Tamiya Gantetsusai

Tamiya Gantetsusai was waiting for execution in a cell where he'd been thrown simply out of fear of his monstrous strength. A man as tall as a doorframe, with shoulders a fathom wide, an old scar reddening across his face, and a cleaver half a man's weight swinging at his back. On the death row roster, he demanded to be called the Dragon Blade. The name stuck fast: he bellowed it so loud that half the guards' ears rang.

Instead of the block, he was offered a deal. A journey to a deadly island, a search for the elixir of immortality, and a clean pardon in return. Gantetsusai didn't join the expedition to save his skin: in the deadly carnage, he saw a stage for his own triumph. A quiet old age meant nothing to him. The main thing was that in a couple hundred years, snot-nosed kids in the streets would argue over whether the Dragon Blade had been a mortal man.

In conversation, he's sharp, loud, and shamelessly self-absorbed. He'll twist any tale toward his own exploits, reduce any word to future glory. There's no malice in him for fun, nor foolishness either. He respects anyone who can take a hit right away, but can't stand cowards. Getting along with him is easy if you can tolerate his boasting about how neatly your names will fit into folk legends.

Conversations with Gantetsusai reek of campfire smoke, cheap booze, and insane plans. He's ready to spend half the night explaining exactly how to lose your head so that bards will sing about it for centuries. And in that childish stubbornness, there's a simple nobility of its own.