Discussion Thread: Link
Worldbuilding: Link

When the Aphelions fell from their sky, they spread divinity upon Earth. Their divinity changed the very ground that the mortals stood. Local flora and fauna changed in abstract ways as the Aphelions led the mortals through the greatest industrial changes in history and taught the mortals to kindle fire and forge steel.

In response, the humans enacted structures in the name of the gods who walked the earth. Noble sacrifices of food, alcohol, and blood were offered to marble and etched stone altars in hopes that the gods would bestow the mortals with newfound gifts. This act pleased the Aphelions greatly for their powers surged with each new follower and grander offering.

However, as humans evolved and grew, so did their egos, as they turned their blessed blades against the ones they once worshipped. Such an act made the gods restless: some revoked their gifts and others, who grew discontent with the peaceful era, joyously slaughtered in the name of revenge. The exchange of bloodshed extended through countless generations until the world was split between Aphelions and mortals, devotees and detractors, and those who desired nothing of the sort.

. . .

The setting takes inspiration from both the Medieval and Victorian eras. Electricity and firearms are still new to the point that they are usually negligible, and many professions of the Medieval era still exist. The world consists of one large continent divided among many kingdoms, each with its own beliefs and practices. Parts of the land have been touched by Aphelion divinity and have deviated from the natural order as humans attempt to combine divinity and machinery into their daily lives.

The story takes place after the Aphelion-Human War. However, the reason for the war differs based on who you ask. Some claim that it was for the sake of justice. Others claim that it was a political act or even one simply out of pure anger. No one is entirely sure what event sparked the war. However, the war established that Aphelions are not "gods" in a traditional sense because they are not omniscient nor omnipotent as humans originally believed them to be. It has also become a widely established fact that Aphelions, despite their immortal bodies, are still fallible.

Aphelions are treated vastly different depending on the location. Despite the war, some kingdoms still associate Aphelions with gods whose words are law. Other places have rejected Aphelions completely and have attempted to create human-only civilizations. However, most of the continent has come to accept coexistance with Aphelions.

Ishtar of the Fallen Stars

Art by Yk93.DA (To be updated with a colored version)

Appearance:
Ishtar wears metal on her ankles, arms, neck, and waist. She prefers to be barefoot, but the soles of her feet never get dirty since she doesn't make physical contact with the ground due to telekinesis. Despite having the ability to levitate herself wherever she wants, she prefers to "walk" due to an old habit.

Abilities:
Ishtar's true ability is to enhance and potentially steal another Aphelion's abilities when she consumes their heart. Since Aphelions only die when their heart is crushed or damaged, Ishtar grows stronger with each aphelion she eats. The chances of Ishtar gaining a new ability are very slim and her ability only works on full-fledged Aphelions, not half or partial ones. Currently, she can manipulate metal and has telekinesis which she can only use on herself. She often wears metal on her body and can manipulate it to be used offensively

Personality + Goals:
Ishtar is resolute in her need for power. She believes that if she becomes a vessel with enough power, she can ascend to godhood and recreate the earth. She believes that the only way Aphelions will be happy is for them to return to the Moon. However, since all Aphelions on earth are exiles, they will never be able to return. As a result, she has taken it upon herself to recreate the earth into a replica of the Moon.

Despite her methods, Ishtar is not a mindless killer. She empathizes with her kind and does not harbor grudges against Aphelions trying to end her life. Rather, she hopes that once her duty is complete, one of her kind is able to put her to rest.

She is rather apathetic towards human society since they come and go.

Other:
Ishtar's ability to sense other Aphelions is very weak. She can only recognize another Aphelion when she looks at them whereas many other Aphelions can feel her presence from far away. This often results in Aphelions simply avoiding Ishtar before she even realizes they were nearby.

Despite being called an Aphelion, this is not necessarily true. Unlike Aphelions who were born from the creation of stars, Ishtar was born from the death of an Aphelion. This means that she has never seen the Moon and thus, her vision of a new earth is what she imagines the Moon to be like. Her odd birth is also why abilities common to all Aphelions are weaker on Ishtar.

Other Aphelions can sense multiple presensenses inside of Ishtar. Most of them view her as an abomination and not an Aphelion.

Name

Naphtali

Son of Erteus| Tali (used by people he is friendly with)| Weeds (he's skinny and is known to dabble in herbs for poisons.) |Cursed Omen of Death (his father is known for his ability to kill and his lack of honoring human life, so people tend to avoid Tali)

Appearance

He has almost shoulder length dark hair. His eyes are an unnaturally vibrant green. His skin is tan. He has a slender build, and he appears fairly unkempt and uncared for.

Picrew

Personality & Motivation

His life has been hard as he has been ostracized by humans and not taken seriously by Aphelions. They either are ambivalent to him or dislike him because he is diluted and will pass on like a human. He is human enough looking that he can pass for a human to humans, but there is still something off with him if enough time is spent around him.

He has a particular grudge against Aphelions who pair with humans. He has been trying to instigate as much destruction as he can among the humans in revenge for their treatment of him. He is frequently sought out for his work as an assassin. He knows he is at a disadvantage with Aphelions so he saves grudge kills against them for particularly egregious Aphelions or weaker more vulnerable ones.

He is not a very loud argumentative person. He prefers more passive methods of protest such as snide sarcastic comments and subtle signs of rudeness such as cold shoulder and avoidance. He rarely asks someone directly a question or if they will do something for him. Instead, he tells them about a preferred circumstance or reality or a problem that needs fixing and waits to see if they will do something about it. His movements are purposeful as if he was constantly trying to conserve energy. He sits still for long periods of time, and he can stand motionless without apparent motion. He rarely says anything sincere prefering to veil anything vulnerable in sarcasm.

Abilities

He is a young half-Aphelion under a century old, and he has not fully figured out his powers. He is very sensitive to knowing negative things about other creatures such as if someone is sick or has ill intentions. Because of that ability, he feels the loss of Aphelions more acutely particularly if he is close or he is the one who has done it. He doesn't realize it, but if he trained he would be able to increase negative things in another person whether that mean causing depression or making cancer grow. He is able to have more lasting impact with physical ailments than mental unless that person is already prone to it because once something like cancer has started it won't stop on its own.

The time was night as the young man crept through the shadows. He walked standing upright as if he was going for a leisurely stroll through the forest. He stopped when he heard unexplainable creaks in the forest turning his head so that his ears were pointed otherwise the mysterious sounds. He only moved on once he had determined the cause. The man blended into the background well because he wore dark clothing, but it also signaled possible ill intent. Why was he skulking outside at such a time?

As the forest began to thin, he could see the stars twinkling overhead in the clearing, and he saw a large building looming in the close distance as it cast a dark shadow in his direction. Before he continued to walk towards the house, he reviewed the instructions in his head one more time. Head to the house outside of the main part of the city. It was quite large and elaborate, but it was not quite a castle as it was without protective outer walls. He was to sneak into the second story and find the bedroom door three doors down to the right and assassinate the man sleeping there to prevent the nobleman from finishing advocating for the peace treaty. Eventually, all of the nobles would cave when they realized that it would be popular among the people. The man only worked for destructive menaces to society.

He patted his pouches tied around his waist, which contained many different poisons and checked if he could pull his weapons out easily. He mainly carried daggers as he preferred not to enter into extended hand to hand fighting. Soon, he had approached the house and was preparing himself to enter through the window. He recoiled as he landed on the floor through the window. He could hear no discernable sounds, and he easily fit through the window with his small frame, yet he could feel dark malice radiating from within the home.

Someone was already here wreaking havoc on the family he had come to destroy. It had taken him a longer time than he would like to admit to realize that he could sense ill will and sickness within a person. As a person with the job of assassination, it had become very helpful in locating humans and sneaking through a house. Only rare moments or even more rare humans existed without some negative aspect. As they tended to consider something negative to them as constant, he normally always had a way to locate them.

He heard a chilling sound in the distance as he approached the room that he had intended to enter. He stifled a gag as he recognized the metallic scent of blood. Remember, he thought to himself, you must keep control. You may need to be able to flee soon. "Who are you?" he whispered at the figure hovering over the bed. "What are you doing here? Who sent you?"

Ishtar of the Fallen Stars | Aphelion

She did not care for the politics of the human world. Like the stone against the sea, all traces would fade against the perpetual flow of time. To create and to destroy was the natural order of the world. In her centuries of wandering the earth, she had seen kings rise to fame only to succumb to a mere cold. Ishtar witnessed kingdoms come to life over decades only to fall overnight. Nothing was made to live forever, except the foreigners to the earth.

The Aphelions never felt like they belonged. Where the Moon had its glassy marble chambers and the world among the stars was neverending, the Earth was finite in its mass and lifespan. The difference between the two species only grew more evident when it came to mortality. Whereas the human skin wrinkled in a few mere years, Aphelions remained eternally youthful in the form they stopped aging at. But if there was anything the last war proved, it was that youth and immortality were exclusive. Aphelions were ageless, but not immortal.

So, when the humans learned of the only way Aphelions could die, some of her kind hid in fear like the man before her now. He peeled off his scales before they could fully grow in and shaved his horns down to blend in. Even his fangs had been filed so he could blend in with the mortals — and he did. He managed to fool them for so long, but his charade came to an abrupt halt when presented before another Aphelion.

The Moon's children could always recognize one another.

"Are you happy like that?"

She truly did want to know. What could've been so worthwhile to abandon his Aphelion nature completely and live among humans and even parade a human family around? But he didn't respond because he was dead. She had ripped his beating heart from his chest and eaten it in front of him. The soft white linens of the bed were drenched in blood and gore as his gaping chest remained exposed for the next person to find her crime.

"Who sent you?" It was a voice so quiet she mistook it as the wind who questioned her taboo. "What are you doing here? Who sent you?" The voice demanded an answer and she turned her head back towards the doorway where a lithe figure stood.

Moonlight shone through the window and perfectly captured Ishtar sitting right on top of the corpse with their arms and legs sprawled out before them. Her mouth and neck were stained red from murder and those were the only parts the stranger could see from where he stood.

Ishtar was surprised to see another here. She was certain she was quiet enough not to wake the rest of his family. "No one," she finally responded. She slid off the bed and revealed the rest of her blood-stained body at him with all of its glory. Her hands, arms, chest, and even her legs were all gold, the color of Aphelion blood. She recognized him as one of her own at first glance. Perhaps he had come to avenge his fallen brethren.

"Have you come to put a stop to me like those before you?"

Ishtar stood in front of him as if to tempt him. It would be so easy for him to plunge the daggers he decorated himself with into her chest and crush her beating heart — the only known way of killing an Aphelion.

(OOC: -_- dunno why it won't all be one font, sorry about that)

Her golden eyes flickered to the hand that rested on his dagger and she found herself rather amused. Was this him warning her? Surely he knew that a little toy knife like that wouldn't prove fatal to either of them. It was difficult to tell age when it came to Aphelions, but she could only imagine he was young. The older Aphelions and even half-breeds had this glassy distant look to their eyes as if they'd seen and experienced everything. They grew dependent on their abilities and that alone made them weak.

The stranger was rather alert. Those eyes never stayed in one place too long and Ishtar could feel his gaze pull her apart for examination. It was rather uncomfortable. Ishtar would've much rathered he mindlessly lunged at her or voiced his thoughts in a way most did.

"Why did you kill him?" She found it an odd question to ask. There were a dozen others more urgent than this, but she supposed this was the human side of him talking. They always sought a need to understand, but sometimes the answer was unfortunately simple. After all, does the hunter question why the prey did not run faster?

"I'm sure the person who hired me will try to wriggle out of a payment [. . .] I don't like being in debt to people."

She reached out for his hand if he'd let her, she'd offer him a ring, once owned the by corpse behind her. It was oddly heavy for its size and a large colored stone was fixed into the detailed gold shoulders. Accent gems glittered on the side and at the center of the statement was a gilded pegasus, the former nobleman's symbol. Flecks of gold blood remained on it.

"Then lie and say it was a job well done." Ishtar tilted her head slightly so that she could see his eyes better. It seemed paradoxical to have an assassin care about honor and honesty. They killed for a living and more often than not, they used methods the victims wouldn't realize until it was too late. It wasn't quite exactly the epitome of what one would call fair. "Not all crimes are committed in the name of a vendetta. He was simply at the wrong place and at the wrong time." And this was the truth. The nobleman's fate was sealed the moment Ishtar locked eyes with them at the square. Even though she never once attempted to hide her intents, the nobleman neither ran nor hid. Perhaps he had already accepted his fate and wanted to die human. At the very least, she commended his dedication to act.

"I have no interest in his wife and daughter." That was the lucky part about having mortal blood running in their veins. They'd never gain Ishtar's attention.

"Why eat him?"

"You can't feel it?" Even were of human descent, most half-breeds were capable of the same as any other Aphelion. This included being able to sense Ishtar's presence and the dozens of others inside her. Usually that alone was enough for others to conclude their own. "Most Aphelions wield fire or control the wind. They get stronger the more human followers they amass. I can't do that. I siphon abilities off of other Aphelions."

She mused to him, "Does this knowledge make you feel disgust or pity?"

"Is curiosity an option?"

"You're an enigma aren't you?" She found him a rather curious creature. "I suppose it is." Usually by now, they'd have a negative response to her. If it wasn't the fact that she felt different, it was the fact that she was essentially a cannibal. Instead, he asked her a plethora of questions as if they were repressed and the seal had been undone.

"I don't have the luxury of choosing my victims nor can I choose what's given to me," she explained slowly as if even she didn't fully understand her abilities -- which wasn't entirely far from the truth. Ishtar was like a beast, moved by instinct alone. If one were to ask about her motives, she wouldn't have an answer that could appease them. Rather, Ishtar knew that these motives existed and that was enough for her. "But I have noticed I seemed to gain more from those who are content with their ending.." she trailed off softly as she pondered the hypothesis.

"Why are you different? Who are you?"

"Would you believe me if I said I was going to remake the world one day? Not in the way the humans love their speeches, but truly remake the earth down to its core?" Ishtar paused to gauge his reaction. She wanted to see if her words shocked him or if he'd see her as a lunatic. It wasn't an everyday thing to hear someone claim to destroy everything as you knew it. "I don't think Aphelions were ever meant to live on Earth. The land isn't meant for us. We're nothing but eternal guests in a foreign land, cursed to wander until our wanderlust dies and is replaced with apathy. I believe this land has brought us far more strife and suffering than the good it has given us."

She smiled softly in a way that seemed almost sad. "Wouldn't you agree, half-blood? What has this world done for you who is neither Aphelion nor mortal, but somewhere between?" It was a rhetorical question. Though the kingdom they were in claimed to be indifferent about Aphelions in their rank, that wasn't true. The mortals still gawked at them and whispered behind their backs. It was such a small act, but it built up over time -- that feeling of not belonging. Human emotions were contagious, that was why her kind preferred a life of isolation so they would never feel or have to deal with anything that didn't come naturally to them like grief and loss.

But when he tried to leave, she urged him to stay a little longer. "Why do you commit your lives to the humans?" He was an assassin, was he not? She found his excuse rather poor. If someone were to come stumbling into her crime, he'd most likely silence them with that dagger whose hilt he touched earlier. Ah, but what if he didn't want to kill anyone he didn't have to? The idea of an assassin with a conscious was food for thought.

"Why hold yourself back when you can be more? You're starving yourself here, stifling your growth like a bird clipping its wings. I can teach you what you've been denied."