Katerina von Rothenberg
Aug 6, 2015 12:20:41 GMT -6
Post by Katerina von Rothenberg on Aug 6, 2015 12:20:41 GMT -6
Name: Katerina "Kat" von Rothenberg
Class: Swordmaster
Age: 28
Born in: Bern
Appearance:
Katerina is on the taller side for a woman, standing at 5'10 and has an atheletic build while still keeping feminine curves. Katerina prefers to keep her hair shorter, shorter than her brother's in fact, but has died a few streaks at the front magenta, which matches her usual lipstick. Her natural hair colour is black and her eyes are blue.
Unlike her brother she tends to dress in brighter colours and wears far less armour. Typically she wears a white top with golden trim and golden armguards to match. Her boots are black, her slacks are a navy blue. Katerina even has a cape to match her brother's, though hers is white and in much better condition. Aside from that Katerina owns a few dresses and more casual outfits.
Personality: Katerina or “Kat” as her brother calls her is, above all else, quite self-confident. It borders on arrogance, but she makes a point not to be mean about it. Rather than put others down and make them feel beneath her she shines on her own, and would honestly raise people to her level. This confidence and security in her own skin is such that she has very little shame and modesty, and is quite hard to embarass. The faults that she is aware of she owns and admits to, and constantly strives to further improve herself.
Katerina has a firm personality but lacks the stubborness of her twin. She is very adaptable to situations and has a sharp mind for tactics and strategy. Katerina sees battle as a form of art but also as a survival skill, and dedicates her all to any fight and every strategy. Though sociable and respected among her peers she lacks the raw charisma and heated energy of her brother, and thus she leaves most of the actual leading to him. However Katerina has be similar to the more successful bandit leaders, having a crude and cruel effectiveness to her strategies that stems from her childhood.
Katerina is not too flirty but acknowledges that she's considered quite the beauty. She is very quick to decide on whether or not she likes a suitor, and if she does then she will flirt back. However it is hard to recover from a bad first impression if you aim to be a suitor of any kind, but she might forgive you to become a friend.
Katerina cares for her twin brother, Adalwulf, to extreme lengths. While she does respect his skills and ability she worries about his reckless style and chastises him on it from time to time, much to his chagrin. They make an excellent pair on the field and off, having adapted to each other's styles and personalites from an early age. Katerina admires Adalwulf's raw strength and courage, and his determination and ability to rouse their soldiers. She loves him dearly, more than anything in the world.
Depsite her ruthless tactical mind and efficient fencing style of combat, Katerina does have an empathetic heart and struggles with ignoring the plights of others. Though she believes people need to be able to help themselves Katerina has been seen, on more than one ocassion, to stop and give a homeless person a gold coin, or even stop to aid everyday citizens with whatever issue they may be going through. She sees it as a way to repay for some of her actions as a child.
Story: Adalwulf von Rothenberg and Katerina von Rothenberg were born twins to Bernese farmers Dietrich and Agnes Rothenberg in the year 1266. Their life was very simple for the first ten years of it. The Rothenberg twins were both playful and competitive, but they were also dedicated to their parents work and started to pull their own weight at a young age. Even at the age of 10 Adalwulf was shaping up to look like a strapping young lad, tall and broad for his age even then. That still didn't stop Katerina from competing with him however she could, and their parents admired their spirit.
In the year 1276, Bernese soldiers rebelled against the crown. The result was a war that involved foreign Ilians and other mercenaries facing the former armies of the crown. Many battles were fought within Bern...and the Rothenber farm was not spared.
The battle came without a warning, but when it did the Rothernbergs did their best to flee. They took nothing but the clothes on their backs and some gold to line their pockets, but they barely made it off the farm before a stray arrow found it's way into their mothers throat. Adalwulf and Katerina barely had time to scream before their father met a similar fate, several burning arrows digging into his body. Neither parent died immediately and the twins watched in horror as their parents struggled and twitched on the ground.
The fields around them started to catch fire from the burning arrows, so Adalwulf and Katerina had no choice to but to flee without their parents. When Katerina's legs eventually tired Adalwulf picked her up and carried her, even though he himself was exhausted. They ran and walked for hours before the flames became a faint orange glow in the distance, and they found themselves in a village.
Ordinarily orphaned children warranted some pity and mercy, but the times were just too dark for the fearful populace of Bern. Though the twins pleaded and begged to people that had no doubt eaten food harvested from their farms, not a soul took them into their homes. The twins were forced to endure the elements and survive from whatever scraps they could find. They were hungry, scared, grief stricken and tired. Often the twins would snap on each other and just as often they would come to blows, overwhelmed by their emotions. But each time they would separate for a few hours before regrouping with tears in their eyes.
This cycle continued for at least a week before young Katerina decided they needed to steal to survive. Adalwulf wanted to be opposed to the idea, but his hunger pangs said otherwise. The village they had been drifting through had little in the way of a town guard. It was mostly a militia that consisted of the elderly who could still fight or the young who did not yet know how to. They had no training and poor weaponry.
Adalwulf himself, while still child and spry, was large for his age and drew more attention. So it was decided that Katerina would do the actual thieving and Adalwulf would cover for his sister. Their first attempt was a success, and the twins slowly began to improve their methods. Adalwulf would cause distractions to help Katerina steal larger portions. At first the distractions were direct, such as shouting out in the middle of the street and hurling a stone at a nearby citizen, but soon he found ways to create indirect distractions, such as sabatoging a cart in the night so it would collapse during the day.
The Rothenberg twins were successful enough to survive for another month. Whenever Katerina was caught Adalwulf would fly in as a whirlwind of punches, kicks, scratches, and bites to keep any threats off of his sister. Larger than other children his age, he had little trouble with the younger citizens, and his crazed ambushses were enough to startle the older citizens. He eventually became decent at fighting with his fists and would take large sticks as weapons as well.
However the village was small and word did spread. It wasn't long before the angry citizens tracked down the twins, who had been living behind houses and relocating every night, and chased them out of the village's borders. Once again the Rothenbergs were left alone...but they were smarter this time. They could survive so long as they were among others, and as they grew older more opportunities would open up to them. Until then the twins traveled from village to village. Katerina demanded that Adalwulf fight her once a day, so she could learn to hold her own and not be dependant on his rescue if she slipped up. The two would battle with their fists and feet, and ocassionally train with sticks.
Living through thievery for two years the now twelve year old twins came across the first major city they had ever seen: Lucerne. Unlike the villages and towns from before Lucerne had a proper trained and armed town guard. It would be very difficult to live in the city simply by stealing, just the two of them. But the twins did their best regardless and were successful for a time, long enough to draw the attentions of other orphans.
Many children of Bern had lost their parents and families in the recent years and many had taken to the heavily populated trade city, one of the last major sources of income in Bern, and even then it had been slipping. These children, at first, wanted Adalwulf and Katerina to join their ranks in the slums and steal from the merchants and traders together. Adalwulf was rather taken by them and wasn't opposed to joining but Katerina had her reservations. She told her twin brother that these children would not watch their backs as well as the two of them alone did. Adalwulf hadn't considered this but did find it reasonable, and so he declined.
The children then changed their tune. When the Rothenbergs turned their proposal down the children warned them to stay out of Lucerne then. They didn't want “competition” in the city and weren't opposed to using force. However the Rothenbergs weren't a pair to back down. They had survived alone all this time and they were not about to be shooed off by a pack of children.
Thus begin a series of skirmishes. At first Adalwulf and Katerina stayed rather passive and continued doing what they needed to do to eat at least one meal every couple of days, but it wasn't long before they found their areas under heavier guard. Someone had tipped off the residents that they were being robbed, and Katerina put the pieces together rather swiftly that it had been those children. Adalwulf proposed they strike back and together they came up with a plan.
The pair tried to observe the behaviors of these children in secret. They used their typical strategy of having Katerina spy while Adalwulf went about in broad daylight to draw attention. The female twin soon overheard talks of a “heist”. Apparently the orphans had gotten downright cocky and were planning on tackling a noble in the area, an ex-knight known as Bertolf von Ebbenhart.
What a perfect plan to sabatoge.
The now thirteen year old twins started to make plans of their own. They found out the location of Ebbenhart's manor and kept doing some spy work to learn what they could about the rival orphans' plans. Katerina discovered that Bertolf had lost some men, who had left to join up with Hargus' forces. As such his personal forces were not what they once were, hence why the orphans figured they could rob his manor.
Then, finally, they found out what night the orphans planned to pull this heist.
Katerina proposed they simply tell Bertolf the plans of the orphans as the ultimate form of sabatoge, but Adalwulf thought the noble might be hard to reach and warn. He also questioned whether the noble would believe them, though part of him simply wanted knock a few heads as vengeance. So the two agreed to try two different approaches: Katerina would go the noble, while Adalwulf would attack the orphans mid heist.
The night of the heist the twins made certain to get to the manor early. Adalwulf kept watch for the orphans while Katerina made her attempt to sneak into the manor. Through careful movements and silent steps Katerina managed to make her way through the halls of the manor and eventually found the room of it's master.
When she opened the door she was surprised to see Bertolf awake. He was seated at a desk by his bed and was reading a letter by candlelight. The man turned his head and blinked, shocked that this girl had actually made it to his room without alarming a single guard. Katerina told Bertolf the plot of the orphans and that her brother was going to attempt to stop them. If anything Ebbenhart seemed amused by this, and when a guard came running to his room with news of intruders, he quickly realized that it had to be true.
Katerina followed the man and a few of his guardsman through the manor until she heard the sound of fighting. If the orphans were doing battle then it had to be her brother that they were fighting. She ran ahead of the guards and Bertolf, despite him calling for her to stop, and entered a kitchen area to see quite a few orphans essentially dog-piled ontop of something. It was there that she heard the unmistakable voice of her brother, and Katerina was thrown into a frenzy.
She started to punch and kick at the orphans one by one in attempt to free her brother. As the children were shocked and a few already wounde dby Adalwulf her attempt proved successful. Adalwulf managed to shove one last orphan off of himself before he got to his feet, and Katerina stood beside him with her fists at the ready.
“ENOUGH!” A deep, booming voice rumbled. The twins and the orphans turned to see three fully armed and armored soldiers at the door way, a well dressed man before them. He looked to be in his late thirties and did not seem pleased. He had the orphans rounded up by his personal soldiers but, to Adalwulf's surprise, they did not come for him or his sister.
Instead the man introduced himself as Bertolf von Ebbenhart, the owner of the manor and head of his house. He told the twins that he planned to round up the orphans and send them to an orphanage at a town just outside of Lucerne. Had Katerina not made her way to him and forewarned him of the orphan's plot he would have done the same with them, but instead he gave them another offer: become official knights of Bern and serve House Ebbenhart.
It was a dream come true. The opportunity to live in a house once again. To not have to steal food and fight off gangs of orphans. Both Adalwulf and Katerina happily accepted, and their lives did soon change.
Though Bern did come to lose the war and the entire country suffered, Adalwulf and Katerina were too busy training Bertolf's guard captain. They both served as squires to the captain and were forced to study as well as train. They learned how to write and read, how to ride, and how to properly fight. Adalwulf took a shine to the axe as it complimented his growing stature quite nicely. While he did struggle a bit to swing one around at first, come the age of 16 he was quite the young force with an axe. Katerina preferred the blade and, while she was far from weak, preferred a speedy, fencing style of combat to Adalwulf's brute force.
Adalwulf and Katerina were nicknamed the Destroyer and the Duelist respectively by the knights under Ebbenhart's pay, though Adalwulf's nickname came from a tendency to break the shaft of his axe by accident. They proved to be big hits and had more potential than Ebbenhart could have possibly hoped. Adalwulf grew up to be “one of the men”, rowdy and high-spirited, but hot blooded. Katerina was more reserved and tactical, another valuable strength, but lacked the brute force and charisma of her brother.
At 16 the Rothenbergs were made knights official, and they became von Rothenbergs to show the upgrade in status.
When they were but 19 years old they were immediately put to the test. It was 1285 and Hargus had fallen: war was coming Bern. Or rather Bern was waging another desperate war. Ebbenhart himself was a patriotic man, once a lieutenant himself who was forced to resign when his brother died of sickness so that he could take control of their house. As such he sent some of his forces to aid Bern's invasion of Lycia, but kept the von Rothenberg twins at his home with him.
When the invasion was pushed back and Bern's enemies came to her borders Ebbenhart sent everything he had to aid the defense of Bern. When battle came to the Rothenbergs both Adalwulf and Katerina found themselves against a combinaton of Ilian and Sacaen forces. Katerina managed to isolate their commanders but she was unable to reach them, and Adalwulf was forced to stay near his sister and the rest of his forces as they were slowly overwhelmed. The twins fought hard and well, but they were both wounded and forced to retreat back to Ebbenhart Manor.
They returned with war wounds and bloody weapons, expecting to face criticism and punishment from von Ebbenhart. However he merely accepted their defeat and was grateful that they managed to bring back some of his soldiers alive. The two had learned from their defeat and strived harder to improve their abilities.
As the years went by Adalwulf and Katerina continued training with their peers and were forced into several more battles. Adalwulf would often lead a charge against an enemy while Katerina would flank with a smaller force or slower, forcing a duel with an enemy faction's leader and taking their head while Adalwulf broke their ranks. These enemies were commonly bandits, but once in a while they were small bands of rebel soldiers who had turned to banditry out of rage. This was before the organized rebellion really came to fruition.
The von Rothenberg twins, as of 1294, are both 28. Much had changed in that time. Bern's regency had fallen to Sasuke and eventually Ilia itself. However Ebbenhart did lend his money and soldiers to the causes of the rebellion. Adalwulf and Katerina expected to be put among the ranks of that force but instead they were kept back. Adalwulf was promoted to a position of leadership, along with Katerina, but the two shared a force to lead. Bertolf agreed that, while the two were an excellent pair to add to any army, they were at their strongest where their strengths could properly compliment each other's.
And so, while the two do not directly affect the rebellion, rest assured that they were for Bern. The pair are often sent to do smaller scale missions, such as taking out individual targets, retaking cities lost to bandits, and so on.
Class: Swordmaster
Age: 28
Born in: Bern
Appearance:
{Spoiler}
Katerina is on the taller side for a woman, standing at 5'10 and has an atheletic build while still keeping feminine curves. Katerina prefers to keep her hair shorter, shorter than her brother's in fact, but has died a few streaks at the front magenta, which matches her usual lipstick. Her natural hair colour is black and her eyes are blue.
Unlike her brother she tends to dress in brighter colours and wears far less armour. Typically she wears a white top with golden trim and golden armguards to match. Her boots are black, her slacks are a navy blue. Katerina even has a cape to match her brother's, though hers is white and in much better condition. Aside from that Katerina owns a few dresses and more casual outfits.
Personality: Katerina or “Kat” as her brother calls her is, above all else, quite self-confident. It borders on arrogance, but she makes a point not to be mean about it. Rather than put others down and make them feel beneath her she shines on her own, and would honestly raise people to her level. This confidence and security in her own skin is such that she has very little shame and modesty, and is quite hard to embarass. The faults that she is aware of she owns and admits to, and constantly strives to further improve herself.
Katerina has a firm personality but lacks the stubborness of her twin. She is very adaptable to situations and has a sharp mind for tactics and strategy. Katerina sees battle as a form of art but also as a survival skill, and dedicates her all to any fight and every strategy. Though sociable and respected among her peers she lacks the raw charisma and heated energy of her brother, and thus she leaves most of the actual leading to him. However Katerina has be similar to the more successful bandit leaders, having a crude and cruel effectiveness to her strategies that stems from her childhood.
Katerina is not too flirty but acknowledges that she's considered quite the beauty. She is very quick to decide on whether or not she likes a suitor, and if she does then she will flirt back. However it is hard to recover from a bad first impression if you aim to be a suitor of any kind, but she might forgive you to become a friend.
Katerina cares for her twin brother, Adalwulf, to extreme lengths. While she does respect his skills and ability she worries about his reckless style and chastises him on it from time to time, much to his chagrin. They make an excellent pair on the field and off, having adapted to each other's styles and personalites from an early age. Katerina admires Adalwulf's raw strength and courage, and his determination and ability to rouse their soldiers. She loves him dearly, more than anything in the world.
Depsite her ruthless tactical mind and efficient fencing style of combat, Katerina does have an empathetic heart and struggles with ignoring the plights of others. Though she believes people need to be able to help themselves Katerina has been seen, on more than one ocassion, to stop and give a homeless person a gold coin, or even stop to aid everyday citizens with whatever issue they may be going through. She sees it as a way to repay for some of her actions as a child.
Story: Adalwulf von Rothenberg and Katerina von Rothenberg were born twins to Bernese farmers Dietrich and Agnes Rothenberg in the year 1266. Their life was very simple for the first ten years of it. The Rothenberg twins were both playful and competitive, but they were also dedicated to their parents work and started to pull their own weight at a young age. Even at the age of 10 Adalwulf was shaping up to look like a strapping young lad, tall and broad for his age even then. That still didn't stop Katerina from competing with him however she could, and their parents admired their spirit.
In the year 1276, Bernese soldiers rebelled against the crown. The result was a war that involved foreign Ilians and other mercenaries facing the former armies of the crown. Many battles were fought within Bern...and the Rothenber farm was not spared.
The battle came without a warning, but when it did the Rothernbergs did their best to flee. They took nothing but the clothes on their backs and some gold to line their pockets, but they barely made it off the farm before a stray arrow found it's way into their mothers throat. Adalwulf and Katerina barely had time to scream before their father met a similar fate, several burning arrows digging into his body. Neither parent died immediately and the twins watched in horror as their parents struggled and twitched on the ground.
The fields around them started to catch fire from the burning arrows, so Adalwulf and Katerina had no choice to but to flee without their parents. When Katerina's legs eventually tired Adalwulf picked her up and carried her, even though he himself was exhausted. They ran and walked for hours before the flames became a faint orange glow in the distance, and they found themselves in a village.
Ordinarily orphaned children warranted some pity and mercy, but the times were just too dark for the fearful populace of Bern. Though the twins pleaded and begged to people that had no doubt eaten food harvested from their farms, not a soul took them into their homes. The twins were forced to endure the elements and survive from whatever scraps they could find. They were hungry, scared, grief stricken and tired. Often the twins would snap on each other and just as often they would come to blows, overwhelmed by their emotions. But each time they would separate for a few hours before regrouping with tears in their eyes.
This cycle continued for at least a week before young Katerina decided they needed to steal to survive. Adalwulf wanted to be opposed to the idea, but his hunger pangs said otherwise. The village they had been drifting through had little in the way of a town guard. It was mostly a militia that consisted of the elderly who could still fight or the young who did not yet know how to. They had no training and poor weaponry.
Adalwulf himself, while still child and spry, was large for his age and drew more attention. So it was decided that Katerina would do the actual thieving and Adalwulf would cover for his sister. Their first attempt was a success, and the twins slowly began to improve their methods. Adalwulf would cause distractions to help Katerina steal larger portions. At first the distractions were direct, such as shouting out in the middle of the street and hurling a stone at a nearby citizen, but soon he found ways to create indirect distractions, such as sabatoging a cart in the night so it would collapse during the day.
The Rothenberg twins were successful enough to survive for another month. Whenever Katerina was caught Adalwulf would fly in as a whirlwind of punches, kicks, scratches, and bites to keep any threats off of his sister. Larger than other children his age, he had little trouble with the younger citizens, and his crazed ambushses were enough to startle the older citizens. He eventually became decent at fighting with his fists and would take large sticks as weapons as well.
However the village was small and word did spread. It wasn't long before the angry citizens tracked down the twins, who had been living behind houses and relocating every night, and chased them out of the village's borders. Once again the Rothenbergs were left alone...but they were smarter this time. They could survive so long as they were among others, and as they grew older more opportunities would open up to them. Until then the twins traveled from village to village. Katerina demanded that Adalwulf fight her once a day, so she could learn to hold her own and not be dependant on his rescue if she slipped up. The two would battle with their fists and feet, and ocassionally train with sticks.
Living through thievery for two years the now twelve year old twins came across the first major city they had ever seen: Lucerne. Unlike the villages and towns from before Lucerne had a proper trained and armed town guard. It would be very difficult to live in the city simply by stealing, just the two of them. But the twins did their best regardless and were successful for a time, long enough to draw the attentions of other orphans.
Many children of Bern had lost their parents and families in the recent years and many had taken to the heavily populated trade city, one of the last major sources of income in Bern, and even then it had been slipping. These children, at first, wanted Adalwulf and Katerina to join their ranks in the slums and steal from the merchants and traders together. Adalwulf was rather taken by them and wasn't opposed to joining but Katerina had her reservations. She told her twin brother that these children would not watch their backs as well as the two of them alone did. Adalwulf hadn't considered this but did find it reasonable, and so he declined.
The children then changed their tune. When the Rothenbergs turned their proposal down the children warned them to stay out of Lucerne then. They didn't want “competition” in the city and weren't opposed to using force. However the Rothenbergs weren't a pair to back down. They had survived alone all this time and they were not about to be shooed off by a pack of children.
Thus begin a series of skirmishes. At first Adalwulf and Katerina stayed rather passive and continued doing what they needed to do to eat at least one meal every couple of days, but it wasn't long before they found their areas under heavier guard. Someone had tipped off the residents that they were being robbed, and Katerina put the pieces together rather swiftly that it had been those children. Adalwulf proposed they strike back and together they came up with a plan.
The pair tried to observe the behaviors of these children in secret. They used their typical strategy of having Katerina spy while Adalwulf went about in broad daylight to draw attention. The female twin soon overheard talks of a “heist”. Apparently the orphans had gotten downright cocky and were planning on tackling a noble in the area, an ex-knight known as Bertolf von Ebbenhart.
What a perfect plan to sabatoge.
The now thirteen year old twins started to make plans of their own. They found out the location of Ebbenhart's manor and kept doing some spy work to learn what they could about the rival orphans' plans. Katerina discovered that Bertolf had lost some men, who had left to join up with Hargus' forces. As such his personal forces were not what they once were, hence why the orphans figured they could rob his manor.
Then, finally, they found out what night the orphans planned to pull this heist.
Katerina proposed they simply tell Bertolf the plans of the orphans as the ultimate form of sabatoge, but Adalwulf thought the noble might be hard to reach and warn. He also questioned whether the noble would believe them, though part of him simply wanted knock a few heads as vengeance. So the two agreed to try two different approaches: Katerina would go the noble, while Adalwulf would attack the orphans mid heist.
The night of the heist the twins made certain to get to the manor early. Adalwulf kept watch for the orphans while Katerina made her attempt to sneak into the manor. Through careful movements and silent steps Katerina managed to make her way through the halls of the manor and eventually found the room of it's master.
When she opened the door she was surprised to see Bertolf awake. He was seated at a desk by his bed and was reading a letter by candlelight. The man turned his head and blinked, shocked that this girl had actually made it to his room without alarming a single guard. Katerina told Bertolf the plot of the orphans and that her brother was going to attempt to stop them. If anything Ebbenhart seemed amused by this, and when a guard came running to his room with news of intruders, he quickly realized that it had to be true.
Katerina followed the man and a few of his guardsman through the manor until she heard the sound of fighting. If the orphans were doing battle then it had to be her brother that they were fighting. She ran ahead of the guards and Bertolf, despite him calling for her to stop, and entered a kitchen area to see quite a few orphans essentially dog-piled ontop of something. It was there that she heard the unmistakable voice of her brother, and Katerina was thrown into a frenzy.
She started to punch and kick at the orphans one by one in attempt to free her brother. As the children were shocked and a few already wounde dby Adalwulf her attempt proved successful. Adalwulf managed to shove one last orphan off of himself before he got to his feet, and Katerina stood beside him with her fists at the ready.
“ENOUGH!” A deep, booming voice rumbled. The twins and the orphans turned to see three fully armed and armored soldiers at the door way, a well dressed man before them. He looked to be in his late thirties and did not seem pleased. He had the orphans rounded up by his personal soldiers but, to Adalwulf's surprise, they did not come for him or his sister.
Instead the man introduced himself as Bertolf von Ebbenhart, the owner of the manor and head of his house. He told the twins that he planned to round up the orphans and send them to an orphanage at a town just outside of Lucerne. Had Katerina not made her way to him and forewarned him of the orphan's plot he would have done the same with them, but instead he gave them another offer: become official knights of Bern and serve House Ebbenhart.
It was a dream come true. The opportunity to live in a house once again. To not have to steal food and fight off gangs of orphans. Both Adalwulf and Katerina happily accepted, and their lives did soon change.
Though Bern did come to lose the war and the entire country suffered, Adalwulf and Katerina were too busy training Bertolf's guard captain. They both served as squires to the captain and were forced to study as well as train. They learned how to write and read, how to ride, and how to properly fight. Adalwulf took a shine to the axe as it complimented his growing stature quite nicely. While he did struggle a bit to swing one around at first, come the age of 16 he was quite the young force with an axe. Katerina preferred the blade and, while she was far from weak, preferred a speedy, fencing style of combat to Adalwulf's brute force.
Adalwulf and Katerina were nicknamed the Destroyer and the Duelist respectively by the knights under Ebbenhart's pay, though Adalwulf's nickname came from a tendency to break the shaft of his axe by accident. They proved to be big hits and had more potential than Ebbenhart could have possibly hoped. Adalwulf grew up to be “one of the men”, rowdy and high-spirited, but hot blooded. Katerina was more reserved and tactical, another valuable strength, but lacked the brute force and charisma of her brother.
At 16 the Rothenbergs were made knights official, and they became von Rothenbergs to show the upgrade in status.
When they were but 19 years old they were immediately put to the test. It was 1285 and Hargus had fallen: war was coming Bern. Or rather Bern was waging another desperate war. Ebbenhart himself was a patriotic man, once a lieutenant himself who was forced to resign when his brother died of sickness so that he could take control of their house. As such he sent some of his forces to aid Bern's invasion of Lycia, but kept the von Rothenberg twins at his home with him.
When the invasion was pushed back and Bern's enemies came to her borders Ebbenhart sent everything he had to aid the defense of Bern. When battle came to the Rothenbergs both Adalwulf and Katerina found themselves against a combinaton of Ilian and Sacaen forces. Katerina managed to isolate their commanders but she was unable to reach them, and Adalwulf was forced to stay near his sister and the rest of his forces as they were slowly overwhelmed. The twins fought hard and well, but they were both wounded and forced to retreat back to Ebbenhart Manor.
They returned with war wounds and bloody weapons, expecting to face criticism and punishment from von Ebbenhart. However he merely accepted their defeat and was grateful that they managed to bring back some of his soldiers alive. The two had learned from their defeat and strived harder to improve their abilities.
As the years went by Adalwulf and Katerina continued training with their peers and were forced into several more battles. Adalwulf would often lead a charge against an enemy while Katerina would flank with a smaller force or slower, forcing a duel with an enemy faction's leader and taking their head while Adalwulf broke their ranks. These enemies were commonly bandits, but once in a while they were small bands of rebel soldiers who had turned to banditry out of rage. This was before the organized rebellion really came to fruition.
The von Rothenberg twins, as of 1294, are both 28. Much had changed in that time. Bern's regency had fallen to Sasuke and eventually Ilia itself. However Ebbenhart did lend his money and soldiers to the causes of the rebellion. Adalwulf and Katerina expected to be put among the ranks of that force but instead they were kept back. Adalwulf was promoted to a position of leadership, along with Katerina, but the two shared a force to lead. Bertolf agreed that, while the two were an excellent pair to add to any army, they were at their strongest where their strengths could properly compliment each other's.
And so, while the two do not directly affect the rebellion, rest assured that they were for Bern. The pair are often sent to do smaller scale missions, such as taking out individual targets, retaking cities lost to bandits, and so on.
