Arivanya Ienith - Character Sheet

ESO @Name: @DarthNerevar

Discordtag: @DarthNerevar#8228

Character Name: Arivanya Ienith

Race: Dunmer (Dark Elf)

Age: 23

Sex: Female

Affliction: None

Marital Status: Single

Sexual Orientation: Bisexual

Physical Description: https://imgur.com/a/8telDdt

Personality: Arivanya is a shy and introverted person, but one who values friendship and trust. She has a strong devotion to Azura and tries to do the (in her opinion) morally right thing, without it mattering if her life is at stake or not. She has had a dark past with times of Strife and having to do what must be done to survive. Due to this she sometimes does morally dubious things for the good of other people, never for her own gain. She likes reading and learning new things, and is a nice person overall, if you manage to warm up to her.

Likes: Honorable and/or Loyal People, Exploring, Dwemer Technology, Legends, Prophecies and the General History of Nirn

Dislikes: Going to parties or similar events, the in her opinion “Evil” Daedra (Molag Bal, Mehrunes Dagon, Vaermina, etc), megalomaniacal people, being arrogant and selfish

Strengths: Arivanya excels at Destruction and Conjuration magic, and even knows a little restoration magic on the side. In addition, she is a good singer and is very studious, can craft basic Iron weapons, armor and can repair her own equipment. Aside from that she does alright with her swords, even though she has never been trained to use them, and is a decent enchanter.

Weaknesses: She doesn’t do so well with heavy weapons, as she feels too clunky wielding them. Besides that, she doesn't know how to mix potions or perform any other crafts that aren’t smithing or enchanting.

Backstory: Growing up, being the daughter of Rivath and Alavria Telvanni who were powerful and influential Telvanni wizards, she had a lavish lifestyle with everything she ever wanted. Instead of going outside and playing with other kids, she spent most of her time inside reading books and learning magic, in which she was particularly skilled at Destruction, Conjuration and Enchanting. She grew fascinated with History, Legends and Culture, always reading and researching. Eventually she learned of the Ashlanders and their devotion to worshipping their ancestors and in lesser quantitude worship the, in their point of view, “true” Tribunal, consisting of Azura, Mephala and Boethia (Even though her devotion to Azura comes from her own decision, since she believes her to be the the one that led the Dunmer to away from the Aldmer, towards their true destiny). It was at this moment that she began to have doubts about the Tribunal of Living Gods. She began to question if it was truly right for them to have ruled the Dunmer since the start, to have “usurped” the power of the Daedra, to have called themselves greater than them.
When she was still around 10 years old, she went on a business trip towards the Black Marsh border, where she got lost exploring and found a nearby Argonian village. Here the Villagers were shocked and afraid of her at first, but when they realized that she meant no harm and that she was just a child, they welcomed her with open arms. Arivanya, being the curious child that she is/was, asked about their way of life. The Argonians told her all about their legends, stories and culture of their tribe and of their homeland, but also telling her about the cruelties that the Dunmer had inflicted upon their race. She didn't believe them, didn't want to believe them, as far as she new, the servants in her home were treated well and as other sentient beings, to this the Argonian Chief replied that she should see for herself, that she should form an opinion of her own, and not follow other ideals dogmatically, that she should question them before agreeing with them.
When she returned, she noticed things that she didn't before, and realized that the Dunmer as a whole used slaves as sources of cheap labor and treated them poorly, as the chief had told her. She saw how the Telvanni near her home regarded the Argonians and the Occasional other race. When travelling with her parents towards other cities she saw how the Slaves in those places were hit,whipped and hurt in other ways, particularly in other House Telvanni and House Dres Territories. Every time she went outside she would notice how the "lesser" races suffered even though they didnt deserve any of it. She was horrified that her people, her own race could do this and not care about the sentient beings they were traumatizing for life, about the families they were ruining and the people they were condemning to suffering and poverty.
She could not bear it any longer...

The last straw broke on a certain night a few weeks after her 16th birthday, an Argonian handmaiden that served her family forgot to collect the washed clothes from outside before the rain started and her father got so angry that he started beating her on the spot. Arivanya was shocked, she thought that it was evil to punish someone for something so minimal. She ran to her room and was positive about what she was about to do, waiting until the corridors were clear and then rushing to the slave pens, trying to free them all. With all the other slaves gone, the last one was the Maid that had been beaten and whipped before. The Argonian was chained to the wall and without any key in sight, Arivanya grabbed a hammer and started hitting the chains. To her relief they started breaking, but when she freed the last slave and went to leave, she was stopped by her father in one of the corridors. He saw the whole thing and, with rage burning in his red eyes, he told her how she didn't deserve to be of House Telvanni and how she had dishonored herself beyond redemption. They held her trial on the next day, the Great House exiling her for her entire lifetime.
She told herself that it was worth it, that the slaves had gone free, but that didn't stop her from sobbing while she packed her things, and on the way out…
Two months had passed since that eventful night, but it wasn't easy in the wilds and more often than not she shivered in the cold of Morrowind. As if bound by fate or by random luck, on this particular day an Ashlander passed through her camp, and saw the state of despair she was in. Once she awoke, he spoke to her, about why she was out here. Once he received an answer, the Ashlander took pity on her and took her with him on his travels. She travelled with him back to his camp, but was looked upon with hatred and fear by the other Ashlanders. She was shunned as an outsider and only once she helped fend off an entire swarm of cliff racers with her magic, together with the other clan members, she was accepted into the clan and granted the title of Clan-Friend.
Arivanya spent 7 years living in the camp and learning from the Ashlanders. Learning their Culture, Beliefs and Philosophy, and agreeing with most of them. She was adopted formally into the tribe and was treated like she was part of the clan all along. She took on the last name Ienith and after that period of time, she decided she should set out into the world and explore all that it had to offer…

That was 6 months ago, since then she has learned from many different cultures, many that were very different form her own. In particular, when she was passing through the frozen land of Skyrim, she met a Nord blacksmith who, in opposition to most Nords who are xenophobic and cold towards outsiders, was very kind and open towards her. Arivanya was in awe of the beautiful weapons he made and, when questioned about how he learned, the Nord simply chuckled and told her that smithing was a way of expressing oneself, same as a song or a dance, and that one puts his soul into every single thing he crafts. The smith offered to teach her, and Arivanya was intrigued by the idea. When she was ready to keep travelling, the Nord had told her that he had taught her all the could teach, and that the rest will come naturally and with practice.
She set her sights towards Valenwood and the rest of her story… has yet to be told...

Edit: I added all the requested things in the backstory (I would recommend rereading it completely).

Your character sheet is awesome in the amount of detail, but I thought I'd go through a few things I see that I'd like to address.

The first thing I notice is crafting iron weapons and armour but nothing else. Blacksmithing is a skill you'd learn with most materials, so you'd more so say they have rudimentary or very minimal skill in blacksmithing instead of restricting them to iron. Having different materials as you get better (at least for more mundane materials) are more of a gaming mechanic than how you would learn the craft in real life. It'd also be interesting to learn where they were taught how to blacksmith, as Dunmer primarily use bone/chitin as materials for their arms and armour than metal like so many others.

I noticed you specifically mentioned Azura, Melphala, and Boethiah, and was wondering about your focus on those three specifically! Ashlanders mostly practice Ancestor worship, combined with select veneration and dealing with Daedra of all types, including those three. They explicitly reject the Tribunal as they consider them false Gods and murderers of Lord Nerevar, so I'm just interested in your choice of those three.

As a House Mer, especially a child in House Telvanni, she would be painfully aware of the treatment of Argonians and Slaves in Dunmer society. House Telvanni and House Dres are perhaps the worst when it comes to the horrific treatment of slaves within Dunmer society. They don't consider argonians, Khajiit, or many others they keep as slaves, as anything but property to order around. So it's not so much that she'd be unaware of slavery at all, but might even have it ingrained within her as a child that it is okay, and that betmer and other species are beneath her as a lesser lifeform. Ashlanders are also well known for their incredibly xenophobic stance on anyone not within their own culture/clan, so it'd be interesting how her more inclusive approach you appear to wish for her to have on other races came into play being among the Ashlanders.

I'm also interested in how they became so adept at destruction and conjuration magic, since ashlanders (whom she spent most of her adult life with), are well known for their dislike and distrust of magic aside from their wise women, with only one tribe actually using magic sparingly.

Other than that, the rest of your sheet seems great. If you could address those few concerns, then I'll be happy to approve the sheet!

Just edited the backstory to include the requested things.

Thanks for fixing it up, I loved the addition as well!

Approved, 22/08/2018