Stein Phais

"Dying is the absolute last thing I plan on doing. Literally."

- Stein Phais, Volume 1 A wanderer whose grimlas weapon contains the spirit of Azriel Santreya. Stein is also known by the terrible name of Reaper of Ardunat. He generally passes himself off as a treasure hunter and cartographer. In truth, Stein is a Necryte mage and a Wanderer.

Personality
"Despite his claims to the contrary, he's luck's favored child. You know who he is. Any bet against him is a fool's wager. But I do believe this wanderer's life takes its toll on him. He hides his bitterness behind a smile..."

- Durdan, Volume 1 Considered by many to be something of a coward upon meeting him, Stein longs for a place to call home despite being a Wanderer. He tends to fit the charming rogue archetype, lying to most people about his past without batting an eye, and does not like to travel alone. He doesn't consider Azriel occupying his mind to be company.

History
"You know how it ends. How it always ends. You, who wields infinite power, cannot save anyone."

- Azriel Santreya, Volume 1 At the age of sixteen Stein was to undergo the Sealing: a ritual which required those going through it to pull a weapon from the Faetree. The Faetree of Ardunat contained the grimlas double blades which bound the soul of Azriel Santreya. Pulling the blades on a whim, the following explosion of magical power not only revealed Stein as a Necryte - the first since Necryte Varda, believed by some to be Varda reborn - it killed two hundred and forty seven souls. The rare survivors of the incident described the Reaper as Ardunat as having a robe of shadows and dark, an armor of bones, and the blackest of hearts.

However, according to Eines none of the survivors of Ardunat had discovered Stein was the Reaper and the cause of the tragedy. When Stein ran as hard as he could, Eines followed with the intention of bringing him back to their family. When Stein chose to instead wander on, however, Eines decided to accompany him rather than returning to their clan.

Since the tragedy of Ardunat, Stein has been a favorite target for bounty hunters as he is a major threat. Each of his 324 names has a bounty on it, though "Reaper of Ardunat" is by far the most feared of any of his names. After the incident at Ardunat, Stein took on the last name of "Phais", which means "wanderer" in the Muraman language. He frequently is found speaking to himself, but is truly speaking to Azriel, the spirit in his grimlas (he can do so purely mentally, but apparently sometimes slips up). Azriel is the one who explained to Stein his nature as a Necryte and what had occurred during his Sealing, and the two often speak throughout the comic.

At the start of the comic, Stein started out at the Karden Border Gate, the Eastern Entrance to the Palladia Region. The heart of the Palladian Alliance, the seat of the living power behind Damanul's church. At the time he was travelling with Durdan, Farad, and Zala. He had to that point been travelling with the three adventurers for a full year beyond the borders of Palladia. During their adventures together, they apparently relieved a number of outposts of their pilgrim tax to the god Damanul.

It was at the Border Gate that Stein parted ways with the other three travelers. While Durdan said he only needed a few more days to get Stein a border pass, the Wanderer refused to wait. Durdan did manage to acquire a decent tracker for Stein, however; well-made runeglass, resonant crystal work, a genuine Sardaheim import. He warned Stein about the care of the runeglass before seeing his friend off: don't use too much magic around the runeglass, or the tracker would break. Stein required the tracker to attach to a dragon of one of the Northern flight of dragons. He had heard that the flight would be passing through Karden that day, and planned to follow them all the way to Runenos. He planned to find there enough dragon scales to make himself rich - and did offer to allow the other three travelers to come with him. They refused on the grounds this was a crazy plan.

Stein's plan to attach a rune to a dragon was a typically insane one for him: take advantage of the fact that dragons hate the smell of human magic by drawing a rune somewhere and imbuing it with magic and waiting for a dragon to attach it, giving him time to place the tracking rune on the attacking dragon. Stein chose to put the rune on the border gates themselves. Unshockingly, Azriel thought this was a completely asinine plan and insisted on making that known.

Caught by the borderguards when he was attaching the rune to the gates, Stein tried to play himself off as a Dragonlord, claiming he could get any of the passing dragons to attack the gates if he wasn't left alone. He then "proved" he was a Dragonlord (he definitely isn't) when one of the dragons came to attack the gate - or, more specifically, Stein's rune on the gate. During the distraction, Stein managed to attach the tracker to the dragon and then escaped in a simple mist spell, calling up mist and then just running away normally.

Once Stein began following the tracking amulet, however, he managed to get himself trapped in a mountain maze. It turns out that following a creatue of the sky on foot is not actually an easy task. While he an Azriel bickered about this outcome, Arthur Feldenstrom rode by with a wyvern in hot pursuit. Arthur ordered Stein to run, but the Wanderer refused and chose to make his stand where he was. Using magic, however, disabled the tracking glass. Stein had to readjust his plans to include fixing the glass, and thus set course for Wade.

Frustrated with the change of plans and with travelling alone once again, Stein and Azriel speak for a little while about his sanity. They're interrupted by Antheus Prayne and Arthur Feldenstrom, who are returning from Palladia to investigate the Buran Mines, and Stein takes the chance to eavesdrop on them. Lady Andrea quickly meets up with the two, reporting the situation in Buran and making certain to inform Arthur that his family survived. She also reports the carcass of one of the wyverns near the mine, stating it looked like the work of the Reaper of Ardunat.

Later, Stein saw the sealing of the grimlas spear Ashewara from afar, the light of destruction a clear giveaway that another wanderer had awakened. While Azriel wanted to go and meet the new wanderer, Stein opted to keep his distance, remembering all too well how messy a grimlas sealing could be.

Even later on foot, Stein argued with Azriel about what size castle he would get when he suddenly spotted a dragon diving at him. Figuring the runeglass couldn't get any more broken from magic use, he immediately attacked with a fire spell, not realizing that the dragon in question had a rider. Lynn de Luctes, the rider in question, took offense at being attacked. While he tried to stop her by telling her he was sorry and had thought it was only a dragon alone, Lynn shortly had him pinned to the ground with her spear to his throat.

Appearance
One of the humans of Ravine who doesn't follow the Southern custom of splitting his ears. Occasionally wears a hat that no one else but him likes.

Abilities
""Delicate" is not my forte."

- Stein Phais, Volume 1 He possesses the knowledge of two true commandwords. Beyond this, Stein is a powerful mage but an unfocused one. As a Necryte, he does not need to pay for his magic with his own maga or lifeforce - which means he is technically unlimited in scope. However, he is also incapable of aiming or controlling his own powers. Think a very strong gun that can go off and hit anything. He tends to deal with this by trying to get enemies alone and far away from anyone else and then letting go.

Beyond his magical skills, Stein is a Wanderer. As such, he has a grimlas weapon. His weapon is two short swords which are capable of linking into a swallow type double blade. The true purpose of the linking, however, is to extend and form a barans spiral which is engraved into the handles of his swords. This means the swords are actually a spellcaster's weapons.

While Stein is incapable of manifesting Azriel in true form like other Wanderers can do with their grimlas avendati, he does speak to the spirit in his mind; Azriel has access to all of Stein's thoughts, and the two can carry on conversations through this. Azriel offers Stein advice and tries to keep him from doing anything that will risk his sanity, as a Necryte without sanity is not a great thing.

Dragons tend to hate Stein, but so far Hurricos has learned to tolerate him.