Iriel Selnar is a brilliant yet unsettling medical student at the Aefir Academy of the Arcane, known for her clinical efficiency, razor-sharp intellect, and unnerving enthusiasm for the morbid. A dedicated coroner and student of divine and arcane healing, Iriel possesses an insatiable curiosity about the limits of life and death, balancing between academia and an unspoken obsession with the intricate art of the dead.
Her bright red hair, often pulled into a messy ponytail, contrasts sharply with the dark robes of her trade, and her round spectacles, always perched on the tip of her nose, catch the candlelight with an eerie glint. Wherever she walks, the distinct metallic clatter of her medical satchel echoes behind her, filled to the brim with surgical tools, scrolls on anatomy, and an unsettling collection of preserved specimens.
Despite her grim profession and eccentric habits, Iriel is highly respected within the Academy. She is meticulous, methodical, and dangerously efficient in uncovering the truths hidden beneath flesh and bone.
Personality & Mannerisms
Iriel is an unapologetic scholar of morbidity, equal parts brilliant and unsettling. Her fascination with death is not out of malice or cruelty but an intense academic drive to understand, dissect, and learn. Her dry wit and deadpan humor often make her the most composed person in a crisis, though her habit of making light conversation over a fresh corpse tends to unnerve even the most hardened investigators.
She is prone to speaking absently while performing autopsies, seemingly forgetting there are people present, only to look up mid-sentence with a bright, inquisitive grin, eager to explain her findings in gruesome detail.
Her obsession with studying "cases" (as she calls corpses) firsthand means she has an unhealthy disregard for social boundaries and an almost predatory excitement when a new body arrives on her table.
Role in Investigating Ares Farric
When the series of strange murders in Aerenal began, Guy the Grateful and Septimus Lucien sought Iriel’s expertise to examine the lifeless, hollowed corpses left in Ares Farric’s wake (see: The Forgotten Son). She proved indispensable, her knowledge of arcane and biological anomalies helping uncover the nature of the Amethyst of the Dying Star and the dark magic siphoning the victims’ essence.
She took a morbid delight in the case, often theorizing in clinical detail about the process of their deaths—sometimes to the discomfort of those around her.
"Oh, this one's fascinating! See here? The atrophy isn’t physical—this poor soul was drained dry, yet his tissues remain intact! Can you imagine what kind of necromantic force could do this? No? Well, I can! Let’s find out, shall we?"
Even as the case escalated into a direct confrontation with Ares, Iriel remained eerily unfazed by the danger, more interested in seeing firsthand what the amethyst was capable of than in personal survival.
Affiliation with the Clerisy
Despite her unsettling demeanor, Iriel is a devoted cleric, studying healing and divine restoration alongside her anatomical research. Her interest in life’s fragility extends to preserving and restoring it, though she often views healing as a puzzle to be solved rather than an act of mercy.
Her divine practices are less about faith and more about understanding the threads of the Ether, seeing magic as a cosmic equation waiting to be unraveled. To her, life and death are two sides of the same coin—equally fascinating, equally important.
Legacy
Though her methods and interests can be unnerving, Iriel is widely respected in scholarly and investigative circles. Her genius in anatomy and arcane medicine makes her a valuable asset to both the Aefir Academy and The Elden Council.
She continues her work as a coroner, cleric, and researcher, forever chasing the next mystery of mortality—whether the world is ready for her or not.