Riordan: Riordan is actually a member of the Mana Tribe, something which the others realize when they see him and L.J./Sailorknight together. All members of the Mana Tribe have red hair and strikingly yellow-green eyes, except for the Priestesses, who bear the markings of their particular element. He was (like so many villains are) not originally evil. In fact, he used to be a doctor--treating the sick and wounded almost free of charge (10 Gold per patient--very little money). He had a wife and two daughters, and he loved them as much as he loved his work. That changed one day, however, when a group of men entered his clinic, appearing to be badly wounded. As soon as Riordan saw them, he called for his wife and eldest daughter to help, and once they were all in the room, the men revealed themselves to be bandits--and perfectly healthy bandits at that. They beat and tied up Riordan, forcing him to watch as they raped and beat his wife and daughter. After they were dead, they knocked Riordan unconscious, stole what little money was there, and left.He awoke some hours later, the images of the past few hours events burned into his mind, replaying themselves over and over. His heart was almost completely dead, the only warmth in it reserved for his remaining daughter, Rose, who had been out collecting herbs and such (which was what he used to heal--he wasn't really a doctor in the sense of how Professor Tomoe was a doctor, he was more like a white mage or something). He managed to bury his wife and daughter before Rose came home, and he told her that her mother and sister had gone away for a long trip earlier that morning to find a special plant he needed, and when they had found it they were going to meet her and himself at their new home. Naturally, you or I would not buy that, but remember that Rose was only about four years old at the time, so she readily accepted that as the explanation. Riordan then burned down the clinic and took Rose with him on a search to find a way to avenge his family's deaths. He found out about a special item created by the gods and given to the Mana Priestess, the Exitium Heart--a beautiful pendant that was worn by the priestess at all times. In the event that the balance was shifted beyond any possible fixing, the Heart was to be put to use, that use being to destroy the world and then bring it back to life, cleansed. Unfortunately, the Heart was shattered into three shards at the time of the great wars, shards which now reside in the animus (soul) crystals inside certain human beings. Riordan used his knowledge of sorcery to take him to the planet where the Priestesses and the shards had been reborn, taking with him three young boys with exceptional powers, which he raised and trained to serve him.
Sailorknight: Sailorknight is Lysistrata, formerly L.J., a character from my old Secret of Mana fanfictions. In her storyline, she is killed by the same man that gave her the little t-shaped scar on her right cheek. As is customary with the females of the Mana Tribe, her spirit goes to inhabit the tree, but said spirit is so angry and vengeful that it is forced out of the Tree and reborn on Earth as Sailorknight.
Etienne Delacroix: Well, in case you couldn't deduce this from the bit on the previous page, Etienne was a Prince way back then, specifically, the Prince of Tasnica. (I suppose if you put his name together with his title it would mean 'crown prince,' [and with the last name, of the cross] which he was) Despite the fact that he was royalty, the relationship between him and The High Priestess would still have been considered scandalous had anyone found out about it--because, even though he was a Very Important Person, he was no Priest and he was certainly not a member of the Mana Tribe. He was constantly weak and sickly, being afflicted with asthma and most likely diabetes (not that they knew what diabetes was back then o.o;) and he was not well-liked by the people. Up until he was 18 the country was mostly run by his aides, who pushed him and smacked him around a lot for crying all the time.
Reve Delasoir:Umm, I'm not going to type it all up... hee.. ^^; Just go to paper butterfly and look under Reve's life... that's pretty much everything. ^^;;
Umi/Gaijin Jigoku: Ah, I think I'll just keep this one to myself.
Charon Asteri:Charon used to be a guard at the Palace of Light back before the Mana War, during the Silver Millenium and all that. ^^; He was equipped with the scythe but not allowed to use deadly force on intruders. In a pathetic attempt to make connections with the game, a nasty little man who was probably a relation of Mammon (a character in the game who stole Lumina's power to make gold^^;) attempted to steal the elemental for the same purpose. Since Charon was forbidden from killing, the robber got past him fairly easily and climbed the tower, where he proceeded to beat up Jada with a few well-placed shadow spells. o.oCharon (who had a crush on Jada :D) decided he didn't care what happened and cut the guy up, saving Jada and Lumina but breaking his code of honor in the process. He was removed from his position, but he didn't have time to worry about it as the Mana War came about soon after, killing him and the Priestess. Like the others, the memory of that past life stayed with him when he was reborn, to be activated upon meeting Lumina. However, Charon's life did not go as smoothly as the others'--after his mother died and his father killed himself, Charon was sent to live with a sadistic uncle who inflicted all of the scars still present on his body. The suffering was too much for little Charon to bear, so it pushed everything onto the memory (as opposed to creating an entirely new and third personality), tainting it.
Pathos: Pathos's mother walked out on the family when he was five, mostly because she realized what an ass he was. ^^; She intended to take Pathos with her, but since his dad had better means of supporting him and better lawyers, he won the custody battle. Pathos lived in a fairly nice house and had nice things, though he rarely saw his father as he always off 'making money.' His day job was a manager at a packaging firm, but he was never home at night, either. When Pathos asked, he responded that he liked to do 'public service' at night...Pathos was very unaware that this public service was selling drugs. ^^; One night, when he was about twelve, he noticed that it was quite late (near midnight) and his father had not returned. The next morning, still no father. At around noon the doorbell rang and Pathos ran for it, thinking that maybe it was his father and he had simply forgotten his keys or something else to that effect. Instead, it was three men. One of them was equipped with a set of claws on his knuckles--five long, sharp blades.
They demanded the whereabouts of Pathos's father; he responded saying he didn't know. The men didn't buy this, and the one with the blades grabbed him and shook him. Pathos, being only twelve and already frightened, started to cry, insisting he had no idea. The man put his claws on Pathos's right cheek and said that if he didn't reveal his father's location, he would rip off the right half of his face. Pathos trembled and cried, insisting that he was telling the truth. The man kept his word, and he dug the claws into his cheek and peeled the skin away from Pathos's face, exposing blood and muscles and all that mess. He then tossed Pathos out of the house while the others proceeded to ransack it. Clutching his face (which hurt very badly^^;), he ran as far as he could before collapsing on the sidewalk. When he woke up, he was in the hospital, his face bandaged.
The doctors informed him that he was a lucky little man, as someone had seen him and called an ambulance. They then removed his bandages and handed him a mirror, showing him that the right half of his face had been transformed into a horrible mess of metal wires intertwining with bone and muscle. His right eye was gone. Immediately, he asked why they hadn't given him a new layer of skin, and they answered that they had tried, but for some reason the artifical skin dissolved on his face (then they said they'd given up because his insurance didn't cover the surgery anyway^^;). They released him a while later, sending him to an orphanage, as his father was found out. All the family's money was gone and he never saw his father again.
He expected to be sent to his mother, but she, too, had mysteriously disappeared. The people of the orphanage introduced him to the little girl who had called the ambulance--a six-year old by the name of Kaitlyn. She was about the only child who didn't run from his disfigured face, so they hung out together during the short time Pathos stayed. When he was fourteen he left the orphanage, stole a mask, and began trying to find work. He took on odd jobs for several years until, while working as a bagger in a grocery store, he met a young woman named Kelsea. She told him quite suddenly that she was there on vacation from her hometown in Vinton, where she owned a small bar, and that he had a nice face and would he like to come back and work for her? He tapped the mask and replied that this wasn't his face, and she said she knew that and took off the mask. Horrified, he tried to cover up, but she forced his hands away. He expected her to run in terror (in fact, some people nearby saw him and _were_ running in terror), but she just tapped the good half of his face and said 'Yes. Very nice face.'
Kelsea then handed back his mask and told him to quit his job and meet her at the airport tomorrow. ^^; Feeling like he had nothing to lose, he did so, and she kept her word--she took him back to Vinton and set him up as the bartender of her establishment. She told him that if anyone gave him any trouble about his face, then he was free to run them out--she didn't want people like that in her bar, anyway. ^^; Despite Kelsea's kindness, Pathos still had an intense resentment for most of the people around him--so intense that it drew Amethyst, who attacked him one night after work. She put the black moon symbol on his forehead and similarly altered his mask, turning it black as well. And thus, he became evile. ^^;
Harmatia/Peripetaia: Peripetaia is a somnialian, a member of Reve's tribe. She and sister both have the ability to turn into wolves. ^^; However, Peri is not a full-blood, as her father was a human (and a not very nice one at that). This man washed up onto the island where the somnialians live (isolated from the world^^;) and they, being nice people, took him in and set him up in a little house and all that. As it turns out, he was a fugitive(by the name of Vitiare^^;), and a rather demented one at that. He decided he could have a pretty good life here if he settled down and didn't tell anyone about where he was from, so he found a woman he liked (Peri & Harmatia's mother). Unfortunately, she was already with a man at the time (Harmatia's father). To remedy this situation, Vitiare pretended to befriend Harmatia's father, while at the same time plotting his demise.
He took Harmatia and her father on a fishing trip (he really would have preferred to leave Harmatia at home, but she insisted on coming with her daddy) and sent Harmatia away to dig in the soil some ways down to find bait. He cast his line and Harmatia's father cast his, and they sat there quietly until Vitiare cried that he had something and pulled the line back suddenly. The wire struck Harmatia's father, and while he sat there looking surprised, Vitiare grabbed the other end of the line and pulled it back around the other man's neck. He then tied the ends of the line together over a branch, leaving her father hanging. The taut wire choked him and he was dead in a matter of minutes. Vitiare ran screaming down the bank for Harmatia, claiming that her father had suddenly taken his line and climbed a tree, using it to strangle/hang himself. Horrified, Harmatia ran back to the scene. She didn't believe for a moment that her father had done himself in, but she feared that Vitiare would kill her too if she said anything, so she just broke down and cried.
Vitiare carried her home and proceeded to back off for a while, saying he wanted to let her and her mother 'recover.' Her mother thought he was just the nicest man, but Harmatia was convinced that her father had been murdered. Her mother refused to listen to her, however, and the knowledge burned inside her--probably part of what caused her to go insane. ^^;
Anyway, Vitiare returned about a month later (not that much time--;) and started going out with Harmatia's mother, becoming highly offended whenever Harmatia accused him. Harmatia, becoming more and more estranged, eventually just retreated into her room. She tore apart her toys and dolls to release her anger, crying herself to sleep at night. After three years of this, Peripetaia was born. At first, Harmatia hated Peripetaia, as she viewed her as the result of her mother and this terrible human's union. But she noticed something strange about Peri--she was almost always sick.
Doctors determined she had some kind of debilitating disease (akin to the Earth version of AIDS, if you want a comparison) which broke down her immune system, allowing all sorts of diseases to enter her body. They admitted (much to Vitiare's annoyance) that it had probably been inherited from the father, and that it was possible that it had been passed onto Harmatia's mother as well. While at the same time feeling sorry for Peripetaia, Harmatia was extremely happy about this, because it caused the other inhabitants of the island to become suspicious of him, even moreso when her mother _did_ contract the disease. She died of it when Harmatia was 14 and Peripetaia was 11, leaving Vitiare without any support. Harmatia told everyone that he was a wicked murderer who had not only killed her father but (albeit inadvertently) her mother and likely her sister as well. This time they believed her, and he, recognizing the rising tension, abandoned the two girls and left the island.
By this time, Harmatia was truly demented (despite only being 14) and had to rely completely on the sickly Peripetaia for support. Peripetaia took care of her, but she didn't feel that they belonged on this island anymore. Though it was generally forbidden to leave, she was allowed because of her special circumstances (being a half-breed, basically). They went to the nearest continent and wandered, searching for a town to take them in. They found a small one, but it didn't take kindly to beggars, so they mostly stole what they needed (including medicine, as Peripetaia's disease wasn't going away anytime soon). They once made the mistake of stealing a pendant from a sorceror (thinking it was just a regular piece of jewelry that they could sell for some money). The sorceror found them, but instead of punishing them, asked them why they felt they had to steal.
They answered because they had no means of getting what they want, and he told them to hold up the pendant and wish for they wanted. Peripetaia's first thought was that she wished to be well, but Harmatia's wish was to get revenge upon the human race for ruining her life. She clutched the pendant and wished this with all of her soul. The two felt dizzy soon after and passed out--when they woke up, they were in Vinton, in front of Amethyst's apartment (lovely how Fate works out like that, isn't it^^;). By this time the two were their current ages, and Amethyst had just awakened. Confused and afraid, the two sisters wondered what the hell the crazy sorceror had done to them and wandered out of the apartment building.
Harmatia was disgusted to find that there were humans _everywhere_, and all of them were looking at her and her sister oddly--mostly because of the marks on their faces, their rags, and their strange coloring. ^^; Peripetaia clung to Harmatia, afraid, and they tried to figure out what to do. Harmatia, insane but not stupid, soon figured that they had been taken to another world--probably an alternate version of their original. Peripetaia agreed, and decided that she ought to find some means of work (as it was much more difficult to steal from these people than the ones on their own world^^;). Before they could figure how to go about doing this, Amethyst returned home. She saw them in front of the building and brought them back to her apartment, hearing their story and placing the Black Moon symbol on their foreheads afterwards.^^;
Fuu: Fuu is a member of a tribe similar to Reve's, but less evolved. Each member of this group changes into the same ferret/cat hybrid animal, and each has markings on their faces that denote their clans, which usually have to do with weapons (for example, Fuu's family name, Gladii, means sword, and his markings vaguely resemble the same weapon). His people were made extinct by Reve's after Reve's time and before Peri and Harmatia's (so to Reve it's news and to Peri and Harmatia it's just history). His family used their ability to traverse the dreamscape to flee, but when they managed to get out of the dreamscape they were in the Dark Kingdom (wondered who could have arranged THAT, eh). Only Fuu survived, and since he was so young at the time (even now he's only fourteen, human-wise), he doesn't remember them at all. Nor does he remember much of anything about the powers of his race...