Eisen Grimm
"I can make you better permanently. Stronger than a spell, smarter than a sorcerer, and way more reliable than any arcane alignment."
Eisen Grimm is a human commonly seen wearing long robes or coats covering the many inventions he keeps. He teaches at the Education Division, affectionately called Professor Grimes by the way pupils' or acquaintances' hands distinctly smell of oil after shaking his. He conducts well-received classes related to Weaponry, but they say his true brilliance shines through in his passion for by-the-books engineering and his pursuit for progress no matter the cost. All without the help of Magitech or the Arcane itself.
He's known to never cut corners or rely on guesswork. He's a genius, but very known to be...subtly difficult. It shows on his face if not in his words.
Appearance
Often seen with a tight, wry smile of greeting before walking past you through the corridors. He wears billowing coats and loose long sleeves, accompanied by fur or leather gloves when outside. He peruses tailor shops in his spare time. His hands, when not gloved, are the most obvious thing about him, a precise mix of cogs, wires, and metals constructed from scratch to make a fully functional mechanical hand.
His walnut colored hair is spiky, but is always kept short. Sometimes he uses a headband to push it back when he has to concentrate for work. When his coats are set aside, students & accomplices would always catch a glint of metal hiding. What it is precisely is a mystery.
Personality
He rarely laughs outright unless out of courtesy, and he has a habit of using dry sarcasm in his speech. His smile never seems to reach his eyes, but a gleam does go to them when he's impressed. He doesn't waste any words, his sentences brief and methodical, having lots of layers that he refuses to elaborate on. Grimes' perfectly harmless, just don't read too much into it.
He refuses to work with anyone else, especially in the aether labs, unless it's really important. Offers his expertise to the Wayfarer's Division and Contingency Division. He's often frustrated with incompetence, but he hides it with blunt comments in a calm voice. He's pretty passive with everything else, doesn't quite directly insult or compliment people. His non-confrontational habits cause him to suffer with his relationships a lot, not knowing when to differentiate work and his personal life.
Biography
Son and destined heir to powerful wealthy sorcerers, Eisen had a decent and privileged childhood. Ranking as one of the best up and coming sorcerers in his coven at such a young age, he had a promising future. During a risky test to see if he could finally balance the coveted Light Aspect for full control of his Dark Aspect, he failed to account for the difficulty that came with achieving such greatness. Instead of casting at the target without a wand for the very first time, he had casted it on himself. The unexpected splash of darkness wrapped around his hands as its unstable conduit, and rotted both of his hands to the bone.
And in the midst of ugly tragedy that could've knocked anyone unconscious, Eisen was wide awake. He had watched as he crumbled under the weight of his own vision.
He cut ties with his family after they disowned him, keeping himself busy by getting into engineering books and slowly building back his hands. First they were mini-stilts made of wood and tied together with copper wire, then they were fork-like mechanisms made of scrap metal. Eventually, he was able to create fully functional hands with a few months of studying and a lot of elbow grease. His ingenuity caused his reputation to spread by word-of-mouth, and he soon gets a job in the Education Division. There he never seems to stop moving, going home particularly late carrying new blueprints.
Relationships
- Serenity Rosewood - They lived in the same town, he accompanied her travels. They are best friends, with Wren being the only one known to call Eisen by his name rather than "Grimes".