift occurred nearby. The event had spooked the birds, sending them up into a flurry and leaving behind a man in preposterously extravagant clothing. Whether or not this male with a poor sense of stealth and a severe lack of sense – as the ecologist quickly noted - came from the same source as the portals or another magical anomaly, Natsumi could not say at first; but simply by watching him fumble about in the presence of a stag through a spyglass, she could tell he was a nobleman's brat, through and through. She had seen many of his kind when her father entertained foreign dignitaries, and knew he was more a danger to himself than the stag was. Even so, the wannabe druid wanted to make sure an otherwise avoidable confrontation did not occur between animal and human. To that end, she left her perch near her campsite and bounded through the forest as quietly as she could until she was atop a tree branch almost directly over the ridiculously clashing gentleman. Spear in hand, she situated herself comfortably, and spoke softly.
 
"He's an herbivore," Natsumi said with a strained attempt to hide her Nisshokian accent. "So he won't attack you unless you act aggressively. Mating season just started with the beginning of Venti, and so there are alpha male stags scattered throughout this forest looking for herds of females. I think that one is more likely to scare females away with how obnoxious he's being, though. I've been hearing him yell obscenities from my camp for the past few hours before you arrived out of thin air. Lucky for you, you didn't end up like the last man to drop out of the ether. He landed in a viper nest instead of on the ground. Died nearly instantly from the amount of venom the serpents pumped into him."
 
 
  
 
 

His senses might not be honed to the environment, but his reflexes were second to none.

The moment he heard a voice he spun, lowering himself into a combat stance with rapier poised threateningly at the source of the noise. The source was a young woman, perched upon a branch above him, a spear in her hand but not ready for combat. Her tone was relaxed as she casually imparted knowledge. Her visage was astonishing, complex eyes, dressed in little more than rags that covered enough for modesty but not decency, showing a tantilising amount of bare skin, a lean body traced with scars where she had been caressed by the savage world she lived in. Still, he'd be stupid to trust her simply because she was beautiful. That fact didn't stop him from ruffling his hair to ensure it was at it's best.

He leaned his head back, taking a cautious look at the stag. It had lowered its head, casually cropping the grass to help prove the lady's point. Sarcastic god damn animal. Why couldn't it have done that earlier so he didn't look such a fool? He sheathed his rapier and turned his attention to the woman once more.

"Perhaps I should try and teach it some better techniques. Being obnoxious is no way to win a lady, thats for sure. My name's Athan. Who might you be, high lady of the forest?" He sketched a brief bow, more an incline of his head than anything else,flashing a cheeky grin of pearly white teeth with the confidence of a man who had spent his life getting exactly what he wanted. "Whilst I may be lucky to to have not landed in the nest, there's still time for me to end in one. Where am I? I don't even think I'm in the same world any more. For one, in my land the forests are the colour of emeralds, not rubies. My guardian made me endure basic survival lessons in them, starting fires, hunting boar, enough to make it back to civilization."

He took a brief glance around the floor, then started eying up the branches. Selecting one big enough, he jumped and grasped it, pulling himself up with a harsh grunt of effort before balancing on it opposite the highborn of the Crimson forest. His arms ached dully from the effort, but endless hours of rapier training and dance lessons made balancing up here well within his ability. I take it the first step to avoiding vipers is to not stand upon the forest floor. What other dangers should I beware, Milady? 

Often times, it is one thing to expect the threat of violence and another to experience it. Although Natsumi had ensured she was far enough away from the young gentleman that she could avoid a strike with plenty of leeway if one came, the memories of her brutal encounter with a group of hunters just three months ago was still fresh enough in her mind to cause her to flinch when the man faced her in a combat stance. In that rapier's blade, the young woman saw the glint of an arrowhead being aimed at her face once more. It was a mild episode of PTSD, made only worse by Miss Yamauchi's past experiences with noblemen. Simply for being what he was, Athan made her nervous.
 
Thankfully, the man quickly sheathed his weapon and did not attack when it became clear to him that Natsumi had no intention of attacking. The young woman's fears were allayed far more by that turn of events than her visitor's manner of speech, enough that she was able to stop using her bare hand to crush the tree branch she was on.
 
"Since you can't actually speak to him, he might think you're challenging his dominance. Not the thing to do for any alpha male, as you seem capable of recognizing." The young woman's accent slipped out in full during her retort to Athan's suggestion, a result brought about by her slightly lowered guard. Since it was clear that this man was likely an outsider unfamiliar with Parvpora, she suspected it was safe enough to risk revealing her ethnicity – at least for the moment. "As for me, Athan, I'm no high lady of the forest. I suspect my background is similar to yours. I simply chose a different path instead of that destined for women born into a high level of privilege. You may call me Natsumi, as that's the only name I go by in these woods. Surnames have no meaning here."
 
After the exchange of introductions, the young man below Natsumi revealed something of the portals she had suspected all along but never confirmed.
 
"You truly are from another world in order for you to not recognize the largest forest in Canelux or what the season Venti looks like." Pausing briefly in her musings, the ecologist whistled loudly to summon her companion falcon from her – relatively – nearby camp. He heard the call easily and came to Natsumi's side with very little delay. Lunch was still in his mouth: a freshly caught, dead rodent.
 
'What is it, Natsumi?' spoke Rauru in a series of squawks after swallowing his meal.
 
'I need you to bring my map from the camp.' Miss Yamauchi responded in a similar language to Rauru's vocalization: something that beasts could understand but normal humans could not. The falcon cautiously looked down at Athan following her request, but eventually followed through. He left and returned with the map in talon. Then, after placing the rolled up manuscript into Natsumi's hands, he departed with a reassurance.
 
'I'll be watching in case anything goes wrong.' In truth, Gaston, the mole, was probably also watching from somewhere right about now. Alone, the girl was only so strong. Her true strength came from her allies in the forest. That knowledge did give her some comfort, even if she was still uneasy enough around Athan to jump to a higher branch once he climbed up to get closer.
 
"So long as you have boots and watch where you step, the ground is fine and less tiresome to travel on." Natsumi began speaking in the common tongue once more: a language that was somehow similar to the outworlder's native tongue. "If you're truly from another world, this map might help. The markers are written in this land's common language that appears similar to your own, so you should be able to understand it. A labeled picture is worth a thousand words, in this case."
 
Because she didn't want to actually give Athan her map so as to avoid a situation in which she would have to get close to him in order to retrieve it, Natsumi unfurled the parchment for him to read from a distance. They were close enough that the larger labels would be visible, but smaller landmarks like mountain names would be near impossible to read without having vision on par with Rauru's. "Revaliir" was emblazoned at the top of the cartographic item along with the continent names and the previous owner's initials. The brunette had acquired the piece from an abandoned campsite she found in the forest, but the speck of blood in the upper right corner might have suggested she stole it instead.
 
"Your current location is the forest next to the mountain range in the south of the continent on the left side of the map. Its human name is Virens Forest. As for the trees, we're now entering the colder months when most trees start losing their leaves and go dormant. Had you arrived a few months earlier, the forests would have been green."