Diamanda Argentum

Ashelia Bunansa
Ashelia jen Bunansa
Gender	Female
Race	Hyur
Clan	Midlander
Citizenship	Garlemald
Place of Birth	Dalmasca
Guardian	Byregot, the Builder
Nameday	4th Sun of the 4th Astral Moon (Age: 25)
Occupation	Magitek Engineer, Machinist
Pronunciation	"æʃ.ɛl.i.ɑ bu.næn.sa"

Born an "aan" in imperially-annexed Ilsabard and orphaned by war, Ashelia Bunansa was conscripted from her homeland of Dalmasca at the age of fifteen to serve as an "oen" in the XIVth Imperial Legion. Gifted at working with magitek from a young age, she was soon made a "jen" as an engineer. Horrified by the ramifications proposed by Garlemald's "Project Meteor," Ashelia defected from the imperial army and contacted Garlond Ironworks in 1572 of the Sixth Astral Era.

Since the Calamity, she has come to look up to Jessie Jaye as a mentor figure, learning much from the interim leader of the Ironworks as an engineer over the five years of Cid's absence. It was with help from Jessie that she crafted a set of magitek-augmented gear as well as a magitek bow and repeater akin to those crafted by her mentor for Rowena's House of Splendors. Due to her skill as a gunner, Ashelia often seeks to lend her aid to the realm not only as an engineer, but as a combatant on the side of Eorzea.

Appearance

"Whoops! That's not supposed to be on fire!" —Ashelia Bunansa

Small of build and stature, Ashelia Bunansa is an unimposing Midlander woman who stands at five-fulms-and-four-ilms tall and weighs no more than 120 ponze. While she has some tone to her arm and back muscles from years of archery and engineering, her skin is mostly smooth and soft. Her most distinguishing feature is a long scar drawn across the bridge of her nose, which she received during her time in the imperial army.

Wearing a bright smile and filled with a youthful enthusiasm obvious from one look into her deep, blue eyes, Ashelia often has a skip in her step. Because of her work, her clothing and face can sometimes become stained with grease. While she's typically very clean, the smell of machinery and ceruleum tends to hang around her. She doesn't wear a lot of makeup, just some eyeliner and lip gloss that can easily be reapplied if smudged.

A spiky mess of straight, blonde hair sits atop Ashelia's head. The majority is spiked backwards save for the hair at the nape of her neck, which is brushed down. A spiky fringe frames the right side of her face, covering her right eye slightly. Her hair is typically clean, as she washes it often, but it can sometimes become greasy if she neglects to wash up. She keeps any other body hair shaved using a special tool of her own invention.

Because she works with her hands, Ashelia sometimes suffers blisters on her fingers and keeps her nails cut short. She paints them occasionally, but the nail polish tends to chip off soon after. She tends to wear very little jewelry, despite being a skilled goldsmith, but is fond of leather necklaces with feathers attached.

Outfits Casual Wear: For everyday wear, Ashelia prefers to wear items made of Garlean fabrics not often seen outside of imperially-annexed provinces. One of her more common outfits is a sleeveless, plum purple, sweater that zips up to the neck worn over a sleeveless, snow white vest fastened at the waist with brown leather. Her pair of loam brown shorts covers very little of her legs, and the bark brown skirt with an acorn brown belt only covers about the first quarter of her thighs. An elbow-length sleeve covers Ashe's lower left arm, and a pair of leather bands decorates her upper right arm. Both her hands are protected by a pair of fingerless, Othard blue leather gloves with golden knuckles and pair of black boots are strapped to her feet. Lastly, a rose-colored satchel sits on her left thigh, wrapped around her waist, and a glowing, magitek shoulderguard of Ashe's own design decorates her left shoulder. Expeditioner's Outfit: Ashelia wears a thick, long-sleeved antique leather tabard over her chest. Buckled at her waist, the brown garments tuck into the pair of matching gloves covering her hands. Various necklaces decorate the opening of her collar, the most noticeable one set with a blue feather. The outfit cuts off at her thighs, revealing part of her matching pantalettees, with frilled cloth adorning its right side. She usually keeps her binoculars and canteen attached to the tabard. Antique leather thighboots, Ashe's favored footwear, reveal only the barest of her inner thighs. Ironworks Engineer Uniform: The attire of the Garlond Ironworks includes an black engineer's doublet with white trimmings worn over a long-sleeved, blue shirt, a pair of black slops, black thighboots with white plating from the knee down, a pair of fingerless gloves, and welder's goggles. It's designed for ease of movement and functionality so as not to hinder the engineer's work. Its made to be practical whether on the battlefield or in the workshop. Ironworks Machinist Armor: Forged of wootz steel and wolfram and based on the brilliant designs of Jessie Jaye often found available for sale in Revenant's Toll, Ashelia forged this suit of Ironworks Aiming armor herself. Every individual piece was painstakingly built in an effort to emulate her idol's handiwork, and her own skill is displayed in every lovingly-crafted ilm of the outfit. The mask, designed with an interface that allows an easier field of vision in dark locations, rises from the eyes with a touch to the earpiece. It's made in such a way that having linkshells installed for communication is simple and convenient. The mask also protects from bright flashes and braces the neck and jaw in case of sudden assaults. Adorning the body is the corselet, spun with Garlean fibers and reinforced with wootz and wolfram plates. The black, white, and blue colors match the typical motifs of Garlond Ironworks, and the spiked shoulder guard is emblazoned with its emblem. The soft fabrics and flared skirt ending make the corselet comfortable to wear. Leather brais cover the legs of the armor, crafted with saurian and chimerical kirimu leathers. Two, blue belt cross at the waist and the outfit's crotch is designed in such a way that it doesn't restrict movement. However, it can cause a bit of a draft due to how it exposes parts of the front and back of the thighs. The vambraces and leg guards are forged in an identical style to the rest of the outfit. The gloves are mostly metal with a leather under-layer, while the boots are primarily leather with metal adorning the feet and knees. The thighboots also amplify the wearer's natural abilities, allowing her to jump and run faster than normal. The pièce de résistance of the set is the Ironworks Magitek Repeater. Formed of interconnecting parts of wolfram and wootz, the repeater is a collapsible scoped rifle enhanced by the aetheroransformer invented by Stephanivien de Haillenarte. This device converts the wielder's mana into lightning-aspected energy to power her special ammunition and other innovations of the Skysteel Manufactory.

Basic Info Date of Birth: 4th Sun of the Fourth Astral Moon, Year 1552, Sixth Astral Era Height: Average (5'4") Weight: Slender (120 ponze) Complexion: Fair-skinned Hair: Short, Spiky and Blonde Eyes: Blue Particular Traits: Scar along nose bridge. Voice: Mezzo-soprano Clothing Style: Garlean fabrics with boots. Laterality: Right-Handed

Preferences

Likes ■ Magitek ■ Airships ■ Beetles

Dislikes ■

Favorites ■ Food: Rolanberry Shaved Ice ■ Drink: Pineapple Juice ■ Color: Storm Blue ■ Place: Idyllshire ■ Festival: The Rising

Other ■ Alignment: Neutral Good ■ Vices: Laziness ■ Religion: None. ■ Goal: To live freely and become an engineer of Cid's caliber.

Personality

Flaws ■ Lazy ■ Rebellious ■ Willful ■ Arrogant

Fears ■ Being captured by Garlemald. ■ Airship crashes. ■ Loss of limb.

Talents ■ Skilled magitek engineer. ■ Excellent markswoman. ■ Ace airship pilot.

Tropes ■ Action Girl ■ Beetle Maniac ■ Brilliant, but Lazy ■ Cool Airship ■ ClockworkCreature ■ Ditzy Genius ■ Firing One-Handed ■ Improbable Aiming Skills ■ Magitek ■ Wrench Wench

Intelligence Ashelia is highly intelligent. As a child, she taught herself much about magitek merely by tinkering with parts in the dump. Years of forced labor and conscripted service have, however, given her something of an aversion to hard work, at least without proper motivation. While she can build for the good of the realm, she's generally content to build for herself

Quirks

Comparisons Final Fantasy Characters: Edgar Roni Figaro (FFVI) Other Game Characters: Shulk (Xenoblade Chronicles) Anime Characters: Winry Rockbell (Fullmetal Alchemist), Bulma (Dragon Ball)

Abilities and Skills

Personal ■ Precise Aim ■ Detail-oriented ■

Weapons ■ Rifle ■ Longbow

Magic ■ Aetherotransformer

Crafting ■ Magitek ■ Goldsmith ■ Carpenter ■ Armorer

Family and Relationships

Family

Friends and Acquaintances ■ Jessie Jaye (Mentor) ■ Sam Hophell (Lover)

Enemies ■ Garlean Empire

Affiliations

■ Garlond Ironworks

■ Skysteel Manufactory

■ Highwind Skyways

Rumors

Note: This section is editable by anyone. Just keep in mind that the rumors here may be both true or false.

Biography

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Childhood in Dalmasca

Ashelia grew up under the Garlean Empire.

In 1517 of the Sixth Astral Era, the Republic of Garlemald named Solus Galvus its dictator and launched an invasion of a small country nestled within the mountains of central Ilsabard. Raining down fire upon this nation with its airships, Dalmasca was summarily conquered and annexed into what became the Garlean Empire only five years later.

Born into the Dalmascan territory in the 30th year of the Imperial calendar, Ashelia aan Bunansa was born into poverty. Orphaned by war as her parents perished attempting to attain citizenship through military service, Ashelia grew up homeless among the refuse produced by magitek manufactory. Living in a scrapyard, she took to trading salvageable pieces for food.

In time, Ashe came to understand much about the parts she found while scavenging. At the age of eight, she began to work in a factory manufacturing parts for Garlean warmachina. She lost the lower part of her left leg in a factory accident. Her leg got caught between gears and mangled, crushing the bones and severing it midway down the shin.

Ashe devised a rudimentary prosthesis for herself. Built from discarded leg pieces of a magitek reaper, she soon grew accustomed to life as an amputee and eventually found herself able to move swiftly once again. She began to wear long boots from that point forward as a way to avoid revealing her disability to others.

XIVth Imperial Legion

Ashelia Bunansa served in the XIVth Imperial Legion.

Determined to make a better life for herself, Ashelia dreamt of one day earning her citizenship and studying at the Magitek Academy. These lofty aspirations required her to first serve as a conscript in the same imperial army that cost her parents their lives. At the age of fifteen, Ashelia became an "oen", forced into service as an imperial sniper of the XIVth Imperial Legion. Stationed in the realm of Eorzea during the Age of Calm that followed the Battle of Silvertear Skies, Ashelia's primary duties in her early career as an imperial soldier involved providing cover fire to soldiers fighting against the Ala Mhigan Resistance in Gyr Abania. Her familiarity with the workings of warmachina and airships impressed some superiors.

Her Centurio took particular notice and stationed Ashelia aboard an airship as a cannoneer. In 1569, she helped shoot down a Highwind Skyways airship transporting civilian passengers. This event led Ashe to develop harrowing nightmares as the guilt of innocent blood on her hands started to eat away at her conscience. The following year saw Ashe among the airship battalion forming a blockade above Baelsar's Wall. In 1570, Ashelia's talents as an airship pilot and cannoneer, and handiness in constructing and repairing magitek weaponry and warmachina saw her removed from her position as sniper and made a "jen", an imperial field engineer. The following year saw her truly enter Eorzea to support the VIIth Legion's efforts against the Eorzean Alliance.

1572 was to be the end of the Sixth Astral Era. Ashelia jen Bunansa spent her time helping to construct Castrum Novum (later known as Castrum Centri) in Mor Dhona, and tuning its various warmachina. At this point, Ashe had become disillusioned with the concept of Garlean citizenship, bearing witness to the sheer cruelty of the empire. Ashelia also noticed the growing insanity within the VIIth Legion, as their soldiers appeared fanatically devoted to Legatus Nael van Darnus and the Meteor Project. The staggering death toll proposed by the Legatus's ambitions appalled and disgusted her, and she found herself unable to turn a blind eye to the empire's actions any longer.

It didn't take long for Ashelia to plan her escape. In her time with the XIVth she'd made two allies, an older man from her homeland named Randell whose support throughout her time as a soldier of the XIVth helped her survive among the infantry, and an Ala Mhigan named Raminas who harbored resentment for the empire for his nation's fall. With the aid of Randell and Raminas, Ashelia created a diversionary explosion within Castrum Novum and commandeered three magitek reapers. Using the reapers' artillery, the three escaped the Castrum with imperial pursuers hot on their trail. The Immortal Flames found them near Raubahn's Push, routing the imperials and arresting the three.

Garlond Ironworks

Ashelia joined the Garlond Ironworks after defecting from the imperial army.

Ashelia, Randell, and Raminas did not spend much time incarcerated. After explaining themselves as defectors seeking Garlond Ironworks, they were eventually met by Cid Garlond himself and taken on as employees. While Randell and Raminas took up mercantile responsibilities, Ashelia was entrusted with the upkeep of airships produced for Highwind Skyways, which had suspended its flights due to the selfsame attacks she helped carry out.

Her talents caught the eye of Jessie Jaye, who instructed her in the finer points of airship design, construction, and maintenance. In but a few short moons, she learned more about engineering among the Ironworks than she had in her entire life until that point. Eventually, she was constructing airships alongside the other Ironworks members, rather than merely maintaining them. For the first time in her life, she truly began to feel at home.

- After the Calamity

- Cid's Return

- Operation Archon

Seventh Astral Era

Stephanivien de Haillenarte entrusted Ashelia with a Machinist's Soul Crystal.

- Revenant's Toll

- Skysteel Manufactory

- The Sea of Clouds

Nicknames ■ Ashe Current Residence The Lavender Beds Gallery