Anton Dassud

Anton Dassud - half-elf, traitor, rogue, murderer

A young half-elf, born in the nation of [Elven Nation] 10 years before the start of The 100 year war with the human nation of Orbicentrum, grew to become one of the architects of the war's end. Early in the war, the elven Dassud family was slaughtered by the attacking humans. The young Anton was rescued by patrolling elven forces. He was made a ward of the state, and taken care of in that fashion until he came of age. The day he came of age, he enlisted into the elven army. Reports are that Anton struggled to get through basic training, but by the time he was finished he was a ruthless asset on the battlefield. Though he, at times he clashed with his commanding officers about tactics, and following orders. He was always a valued member of the team. Capable and trustworthy.

Then something changed.

A member of Anton’s platoon was discovered in their bunks, murdered. An investigation was performed. The results were inconclusive. Sometime later, Anton was moved to a different platoon for unrelated reasons. Another member of his platoon was found dead. Poisoned. The investigations focused heavily on him. His interrogation was long and arduous...but in the end, nothing could be proven. He was transferred to a desk job so that eyes could be kept on him. That’s when the deaths started piling up. Members of the elven army, seemingly unconnected to one another, started dying. All over the nation, singular, inexplicable deaths began to pile up. Anton vanished into thin air, but the assassinations continued. The next time Anton Dussad was seen by elven forces was alongside human forces. Slaughtering the elves from the shadows. Anton was declared a national traitor and embarrassment. His position in the human army was a point of diplomatic contention until the end of the war. His position as spy-master was considered a diplomatic slap in the face.

Anton Dussad - half-elf, rogue, spy-master, and national hero

A young half-elf, born in the nation of A'fdell 10 years before the start of The 100 year war with the human nation of Orbicentrum, grew to become one of the architects of the war's end. Early in the war, the elven Dassud family was slaughtered by a movement that called themselves “purists” within the elven nation that sought to cleanse the area of those that would consort with humans and to wipe the half-breeds that were spawned as a result. These purists burned down the Dassud estate.

   A battalion of traveling humans rushed from their position only to discover the boy being the only one who survived. 

That’s when the elves arrived, chasing the humans off, and returning home, blaming the destruction on the human soldiers.

   As a ward of the state, the story of the human’s destruction is the one he was told for more than a decade. Living the life of an orphan in his formidable teenage years, Anton became quite adept at lying, stealing, and hiding. As an older child, he never anticipated being adopted. 

The day he was given leave to live life as an adult he joined the elven army. Anton remembers being complimented on his already-developed skill with a blade. “Your family must keep the traditions alive.” He continued through basic training and joined the front lines. Wanting to, “Kill as many humans as he could get his hands on.” He did. His kill count rose higher than any other member of his platoon. His only reprimands on his record, he recalls, were times when he put himself in danger to take out an enemy combatant. He got called reckless. And yet, still not accepted among the other men. As a half-elf, he was always held at arm’s length. Until, Anton recalls, one of the officers drunkenly told a story to another officer within earshot. Of this time they destroyed a mixed human-elf family’s house and killed them all. They burned the place down, and by sheer dumb luck, a patrol of humans approached. They ran to the elven authorities to report human’s having crossed the border and burned a house down. The officer described all of the people Anton remembered. The next morning, that officer’s body was already cold by the time they found the arrow that had been shot straight through the elf’s ear, out the other side of his head, and into the pillow. The platoon was questioned and questioned and questioned. Nobody knew anything. Nobody broke. There was no explanation. The conclusion was that humans had gotten a hold of some personal item of that officer, teleported in with their fancy gadgets, killed him with his own bow and arrow, and teleported back out. They’d been used recently in live combat. The human’s called their devices “visitors.” It seemed his fellow soldiers didn’t quite buy that answer.

   Anton put in for a transfer due to “racial bias amongst his peers.” The transfer was quickly granted.

Anton began to look into his family’s demise. He had never needed to before. He already knew the truth before now. He could only remember one name from the first elf’s story. So he sought them out. The other man had since retired from the army and had since become a blacksmith. Anton didn’t remember what he asked the man he found in that beautiful elven forge. He only remembered that the first thing the man said was about him being a half-elf. He tried to push past that and get more names. The only other thing that Anton could remember was that once he got *one* name he threw that man into his own forge. Anton reported to base for his new assignment. One single name bounced around inside his mind. He reported to a central city. He looked at every nameplate he saw while at the base. He started watching and memorizing people’s movements, mannerisms, and patterns of speech. He started thinking of different ways to memorize these things. He began to hum to himself, and practiced his mnemonics in his head until he stopped in his tracks before realizing why. He stared at the nameplate. The next name. That man was found a week later with an arrow through his eye. An investigation was launched. Anton faced an interrogation that, at times, bordered on psychological torture. Anton began humming to himself more often during those weeks, he remembered. After Anton was cleared of all charges, he was given an “apology” for how he was treated during the investigation in the form of a medal. He was forced to wear it on his uniform. He said every time he looked at it all he could think of was how many times they said he could “make it all stop, if he just told the truth.” Anton’s newest assignment was records. In the capital. Anton accepted the new paper-pushing assignment happily. During that time, he collected the list of people who were deemed responsible for reporting the location of the human’s attack on the Dussad estate. He found the name of the officer who wrote the report after the fact and cross-referenced it with all the members of that squad and when they were assigned there. He found a number of them in retirement. He found plenty still in the armed forces. Some were already dead. He searched for any reference he could find to the humans that were discovered at his family’s burned home. His research led him down a rabbit hole of interconnected elven families via their vast wealth. He began his campaign by getting to know all of the retired people on his list. A warm smile and a nice bottle of wine usually got any elf talking about the old days, he found. A lot of them remember that night. They remembered things seeming weird about how the humans were being. Some of them even lamented their human friendships after the events of those nights. How could they stay friends with people who could just suddenly do that? Some of them admitted it didn’t make a lot of sense. A lot of people were hurt when it happened. A lot more than just Anton. Then Anton interviewed his first retiree who seemed to revel in the stories that he told. He loved to tell the stories of the gutted humans, begging for one last second of consciousness. He bragged about his kill count in one battle. Middling double-digits. He remembered the fire that night. Said he didn’t really see what the humans did as a particularly *bad* thing, you know, killing the human-lovers, but they still didn’t belong on elven land. Anton poisoned that man’s drink before he left the bar. One-by-one people on Anton’s lists began to disappear. There was a growing concern at the base. Did the humans have some new contraption? Some new magic? Officers began wearing protective amulets and medallions. It didn’t slow down Anton. An accident introduced him to other half-elves who felt the same way as him. Eventually, Anton had 5 agents keeping tabs on different elves in the army in different cities throughout A'fdell. Anton found the name of one of the human officers who was present when was rescued. One of his agents got caught. He and the other four ran. They ran to Orbicentrum. As half-elves, the humans were wary, but when they claimed to be visiting an old, retired uncle it seemed most people were happy to point them in the right direction. Anton remembered just how *old* the man was when he cried about how much he regretted how that night turned the tide of things at the beginning of the war. Anton suggested he and his friends would “turn it back.” Anton and his agents brought their plan to the human army: They will capture any enemy soldier that needs captured. We will extract information from anyone who knows anything worthwhile. They didn’t take kill orders. They had their own kill-lists. The human army set to deliberate before Anton emptied his bag of holding onto the floor. Thousands and thousands of pages of military intelligence. Anton and his crew went on to create a real sense of dread amongst the ranks of the elven forces. His title of “traitor” was used to great effect to make him more of a boogeyman than a real operative. He found his true calling in guiding, delegating, and researching. Anton claims to have only, *personally,* killed 20-25% of those that were killed during the war. He claimed, “I didn’t want to kill. I wanted to root out a certain mentality. I didn’t have to kill *everyone.* I’m not a serial killer.” Historians still debate the results of Anton Dassud’s campaign against elven superiority, but the results of his campaign of terror are settled. The officers of the elven army were gripped in terror. The elven army that had been known for its ambushes and daring feats of deadly acrobatics was no more. Risk assessment somehow fell to the diviners. The elven nation became more magical in response to the more technical growth of the humans.