Tianxia:Seppo Ilmarinen

Thus came hopeful Ilmarinen,  Mettle-bright and eyes all gleaming;  Sought to give the sky his handwork,  Lapped from heat and not from matter,  ''Map-inspired and full-purposed. ''

The Ilmarinen that this verse speaks of is not the Ilmarinen of now, for one would surely not meet a purposeful and inspired individual if they called upon his essence. On that note, Seppo Ilmarinen is a Baltic/Slavic/Finnic god of metal creation from a distant past - a past during which the expansive hierarchy of the Celestial Bureaucracy was a mere fraction of what it is now. He was far more active in this time period, and took commissions from a great variety of individuals. One of such commissions gave him great fame among Heaven - this was the "forging of the sky," an abstract notion that the sage Enlil employed him for. Of course, at present, Ilmarinen does not do very much other than check on his craftsmanship every once in a while. One may invoke his divine essence, though his duties have largely been taken up by his son, Garmē Āutrās.

Background


Personality
Ilmarinen is the quintessential caricature of an old man who has little left to do in the world. It would be truly rare to see him out and about, since he would much rather sit and tinker about with his knowledge of creation and topography. He is very much a shadow of his former self in terms of purpose, since other gods would seek him out frequently thousands of years ago and he was extraordinarily confident in his own deeds. Now that most of his old friends are either busy, long dead, or have gone on some endless journey to a different celestial plane, he has few personal connections left to turn to on a regular basis. Even his virility was lost to the ages, and he no longer seeks out romance. One may see all of this as odd, since he is quite capable of creating celestial wonders of metal with his skill and power as an old Dieva.

If one were to speak with Ilmarinen, they would find that he is certainly not your stereotypical "pleasant" grandfatherly figure. He complains quite a bit about the state of the new generation of divine spirits in Heaven, and generally laments the veil of falsehood that individuals put over themselves to get what they want. His dealings in the past with such tricksters (not to mention his son) are also what caused him to put little trust in anyone that he meets. He is extremely vocal about doubting those who cross his path, too, and he'll be quick to speak his mind about such things. Terrible things were done in his guise in the past, and he surely does not want to repeat those events. Imarinen's whining can be most bothersome, and to most, makes him an unpleasant individual to be around. Furthermore, if an unfamiliar person managed to look past these flaws and tried to coax him into doing something, Ilmarinen would stubbornly refuse to follow their coaxing. He is stubborn enough to not get involved in ruinous affairs, and if a sufficiently familiar face does cross his path, then he would reasonably speak with this individual on a more personal level.

However, Ilmarinen does not find socialization very fruitful anymore. He has succumbed to a sort of practical nihilism in his old age, where very few banal doings garner any meaning for him. If he must talk about something fairly important, he will certainly do so - these things of importance are known to him as "pratical matters." Such matters include the properties of different metals, the history of the Celestial Bureaucracy, or political issues.

If, then, one somehow managed to break through such a wall of mild doctrinal sociopathy, they would find a deeply troubled individual that truly wished that their existence still had some importance. Around one thousand years ago, Ilmarinen deliberately rested most of his earthly duties on his son Garmē Āutrās on the pretense that he needed an indefinite break from said duties. Though he has trusted his son lately, he cannot help but have misgivings about his past and what he could have done differently. Aside from that, he still adheres to a philosophy of universal balance and possesses an overwhelming sense of honor and celestial law, yet such notions are not often brought forth due to his relative inactivity. At the very least, if someone who he knew well enough were to blatantly lapse into malevolence and unbalance, his wrath would be terrible to witness.

Power/Combat
Ilmarinen has not had a reason to do battle in around two thousand years, which is somewhat ironic considering how much his son has fought over the years. Nevertheless, if one were to challenge him to combat, he would show that he is no slouch. His greatest feats were accomplished during a time of warring celestial entities, and he was initially among the groups of earthly divine spirits that attempted to fight off the aggressive gods of the Celestial Bureaucracy. Even back in such bygone days, he matched some of the stronger entities in duels due to the potential of his skill and abilities. Now, he can at least fight the leader of the Dievai on fairly equal terms. For him, combat is more akin to crafting a fine tool than to wrestling in a ring, and he will skillfully incise runes that do anything from pounding objects into atoms to breaking the resolve of his enemies. He also is fiercely skilled with polearms, swords of various sizes, axes, knives, and other melee weapons forged from metal, though he prefers to use hand-and-a-half-length swords in general. Those, he finds, are his favorite iteration of sword design.

Creation of Metal
Creation of matter requires that energy be converted directly into matter, and such events occur at a small scale in modern particle accelerators. Smaller amounts of mass are also produced in any reaction that requires energy input to run. That being said, it is incredibly difficult to convert energy into matter at a larger scale with current human technology, though high-energy cosmic rays are capable of giving up their kinetic energy in order to produce protons, neutrons, and electrons. The expression of Ilmarinen's aura gives off similar energy, which is thus used by him to create all manner of metal atoms. He then has sway over this metal, and can use it to build incredible structures, weapons, and anything else one can conceive of being made of metal. Doing all of this overrides the need to start with raw materials, and he can literally produce metals anywhere. Special alloys can be created in moments, and Ilmarinen's necessary knowledge of atomic and subatomic structure allows him to combine metals that would be impractical to combine with human means of production.

The Control of Pressure
Ilmarinen is mandated to control pressure, which is defined as the ratio of force exerted perpendicular to an object's surface over a certain area. Though such an ability can be used to bring atmospheric phenomena to the fore, Ilmarinen does not primarily use his ability for that purpose. Instead, Ilmarinen uses this ability on areas in space to force metals to take a certain state regardless of the temperature that they are at. Accordingly, he can make phases of metals such as molten and gaseous exist at STP, (standard temperature and pressure) and can also force hydrogen to take a metallic state. All of the applications for this ability are too numerous to list here, though Ilmarinen makes great use of it in his so-called "impossible" divine metal creation.