Name: Lucie "la Brèche" Severin
Age: 22
Gender: Female
Personality: Lucie is open minded and independent. She prefers practical solutions and conversation, but in her personal life is fairly laid-back. Though she is not very conscious of it, she likes attention when in social situations, but also likes to spend much of her free time alone and does not think of herself as particularly outgoing or sociable. She is honorable and sincere, but is also, to perhaps an unhealthy extent, detached and unempathetic. She's quite stoic and unconsciously possesses at least some level of sadism.
History: Lucie was born into the house of a sergeant of a minor nobleman, and raised with the intent of serving in court as a personal attendant. She had natural aptitude with horsemanship and grew to become skilled with a blade. As part of her education, she was taught history, politics, strategy, tactics, and etiquette, and these talents, alongside her personal athleticism and optimism, earned her a position in the same court as her father. For several years she served in a leadership role, mostly training the local retinue and policing the fief, until a border war broke out between her liege's faction and neighboring Landoran barons, so she took to the front alongside her father and her liege. Her liege's force was nominally larger than that of their opponent's, but the campaign was an offensive one and reconnaissance was scarce. As they marched to the field of battle it became apparent that the enemy force was heavily fortified and had laid numerous traps for the Rothinyans. Despite some losses, the Rothinyan army was not led by fools, and so sufficient haste was made to the enemy lines that battle took. The melee was fairly one-sided, with the Landorans present being almost exclusively peasant conscripts armed with shoddy pikes and shortbows, but the force they engaged was significantly smaller than even the minor army scouts had reported.
As part of the watch set for the night after the battle, Lucie spotted torchlight in the distance and tried to rally the Rothinyans, but the assault was too sudden and they were overtaken by the combined forces of the remaining Landorans and several mercenary companies. Taken prisoner alongside her liege and father, Lucie was spared indignity only by virtue of the greed of her captors, as the ransom for a baron and his marshals seemed more valuable to them than another girl to rape. They were marched to the castle of the leader of the Landoran baronies, and kept in cells there until ransom was received from Rothinya. Unfortunately, her liege's fief had been attacked by marauding brigands sometime after the battle, and with no retinue there to protect it, the town and even the baron's estate were swiftly plundered. With no ransom forthcoming, they were set to be executed as enemies of the Landoran crown. Her liege attempted to appeal to the Rothinyan monarch for their safety, but the Landoran barons conspired against him and he was slain by poison before the letter could be sent. It became quite clear that the "marauding brigands" who had attacked her home were in fact the mercenary companies, collecting their "payment" for services rendered to the barons. Her chance at safely and honorably escaping now dashed, Lucie resigned herself to death, though not, at least, as her captors intended. When the Landoran baron came to deliver her final sentence, she challenged the man to a duel. He happily accepted, fully aware that slaying her through honorable combat would improve his prestige and justify this endeavor further, though he was not stupid enough to simply duel her personally. He appointed his most brutish knight as champion, and set the conditions of the duel as being to yield, though the winner would be allowed to do with the loser as they pleased. Unsatisfied with a fair fight, on the night preceding the duel, he had a known lunatic placed in her cell while she slept, and the madman struck at her, doing great damage to her sword arm and legs before she was able to knock him unconscious.
Of course the baron's champion had excellent armor and weaponry, as well as prodigious strength and skill, while Lucie was allowed to select from only the most basic of weapons, and given no armor (as hers was claimed by a mercenary in the aftermath of the battle). She selected a simple halberd, unable to effectively wield the longsword she had been trained with, and entered the small balcony that had been reserved for the duel. The champion was a hulking man, and strode towards her confidently with a great hammer in one hand. He casually struck out, she dodged, and the hammer cracked on the stone floor, cracking it. Even for a strong man, the level of damage his strike caused was unusual, especially given how little effort he had put into the blow. She saw him grinning through his visor as he looked at her dawning realization: he was gifted with unnatural magics. She glanced over at the audience to see the baron, too, looking pleased as he sipped from a goblet. He had never intended for any possibility of defeat to be allowed, and though honor forbade duels between those wielding or affected by the power of the runes, he had deceived her into believing, at least, that this basic rule would be observed.
Realizing her original strategy was meaningless in the face of a rule-breaking power like this, she rushed in and went on the offensive, levying strike after strike at the champion. He batted most away, but his armor was dented in here and there, and he grew weary of the onslaught. With one powerful blow he struck out at Lucie, shattering her halberd in half and grazing her side. Even that glancing blow was enough to send her reeling, though, and she had lost the bladed portion of her weapon. Lying on the ground, hurt, effectively unarmed, she looked up at her opponent with spite. He smiled as he brought his hammer above his head, preparing to deliver a lethal blow. As he lowered the bone-shattering weapon, she leapt up and stabbed straight into his visor. He stumbled backwards, dropping the heavy hammer, and collapsed, blood pooling behind his helm, as the audience was overcome by a stunned silence. Lucie retrieved the other half of her weapon, lifted and pointed it at the baron, claiming him as her prisoner by rights of the duel. He fumbled for a reply to deny her her prize, but was silenced by the appearance of a hand on his shoulder. An elderly, regal figure stood behind him, and it took Lucie a moment to recognize the man as the duke of this region. He bowed slightly before her and spoke to the crowd, affirming her honorable victory and right to the baron's life. She graciously bowed and took to binding the baron and collecting her father from the dungeons. The duke gifted her with some equipment from the baron's armory and sent her off with horses for the three of them.
She returned to Rothinya, headed to the capital, and was received as a hero by the court. For her services, honor, and bravery in the defense of the realm, she was knighted, receiving a device of the House Severin, a noble family which had gone extinct some generations ago, and given a fief not dissimilar to her former liege's on the border with Landora. Since then, she's joined the Order of the Stag, a knightly order who served to defend the realm from external threats, leaving her father and mother in charge of administrating her estate. Despite her noble name, she is known colloquially as "la Brèche," or "the breaker," for the now famous manner in which she defeated her opponent in that fateful duel. Having served in the Order of the Stag for three years now, she has become expert in the use of polearms, halberds in particular, and relishes the fame, glory, and honor that come with being something of a hero. She resides in the capital at a comfortable apartment when not on campaign, and occasionally checks in at her fief.
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