Jaime Synge/Book of Mirrors
From Unofficial Handbook of the Virtue Universe
Main Article: Jaime Synge
Jaime Synge's Book of Mirrors is an account of his In-Character, In-Game History and exploits. It is not a literal book and is closer to a journal or diary in-game than is represented here. A Book of Mirrors is a personal journal kept in some wiccan traditions and is a collection of opinions, feelings, reactions, and thoughts on magical and mundane events in the witch's life. Possessing this item in-game would not likely provide much literal magical power, although it would prove an interesting insight into Synge's psychology and perspectives.
The following is not a literal transcription of the contents of the Book of Mirrors, but is a summary of some of the events described within.
Contents |
Out of the Crucible and Into the Forge
Synge was released on to the streets of the Rogue Isles in Fall of 2007, emerging from the Arachnos Flyer and introduced coarsely to the Fortunata Kalinda - who was ill impressed by him. Nonetheless, the magician managed to complete the tasks required of him and was shuffled on through the system to further his career.
Within a few days of his arrival, he became aware of a refuge for magical beings and practitioners which offered shelter with no questions asked. He was hesitant to take such an offer without some scrutiny, having had a long history of similar invitations being bait for trapping him or his kind. However, after a conversation with one of their recruiters (and the knowledge that rainy fall would quickly turn to freezing winter), Synge set aside his reservations and accepted refuge within the Daemon Consortium.
His integration within the Consortium would be ever-tumultuous; partially as Synge's magickal training had never taught him how to co-habitate with beings and beasts of legend, and further exacerbated by his acerbic and abrasive personality. His antics quickly became something of an embarrassing cabaret; his actions alternately or compoundedly boorish, loud, rude, confrontational, seemingly witless, persistently insubordinate, and occasionally violent. Within a few hours of having been introduced to the Consortium members, he was mesmerized by a nearby daemon into spouting only gibberish, and initiated a continuing feud with a senior member of the Consortium.
His friendships were few and haphazard. He gradually warmed to the ever-present guardian thrall-demons of the Consortium, along with an escaped, restrained Succubus who held a respected position in the Hostel. These, along with some fleeting camaraderie with the floating residency of the Hostel, were the only figures in Synge's life in the Rogue Isles who had any tolerance or sympathy for his reckless behavior and unstable emotional outbursts.
Late fall and the change of the seasons brough further turmoil to Synge's life. Having broken from the pack of novice villains, Synge found himself increasingly confident in his abilities and more frequently chastised by the senior members of the Hostel. Upon Auriana's assumption of power at the Hostel during the Samhain season, Synge remained one of the few voices of protest against what he saw as a crude grab for power over the quiet dealings of the group. The emnity between himself and the Hostel's leader brought itself to a head shortly afterward, leaving Synge severely injured and cowed by his complete inability to defend himself.
Life went on, however, allowing Synge to bury his humiliation in a series of mundane capers and meager successes among the criminal element of the Isles. Desiring to strain and perhaps break the bonds placed on him by the Legacy Chain, Synge sought the advice and help of the Mu archmage Tarixus. While the ritual described by the Archmage was almost completely useless to him as mere hedge magic, the focal elements were powerful enough to allow Synge to partially reignite the Ember of power with his Radiant soul. Unfortunately, this also partially unchained many of Synge's suppressed Soul Echoes, aspects of his former incarnations and splinter-personalities the magician carried with him. The expression of these mocking and violent Soul Echoes threatened and attacked Hellfire Rose, one of Synge's few allies. Rose's bound guardian, the thrall Ahlai, instinctively lashed back at Synge with the full force of her might. The result blasted the Radiant mystic's body, very nearly killing him. The attack, timed as it was so close to the event of his aura's manifestation, had the additional effect of shattering the bonds on Synge's Soul Echoes and sending them careening across the Rogue Isles. Physical and ghostly apparitions of these Echoes plagued the Consortium and its members for several weeks. At this time, only a few remain at large.
To Thwart a Darkling God
In a bout of supreme foolishness, Synge wagered with several members of the Consortium that he could single-handedly defeat the hero Infernal in direct combat. Synge took offense to the fact that his offers to join forces with the demonic and magical creatures within the Hostel in order to topple the Hero (who had bound and subjugated their kind repeatedly) were rebuffed with what he felt was mockery. After repeated demonstrations that he was simply not up to the task, the spectating members of the Hostel stepped in and assisted with the task.
The sting of this defeat continued to linger within Synge. Recently, he got his chance for revenge when he joined a small group of villains performing a task for an obscure mystic. With the hero manipulated into battling an ancient demon, Synge was able to delay his attack until the hero sufficiently worn down. Once defeated, Synge took a small chunk of volanic rock from the hero's person, a rock which radiated a faint, muddled mystical energy He considered it a souvenir of the victory, despite its tainted challenge.
The rock, however, turned out to be related to the history of none other than his fellow comrade, Luciana Darkbloom. Having disappeared from the hostel months before, her sudden reappearance jump-started a series of events Synge continues to struggle with. The rock, and the soul-stone within it, became the focus of interest for several entities, including Luciana's brother Zilvas & her husband Ekali. Uncertain how the stone is connected to Luciana and whether it promised her restoration or her destruction, Synge locked it away in a safe place until he could determine a use for it.
Unfortunately, as with so many things in Synge's life, his plans did not go as expected. Conflicts began to arise in relation to Luciana's fate and with the stability of her corporeal form (to say nothing of her spiritual essence), and Synge was hard pressed to continue withholding the stone despite his mistrust of those who sought it. Finally confronted with the desperation of Luciana's condition, Synge attempted to intervene and potentially accelerated her decay. He was left with little choice but to deliver the stone into the hands of more competent beings. Following this, Luciana recovered somewhat, although Synge remains uncertain to what degree she was successful in recovering her individuality.
Jaime had little time to contemplate this issue, as the Consortium drew the attention of the extradimensional entity known as Crake. An allegedly all-powerful creature hailing from Luciana's home plane, Crake dispatched two powerful agents to track down its errant assassin and to crush any source of resistance. Synge, being one of the few humans on the Prime Material Plane who had even passingly heard of Crake (from Luciana) became a target for the two agents. The encounter nearly resulted in Synge's death and left him temporarily maimed while he cowered for shelter in Port Oakes. The Consortium had its own difficulties as Crake's Agents inflitrated the Hostel and abducted Luciana and Crake's young daughter, Vivyenne. The spurred the leaders of the Hostel to breach Crake's realm in search of the child-daemon.
Synge was left behind and eventually found himself researching the rituals necessary to breach the dimensions, in order to form an independent strike team. When Ekali returned sooner than expected with his daughter (essentially) intact, the "Old Man" surprised Synge by supporting his efforts. After a long period of research and experimenting, Synge forged a bridge between the two worlds; allowing Ekali's strike force to invade Crake's dimension and pursue whatever justice the daemon saw fit to render.
Since that time, the Hostel has remained largely empty - its purpose perhaps drained by the efforts of its leadership to pursue new, more ambitious goals.
The Call of The Wyrd
Following the winnowing of the Consortium, Jaime continued to pursue whatever minor jobs and goals that could provide some income and safety in notoriety. This eventually brought him to the attention of Scirocco and the elders of the Mu, who finally accepted his bid to join their faction. Synge figured it was better to follow a man who at least remembered the Light rather than those who had never seen it to begin with. The warlock perhaps reminded the Lieutenant of the younger Imad - a naive wanderer undermined by the fickle circumstances of fate. This, along with his respectable magical knowledge, warmed the Archvillain to the Warlock - despite the grumbling of the Mu Guardians who found the gutterpunk too debased to be allowed access to their secrets.
Despite Scirocco's orders, the Mu were unable to break the mystical bindings restraining the majority of Synge's talents. The weeks of experimentation and grueling rituals strained the limits of Jaime's endurance, both mental and physical. With these limitations in place, Scirocco could not tutor Synge in the enchantments he normally bestowed upon his chosen. This was of little surprise to Jaime in any case, having doubted that mere ritual enchantment would actually weld to his dynamic ember as one of the Radiant. Still, the punk warlock felt that the answer must reside in some uncovered corner of the Mu Archives, and continued to search for a release from his magical shackles. This eventually led him to the fabled Malleus Mundi, and into conflict with his Patron Lieutenant, who sought to re-write the planet in to a more ideal form. Sensing this for a disaster of cosmic proportions, Synge opposed Scirocco in combat over the tome. Imad slyly tempted him with a vision of an idealized world, free of suffering and evil, as well as the full restoration of Synge's powers. The offer shook Synge's resolve for a moment, but the Wyrd would not be subverted so easily. Synge does not precisely recall what happened next, but when he awoke to himself, the Desert Wind had been defeated and the Malleus Mundi was quickly falling back into the shrouds of mystical obscurity which had kept it safe for so long. Despite losing a once-in-a-lifetime chance to retroactively alter his own destiny, Synge has since concluded that Scirocco's plan was philosophically flawed as it had discounted individual choice and the primacy of will.
Eventually, Synge found assistance with his troubles from an unexpected source. Spending an unremarkable afternoon in the courtyard of the Aeon University drinking and trying to score some weed, Synge was surprised to find that an attractive girl was willingly approaching him. Even more surprising was her use of a hand signal he recognized as belonging to a member of the White Hall. Synge leapt at this chance to reintegrate with the White Hall, but found that the girl did not actually represent that group but the Midnight Squad instead. After a few brief discussions and demonstrations of his sincerity, Synge was admitted to the halls of the Midnight Club. Now with an entirely new avenue of investigation open to him, Jaime renewed his efforts to shatter the chains restraining his development.
Curiously, even before he was urged by the Midnight Squad to travel to the ancient locale, Synge had been feeling an irresistable compulsion to visit the colony of Cimerora. Something in the Wyrd called to him...
The Fifty-Million Dollar Punk
Following a disastrous confrontation between Inevitable Revolution leader Run Riot and one of his subordinates, the entire submarine base of IE was dislodged and brought to the surface of the Rogue Isles - in the middle of St. Martial. Arachnos pounced at the chance to cripple the revolutionary dissident force, ultimately resulting in a Grand Guignol-style triple-threat brawl between IE, Arachnos, and Longbow (who intervened to stem the civilian casualities as well as to apprehend IE's notorious operatives). Due to the prior damage and the continuing battle, the base's reactors had reached critical failure and a catastrophic explosion was imminent. With time running out and options winnowing down to extreme long-shots, Team Kill expended a vast amount of power shunting the IE base into another dimension in order to prevent a cataclysm of staggering proportions. This left IE with a problem: from where would they continue to operate?
Fortunately, IE had a small reserve bunker in subterrean Cap Au Diable. This smaller, less sophisticated, but still operational base had not been accessed since the revolutionary group had "acquired" their submarine facility. Unfortunately, the base had not remained empty the whole time. Indeed, it was clear to the members of IE that someone had broken into the base and was squatting the facility. Oh, and then that same infiltrator took out a classified ad to sell the bunker. Truly, such a masterstroke of jackassery could not be ignored.
