An orc barbarian, isekai’d to Edyrea from The Merciless Reach (e00 01:20, e00 01:38), who is hunting a man she says murdered her loved one (e01 00:54), and has invited the other three isekai’d arrivals to help her kill him (e02 00:47, e02 01:01). In Wriem she saw Gabriel Landaluce, the God-Queen’s son, who looks exactly like him (e03 01:36, e03 01:39); she now calls Gabriel second on her list (e04 01:02). She is heading to Holst with the others to cure the Hollowing Plague (e04 01:19).
Details
Appearance and personality
Rue stands about six foot nine, built like a rugby player — a solid, imposing physical presence (e00 01:20). She has scars all over her, and her hair is shaved on one side and long and black and white on the other (e01 00:37).
She has a temper, but isn’t always angry; her primary drive is taking care of the people around her — if she had a love language, it would be acts of service, making sure people are fed and cared for even if she won’t say outright that she cares (e00 01:20). Life has been hard for her, and she’s trying, not always successfully, to balance that history against staying positive (e00 01:20). She can swim, and wants to (e01 00:59). She likes nature, hates caves, and misses trees (e02 00:42); she says plants have feelings, refuses to hurt even a plant that bites her, and carries plants out of danger (e03 00:33, e03 00:44, e03 01:01). She has no nickname and says she doesn’t need one — “Rue’s enough” (e02 00:57, e02 00:57). She would rather sleep with trees than in a city (e04 00:21), and doesn’t like robbing anybody (e04 00:37). She signs her initials, LRO, in a straight, almost chicken-scratch hand (e04 01:23, e04 01:23). She calls immortality an absolute sin — people need to die (e05 00:56, e05 00:56) — and says you only take if it balances the scales (e05 00:55).
Background
Rue is from The Merciless Reach, specifically the region ruled by the God of Harmony — a heavily forested, isolated island culture built around a strict belief in balance: what you give, you get back (e00 01:38). A villain rose there recently, and Rue had been actively fighting against the resulting unrest up until the start of the campaign (e00 01:41). She was born on an island, called Mutewind, in The Merciless Reach, which she calls quite beautiful compared to here (e02 00:14, e02 00:38, e02 00:38); she had never been in caves before (e02 00:24). The island is tiny and wooded, home to a small tribe of near-druids; she grew up there with a brother, and her favorite pastimes were competing, climbing trees, and wrestling local wildlife (e04 00:05, e04 00:05, e04 00:06, e04 00:06). There, she says, you work for the island and give back to it, by dying and going into the ground (e04 00:59, e04 00:59). Her god isn’t a lady, but she says Vargus’s account of Our Lady of the Deep, who murders on a whim and takes more than she gives, is about right for him too (e04 00:56). In Edyrea she was in a blacksmith shop, and says her boss is going to be very angry about what happened to it (e01 00:32, e01 00:42).
The man she is hunting
Rue wants, more than anything, to come face to face with the person she wants to kill the most. She believes she could act on it even against overwhelming odds; the outcome she fears most isn’t failing to reach that person, but getting close only to have the chance taken away from her (e00 01:23). The man she was lying in wait for disappeared when she was pulled into the cave (e01 00:38). She calls him a horrible human being who murdered her loved one, and says she has to murder him back (e01 00:54). In the cavern she checks the faces of the humanoids she sees for a man she calls Weston, saying she is going to stab him (e01 01:06), and she asks the Nightforge guild whether anyone knows Weston (e02 00:38). She says she has spent about the last ten years waiting to catch him (e03 01:38). Vargus describes the man she is after as a convict and a murderer (e02 00:38, e02 00:38). She tells the others she is chasing someone, and asks Wisp to come with her and Vargus to kill the man she is looking for, then asks Orrin too (e02 00:47, e02 00:47, e02 01:01).
In Wriem, Gabriel Landaluce looks to her exactly like Weston, if Weston had long golden hair, though there is no recognition in his face; she thinks he looks prettier than she remembers (e03 01:36, e03 01:36, e03 01:38). She resolves that if his name is Weston, they punch him in the face (e03 01:38). Of the man she is hunting, she says he was a golden boy, and an asshole (e05 01:02, e05 01:02). Told that a doomsayer wants Gabriel to ascend to Elysium, she says he should instead be killed and put into the depths (e05 00:53). Mikhail Asimi names him as the God-Queen’s son, Gabriel Landaluce, and can’t say whether he ever renamed himself (e03 01:39, e03 01:39).
Abilities and gear
Rue fights with a maul (e01 00:33). She has a cantrip that lets her sculpt dirt (e02 00:40), and uses elementalism to stir up a breeze (e03 00:35), conjure the smell of smoke and embers, or drench someone in water (e05 01:25, e05 01:27). She carries plants rescued from Matilda‘s herbalist shop: one each of a gray-leaved and a red-leaved creeping vine, multi-colored flowers with bees, a flower with drooping white bells, some small green vines, and Matilda’s purple biting plant (e03 00:44, e03 00:52, e03 00:59). Her face tattoos flash briefly when she goes into a rage (e01 01:16).
Flaws and Covenants
Flaws are drawbacks the GM gives when a character does something they maybe shouldn’t have, or something goes badly; covenants are deals a character makes with the GM for a result, costing more the stronger they are (e01 01:29).
- Flaw — Radical Honesty (received e01 00:55): the GM tells Rue she has activated the campaign’s first flaw and offers it to her (e01 00:54); she accepts (e01 00:55). Rue has disadvantage on Deception about her motivations and advantage on Persuasion when she uses her past to persuade someone — harder to hide why she’s doing things, more persuasive when she is radically transparent about it (e01 00:55, e01 00:56).
- Flaw — Spell Burn (received e03 01:03): the arcanery explosion in Wriem engulfed Rue and the others in fire that burned, but not physically; the GM gave everyone caught in it a flaw called Spell Burn and didn’t say what it does (e03 01:02, e03 01:02, e03 01:03).
Story so far
The Fissure Below Wriem (e01–e04)
Lying in wait in a blacksmith shop for the man she was hunting, Rue was pulled with half the shop into a cavern below Wriem, and the man was gone (e01 00:33, e01 00:34, e01 00:38). She met Vargus, received the campaign’s first flaw, and fought the moon goblins alongside the others (e01 00:55). She recruited the others for her hunt, named Orrin “Stumpy,” and pressed him until he admitted his employers may want him dead (e02 00:47, e02 00:57, e02 00:59). In the attack on Wriem she chose to save the healer Matilda, carried out her plants, received the Spell Burn flaw, and rescued a cat from a magical tower (e03 00:30, e03 00:44, e03 01:03, e03 01:31); then she saw Gabriel Landaluce, who looks exactly like Weston (e03 01:36). At Willy’s Wards she argued for putting the plague-bitten boy down, received a scroll and gold from Arleana for saving her cat, and named Wisp’s Passenger “Frank” before setting out for Holst (e04 00:15, e04 00:42, e04 00:58, e04 01:19). See e01 – When the Moon Hits the Sky, e02 – We're Not From Here, e03 – Kaiju City Battle: First Responders, e04 – A Spot to Rest our Pot.
The Road to Holst (e05–)
e05. Rue answered Caspian‘s call on the sending stone (e05 00:11). Hunting Kendrick, she kicked in the wrong door, then faked a fire to get past his guards; in the fight she tried to hold him rather than hurt him until Wisp found the relics, then cracked him across the head with her maul (e05 01:21, e05 01:25, e05 01:37, e05 01:48). See e05 – The Mask of Humanity Falls From Capital.
Relationships
- The Merciless Reach — Rue’s home world.
- Orrin, Wisp, Vargus — fellow isekai’d party members.
- Weston — the man she is hunting (e01 01:06).
- Gabriel Landaluce — second on her list (e04 01:02).
- Arleana — gave her a scroll and gold for saving her cat (e04 00:42).
Episode history
- e00 (01:20) — introduced; established as a barbarian from the Merciless Reach with an unresolved vendetta.
- e01 (00:32) — shown in a blacksmith shop that is pulled, half of it, into a cavern; the man she is hunting is named.
- e02 (00:38) — names her island, Mutewind; recruits the others for her hunt; nicknames Orrin.
- e03 (01:36) — sees Gabriel Landaluce, who looks exactly like Weston; Spell Burn flaw; rescues Matilda’s plants.
- e04 (00:05) — her island childhood and brother; Arleana’s gifts; heads for Holst.
- e05 (00:56) — calls immortality a sin; says Weston was a golden boy; fights Kendrick.