Zivia Severa Vizori

"When you've done it all, sometimes the only feasible option is to start over and do it all again." ~Zivia Severa Vizori~

Zivia Severa Vizori is a powerful Jalenga sorceress who was directly and indirectly responsible for a great deal of the events that transpired in the 181st Age. She is a major character in the The Crest of Zabutur series, playing important roles in all 10 volumes.

While she sometimes muses about her losses in private, she is generally cool and level-headed despite being the last living member of her race. Her age is timeless, and her abilities as a Jalenga mean her tales are nigh endless.

Early Life
Zivia first came about in the early throes of the 170th Age. Like all Jalenga, she lived an immensely long time, even "reincarnating" several times over the lengthy course of her life. She gradually rose through the enigmatic ranks of Jalenga society before marrying prince Ajun Vizori on Žaníma in the 1496th year of the 175th Age. Sometime between this event and her birth, she created a powerful artifact that later became known as her crown, even when she was not royalty.

The rest of Zivia's early life was spent the way most Jalenga spend their days: wandering the world or playing with its reality like strings on a puppet. Like many Jalenga, she was a prominent agent in the creation of hundreds of different Kumenza, and had such a prominent role in Kumenza lifestyle that she was revered as one of their highest creators even during her years as a princess.

Ascension to the Throne
In the early 181st Age, Ajun became king over the Jalenga people, which in turn made Zivia queen. It was more a representative title rather than absolute rulership, but from the highest pinnacle of Pikas-Jorgomna, even she began to realize the inherent superiority of the Jalenga compared to the other races. Only the Kumenza seemed anywhere close to what the Jalenga wished to realize, and even Zivia became more and more aware of what her people were starting to think.

War and Fall of the Jalenga
Late in the 181st Age, Zivia's husband Ajun waged a war against the rest of Mencu in a quest for dominance and superiority. He was slain almost comically early on in the battle, but the people rallied behind Zivia, who in turn continued the conflict. This became known as the Great Jalenga War, and ultimately led to the demise of her people. She halted the war and eventually was among the few Jalenga that tried to make amends, but shortly after this her people retreated northward to Sayenzi before disappearing entirely and suddenly. Zivia was the only survivor, and she was first seen on Mencu again in the form of her crown, where she had apparently laid dormant for nearly 5000 years. As such, she missed the entirety of the 182nd Age, meaning the last time she ever saw any of her people alive had been over 47 centuries ago.

182nd Age & Modern Times
Zivia "awoke" from her crown form in the 4587th year of the 182nd Age, reappearing in a world that had mostly long-forgotten her and her people. The first people she met were the Zukuren princess Leto Irizari and the Serenghe mercenary Zak Dreggite. Together, the three of them formed a little band of their own, and set off into the world to leave an impact. While she remains an amiable individual in the current day, her past harbours a great deal of violent and sociopathic behaviour during the war, which she has not told anyone still alive today.

Appearance
The Jalenga are shapeshifters whose abilities far exceed even the ancestral Vartiz, and Zivia is no exception. As such, the number of different shapes or forms she can take are virtually endless. However, there are several common forms that Zivia elects to take, and as such, she is recognized the most in said forms.

Physical Appearance
While Jalenga trends come and go, both for the color of one's body and appearance, Zivia retains much of her original Jalengan appearance, including the brown skin, pointed ears, thick curly black hair, and bright colored eyes. She is fairly consistent with this humanoid form she elects to take on, even down to her height and weight. This normal appearance of hers is an athletic build standing at 5'6" and weighing in at 141 pounds. She wears her black hair long as all Jalenga do, with her curly strands descending to just below her breasts. Like many Jalenga as of the 181st Age, she chooses to have dark skin, and her eyes are a brilliant shade of turquoise.

While she sometimes alters the density or form of her body, Zivia has considerable strength. Her transformative abilities make it ridiculously easy for her to stay in shape and good health, to the point where many of her friends jokingly (albeit truthfully) consider it an unfair advantage.Because these transformative abilities can also halt or even reverse aging, Zivia likes to appear as a woman in her physical prime. While most of her body is free of adornments, she has ornate green tattoos across her arms, and wears a few small piercings on her upper ears, with large, golden-hoop earrings in both of her lobes.

Clothing
Before their extermination, the Jalenga were known for their exotic colors and styles of clothing, a series of fashion statements that were tragically lost after their extermination. Zivia, however, retains this trend, and as such tends to wear an exotic and slightly unusual array of attire. Her most common outfit consists of loose black pants worn beneath an asymmetrical magenta dress, with a loose flowing long sleeve on the left and a shorter one that leaves the elbow exposed on the right.

A much smaller and more ornate blue dress is worn atop this dress, decorated by strings of jewels or stones, as well as a red-colored corset. While it appears tight-fitting, Zivia merely altered her form to make it fit snugly around her waist without it being constricting. She wears a thick golden bracelet on her left wrist, while her right forearm and hand are covered by a black, fingerless gauntlet. An ornate headband is worn over her forehead, and through all of this, she keeps her feet bare. While in most cultures the symmetry of one's outfit might be seen as unusual, the Jalenga had turned this symmetrical style of clothing into an art--one that Zivia wishes to keep alive.

Personality
Despite her attempt at conquering the world, Zivia is actually a very mellow and easy-going woman these days. After the realization of what she had done to her people had hit her, she wished to live in this world to make amends, and so has taken on a much more righteous outlook on life. Despite that, she still tends towards the chaotic and the reality-altering, in tune with her nature as a Jalenga.

Virtues
Zivia is a very calm and collected individual whose lax personality and easy-going attitude attract a great deal of positive company. Her personality in this regard is nearly identical to that of Zak Dreggite, and thus it is unsurprising that the two are very good friends. She is a very straightforward woman who owns up to her mistakes and generally apologizes for them. A few, however, are things she knows she will likely end up doing again, although if she feels like one of those actions is likely to resurface, she at least retains the decency to properly warn those it might affect.

Vices
While Zivia is considered by many people to be virtuous, she is not without her vices. One of these is her adherence to some of her old ways back in the days of the war. Even when she apologizes, there are some incidents that she warns are likely to happen again. Her warfaring mindset is also what helps convince Zukuren princess Leto to start a war against the rest of her family, which thus leads to the Elven Civil War. However, Leto's motives for wanting the war were far beyond Zivia merely speaking to her; Zivia's words were little more than the "final push" in that regard.

Like most Jalenga, Zivia is also rather arrogant and has little regard for rules or customs that she feels might hold her back. This has also led to some type of reckless behaviour and little regard for her own safety, which often endangers her and occasionally those around her. Ultimately, Zivia remains fairly traditional to the old Jalenga ways, for better or for worse. Considering that the Kumenza of Shahar-Eka revere her for her status as one of the creators of the Kumenza, she finds it hard to change when so many people approve of her actions.

While she has turned over a new leaf in the 182nd Age, Zivia was particularly ruthless and sociopathic during the Jalenga war, and to this day still looks up to warlords like Izuka, Aldrich, Zulera, or Leto, as well as dangerous warriors or assassins such as Akhet, Valente, Eka-Katara, or Candie, admiring them for their relentless ambition and drive to succeed. While she does not actively support any of their efforts, she respects them highly, and so her own morality is often called into question.

Beliefs and Morality
Zivia firmly believes that most morality is purely subjective, although does not hold the "master race" theory that her husband Ajun once did. She looks upon Serenza as equals, viewing even the gods in a similar light. She does not worship any of them, and still firmly believes that something went wrong when her people infiltrated the throne of the gods and were destroyed. She would absolutely have no qualms with attempting this again were she given a chance, but with her as the only surviving Jalenga on Mencu, this seems highly unlikely.

Abilities
Zivia possesses a myraid of abilities as any Jalenga does, her most notable ones being her shapeshifting talents, which makes her more versatile than any of the Vartiz, whether ancestral or modern. Similarly, like other Jalenga, Zivia had the ability to reincarnate, and so she enjoys memories from some of her past lives over the previous ages.

Reincarnation
Like all Jalenga, Zivia is capable of reincarnating, where Jalenga no longer use their alchemical processes to slow or halt aging, and they allow themselves to pass away. From there, their soul is born anew, and they start another life in another place. As such, she has lived many different lives under many different names, with this incarnation, Zivia Severa Vizori, being her 14th such incarnation. Her last death, birth, and reincarnation were on the 25th day of the 3rd month, during the 576th year of the 170th Age.

Shapeshifting
Zivia's talents as a Jalenga give her access to shapeshifting abilities to rival those of the ancestral Vartiz. Instead of just animals and creatures, however, she also possesses the ability to transform into inanimate objects, which makes stealth a peculiarly easy trick for her to accomplish. One of her most well-known shapes was a crown, which she was in the form of for many years during her stasis, as well as on occasion while she accompanied Zak or Leto. She also takes the form of a powerful dragon on occasion, other times assuming elemental or primal forms not unlike those of the Kasil. Essentially, Zivia's transformative abilities have almost no limits, and coupled with her elemental prowess nearly on par with a Lakamaté, all of these factor into making her an extremely dangerous combatant.

Elemental Prowess
Having had millennia to hone her skills, Zivia is unsurprisingly a master of all six elements, which she wields with great power and finesse. However, like even the most formidable anima sensei, Zivia has an affinitive element as well, with hers being Water. While she is not a Lakamaté, her power remains formidable enough that she can hold her own against many of them even without transforming at all.

Relationships
Since the Jalenga disappeared over 4½ centuries ago, and that other races were not effectively immortal the way her and her people were, most people that Zivia knew and loved from before the Jalenga Wars are gone. As such, she has had for forge new frontiers and blaze new trails with who she meets and who she befriends. She currently is close friends with the Serenghe mercenary Zak Dreggite, as well as the renegade Zukuren princess, Leto Irizari.

Family
Zivia had a husband named Ajun Vizori who was with her at the "end of the world", as she called it. Together they had three children, all of whom perished with the other Jalenga. Zivia speaks little of them, although this seems to be less about privacy and more about certain wounds that never heal, even with time. She was the middle child of three, with both of her other siblings being brothers. The elder brother was named Veike, and the younger one named Alezan. She seemed more attached to these individuals than to her own husband and children, but she dismisses discussions about them on the basis that "they're all dead anyways, so what does it matter?" Much like the deaths of her husband and children, this seems a sensitive subject for her.

Friends
Much like her family, All of Zivia's friends were wiped out when the Jalenga disappeared, and those of other races that were not Jalenga passed on with age, and they did not reincarnate the way Jalenga did before their disappearance. Nowadays, however, she has begun to befriend many people, particularly Kumenza. She is particularly close friends with the Serenghe mercenary Zak Dreggite, who was also a middle child just as she was. Zivia also befriended the renegade princess Leto Irizari, although she also takes special interest in Leto's older sister Iona, both as a friend and accomplice, but also as a source of information. Zivia also seems to know "The Mavericks" rather well, as if they had met somewhere either by chance, or during one of her misadventures in a far-off depth of Mencu.

Enemies
Zivia's list of enemies is vague, because she is no longer as influential as she was in the 181st Age and other previous ones. Since she is not at the forefront of wars or political movements any more, her name rests in somewhat obscurity for many people at the moment. How long that lasts, however, remains to be seen.

Role in the Series
Apart from a Kumenza that gets made in her image, Zivia is the only Jalenga that appears in the entire The Crest of Zabutur series. However, she is a recurring character and one of only three that appears in every volume. As such, her role in the series as a whole is notable, even if most of her roles and appearances are as a supporting character rather than one of the main protagonists or antagonists.

The Crown of Zivia
Zivia is discovered on Mencu for the first time in a literal age in The Crown of Zivia, where she is found in the form of the titular artifact before being "awakened" by Leto Camilla Irizari, whom she joins and befriends, and later supports as a member of Leto's Rebellion.

The Crusade of Zulera
Zivia takes a minor role as a supporting member of California's party in The Crusade of Zulera, where she also helps deal with the Renkida Vampire Crisis. She also disappears now and again to return to Shahar-Eka and keeps in contact with Leto and Iona.

The Shadows of Shinzoka
Zivia plays a great deal of tricks on the sidelines during the events of The Shadows of Shinzoka. Since she attempts to help Isikiro cure herself of her vampirism, the two of them visit many Jalenga ruins, including the legendary Pikas-Jorgomna. She is also the one that reveals to Asami that the latter suffers from psychosis.

The Rebirth of Krippa
While she does not get directly involved, Zivia does appear at some point to console Liberty during the perilous times of the Siege of Shangda-Fei, being reminded of her own imperialistic days.

Trivia

 * Zivia's Reference Number (448) is the sum of the reference numbers of her two companions Leto (442) and Zak (006) from The Crown of Zivia.
 * Zivia has a Kumenza named Eka-Zivia, proving that Kumenzic Jalenga could in fact be created from the Rites of the Kumenza.
 * Zivia is one of a very few characters that has been to the Northern Lands. As a result, she has confirmed that these lands are where The Mavericks: Kada, Zoroka, and Aveline originated from.
 * Zivia is one of three characters that appears in every volume of the The Crest of Zabutur series.