B A P H O M E T
 
Even amongst the elite mercenaries of the Shadow Dragons, Tyreal is known to be the best.

His giant Sword, which only he can handle, has extremely destructive power. He was said to have disappeared years ago, his current whereabouts are unknown.
 

 
The Code
 

Over the years, the demands of Strength, Honor, and Valor have grown into the six precepts of "the Code". I have learned them well, and always live by their injunction:
 

I. 

A ruler's mandate comes only through strength.

II. 

Weakness in the mighty is rewarded by death.

III. 

The weak must earn your protection and your loyalty.

IV. 

War is the only true expression of chivalry.

V. 

Avenge any slight or insult, however trivial.

VI.  

Death before dishonor.

 
"The Code" of the "True Knights" or Paladin's if you prefer, had long since failed - it presumes that we are all saints or gods ourselves, not mortals. Look at the beasts of the field and wild. Does the wolf show generosity to the lamb, or modestly defer to the bull? Never! He eats the one, and stalks the children of the other. The Gods made the races of Vana'diel out of earth, and so we are creatures of this world. The strong will prey upon the weak, and only the strong deserve to rule and survive.

Of the five virtues of "The Code", three are impossible to achieve in a world of war, and another is a fiction. Generosity is a luxury no true ruler can afford, Modesty a lie that belittles one's strength, and Mercy is a mistake. I am left with Valor, the highest virtue of all, and Justice. The "True Knights" seek some ethereal, transcendent ideal of fairness and call it Justice. It never existed, and it never will. The strong rule the weak, and the weak must serve in return for protection. Only the strongest party in a fight will win. This is Justice, the justice that is woven into every stone and beast in this world. Why should I not live by the same standard? Fairness is the stuff of sentiment, and will get you killed on the battlefield. Mercy and courtly love are for poets, not warriors.

 
Race: Galka
Sex: Male
Name: Tyreal
Synthesis: Fishermens'
Job: Paladin/Warrior
Age: 247
Weapon: Two Handed Swords
Height: 228cm
Birthplace: Windurst
Blood Type: A



"My armies are all slain. My homeland lies in ruins. My enemies have taken everything from me, all my wealth and power. But they could not kill me. I still walk the earth, weak but alive. They have taken everything but the beating of my undead heart. Now they will learn of fear, these mewing babies who thought they could destroy me. I shall regain my powers, and I shall come to them in the night. And my visits shall not be kind."



In the centuries before Tyreal's birth, the land was protected by an oligarchy of Summoners - guardians sworn to serve and protect the gate to the Underworld.

But the Underworld was infiltrated by the Shadow Lords beast men, and Sakura, the Guardian of Darkness was cruelly murdered. Her assassination sent psychic shockwaves throughout the Underworld, and in their derangement the remaining sorcerers turned their powers to dark purposes, poisoning the land with their sorcery and abandoning the gate of the Underworld to stand like a silent, decaying sentry.

Into this dying world Tyreal was born. The son of an aristocratic Windurst family, he lived the privileged life of a nobleman, never realizing his undiscovered destiny that he was marked from birth as Sakura’s successor, fated to take her place as the Guardian of Darkness.

Ignorant of his destiny, the ambitious but directionless Tyreal had risen through the ranks, and had become the leader of a powerful army fixated on helping the land of Vana'diel. In response to his ascension to peace, another faction known as the army of the Shadow Lord appeared in the land. The armies of the Shadow Lord are a group of militant and zealot beast men led by a mysterious and potent figure, known only as the Shadow Lord. Determined to wipe out the civilization of Vana'diel, the army of the Shadow Lord clashed with Tyreal's army over decades of blood-stained and infernal conflict. Eventually, this war ended when the army of the Shadow Lord triumphantly defeated Tyreal's army. In the final battle the Shadow Lord defeated Tyreal in mortal combat, impaling him on his own Sword. Tyreal was then tossed him off a cliff into an abyss of apparent demise.

Yet this was not to be so. Pure and true wickedness of Tyreal's ilk cannot be purged so easily.

After more than 200 years of drifting in a void of unconsciousness, Tyreal groggily awakens in a strange place, with almost no memory of his former self. The god of the Underworld had taken him and revived him to health after Tyreal's little recollected and deadly battle with the Shadow Lord. He is weak and has lost most of his former formidable powers. As Tyreal regains presence in the waking world, the god of the Underworld begins to fill him in on the events of his recent past, while fragments of his shattered memory return.

The god of the Underworld recounts to Tyreal that when his torn body was found, it was brought back to his homeland, the Federation of Windurst. In the two centuries that Tyreal had been dormant in hibernation the Shadow Lord has risen and taken fascist control over most of Vana'diel. Far from the great empire they once embodied, the people of the Federation of Windurst now exist only as a small resistance to the Shadow Lord. It is into this resistance that Tyreal emerges and is now, by brotherhood and lust for vengeance, a part of. The ambition of the resistance is simple: Slay the Shadow Lord and his armies will crumble.

Because the armies of the Shadow Lord have no knowledge of Tyreal's existence, he is the perfect agent to kill the Shadow Lord. Tyreal agrees to help the people of the Windurst for the time being, until which time he sees fit to follow his own agenda, and seek revenge at all costE/span>