Many Worlds Tavern releases a character a week on their paid Patreon subscription. I write art briefs and character archetypes, and then flesh those characters out for TTRPG players to drop them into their home games and to inform the worlds they come from.
Here are my favorites.
Walt & Willow, the Bounty Hunters
It was about 453 years ago that Willow met Walt. Willow was, and still is, the strong, silent type. Walt hasn’t shut up since he latched onto Willow’s brain.
A bounty hunter already, Willow nearly died on a job hunting the notorious necromancer, Daexorim Blightfall. Knowing Willow would likely succumb to his wounds after their fight, Daexorim used his dying breath to curse Willow with Mensmorium: an undeath of the mind that would cause it to live on even after the death of its body, effectively sentencing the human man to a slow descent into immortal, immobile insanity as a final act of vengeance.
Expectedly, Willow fell unconscious in Daexorim’s necromantic laboratory where their battle took place. Most of the lab and its instruments were casualties of combat, but as for a small jar containing a creature colloquially known as a “mind mollusk,” it was shattered open with the specimen unscathed. It crawled for food to the closest brain it could sense: Willow’s.
Willow’s undying charisma and Daexorim’s potent curse had already merged. So when the creature tried to feed and zombify Willow’s body, it instead melded with the cursed mind as well.
In barnacle-like attachment to Willow’s brain, the mind mollusk became intelligent, taking on much of Willow’s personality, memories, and mannerisms, all the while maintaining awareness of itself and Willow as two different, yet bound, entities.
At the same time, Willow’s body changed, healing itself in a strange, alien physicality similar to that of the creature atop his head. Although he was no longer able to speak, he found the mollusk could, and the two could communicate telepathically.
Willow emerged from the necromancy lab as an altogether different creature than when he entered three days prior, and now had a strangely symbiotic partner who would have to do his talking for him. It decided to call itself Walt, and they both decided to get back to what they both knew best to get by: bounty hunting.
Thus was born the forever intertwined as the inseparable, indefatigable, infamous duo, Walt & Willow, whose allegiance is always bought by the highest bidder. Lately, that’s been Lord Dominik.
Somber in demeanor and mute in voice, Carakor communicates with the grace of her rapier and the precision of her steps, like any good Bladeancer should.
Coming of age in the Melorealm without the ability to speak was difficult, but it’s what drew her to the art of Bladedancing and compelled her to excel. She expresses a compassion unlike any other in all she does, and lends her graceful blade to anyone in need of it—especially those on the fringes of the Melorealm’s musical culture.
And with her compassion came great humor. She knows the absurdity of living in the Melorealm and never speaking a word, but instead of looking to leave the plane altogether, she’s continued to appreciate the ironic beauty of it, and just the same, come to love the silence she was born with.
Loyal to his people and loud about his skill, Jomir Bottleheart grew up in Cloudheim, trained in archery by his mother. She’s still the only person he’s ever met who can shoot better than him.
Jomir knows he’s from a city of extremely powerful people, and he likewise knows he’s just as skilled as most of them. He withholds his respect for people that earn it by proving themselves to him. Typically, that means he wants to see someone fell an ice giant before he takes them seriously.
Being such a skilled archer, Jomir has been repeatedly asked to join the Wallguard: Cloudheim’s first line of defense (and historically, the only one necessary). He always declines, yet fights with them anyways when the city is attacked, not wanting to abide by their rules or drills, and instead defending the city in his own way: surfing through the air on an elemental with his trusty, mundane longbow. According to him, “ya’ only need magic weapons if yer shot’s not good enough!”
But despite his confidence often toeing into arrogance, Jomir is fiercely loyal—first to his family, then to his city. In fact, the only person he’ll generally listen to is his sister, Eleir, an expert druid, extraordinary alchemist, and the only person he’s ever met who can drink more than him.
Muka died after she came to Latehaven.
She traveled to the afterlife to save her husband, Omir, who was swindled by a devil posing as a noble, promising a life of comfort for he and his wife should he come work for him.
As soon as she heard, she abandoned everything she owned, rushing to find someone willing to send her to the storied realm of Latehaven, ignoring people’s warnings that it’s only a paradise for the dead. Omir had been taken alive, after all.
She finally found a wizard willing to plane shift her, and went forth without so much as a second thought or a plan to get back.
The strange land and even stranger people of Latehaven, she found, weren’t welcoming to living people, making her quest all the more difficult, and all the more urgent. Without a soul willing to ally with her, someone claiming to be a spirit, calling herself Volpiko, appeared, offering to help Muka. She accepted.
A half-successful heist followed. Muka and Volpiko discovered the hideout of the devil who tricked Omir, far in the wastes outside of Latehaven’s city proper, conducting necromantic experiments on living creatures. Omir was still unscathed.
They managed to free Omir and several others, but were caught in the process. Fighting ensued. The devil fell. So too did Muka.
Having experienced Latehaven’s refusal of living people, Muka spent her last breath asking Omir to live the long elven life he was meant to on the material plane. She’d be here waiting for him, even if it took centuries.
Muka awakened, bound to the city of Latehaven and welcomed with open, skeletal arms. She knew it would be some time before she saw Omir again, but Latehaven was a peculiar place with strange rules, and she’d want to learn it well, so she could show him around when he arrived.
That was 258 years ago. Since then, she discovered power in patience after joining the monastery in Latehaven’s Senpou Temple. It was Volpiko’s recommendation that she seek peace there.
Aloria didn’t mean to destroy her village.
She was only 14 years old when it happened. A malicious gang of tamers—people of Flowcliff who live by subjugating beasts—rode in, demanding everything in the people’s possession. The small dragonborn village had no choice but to bow reluctantly, fearing for their lives. Aloria was furious at the injustice, and when she let her emotions burst from her, something in her changed. So too did the earth.
The ground erupted with a thunderous crack. A fissure appeared beneath the tamers. Some were swallowed by the pit. Others were caught by the magma that flung forth. No tamer escaped, no building still stood, and yet no villager was harmed. Regardless, the village turned their fear on Aloria, forcing her to leave her home.
She wandered for some time, slowly attempting to understand her newly discovered magical abilities. Eventually, she began living more permanently in the city of Meridia, where she could keep to herself, blend into a crowd, and work for a normal life, attempting to forget the time her people deemed her wicked.
The tavern she worked was a small and slow one—one where a single silver coin could net a dozen ales. There, an odd two men were regulars, using the space to discuss upcoming jobs. Over time, Aloria realized none of their discussions actually led anywhere, restating the job over and over again, often glossing over details of their jobs that were notably dangerous. She spoke up.
Thus was how the woman known now as Aloria the Great fell in with her party, but of course, that was before they met Nisk the Knowing.
RK-3-MM-52 was a member of the Rifleknights: a legion of automatons created by the Cielaterran Overseers’ Guild to keep the peace between people of the skies and defend against pirates and wyverns.
It was one of the third generation of these automatons, which were built with arcano-mechanically fashioned judgment cores. Intended to function with less direct oversight from the COG, this generation of Rifleknights quickly began “malfunctioning.” More specifically, many began acting out with their own sentience, even if it clashed with direct superior orders or carrying those orders out in unintended ways. This led to most third-gen Rifleknights being sought out and shut down.
RK-3-MM-52 was part of these bot-hunting efforts. It knew a number of these automatons were plainly dangerous, but it also believed some were actively choosing peaceful lives. Thus it chose to prove to the COG with its own actions that generation three of the Rifleknights was not a failure. Rather, it was “a time to learn the nuance of creation.”
As time passed, RK-3-MM-52 developed somewhat of a reputation, and its name was shortened by people who told the tales of “Tee-Two, the Bounty Hunting Philosopher Bot.”
You can see more on Many Worlds Tavern’s Patreon.
Steven Blake Harrison 