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 Posted: Wed May 19, 2010 5:15 pm
Zainire"Bohemien, bohemien, qui peut dire ou je serai demain?
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Posted: Wed May 19, 2010 5:17 pm
Biography  Name: Zainire (Zayn-EER-ay)Age: 24 Race: Mer [Gaia-Native] Family: Melchor [Father]; Yesenia [Mother]; Priama [Step-mother]; Matthias [Half-brother, Deceased]; Lienell and Afayana [Foster Parents] Description: The eldest son of King Melchor of Antium, Prince Zainire (as he will be known, thank you *wink!*) has a claim on the throne more solid than the Overseer's trident. Well... not quite. And, quite frankly, he couldn't care less! It's a long story, beginning with his birth. Zain is the illegitimate child, sired before marriage, of Melchor and a gypsy sorceress. Unacknowledged until he turned six, Zain took to life amongst nobility like a duck takes to ice skating. Altogether a sweet and charming child, he still managed to drive his foster family around the bend with his boundless, sunny energy and playful disposition. His mischieviousness was totally improper for a boy of his standing! Zain constantly evaded his family's attempts at keeping him within the noble sector, instead swimming out to meet and play with the common merfolk. Beloved by everyone he met, Zain eventually caused a big stir for distributing wealth from the royal treasury to the poor. It was after this point that his personality underwent a hardening. He would never be the same totally innocent child again. Now an energetic, free-spirited young man in line for the throne since his brother's assassination, Zain finds himself more frequently disillusioned with the world due to the selfishness and unkindness of the people around him. With no clear reason aside from his own tiredness, Zain has set off from his mother's home in search of... something. Anything. Adventure. Fun! blaugh
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Posted: Wed May 19, 2010 5:18 pm
Extended Biography
Zain was born on the fringes of his home society, into the loving embrace of a gypsy family. However, his memories of these times are vague and almost non-existent, for very soon - nearing his sixth birthday - he was taken into the depths of the city to live in the circle of his illegitimate father: the king of the land. His mother, a famed, fiery dancer and sorceress, having placed pressure on the king in private for many years, finally acknowledged the birthright of his son... in the least troubling way possible. Zain was fostered to a close cousin of the king's sister in law, and lived in the palace grounds from then on.
The extent to which Zain acclimatised to his new existence is debateable. When neccessary and in public, he came off as a charming, witty and polite boy - altogether the kind of child smiled upon by kindred society. In private, he was a bundle of energy incapable of settling down to schoolwork and capable of terrorising the servants daily, stopping just short of near-insanity. They began to say that he was "a little bit wild - just like his mother." Eventually, a focus was found for the boy's bright energy... in the form of the warrior's arts, which Zainire discovered for himself one day by escaping his nanny and wandering in on training exercises just outside the palace grounds. It was at this point that nobles amongst the court, previously rather blase to the illegitimate child of a known courtesan, began to bristle. It didn't do to have a boy of his position, of his disposition, to be training with warriors like a common soldier. It was as if it reaffirmed the fact that he was somehow different from them. The boy was kept inside more often from then on, and hired a private instructor.
As he grew, Zain continued to evade his captors, escaping whenever he could into the city below. He mixed, danced and played with the common merfolk, making a best friend of everyone he met. He visited his mother and learned from her people and their ways: folklore, parables and the many different ways of divining the future. He was truly what you might call a "people's prince," always kind and generous to the plights of the needy. When he found that his guardians refused to listen to their concerns, Zain discovered his impatience and his temper for the first time. He made no secret of smuggling out festoons of jewels and wealth from the treasuries and passing them out amongst the poor. This, of course, did nothing but anger the court, and for the first time his father gave the teen a stern and formal reprimanding. This single event caused the carefree young man's heart to harden slightly; his personality grew a shadow. He found himself suddenly more impatient, more determined. The simple confidence that had pushed him through life became sharper and more refined. He had come to the unpleasant realisation that no, he was not like the others. That not everyone wanted to be his friend. That, lurking in dark corners, he had enemies.
In what the nobles perceived as a show of arrogant defiance, Zain continued his visits to the poor. Indeed, their guess wasn't very far off from the true intent. The young half-prince was shoved even further to the coldest corner of the ballroom, where he sat still for a time, stubbornly planning on how to make them see things his way.
In a show of unparalleled initiative, Zain collected demographics and testimonies on the causes of poverty and the gap between the wealthy and the poor within the city, compiling them all into a report which he presented formally to his father soon after he turned sixteen. The immediate reaction was, predictably, outcry. However, when the king began to act on the report's suggestions, his many critics were left to grumble unhappily, now shoved into their own corner for a turn.
Years passed, and Zainire seemed to revert back to his old self. He was confident and charming, and many female admirers began to draw about him as he grew into a man. However, Zain's reputation encountered another sudden knock when word got round of liasons with both male and female youths. While merpeople are somewhat more open than surfacers, it was another black mark against the wild gypsy's son. His popularity amongst the common people also took a hit as exaggerated rumours spread. People began to look at him strangely in the street. Once again, the young man found himself disillusioned due to the hateful nature of people, and retreated again for several months into his brooding shell.
Without warning during this time, Zain's half-brother, the heir to the throne, was assassinated. With no other direct heirs, suddenly the spotlight was forced onto Zain. Although illegitimate, he was the son of the king, and well within his right to claim the throne. However, there were problems. Firstly, his unpopularity. Secondly, the fact that intrigue was suspected over his brother's murder. It was muttered that the assassin had been - that's right - a gypsy, who wanted to see just that which was being discussed happen; Zain's ascent to the throne. With the power structure destabilised, rather than allow Zain to make a decision for himself his father sent him back to stay with his mother for some time.
What was meant to be a few weeks turned into months, then years. With the king still fairly young and in good health, the city's elite seemed content to push the problem of a successor under the carpet. The king was encouraged to produce another heir - alas, none resulted. Meanwhile, Zain underwent fastidious informal training under his mother on exactly how to be a ruler.
Finally one night, Zain, frustrated, consulted his mother over her insistence that he train for kingship even so far from the center. She revealed without hesitation that she had been striving for his coronation since before his very conception. She had been his brother's assassin. She had kept his father supplied with infertility drugs to keep him from reigniting the competition. He'd nearly ruined her plans with his lack of propriety several times, but things still seemed to be on track, and she wasn't going to let the kingship slip away from her son.
Zain accepted his mother's scheming totally, touched by the strength of her love. Perhaps, if he'd thought he had even a chance of actually becoming king, he might have been angered at being played as such. As it was, he was of the opinion that no matter what he did, his mother's goal was impossible.
Shortly afterwards, the Sentinel War broke out. All the merpeople rushed to the aid of the Overseer, though to Zainire's ultimate annoyance he found himself unable to participate directly due to his inability to do battle on land. He tried to have himself instated as an ambassador just to get closer to the action, but was rebuffed. Angered, he began to protest loudly, directly citing his position as heir to the throne for the first time. With more pressing things to worry about, he was totally sidelined - completely ignored. Zain grew more and more impatient as the days ticked on, energy building up inside until he was bouncing off the metaphorical walls. Realising he was getting nowhere, he went and imposed himself on the warrior divisions, who were serving as messengers and gatherers. The generals, however, were not keen to have him in their squads. Things turned nasty, and Zain ended up wounding an officer. Now a confirmed outcast, he spent his time roving around in a dark and frustrated humour, which is when he met Shinichi.
Zain attached himself to the younger merman, declaring himself his best friend and knight within the first day of acquaintance. Shinichi couldn't have shaken him off if he'd tried. All the energy which had been wasting away found a focus, totally directing itself towards Shin, and Shin alone.
The war ended. Abruptly, Zain said goodbye to his friend, and returned home alone. There, he found the coronation debate reignited due to his less than savoury actions during the war. Several relatives of the king and his wife were putting forward their own candidates for heirship, including the son of the foster family he'd grown up in. Zainire retreated back to his mother's home, who seemed totally undisturbed by the newfound competition. She prophecised with confidence that Zain would take the throne, one way or another, sooner or later. A few weeks passed, and for the first time Zain grew tired with his mother's insistence. He didn't care one way or the other himself if he became king or not, so to hear his fate day in and day out became a burden. One day, he packed a little bag and drifted away, setting off on a walkabout. He had no aim, no destination and no totally clear reason for leaving. The free, open world simply called to him.Trivia * The shell Zain wears around his neck is a mark of the royal family, worn by all direct members of the bloodline. It has magical properties - for example, the ability to act as a mystical "skeleton key" of sorts. His mother tried to teach him to tap into its energy, but he never paid much attention.* Silver and black are the colours of his tail and purple is the colour of the royal family, but Zain's favourite colours are orange and yellow!* Zain is very close to his mother, much closer than anyone else, and he adores her. However, his father loves him more genuinely, if from a distance.* As a warrior, Zain uses two short-range daggers.* Although Zain may appear to toot his own horn, he's actually sending himself up. He makes fun of everyone and everything, including himself.* Yup, he's bisexual.* We originally needed him to be a prince just because he would then have the authority to demand alterations be made to the Temple to accomodate for marine life.* Zainire is a made-up name, but the root is a Hindu name meaning "godly light."
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Posted: Wed May 19, 2010 5:19 pm
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Posted: Wed May 19, 2010 5:21 pm
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Posted: Wed May 19, 2010 5:22 pm
  Mer cities: mystery, beauty, shining homes beneath the waves. Places of sun, fun and the carefree mer lifestyle.
At least, this is what we would have believed just fifteen years ago. With advances in technology have come new means of communicating with and studying our fascinating cousins under the sea, the merfolk. Interaction with the mer is at an all-time high, so much so that the memory of half-men half-fish being confined to fairytales is laughable in itself. With this increased knowledge, the idealised illusions held for centuries over mer society have been shattered.
Or, a better term might be that our perceptions have been corrected. Merpeople are, for all extents and purposes, people. They must work, as well as play. They have an economy, albeit a recognisably looser form than ours, and they have ruling and common classes. Mer cities are governed almost exclusively by monarchies, whose bloodlines can be traced back through the centuries to the founding of the city.
Mer monarchs take a laissez-faire approach to ruling. They tend to stay out of the commoners' eyes, and mer cities are usually divided neatly into a "noble" sector and a "common" sector. With the extended families of the monarchs stretching back many generations all living around each other, it is usual for the wealthy nobility to match commoners in number and yet hold more than quadruple the share of capital. The majority of this is further centered in the King and his immediate family, who hold more than half of the wealth of all the nobility put together.
Most of this treasure takes the form of valuable jewels, hoards of gold, splendid finery, crowns and ornate weaponry, as well as rare shells, stones and pearls. The reason for the shallow distribution of wealth is mainly due to an inherent greed: merpeople are said to be especially prone to the "magpie effect," where objects which are perceived as pretty or valuable are hoarded for the future with no intent of using them for other gains. As such, there is little flow of these goods between any sectors. Treasures are confined to families and individuals, locked away and carefully guarded.
A comparatively young city several miles off the coast of the Isle de Gambino, Antium only recently came to the attention of humans after the discovery of a massive coral reef stretching several miles across just outside its boundaries. An unusually militaristic city, it boasts several impressively-numbered squadrons of soldiers who are commanded by a committee of noble generals. As merpeople rarely war, however, their function is much more geared towards providing increased opportunities for common merfolk. The martial arts native to the Antium region can trace their origins to the ancient styles of the "dark" merpeople, who we would identify more closely as gypsies. There is a markedly healthy population of these people on the outskirts, notable as the "dark" mer are usually driven off for their negative role in mer history, left to form their own secluded and esoteric societies.
The anthropological community has cited this as the acknowledgement and integration of social classes not present in other mer cultures, which makes Antium an anomaly. True interest has been drawn, however, from the changing attitudes towards state intervention which have mainly come about due to the reports compiled by Prince Zainire, an illegitimate child of King Melchor and Yesenia Yadira, the elected "queen" of the gypsy populace. His birth was anomalous in itself, as mer are also known for their loyalty to a single life-long mate, though as the Prince was born before the marriage of Melchor to Priama the King is said to have committed no true offense. The Prince, however, has caused unparalled stirs amongst the stiff upper echelons for choosing to train as a warrior, passing out riches from the treasury to the poor, engaging in homosexual relations and, most recently, injuring an allied officer during the Sentinel War.
The boy is now considered by most a troublemaker, but Antium's political woes are not isolated in him. The Heir Apparent, Prince Matthias, only son of Melchor and Priama, was found assassinated in March 2005. Though the heirship should, by right, now fall to Prince Zainire, the King's circle has proved reluctant to announce the new successor. In only the past several weeks, caused seemingly by the Prince's unsavoury conduct, other related families have begun to put forward their own candidates for kingship, in defiance of the tradition of direct-descendency.
An in-depth account of Antian political intrigue, including a chronology of important events, continues on Page 26.
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Posted: Wed May 19, 2010 5:24 pm
Other Stuff  ZOMG, it's CHI-CHI! Go say hi, everyone!
Mmmm, SQUID! My favourite food! I dun get why you guys cook them, though. It's kinda.. unnatural, don't you think? Whatever that green stuff is looks yummy, though!
Hey, this guy looks kinda like ME! What's with the weird ears and hands, though? I mean, seriously! What do you humans think we are, fish? LOL!
THAT'S better! Hey, that kinda looks like Antium in the background! But... there's not enough colour for it to be Antium... and all mer cities are just as pretty, so...
Antium has loads of coral reefs all around it! Humans didn't find out about them cos they're so deep down, and when they did they were real excited. Then we started getting lotsa tourists... people weren't happy!
I LIKE THIS!!! Pretty, pretty colour! Hum, but... these look better on Chi-chi... he's so pretty... he doesn't need bright colours... they're just distracting...
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