Charles Gwenth

Founder of Caelua

Male (he/him)

56 (age of death)

5'10"

Black

Almond

Ectomorph

The man who led Caelua into the era of magic is usually depicted as a giant of a man, with broad shoulders and bulging muscles as he valiantly led his army of rebels into battle. He represented peak Areliese masculinity. But in reality, the man who led the revolution was a skinny, lanky scholar of average height who hated exercising.

Charles was born half-Areliese to an immigrant mother. He never knew his dad because he disappeared before he was born, leaving his mother to raise him by her lonesome. Despite being stranded in a foreign land with unfamiliar customs, a language she could barely understand, and no one to rely on, she worked day and night to make sure her son could afford a good education. It was only because of her that Charles graduated from university with a degree in history.

He became an archivist for the National Library of Areliene. Little did his superiors know, he photocopied a wide array of documents so that he could take them to his bunker at home. These documents ranged from public domain texts to highly classified files. He didn't know why, but Charles felt compelled to keep a store of essential readings related to Areliene's history and culture in case something ever happened to the national archive. In the event that the world ended and humanity needed to rebuild itself, at least they would never forget the history of where they came from.

And then the world actually ended. Until the day of his death, Charles remembered that day vividly; he was doing his usual tasks at the archive when the nuclear attack siren went off throughout the facility. Minutes ago, Areliene declared war and fired its entire arsenal of atomic bombs across the ocean, and it received several dozen of them in turn. Seeing as the archive was already underground, he had a short trip to the bunker, but when the blast doors sealed shut behind everyone who made it in and the ceiling started trembling like a gargantuan beast was trying to shake them out, he knew that this was the end of human civilization as they knew it. This bunker was about to become their new home for what might be the rest of their miserable lives.

Then, of course, the miracle happened. Three months after the nuclear annihilation, every trace of radiation on the planet's surface caused by the bombs magically disappeared. At the same time, about half of the world's population unlocked supernatural powers that were only seen in myths and legends. Charles happened to be one of them, unlocking the ability to []. During this tumultuous period, he and his fellows scholars decided to mark this date as Year 0 of a new era called After Common Magic and dubbed the previous era as Before Common Magic.

Little did he know, Charles and some of his colleagues would be leading a rebellion against the very government they used to work for twelve months later. Despite the opportunity to restart being handed to humanity by whatever pitying god was watching them, the same government that declared nuclear war failed miserably in its attempts to organize Areliene's population into reconstruction. Millions of impoverished survivors starved as corporations took advantage of their stockpiles protected from the war and charged extortionate prices for basic goods.