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Personality

Aesthetic

Summary

Childhood

Eric lived in an Araluen orphanage for most of his life, his parents unknown and him having been left on the doorstep of the fiefdom Tallmount’s ward by a stranger.

At fifteen he attended the choosing where children in the ward would be selected for a career to pursue. He chose to work in the horsemaster field, but was unsatisfied with the work after a few days. After wandering through the woods on his time off, he stumbled upon a horse breeder and trainer for the Rangers of the kingdom, and was approached by the fiefdom’s ranger Stomm for an apprenticeship. He readily accepted and began his training.

From there, Eric spent a relatively uneventful year training under his new mentor, learning archery, survival, knife skills, stealth, and horse riding, as well as a handful of other skills important to the Rangers. Before he had finished his apprenticeship, Stomm and he were called to deal with a bandit threat, working efficiently as a team to put an end to the issue.

Following their first mission, Stomm took Eric to a Ranger Gathering, where he met his first Ranger friend, Lora Wargo.

Adulthood

After a successful apprenticeship, Eric Oakentes graduated to become a fully-fledged ranger and was assigned his home fiefdom Tallmount to protect as it’s official ranger. He worked on several important missions throughout Araluen, becoming popular with the other rangers.

While out on assignment, word reached Eric that the current commandant of the Ranger Corps was stepping down, opening the position for any prospective new applicants. Hoping to take the position, Eric finished his mission and attended that year’s Gathering, where he met back up with Stomm and his old friend Lora. The two caught back up, and over the years Lora had proven herself a capable ranger, similarly well-liked among the corps. He also learned that she was also applying for commandant, and they began an electoral race among the Corps to see who would become commandant. In the end, they ended up tying, and became the first co-commandants in the history of the Ranger Corps.

Eric and Lora became closer friends over their first few years as co-commandants, learning the ins and outs of leading the large organization with some mentorship from the previous commandant. Their collaborative leadership was a great driving force for the Corps, and their varied experience over their time as Rangers ensured they were prepared for most any issue they may force. They became close friends with several other Rangers, building a close unit of allies.

Main Story

Shortly after Eric’s thirty-fifth birthday, a Ranger’s apprentice was mysteriously killed by a man named Sam Reuphas. Lora knew the killer from her past and pieced together that he wanted revenge on the Corps. Several other rangers were murdered over the span of a few short days, and Eric and Lora scrambled to find a solution to these killings. Sam’s threat grew more substantial as he gathered a following under a false name, calling his group the Scarathous Cult. His circle concocted a drug to mind control citizens of Araluen, and the Ranger Corps became locked in a long battle with Sam’s followers while his plan unraveled.

Sam Reuphas’s plot culminated in a direct attack against the capital of the country, Castle Araluen, in a full siege, supplemented by enemy soldiers from neighboring countries. The royal army and all the rangers the kingdom could muster prepared a final defense on the castle grounds. They lost more and more ground to the opposing force, and Stomm sacrificed himself to buy the remaining rangers time to fortify the castle. Their defenses failed to stop the invading force, so the rangers and the queen prepared an ambush in the lower levels of the castle as enemy soldiers poured in. Eric sustained several injuries while the rangers put up a desperate fight. They were driven into a collapsing throne room where they made their last stand, and against mounting odds succeeded in killing Sam, Eric breaking his leg in the process. With their leader dead, the Scarathous cult was destroyed and the Araluens were able to take back their capital.

Following the uprising, Eric took some time to recover from his injuries and ended up having to use a cane, gaining a permanent limp in his left leg. He and Lora worked tirelessly to repair what was left of the Ranger Corps and restore order to Araluen in the wake of the siege.