Just have the basics of his history down. Oh man, I'm so happy to have this guy <333 I have some tattoos to add to this reference later, but he'll accrue them more over time more than likely.
Name: G.M. Dark "The Illustrated Man"
(previously Umbra, previously Boutros)
Gender: Male
(previously Umbra, previously Boutros)
Gender: Male
Boutros was his given name, dubbed so by his parents on the day of his birth.
He was born a human, a beautiful child with a bright future. At least, so his parents thought.
The world had different plans for him.
His father was a wealthy Greek, and his mother the daughter of an Egyptian landowner. The two were married for political reasons, though they bore sons for love. His grandmother had been a Christian, although it wasn't the safest religion to hold in one's heart at the time, and it was a faith that had been passed down to her son (Boutros's father) and then passed down to both him and his younger brother.
From early on, he was taught to hide his faith. However, in his father's house-- by the light of a tallow candle, he learned of his ancestral faith. His father would teach him language, writing, and manners, but as the candles would burn down, he also learned theology and religion.
Boutros enjoyed this time with his father, learning everything he could and coming into his own.
This peace did not last.
When Boutros turned eleven, his father was taken by the Roman empire for a crime the gentle, kind man did not commit.
That same night the soldiers came for the eldest son-- Boutros. They sold him as a slave, assuming no one-- aside from his mother-- would miss the child of a disgraced Greek and an Egyptian woman.
Boutros was sold to different owners over time, he began to feel like a faceless possession-- a nameless slave. He filled out as a young lad, and at fourteen was eventually sold to the empire. He was given to a ludus-- a school for imperial gladiators where they were trained and boarded for gladiatorial games and sport.
He dropped his name by his first bout in ludi-- the public games. He picked up the name Umbra, meaning shadow. It was given to him by his lanista, mostly due to his dark skin tone he inherited from his mother. He became a thraex, a specific type of gladiator with a small, square shield and a sword.
The newly dubbed Umbra was a fierce competitor in the arena, and he quickly became a fan favorite.
He won many matches and killed many wild beasts in the arena, but he did not kill another man until he was sixteen. After that match, Boutros prayed to the God of his childhood for the last time, asking for forgiveness. Feeling he didn't deserve the forgiveness he pleaded for, he turned from his childhood religion and name completely and tattooed a hieroglyph-inspired symbol on his person in remembrance of the man whose life he had taken.
Umbra's tattoo, clearly visible on his bare chest in his next fight, quickly garnered interest and speculation. It wasn't until his second kill, and subsequent tattoo, that anyone guessed correctly what the images were for. The crowds ate up the reasoning for his markings, and it didn't take long for the summa rudis, the referee of the matches, to catch on. Soon, nearly all of his matches ended in the judgment of death for the bested gladiators.
As time trickled past, Umbra could no longer remember the names of the men he had taken the lives of, only their faces could he remember, and only that because he burned their likeness into his mind during the pain of each black mark on his skin. Soon there were not two, or five, or ten marks. Before his eighteenth year, Umbra had twenty-nine marks on his skin. All small, but all permanently placed on his skin and in his mind-- but as time does he was even beginning to forget their faces, one by one.
A month into his eighteenth year, he had risen to the highest position in the ludus. Thanks to his wide popularity, and the certain crimes of a young Egyptian man, he was instructed to carry out the damnati ad mortem of the Egyptian, this was a death sentence, handed down to the criminal for treason.
His thirtieth mark was placed on his skin that night.
But something different happened that following night-- he awoke three hours past midnight, a ghostly form over him.
He felt fear for the first time in years as his mother's ghostly eyes pierced into his soul.
"You have killed your brother. Your own blood." Umbra hadn't known it, hadn't even realized until his mother's phantom spoke the words. He could see the truth in it, he could remember the face, and now that he knew what he was looking for, it was obvious. That young man, barely more than a boy, had been the same young boy who had clung to him-- who had adored him. Umbra-- no, Boutros-- had loved his brother once very dearly.
"I love you, my son, I free you from your slavery, from your bonds. But your sins come at a great cost."
After that, all he knew was pain for a time, until he descended into a dark, dreamless sleep.
When Umbra awoke, he was no longer Umbra. He no longer wore the skin of a man, but the skin of creature-- a creature he had slain in the arena time and time again.
"Viscet..."
He had become one of the strong beasts that he had bested time and time again. The only thing that seemed to remain the same, were the markings he had accrued in the arena,bright gold against his pelt.
He was no longer tied to the ludus, but he was no longer human either. He wasn't free, he was more trapped than he had ever been.
He ran.
The viscet with no home traveled in the wilderness, avoiding both humans and viscets as he ran in the desert and away from his past. Slowly, he began to descend into madness as his life continued on.
He was old and gray before he finally stopped running, and before he killed again. This time, a viscet was his victim. The viscet had been afraid of him, had been much smaller than he, and a fight had ensued. He would have left the young thing there, bleeding, but the viscet begged him for death when he turned. He obliged the request. When he lifted his paws, blood spattered on them for the first time since his transformation, he could practically drink in the fear that the younger viscet had succumbed to. Another mark appeared on his body, this one bright as crimson for a day until it eventually faded to gold as well.
The strange part? In that day, he grew younger once more. He could feel the life-force of the other viscet thrumming in his very veins. There was so much energy left, even after it had turned back the clock to his youth. Energy to spare.
Over the course of the next century, he learned many things about his affliction; He didn't have to kill to receive energy. It was stronger if the viscet or human died, but if he spared them they were under his spell, and when he would touch their mark they would always succumb to his wishes. He learned he had to do or give them what their heart's desired, even if it was in some twisted way, before he could gain their life energy or keep them under his influence. He could age himself and others forward and backward. And the most important thing-- if he forgot the face of one of his victims, their mark disappeared from his pelt.
As time passed, the nameless viscet was corrupted and twisted further. He was there for the fall of the Roman empire, he followed the dark hearts of men and their fears of themselves and evil. He feasted on their fears, their life force, living through the ages. He became a traveling merchant, making victims of those he met along the road, either taking their lives or taking them for his own twisted reasons to walk beside him. By this time, humans in Europe were practically nonexistent, and the viscets reigned and still, he walked the earth, taking victims.
He coined the name Mr. Dark in Europe around the time he decimated a band of gypsies and took over their caravan. He eventually lost the use of the caravan, and took on the mask of a wealthy businessman, became G.M. Dark.
His marks, so resembling tattoos, hindered him in this pursuits, people did not trust him, did not become lured into a false sense of security into accepting a deal.
He tried many other things, some things surviving such as his antique trinket store he mans for most of the year, but he didn't find his next widely successful endeavor until the late 1800's, early 1900's when traveling funfairs and carnivals were successful.
Mr. Dark kept his name, but also took another on the night he relieved a traveling carnival of their property and lives. Due to his makings, he took on the name of The Illustrated Man and served as the owner and as an attraction for him carnival-- Dark's Pandemonium Shadow Show. Mr. Dark is truly sinister. He feeds off of the fears of others, the deeply-rooted fears of evil specifical. Fear of his evil, of the evil in their own hearts, and of the evil in the world around them.
He now tricks both young and old into making deals with him (whether they realize they are doing it or not, whether they are entranced or not), using the grandeur of the carnival to lure them in and lull them into some sense of security.
Once they fall prey to their own heart's desire, they lose themselves and become a prisoner to the Illustrated Man. A piece of them, some symbol or representation of them, becomes inked into Dark's pelt, and they lose themselves. They become attractions-- slaves to Dark and his whims.
The carnival itself is not what is horrible, it's not what scares anyone who sees it, it's what lies underneath. There is a deep-rooted darkness, even with the beautiful colors, the excitement, and the sounds of what should be a harmless carnival.
When the autumn is over, and the winter is in full, the Illustrated Man puts his puppets to bed and they sleep while he retreats once more to his shop, waiting for the leaves to fall once more so he might again awaken them and begin his hunt for souls anew.
Mr. Dark is a mysterious viscet. The people who meet him see him as an almost looming presence. He seems confident, assured, and perhaps a little peculiar. When one looks into his eyes, he seems ageless to anyone who meets him, and in a way, he is fairly ageless.
His small, quiet shop that sells trinkets and artifacts from other time eras-- all rare and strange. He spends a good bit of time there, but every autumn he closes up his shop and meets sets out with his carnival to set upon another unsuspecting town.
When carnivals and fairs finally lose the last of their luster, who knows what he will pick up as his next gilded trap.
