Crom

Information

Player: Scout

Character Full Name: Crom Cilcruan

Character In-Game Name: Crom

Nickname(s): The Psychopomp

Association(s): None

Race: Gnome

Class: Necromancer

Age: 52

Sex: Male

Hair: Bald. Would be brown if grown out.

Eyes: Wide and green.

Weight: 40 lb.

Height: 2'11”

Appearance

A plain brown robe with a hood.

Other: He walks with a walking stick, with a shuffling gait, and he usually has a rather large sack with him, which has been enchanted to be able to carry far more than its usual amount. He is blind in one eye, and he wears a bandage over it.

Personality

Alignment: True Neutral

Crom delights in meeting new people, greeting them with a wide, toothy grin, one that never quite seems to fade from his face. Overall, most people would describe him as a disturbing fellow, as his main hobby consists of walking around and collecting corpses--whether they are insects, dogs, fish, or humanoids. He is, however, not malevolent, and he is more than willing to help people, providing he gets something out of it. He is cryptic and manipulative, however, often speaking in phrases that don't mean quite what they seem to imply, and presenting deals that seem reasonable at first glance, but profit him more in the end.

History

Crom was born in Gnomeregan. His mother died in childbirth after complications during delivery, Crom having come out awkwardly and being somewhat large for a baby. Crom's father continually blamed him for his mother's death, and he grew up in shame as his father continually went out at night, getting drunk and coming back enraged and frustrated.

Crom's mother had been a mage of Dalaran, and when Crom became old enough, some wizards expressed interest in his potential as a mage. There were far fewer gnomes studying arcane than anyone else in Dalaran, and they wanted to see if Crom could replace the hole left by his mother. Crom's father, in the hopes that he might be able to fill the gap left when his wife died, sent him with the wizards to Dalaran. His parting words were no more kinder than any others he said.

After thorough testing, Crom was deemed fit to learn the art of Arcane magic, as he possessed the right sort of spark necessary to learn. Progress began slow, as Crom was mostly unfamiliar with the arcane arts; however, he was always eager to progress, stalwartly moving through what he needed to learn. Despite being without any true family in Dalaran, he felt more at home than he ever had before.

Over the years, Crom grew into a competent mage, with no true specializations, being somewhat of a jack of all trades. He was, however, continually mocked by his peers, as his head was altogether too large, his mouth was altogether too wide, and his antics were altogether too eccentric. His teachers remained proud of him, as he was slowly growing to take his mother's place, but Crom felt alienated, overly self-conscious about his race.

Crom had admired the wizard Kel'Thuzad, before his banishment from the Kirin Tor. He wasn't in the habit of bringing it up to others, but it was by no means a secret, and many were aware of his fascination with the ex-Archmage. One day, as Crom was drinking in Dalaran, he was approached by a man in simple robes that offered him a place in a new society that was similar in practice to what Kel'Thuzad had done, a family that would accept him regardless of his race and behavior. Desperate for some sort of respite, Crom accepted the proposition, and that night, he and the man left Dalaran.

The society was a small coven of necromancers, of which Crom became a willing member, undertaking the art of necromancy, the forbidden school of arcane magic that Kel'Thuzad had been banished for attempting. He participated in many rituals, and he felt strangely empty. He no longer hurt, but there was no emotion that had come to replace it.

When the Scourge came to invade Lordaeron, the coven decided to pledge itself to the forces of undead. Crom realized that he had no place in the Cult of the Damned. He held no hatred for the living, and he didn't condone the wanton slaughter that was taking place. Secretly, during the night, he left the camp where his coven was staying, in the hopes that he would be able to leave the Cult behind him forever. Unfortunately, he was seen as he was leaving, and a single other acolyte came out to stop him. They had a bloody brawl, in which both of Crom's legs were shattered and mangled below the knee, and his eye was gouged out by a ceremonial dagger. However, in the end, Crom managed to persevere, killing the other acolyte. In the midst of the night, with nobody else to save him, he realized that his condition was dire. He took a bone saw and amputated both of his legs just above the knee, cauterizing the stumps with his torch. He managed to crawl to a riverside before passing out from exhaustion.

Crom discarded his old robes in the river and bandaged his eye, and then he wandered to the next town, purchasing a simple robe and a walking stick with what little money he had on his person. Afterward, he wandered south aimlessly, away from the destruction the Scourge wreaked upon Lordaeron.

In the Arathi Highlands, Crom came across a fatally wounded soldier, lying on the ground and bleeding out. He shuffled over to the man and peered at him. The soldier, delirious from fever and blood loss, stared at Crom and asked him if he had come to put him out of his misery. When Crom asked the soldier if he would like to be ended, he said yes. Crom took the ceremonial dagger that he still possessed and slit the soldier's throat along the vein, swiftly killing him.

Crom was still a capable necromancer, despite several months of having cast no magic at all. Over the course of the next few days of travel, he mulled over in his mind how he could use necromancy for purposes other than sheer evil. It occurred to him that he could perhaps fix people who were as unlucky as he had been, losing limbs to violence or disease. While he himself was long beyond any sort of help, he aspired to help others, by offering them a means of becoming whole again through dark powers.

Crom continued to wander southward, and whenever he found a wounded soul, he would ask them if they wished to end their misery. For every one that accepted, he would slit their throat. He acquired a simple burlap sack and enchanted it so that he could carry vast amounts inside it, and so that the body parts within would stay fresh and never rot so long as they were inside.

His practice, over time, turned into an obsession. Crom cast aside his old name, dismissing it as a figment of a different time, an older person that was no longer him. When people would ask who he was, he would simply say “I am the Psychopomp. I guide the dead to their final rest.” He has yet to lose interest in his work.