Ivan Dross

After his father, Edwin Dross, led the Massacre of the Sorcerers and tragically lost his life to a mysterious and dangerous young sorcerer, Ivan Dross swore revenge and delved into studying sciences to protect Skymar from mystical and supernatural threats. He soon found himself being accepted into Dalman University’s School of Advanced Science Studies. However, he had little money and had to serve in the Skymar War Force to acquire the necessary funds. During this, he used his intelligence to advance quickly through the ranks and perfect his skills in weapons and physical, unarmed combat. His agreement allowed him to train and simultaneously attend school. While in school, he became acquainted with Emerson and Lucinda Wyverstone, two people who would eventually become wealthy entrepreneurs, and financially support Ivan in his future endeavours. After emerging as the valedictorian of his graduating class, he began to serve full-time for two years as an officer. He led his platoon on several successful missions throughout the years, and his service was concluded. He then began to work toward his goal of forming a secret organization that monitored and regulated supernatural occurrences and investigated and thwarted any possible conspiracies. Dross named this research and defense group the Supernatural Conspiracy Analysis and Regulation, or simply SCAR. Dross recruited several members of his old platoon, as well as some of the students and former professors and researchers from DU. Among those funding him were the Wyverstones. One of these recruits was his own daughter, Veronica Dross, a brilliant young woman who had also attended DU, as well as an amazing soldier with a talent for archery.

After losing his wife while she gave birth to Veronica, he would grow to become bitter and more obsessed with his work in SCAR. This would also affect the way he raised Veronica. He told her he loved her, but he was often cruel and verbally and physically abusive towards her, forcing her to endure immense physical challenges in extreme climates, and claim that he was only giving her a head start for her training. After she finished her advanced training, he crossed the line when he hired a group of criminals to jump her while she was alone one night. Despite her eliminating them, she was beside herself with anger when her father explained himself. She attacked him, and Ivan, despite his age, was still a very good combatant. In a blind rage, she reached for her knife and slashed his eye. He subdued her and locked her in a cell, while his robotics department replaced his eye with a synthetic optic.

After years of investigation into the sorcerer that murdered his father, he acquired a lead on a small land outside of the Bridged Worlds. He sent Veronica, his finest agent, into the world, only to suddenly lose contact with her. He sent a rescue team, only for them to be slaughtered by Novus Ordo, a secret paramilitary cult that recruited members from any race of the worlds that was led by the very sorcerer that murdered his father: Lord Dominus. Frustrated, Dross ruthlessly continued the search for both Dominus and Veronica. Three years later, he hears reports of drastic activity on a distant farming world. They investigate, only to find there to be the ruins of a farmhouse, hundreds of dead Novus Ordo soldiers, and the bullet-ridden corpse of Veronica. Heartbroken over the loss of his daughter and best soldier, Dross examined the dead soldiers. Whoever or whatever attacked them, did not use any modern firearm of any sort. All of the bodies were either sliced open, decapitated, amputated, burned, shocked by some sort of lightning, or even physically torn in half, or (to the disturbance of Dross and his people) crushed with bare hands. Whatever being caused this carnage, they were extremely dangerous and were just as lethal to Novus Ordo. One of the most innovative features of Dross’s optic eye was that he could analyze what happened to victims of murder or crimes and he could reconstruct the crime using a hologram projector encased within the eye. He utilized this feature, and to his shock and grief, he discovered what had happened. A lone Skymarn man had somehow acquired ferocious powers of a demon and had dual-wield swords that ignited with fire and lightning, and ruthlessly slaughtered all those that opposed him. He rewound to the start of the fight, and saw that the man was crying over his daughter, meaning that he cared for her tremendously. The hologram ended, and Dross left.

Dross now kept spies in all of the worlds to monitor anything even remotely suspicious, reporting directly to him and keeping a task force on standby just in case. In the meantime, he also had spies that relayed information regarding potential candidates for a special team he planned to build to combat Novus Ordo and this mysterious solitary adversary.

Dross would later conduct ruthless, inhumane experiments on Symarns to get them to evolve quicker. This was kept secret from most people in SCAR. However, one night, the Wyverstones would discover that their own money was being used to fund these experiments. This shocked and horrified the couple, and they withdrew all support for SCAR, and gathered the evidence that they needed to shut the group down and incarcerate Dross. However, Dross had a plan in mind. A few individuals he was negotiating with to become subjects, he instead chose to pay them to break into Wyverstone Manor, kill them, and destroy the evidence and make it look like a robbery gone awry. They succeeded in destroying the evidence and murdering Lucinda and Emerson, but their daughter, Sabrina, was not there. They left before she arrived. Ivan had heard of Sabrina’s marvelous achievements in school and realized that she could be an asset, if successfully manipulated. Dross promised the killers that if they went through the trial he would get them out of whatever predicament they ended up in using his resources. After the trials, he visited the mansion and introduced himself to Sabrina, and gained her trust very easily. He then reneged his promise to the killers and had them eliminated and retrieved his money from them, while also using this an opportunity to demonstrate the power of SCAR’s technology to Sabrina, further gaining her trust and now her intrigue.

 

Dross would then come to hear of the exploits of Major Joseph Stavries, an exemplary  officer in the Special Forces sector of the Skymar War Force. He would send Sabrina, now a Captain and one of his most skilled and loyal operatives, to recruit him. Dross’s people in the robotics department would also complete Edwin, the first fully-functioning synthetic humanoid that worked as a soldier and named after his father. After supplying Joe, Sabrina, and Edwin with a ship, he would send them to recruit the various members utilizing the dossiers he compiled with the information supplied by his spies. These would include: Dr. Donolin Malakin, a middle-aged Luthornian scientist with an eccentric personality who hopes to develop a scientific counter to magic; Norvok Elmont, a Tyrak mercenary soldier who had agreed to help fight Novus Ordo due to an apparent grudge against Dominus’s second-in-command Gen. Zarnaeus; and Agrillo, a Vorsalin guardian that is willing to travel away from his home to combat any threats to his sacred territory.

Dross informed them that they were to fight Novus Ordo while he sent soldiers to subdue the demonic Skymarn being. What he chose not to tell the team was that they were essentially a filler squad while he found a way to control the being so that he could use him to defeat Dominus. However, nothing could have prepared Dross for what was to come.