Natanalok


Appearence

Natanalok is an elk-folk. He resembles an anthropomorphic wapiti, bearing a brown hide that it's of a darker tone on the head and limbs and with an almost white/silver colouration in the torso[1], a pair of massive and imposing antlers and a rather muscular, yet slim physique. His feet are hooved and so are his hands, though the latter are shaped as typical per humanoids, simply wih the last finger phalanges being covered by a hoof. He is somewhere in his species equivalence of the 19-21 young adulthood.

His garments vary from plane to plane, though he tends towards skin-tight clothes, usually leathers and hand bandages. His antlers are always adorned with talimans that aid in his magic, and he sometimes wears a cape. His favoured weapon are the bow and arrows.


Backstory


Natanalok was born in the northern taiga expanses of a relatively young plane, to a small tribe of his people. He ignited his spark very early, when he was eight: one day, when he was collecting berries, a roc grabbed him with its talons, the pain and fear violentely awakening his planeswalker essence and throwing him to Tarkir. There, he ended up near a Sultai excursion to Qal Sisma, and was almost taken by them if not for a Jeskai Aven scout, who saved him from the serpents and took him to the Sage-Eye Stronghold. Traumatised by this series of events - not the least because the Aven reminded him of the roc -, he was taken in by the Jeskai, who comforted him and allowed him the option to join them.


So for the next seven years of his life, Natanalok trained in the Sage-Eye Stronghold, passing the initiate's stair test with prowess and going on to follow the way of the wandering warrior, as a means of thanking the Jeskai for taking him in, serving them loyaly as an arbiter of justice. Yet, after some time he began to grow disilusioned and felt that he didn't belong anymore, so he asked for resignation. Once that was granted to him, he wandered Tarkir, learning from the desert Ainok the ways of the Abzan (which ultimately didn't interest him much, though he did made some acquaintances among the outcasts) and successfully halting several Sultai and Mardu raids.


Eventually, he returned to the very mountains that saw his arrival to Tarkir, and learned the ways of the Temur. Here too he found no better luck in feeling at home, as the familial units weren't appealing and neither was the ferocious attitude of the Ainok, who saw him as nothing more than prey. He, however, felt drawn to the whisperers, and one day he consulted one, Gargur, in order to seek guidance in his life path. They informed him of the multiple "nows", showing him alternates paths such as one where he became an undead slave to the Sultai, another in which he never left the Jeskai, and another where he never even entered Tarkir.


Inspired by the exchange, Natanalok bowed and left, just as a Mardu raid arrived to capture him, lead there by an Ainok. With a deep breath, Natanalok simply left, and never returned to Tarkir.


Since then, he has travelled the multiverse, mostly sightseeing and working as a mercenary. Recently, he has began some sort of agenda, creating his own stronghold in the arctic steppes of his own birthplane. There, he has built a large cathedral-like palace in the midst of the vast, almost desolate plains, guarded by fierce gargoyles and lammasu, his own estate in the middle of nowhere. From there he operates his schemes, now more higher minded than ever.


Personality


For the most part, Natanalok is a very reserved person. When he speaks, he does so pratically, not wasting much time with embelishment, making him sound rather brash and demanding. When dealing with business, he insists upon the client's clarity and honesty, and is known to pettily take their words literally if they don't follow this. He himself is a largely honest person, preffering silence to outright lying, though he is fond of using half-truths to get his way.


In spite of this, Natanalok is a deeply mystical person, spending a lot of his time in contemplation and serenity, meditating and pondering upon the grander truths of the multiverse. He isn't particularly fond of the academic approach to philosophy, preffering an introspective, meditative road to enlightment. Bearing a personal moral code, he believes in compassion, but ultimately the greater scheme of things is more relevant, and for this reason he doesn't mind his murderous ways, which he believes will help him gain enough power to actually influence the multiverse at large for the better. Gratitude is also a very important concept to Natanalok's morality, though he isn't opposed to go around it via proxies.


Usually, he doesn't feel much in regards to the act of murder, being simply business, but occasionally he deems a target particularly morally abhorrent. In these cases, he not only feels a degree of satisfaction, he is also willing to lower the cost for his services. In younger years he deliberately went out of his way to play vigilante, but more recently he has focused his energies more on higher agendas, leaving the short term solutions to the locals.


Natanalok is a very disciplined person, self-control having become rather natural to him after training under the Jeskai. He, however, is more willing to cater to his impulses than them, mostly whenever he is particularly stressful.[2]


Powers


Other than an incantation taught to him by his grandmother to help heal fractures, Natanalok learned the mystic arts from the Jeskai, and as such his basic understanding of how magic operates is based on their teachings. Like the Jeskai, he understands the existence of the five "fires", and like them he sees the "deathfire" as an abomination to be avoided at all costs, while the "soulfire" is a divine and pure force, and to this day the "fire" in which he has the most mastery over. However, this is here the similarities end: Natanalok has always strongly detested the "mistfire" and the "bloodfire", seeing the former as cold and unnatural and the latter as hard to control and too overwhelmingly passionate. By cotrast, he sees the "vitalfire" as a welcoming, vibrant source of life and strength, and while he bears no hard feelings over the Jeskai, Natanalok believes they're rather wasteful for not using it. He hasn't ever tried the "ghostfire", and has no sincere interest in doing so.


On a pratical level, his focus on magic as elemental forces rather than specific schools provides him with a lot of versality and sheer raw power. Natanalok specialises mostly in a form of bow magic remaniscent of the Mardu Dakla and most likely inspired by it, charging his arrows with mana and weaving spells through them, resulting in a rather lethal form of combat magic. At best, the arrow reaches its target without failure. If the victims are less lucky, things like searing beams of light cutting through them or a tree growing from the inside out upon contact will happen.


Besides the brutal arrow magic, Natanalok is also well versed in photokinetic, geokinetic and phytokinetic elemental magic, as well as healing and apotropaic spells.


Additional Notez

Helio,

Let me start off by saying that I'm sorry I haven't looked at...well, most of your stuff. I feel pretty bad about that, because I try to get to as much of the stuff put up here as I can. The problem is, between grading and my own work, I have relatively little time to look at things, and what time I do have, I usually go to my primary focus, which is fiction. So your planes and characters, sadly, have mostly fallen through the cracks. I'm going to try to get to your most recent plane, and CKY's as well, for that matter, but it will still be a little bit before I can. A week at least.

Now, having said that, I did read over this. I don't have a lot of comments, because I haven't had the chance to look over Tarkir lore stuff yet, and this relies on that quite a bit. I'm not sold on elk-folk yet, but I don't have an immediate problem with it, either. I do have a few questions, though. Am I right in assuming Natanalok is a biped, or is he more like a centaur? I'm also unclear on how the "finger-hooves" work. Also, how did he manage to build "a large cathedral-like palace in the midst of the vast, almost desolate plains?" Wouldn't that take decades at least? Cathedrals are no small pieces of architecture, after all...

As for his personality, I sort of like what you're going for, but I think I would have to see it in action (in a story) to know for sure. It seems he's a little torn between being a sort of moral assassin or a pragmatic missionary. He seems to be fairly aloof, both in personality and living conditions. I'm also not entirely clear on what sort of power-level we're talking with him. Actually, his powers in general still seem a little unclear to me. I do, however, like the idea of an archer. I love archers, and I've been meaning to make one for the M:EM for a long time now, but it just never seems to happen. Anyway, I suppose what I'm saying is that I'm interested, but not sold yet.

Thanks for posting!

That is alright, I accept that people are busy and I myself have been very negligent.




Yes, he is a biped.




Basically like claws, only thicker and less sharp.





Geokinesis.


As for the rest, it will be made more clear in a short story I am devising

"For the Curious...." That means bi-sexual, n'est pas?

His non-humanoid form flys below my gadar.... which is important.

I like this character. If he was a metaphor for a human in our world, I feel like he would be an artist/writer.
When fictional characters are a reflection of the real world around us, something special happens-
A soul can relate and shrug off some of the slag built up in this melting pot.

Well done!

Glad you like him