Sirius

Sirius is the second and current Pharaoh of Lennox. Succeding to Buzzald, he is responsible for modernizing the country into its current form, the creation of much of the yularian ice roads, and the adoption of Lux.

Sirius’ actual age is unknown. First, because of the lack of information on his early life, and secondly, because of the multiple journeys to Khonopeos’ ruins, which have the strange property of slightly warping time and space. While officially, Sirius never had any offspring, there are rumored to be one or multiple bastard children, or even grandchildren, descended from him.

Appearance
Sirius has a brown skin, black hair that became light grey or white with age, and a long beard caused by his lack of care for shaving. His eyes are light blue in the cornea, blue in the iris, and dark blue in the pupil due to the kisha, which always give him a strange and otherworldly stare, even when it is not the intention and in mundane situations. While he is neither small or tall, he is still quite muscular due to his regular exercise. The cloth he is most often seen with is a white and purple toga embroidered with gold, on which are written strange blue runes. He rarely wears his crown, mostly reserving it for important events.

Personality
Saying that Sirius is a cold man would be an understatement. He is very solitary, refusing to even be in presence of his own guards most of the time, and thus is rarely seen outside of important events. Because of that, many fear that he will never produce any legitimate offspring, bringing a succession crisis to Lennox. But according to him, he will start searching for a queen once “the time is right”. This lead to one of his other traits: his readiness to always work, as he put it himself: “there is always something to do, boredom is just not knowing what it is.” And so rare are the moments where he indulges in an activity purely for pleasure, in fact there seems to be only three such activities. The first is fishing, where he can just sit and admire the sea without the horrible sensation of being lazy. The second is drinking alcohol, which Sirius always treat as some novelty because of the absence of it in his homeland, however this seems to be more of a guilty pleasure, as while he like the sensation the drinks give, he fear becoming addicted to it. The last one would be fighting, as he is one of the many beings for who fighting is as naturally enjoyable as eating, drinking and reproducing, but even more so, it help him staving off the weakness that comes with age. Sirius’ anger can come very quickly, and go very far in both intensity and time. Bardonia is an example of this, but it can also be caused by something way smaller, like an insult, or simply causing him any annoyance. But surprisingly, he will always accept any criticism, even if it is an unfair one. This may be due to the humbleness he display in some domains, one of them being his former residence in Dragoonios, where he lived in even before becoming Pharaoh and barely had any decoration in its interior. This humbleness can also be seen in his mannerisms, which are nothing king-like, but something rude instead, although it could in actuality be just a stubborn habit.

Due to his hoarding habits, he possess a number of strange objects, some most likely having magical purposes, and while other seems to be just here for collection purposes

Biography
Not much is known of Sirius' life before his arrival in Lennox, the only reliable source of information on the subject being the pharaoh himself, who rarely speaks about it. While there is very little information on Sirius’ homeland and the warlords living there, we know at least two of them, thanks to their quick mention by the Pharaoh: Thareya, who tried to build an actual city, and failed, as it would get attacked even before it was completed. The second was Waythix, who apparently wrote several books. It seems that Sirius wasn’t the only one aspiring to a greater degree of civilisation.

The region of the world in which Sirius was born isn't located anywhere in Rathnir, and very little is known about it. Since Lennox was the first nation of Rathnir he stepped into, it can be supposed that it is located in the north-west. Some have speculated that Sirius actually come from Beauridine, but this is highly unlikely due to Sirius sharing very little with the Nortfolks, be it in skin, eye, and hair color, but also in culture and religion. Also, Sirius' land never had the Echad Valley, which acted as a island of peace in the middle of endless conflicts. There was only an endless war between petty warlords empowered by powerful artifacts where the future Pharaoh would be born. On the subject of his parents, Sirius made contradictory statements, saying once that he never met them, just to later say that his father was a warlord himself, and another time that he didn't actually remember if he ever had any contact with them. After this unclear childhood, he would acquire some artifacts himself, and became a warlord, laying waste to countless settlements. Sirius would even grow a reputation of being cruel among some of the softer warriors, due to his habit of chasing the weak for sports. As to show his superiority to the other warlords, he would start decoring his lair, that were usually just caves barely amenaged for life, and grow his knowledge in all things by taking the books of the places he would attack. This is very likely how Sirius learned about Rathnir's existence. One day, his lair would be destroyed by some other warlord, and his weapons stolen. Given some time, he would have recovered his weapon and rebuilt his lair, but he realized that he didn't want to continue this kind of life, and enjoyed learning and creating more. And so started his journey to Rathnir, where he believed he would find peace.

Life in Lennox
Sirius was first seen by rathnirian eyes in the southern Yularian Desert, which was at the time the only territory controlled by the then young nation of Lennox. He would be found by lennoxian scouts that took him to Dragoonios, which at the time was called Dragoonia and was the only real Lennox city. There he met Buzzald, the founder of the country and its first pharaoh. Due to it being his first contact with Rathnir's civilisations, Sirius accepted to join the nation with the intent of learning about the inner workings of Rathnir and its nations, as to one day make his own kingdom, or taking over Lennox. However, only a short time after his arrival, Bardonia would declare war on the country. Due to this, many fled the young nation, including Buzzald, who would officially dissolve it. However Sirius, neither wanting to be defeated again and giving up on something that was still new to him, refused to follow them, and started to prepare for a war, even if he knew very little about the invaders, their strength, and how much an actual battle would be different from the raids he was used to. In the process, he would reform Lennox and make himself Pharaoh, the incoming threat taking away the satisfaction of reaching his goal of rising to power. This would surprise many people both in the kingdom and beyond it, who expected this to be its end, including Bardonia's chancellor. Seeing this, Sirius would use the opportunity to ask for peace, using the argument of having little to do with Buzzald, whose actions brought the wrath of Bardonia. Uni would accept, and Buzzald would return and make Sirius' title official, finally receiving the three drops of kisha in both eyes, turning them forever blue.

However, he quickly noticed that a large part of the population distrusted him, being viewed as an opportunistic barbarian. This, with the threat of a bardonian invasion still looming and the complex international politics that came with it, made Sirius realized that his current situation was little better than when he was a warlord, the physical effort only being traded for mental one. However, the Pharaoh still believed that unlike during his past, he had a way of "winning", and earning himself a peaceful existence, this way being the destruction of Bardonia. And so, he would start preparing himself and what was now his country. But even then, he knew that it wouldn't be enough to stop the potential invaders, and so did parts of Lennox's aristocracy, who would go as far as to make an attempt on his life in the then newly rebuilt Ramtopia. In his rage, this would mark the first time he used his weapon in Rathnir, as he would violently execute all the nobles who participated to the plot by himself and in public. But this only strengthen the image the aristocracy had of him, making the risk of other assassination attempts even greater. The Pharaoh would slowly be consumed by dispair, having less and less faith in his ability to realize his goal and to have another shot if he failed or left, to the point that his will to stop other plots against him became weaker and weaker. It was around this period that he would hear about Lux for the first time, from an unknown mouth which told him to go to the Goddess' temple. At the time, the very concept of gods and religion was foreign to him, his homeland having little more than folktales, yet, he still saw in that temple a possible solution that was worthy of being tried. For weeks he would travel alone, not really caring about the spread of rumors about his death. When he found the city of Luxios, Sirius would be led before the Eternal Flame and its warmth. For one of the few times in his life, the man felt hapiness. Not nostalgia over a long dead past, not hope toward a future that may never come, not even the joy of killing or getting more power in the present. It was a plain, but innocent happiness. When returning to Lennox, Sirius was a devout follower of Lux, and converted the entire country with relative ease.

When 3rd Bardonian empire threatened the kingdom with war, the Pharaoh was almost relieved, no longer because it would have ment the end, but simply because he and Lennox prepped themselves so much for this moment. However, before he took the decision to go to one last war, he would learn about plans of a much larger war against bardonia in the future. And so to the surprise of all, Sirius would give up and surrender to the empire, to buy time. Not much is known of his actions during the bardonian occupation, as he barely interacted with the wider empire, and mostly acted in the secret resistance group, even neglecting his own kingdom to focus on the coming war and deny the empire a good province. He is also suspected of having created the Wickmen during this period, though other evidences show it might be Spyral Ulburnr. When the war that would be later known as the 3rd Coalition War started, Sirius would provide to the rebel side large quantities of equipement, and was even supposed to participate to the battle of the Pillars of the Sun, but failed to show up as he missed the boat to the continent.

Some time after Lennox’s liberation, the pharaoh and his army would help Solisios in their war against the Huitca Federation, more precisely at the naval battle that took place in the sea east of urmammu. But despite all their efforts, Solisios would loose, and Sirius would be badly injured. This made him realize that it has been decades since he took the crown and that he no longer is in his prime, and would continue to become weaker and weaker with age until his unavoidable death.

However, the Hirreath war would show that the will to fight is still present in him, and hasn’t blunted at all. The war started when vallians secessionists launched an attack on Ramtopia, so that they may begin a conquest of the island. Again, Sirius would help with the defense of the city, however this time his side would be victorious, has not only did he ended up with no injuries, but many would notice his renewed ferocity, even chasing his opponents with no fear but all speed across the savannah. Also, many were shocked to see the Pharaoh himself making the secessionist’s leader a human sacrifice.

When the proposal to form The Three Thrones came to him, the Pharaoh was originally reticent at the idea of having foreigners influence his rule. But the favorable opinion that the people of Lennox had for it, and the threats posed by surrounding great powers, such as the Sapphire Commonwealth, and a new Bardonian Empire, forced him to reconsider his position.

Magical elevation
Contrary to many users of magic, who start to learn its mastery in the early years of their lives, Sirius only started practicing after his defeat against the huitcans, when he realized that he couldn’t rely on his physical strength and skill forever. And so, he would soon start to pass more and more of his time alone at the top of his pyramid reading books stolen from the library, testing rituals, and training his eyes transformed by the Kisha, which was originally intended to be purely ceremonial.

Later, when searching the source of strange events happening in Zar’roc, he became the first living being to gaze upon Khonopeos in millenia, as he discovered a ravine at the bottom of which lied the entrance to the buried city. But calling this a lucky coincidence may be wrong, as a few months before, Sirius would make a ritual in order to receive visions of the future, and one of these ended up showing an image of the city. The pharaoh would descend there, and felt a strange sense of comfort in it, despite the place’s relative hostility, to the point that multiple time he returned and decided to move to Zar’roc in order to get closer, even using some of the ruins’ stones to build his new house, which is located underground.

His secrecy eventually attracted the distrust of the priesthood, who could only speculate on the Pharaoh’s activities, and had to assume the worst. Multiple spies were sent to investigate him with little results, as each time, they would simply disappear and never be seen again. Some think that it was the work of the Wickmen, with who Sirius as more ties with than the quasi-totality of Lennox. But this only increased the Duatims’ suspicions, as they are now aware of the importance of those secrets.

The full extent of his magical ability is not known, as he still mostly fight using a great-sword as his weapon of choice, and rarely use magic in public.