Shin - Background

Shin is a human slave, raised in the fighting pits of the Desandre Underground. Born an illegitimate son to a servant to a noble in House Madara, he was exiled as an infant to the Breakaway, the gladiator-style arena; its existence unlawful but a frequent haunt of Desandres more pathological elite.

Though he was put to work scrubbing areana floors of blood and gore the moment he could stand and push a broom, as he began to mature and grow broader and taller, he was snapped up as property by one of the Underground's ruling thugs, Figius Meld, and trained to compete. His swordmaster, Cletus Broadbane, was a knight, also a slave, captured from a long irrelevant war many decades before. Whilst resigned to a live where one must learn to kill to survive, Broadbane enstilled upon Shin a sense of chivalry and honour, teaching that empathy and respect for ones opponent was a keener edge in a fight than a bright blade. Honour aside, Broadbane also honed Shin's skills in all manner of weapons, from shortbows, sword and shield, to spears and glaives.

Put to his first fight at the age of fifteen, Shin slowly and uninspiringly kept himself alive, meteing out an existance as a middling fighter, doing just well enough to keep alive, but not quite good enough for him to avoid breaking ribs, earning scars and losing the last two fingers from his left hand (eaten in a rather inspired display from a pair of crazed halflings in the death throes of the Feasting Virus).

As Shin's prowess as a fighter grew, and his cumulative probability of living to see a retirement dereased, he began to look for edges futher afield from his traditional martial training. An old wizard, Radacus Longfellow, a frequent face in the Breakaway (and an even more frequent face in the adjoining tavern), overheard Shin and his swordmaster discussing such strategies one afternoon and offered a deal. Whilst Longfellow's abilities to vanish kegs of cheap Dawrven whiskey and then conjure excuses why he could not pay were well known and respected, Shin was unsure of what other skills the old wizard could teach. However, weighed against his eventual demise, Shin