Risto

General Information

Names: Risto, Spit

Pronouns: they/them

Gender:

Race: Shadow Puppet, subspecies of Doll

Group: Kent State Solaris

Event Attendance

• Gathering of the Clans 2024-2026
• Armageddon 2024-2026
• Oktoberfest 2024-2025
• Eclipse 2025

Titles and Achievements

• Former Head Herald of Solaris (May 2025-May 2026)
• Current President of Solaris
• Uno from Hell Champion of Oktoberfest (2025)
• Uno from Hell Champion of Gathering of the Clans (2026)
• Bardic Champion of Gathering of the Clans (2026)
• Keeper of the Forest of the Faraway (2024-present)
• “Monarch of Misdirection” Assassin’s Tournament Mark Winner Armageddon (2026)
• Wrangler of the Roaming Revelers (2025-present)

Lore and Event History

The Forest of the Faraway

Risto was the only one who truly lived in the Forest of the Faraway, and Orphie was the only thing that would remain when said Forest could not stay.

The shrubs and shrugs and faces fierce are all but clothes that help to pierce the stillness of water and the silence of shams or shames of those who dodge the blame. And many shrug or force the fight while others just refuse to fight and lie or cry simply deny that they are in charge of changing their lives. The Keeper lived here to herd the ones whose souls were left unheard, unsung. Or unabashed, unable, unabsolved and unactive, unaffected, and frankly uninvolved.

Risto knew only of fog and strangers, only of mist and missed one’s angers. But the dangers?

A loneliness.

A loneliness in these woods whose species of trees had always shifted to meet the lands they oversee. But the mist was all the same. The sorry scouts or wistful warriors could barely keep their minds, much less the company of the Keeper in the Forest of the Faraway. It is not easy for wanderers to perceive the Keeper as their thoughts are fated to be occupied by other matters. It is a necessary process, and the Keeper cannot concern themselves with their longing for companionship when they are needed here to guide those who lie to their own souls. Besides, Risto had Orphie, and the doll had some of a mind of its own that knew how to make sure that Risto wasn’t completely alone. If Risto had Orphie to be their friend, then the souls of the fog would have the Keeper so that their journeys would end. And beginning of the end of who you can't stand being any longer is a challenging trial indeed:

To be pulled away from all you know to face your fears as though they’re foes, but then just when your hope all goes

You are placed where you are needed.

Whether that be your family home

Or new lands that you're forced to roam

Or by yourself

All alone

To pass through this forest, one must be in the wrong place at the right time. Any grouping of trees would do, as long as they were covered in a thick white haze of what you think your life ought to be like. Also known as the fog of war, the fog of love, of hopes, of clues, of visions untrue relating to you.

To be born in this forest, one must be wrong. At least, that’s what Risto thought. Risto also thought that they needed to change their face and body and voice and mannerisms upon meeting each wandering stranger. Of course, that made it easier for Risto to be perceived. For the Keeper had to become important enough to these souls to be seen, and they knew how to watch the stories the forest told and paid heed. The Keeper learned to fit into these stories in order to guide the souls towards their truths. Most of the time.

It gets boring helping every soul, it gets boring to write in the third person as though I, Risto, was not here. It is also boring when I have to watch soul after soul complete their trials just to walk through the fog and appear moments later, with years of baggage to process. That’s when I realized that time wasn’t linear, and that the space which the mist occupied was its vessel.

One time I tried to throw a woman through the mist back into her world when she was taking too long realizing that she was in love with her best friend. I was hoping to see her disappear and return moments later with a story that ended differently. She broke her leg, or more accurately, I did and it wasn’t on even on purpose. Normally people don't hit the ground that hard. By the time it healed, she talked with her story enough to realize that she needed to “work on herself”. Whatever that means. The mist let her through either way and I never saw her again.

Which really made me wonder about the rules of the fog, if it had any.

Then, I tried to throw Orphie through the fog. Multiple times. I figured it was as bored as I was and it’s not like the fog was letting me through any time soon. Or maybe I was bored and wanted to see what would happen to it. Nothing would change when we were the only ones in the fog, but when a soul or two was facing the stories they wrote, the doll started to glow. I wasn’t too sure how it was happening, but I was sure that Orphie was taking a part of their stories every time I threw it against the mist. It didn’t need to talk to me to show the parts of personalities it was taking on, and it especially didn’t need to speak to scold me about making the trees taller for a hobbit who had a story about being afraid of heights.

I think that Orphie needed to figure out who or what or why it was. And I think that I needed Orphie to remind me who and what I wasn’t, and why.

One day, Risto was still bored. A man in red and way too much plate armor stumbled through. He spent the beginning of his reckoning with his story continuing to fight. He would then turn around and realize he was all alone, covered in the blood of his enemies and none of his own. He then made a campfire which I fed while he slept and rambled about a “plague”, a “laughing tyrant”, and his home “on fire” while repeating that it was a bad omen. When I stopped coughing from the smoke and laughing at how he slurred his words, I remembered to stop adding wood to the fire because he was burning up. This happened to align with his nightmare ending and Orphie stared at me because apparently it was my fault he was having one to begin with.

He spent much of his time in the forest walking in circles and getting frustrated every time he walked past his camp. Whenever he gave up walking, he would practice telling a story to himself about a “small elven child” or muttering about someone’s “unimpeachable gravitas”. As he chronicled to himself, I learned much about him. Tertius Diomedes Lupus the Roman told stories about his battles, how he helped crush treason against Rome and how he earned the name “Lupus”. It’s nice to listen to the lost ones when they’re coherent.

Eventually, the fog decided he was needed again. Lupus finally learned how to walk in a straight line. As per usual, I threw Orphie to see if anything would happen to it. This time, the Keeper noticed that instead of bouncing towards Risto, the doll instead went through the fog, and returned covered in seawater. Risto quickly picked up Orphie and tried to run through the fog, hoping that this time would be different.

It was cold. It was never cold in the forest.

It was wet. It was never wet in the forest.

It wasn’t here anymore. Orphie had always been close by.

Risto realized that the doll was being ripped away from their hands as they waded through the mist, finally leaving its confines.  

Orphie could not pass through the fog with Risto.

Gathering of the Clans 2024

I was fucking drowning. Luckily I grabbed onto the spear in front of me and that Lupus guy didn’t even notice that he pulled me out of the water. I was wearing chainmail armor for some reason and there were more people than I had ever seen at once in this place that I would later know as the Northern Steppes.

I followed the Roman and found out that he knew how to survive out here with the war against the pirates. He didn’t even notice me until I put up the tent I stole near his.

Risto was elated. No one had ever noticed the Keeper in their true form before and their first impression caused an uproar. Apparently “clothes” were necessary for this “society” thing Risto often heard wanderers speak of.

Risto eventually got bored of following the Roman and wandered into the first forest they saw that was not covered in a haze. In this forest, they met Thalionorwen, a Ranger of Ithilien. She was tasked with finding goblyn ears in exchange for coin, so Risto joined her because they were very good at forests and differentiating leaves from goblyn ears. Thali was the first friend Risto made outside of the Forest of the Faraway.

Armageddon and Oktoberfest 2024

Since leaving the forest, everything has been a blur. I’ve found myself staying with Solaris just outside of the realm of Avalon. During Armageddon, Risto camped with the Roman’s new unit of the Extraordinarii and frequently visited the Rangers of Ithilien.

During this time, Risto realized that they could still change their form and learned of the race of changelings, which best correlated with whatever was going on with me. During the bardic competition, a watermelon was smashed and Risto became a frog upon consumption. At the end of Armageddon, Risto officially became a friend of the Rangers of Ithilien and camped with them during the celebrations of Oktoberfest.

After returning to Solaris, Risto was very delighted to see a friendly face, newly freed. Orphie had made it out of the Forest of the Faraway, and it recounted its experience as a Keeper of the Forest. Both Orphie and Risto would go on to help lead Solaris.

Gathering of the Clans, Armageddon, Oktoberfest 2025

Risto developed their chainmail skills, and learned to trade under some members of the Rangers of Ithilien at GOTC. Soon enough, Risto had established a space for themselves at the barbarian trading post. Risto met many travelers during the year of trading and celebrations, but soon realized that they had some lingering effects of the fog from the Forest of the Faraway and forgot many people they met.

At Armageddon, Risto adapted their performative skills developed in their time guiding souls in the Forest and joined the Lyres’ Guild. The now bardically inclined Risto was excited to sing with their new friends in the guild from camp to camp as the “Roaming Revelers”, but noticed that a haze was beginning to set upon the forest around them.

I didn’t want to go back. I had made it out, Orphie had made it out. I was afraid and my breathing became shallow. I tried to stop the group as their leader led them into the mist that they were blind to. I realized that if I did not follow them, they may become lost for years or more in the Forest of the Faraway.

It is hard to steady your breathing when you are running from a past that is right in front of you. New friends disappearing one by one, into the mist, into their troubles, never to return unless called upon by this world.

Plunging myself into the fog, I realize that the air is not as heavy as I thought it might be. As my breathing finally returned to normal rhythm, the rhythm of the music around me began to swell. The sound sliced through the fog, carving a pathway for the revelers to roam. Some people struggled to keep up and I noticed our numbers slowly dwindling into the white haze. There was something about the music, about the sense of belonging and the creation of a shared moment of purpose that seemed to fight against my captor. I sang the Wellerman, barely even knowing the words, searching for the members of my guild, swirling my head to look through the miasma, linking arms with those I found, and danced them back to the group.

At Oktoberfest, the Roaming Revelers again took up their instruments and voices to create pockets of space and time untouched by the mist. This is where I needed to be. I will always be a Keeper of the Forest of the Faraway, but I now don the title of the Wrangler of the Roaming Revelers.

Eclipse 2025

Entry #1

Perhaps I got too comfortable. Between my bouts of sparring and drunken stupor, I lost my name and have no replacement.

Entry #2

The fae who I gave my name to agreed to give it back upon seeing my chain artistry. I will be making a necklace as soon as I am sober.

Entry #3

That Roman? Yeah, he’s Squire Roman now. Squire Tertius Diomedes Lupus under Sir Rint of Redania of the Order of the Grey Goose. I should stop drinking at some point.

Entry #4

The Keeper or the Wrangler, whatever you want to call me that isn’t “Risto”, is incredibly proud to announce that they stole the name of someone at the bardic competition and gave it to the entire crowd.

Entry #5

Risto is so back.

Risto's Stories of Lives Lived, Observed, Imitated, or Stolen

Nothing is in the Forest

Through the fog, betwixt the mist

Senseless slog, a heartbeat skipped

Time will rage and quake and break

Nothing will rise and fall and take

Nothing knows secrets left untold

Nothing hears sounds buried in souls

Nothing is not a woman or man

Nothing can stop what never began

Nothing can hurt the stones eroded

Nothing can splash the water frozen

Nothing can chain the crying song

Nothing can fight through mist and fog

Nothing can tear

And Nothing can spare

Nothing can preach

And Nothing can scare

Nothing will puppet you with ease

Until your hearts and minds do please

I am Risto, Nothing for you to worry about.