#Guess who's going full arthurian legend because apparently I needed more of that for Balestra to play off of...

[gem-quest]

NPC: Nimue DuLac (tbf)

“I praise what is truly alive,

what longs to be burned to death.”

--Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

Real Name: Nimue DuLac

Age: unknown

FC: Golshifteh Farahani

Species & Class: Half Night-Elf Sorceress

Guild: has ties to Ammolite

 Powers:

Night Elves (officially known as Noctium) are my version of drow, but instead of being subterranean they’re entirely nocturnal, very sensitive to light and fire magic, but with a strong affinity for water and death. They tend to keep to their own and much of their culture and known background are just rumors. There are many stories about them ranging from them sacrificing weak night-elves to underwater gods in a dark covenant to gain more power, to their tears being poisonous or vital ingredients for powerful sleeping draughts.  It’s quite rare to see half-elves of this background as they tend to be ostracized by both humans (or even other elves) and by full night elves. It is thought that they were the original creators of the sprawling temple complex on level 16, though very little is actually known about their original civilization.

Although Nim is half-human, she maintains the Noctium talent for necromancy and affinity for water, particularly that of the lake which she guards. Her power and tie to the world of the living do seem bound to the phases of the moon, another vital symbol to the Noctium. She does have various forms though, and they each have slightly different specialties. As is Noctium tradition, items can be ritually killed by breaking them and given to the netherworld through sacrifice to the water and moon. Pools, swamps, and chiefly the ocean are seen as boundaries with the netherworld, where Noctium gain their power. So ritually killing an item can link it to that power, that long lineage, and the water or moon themselves. In her more mundane form, Nimue can’t raise the dead exactly. But she can link souls to items or link items to souls, imbuing them both with the powers of death/water/the moon and imbuing them with some of the life of the soul itself. This is how she herself found her way into this cycle of resurrection, linking herself to first the lake she haunts and then to the Quicksilver Longsword (one of the winnable items from her quest). In her most powerful or desperate while in her more mundane Nim form, she can even call upon the souls an item has taken, turning a player’s most treasured weapon against themselves with the vengeful spirits of those they’ve killed with that weapon.

In her more powerful form, Nimue -- as a conduit for her lake, the moon, and the full force of the netherworld -- she has much more physical control over the dead. As well as being much more physically strong than her other form, she can raise the dead of those trapped in her lake to fight whatever unlucky player triggered that route of her quest. She can also somewhat resurrect herself on command in that form, though she becomes more changed with every resurrection, melding with the thousand souls crying out from the water’s depths.

As a NPC, she seems much more alert and conscious than many others. Her dialogue is complex, and sometimes verges on prescient. In reality, her AI draws from all the choices players have made throughout the game to inform how she reacts to them and her different dialogue. Kill a certain NPC instead of save them? Choose one wrong answer in a riddle? Favor one side over another? She seems to know. This usually makes her a perfect quest for classes focused on choice making, such as Celestials. But this also makes her a very difficult mini quest for those who approach the game more randomly. And, more randomly, in her full Nimue form she seems to be gaining knowledge of other things players are doing beyond the pre-scripted choices they make in certain quests. 

Appearance: Players can pick up Nimue’s quest at various points throughout the game, and there are a few cameos of her in different NPC forms on different levels to hint at her background before her quest begins. But most players first see her as a humble herbalist in the lonely wilds of the Valley of Monsters. There, she wears the same buttoned blouse, embroidered vest, plain skirt, and various leather bags full of mysterious odds and ends, though the colors vary depending on the day. Overall, her look is reminiscent of traditional scandinavian folkwear. She wears her long, loosely curled black hair loose, sometimes absentmindedly tucking feathers or twigs or bird bones behind her ear. Her eyes are wide and somewhat sad, tired in the way of something ageless and knowing. But when she meets someone’s eyes, she stares through them as if she is peering through a rippling pool to see what lies beneath. 

“I turned and ran

To save a life I didn't have.”

--In the Woods Somewhere, Hozier

Places Most Likely to be Found In-Game: around her lake in the valley of monsters. She is pretty much trapped there as that is where her mini quest is picked up. Different dialogue options will hint at her having traveled across various levels, and she may even give some veiled hints for the maze in the Midwinter level and the Faerie Court depending on how players interact with her.

Item Drops:

She can be a source of healing potions for players grinding in the Valley of Monsters, as well as a simple healing spot. Stay in her cabin and you’ll wake fully healed.

There are different routes for players who’ve activated her quest, all depending on their specific interactions with her. These routes also determine which items players will gain from her quest, and ultimately which strategies will be necessary to finish her quest (most often by killing her or neutralizing her so she sleeps again at the bottom of her lake). The most common item people go for are Noctium Tears, a potent ingredient in sleeping draughts, poisons, and hallucinogenic potions which can provide prophetic visions for future levels. This is definitely the more practical item drop, and usually coincides with the more gentle end to Nim’s quest, simply laying her to rest again or trapping her once more to hold off the cycle of resurrection for a time. The more powerful though admittedly more unpredictable and possibly disastrous item she gives players would be the Quicksilver Longsword, a blade imbued with all her anger, guilt, roving curiosity, and trapped energy. This is the trickier route to set up, though ultimately the most difficult to finish although the most rewarding in terms of XP. This route requires Nim to transform into Nimue, where Nim is just one voice among thousands and the true power of the Netherworld is unleashed as she tries to break free from her lake prison. The sword is the only true piece of Nim left, and its powers of transformation and connection to the moon make it one of the most useful weapons in actually defeating Nimue. 

Along with the main items she drops, Nim can also be a source of unique apparel for those focusing on the medieval aesthetic, a guide to acquiring valuable herbs in the Valley of Monsters, one of many NPCs to gift certain magical scrolls to players, and a source of information on runes themselves.

Strongest character trait: wise and melancholic

Player Stats: (She has two sets of stats based on the path the player chooses, that of Nim and that of Nimue. Nimue is inherently stronger, although Nim is much more manipulative. Players may choose to handle either of them in different ways, either typically through force or in much subtler ways. I wanted her normal stats to be similar to a PC, but her altered stats are much higher, a punishment of sorts for those players who provoke her into that form)

STRENGTH: 2 || 8

DEFENCE: 2 || 8

CHARISMA:  7 || 4

PSYCHE:  8 || 8

WILLPOWER: 7 || 7

CAUTIOUSNESS:  4 || 1

AGILITY: 4 || 8

ENDURANCE: 2 || 7

INTELLIGENCE: 9 || 10

LUCK: 5 || 9

 Personality: 

“Like the stars chase the sun Over the glowing hill, I will conquer Blood is running deep Some things never sleep

Suddenly I'm overcome Dissolving like the setting sun Like a boat into oblivion”

--Queen of Peace, Florence + the Machine

Biography: 

 Playlist

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