Profile

Name: Sapho'li Rasasiri
Clan: Keepers of the Moon
Age: 29
Height: 5'4'' (1.5 meters)
Birthplace: Quarrymill, The Black Shroud
Canon Job(s): Dark Knight, Bard (former, but still capable), Goldsmith/Miner

Character reference images: here

Ongoing fic detailing his and J’tomo’s experiences directly after the Calamity: here

Important Points:
Blind in his right eye. Almost always wearing an eyepatch over it.
His eyes are violet, though the blind one is milky white now.
Long hair with various braids that held ritual meanings within his tribe.
Tends to put off an unpleasant or stand-offish aura even when not meaning to.
Dresses primarily in leathers and furs, often showing a good deal of skin though he doesn't seem to think this has any real meaning. It's just comfortable.

Personality: Sapho'li is amicable enough, but he has a dark and somewhat dramatic personality. He is prone to peels of maddened laughter and rushing-head-first into battle. He loves to fight, thrives on the rush and any challenge that he can find. Loves books, knows a lot of useless trivia about Eorzean history though he cannot remember why. His sense of humor is morbid, and he seems more comfortable around the dark specter he can summon than he does around things fluffy and warm.

His memories from before the calamity are spotty to non-existent due to a bad head injury he suffered on that day in a cave-in, and this has given him a rather glib outlook on the world. He treasures his memories with his friends because a part of him wonders if he could lose them at any moment. This causes him to be relatively protective once he’s decided he likes you.

All the same, he is warm and helpful to outsiders, taking it as part of his duty as a dark knight to serve others. This is how he's found meaning in a world that has been inhospitable to him. He is untrustworthy towards most (Wildwood) Elezen and Lalafell at first due to his experiences growing up in the Black Shroud and then moving to Ul'dah with J'tomo after the calamity. His Free Company is a big part of his story. His closest friends consist of a mysterious Raen named Yashet who is just as odd as he is, J’tomo Tia, his partner and an Ala Mhigan refugee.

History: Born in the South Shroud to the Miqo’te tribes largely shunned by Gridanian society, he grew up knowing the forest like the back of his hand. His mothers taught him archery and hunting from a young age. He had two brothers, the eldest of whom took his mother’s partner’s name (Gota’a) and the middle brother, Sapho’to who perished during the Calamity. This early history bears little on his current nature.

A travelling caravan of merchants came through the shroud every Moonfire Faire, and this was how he met J’tomo Tia-- then, a merchant in training, travelling with the remnants of his tribe and other Ala Mhigan refugees. They spent every summer enjoying the festivities and sending letters throughout the rest. When Sapho’li persued the path of the Bard, J’tomo was the first to hear him sing.

Upon the eve of the Calamity, Sapho’li was awaiting a visit from the merchants, excited by whatever ‘surprise’ J’tomo had promised him. So stubborn was he that after helping other evacuate to hide in the underground passages of the Muntuy cellars and Glemorra, he tried to slip away only to be caught in a cave in.

He woke up in Gridania only to be sent away, and told to go back where he’d come from. He stumbled his way back to Quarrymill and collapsed, where J’tomo found him the next morning. J’tomo had escaped what his fellow caravaners had not and immediately fled into the burning forests in search of Sapho’li.

Due to his badly broken arm, Sapho’li temporarily lost the dexterity needed to pull a bow. This was when J’tomo convinced him to return to Ul’dah with him and join him among the Sultan Sworn. They worked tirelessly in their time there, Sapho’li unbothered even after the order’s fall from grace. He was used to being called names and spat upon, after all. Shortly after bumping into an old acquaintance, one Thancred Waters, they were given a mission that took them back to the Black Shroud for the first time, chasing rumors of voidsent.

The Voidsent was said to be capable of revealing hidden truths, and he fell to the temptation-- still unable to recall his mother’s name and face, his childhood home or where he’d come from aside from the fact that he’d wound up in Quarrymill. Of course, upon trying to appeal to the occultists, he wound up promptly used as a sacrifice, though he was bargaining with the Voidsent up to the last. J’tomo arrived in the nick of time, stalling by desperately bargaining with his own life. The price had been originally Sapho’li’s eyes-- the Voidsent then suggested he take J’tomo’s instead. They were able to save each other by reminding him the agreement-- a pair-- and giving up one eye each.

Yda and Papalymo found them unconscious and returned them to the Waking Sands. They were informed about the manifestation of their echo having been what saved them.

After officially joining the Scions, they were deployed to Coerthas and Ul’dah-- separated for the first time in years. J’tomo took up the path of the Dragoon and Sapho’li went about his business as a Sultan Sworn, though he was really tracking Lolorito and the Brass Blades.

They came together for the fight against the Empire, and then returned to their previous assignments.

J’tomo was in Coerthas still when a disturbing letter arrived in Sapho’li’s hand, shakey: “Don’t come home. I will meet you in the snowfields.”

It was only then, upon reuniting with Sapho’li, Alphinaud, and Tataru that he learned the extent of what had happened at the bloody banquet, and their path turned towards Ishgard itself.

Sapho’li was so affected by what had happened-- and what he saw as his ultimate failure to uphold his oath to the Sultana whom he had come to adore-- that he began to isolate himself. He fell into a dark depression, and that was when he first met Fray.

As the Azure Dragoon, J’tomo worked side-by-side with Ser Aymeric and Estinien Wyrmblood while Sapho’li wandered in and out of their inner circle. He favored instead the Dravanian Wastes, as if the ruins called to him more than anything else-- and found himself often in the company of Vidofnir and her brood.

J’tomo and Sapho’li began to fight, often over the issue of dragons and whether or not peace was possible. It was then that J’tomo was asked to investigate a string of bloody murders involving Temple Knights. Sapho’li continued to make himself scarce until after the vault when he truly seemed to come undone. He was close to Haurchefant-- seeing him as the first Wildwood who’d ever been kind to him or treated him with respect. Losing him was the last nail in the coffin for him as a Paladin, even after discovering that the Sultana was in fact alive.

He ran out into the wastes, screaming after Fray, demanding the power to destroy the Heavensward and make them pay-- and had to be found hours later, near frozen to the bone by J’tomo and Estinien who had formed a search party.

J’tomo’s investigation was put on hold until after Azys Lla, and that was when he followed the trail to find Sapho’li or-- someone wearing Sapho’li’s skin, he thought-- at the heart of the murders. The confrontation could have claimed them both if not for the love that stayed their blades against each other in the end, unable to best one another or perhaps unwilling to. If not for Aymeric’s wish that they bring man and dragon together, it likely would have ended differently.

Sapho’li remained a bit of a fugitive right up to the end, and he was glad not to have to get involved with the exchanging of eyes nastiness. His affinity for the dragons and for Vidofnir in particular is what drove him to fight.

It was after the events of Heavensward that he met Sohn Auf, the dragonling that he has now adopted. Sohn Auf’s parents were of Nidhogg’s brood and perished in the last leg of the Dragonsong War. He imprinted on Sapho’li by happenstance, and they are as inseparable as any blood family might be. Even J’tomo seems to at the very least tolerate him, though it’s hard for him to un-do his Dragoon training.

They were married shortly before the events that set the Ala Mhigan and Doman revolutions into motion.

Now, most of their time is spent running Lore, named for the tomestones that they dealt in during the time which the group was founded.

As of the events of Shadowbringers, Sapho’li has found another cause to champion-- and serves the Exarch in whatever capacity he can.