#both bewitched and fearful of the abyss

[izar-tarazed]

In the beginning, long before Izar learned to understand his sign language, this is how they communicated: Ensha signing his messages into her palm.

A painfully slow form of communicating, but at least he didn’t have to waste her treasured ink, and there was another aspect to it: With those brief, invisible messages, fleeting words traced against her palm, Ensha didn’t have to worry about anyone—not even his master—ever finding out what he was sharing with the stargazer.

Then again, it required enough trust on Izar’s end to let him touch her hand. You might not want someone within arm’s reach who previously attacked you in a supposedly safe space.

She was rather tense when she first held out her hand. But she still did.

[izar-tarazed]

just realized that maybe at this point I'll need different verses or rather, points in the timeline for Izar? the default would still be her (and Ensha) on their quest towards the Elden Throne; but her having defeated the Elden Beast somewhat calls for that post-game verse where she already is running the Academy of Raya Lucaria.

I made this post a few days with my headcanon for Izar's exploration of the Shadow Realm basically taking place in between those two phases, too...

(It's funny because I never thought I would need to establish these things because Izar's journey seemed like it would last forever, but now maybe I'll come up with something to add to my Stargazer's Cookbook.)

[izar-tarazed]

The little burnt-down candle on Ensha's besagew is probably one of my favorite details about him and I might write more about that at some point, but.

I remember being surprised when I first noticed it on his armor and was like, "wait, how did I miss this before?"

The reason is pretty obvious, though. With Ensha's iconic edgelord pose, we never get to see the candle. It's almost like he's deliberately covering it with that hand.

There's probably nothing to that and he was just meant to stand there in a casual pose that simply happens to cover this particular detail of his armor, but still funny.

(My first thought was "why give a character such a peculiar detail on their armor and then never show it," but then again, this is Elden Ring where nearly all the NPCs have individual faces and the game never bothers to let us see them, so... hiding a candle is nothing.)

Also, he's standing right next to three more burnt-down candles. Again, this might be pure coincidence but considering how much emphasis Elden Ring places on environmental storytelling in general, this arrangement might well be on purpose (...while probably not too meaningful).

[izar-tarazed]

Welcome!

What this is: This blog is mostly dedicated to my Elden Ring OC Izar (and well, her companion Ensha – more about them below). There might also be other content (other games, DnD 5e, writing) unless I’ll feel the need to create specific sideblogs for that (unlikely, I lack the energy).

What I do: I’ll mostly share screenshots, headcanons, storytelling, and writing snippets. (Here's my tag list!) While this is not a pure RP blog I very much enjoy RPing, so feel free to shoot me a prompt/starter whenever you like! (For more information regarding RP, flip through the Stargazer's Cookbook over here!)

Who I am: You can call me Zari. I’m over 30, she/her. Not a native English speaker, so bear with me if I say strange things. Expect occasional ramblings about the glory of freelance life, and know that there is never enough coffee.

Izar Tarazed, Tarnished Astrologer

Izar barely remembers anything from the time before her awakening in the Lands Between – just her name and what she knew of the stars. However, the stars above the Lands Between are different, their lore mostly lost to her, so she gathers stories and bits of information wherever she can.

Her most treasured possessions are her telescope and her map-making tools.

Whenever she gets the chance, Izar will sit and work on her celestial maps, preferably beneath the golden light of grace, trying to figure out constellations and their possible meanings. Working on her maps also calms her down and helps her focus.

She’s often more driven by her astrological curiosity than by the ambition to become Elden Lord – she’ll confront Rennala mainly because she wants access to the library of Raya Lucaria, and Radahn because she wishes to set the stars back in motion.

Izar relies mostly on her sorceries – the Comet and Night Comet are her favorites – and only starts improving her skills with melee weapons and a shield when Ensha insists on teaching her.

Personality

Izar is a little geek when it comes to astrology and will talk about it with neverending enthusiasm. At a new place, its (potential) view of the night sky is usually the first thing she’ll check.

She values the friendships and alliances she makes, being protective of those she cares about; that might be both her greatest strength and her greatest weakness.

Upon meeting someone for the first time, she'll rather be calm and cautious, but much more confident, cheeky and bubbly once she feels comfortable.

The fact that she doesn’t remember who she was before bothers her more than she lets on.

Izar soon realizes that she isn't as ambitious about taking the Elden Throne as she maybe should be. Her true dream is running the Academy of Raya Lucaria and turning it into a welcoming place where knowledge is not hoarded but shared.

When upset, she can be pretty defiant, sarcastic and snappy.

Sir, That’s My Emotional Support Skeleton

Izar spares Ensha’s life when he attacks her at the Roundtable Hold. This leads to them being sent out on a mission together to track down Latenna (which, of course, doesn’t go as planned). While they start out deeply suspicious of each other, teaming up only reluctantly, they eventually come to trust each other and, despite some challenges, become close friends. (I’m not entirely sure what Ensha is, but I’m leaning way more into the headcanons of the somehow animated armor/actual skeleton with some kind of relation to the ancient king mentioned in the description of the Royal Remains set, rather than just being some guy with a skull mask.)

Ensha will often travel with Izar, having her back and finding picturesque dungeon walls to lean against and ponder how on earth this careless astrologer can still be alive. (He's exaggerating, of course. Izar can definitely handle herself ... most of the time.)

Ensha tends to be more wary of others than Izar is. He's extremely perceptive and quite good at reading people (and finding things). He often encourages Izar toput in t he work to improve her skills, and be more disciplined about her goals. However, he's also surprisingly fine with engaging in all kinds of mischievous shenanigans with her.

Since Ensha doesn’t speak, their communication process is a little rocky at first but improves once Izar gets better (and eventually good) at understanding his sign language. From then on, they'll often have some partially silent banter going on, and are able to communicate subtly if the situation calls for it.

Izar is also able to sense Ensha's emotions to a certain extent (more on that headcanon here).

[izar-tarazed]

Headcanon: Ensha doesn't eat regular food, just golden runes.

[izar-tarazed]

The DLC has been out for a month and I’m far from finishing it, but it’s stirring so much in terms of new headcanons and storylines for Izar and Ensha and their dynamics (probably there'll be even more of that as I progress and find out more about the DLC lore).

Since I finished the base game so briefly before the release I can’t help but imagining the same correlation in game: Izar has just defeated the Elden Beast and declined to follow Ranni to the stars, and sets out into the Shadow Realm shortly after with Ensha.

And it feels a little bit like they’re pretending they’re still on a journey instead of finally arriving somewhere (in Izar’s case, the Academy), deferring all the questions that would come with that. They’re doing what they’ve been doing best for a while—adventuring together—because change is a challenge and maybe they’re both afraid of it for their own reasons. (If the journey comes to an end, will they still have need for each other’s company? One should suppose that they know that by now but I’m not sure they do because that always seemed such a distant future that it was rarely ever brought up.)

So they keep travelling, pretending things haven’t changed.

But things already have changed, and there are issues they haven’t really sorted out yet (I have this headcanon that Ensha was secretly reporting a lot more to Gideon than Izar knew, and well aware that his master would at some point use that knowledge against her but had no other choice if he wanted to keep travelling with her; it’s an understandable betrayal, and forgiven, but it’s still fresh.)

The Shadow Realm is even more dangerous than the Lands Between and they have to rely on each other more than ever, and they’re convinced that they do, but there’s still doubt and guilt and this realm being unsettling in its own right. There may also be hints about their respective pasts here that they haven’t expected (I think the reason that Izar is willing to drink St. Trina’s deadly nectar time and again is because she is promised to learn something about her family—there is a potential connection for my respective headcanon that would just make sense).

Not really going anywhere in particular with this but felt like writing it down.

[izar-tarazed]

"Now, go forth. Do what you believe is right."

It's minor but I realized how much I love that Enia eventually just tells us this (rather than "go forth, become Elden Lord" or "Let the words of the Fingers guide you").

It's simply "Do what you believe is right". Yes, the implication here is probably just that she can no longer offer any advice and even the Two Fingers are silent, so all that remains is our own judgment.

But still, she says it in such a gentle and supportive way? As if she trusts us, and actually believes it's a good thing if we do what we believe is right.

(... Yes, I keep coming back to the Roundtable Hold whenever I need to hear it.)

[izar-tarazed]

some DLC related headcanon thoughts about Izar below the cut:

I just realized how wild Miquella’s endeavor must seem to her. He seems to be shedding all the essential parts of his being and personality, and Izar as a Tarnished who has lost all memory of her life before the Lands Between has basically been on the opposite journey the whole time: wondering who she was, who she is, hoping and trying to reclaim and recover.

One of her deepest fears is to lose even more of herself than she already has—especially memories. The idea that someone could be willing, for whatever reason, to leave behind their very being, is so strange and troubling to her. She's basically been hoping to recollect all the parts of her personality that she might have forgotten, and to see someone (apparently) leave behind the essence of her personality... she has a hard time understanding that.

[izar-tarazed]

Something I find both fun and challenging when writing Elden Ring fanfiction is translating or adjusting certain in-game mechanics into something that makes sense storywise and doesn't break the narrative. For example, fast-travelling between sites of grace is something I'm mostly ignoring for now. I think Izar can use sites of grace as portals back into the Roundtable Hold (or access them from there), but I'm still struggling to come up with a concept that explains access to the Hold without grace because most Tarnished there no longer see it but apparently can still enter and leave at their pleasure. I've been thinking about establishing that those without grace need a grace mimic to do so and have just now looked up that crafting one does require a human bone shard... so maybe Ensha (for story-purposes) might have one permanent grace mimic worked right into his armor? Or he might still need to carry a normal one that's consumed upon use but in case of emergency can craft one by sacrificing a piece of bone from his armor? Even if it's permanent and built-in I think I'd want to come up with some limitations regarding its use, probably that it still requires something like a ritual to create a fake site of grace that then serves as a portal back to the Hold, and that in turn takes time or can only be done in certain spots?

[izar-tarazed]

Izar is mischievously fond of the Mimic's Veil.

It has saved her life on more than one occasion when it allowed her to hide from enemies...

... but it has also led to her spending hours in Gideon's study disguised as a pile of books when she had sneaked into the room during a brief absence of his, and didn't manage to get out in time before Gideon returned.

Uncomfortable, but better than getting caught.

Although there was that one time when she didn't turn into a pile of books.

[izar-tarazed]

Izar does fight Radagon and the Elden Beast on her own, but Ensha insisted on lending her his gauntlets for the fight, claiming that their healing properties might make a difference.

(And yes, they just did, with Izar barely still standing after one of Radagon's hammer blows, so she could eventually make it into the second phase of the fight. It would have been narratively perfect if she had taken down the Elden Beast then as well, but... not yet. Still, she keeps going in with the gauntlets. They'll make a difference.)

[izar-tarazed]

me: okay brain, time to focus on serious real life stuff, did we pack everything for the book fair and did we- my brain: wow did you ever realize that Izar probably loved her astrologer robe because it has pockets me: what my brain: i mean, look at that robe, it's so comfy, it has to have pockets me: my brain: and then you gave her that stupid carian knight armor. it has no pockets. where is she supposed to keep anything

[izar-tarazed]

Sometimes Izar won't summon Torrent, but instead sneaks onto one the huge carriages and quietly makes herself comfortable. A slower means of travel than her trusted steed, but perfect for observing her surroundings and the sky through the telescope or fill her journal with sketches. Sometimes she stays there for hours, enjoying both journey and mischief.

The Trolls never notice.

[izar-tarazed]

A headcanon I think I didn't elaborate on much until now: Izar can sense Ensha's emotions—at least within a limited range, and provided they’re intense enough. That means she’ll perceive sudden bursts of anger or fear, but at times also more persistent sentiments like concern or wariness.

She isn’t exactly sure why this is, but it seems to be connected to the grace in some way. Ensha can’t see it, but during their first mission together—stranded at the Academy of Raya Lucaria—, Izar wanted to test whether he might be able to feel it, so she pointed him to a site of grace, carefully directing his hand right to the golden light.

While it didn’t change anything for him (from his perspective, he was merely reaching out towards a random spot in a dimly lit chamber; the shadows there didn’t feel any different from those everywhere else), Izar found herself with that new ability that proved rather helpful when it came to gauging Ensha’s reactions to pretty much everything. (Intense skeletal stare? Well yes, but I can tell you’re actually pretty terrified of ...something?)

It’s useful, but still has its limits—she won’t know the reasoning behind any of the emotions, or what they’re directed at.

Also, Ensha wasn’t exactly pleased when she first told him about her new capability (yes, she could sense that anger), considering it overstepping and intrusive (not wrong), but he has since come to terms with it.

That's partially due to the fact that by now Izar knows him well enough to see his other tells, however subtle they may be.

He might be able to take a somewhat guarded stance and basically block her out (I'm not yet sure about that).

He also acknowledges that it can be a useful part of their communication process—if they meet someone he’s deeply suspicious of, Izar will know. (However, whether she’ll believe his wariness to be justified is another story.)

[izar-tarazed]

So my headcanon is that when Ensha attacks Izar at Roundtable Hold, she's completely confused for a moment, thinking it must be a misunderstanding, until she realizes the silent fellow is indeed going for the kill and she must do more than simply dodge his attacks and try to reason with him ... ... and she does, but she still makes a point of not killing him. Even if that's obviously the easy way out. But this is not a random highwayman assaulting her out in the Lands Between, it's someone she considers a fellow Tarnished at Roundtable Hold ... the only safe place she knows. Besides, he serves the Hold's leader, and at this point she still thinks Gideon might be upset should she kill Ensha ... and last but not least, she's hoping to understand the reason behind the attack, and her odds at that are better if she lets him live. So while Ensha might be intent on breaking the rules of Roundtable Hold, Izar is not; she's not going to shed any blood here. Instead, she fetches a sleep pot that she hurls at Ensha, and once she has knocked him out, she carefully ties him up (after all, she has enough string after coming across so many demi-humans), and just leaves him there as she goes to report to Gideon, hoping that he might have an idea what the hell that was about. (And yes, he probably has, but ... well.)

[izar-tarazed]

pondering headcanons: how well does Izar cope with heat? and Ensha?