Skjoldr Jórundsson (Hrimstrand)
Name Skjoldr Jórundsson (Hrimstrand)
Position Faculty Member
Second Position Resident
Character Information
| Codename | Iron-Pelt | |
| Gender | Male | |
| Species | Mutant | |
| Age | 26 | |
| Affiliations(s) |
Physical Appearance
| Height | 6' 3" | |
| Weight | 230 lbs | |
| Hair Color | Dark Brown | |
| Eye Color | Grey | |
| Physical Description | A broad-shouldered, heavily muscled islander with the build of a working smith—dense forearms, thick neck, and solid core. Skin is weathered by salt wind and cold; a few pale scars trace old rope-burns and training cuts. He wears a sleeveless Hrímjárn cuirass and backplate with gorget, fauld and tassets, greaves, and heavy runed bracers; his arms are otherwise bare for reach and clinch. Practical leathers and sealskin padding sit beneath the plates; boots are cut for ice footing. Short hair is kept neat. An eight-point Northstar rune—his “star mark”—rests over the sternum on the cuirass; when his Vardr stirs, faint runes along the plates kindle with cold light and a luminous “iron pelt” shimmers over the armour. |
Family
| Spouse | ||
| Children | ||
| Father | Jórund Hrimstrand | |
| Mother | Svala Hrimstrand | |
| Brother(s) | Leif Hrimstrand | |
| Sister(s) | Kára Hrimstrand | |
| Other Family | Island tribe (name withheld) — entire settlement absent without sign; “Bound Elsewhere” rune carved fresh on the clan stone at the time of disappearance. |
Personality & Traits
| General Overview | Skjoldr is a steadfast, honour-bound practicalist who measures life by work done and people protected. He’s quiet, plain-spoken, and slow to trust, but once earned his loyalty is rock-solid; warmth shows in deeds more than words, with a dry, understated humour. He values craft honesty, keeping oaths, and community first, instinctively stepping between danger and the vulnerable. Under pressure he grows calmer and more focused, stripping plans to essentials—protect, stabilise, evacuate—and others can reliably anchor around him. His strengths are reliability, grounded judgement, and a knack for finding the “hinge” of a problem; his blind spots are city discomfort, taking on guilt that isn’t his, underestimating guile, and absorbing more punishment than he should. After a crisis he seeks cold air and quiet to reset. Growth for him means delegating protection, adapting to modern systems, and learning to forgive what he couldn’t prevent. |
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| Mutant Power(s) | Vardr — Varðbjörn, Polar Bear Manifestation Skjoldr summons Varðbjörn, a semi-ethereal polar bear formed of psychic force. Within 25 metres, Varðbjörn acts independently on Skjoldr’s intent—flanking, pinning, shielding, or striking—and can shift from ghostly to fully tangible at will. Its blows land with real mass (Force-Maul) and it can envelop Skjoldr or an ally in Guard-Aspect, a luminous bulwark that soaks impact, heat, shrapnel, and pressure waves. Power scales with emotion (anger hardens it; grief makes it brittle) and it reads battlefield cues like a trained partner. Shared Pain Link Varobjorn’s pain echoes in Skjoldr as psi-strain mapped to the struck area (stabbing headache, rib-ache, limb burn). This doesn’t cause physical injury but it does tax focus and stamina; stacked impacts can overwhelm him even if the armour holds. Overbind (Burst Fusion) For short bursts, Skjoldr layers with Varðbjörn—gaining ursine reach, momentum, and shock absorption. Powerful but taxing; chained Overbinds trigger migraines, vertigo, and brief blackouts. Spirit Anchor & Armour Synergy Runes on the Hrímjárn cuirass and backplate let Varð anchor as a shimmering pelt across heart, ribs, and spine while leaving arms free for hammer work and clinch. Hammer impacts resonate through the anchored bear, producing brief shockwaves that stagger crowds and crack shield lines. Human-Side Mutation (Tank Traits) Life on the storm isles has left him physically enhanced—noticeably tough but not superhuman: Cold Resistance: Efficient thermogenesis and circulation; functions in freezing conditions with minimal kit (not immune to hypothermia). Increased Durability: Dense musculature and fascia; improved micro-fracture resistance—he bruises but keeps moving. Bones still break under extreme force. Impact Tolerance: Trained breath-bracing and shock absorption; rides tackles and blast-waves better than most. Stamina & Recovery: High anaerobic capacity and steady pain threshold; needs rest/food to sustain campaigns. Grip/Core Strength: Exceptional torsion for holds, shield-wall work, and weapon retention. Limits & Counters Leash: Beyond 25 metres the bear weakens and flickers. Focus: Concussive, sonic, or sensory overload can disrupt complex manoeuvres. Feedback: The bear’s damage returns as psi-strain (headache, disorientation, pain), not physical wounds. Range/Air Threats: Snipers, flyers, and precision telekinetics force him to guard or close distance. |
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| Profession(s) | Hunter/Protector • Fisherman/Seafarer • Salvager • Smith |
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| Strengths & Weaknesses | Strengths Skjoldr is steady, honour-bound and deeply reliable; people can set their watches by him. He leads by example, taking the hard, unglamorous jobs and keeping promises to the letter. Practical and unflappable, he breaks big problems into workable parts and keeps teams grounded when tempers rise. His work ethic is fierce—craft honesty, tidy kit, clear comms—and he’s quietly compassionate, measuring success by who is safer at the end. Loyal once earned, he’s resilient in spirit as well as body, slow to panic, quick to shoulder responsibility, and teachable without ego when shown a better way. Weaknesses The same gravity that makes him dependable can turn to stubbornness; he’s slow to pivot unless presented with plain, practical reasons. He over-shoulders blame, carrying failures that weren’t his, and will martyr himself rather than ask for help. Reserved by habit, he can read as distant, struggle with small talk, and fares poorly at politics, bluffing or bureaucratic dance. He’s literal and expects others to be the same, which leaves him open to manipulation by guile. City chaos frays his patience; he dislikes crowds and performance, and he can hesitate to delegate, trying to protect everyone at once until he’s stretched too thin. |
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| Ambitions | Find what became of his tribe and either bring them home or lay their absence to rest. Put his strength to work where it matters—rescue, rebuilding, and safeguarding a new community—while mastering his craft with Hrímjárn so their legacy endures. |
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| Hobbies & Interests | Skjoldr unwinds with hands-on, useful work: carving small fetishes and rune-markers, knotting ropes and mending nets, and tinkering at the forge with Hrímjárn fittings and tool upkeep. He takes cold-water dawn swims to clear his head, trains with practical carries and sled-drags, and keeps himself calm by doing quiet maintenance rounds—checking straps, edges, and stores (his and everyone else’s). He loves simple food done well—bread, stews, smoked fish—and happily cooks extra to share. Nights find him stargazing and tracing old charts, or trading sagas and local tales, adding new waypoints and proverbs to his mental map. |
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| Mutant Mastery | X-1 |
| Origin Story | Skjoldr was born on a storm-scoured island far north of ordinary sea routes, where his people lived by net, forge, and oath. Cut off from modern comforts, the tribe raised its own halls, mended its own boats, and learnt only what wind, sea, and season demanded. Their lives were communal and self-sustaining; tools were shared, labour rotated, and every winter was survived together. Among Skjoldr’s folk, each child comes into a Vardr—a spirit-animal—at puberty. It is an extension of the self: temperament given shape, purpose given claws. Skjoldr’s Vardr took the form of a polar bear he named Varðbjörn: ghost-pale, edged with cold light, able to pass through a doorway like mist and then strike with the weight of a falling tree when his focus hardened. From early hunts he learnt to move with it; man and bear working in tandem—one pinning, one striking—until the village shield-wall drill set them at the centre of every defence. His father, Jórund, was the tribe’s smith; his mother, Svala, kept the smokehouse and charts; his siblings Leif and Kára split their time between line-fishing and sail repair. Skjoldr followed Jórund into the forge because it was honourable—not glorious, but necessary. There he learnt the island’s secret alloy, Hrímjárn (“frost-iron”): a strange, star-grained metal their elders said came from glacier ore tempered with a fallen sky-stone. Hrímjárn held a keen edge without heavy weight and, when etched with old runes, answered a Vardr’s presence with a low, cold hum. From this metal, father and son shaped a compact war-hammer, Hreggbrot (“storm-break”), balanced for one hand but capable of cracking shields with two. They built Skjoldr’s armour as a sleeveless Hrímjárn cuirass and backplate with fauld and tassets—full coverage over chest, spine, and hips, his arms left free save for runed bracers. The design kept his swing fast and his grapple clean while still guarding the vitals; when summoned, Varðbjörn could anchor as a shining pelt across the plates. The winter it happened, meat was low and storms lingering. The hunt captain read the sky and went anyway. White came down like a curtain. The party roped themselves together until ice built on the lines and snapped them one by one. Skjoldr dug into a drift and wrapped Varðbjörn around him like a living windbreak, breathing slow, counting heartbeats, waiting the gale. When he fought home, the village was silent. Longhouses stood intact; hearths drowned cold; doors unbarred. Nets were coiled, tools shelved. There were no bodies, no tracks—only wind-scoured snow and the sense of a wave that had carried the people off without taking their things. For days he circled the island searching for signs. For weeks he kept the beacon fire, burning through the last of the pitch. An island can be survived alone, but it is meant to be lived together. Nets require hands; halls require voices. With no trail to follow and no kin to answer, Skjoldr took what a man could carry—Hreggbrot, his Hrímjárn cuirass and greaves, the runed bracers, dried fish, flint and steel, a roll of tools—and set his prow toward the wider world. He did not leave to chase glory. He left because the work of living had become too large for one back, and because somewhere, someone would know what takes a village without a trace. Until he finds that answer, he will lend his strength where it is needed—holding lines, hauling weight, and standing where things might otherwise break—with Varðbjörn at his side. |
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| Past Exploits | The Shield-Line Break (spring thaw): When raiders beached at dusk, Skjoldr set Varo to pin their lead shieldman and drove Hreggbrot through the hinge of the line, shattering it and forcing a retreat without a single villager lost. The Black-Ice Rescue (Year of the Long Gale): A fishing sledge went through sea-ice; Skjoldr lay flat, anchored the bear as a luminous pelt to spread weight, and hauled three crew out one by one while the ice groaned and spider-cracked beneath him. The Cliff-Path Dig (midsummer): A rockfall trapped children and elders on a goat path. He braced the slope with the bear, then hammered and cleared a crawlway, ferrying people out under the Guard-Aspect while loose scree kept sliding. The Storm Beacon Run (late winter): With visibility near zero, he and two others roped together to keep the headland fire burning for boats still at sea. He carried pitch kegs through the whiteout, shouldering the brunt of the gale so the others could keep the flame alive. |