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Jovius
is a cutter with a mission, and it's nothing less than the
redemption of Good's good name. Sure, not everyone would see
it like that, but then not everyone's got his foresight.
See, there's this chant rattling about the Cage (and since
nothing in Sigil is secret for long, the entire Upper
Planes) that the celestials are helping their fiends in the
Blood War!
'Course,
you'd have to be a bit soft in the head to swallow something
like that without asking any questions, but Jovius did his
asking long ago and pretty much confirmed the rumour as the
truth. Imagine that: Good helping evil to spread! What a
disaster!
With
the subtlety of an aasimon, Jovius tracked the merchants and
cross-traders in this little scheme down to Sigil...of
course, they'd seen him coming a mile off and covered their
tracks fast, but not before Jovius had caught their scent
proper. He's confirmed to himself the main details of what's
happening:

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SEE
ALSO:
- Cage
Rattlers:--
- Krr'k'akar,
Lagnos
of the Seventh Breath,
Laurelli
Tantarella,
Peacock
Lord.
- Uncaged:
Faces of Sigil:--
- Cirily
(p.20), Estavan
(p.30),
Iarmid
(p.46), Koe
(p.52),
Rule-of-Three
(p.84),
Tripicus
(p.102).
- Hellbound:
The Blood War:--
- Spiral
Hal'Oight is
detailed in the War Games book.
- Philosophers
with Clubs:--
- Zepherai
Thunderstorms
is an Anarchist Visionary detailed on the
Mimir.
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The
fiends are being sold weapons, magic and supplies by a
group of persons based in Sigil, and their number
included creatures of the Upper Planes who ought to know
better,
- One of the dealers is possibly the
asuras Koe,
though only rumours from Doomguard contacts confirm this,
and Jovius assumes the celestial is not working alone
[he does not know the other cutters he is after are
the ursinal Tripicus
and the eladrin Cirily],
- The rastipede merchant
Krr'k'akar
may well be involved in this trade. Again, Jovius has no
firm evidence, merely the fact that Krr'k'akar is
depositing vast amounts of jink left right and centre,
and has almost as many fiendish clients as the Styx
Oarsman!
- Neither baatezu nor tanar'ri is
being favoured -- both races are being secretly aided by
the same group (in an attempt to double profits,
perhaps?),
- The fiends have learned where
these weapons are coming from, and gleefully accept them,
all the time pretending to be ignorant of their origin
(whether the traitors of good are aware of this
double-cross, Jovius is unsure).
So
what's his problem? Why does this Astral Deva have to get
his sticky beak into the whole sordid affair? Can't he just
leave cutters to make their jink they way they
want?
Well,
no. See, Jovius' inquiries have led him to believe that the
traitors of good are themselves being betrayed. Whilst
talking to a well-known anarchist, Zepherai
Thunderstorms, Jovius let
the dark slip on his mission. Zepherai became very excited
and rifled through her desk until she found what she was
looking for. According to her sources, large numbers of
munitions from the upper planes are falling into the hands
of the yugoloths, who are attempting to 'reverse engineer'
the magic in the items to discover weaknesses in the method
that celestials use to enchant their weapons. They'll then
be able to use this information to better defeat the
celestials should the yugoloths ever need to fight
them!
This
'evidence' steeled Jovius' resolve tenfold. He now believes
it's imperative that the shipments be stopped. Once this has
ceased, he thinks he may be able to prevail onto some of the
other main Blood War arms dealers of whom he has learned;
Estavan,
an ogre-mage of the Planar Trade Consortium, and
Spiral
Hal'Oight, an aasimar merchant
to reduce or even stop their trade altogether.
This
in turn will be the first stage to calming the savage Blood
War. Perhaps in the deva's long lifetime he may even be able
to make some progress into stopping the devastating War
which ravaged the Lower and Cordant planes so heavily. He
hopes.
In
this respect the deva has two main allies. The first of
these is Laurelli
Tantarella, a trumpet
archon who's often in Sigil on business. She and her
immediate archon superiors on Mount Celestia would welcome a
truce or calming of the Blood War; they grow weary of the
ever-growing number of new petitioners to the Heavens who
were once self-righteous paladins fighting for the causes of
Good and Law. The archons recognise that this is a tragic
waste of life and should be stopped, and thing that soothing
the Blood War might be a good way of achieving
this.
Jovius'
second ally is the cambion sage Rule-of-Three,
though Jovius knows him only in his githzerai form.
Rule-of-Three is also keen to stop the Blood War, though for
very different reasons than Jovius expects. The tanar'ri
really wants the Lower Planar races to unite and attack the
celestials together. Once the scourge of goodness is
crushed, the fiends can get down to the real job of dividing
up the planes.
Jovius
would doubtless be horrified if he knew he was working with
a fiend, but that probably wouldn't stop him in the long
run. See, he believes that for some goals the ends far
outweigh the means, and if the goal is the salvation of
countless innocents, working with a fiend wouldn't hurt too
much.
When
he's not consorting with fiends or hunting down traitors,
Jovius likes to relax and enjoy himself. Being a deva, of
course, much of this involves prayer and meditation. Jovius
can often be found in the newly-restored Temple of
Brihaspati, in the company of Lagnos
of the Seventh Breath, who
relays his prayers through Brihaspati's grace to the deva's
home powers in Bytopia. Since he learned that Koe frequented
Iarmid's
massage parlour, Jovius has taken to going there as well,
coincidentally at the same time as Koe each week.
While he stares at the traitorous asuras, the attendants at
the Other Place polish his golden skin, clean his blond hair
and send the deva back out into the cage with a fresh mind
and radiance that'd shame many devas who never leave the
Upper Planes.
But
it ain't all work and pray. Unlike many of his ilk who are
strictly celibate, Jovius has had several romantic
entanglements in Sigil. Perhaps that's because he's spent so
much time out of Bytopia that he's beginning to lose touch
with the way aasimon are supposed to conduct themselves, or
perhaps he's just a little different from the rest. In any
case, his latest amour is the former Peacock
Lord of the Beastlands.
The couple don't get to spend much time together, as Jovius
is always travelling here and there through portals (and by
all accounts the Peacock Lord is much too fond of the high
life to want to leave the Cage and accompany Jovius), but
when they're together out on the town they turn
heads!



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