Guile's Tattoo Seminar (+ Poem)

    It begins with Holy Mother Maria countless eons ago, when she stood amongst the most powerful magicians to ever walk the face of Toril. The height of her power paralleled the rise of archdemon Graz’zt, stepping from the aftershock of The Blood war, thirsting to fill the ranks of The Little Hells. 

    You witnessed the powers of his charm when wielded by a mere sulfur-blooded grunt, you can imagine what Graz’zt was capable of in the flesh... slithering into her cadre to rot it from the inside out. Powerful as Mother was, she was soon abandoned by sister and friend alike as they fell to his control. In the end, her only chance to regain what was lost was by offering herself up to Gratz’zs horrid passions, playing his game and biding her time for twenty seven years. 

    Twelve children she gave him, six with the blood of wolves, six with the blood of man, but all tainted with the blood of devils… devil blooded, and yet destined to scrub the world clean with the gutted entrails of the infernal. 

Guile gestures to the images on her shoulders: two hands, each holding a cup, spilling their contents in swirling torrents down her shoulder and up her wrists. Then she turns around to show a completed version of the image between her shoulder blades: two hands clasping a single chalice, overflowing with such avidity that some swashes reach all the way up to spill down the front of her collarbones. She reaches back and points to a second image below it her shoulders: the handguard of what looks to be a flamberg, continuing downward along her spine, though most of the blade is hidden behind the dress.

    The wave of sorrow: the greatsword Mother Maria stole from Gratz’zs bedside, as acidic as her name is on the tongues of demons, while the day of our deliverance draws ever-nearer.

Tainted goods though we may be

Pruned from the flesh of purity

Poisons we, by many names

But by poison brewed in a noble womb

Can a dethroned archdemon’s soul be claimed