Name: Ishida of a Thousand Words (Often referred to as "Swampy" - she doesn't seem to mind this unflattering nickname)

Occupation: Traveling Bard

Actual Age/Apparent Age: Unknown/22

Gender: Female

Sexuality: Heterosexual

Race/Species: Naiad, "Swamp Elf"

Appearance: An uncommon sight in these lands, Ishida bears the appearance of a wispy, petite elf, standing barely at 5'1" (155 cm). Amphibian in nature, she has greenish-gray skin, which is mostly hairless, with the exception of her eyebrows, eyelashes, and dark hair, reaching to her mid-back. She has long, dagger-like ears and somewhat slanted, violet-colored eyes.

Her frame is slim, almost fragile-looking, yet sleek, and obviously well adapted to swimming with surprising speed and efficiency, due to her fingers and toes being partially webbed. Hidden underneath her curls, just below her ears, is a set of functional gills, which allows her to breathe underwater, despite the fact that she has lungs and has no trouble spending long periods of time on land.

She is usually seen wearing clothing in earthy tones, old and worn, but well kept and taken care of, as Ishida very much dislikes being filthy.

Personality: Though, at first, she appears timid and withdrawn, to a point where less patient people would simply categorize her as dimwitted, Ishida is actually very intelligent and observant. She's just picky about whom she shares those sharp wits with. But once she deems one worthy of getting into a conversation with, she reveals herself as something of a master storyteller, capable of keeping people enraptured with her words. That particular talent earned her the nickname of "Ishida of a Thousand Words" in her travels.

Through her speaking voice can wrap around someone like a comforting blanket, making them near-oblivious to their surroundings, if she chooses to do so, her singing voice is a step above it. Able to produce tones both high and low, way beyond the capabilities of a human, if she did not speak words while she sang, one could swear she was playing an instrument out of sight.

Privately, Ishida is kind and loyal. She seeks to help others, even though she is often rebuffed due to her appearance, given that she looks as if she can barely carry her own belongings, without bending over. She spends a lot of time trying to get out of people's way and not be noticeable, with the expectation of sharing a story or a song for food and temporary shelter.

Abilities/Skills:

Waterborn: Her body seems to be made for the water - She moves through it with skill and agility, making it near-impossible to catch her if she ever manages to reach it while fleeing. She has an additional set of gills and eyelids, and is able to see clearly underwater and stay there for long periods of time. While she can manage well enough in saltwater, she greatly prefers freshwater.

Bard: A collector of songs and stories, Ishida is blessed with an extraordinary gift for narration and song. Some even claim that she has a voice that can hypnotize someone and make them do her bidding, which is partially true. While her stories merely capture attention, if she chooses so, he can influence people by singing. It usually manifests in them getting emotionally moved, and tossing an extra coin into her collecting box.

Her people actually have the ability to use their voices in much more devastating ways luring unsuspecting travelers into the deep swamps where they live, or causing internal injuries with sound alone, but due to an unfortunate loss of memory, Ishida no longer knows how to do anything of the sort. The worst she can do with it usually backfires, as sometimes, when she goes overboard, the admiration goes into obsessive infatuation, and it happened more than once that Ishida had found herself at the receiving end of unwanted attention from "admirers", causing her to flee, or risk being imprisoned, assaulted or killed.

This is the reason why she tends to avoid using this ability, unless the coin is tight and she has no other source of income.

Blowdart specialty: While she is not much of a fighter at all, when it comes to defending herself, Ishida believes in the power of avoidance, rather than engaging in conflict. Due to this, her weapon of choice is blowdarts, dipped with a sleeping agent. It's enough to put someone the size of a human under for a good half an hour, and well enough to at least daze anything bigger for a few minutes - oftentimes enough for her to slip past undetected, or run away.

History: Ishida is much as she appears... somewhat lost and alone. Separated from her people, both by vast distance and memory loss, she has no recollection of her past. All she knows is that 22 years ago, she had woken up in a hall made of ice, with a fist-sized bruise on her head, nearly frozen to death and with no memory of who she was, nor where she hails from. The icy hall ended up being the entrance to the Snow Elf kingdom, which were about as surprised to see one of her kind at their doorstep, as she was at finding herself there.

The time spent among the Snow Elves was awkward for the most part, as Ishida (then still simply known as "Swampy") got the feeling like they were very cautious of her presence there, yet she had no idea why. Through whispers, she had found out that the Snow Elves, and "The Swamp Elves", which she guessed were her people, were simply not in close relations, both sides having issues with the other one, and having a silent agreement to just keep to their own territories, in order to keep the peace.

And though she was looked upon with caution and distrust, she still couldn't say that her stay there was all that bad, as one of the guards assigned to keep an eye on her ended up being very nice to talk to, and was seemingly aware that she could not influence which people she came from, no more than he could do so on his end. Nevertheless, as time went by, and Ishida found herself accommodated to the place, where even the cold did not bother that much anymore, just like that, it was all ripped away from her again.

All she recalls is falling asleep normally one night, and waking up bound, her lungs and gills seemingly on fire. The was on a ship, she could tell that much, as she could both hear and feel the water sloshing around, and she was chained to a long string of people, most of them still unconscious, the rest as dazed as she was.

Using a few tricks her Snow Elf friend had taught her, she managed to slip from her bonds, and as the people above head settled for a nighttime journey, she slipped out and jumped into the sea. Not knowing if her absence would even be noticed, she pressed to swim for the distant lights reflected in the water, signaling that there must be a shore nearby, which eventually landed her in the Al-Jalasan harbor. Exhausted, she crawled her way up and since then, simply tried to survive, spending the past sixteen years here.

Her name was given to her by a kindly traveling storyteller, which she had met only a few weeks on Al-Jalasan soil, telling her that she reminded him of a protagonist of a story he knew and it was him who eventually got her to appreciate and seek new stories to tell.

Though she was often referred to as "The Swamp Elf" by the Snow Elves, and the name eventually being shortened to "Swampy", it was only when she had found herself on a completely different continent, that she adopted this new name, and Ishida of a Thousand Words was born. (Though, secretly, she missed being called Swampy, as unworthy of a talented bard as it was.)

Other information:

- Being amphibian in nature, she prefers damp and rainy weather. The sun makes her skin dry up very easily, so she mostly keeps it covered, while the cold makes her very drowsy.

- Due to two decades of living on what she earns from town to town, Ishida had learned to sleep light and always be on her guard. It's exhausting and often affecting her performances, but she dares not to allow herself to fall into a deep sleep, or settle for the night where she can be easily reached, being aware that should anyone catch her unprepared, she had little to no chance of escaping.

- She has an instrument in her possession, which she often plays, but mostly to herself - a small wooden kalimba, carved to size so it fits her hands, without the webbing between her fingers getting in the way.