Glendala "Glen" Eire (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
glenamored) wrote2012-12-02 12:56 pm
glenamored) wrote2012-12-02 12:56 pm
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exsilium application and world info
» PLAYER INFORMATION
Player NAME: Missa
Current AGE: 25
Player TIME ZONE: EST
Personal JOURNAL:superego
IM & SERVICE: AIM: fallingrapids (rarely used)
Player PLURK:![[plurk.com profile]](https://plurk.com/favicon.ico)
bailamos
Current CHARACTERS: None.
» CHARACTER INFORMATION
Character NAME: Glendala "Glen" Eire
Character PULL-POINT: After the attempted assassination of Vermall's crown prince, just before Glen is confronted by him in her flat.
Character AGE: 19
Character ABILITIES:
Glen is two things by profession: a courtesan, and a sort of information broker on top of that. She sells the information she learns about her clients while they are getting to know each other intimately to the highest bidder. This requires a rather unique set of skills.
As a courtesan, Glen has had two years of almost nightly encounters to help her learn not just the obvious bedroom skills, but also acting. She knows how to become almost any sort of woman you can dream of, and can act much better than most despite not having any stage training. The training she endured involved much higher stakes than most stage actors can imagine, and the learning curve was steep, but Glen's been a great liar for all her life so it came to her naturally with time.
Coupled with the acting and lying is her ability to manipulate others into revealing information that they might not normally share with a stranger. Her job is perfect for this -- when you're lying with someone, your walls are already well on their way down and you're very likely to be stupid and say something you shouldn't. Secrets sometimes spill out. Glen has perfected her technique so that the probability of her clients revealing some juicy piece of valuable information, whether they be business secrets or personal scandals, increases several fold with the help of her silver tongue.
Glen possesses several other less-than-legal skills, too. She wasn't always a courtesan, but she has been a pickpocket since the age of eight, as well as a minor thief. She's stealthy and subtle in everything she does, and therefore almost never gets caught. Time spent as part of a local gang when she was younger means that she's picked up some self defense skills and knows how to handle daggers and knives, too, but she's not so good at fighting and more often than not will retreat if she encounters a situation she doesn't believe she can win.
As for skills that did not originate in the underground, Glen grew up on a farm and therefore knows more than a little about growing and harvesting crops. These days, she doesn't really draw upon that knowledge beyond keeping a potted herb garden in her flat.
Character HISTORY:
Glen was born on her family's farm on the outskirts of a small town called Grumall, located in central Vermall. Her mother died giving birth to her in childbirth, leaving her father a much more bitter man and an occasional drunk who on a bad day would blame his daughter for his wife's death and the family's troubles. The Eires didn't have much while Glen was growing up. They tended the farm together once Glen was old enough to work, and traveled only occasionally to sell their crops. For the most part, their crops were bought and sold locally in Grumall, so from a young age Glen knew the road to and from the farm into town. Once she was a bit older, Glen went to school in town, though she quit when she turned fourteen and finished her eighth year, the same as most small town girls and boys.
Long before she quit school, however, when she was eight years old, Glen started to get involved in a few activities that had little to do with harvesting crops or doing arithmetic homework. As was mentioned previously, the Eires didn't really have much in the way of income. This was mostly thanks to the family being incredibly short-handed when it came to doing the farmwork. An aging man without much money to hire farmhands and a little girl who is often out in town going to school are not able to man a farm effectively. This meant that they were losing money with each coming year. Glen decided to do something about this, since even though she was still very young, she wasn't stupid and could see what was going on.
She started picking pockets. The townspeople didn't often carry much that was of value, but she managed to pick enough that she and her father didn't have to worry as much about affording food and basic necessities anymore. And luckily, Glen was good at it. She could read people well, knew just what to say on the rare occasion that she got caught -- "Oh, did you drop this?" or even sometimes the fake-tearful "I'm so sorry! I'll never do it again!".
This state of affairs continued until Glen left school at fourteen, but as the Eires grew poorer and the farm became more of a liability than an asset, Glen's father's attitude became even worse. She was never defenseless around him -- in fact, Glen learned most of her more colorful curses and insults from her old man at his worst, and was not at all afraid of using them against him when he went too far. Even so, though, Glen found that she couldn't stay at home when things got too heated with her father. She still loved him, and still wanted to help him and make up for the pain she'd caused (years of her father blaming her for her mother's death left a very strong impact), but she could not remain there and would often disappear for days on end.
Where did she go? Well, it turns out that even smaller towns have a few young people wishing to imitate the gangs found in the big city, and Glen's skills meant she had an instant in to one of Grumall's two main gangs, the Pinchers. Among the Pinchers was an old school friend of Glen's named Kagan. The two of them got on pretty well, and he even introduced her to more serious forms of thievery, though as it happens he taught her several other things that would prove even more useful to her in the future. This was mainly because Kagan was Glen's first boyfriend, and her first ever lover. While she was with Kagan, Glen learned the basics of being with a man, and not just sexually. There's a song and dance, a give and take, a process of flirtation and withdrawal involved in being someone's lover that Glen learned during this time and perfected in later years.
Despite her issues with her father during these few years and the danger involved in being a part of a gang and committing petty crime, the years Glen spent with the Pinchers were some of her favorite. There was a sense of camaraderie in the gang, almost a sense of family. Since she'd never quite had the best relationship with her dad, this was refreshing.
It was very unfortunate, then, when it all inevitably came crashing down.
It started when Glen picked a fight with the head of Grumall's second gang, the Toxic Rounds. Said head was a burly young woman over twice Glen's size named Rois. What Glen thought was mostly harmless posturing, however, really set Rois off. Gang violence increased in Grumall over the coming weeks, to the point where Glen didn't feel safe going into town without some sort of disguise. The Toxic Rounds were, on the whole, a lot tougher and meaner than Glen's own Pinchers, and it was rumored that the name of the gang was cautionary -- the Rounds were hiding real toxic ammunition that they wouldn't hesitate to use on somebody who really deserved it.
This was Grumall, however. The Rounds were mean, yes, but they weren't deadly. Grumall hadn't seen a murder in nearly ten years. This was what Glen told herself, but in reality the violence was getting progressively worse. The Pinchers and Rounds were graduating from fistfights to breaking bones to stabbing with daggers. If even one of them owned a gun, the Pinchers were all in agreement that they couldn't last long against them. A surrender was planned after Rois and her Rounds stabbed one of the Pinchers, causing him to nearly bleed to death.
The surrender went poorly from the start. Several of the Rounds and Pinchers top members were in attendance -- Glen and Kagan among the Pinchers and Rois and her top lieutenants among the Rounds. The gangs met up at a neutral location, the roof of a warehouse on the far end of town. The meeting ended with much name-calling and threats from the Toxic Rounds, and when Rois pulled a gun, pointing it at Glen, Kagan was the first to put himself between her and it. This amused Rois, who lowered her weapon, but she wasn't finished. The Pinchers had pissed her off, and they weren't the only ones getting hurt by this feud. The difference was, as far as Rois was concerned, this had all started when Glen had picked a fight with her.
It was Glen who'd have to pay the price for that. Glen didn't lose a lover that day, but the following day, when Glen returned from town to the Eire farm, she was met with an unpleasant surprise: her father, shot dead by three toxic bullets, his wounds burnt as if by acid and his face contorted with pain even in death. The message was clear: the Rounds weren't about to forgive her, or the Pinchers. This was a threat. They'd first kill everyone who mattered to Glen, then go after her. This was confirmed when a Roundsman stepped out of the shadows to deliver an ultimatum: leave Grumall, never come back, or they'd make her leave by killing anyone and everything that might mean something to her.
A tearful, resentful, guilty Glen accepted the offer, not knowing what else to do and not caring enough to try to find another way, not after seeing her father shot dead. Her father hadn't even known she was a Pincher. He'd thought Glen had grown out of picking pockets years ago, believed she'd got a part time job in town and stayed with her employer's family whenever she was away from home for long periods of time. She'd lied to him masterfully, and all that had gotten him was three bullets and an excruciatingly painful death. And no goodbyes. This seemed like proof that her dad was right all those years and she really did bring death to those she got too close to.
With a hardened heart, Glen was gone in the direction of Vermallia, the shining capital of Vermall, that very same day. She said no goodbyes to Kagan or any of the other Pinchers, since there was no need to put their lives in further danger because of her. Once in Vermallia, Glen was stunned once again by its splendor, its electric lights, its steamcarriages, and the way every street and every building seemed to be gilded. The shock of the architecture and technology didn't last for too long, though, and neither did her money. Her skills in pickpocketing and shoplifting helped, but if she didn't want to live on the streets she would need to do something more. Conveniently, the answer to this problem came to her completely on accident when she was propositioned one night. Thinking that there were a lot of jobs that were harder and paid less than having sex, she grudgingly accepted and got enough that night to purchase a down-payment on her first flat. Whatever was left of her childhood had been promptly lost when her father was murdered, but if there had been any left after that, selling herself would have diminished it for good.
This was how Glen Eire became a prostitute at the age of seventeen. It took her a few months to really settle into it, but she found that once she had, the job was almost ridiculously easy. The men who paid her all wanted something, and if she gave them what they wanted she could get more than just the agreed upon sum of money if she was lucky. She could stick around after and listen to a customer drone on about his life, his problems, his business... and sometimes, a customer might tell her something he shouldn't. Something that if it got into the wrong hands would harm him greatly. Something that someone else would pay her hundreds, or even thousands, to know.
It was in this way that Glen started selling secrets. Months, and then years, passed. She became well known in the underworld. Anyone who wanted dirt on a competitor or wanted to discredit a politician knew someone who knew someone who knew the Secret-Seller, a so far 100% accurate information broker. Glen had a few regular buyers, and even ran a few auctions for information she'd gleaned through her rather unconventional means.
Occasionally, when their secrets came out Glen's former customers might remember what they'd happened to let slip to the cute whore they'd slept with a few weeks back, but this was rare. And if they did, Glen was smart about it. She always covered her tracks, and often altered her appearance so that she couldn't be recognized the second time around except by the most observant customer. Besides, Vermallia was not like Grumall, its population totaled in the millions, and it was easy for a single woman to disappear and reappear at her convenience.
This is the life Glen has built for herself over the past two years. She's now nineteen, and has recently unknowingly been bought by Vermall's crown prince. She'd managed to squeeze some important-sounding information about the transportation of a steamcarriage full of tax refunds travelling from the capital into the plains region from him, but little did she known that selling this information would lead to an assassination attempt on the prince. She had incorrectly assumed that the money would be the object of interest and had not known or realized that the prince would be travelling with the tax refunds. She hadn't even known that the man she'd slept with and gathered the information from was the prince at all.
The prince, luckily, had faked his own death, having been tipped off about possibility of an attempt on his life just in time. Unfortunately for Glen, however, Prince Conan is one of the smart ones who realizes in hindsight just who he'd let his secret slip to, and he is rich and powerful enough to track her down.
It's just before he confronts Glen about her betrayal to crown and country that I am taking her from.
Character PERSONALITY:
Glen's is the type of character whose personality comes across best when her story is told through the first person. There's just so much you'll miss otherwise, like sarcastic, witty comments and strategic insults that she knows better than to say aloud most of the time. She puts on airs for most people, a habit that she's gotten into since becoming a courtesan, and they're convincing. She's a great actress who can seem to be any sort of woman, but unless she's really trying hard, a little bit of herself can and does come through. That person is a little complicated.
Glen has been mired in guilt since the moment she was born, thanks to her mother's death during childbirth. This is something that, as a child, she'd think of and consider often, and even though it's something she doesn't think of often anymore, it has lead to some self esteem issues that aren't necessarily immediately obvious. She literally thinks that getting too close to her is an invitation for death. It happened to her mother, it happened to her father, and it would have happened to her friends in the Pinchers had she not left Grumall. Glen's life now is a constant exercise of pulling people in close and then pushing them away and sometimes betraying their misplaced trust afterwards. Obviously, the idea that she brings death is not true, it's just a superstition based on the insecurity she carries. Even so, the things she does in her life, from getting involved in gangs to becoming a seller of secrets, help to make her prophecy self-fulfilling. It's true, what people say about your attitude on life -- if you have a negative attitude, it will reflect in your actions and bring more negativity into your life. This holds especially true for Glen, who now views her life as a constant struggle to simply make it in the world, and who refuses to let anyone get close enough to be her friend and truly know her.
This leads to severe loneliness, though. Glen accepted long ago that she isn't a normal girl, she can't have the normal things that other people have, like family and friends and a normal career. She tells herself she's fine with this, but deep down it bothers her immensely. Deep down she is incredibly lonely, but she pushes others away for what she believes is their own good -- literally the only moral high ground she believes herself to possess. The idea that this is a good thing that she's doing, and that she's protecting people by allowing herself not to get close to anyone, makes her feel like a martyr and allows herself to be able to do it, even through the pain of loneliness. This is the only good thing she does for others, the only thing that makes her a somewhat decent person, so she grins and bears it so she can sleep at night, even though Glen is, by nature, a fairly outgoing person. There's a reason she doesn't mind prostituting herself, after all, and it's not just that it brings her an opportunity to earn a lot of money (though Glen does like money very much). With her job, she can mimic the close relationships she lacks in her personal life with little or no risk involved. It's a mutually beneficial set up, as far as she's concerned. She doesn't really care about most of her clients, but they do give her the social interaction she craves. Being around people energizes her and fulfills her, even though she may harbor an attitude of disdain towards most people, believing most of them are fools just waiting to be used.
Glen's sense of empathy is a bit warped. It exists, but she justifies her use of others and the selling of their secrets by convincing herself that they deserved it for trusting someone they know nothing about. A lot of her clients are relatively innocent and naive, and it's Glen's belief that no one should be this way. Everyone should be just paranoid enough not to let important things slip to anyone whose business it isn't. It's common sense to her, and she just can't understand how it isn't common sense for everyone. Even so, it's hard not to feel a bit of pity for the idiots she takes advantage of. She can only hope they're a bit smarter and more careful with information that could hurt them in the future.
Enough about Glen's behavior on the job and the justifications she finds for her preferred method of bringing home the bacon, though. It's just as important to understand how Glen acts when she's alone and not on the job, if not more important. I mentioned earlier her insecurity and fears about getting close to others. Glen prefers living alone and enjoys spending her free time on activities that don't require other people, like gardening and occasionally reading, though she's not much of a classical intellectual and prefers fiction to nonfiction and booklearning. Being around other people for any extended period of time when she's not working makes her a little anxious, and depending on the person and their personality and intentions, she can definitely be a bit rude or snappish. People who mean well are met with kindness from Glen most of the time, though, it's only the annoying people, the people who want her money or her time, the passive-aggressive and the just plain aggressive people who she really can't stand.
Glen isn't afraid to curse or pick fights with people when the situation warrants it. Outright cruelty of the physical variety is something she definitely can't stand. It reminds her too much of the scuffles the Pinchers and the Rounds got into, which reminds her of how those scuffles unfortunately cumulated in her father's gruesome murder. If she witnesses an assault, she'll likely interfere if she thinks there's a chance she can help. In a fight, Glen actually isn't that bad. She knows her way with a dagger and can move surprisingly fast. She's very light on her feet. But obviously fighting outright is not her forte, especially against people much physically stronger than she is. She knows that her real strength is in her words. If she can convince a bully to stop beating on his victim, that's preferable to a more violent outcome.
I mentioned before how Glen prefers paranoia to naivete, and how could this not be the case considering her past? Glen is a woman who thinks carefully about her actions and chooses her words carefully as well. She's a logical thinker who is hell bent on never getting hurt and never getting anyone she cares about hurt. She's also incredibly determined and single-minded in how she approaches problems. She is willing to do almost anything, even things that most people would find immoral or grotesque, to reach her goals. Stealing, whoring, manipulating... all of these are valid tactics and ways of survival for Glen. She draws the line at actually physically hurting people, but even then sometimes that is inevitable. She also conveniently doesn't think too much about who she's selling her information to and whether or not her clients might be hurt physically by the information she sells. Most of the time, they aren't, and that's good enough. She focuses on that, otherwise her guilt might get in the way. This is the only naivete she allows herself, and it settles in the back of her mind like a slow-growing cancer, sure to grow malignant at some unspecified time in the near future.
Glen would love to believe she could do this forever, live alone, take advantage of people when it suits her, but that's just not the case. Deep down, she's a very insecure person with a paralyzing fear of allowing people to get too close. Add to that a slowly growing fear that what she's doing is wrong and has the potential to seriously hurt people or even cause the whole kingdom to fall, and you've got a catalyst for disaster. Glen is still growing and still learning, even though she'd love to believe that she knows all about the world's dark side, she has yet to discover its lighter side and how she could possibly one day become part of it without sacrificing everything she is and all she knows about the world's dark underbelly.
» EXSILIUM INFORMATION
Chosen WEAPON:. Glen's weapon of choice will be a Scottish Gaelic Sgain Dubhs dagger knife, like this. She'll be picking this out from the armory. The weapon would evolve by tiers. The first tier would be subtle guidance from the knife, where it would sort of guide Glen's hand when she uses it, teaching her new techniques bit by bit. The second tier would allow for the knife to come back to her like a boomerang when thrown. The third and final tier would grant Glen the power to become virtually invisible using cloaking technology for up to one hour. After an hour, the knife would need a recharge period of about a day before she could use the invisibility function again. These powers will stack. For example, the knife can still guide her hand and come back when thrown even when she's reached the third tier. As soon as the knife leaves her person, however, she will become visible again if using the invisibility cloak. This means if she wants to use the knife while remaining invisible, she can't throw it. (...by the way, if these powers are too far-fetched, I'd be happy to edit them, but I'd rather be a little too liberal at first with the knife's powers than not liberal enough!)
Character INVENTORY: A red silk and chiffon gown, sheer stockings, and heeled shoes, as well as several gold rope necklaces and classy hanging earrings. Beneath her gown -- cleverly incorporated into her corset, in fact -- are two hidden items, a very small knife and a tiny spray bottle of mace. She won't be carrying any money or anything particularly useful other than the knife and mace.
» PREVIOUS GAME INFORMATION ( IF APPLICABLE )
Previous GAME(s): None, so I'm omitting the rest of this section.
» SAMPLES
First PERSON:
[ The following is an email meant to be sent to the leaders of Exsilium. Unfortunately, Glen is still new and unfamiliar with the technology she is using and this ends up posted to the network instead. ]
*venerable* leaders of exsilium,
i've looked through the archives (only a little bit and never for more than ten minutes at a time since it gets boring and tedious) and i think i finally understand. this war is just like the conflict between vermall and the frabian archipelago. long and hopeless and desperate and full of a lot of hate and ill intent.
i never cared much for politics back home and i am not going to start caring now. you say my world is in danger but i see no proof. you lead me into a room full of weapons and ask me to choose. but actually that choice is a lie, isn't it? very clever. taken against our will, thrust into a situation we have no hope of understanding, at least not at first, feeling powerless and confused, you offer a choice for us. a choice of weapon, as if the knife i picked up represents something more. when really, if you're up against a nation as powerful as the archives seem to suggest, what is one young woman with a knife supposed to do, exactly? congratulations, you won, you succeeded, you made me feel better for perhaps the better part of half an hour after giving me the knife, but now i find myself doubting. doubting *strongly*.
this is an intriguing game you're playing but i want no part of it. am i to understand you can't send me back? excuse me if i find that assertion horse shit. your machine can reverse this, it has to. i am not suited for war and i am not putting my neck at risk for you.
unwillingly yours until such a time as you see fit to release me,
glendala eire
Third PERSON:
Glen follows her guide, her eyebrows narrowed at the woman the entire time. She's dressed like a priest, which is odd, but that is a minor oddity compared to the rest of this. She doesn't trust this woman... it's something in her eyes, and the way she's smiles without it reaching them. Glen knows that look. Her own eyes used to look like that when she smiled falsely. Sometimes they still do, but for the most part she's trained herself out of it. It's foolish to fully trust someone with those eyes, and it's even harder to guess their intentions. It could be Glen's priest-woman guide is just having a bad day, maybe has a bad case of menstrual cramping today. Or it could be that she's walking further into a trap the priest-woman and her Exsilium people have set up. Glen remains on her guard, listening to her guide talk but not really digesting all of it yet. It seems she'd been correct to be cautious when alarms sound in her head as they walk straight into a room full to the brim with various weapons.
Is this it, then? Eyes wide, her heart jumps in her chest as she surveys the weapons, everything sharp and blunted and heavy and light, everything quick and dirty and deadly that the human mind could possibly fathom, and even a few that defy imagination. Which of these is the strange priest-woman going to attack her with? Will she get a chance to defend herself? Glen swallows, feeling her heart in her throat, beating quick and hot. Her eyes fall to a nearby table, to a blade with a knotted hilt and a red gem at the base, and she grabs it, unsheathing it and assuming a dual purpose offensive-defensive pose.
For a moment, she hesitates. It almost feels as if the knife is sizing her up, as if it acknowledges her and is slowly coming to the conclusion that yes, she's really quite all right and it wants to help her... which is ridiculous. Absolutely mucking bonkers. Glen shakes this thought from her mind, hoping that the momentary distraction from the problem at hand won't have cost her precious time, or worse, her life.
When she meets the priest-woman's eyes again, however, it's curious. Her smile is now reaching her eyes. She approves, Glen realizes with a start, surprised at once out of her adrenaline rush.
"I was going to offer you plenty of time to think about which sentient weapon you'd like to take from the armory to aid you in the battles to come, but it appears as though you don't require it. Am I correct?" The amusement in her voice is practically palpable.
"What?" Glen asks incredulously. It's not the most eloquent she's ever been, but the events of the past ten minutes or so have thrown her so far out of the loop that she might as well be luau-looping on Mars while starting to go brain-dead from the lack of oxygen
Her guide simply sighs, though her smile doesn't fade and it's still reaching her eyes. She's either being honest, now, or she's a better actress than Glen had initially thought. "I will explain again. This time, I'd advise you to pay closer attention."
And so, she does. Let it not be said that Glen Eire doesn't have an ear and eye for details and a mind interested in acquiring knowledge essential for survival.
» ADDITIONAL NOTES
I just want to repeat that I realize the evolutions for Glen's knife might be far-fetched. Just say the word and it will be toned down! And thanks for looking over this ridiculously long app.
For more information on Glen's world that was not present in the original app for this game,
» WORLD INFO
For reference while you're reading this section, here is, an extremely rough map of the island kingdom of Vermall and its surrounding countries: http://oi49.tinypic.com/5uhhjm.jpg
Picture earth around the year 1900. Now picture an earth that isn't reliant on fossil fuels such as coal and oil. Machinery functions via steam and clockwork, and what little electricity exists in this time period is generated using water power and wind mills. Since this technology isn't viable everywhere, however, only some cities and some buildings within those cities have electricity. Vermallia, capital of the Island Kingdom of Vermall, is one of the largest and most technologically advanced among these. It boasts not only the most buildings with electricity, but also the most steam-powered cars, called steamcarriages, and trains too.
The earth that Glen knows has a geography sort of similar to that of the earth we know, but plate tectonics have shaped the continents in ways that make them almost indistinguishable compared to the seven we know. The coastlines and size of the oceans and seas are completely different. Vermall's location is approximately where you'd expect the British isles to be, but instead of Ireland there's a small archipelago of islands called Frabia to the northwest. To the south, where you might expect to find Europe, you'll find Euroa instead, a continent consisting of eighteen sovereign nations. To the east is Easia, south of Euroa is Afrikans, and far to the west you'll find the New World. An equivalent of Australia does not exist, and neither does Antarctica. They exist as landmasses still connected to the existing continents, which did not break apart as much as our own continents did due to the slightly different plate tectonics of this version of earth. This different geography was enough for ancient human beings to develop in a totally different direction than our own early cultures, resulting in different nations, languages, and religions forming, in addition to the different technologies.
As far as culture is concerned, there are a few subtle and major differences to note. I will be focusing on the culture of Vermall, since Glen has never left her kingdom and the details of any cultures in and around Euroa are unlikely to be relevant. Vermall is run as a traditional monarchy, with a royal family who have been in control of the island for almost two thousand years. The power of the monarchy has been subsiding over the past few centuries as Vermall slowly but surely developed beyond the limitations of a pure monarchy. There are political movements in play in the current time to introduce an elected body to make political decisions that directly affect the common people, though the King has been reluctant to give up the royal family's power so quickly, especially with the Frabians being more aggressive than ever as of late.
The history of Vermall and the Frabian Archipelago runs deep, and they've been enemies since the ancient times. The ruling religion throughout Euroa is one very similar to modern day Judaism. There is belief in a single god, though the individual practices and tenets vary from any modern monotheistic faith in our world. The tension between Vermall and Frabia began when ancient Vermese mercenaries attempted to travel to Frabia and convert the locals there. The Frabians were set in their ways, worshipping their own gods, most notably their Mountain Goddess. Various Euroan nations besides Vermall also attempted to convert the citizens of the Archipelago, but to no avail. This effectively isolated the Frabian Archipelago, but the proximity of their islands to Vermall meant that they could send ships to intercept trade between Vermall and Euroa. You can see how a milleniums-long rivalry could develop between the two nations, then. Most Vermese would think nothing twice of spitting on a Frabian.
Moving on from historical rivalries, it's worth mentioning that despite this blind hate for Frabians, on the whole the people of Vermall are relatively accepting and respectful of civil rights. People of different races, colors, and even religious creeds can live in Vermall's cities unharassed, and the status of women in Vermall and much of Euroa on the whole is comparable to the status of women in our time and culture. They are respected, most hold decent jobs with decent pay, and they are also starting to work their way into seats of power within the government and military. It's not as if Glen couldn't have found a job to occupy herself other than becoming a courtesan, but desperation, a need for quick cash, and a sneaking suspicion that she'd be pretty good at it cemented her decision to get involved in that business rather than something more legitimate and respectable.
Player NAME: Missa
Current AGE: 25
Player TIME ZONE: EST
Personal JOURNAL:
superegoIM & SERVICE: AIM: fallingrapids (rarely used)
Player PLURK:
Current CHARACTERS: None.
» CHARACTER INFORMATION
Character NAME: Glendala "Glen" Eire
Character PULL-POINT: After the attempted assassination of Vermall's crown prince, just before Glen is confronted by him in her flat.
Character AGE: 19
Character ABILITIES:
Glen is two things by profession: a courtesan, and a sort of information broker on top of that. She sells the information she learns about her clients while they are getting to know each other intimately to the highest bidder. This requires a rather unique set of skills.
As a courtesan, Glen has had two years of almost nightly encounters to help her learn not just the obvious bedroom skills, but also acting. She knows how to become almost any sort of woman you can dream of, and can act much better than most despite not having any stage training. The training she endured involved much higher stakes than most stage actors can imagine, and the learning curve was steep, but Glen's been a great liar for all her life so it came to her naturally with time.
Coupled with the acting and lying is her ability to manipulate others into revealing information that they might not normally share with a stranger. Her job is perfect for this -- when you're lying with someone, your walls are already well on their way down and you're very likely to be stupid and say something you shouldn't. Secrets sometimes spill out. Glen has perfected her technique so that the probability of her clients revealing some juicy piece of valuable information, whether they be business secrets or personal scandals, increases several fold with the help of her silver tongue.
Glen possesses several other less-than-legal skills, too. She wasn't always a courtesan, but she has been a pickpocket since the age of eight, as well as a minor thief. She's stealthy and subtle in everything she does, and therefore almost never gets caught. Time spent as part of a local gang when she was younger means that she's picked up some self defense skills and knows how to handle daggers and knives, too, but she's not so good at fighting and more often than not will retreat if she encounters a situation she doesn't believe she can win.
As for skills that did not originate in the underground, Glen grew up on a farm and therefore knows more than a little about growing and harvesting crops. These days, she doesn't really draw upon that knowledge beyond keeping a potted herb garden in her flat.
Character HISTORY:
Glen was born on her family's farm on the outskirts of a small town called Grumall, located in central Vermall. Her mother died giving birth to her in childbirth, leaving her father a much more bitter man and an occasional drunk who on a bad day would blame his daughter for his wife's death and the family's troubles. The Eires didn't have much while Glen was growing up. They tended the farm together once Glen was old enough to work, and traveled only occasionally to sell their crops. For the most part, their crops were bought and sold locally in Grumall, so from a young age Glen knew the road to and from the farm into town. Once she was a bit older, Glen went to school in town, though she quit when she turned fourteen and finished her eighth year, the same as most small town girls and boys.
Long before she quit school, however, when she was eight years old, Glen started to get involved in a few activities that had little to do with harvesting crops or doing arithmetic homework. As was mentioned previously, the Eires didn't really have much in the way of income. This was mostly thanks to the family being incredibly short-handed when it came to doing the farmwork. An aging man without much money to hire farmhands and a little girl who is often out in town going to school are not able to man a farm effectively. This meant that they were losing money with each coming year. Glen decided to do something about this, since even though she was still very young, she wasn't stupid and could see what was going on.
She started picking pockets. The townspeople didn't often carry much that was of value, but she managed to pick enough that she and her father didn't have to worry as much about affording food and basic necessities anymore. And luckily, Glen was good at it. She could read people well, knew just what to say on the rare occasion that she got caught -- "Oh, did you drop this?" or even sometimes the fake-tearful "I'm so sorry! I'll never do it again!".
This state of affairs continued until Glen left school at fourteen, but as the Eires grew poorer and the farm became more of a liability than an asset, Glen's father's attitude became even worse. She was never defenseless around him -- in fact, Glen learned most of her more colorful curses and insults from her old man at his worst, and was not at all afraid of using them against him when he went too far. Even so, though, Glen found that she couldn't stay at home when things got too heated with her father. She still loved him, and still wanted to help him and make up for the pain she'd caused (years of her father blaming her for her mother's death left a very strong impact), but she could not remain there and would often disappear for days on end.
Where did she go? Well, it turns out that even smaller towns have a few young people wishing to imitate the gangs found in the big city, and Glen's skills meant she had an instant in to one of Grumall's two main gangs, the Pinchers. Among the Pinchers was an old school friend of Glen's named Kagan. The two of them got on pretty well, and he even introduced her to more serious forms of thievery, though as it happens he taught her several other things that would prove even more useful to her in the future. This was mainly because Kagan was Glen's first boyfriend, and her first ever lover. While she was with Kagan, Glen learned the basics of being with a man, and not just sexually. There's a song and dance, a give and take, a process of flirtation and withdrawal involved in being someone's lover that Glen learned during this time and perfected in later years.
Despite her issues with her father during these few years and the danger involved in being a part of a gang and committing petty crime, the years Glen spent with the Pinchers were some of her favorite. There was a sense of camaraderie in the gang, almost a sense of family. Since she'd never quite had the best relationship with her dad, this was refreshing.
It was very unfortunate, then, when it all inevitably came crashing down.
It started when Glen picked a fight with the head of Grumall's second gang, the Toxic Rounds. Said head was a burly young woman over twice Glen's size named Rois. What Glen thought was mostly harmless posturing, however, really set Rois off. Gang violence increased in Grumall over the coming weeks, to the point where Glen didn't feel safe going into town without some sort of disguise. The Toxic Rounds were, on the whole, a lot tougher and meaner than Glen's own Pinchers, and it was rumored that the name of the gang was cautionary -- the Rounds were hiding real toxic ammunition that they wouldn't hesitate to use on somebody who really deserved it.
This was Grumall, however. The Rounds were mean, yes, but they weren't deadly. Grumall hadn't seen a murder in nearly ten years. This was what Glen told herself, but in reality the violence was getting progressively worse. The Pinchers and Rounds were graduating from fistfights to breaking bones to stabbing with daggers. If even one of them owned a gun, the Pinchers were all in agreement that they couldn't last long against them. A surrender was planned after Rois and her Rounds stabbed one of the Pinchers, causing him to nearly bleed to death.
The surrender went poorly from the start. Several of the Rounds and Pinchers top members were in attendance -- Glen and Kagan among the Pinchers and Rois and her top lieutenants among the Rounds. The gangs met up at a neutral location, the roof of a warehouse on the far end of town. The meeting ended with much name-calling and threats from the Toxic Rounds, and when Rois pulled a gun, pointing it at Glen, Kagan was the first to put himself between her and it. This amused Rois, who lowered her weapon, but she wasn't finished. The Pinchers had pissed her off, and they weren't the only ones getting hurt by this feud. The difference was, as far as Rois was concerned, this had all started when Glen had picked a fight with her.
It was Glen who'd have to pay the price for that. Glen didn't lose a lover that day, but the following day, when Glen returned from town to the Eire farm, she was met with an unpleasant surprise: her father, shot dead by three toxic bullets, his wounds burnt as if by acid and his face contorted with pain even in death. The message was clear: the Rounds weren't about to forgive her, or the Pinchers. This was a threat. They'd first kill everyone who mattered to Glen, then go after her. This was confirmed when a Roundsman stepped out of the shadows to deliver an ultimatum: leave Grumall, never come back, or they'd make her leave by killing anyone and everything that might mean something to her.
A tearful, resentful, guilty Glen accepted the offer, not knowing what else to do and not caring enough to try to find another way, not after seeing her father shot dead. Her father hadn't even known she was a Pincher. He'd thought Glen had grown out of picking pockets years ago, believed she'd got a part time job in town and stayed with her employer's family whenever she was away from home for long periods of time. She'd lied to him masterfully, and all that had gotten him was three bullets and an excruciatingly painful death. And no goodbyes. This seemed like proof that her dad was right all those years and she really did bring death to those she got too close to.
With a hardened heart, Glen was gone in the direction of Vermallia, the shining capital of Vermall, that very same day. She said no goodbyes to Kagan or any of the other Pinchers, since there was no need to put their lives in further danger because of her. Once in Vermallia, Glen was stunned once again by its splendor, its electric lights, its steamcarriages, and the way every street and every building seemed to be gilded. The shock of the architecture and technology didn't last for too long, though, and neither did her money. Her skills in pickpocketing and shoplifting helped, but if she didn't want to live on the streets she would need to do something more. Conveniently, the answer to this problem came to her completely on accident when she was propositioned one night. Thinking that there were a lot of jobs that were harder and paid less than having sex, she grudgingly accepted and got enough that night to purchase a down-payment on her first flat. Whatever was left of her childhood had been promptly lost when her father was murdered, but if there had been any left after that, selling herself would have diminished it for good.
This was how Glen Eire became a prostitute at the age of seventeen. It took her a few months to really settle into it, but she found that once she had, the job was almost ridiculously easy. The men who paid her all wanted something, and if she gave them what they wanted she could get more than just the agreed upon sum of money if she was lucky. She could stick around after and listen to a customer drone on about his life, his problems, his business... and sometimes, a customer might tell her something he shouldn't. Something that if it got into the wrong hands would harm him greatly. Something that someone else would pay her hundreds, or even thousands, to know.
It was in this way that Glen started selling secrets. Months, and then years, passed. She became well known in the underworld. Anyone who wanted dirt on a competitor or wanted to discredit a politician knew someone who knew someone who knew the Secret-Seller, a so far 100% accurate information broker. Glen had a few regular buyers, and even ran a few auctions for information she'd gleaned through her rather unconventional means.
Occasionally, when their secrets came out Glen's former customers might remember what they'd happened to let slip to the cute whore they'd slept with a few weeks back, but this was rare. And if they did, Glen was smart about it. She always covered her tracks, and often altered her appearance so that she couldn't be recognized the second time around except by the most observant customer. Besides, Vermallia was not like Grumall, its population totaled in the millions, and it was easy for a single woman to disappear and reappear at her convenience.
This is the life Glen has built for herself over the past two years. She's now nineteen, and has recently unknowingly been bought by Vermall's crown prince. She'd managed to squeeze some important-sounding information about the transportation of a steamcarriage full of tax refunds travelling from the capital into the plains region from him, but little did she known that selling this information would lead to an assassination attempt on the prince. She had incorrectly assumed that the money would be the object of interest and had not known or realized that the prince would be travelling with the tax refunds. She hadn't even known that the man she'd slept with and gathered the information from was the prince at all.
The prince, luckily, had faked his own death, having been tipped off about possibility of an attempt on his life just in time. Unfortunately for Glen, however, Prince Conan is one of the smart ones who realizes in hindsight just who he'd let his secret slip to, and he is rich and powerful enough to track her down.
It's just before he confronts Glen about her betrayal to crown and country that I am taking her from.
Character PERSONALITY:
Glen's is the type of character whose personality comes across best when her story is told through the first person. There's just so much you'll miss otherwise, like sarcastic, witty comments and strategic insults that she knows better than to say aloud most of the time. She puts on airs for most people, a habit that she's gotten into since becoming a courtesan, and they're convincing. She's a great actress who can seem to be any sort of woman, but unless she's really trying hard, a little bit of herself can and does come through. That person is a little complicated.
Glen has been mired in guilt since the moment she was born, thanks to her mother's death during childbirth. This is something that, as a child, she'd think of and consider often, and even though it's something she doesn't think of often anymore, it has lead to some self esteem issues that aren't necessarily immediately obvious. She literally thinks that getting too close to her is an invitation for death. It happened to her mother, it happened to her father, and it would have happened to her friends in the Pinchers had she not left Grumall. Glen's life now is a constant exercise of pulling people in close and then pushing them away and sometimes betraying their misplaced trust afterwards. Obviously, the idea that she brings death is not true, it's just a superstition based on the insecurity she carries. Even so, the things she does in her life, from getting involved in gangs to becoming a seller of secrets, help to make her prophecy self-fulfilling. It's true, what people say about your attitude on life -- if you have a negative attitude, it will reflect in your actions and bring more negativity into your life. This holds especially true for Glen, who now views her life as a constant struggle to simply make it in the world, and who refuses to let anyone get close enough to be her friend and truly know her.
This leads to severe loneliness, though. Glen accepted long ago that she isn't a normal girl, she can't have the normal things that other people have, like family and friends and a normal career. She tells herself she's fine with this, but deep down it bothers her immensely. Deep down she is incredibly lonely, but she pushes others away for what she believes is their own good -- literally the only moral high ground she believes herself to possess. The idea that this is a good thing that she's doing, and that she's protecting people by allowing herself not to get close to anyone, makes her feel like a martyr and allows herself to be able to do it, even through the pain of loneliness. This is the only good thing she does for others, the only thing that makes her a somewhat decent person, so she grins and bears it so she can sleep at night, even though Glen is, by nature, a fairly outgoing person. There's a reason she doesn't mind prostituting herself, after all, and it's not just that it brings her an opportunity to earn a lot of money (though Glen does like money very much). With her job, she can mimic the close relationships she lacks in her personal life with little or no risk involved. It's a mutually beneficial set up, as far as she's concerned. She doesn't really care about most of her clients, but they do give her the social interaction she craves. Being around people energizes her and fulfills her, even though she may harbor an attitude of disdain towards most people, believing most of them are fools just waiting to be used.
Glen's sense of empathy is a bit warped. It exists, but she justifies her use of others and the selling of their secrets by convincing herself that they deserved it for trusting someone they know nothing about. A lot of her clients are relatively innocent and naive, and it's Glen's belief that no one should be this way. Everyone should be just paranoid enough not to let important things slip to anyone whose business it isn't. It's common sense to her, and she just can't understand how it isn't common sense for everyone. Even so, it's hard not to feel a bit of pity for the idiots she takes advantage of. She can only hope they're a bit smarter and more careful with information that could hurt them in the future.
Enough about Glen's behavior on the job and the justifications she finds for her preferred method of bringing home the bacon, though. It's just as important to understand how Glen acts when she's alone and not on the job, if not more important. I mentioned earlier her insecurity and fears about getting close to others. Glen prefers living alone and enjoys spending her free time on activities that don't require other people, like gardening and occasionally reading, though she's not much of a classical intellectual and prefers fiction to nonfiction and booklearning. Being around other people for any extended period of time when she's not working makes her a little anxious, and depending on the person and their personality and intentions, she can definitely be a bit rude or snappish. People who mean well are met with kindness from Glen most of the time, though, it's only the annoying people, the people who want her money or her time, the passive-aggressive and the just plain aggressive people who she really can't stand.
Glen isn't afraid to curse or pick fights with people when the situation warrants it. Outright cruelty of the physical variety is something she definitely can't stand. It reminds her too much of the scuffles the Pinchers and the Rounds got into, which reminds her of how those scuffles unfortunately cumulated in her father's gruesome murder. If she witnesses an assault, she'll likely interfere if she thinks there's a chance she can help. In a fight, Glen actually isn't that bad. She knows her way with a dagger and can move surprisingly fast. She's very light on her feet. But obviously fighting outright is not her forte, especially against people much physically stronger than she is. She knows that her real strength is in her words. If she can convince a bully to stop beating on his victim, that's preferable to a more violent outcome.
I mentioned before how Glen prefers paranoia to naivete, and how could this not be the case considering her past? Glen is a woman who thinks carefully about her actions and chooses her words carefully as well. She's a logical thinker who is hell bent on never getting hurt and never getting anyone she cares about hurt. She's also incredibly determined and single-minded in how she approaches problems. She is willing to do almost anything, even things that most people would find immoral or grotesque, to reach her goals. Stealing, whoring, manipulating... all of these are valid tactics and ways of survival for Glen. She draws the line at actually physically hurting people, but even then sometimes that is inevitable. She also conveniently doesn't think too much about who she's selling her information to and whether or not her clients might be hurt physically by the information she sells. Most of the time, they aren't, and that's good enough. She focuses on that, otherwise her guilt might get in the way. This is the only naivete she allows herself, and it settles in the back of her mind like a slow-growing cancer, sure to grow malignant at some unspecified time in the near future.
Glen would love to believe she could do this forever, live alone, take advantage of people when it suits her, but that's just not the case. Deep down, she's a very insecure person with a paralyzing fear of allowing people to get too close. Add to that a slowly growing fear that what she's doing is wrong and has the potential to seriously hurt people or even cause the whole kingdom to fall, and you've got a catalyst for disaster. Glen is still growing and still learning, even though she'd love to believe that she knows all about the world's dark side, she has yet to discover its lighter side and how she could possibly one day become part of it without sacrificing everything she is and all she knows about the world's dark underbelly.
» EXSILIUM INFORMATION
Chosen WEAPON:. Glen's weapon of choice will be a Scottish Gaelic Sgain Dubhs dagger knife, like this. She'll be picking this out from the armory. The weapon would evolve by tiers. The first tier would be subtle guidance from the knife, where it would sort of guide Glen's hand when she uses it, teaching her new techniques bit by bit. The second tier would allow for the knife to come back to her like a boomerang when thrown. The third and final tier would grant Glen the power to become virtually invisible using cloaking technology for up to one hour. After an hour, the knife would need a recharge period of about a day before she could use the invisibility function again. These powers will stack. For example, the knife can still guide her hand and come back when thrown even when she's reached the third tier. As soon as the knife leaves her person, however, she will become visible again if using the invisibility cloak. This means if she wants to use the knife while remaining invisible, she can't throw it. (...by the way, if these powers are too far-fetched, I'd be happy to edit them, but I'd rather be a little too liberal at first with the knife's powers than not liberal enough!)
Character INVENTORY: A red silk and chiffon gown, sheer stockings, and heeled shoes, as well as several gold rope necklaces and classy hanging earrings. Beneath her gown -- cleverly incorporated into her corset, in fact -- are two hidden items, a very small knife and a tiny spray bottle of mace. She won't be carrying any money or anything particularly useful other than the knife and mace.
» PREVIOUS GAME INFORMATION ( IF APPLICABLE )
Previous GAME(s): None, so I'm omitting the rest of this section.
» SAMPLES
First PERSON:
[ The following is an email meant to be sent to the leaders of Exsilium. Unfortunately, Glen is still new and unfamiliar with the technology she is using and this ends up posted to the network instead. ]
*venerable* leaders of exsilium,
i've looked through the archives (only a little bit and never for more than ten minutes at a time since it gets boring and tedious) and i think i finally understand. this war is just like the conflict between vermall and the frabian archipelago. long and hopeless and desperate and full of a lot of hate and ill intent.
i never cared much for politics back home and i am not going to start caring now. you say my world is in danger but i see no proof. you lead me into a room full of weapons and ask me to choose. but actually that choice is a lie, isn't it? very clever. taken against our will, thrust into a situation we have no hope of understanding, at least not at first, feeling powerless and confused, you offer a choice for us. a choice of weapon, as if the knife i picked up represents something more. when really, if you're up against a nation as powerful as the archives seem to suggest, what is one young woman with a knife supposed to do, exactly? congratulations, you won, you succeeded, you made me feel better for perhaps the better part of half an hour after giving me the knife, but now i find myself doubting. doubting *strongly*.
this is an intriguing game you're playing but i want no part of it. am i to understand you can't send me back? excuse me if i find that assertion horse shit. your machine can reverse this, it has to. i am not suited for war and i am not putting my neck at risk for you.
unwillingly yours until such a time as you see fit to release me,
glendala eire
Third PERSON:
Glen follows her guide, her eyebrows narrowed at the woman the entire time. She's dressed like a priest, which is odd, but that is a minor oddity compared to the rest of this. She doesn't trust this woman... it's something in her eyes, and the way she's smiles without it reaching them. Glen knows that look. Her own eyes used to look like that when she smiled falsely. Sometimes they still do, but for the most part she's trained herself out of it. It's foolish to fully trust someone with those eyes, and it's even harder to guess their intentions. It could be Glen's priest-woman guide is just having a bad day, maybe has a bad case of menstrual cramping today. Or it could be that she's walking further into a trap the priest-woman and her Exsilium people have set up. Glen remains on her guard, listening to her guide talk but not really digesting all of it yet. It seems she'd been correct to be cautious when alarms sound in her head as they walk straight into a room full to the brim with various weapons.
Is this it, then? Eyes wide, her heart jumps in her chest as she surveys the weapons, everything sharp and blunted and heavy and light, everything quick and dirty and deadly that the human mind could possibly fathom, and even a few that defy imagination. Which of these is the strange priest-woman going to attack her with? Will she get a chance to defend herself? Glen swallows, feeling her heart in her throat, beating quick and hot. Her eyes fall to a nearby table, to a blade with a knotted hilt and a red gem at the base, and she grabs it, unsheathing it and assuming a dual purpose offensive-defensive pose.
For a moment, she hesitates. It almost feels as if the knife is sizing her up, as if it acknowledges her and is slowly coming to the conclusion that yes, she's really quite all right and it wants to help her... which is ridiculous. Absolutely mucking bonkers. Glen shakes this thought from her mind, hoping that the momentary distraction from the problem at hand won't have cost her precious time, or worse, her life.
When she meets the priest-woman's eyes again, however, it's curious. Her smile is now reaching her eyes. She approves, Glen realizes with a start, surprised at once out of her adrenaline rush.
"I was going to offer you plenty of time to think about which sentient weapon you'd like to take from the armory to aid you in the battles to come, but it appears as though you don't require it. Am I correct?" The amusement in her voice is practically palpable.
"What?" Glen asks incredulously. It's not the most eloquent she's ever been, but the events of the past ten minutes or so have thrown her so far out of the loop that she might as well be luau-looping on Mars while starting to go brain-dead from the lack of oxygen
Her guide simply sighs, though her smile doesn't fade and it's still reaching her eyes. She's either being honest, now, or she's a better actress than Glen had initially thought. "I will explain again. This time, I'd advise you to pay closer attention."
And so, she does. Let it not be said that Glen Eire doesn't have an ear and eye for details and a mind interested in acquiring knowledge essential for survival.
» ADDITIONAL NOTES
I just want to repeat that I realize the evolutions for Glen's knife might be far-fetched. Just say the word and it will be toned down! And thanks for looking over this ridiculously long app.
For more information on Glen's world that was not present in the original app for this game,
» WORLD INFO
For reference while you're reading this section, here is, an extremely rough map of the island kingdom of Vermall and its surrounding countries: http://oi49.tinypic.com/5uhhjm.jpg
Picture earth around the year 1900. Now picture an earth that isn't reliant on fossil fuels such as coal and oil. Machinery functions via steam and clockwork, and what little electricity exists in this time period is generated using water power and wind mills. Since this technology isn't viable everywhere, however, only some cities and some buildings within those cities have electricity. Vermallia, capital of the Island Kingdom of Vermall, is one of the largest and most technologically advanced among these. It boasts not only the most buildings with electricity, but also the most steam-powered cars, called steamcarriages, and trains too.
The earth that Glen knows has a geography sort of similar to that of the earth we know, but plate tectonics have shaped the continents in ways that make them almost indistinguishable compared to the seven we know. The coastlines and size of the oceans and seas are completely different. Vermall's location is approximately where you'd expect the British isles to be, but instead of Ireland there's a small archipelago of islands called Frabia to the northwest. To the south, where you might expect to find Europe, you'll find Euroa instead, a continent consisting of eighteen sovereign nations. To the east is Easia, south of Euroa is Afrikans, and far to the west you'll find the New World. An equivalent of Australia does not exist, and neither does Antarctica. They exist as landmasses still connected to the existing continents, which did not break apart as much as our own continents did due to the slightly different plate tectonics of this version of earth. This different geography was enough for ancient human beings to develop in a totally different direction than our own early cultures, resulting in different nations, languages, and religions forming, in addition to the different technologies.
As far as culture is concerned, there are a few subtle and major differences to note. I will be focusing on the culture of Vermall, since Glen has never left her kingdom and the details of any cultures in and around Euroa are unlikely to be relevant. Vermall is run as a traditional monarchy, with a royal family who have been in control of the island for almost two thousand years. The power of the monarchy has been subsiding over the past few centuries as Vermall slowly but surely developed beyond the limitations of a pure monarchy. There are political movements in play in the current time to introduce an elected body to make political decisions that directly affect the common people, though the King has been reluctant to give up the royal family's power so quickly, especially with the Frabians being more aggressive than ever as of late.
The history of Vermall and the Frabian Archipelago runs deep, and they've been enemies since the ancient times. The ruling religion throughout Euroa is one very similar to modern day Judaism. There is belief in a single god, though the individual practices and tenets vary from any modern monotheistic faith in our world. The tension between Vermall and Frabia began when ancient Vermese mercenaries attempted to travel to Frabia and convert the locals there. The Frabians were set in their ways, worshipping their own gods, most notably their Mountain Goddess. Various Euroan nations besides Vermall also attempted to convert the citizens of the Archipelago, but to no avail. This effectively isolated the Frabian Archipelago, but the proximity of their islands to Vermall meant that they could send ships to intercept trade between Vermall and Euroa. You can see how a milleniums-long rivalry could develop between the two nations, then. Most Vermese would think nothing twice of spitting on a Frabian.
Moving on from historical rivalries, it's worth mentioning that despite this blind hate for Frabians, on the whole the people of Vermall are relatively accepting and respectful of civil rights. People of different races, colors, and even religious creeds can live in Vermall's cities unharassed, and the status of women in Vermall and much of Euroa on the whole is comparable to the status of women in our time and culture. They are respected, most hold decent jobs with decent pay, and they are also starting to work their way into seats of power within the government and military. It's not as if Glen couldn't have found a job to occupy herself other than becoming a courtesan, but desperation, a need for quick cash, and a sneaking suspicion that she'd be pretty good at it cemented her decision to get involved in that business rather than something more legitimate and respectable.