Akuna Ravdash was born in the Haltan village of Oak Landing, two hundred and eighty-one years before the Scarlet Empress ascended to the throne of the Blessed Isle. A hot-headed and rather thoughtless warrior, but one who was entirely devoted to his nation, Akuna served from the age of 15 in the war parties that his border village sent against the Linowan and fought with distinction. His devotion to Halta never wavered, and he expected to rise up and become a leader of men, as well as to marry, all in service of his nation. But one day, while his party were conducting a raid to the south, a small group of Linowan warriors snuck into Oak Landing and dealt viciously with the villagers. Akuna's parents were slain; his sister was beaten and her face left scarred.
When Akuna returned and discovered what had happened, he flew into an uncontrollable rage. Snatching up his spear, he did not stop until he had reached the nearest Linowan settlement, and he began slaying indiscriminately until sixty-two Linowan lay dead at his hand. His last energy spent, he blacked out. When he awakened, he remembered nothing... but he saw the corpses around him, and, perched upon his chest, the lithe form of a silver wolf. He knew then that he had been Chosen.
Newly Exalted, Akuna began to seek out a new purpose in life. A Linowan warchief found him and quickly convinced him that he had been a survivor of the attack. So encouraged, he fell in with the Linowan, becoming ten times the scourge upon the Haltans that he had been upon the Linowan before. For many years, his victories were unthreatened; until one day, a Haltan champion arose: a black-haired woman, with the feathers of a hawk.
From then on, they were mortal enemies; each led their warriors against the other, leaving a trail of dead Haltans and Linowan in their wake as their battle became increasingly personal. After a time both grew so obsessed with the conflict that their nations drew away from them, and they took to breeding twisted beastmen in secret to continue their war. It went on for generations, tearing vicious swathes through the forest, until one day they each amassed their greatest forces. The battle went on for three days, as warriors by the thousands died on each side, until finally only the two Lunars were left alive at the center. They fought viciously, wounding each other again and again, until both were bleeding and exhausted; then they embraced.
In the night, however, each withdrew, and as the sun rose they met again, for their final battle. It was hard-fought and vicious, but finally, at the brink of death, Akuna struck her down. It was when her hair fell -- for the first time -- away from her face and revealed her scarring that he remembered his life before he was Chosen.
After that moment, Akuna's life changed again. Not much care for his fellow beings existed in him even before that moment, but afterwards, even that was gone. Akuna abandoned the Linowan and went out into the world. He knew only two things now: he wanted to rule the world, and he wanted to do it atop the smoking carcasses of the Gods and the Exalts they had created. He wandered for years, gaining knowledge and skill, facing vicious foes and claiming their hearts' blood, and learning all he could of the workings of the universe. In the process, he became worldly and cultured, a far cry from the raging barbarian warrior he had once been, going so far as to self-consciously adopt the poise of a wealthy, refined gentleman.
Akuna has been biding his time, waiting for the proper mechanism to enact his goals; when he encounters the Red Lily he knows that he has found his catspaws. Taking (initially) the form of an un-Exalted human, he "joins" with them to pursue their rebellion against the world order.
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