Marchese di Houf – Boss of Nova-Rossa

Brought in chains from Edrador to Sudd Tohst, Marchese di Houf was purchased as a labourer by a Sudd Tohsti spice merchant, needing labourers for his vessels. Unbeknownst to the merchant, Marchese in his life before slavery was a renowned soldier and well-read scholar, one who was sold into slavery and exiled by a political rival. On the first port of call in Belfrie, some six month’s since his purchase by the merchant, Marchese broke his bonds and left the ship’s hidden hold, crushing the skulls of the merchant’s guards who tried to halt him. Yet he knew freedom existed for him beyond the gangplank, for slavery in all its forms was outlawed in Belfrie, thus once on the docks, the merchant was powerless to stop him. Though he sought for a murder trial against his former slave for the guards he slew, no such trial came to be. The merchant mysteriously disappeared several days before the trial date, and Marchese was freed from jail by a mysterious benefactor. He would come to learn that benefactor was the Rossa Cartel, who had taken a keen interest in the mysterious Minotaur. That was decades ago, and Marchese came to learn the mysterious benefactor was a high ranking member of the Rossa Cartel, who held a long standing feud with Marchese’s former master. Since his release, Marchese was brought into the Cartel, seeing him as having little other prospects and honouring a life debt owed; he would be invaluable with both muscles and mind to the organisation. Skilet thus trusted him with overseeing the fledgling Baldurian branches of the Cartel, sending him to Grimgate to oversea it. He knew it would be a difficult task, for Baldur’s criminal underbelly held foundations dating back centuries, yet if anyone could get a hoof in the door there, it was Marchese. Now a year past Skilet’s death, the Rossa Cartel has fractured into dozens of proclaimed successor factions. Though in Baldur, the power vacuum has been mostly quiet, thus far. Not waiting for someone to come knocking on the door, nor wishing to return to Belfrie to become embroiled in underworld politics, Marchese opted to secede from the Cartel, becoming an independent faction to carry on Skilet’s spirit, rather than try to fought a battle that’s already lost. Thus he formed the Nova-Rossa, allowing any who wished to return to Belfrie to do so, and those who sought to finally leave their life of crime, to walk away freely. Many remained at Marchese’s side for such a notion, and those within the Nova-Rossa now are fiercely loyal to him.