Helgin Black, born Jack Helgin Forester Jr., was born in a small town on the West cost of Faedrun as the son of Jack and Anna Forester. His mother was born Anna Helgin and later in life was married to a man named Jack Forester whom she had met along a journey to the north. They were a loving couple who survived off of Jack’s wealth gained as a scout for hire. However, Jack was never quite right in the head after an incident involving a book written by an unknown madman. Jack Jr. grew up listing to his father’s mad stories of walking corpses and evil scripts, but resented his father every day in his youth, feeling that his father was a weak crazy old man that just couldn’t live with the idea of life. Life went on as normal, as day by day Jack Sr. would train Jack Jr. to his craft of scouting, yet the crazy ranting’s and solo talk sessions of his father would drive him to the point of neglect towards his father.
One day a letter would come requesting Jack Sr.’s assistance in exploring a new land dubbed Mardrun. Jack Sr. would kiss his wife goodbye and wish his son luck with his life, claiming that what he was doing would be important when the day came that the undead would over run Faedrun. This angered Jack Jr., feeling his father was truly mad to give in to his false fears and that abandoning his wife and child was a coward’s move.
Jack Jr. would start to run with the wrong crowd that would lead to Jack Jr. using what his father had taught him to become an assassin. Caring little for the lives of others was easy for Jack and would make him a great assassin with his skills. Jack would gain a reputation among the assassin community and gain the name Jack Black, for his heart was just that, black.
Upon receiving a job up to the north one day, Jack would enter a town that was filled with disease and plague and use this to advantage for his kill. He would merely poison that man’s food and watch him die. Jack sat and watched as the man would consume the food in his sickened and famine state in order to live, only this food would lead to his death. The man would twist and squirm as his insides slowly died and eventually gave out. Jack had done it. The man was dead.
“Yes, yes I have done it” he thought, as the man slowly arose from the wooden floor of his kitchen. How could this be? Jack thought, he was dead or wasn’t he? And then Jack saw the undead corpse his father spoke so much of slowly arise and look back, sensing Jack’s presence. Jack would run and run for his life, making it back home only to find that his mother was dead and the town over taken.
Jack traveled for years avoiding the plague till he would find a town that was still yet left standing. There Jack settled and began to study and learn of the undead and there plight in order to stop them.
One night in his sleep, Jack was awoken by a dark shadowy presence that told him that he would help Jack learn of the undead and ways of defeating them if he wished, but he would have to devote himself to all that his order would teach Jack. Jack accepted and was later inducted into what would be called The Order of the Black Knight Society.
The Order of the Black Knight Society was one that considered themselves protectors of the people of Faedrun in which devoted practice and study of the necromantic arts would be used to understand and defeat the undead plague. However this practice was one that was shunned and looked down upon by many humans and for that reason its followers would follow the same fate. Jack, abandoning all he knew of the assassin way, took on the study necromancy in order to get his revenge on the undead plague. He would also abandon his old name and dub himself Helgin Black in memory of his mother. But not enough time would be given in order to stop the undead plague and in time, would be forced to flee in order to study his way elsewhere. Helgin would dawn the appearance of the penitent by marking his face for life and brand himself a traitor for all time. To Helgin, this way his only means to sneak through their forces and gain passage to the new land. Helgin, finding a small sailing vessel manned by only five remaining survivors would find his means to the new world and with it the hope of finding the means of stopping the plague once and for all.