Trivia

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Character

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History

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After being rehabilitated, Phi started to have a different outlook on life; one not fully restricted to the ground, but enjoying the world from the viewpoint in the skies. The shift from his old workplace to his new one had too also changed how he feels about himself, and wished he made the transition sooner.

Hate the People, Love the Job

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As a night operations scout, Phi's job was to travel, document, and report to his division about anything abnormal within the region. The region in question requires extensive surveillance due to a couple of factors.

Firstly, the geological landscape of the region is incredibly diverse. Filled with deep caverns, caves, and bad lands, it takes a lot of effort to keep track of what goes in and what comes out. Secondly, because it has such diversity in geography, a lot of scientists and geologists come into the area to learn and discover new things - new people coming in require proper documentation to ensure that nothing of importance is taken without permission. Thirdly, this region, surprisingly, is a popular route for merchants and travellers. Safety is of high priority and scouts are needed to ensure that nothing dangerous is in the nearby vicinity to these routes. Lastly, as previously mentioned, this region has a lot of dangerous creatures and vulnerable soils, meaning the protection of citizens along these routes is again stressed.

Regardless if one was in the night ops division, oftentimes both the daytime and nighttime employees switch working hours. The reasoning behind this is that certain squads know certain areas of the region the best, and so they know where to look for signs and when it is time to report.

Philip did not like the administration or higher ups within the organization. Cheap and only interested in promotions and looking good in the eyes of others, a lot of divisions were pushed to the max capacity of work capabilities, often making employees do more work than what their job originally entitled them to do. It didn't help that these people were only able to get in through connections or corruption, and the only two reasons why Phi stayed was because he loved exploring the region and teaching individuals.

Negotations and contracts with employees forced them to stay, so whether Phi decided to stay or not was up to his decision. Those promoted often were able to get away, but as Phi was the most experienced in the area, the administration wanted to keep him as long as possible to teach the rest of the novices that came in.

He hated the fact that he was too young back then to understand the contract terms, but at least he could continue to explore the area. Hopefully, Phi would be able to leave this place to see and explore something new instead.

An Unlucky Event

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During one of those days where Phi was teaching another during the day happened to be one of his worst days. Conditions were good; the sun was out with little clouds to be seen and low, soft winds. There were no reports within the past week about dangers related to animals or landscape, and the scientists and geologists that came through respected the rules. The only aspect that kept Phi on high alert was the timing of the year.

Opilios Wyrms, or the Ragged Tooth Worm, were coming close to their breeding times. Males tended to get extremely aggressive to anything that entered its territory, as females are hard to come by and eggs provided by females are fairly fragile. Needless to say, seeing a 10 meter tall slug-like creature with tiny legs running down the whole length of it's staggering 16 meter body was not something anyone would want to see or deal with.

Encountering one was Phi's group's worst luck. The best way in dealing with these creatures was to drive it off a steep cliff, but depending on the terrain and where the scout was positioned, there would be no chances.

In an effort to protect the rest of his group of three - two of which were just learning the area - from the viciousness of this rampant worm, Phi became the distraction. Shaking off one of these worms forces a lot of exertion, and Phi unfortunately was stuck between a cliff wall, a ravine, and this massive beast.

It was one way to die, he thought to himself. Not the way he wanted it, but it's not like he could choose how to die either.

The weight of the worm as it pummeled down into the ravine knocked the wind out of Phi's body. Loose rock from the worm's impact crushed his legs, intense pain shooting throughout his entire body as he finally landed at the bottom of the ravine. Unable to call for help or even scream in pain, Phi was left to bleed to death.

New Me, New Legs

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Bleeding to death was what he expected. What he did not expect was to wake up in a hospital.

Scientists had flocked to him the moment he woke up. Apparently a rescue team went out to search for him, and his receptor was thankfully working. What they found instead of a body was Phi and... something on his legs. Or what was his legs.

He had landed on a pile of special ore. It was by random chance that he happened to be compatible with it, and so it replaced his broken legs. They were chunky, felt heavy, and would not react to temperature or pain. What scared him more was the viscosity of the ore, and how dependent it was on his mood. Scientists were interested in it, because although this ore had been seen before, they had never seen it take up to 46% of a person's body. What's more, the changes in mineral levels forced them to act quickly - lethal doses could be achieved and the rest of Phi's human body would naturally be affected.

Phi had to relearn how to walk again, as his legs made of ore felt incredibly foreign. In the same process, he was forced to learn quickly on how he was to control his legs, given its weird solid-to-liquidy nature.

Being Tempered

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Word travelled far, reaching the ears of a blacksmith. Perking his interest to confirm the type of ore that it was, he made his way to visit Phi. Upon learning and confirming the type of ore, he proposed to reshape and mold it to make Phi stronger and better at his job. He was careful with his words when proposing to the administration after originally being shot down by Phi - he could easily see how the organization was only interested in maintaining it's wealth and reputation and got an immediate OK to "increase the value of their asset".

"Abducted" against his will, Phi was forced to go through a tempering process. His legs that never hurt before started to hurt, and sleepless nights grew more frequent. Eating was difficult because his body could not handle the pain, and having an individualistic personality, being helped to go to the bathroom or bathe made him embarrassed.

He didn't like this blacksmith, but he could at least understand why he was doing so.

Tempering would allow Phi to use the ore to its fullest potential. As one with his body, being in its raw-form would slowly degrade the rest of his body, killing him slowly. Leaving it in its current state also would restrict Phi from doing certain things as the ore was incredibly heavy.

Purifying the ore would give him huge benefits. Firstly, his life would be extended. Secondly, his legs would not only be lighter, they could provide more power and be better controlled on its current format. He could actually sleep in a bed for once!

There was a catch however. Tempering took a painstakingly long time, and required a lot of hands-on work. Relearning how to walk again was something else Phi needed to do once more, and the thought of getting used to his legs for the second time made him groan. The first year was dreadful and very awkward between the two, but slowly they came to become more comfortable the more the blacksmith worked on his legs.

Trivia

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The first two years of tempering were awkward. The blacksmith wasn't sure if he was developing a leg fetish (LOL) and Phi wasn't sure if he was developing stockholme-like syndrome feelings. It didn't help that they didn't talk much to each other other, with the blacksmith being serious and Phi being nervous.

Relearning how to use his legs after they had been tempered allowed him to learn what it is like to be up high in the air. His legs gave a new strength, allowing him to reach high altitudes and a growing sense of freedom.

The blacksmith had a plan to get Phi out from his workplace. It would be tedious and he would have to be extremely careful with his actions and words, but the efforts paid off. Phi was able to move somewhere else to work with a medical facility attached, with his efforts finally being recognized.

Style: Incredibly fast on his feet thanks to the ore that replaced them, Phi is not only able to track distances and jump to high cliffs in a short amount of time, manipulation of the form of his legs is another bizarre option. Changing forms to fit his needs, his legs can turn into a multitude of shapes and mimicry, packing a punch whenever they make contact with something else. Aside from using his legs as his main offense, Phi carries around short swords, daggers, and a grapple hook to pinpoint enemies or monsters.

Although his first option is to flee the scene as his primary habit of facing large monsters is too difficult to deal with his smaller stature, Phi will opt to extend his legs to puncture anything that comes too close. Because of his odd legs and nature of work, Phi is very well versed in understanding distances and spatial recognition.