Character:Terek Bthrek

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Terek Bthrek

"I am impatient, so do it quickly and without hesitation."

Basic Information
Homeland	Vethrala	Home City	Vouudakfel
Heritage	Duuema	Gender	Male
Profession	Harmonic Artificer	Title	Lord Master
Family
Culture	Clan Bthrek	Rank	Noble
Father	Unknown	Current Partner	None
Mother	Unknown	Previous Partner(s)	Unknown
Siblings	Unknown	Children	None

Warning: The content below contains spoilers for the media that this character is involved in.

Profile

Lord Master Terek Bthrek is an older nobleman that lives within King's Quarter, a section of Vouudakfel entirely inhabited by members of Clan Bthrek. He is a harmonic artificer and member of the Harmonic Council.

The Awakening

Rank and Conflict

During the Awakening, Terek Bthrek pretended to be an average noble in the Bthrek clan. During this period, he decided to focus on the career thought to be the hardest and most prestigious one in all of Duuema society. Indeed, he decided to put his lifetime of knowledge to work as he attempted to become a harmonic artificer. His goal was to work as an artificer until he could reach the rank of Lord Master, and then keep working until he could attain the level of harmonic architect.

Most of those ambitions were fulfilled. However, he eventually hit a wall when it came time for him to attempt to become the harmonic architect. The man who held the position at that time, Mzark Kthren, did not have any intention of relinquishing his position. He was not elderly, and he thoroughly enjoyed his job, so it was unlikely that he would simply step down and let someone else take his place. This required Terek to wait, which was not something he was too averse to. He had been forced to be patient for all the previous years, so a few more would not hurt him. However, a wrench was thrown into his plans when he accepted a young Kavrenthak to be his apprentice.

It was obvious from the first time they met that Kavrenthak was not a noble, nor was he even from the city of Vouudakfel. His ashy skin and hair revealed him to be an Abstuutha, perhaps the one Duuema clan that Terek hated more than anything. This disdain was due entirely to the existence of a single man. While Terek knew that the man wasn't dangerous nor could he affect his plans, he still had come to hate all of the Abstuutha regardless. Kavrenthak being one of them angered him, as he could not believe that he had inadvertently recruited such a man to be his apprentice.

Kavrenthak's presence only served to bring out the worst parts of the older man, although Kavrenthak himself had no idea of why he was being treated so harshly. Terek refused to teach him anything substantial, forcing him to do work without direction and punishing him for asking for help from the other artificers. What angered him more than Kavrenthak being an Abstuutha, though, was the fact that he was exceptionally good with harmonic magic. Despite his long years, Terek had not yet reached the level of harmonic mastery that Kavrenthak had at such a young age. The younger man's skill infuriated him and caused him to be even more abusive toward him. He restricted his abuse to only verbal things, despite knowing that he could easily have the young man killed if he so desired it.

Things got even worse when Architect Mzark announced that he would be stepping down, much too soon for how long he had intended to stay. He spoke to the king and arranged for the Tonal Trials to be held to elect a new harmonic architect. Terek knew that he should participate, even though he was aware that he wasn't necessarily good enough to earn the position at that time. It came as a shock to him to learn that Mzark had convinced Kavrenthak to participate too, especially seeing as Kavrenthak did not hold a mastery in anything, let alone a mastery in something relevant to the position. Despite his arguments that Kavrenthak should not be permitted to test, Mzark pointed out that it was not a requirement of the position for someone to hold a mastery of anything. Therefore, Kavrenthak was perfectly eligible. With the support of the harmonic architect and his existing skill in harmonic magic, it was almost child's play for Kavrenthak to win the position and become the next harmonic architect.

This, of course, made Terek exceptionally angry. It did not seem right to him that someone so young, with so little experience, and without any mastery certifications, should have won such a challenging competition. With his apprentice now serving as his master, he made the decision to ensure that Kavrenthak knew what he thought of him at ever chance he got. He hated him, he knew, and he lived every day to try and make Kavrenthak's life difficult. Kavrenthak, a generally peaceful man, did not understand the depth of hatred that the other man held for him. In an attempt to get him to treat him with respect, he adopted some of his aggressive behaviors, although that did nothing but make things worse. Eventually he resigned himself to the fact that Terek would be a regular menace. It was not within his power to remove him from the council, as his title of Lord Master protected him from a great many things such as that. Many years passed with that unfortunate dynamic.

The Vanishment

One day, near to the year 1,202 of the Awakening, miners discovered a strange rock and Kavrenthak was put in charge of it. Terek was not permitted to be near it, but even he caught onto the architect's shift in personality. Once Kavrenthak revealed that he was in possession of the mythical Soulstar, Terek wrote many essays on why he should not be touching it and should return it to where it came from. Since the warnings were coming from the one man that no one on the council had any love for, his warnings were disregarded. As if to spite him, everyone else turned harder into supporting Kavrenthak's efforts to build a machine that could transport everyone to Thera.

Terek distanced himself from the council members that supported Kavrenthak's folly, and was not aware of the incursion led by Raevoth, the Caeluvex leader in service to Umbrex. In fact, he had been so completely left out of the loop that he was at home, keeping his distance from the harmonic council, when the Caeluvex army began its assault on the city. Because of this, he had absolutely no idea that such an event was occurring, nor did it affect him in any capacity.

The Realignment

Return to Zyrkthraan

Terek was sitting in his manor when suddenly everything around him changed. His home became broken, dirty, and full of pests, which was definitely not normal. Luckily, he did not have to exert much effort to fix things and expel the pests. Doubting that his home was the only thing affected by whatever had happened, he left the manor to seek out Duumast, the current king, and demand answers of him. However, upon entering the palace courtyard, he found the main palace doors to be closed and only one person loitering nearby. Recognizing that person as Rhzoreck, the apprentice to council artificer Yagramar, he decided to utilize him to gain entry into the palace. However, after commanding the young man to open the gate, it was revealed to him that everyone inside was dead. Knowing that he would not gain answers from corpses, he set off to find Kavrenthak, who he knew was now considered the leader of their people.

It did not take long for him to find the harmonic architect, who was in the process of collecting children off the streets and bringing them to safety. Kavrenthak directed him to the Hall of Oration, where he promised him that everything would be explained to everyone at the same time. Not having the energy to fight with him at that time, Terek passed through the city to enter the Hall of Oration and find himself a seat close to the stage. It was there that he waited until Rhzoreck arrived and announced what had happened to everyone. While he did not wish to trust a man who was clearly of mixed heritage, he could not deny that what he said seemed to be true. He was ready to accept that things were this way now, until the crowd around them started demanding that they make Rhzoreck their new king. It was clear that no one trusted Kavrenthak with such a responsibility, and he knew the other man well enough to know that he wouldn't accept it anyway. Traditionally, if the king was dead and the harmonic architect refused the position, it would fall to the highest ranked member of the council, which was himself. He foolishly trusted in the people to recall this piece of their law, but they did not. Instead, they proceeded to name Rhzoreck king simply because he had the King's Key tucked into his belt.

Having now been victim to two unworthy people stealing a well-earned position away from him, one of which was an Abstuutha and the other a half-Roketh-half-Kraginth man, he made up his mind to hate the both of them. What made things worse was that they clearly had some kind of chemistry despite Rhzoreck's pointed anger toward Kavrenthak. He knew that it would be exceptionally bad for the two of them to form a positive relationship, but he determined that he could steer Rhzoreck in a different direction through the use of his public servants. Primarily, he used Rahk Vvarmz, the head of the King's Circle, to influence Rhzoreck's opinion of Kavrenthak.

Unfortunately, Rhzoreck refused to let Kavrenthak out of his sight, which resulted in him becoming far too partial to him. To solve this issue, Terek knew that he would have to simply take his life. While he did not use physical violence on others himself, he knew that it would not be hard to incite loyalists to his cause. He designated Rahk as the orchestrator and instructed him to have Rhzoreck assassinated in whatever way would be the most effective. He sent his letters to him in unmarked envelopes sealed with only a spider imprinted into black wax, a mysterious sigil that was used by no one else. Terek did not send letters often, and he typically used a different, public seal and golden wax whenever he did so. He knew that the black spider would not be identifiable to anyone who would get in his way or stop him, so he was secure in using that method. His faith in Rahk seemed to be misplaced, though, as the politician inevitably failed to have the new king assassinated.

When Rhzoreck returned and Kavrenthak found the evidence proving that Rahk was the mastermind, Rahk smoothly turned things around to frame his son, Demjr. Terek did not care about the life of the boy, so Rahk's request for him to find some way to get him out of jail and off the hook for the crime went unanswered. Then, when Demjr took Kavrenthak's advice and pointed the blame back to his father on the stand at his trial, Terek once again did not attempt to help him. While it may have been possible for him to save the politician or get his punishment reduced, it seemed like too much of a risk for very little payoff. Now that Rahk was the center of attention, it was unlikely that anyone in power would ever trust him again. In fact, Rhzoreck was so distrustful of Rahk, that even after he had been executed, Rhzoreck chose to dismantle the King's Circle entirely in case others on the governmental body were influenced by him.

By this point, Terek had returned to the council hall and spent most of his time attempting to convince the other artificers that he was in command of them. Rhzoreck had named Bthand as the temporary leader, though, and no one on the council was willing to take any direction from Terek. When he was unable to get them to listen to him, he decided to hassle Rhzoreck about it directly. He had no problem bringing up this issue whenever he had the chance, although Rhzoreck's answer was always the same. He was to treat Bthand as his superior despite their difference in rank. This, of course, irritated Terek to no end, as he had worked extremely hard for his rank and was now being forced into subservience to another simply because no one else seemed to like him. In his opinion, his rank should mean far more than whether or not anyone liked him as a person, although that did not seem to be the case.

It was not long before Rhzoreck announced that Kavrenthak's debt to Ereboseth was paid and he would be giving him back his position. During the event where the king formally returned his title to him, Kavrenthak proposed to him unexpectedly. Terek, whose personal chef was the father of one of the palace maids, had overheard his chef speaking to his daughter about the king having a baby. Seeing as Rhzoreck did not look like he was pregnant at that point but knowing that if he had a child it must be Kavrenthak's, he decided to confront the two of them about the topic at the party after the announcement. However, his tactless word choice resulted in Rhzoreck falling catatonic, leading Kavrenthak to punch him in the face for his indiscretion. Having no idea why this happened, as he was not privy to what had truly been going on between the two men, he determined that this interaction only happened because they both hate him. While he normally wouldn't care much about others disliking him, the fact that Kavrenthak broke his nose made him especially angry. He felt that his work restraining himself from physically assaulting the other man should have protected him from that sort of violence, but it seemed he was incorrect.

He was temporarily arrested by the palace guards and escorted to his healer, Kjmjra, who did her best to repair his nose. Once she was finished, he was taken back to the palace and placed within a holding cell to await Rhzoreck's decision on what to do with him. Of course, he did not hesitate to openly complain about his situation to any of the guards who would listen. None of them had any sympathy for him, mainly because there was not a single one who was more loyal to him than to Rhzoreck, despite Rhzoreck being a relatively new king. The next morning, Rhzoreck decided to have him stripped of his rank and title through a social execution, where he would be brought into the city's main square and the executioner would cut off most of his beard. As the element considered by the Duuema to denote how much respect one should get, having his beard cut down was entirely unwelcome. He was not willing to show weakness even then, though, and did his best to keep his dignity about him during the event.

Afterwards, he played along with Rhzoreck's little plan for as long as he deemed necessary. He spent his days lounging in the King's Quarter square, most of which was full of well-kept grasses and trees. To the other Bthrek in the Quarter, he seemed as if he was merely enjoying taking a bit of time off work. To those outside of his quarter, though, they believed he was destitute.