HOARFROST PALADIN

NAME.	Nikolas Snezhevich (Formal Name)
ALIASES.	Hoarfrost Paladin, Lord Harbinger, The Captain, Il Capitano, Lord First
AGE.	500+ years old
SPECIES.	Presumed Human
BIRTHDAY.	June 21st
GENDER.	Male (He/Him)
ORIENTATION.	Heteroromantic / Demisexual
LOCATION.	UNKNOWN
OCCUPATON.	1st of the Fatui Harbingers

history & more

A Man who claims to remember little of his past, nothing more than a bare faced lie from the masked man. He remembers his past all too well, remembers every sin committed in the name of loyalty. The recruits from Mondstadt often speak of the Bloodstained Knight as if he were little more than a mythological figure who disappeared amidst the flames of the Calamity. It's almost amusing to him that 500 years is all it takes for the description of his broken oath and broken will to fade into myth. Their descriptions of that cursed claymore never ceases to amuse him, it was his unfortunate younger brother who wielded that weapon, who carried it from the mouth of that ABYSSAL HELL dripping with the ichor of unnatural beasts. Even now, he is content to let the belief he swore himself to the Abyss propagate, an almost nicer story than the story of a broken knight who witnessed those swirling purple depths rise up and claim so many innocent souls.To the Snezheviches and Snezhevnas of the Hotel Bouffes d'ete, there exists a different story that he's content to remain unknown in, one of myriad sailors who sailed upon the seas for 35 long days in an attempt to stop the last great Abyssal Leviathan. He hadn't intended to be involved with that hunt, wishing only to travel to the frozen north in an attempt to find Barren Land in which to spend the rest of his unknowingly long lifetime. Perhaps it was atonement for his sins that made him volunteer for that hunt, a misguided belief that the God of Justice would render punishment on him for unknowingly assisting in the Heavenly Principle's subjugation of Khaenri'ah.To the Tsaritsa and the Fatui Harbingers, there exists only The Captain, his name has long faded from the annuls of history, replaced with a name too common to trace and a surname fitting for a man orphaned from home and family. His past is shrouded in lies and misdirection, and yet one singular truth has fallen from him time and time again, he has no love for the reigning PYRO ARCHON, the feeling is more akin to hatred for a sin reflected in unmelting ice. If he admitted to a single undying ambition, it would be to take the gnosis with his hands alone, and tear down the rules that perverted the laws of nature, the rules that invited the Abyss to surge from the void realm. His is perhaps the closest in ideals to SHE who outstretched her hand, the ideal of love, for he had no love left to give to the archon whose odes enticed the powers the sinners so cravenly held.For the Hoarfrost Paladin, no cost is too great to seal away the Abyss and its tides. KNOWN ASSOCIATES. 

HEADCANONS

 LOYALTY.  —
-> FOR THE LONGEST TIME, loyalty was something he struggled to define, not out of a lack of understanding, but merely because LOYALTY at its core is something that shares a million different peoples. He's seen loyalty be rewarded by the rich and powerful, watched it used as a weapon against the meek and most vulnerable by the pillars of Celestia. For those who sail ancient waters, loyalty is a thing you reserve first and foremost for your brothers and sisters, for the ship that bears you across volatile waves, their ideology of what loyalty is, what it means to be loyal, has long since resonated with him.Once he swore fealty to a grand order, to a knight who rode forth with freedom carried upon the wind. He watched that man cross great plains in defiance of the calamity that befell the world around him. That man went not in search of glory, but in defence of the meek and feeble, that could not raise a sword against the black ichor that spilled forth from the world. Beholden to those ideals, Nikolas lingered in those depths until the curtain of LOYALTY's bladed edge was pulled from his eyes. The images of a land marred, all because they refused to swear fealty to a god they were expected to worship took something from him that he could never regain, cursed him with unending life for daring to renege against vows of fealty to an ideal that forsook so many innocents.He spent years wandering after that, identity after identity discarded in his search for a meaning to the word that had become so foreign to him. For five years, that seemed to pass in a blink of an eye, he swore the same loyalty to the ship that bore him and so many in the hunt for the last great Abyssal Leviathan, and even then he didn't stay with those valiant few long after Elynas came to their peaceful final rest. His search for meaning to the word carried him north, with naught but a letter promising answers to that undying question for which he searched.SHE asked for nothing of him, nor offered nothing in return, and yet that was the third and final time he swore fealty. Even now, hundreds of years later, SHE understands that the greatest loyalty he can offer to her is the sharp edge of a descending blade if ever she were to ask for him to violate his singular INDOMITABLE ideal. There is no love to be found in her breast for him, nor to be found in his for her, merely the embers of a dead flame that promised to ignite the world should LOYALTY turn to TYRANNY HOARFROST PALADIN.  —
-> Amidst the branches and roots of ancient trees exists primordial powers, abilities that exist within and outside the laws of the world. To the Fatui, these powers are nothing more than a thing to be collected and shaped into a weapon for the grace of the Tsaritsa. Rosalyne took fire into her, sacrificing mortal form and became a living flame, as such she was granted the title of Crimson Witch of Flames. Tartaglia, the child who fell into that which lurks beyond the borders, learnt to harness the power that dwelled there from ancient legends, and for that the child was recognised as Foul's Legacy, made the Cryo Goddess' opening move and appointed Harbinger Vanguard.As for he who was dubbed Captain, his power came from deep beneath frozen lands, a blade from the south left to absorb harsh winters until once fiery stone turned cold as ice. In that stone was the power to freeze all that it cut until nothing but hoarfrost remained in the place of that forgotten existence, and for that power, the indomitable strength and unwavering ideals that rivalled the seven chosen gods atop seven stolen thrones, he was named HOARFROST PALADIN. His mandate differs from those unlucky few, acknowledged by the lonely god atop a frozen throne, his task is singular and unrelenting, to bring an end to the war with the abyss before it can be allowed to spill out once more.None of the recruits ever find themselves assigned to him, or would the hoarfrost paladin allow it, each and every new member of the ever-growing company is hand-picked by methodical icy gaze. Some find themselves with pockets laced with bribes, to be Fatui, be it those who enter through the Academies or through the Hearth, is to live for survival by any means. He does not shun those who cannot meet his lofty morals, content to let them linger and report to whichever HARBINGER has seen fit to use them as a pawn in their elaborate game of chess.Even the Harbingers are not above playing for power, to remove bitter rival or once friend as a means to reach a higher power, even the Jester dare not interfere with the politics that play out beneath their banners, for no matter what, all know that their titles, their power, is all but a tool to ensure the mask of the old world burns away in the flames of Heresy. So the Hoarfrost Paladin waits, lingers amongst shadows for the day that his ideal, his oath, must be fulfilled with a sweep of his blade. SAILING.  —
→ WHILE he is loath to admit the extent of his involvement when it came to the ship that trawled the origins of all waters during the cataclysm, the experience has left its mark on him in more ways than one. Even before he was formally initiated to the Fatui, his primary means of travel was primarily seaborne, a remnant of an age he's rarely inclined to speak about and that few alive can remember vividly, his place in it all is merely to record it for whomever follows yet still he finds it hard not to think of the countless brave souls that took to sea in an attempt to contain the flood of Ichor.Being atop what was a merchants' vessel when it set out from port, only to find himself roped into manning a line after the great Leviathan emerged from the depths, was an illuminating experience for him, something that never truly left his mind nearly 500 years later. The kinship he felt with those sailors is something that consistently lingers in his mind, even when he's long forgotten his age and his date of birth, he never seems to forget their graves and their descendants, funds he has no use for always seemingly ending up in the coffers of those who descended from the brave men and women that guided that graceful creature to rest amidst the tides.It's that same loyalty, the same kinship that has him push for a naval flotilla, a legion of icebreakers and frigates that patrol as far as Dornman Port to the East and Fontaine to the south. He's cautious, but he's seen the reports of the Boughkeeper's reappearance, of the Abyss Order moving more and more. He owes it to those brave souls to ensure no ships will see their routes upheaved, cargo thrown overboard in an attempt to stall such great beasts, even when his personal ship is carrying him to the west, sailing through the strait to deal with matters in Natlan that he's put off for far too long AGE AND IDEALS.  —
→ Returning once more to that little leather book, only slightly more singed now for his troubles. The man beneath the mask is old, so old that he's long since taken to rounding his age to the nearest 0 rather than care about the specific digit at the end of the sequence. Of course, said long life hasn't been without benefit, giving him ample time to document the myriad powers running through the continent and even those that exist far beyond the bordered sea. Mind, he doesn't proclaim to be a scholar as to the nature of the world, that, in his opinion, is better left to the more mystically inclined.He's lived through the cataclysm and the forgotten years after it, when the world and ley lines struggled to recover from the long night that unleashing such dark powers had brought. He watched, patient and Stoic, as a sea of ash came to rest over the land, which sacrificed all in an attempt to stem the hubris of a Sinner. Once he had tugged at ropes under the guise of a northern sailor, bringing a great yet remorseful Leviathan to rest amidst ancient waves, watching as its ichor flowed away to give shape to new life.He remembers meeting the Jester, seeing the fires of an ancient kingdom in his eyes, and indulging him as story after story fell of the world that predated the archon war and the divine thrones. The hulking man will gladly admit to being intrigued by the stories, that lingering hunger for knowledge of all things fuelled by the need to understand a lifelong enemy. It's easy, in a way, to accept that offer, knowledge in return for his strength, even as he is steadfast in his refusal to accept a power, a delusion, that feels so similar to the long dark night and the ichor that continued to corrupt the land.No, his power, his strength is born of the light of life. A higher element that permeates the land where lay lines refuse to linger. There is a deep, unspoken respect in his breast for the peoples that use that power to commune with the descendants of ancient dragons. He is remorseful, in his own way, for the science he'd been forced to turn a blind eye to, even as that obsidian blade had been levelled at the lesser ranked immoral scientist who relished in experimentation.Even now, as he stares out at the sea of lava that has sealed away the land of ash, a part of him regrets not unsheathing the blade in full, to call upon revered strength as a means to reunite the delightfully mortalised Second with the deceased Fourth before the bell toiled for him naturally. In his eyes, these experiments in Heresy are sooner ended before another Sinner is allowed to join the ranks of the Five that he hunts in the darkest corners. The being, the one dubbed First has seen all the folly of mortals time and time again, the part of him that clings to ancient oaths rattling at the bars to ensure that the realm between light and dark will no longer suffer their wars. MORTALITY.  —
→ He's never given much thought to the idea of mortality, never had time to consider it in lieu of the curse he'd so gracefully accepted for the supposed perversion of the laws of the world. After 100 long, cold, years in the dark, even the concept of time had become something he held little care for. Time flowed differently amidst the unmoving tides, one year in the darkened abyss being two more on the continent to turn him name to memory.He felt sad, of course he did, for those who found themselves subject to the curse merely for the crime of being a land without the laws of the primordial. The sadness in him coils and twists, the memories of unaging children cursed eternally to never see their face for the hubris of a ruler long gone. Perhaps that was why he'd so willingly followed the one eyed sage, Pierro, from the scarred land.It took him far too long to grow used to the newfound strength of a life unending, to relearn weapon after weapon that had found itself invented in his absence. All manner of martial and ranged weapon carefully adjusted for the almost giantlike body that seemed to have faded into oblivion outside the frigid northern winds. JOURNALS.  —
ONCE, long before he'd received the vision dyed red by his own actions, he'd taken to recording everything in the first of many journals, a gift from a mentor and a dear friend to celebrate his return from afar with claymore in hand. His brother, oh his dear forgotten brother, had chosen to stay behind to torment Rozalyne like he had since the three were far younger while he'd returned to the city of Freedom, to the friends that awaited them in the land they'd settled in so many years ago. He remembers how welcoming Rostam had been when the duo arrived, helping to obscure the reason why they'd crossed desert and valley in search of a better life.He remembers the first words carefully recorded in that journal, cover engraved with the crest of Swords wrapped in wings. Some he'd forgotten with the tide, others seared into his soul as he adorned himself in the gleaming suit of white before riding off to battle, to the beginning of Celestia's Long War. He remembers the marching machines, the way those abominations spread their ranks thin on every front as Rostam descended into those dark depths. He remembers the endless fighting, the blade long discarded as his armour was tinted black by his actions.He knows, of course he knows, that the original journal is lost to time, to grief and anguish. He'd replaced so many journals, so many friends, in his long lifespan. Sworn to atone, he refused to allow himself to pass until they were free, discarding the attire of the Proud Knight of Favonius to clad himself in the garb of the Mourning Archon. Once, Pierro had handed him another, pleaded with him to join and ensure no one else would fall in the way the citizens of Khaenri'ah had, a request from the Tsaritsa herself he'd said.And so he dedicated himself to a singular cause for five hundred years. Yet he never truly turned his gaze from his home, the land where he'd laid his brother to rest so long ago. He'd lost track of how many Grandmasters he'd watch ascend to and eventually retire from the position, continuing to train all who picked up his banner in the old ways, instilling the same values in them that Rostam had once done for the man who'd disguised himself as Roland with his advice.On his shelf there remains a journal, a dossier almost, the name and family of everyone who'd ever led the order that Rostam had taken great pride in so many lifetimes ago. Perhaps that journal holds his disgust for how Varka had failed his successor, taking so many knights with him and allowing that Monster Alberich's order to corrupt the gleaming symbol. Perhaps if one were brave enough to steal a glance, they'd see just how quickly he'd stricken that undeserving fool from the role of grandmaster. Those that flew the banner of the first, of the bloodstained knight, knew better than to interfere with those that their Lord favoured as the RIghtful Ordo Favonius. TRADITIONS.  —
Every year, without fail, one of his knights is chosen for a task of the upmost diplomatic importance. They all know when the day is coming, the drilling of customs belonging to a pre-cataclysm world into each and every one of them until they know the customs of the Windblume dance without fail. To the mages, they see it as an opportunity to discard the attire their lord views as restrictive and defenceless, while the agents view it as an excuse to break out formal aware of their myriad homelands.For Nikolas, the task is an excuse to shed the blackened armour, donning the clothes that are purchased in secret from his homeland every few years without fail, always accompanied by a single Cecilia flower in remembrance. He encourages them, as best they can be convinced, to bring music, to celebrate the cultures that drive them in their tasks, no matter how complicated it may be to retrieve the necessary items.The legions of the 8th know when the day approaches, when orders come to return to the palace so the 1st may take up post. The 1st, however, dare not to travel as a single unit. Nikolas and his knights memorial are always the first to leave for the Windkissed Capital, gifts in stow for the Hotelier who had so kindly allowed usage of his historic abode, the mages are next to follow, dancing merrily in the streets despite the diplomatic tensions because they understand that any conflict would displease their leader. Last are the agents, travelling with the documents personally entrusted by their archon to renew their ties.And for the night of the ball, one is always chosen to represent their nation, proudly wearing the banner of the Knight in favour of their leader.
 DIPLOMACY.  —
As befitting his title of Lord First, Nikolas takes great effort to ensure his knowledge of current FORMAL greetings and diplomatic customs remains relevant at all times, he is of the mind that combat need only be the LAST possible course of action in all situations where he is not met with justified hostility. As the right hand of the Director he strives to instill this quality in all who served under his direct command, taking careful action in foster the qualities in those he considers to be his KNIG