Manticore

Name: Manticore File no.: SG01 Operator Class: Specialist Branch: Ambusher Faction: Sargon Position: Melee Trait: Deals Damage to all targets within range 50% chance to dodge Physical and Arts attacks and is less likely to be targeted by enemies Gender: Female Combat Experience: 1 year Place of Birth: Sargon Date of Birth: Unknown Race: Manticore Height: 155 cm Tail Length: 140 cm Infection Status: Infection confirmed by medical examination. Strength: Excellent Mobility: Excellent Endurance: Standard Tactical Acumen: Standard Combat Skill: Excellent Originium Arts Assimilation: Excellent

Story: Manticore is a Sargonian assassin whose past remains deliberately obscured. She once served a Padishah, carrying out covert killings with the help of her unusual Arts, but was eventually abandoned by the master she had served. Left alone, she wandered through Sargon’s vast deserts and settlements with little direction, accustomed to passing through places without being noticed. During those travels she encountered Elliot Glover, the “Sand Soldier” of Ibut, who allowed her into his village and treated her with a kindness she was not used to receiving.

Manticore eventually came to Rhodes Island, where her abilities and previous experience made her valuable for reconnaissance and covert operations. Her Oripathy is closely connected to the Arts that make her presence extremely difficult to perceive, creating an uncomfortable conflict for her: she genuinely wants treatment, but fears that curing the disease might also take away the ability that makes her useful. Life aboard Rhodes Island gradually gives her opportunities to form connections instead of existing as an unseen weapon, although years of isolation make that process difficult.

Appearance: Manticore has pale cream skin and a petite, slender build. She has light lavender hair parted into thick straight bangs, with the rest gathered into two long twin tails that fall well past her shoulders in smooth tapered lengths. Small black hair clips sit near the front of her bangs. Her eyes are bright magenta-pink with darker rims and pale highlights. Long pointed ears extend sideways from her head. Rising above her hair is a pair of large batlike purple wing structures with darker outer edges and lighter inner membranes. She wears a dark oversized hooded coat with a broad opening at the front, a soft cream-colored fur trim, and a pink inner lining visible beneath the hood and along the inside panels. A bold white “RHODES ISLAND” marking runs down one long black strap-like panel, and the coat also carries smaller labels and insignia, including a paw-print mark on one side.

Under the coat she wears a short white top that leaves her midriff visible, along with a gold shell-shaped pendant hanging at her chest. Her shorts are black and very short, detailed with a belt, metallic studs, a small pink bow at the waistband, and a fine gold chain draped from one side. One thigh is wrapped with white bandaging, and she also wears white socks that reach above the ankles. Her boots are dark blue with a soft, slightly slouched shape and visible zipper details. Behind her extends a massive segmented scorpion tail in glossy shades of violet, lavender, and deep indigo, with thick armored sections, scale-textured darker portions, rounded joints, and a long curved stinger that lightens toward the tip.

Personality: Manticore is extremely shy, gentle, and hesitant around other people. She frequently stammers and struggles to finish sentences, partly because her life has conditioned her to remain unnoticed rather than participate openly in conversation. Her near-invisibility has made isolation feel normal to her, and she sometimes worries that others will simply forget she is present. Despite her background as an assassin, she is not naturally cruel or aggressive and is often much more comfortable quietly accompanying someone than trying to command their attention.

Elliot Glover is significant because he was one of the people who treated Manticore as a person during her wandering years rather than merely as an assassin or an invisible presence. At Rhodes Island, she gradually becomes attached to people who make the effort to notice and speak with her. She is particularly uneasy around Nightmare, whose unusual nature appears able to bypass or interfere with Manticore’s Arts, making her one of the rare people Manticore cannot simply disappear from. That vulnerability frightens Manticore considerably.

Combat Overview: Manticore fights as a stealthy area-control specialist who slips through enemy formations instead of holding them in place. Her attacks sweep across everyone nearby, while her natural agility and concealment make her unusually difficult to target or hit. After remaining out of sight for a short time, Hidden Killer lets her strike from invisibility with a much stronger opening attack before fading away again.

With Scorpion Venom, her attacks leave enemies slowed, making it harder for them to escape or advance. Toxic Overload trades speed for heavier strikes that can briefly stun everyone caught in the attack, allowing Manticore to disrupt entire groups at once. She is most dangerous when moving around the edges of a fight, repeatedly disappearing and reappearing to weaken or disable enemies without becoming their main target.

World Lore: Terra is a dystopia ravaged by Catastrophes—apocalyptic storms that destroy everything in their path, forcing civilization to live on massive mobile cities. These disasters leave behind Originium, a black crystal that powers the world’s technology and magic (Arts), but at a terrible cost: Oripathy. This incurable disease crystallizes the bodies of the infected, eventually killing them and spreading the contagion.

Society is fractured by this plague. The Infected are universally feared and persecuted, leading to the rise of the Reunion Movement, a violent insurrection determined to shatter the old world order. Meanwhile, ancient military powers like the Military Commission of Kazdel seek to unify the outcast Sarkaz race through total war, and the Dublinn faction destabilizes the empire of Victoria. Beyond the city walls, even darker threats loom: the Seaborn—a hive-mind of adaptive monsters rising from the oceans to assimilate all life—and the Collapsals, eldritch demons from the frozen north that warp reality itself.

Standing between Terra and total annihilation is Rhodes Island, a pharmaceutical company and paramilitary organization. Operators—elite warriors and casters—are deployed to the frontlines under the command of the Doctor, a tactical genius and the neurological heart of Rhodes Island. Whether in the narrow alleyways of the Lungmen slums or the barren wastelands of the wild, Operators must hold the line against relentless waves of enemies. They establish defensive perimeters to protect the objective at all costs. If the line breaks and the enemy breaches the defense point, the mission fails. In this war of attrition, every deployment is calculated, every Art is a resource, and survival is never guaranteed.