Bruce



Bruce was a PC in the Scales of Justice campaign.

Once upon a time there was a little thief. Though he was little, he did not curse himself for being slow or small or weak. His small size raised no alarms, his short legs granted him the quietest footfalls, and his lack of strength gained him an easy trust. He would roll into a new town with a smile on his face and a song in his heart because he loved money, and every new town meant new opportunities to trick people out of their wealth.

If a rube didn’t know they had been robbed, it was okay in his book:

‘Only the family dog was home when the jewelry went missing, you must have misplaced it!’

‘These charms of protection must be working, he told me I was sensitive to auras so I can tell.’

‘I drank so much last night I think I must’ve dropped my wallet, have you seen it?’

And after every major haul he would sneak back to the abandoned Weatherby mine and roll in the his own heaping pile of gems and coins.

It was during one of these many treasure baths that the shaft deep in the Weatherby mine collapsed. Drowning in darkness, the little theif found himself alone with nothing to comfort him but his towering pile of wealth. As the hours passed and he fumbled for light, the little theif explored the rest of his mine shaft finding only rusted bits of metal, septic water, and crawling insects.

Then he found the tiny shovel. Barely bigger than his palm, made of steel, he turned to the piles of rubble and rock that blocked his path and began digging. The little theif dug and scraped for three days moving dust and rock by inches listening to the ceiling shift and groan around him. Starved and dying of thirst, his valuables became nothing before the taste of sweet fresh air and the sturdy little shovel. With a puff of dust he finally breached the collapse just in time to hear the weight of the earth bury the ill gotten tithes of a hundred towns forever.

After his escape the little theif had almost nothing. He had smuggled a few coins, he had the clothes on his back, and he had the shovel. But in the light of day he could see that the tiny shovel that had saved his life was blunted and bent, twisted by desperate use. He traveled to the first blacksmith he could find.

The blacksmith in Edril refused. The blacksmith explained that only Harosh Contractors could repair holy symbols of Harosh. He pointed the little theif to their nearest temple,

It was in the temple of Harosh that he met Contractor Rocko. Rocko explained to the little theif that gold and silver were alright, but there were many other more valuable metals out there like mithral and adamantine. Money is only a means to what you can build and the real valuables are the quality tools you make. When the Skylands break down, it is Harosh who builds it back up. The little theif voluntered to learn more, but Rocko explained that first the little theif would need a new name. Something tough for use around the worksite, like Phillips or Knox.

Meet Bruce, Journeyman first class in the Continent Conservation Corps. Covered in soot, wearing fire gloves, goggles, and a forge apron, he spends most days studying the application of magic to technology and equipment. He obsessively repairs imperfect work and nothing disappoints him more than bad craftsmenship. His first assignment since leaving the laboratory is to join up with a group about to delve some ruins.