Rarity: ★
47歳。ロスガル族。
ボズヤ・レジスタンスの一員。「新生グンヒルドの剣」のひとり。
Race: Hrothgar
Age: 47
Birthplace: Bozja (unverified)
その出自は不明。ボズヤ人と思われるがゼヴェンの過去を知る者はひとりもいない。本人も好んで過去を語ることはないが、わずかに知り得た情報によると、曰く、魔術を極めるために各地を放浪していたらしい。南はサベネア、東はひんがしの国、北はガレマール帝国の帝都ガレマルドまで足を伸ばしたことがあるようだ。
魔術を志したきっかけはエオルゼアの地を訪れた時のことだ。不治の病に冒された母を助けようと父と二人でグリダニアを目指し旅していた。だが、残念ながら治癒法を見つけることは出来ず、母は旅の途中で亡くなった。その病はガレマール帝国によるボズヤ侵攻が原因であり、母を失った哀しみは幼心に帝国に対する憎悪と復讐心を芽生えさせるには十分だった。
旅の途中、様々な魔術を目にしたゼヴェンはその知識をボズヤに持ち帰ろうと考えた。独学で身につけたその魔術をボズヤ解放に役立てようというのだ。
各地で学んだ魔術はゼヴェン独自の魔術体系としてひとつの学問になり得ていたが、ゼヴェンはそれを他者に教示しようとはしなかった。なぜなら、それは破壊を主とした魔術であり、利用者の目的次第ではただの「災い」となるからである。
気がつけばゼヴェンは唯一無二の魔術士として、兵士から畏怖の念を抱かれ、軍神として崇められる存在となっていた。
ゼヴェンは戦場での死を恐れていなかった。むしろ死を望んでいた。それはかつてダルマスカの大迷宮を訪れた際、遭遇した異国の怪しげな魔道士にされた予言である。異国の言葉を聞き取ることは出来なかったが、その意味を理解することはできた。いつかボズヤで解放の狼煙が上がるときこそ、ゼヴェンの死が訪れる時であると。今、この南方ボズヤ戦線がその死地ではないのか。だとしたら、自分はその死を恐れずに、ただ、ただ一振りの剣として、新生グンヒルドの剣として戦い死ねばよい。ゼヴェンは死を恐れてはないのだ。
そんなゼヴェンに対する予言が成就しようとしていた……。
Xeven is a member of Gunnhildr's Blades, and assumed to be a native of Bozja...though none claim to know this for certain. Notoriously reticent, the little he has divulged of his past suggests his road led through many lands─Thavnair to the south, Hingashi to the east, even the imperial capital of Garlemald to the north─in his quest to master the arts of the arcane.
His obsession with magery began with a journey to Eorzea. He had traveled with his father to Gridania, desperate to find a cure to the wasting disease which afflicted his mother. Their efforts, however, were to be in vain─the illness took her life even as they sought the means to her salvation. Knowing only that his mother's ailment began with the Empire's occupation of Bozja, the young Xeven's grief soon grew into a wrathful hunger for vengeance against those he held responsible for her passing.
He considered the magecraft he had witnessed in his travels, and swore to take that knowledge back with him to Bozja. He would make his own study of the world's magicks, and bring those powers to bear against the imperial invaders.
Yet although Xeven succeeded in creating a unique school of spellweaving, he refrained from sharing this expertise with others. He simply could not risk his wisdom─focused as it was on dealing destruction─becoming the catalyst for misery in the hands of an unscrupulous practitioner.
Xeven himself soon became a peerless mage, his presence on the battlefield akin to a vengeful god, inspiring awe and terror in equal measure. He does not fear death. He tempts it─welcomes it, even. Such fatalism stems from a prophecy pronounced upon him by a seer of unknown origin, whom he chanced across in the ruined halls of Dalmasca. Though the words spoken were foreign to his ear, Xeven was nevertheless able to divine their meaning: when the fires of revolution stained the skies of Bozja, his doom would be at hand.
And now that the southern front is consumed by turmoil, he believes it is there that his grave awaits. He will not seek to avoid this fate, but carve a red trail through his foes as a proud blade of Gunnhildr, until such time as his inevitable demise rises up to claim him. He does not fear death.
With every moment that passes, the prophecy edges ever closer to fulfillment.