Acrion Sythe

 Acrion Sythe is a main protagonist in the fanfiction series the Ronin Chronicles. He was formerly a freelance assassin-for-hire before being recruited into ONI Special Forces, and subsequently becoming an independent assassin once again.

Early Life
Acrion Sythe was born on January 29, 2538 on the human colony world of Emerald Cove. He was raised solely by his father who had been widowed after his wife was murdered by an assassin sent by Tyler Stohess, Rileya Stohess's father, sometime after giving birth to Acrion. Griefstriken and heartbroken, Acrion's father decided to train his son to be insensitive to death through cruelty and abuse, so as to have him avenge his mother. Eventually, after thirteen years of abuse and maltreatment, Acrion turned on his father and killed him.

Amateur Assassin
As Sythe was left without a way to support himself, he began to use the skills he had learned to his advantage. He became an assassin-for-hire, earning a reputation of being effective despite his lack of experience and age.

In 2554, two years after he began his assassin service, the Office of Naval Intelligence became aware of his work. Impressed with his abilities, they approached him and offered him a way to put his abilities to a greater purpose and role, serving in the ONI Special Forces. After giving it some thought, Sythe agreed and was taken for four years to train in ninjutsu and perfect his skills in stealth, infiltration, and combat as well as recieve specialized genetic augmentations that enhanced said stealth capabilities. After this was completed Sythe was taken back to his home planet, Emerald Cove, which was earlier abandoned by the UNSC during the war. He was stationed on a single ONI outpost there which acted as a sort of home base for him to stay at as he worked to assassinate people who could detriment the UNSC (mainly insurrectionists).

ONI Silencer
Sythe was placed under the command of Captain William Johnson, who acted as the administrator for all of his missions, many of which Sythe found questionable. Despite this, Sythe continued to carry out his contracts without hesitation, until one fateful mission.

In 2560, during one operation, before Sythe killed his target, a seemingly harmless old man, he asked him if he really knew why he was killing these people. The assassin was about to answer, but then he remembered his mission and instead eliminated his target. After he returned, he began to question why he was killing these people as they were merely on Captain Johnson's orders. Following this operation, Sythe finally chose to ask his commanding office what reason he had for having him killing these people. However, Johnson seemed to be enraged by the question and sent him off, telling him that he didn't have to know the "why".

Despite his disatisfaction with this answer, Sythe chose to follow orders, though would be more investigative with his targets. On his next few missions, Sythe still continued to eliminate his targets, but made sure to identify each target, and find if they had any affiliation with anyone who would be a threat to the UNSC. After a few missions, he attempted to draw connections between his assigned targets, but found they had nothing in common, other than the fact they didn't actually seem to have done anything wrong. This made Sythe even more curious, and even more irritated by his commanding officer's unwillingness to tallk.

Revelations
All of this eventually came to a head when he was sent to assassinate a young woman about the same age as him named Rileya Stohess. This time extremely curious on why he would be assigned to kill someone like her, Acrion decided to directly question her, and spare her life if she was found innocent. After informing Riley that he was sent to assassinate her (as well as calming her down and assuring her that he wasn't going to), he asked her if there might be a reason that she would have a hit placed on her. Riley replied that she didn't do anything wrong, although her mother did decline a request from a "menacingly philosophical" looking officer called Captain Johnson, causing Acrion to realize that he was being used to kill innocents. Infuriated, Acrion began to leave to take his revenge, but was stopped by Stohess who warned him that, without concrete evidence, he would be unable to bring his CO to justice. Following this, she suprised him when she asked if she could help him as show of gratitude for sparing her. Acrion, knowing full well she was right and that he couldn't do this alone, though also afraid that she would fall into harms way, reluctantly allowed her to join.

He returned to base with Rileya, and managed to decieve Johnson into believing that he had eliminated her, with Rileya disguising herself as a member of the outpost's staff. Shortly after, and with Rileya's help, he investigated Johnson's personal files to find evidence of his crimes. While exploring the files, he discovered that he was correct, and that most, if not all, of the targets were people  Johnson seemed to have a personal vendetta against, or the death of that person would devastate the person he did want dead. (Riley herself was the daughter of the CEO of a munitions corporation that had denied Johnson's request for extra equipment). According to the plan, Sythe was to be eliminated at the end of this list. With their new found evidence, Riley and Acrion began to formulate their plan to bring the corrupt captain to justice.

New Hero
Under the guise of continuing to follow orders, Sythe began saving the rest of his targets rather than eliminating them. One such encouner was with Freelancer California, who became one of the few of whom Sythe actually became aquainted with.

After completing the rest of the contracts, Sythe and Stohess gathered all the incriminating evidence and took it to the higher-ups in ONI. Shocked by the captain's corrupt actions, as well as impressed with the pair's work, they sent their silencer on a mission to put Johnson to death for his crimes, which Sythe gladly accepted. He returned ot the outpost and killedl Johnson who was arriving from a meeting.

F ollowing this, Sythe left the UNSC to work independently once again, though this time Rileya, with whom he had formed a close friendship, joined him to assist him. The two decided to work to eliminate any UNSC officers or political leaders that take advantage of their position for personal gain.

The Ronin
a while  later, Acrion was contacted by one of the few people whom he rescued that he became familiar with, Zak Derekson. The independent soldier notifyed the assassin that he needed his help on tracking and killing a Forerunner possessed and demigod-like enemy, rogue Freelancer Arizona. While at first doubtful, Acrion and Rileya chose to join the Freelancer's team.

Personality
Sythe is described by his peers as extremely quiet, ghostly, and even not present due to his habit of reducing his presence to others. He rarely states his own opinions, though this is because he finds his own opinions inferior. He tries to cooperate during combat, but often fails due to his lone wolf nature. However, he does follow orders well. In actuality, Sythe is a person with high morals and values, however his "silent assassin presence" makes his peers think otherwise. In combat Sythe is willing to die for his teammates if necessary, but it is often criticized as recklessness. While hard to notice, Sythe is often positive and optimistic, even in grim situations. Acrion has a tendency to go alone on missions which earned him the alias "lone wolf". Rileya Stohess is the only one who ever managed to get Acrion to fight alongside someone; namely herself. They became known as the Strike Team for their "hit and hide" style of combat.

Ablities
Due to Sythe's assassin work, he mainly acts as a stealth operative for the Ronin, which implies that he is adept at breaking and entering silently. During his time working for William Johnson, Sythe was granted access to top secret, prototype weapons, and from this access, he had a Type 32 Advanced Munitions Delivery System (Advanced Bow) uniquely designed for his purposes, but instead of having the UNSC manufacture the bow, he ordered the necessary parts and building equipment needed to make such a weapon. After making several tools, including a grappling system which doubles as a rope dart, Sythe managed to persuade Command to give him a molecular aligning laboratory, which acted as a "forge" to produce a Japanese long sword, or katana, that was made of molecularly aligned titanium aligned with graphene along the edge which, when conducting energy from a battery cell, can be super heated to make the edge of the blade as deadly as a type-1 energy weapon (energy sword). After acquiring the Artron, Sythe made his normal rounds into specialized rounds (incinderary rounds, explosive rounds, EMP rounds, stun rounds). These types of rounds were also incorporated into into the arrows of Acrion's Type 32 which negated the need for special arrows besides self-guided arrows.

Sythe became the wielder of the Artron: a bio-weapon originally designed by the Forerunners to combat the Flood. The Artron is held inside six pieces of a Forerunner pentagram and only activates when the Successors put the puzzle together. This causes the Buried within the Artron is Star-Essence which is an ancient power used by the early Guardians of Humanity.

Artron: Star-Essence: an evolution of Starlight, and like Starlight, it is an energy that looks like light, but depending on color, can act like different types of energy (fire, electricity, plasma, etc.) but it may have a different effect than the mimicked energy; there has only ever been one color (that being Red). Unlike Starlight sources, a Star-Essence source has the power to synchronize with another source of Star-Essence to amplify the power output.
 * The Generator: gives the user power to generate Star-Essence from nervous system (can be used to fuel batteries, EMP from hand, electrocution/stun, weak energy shielding, etc).
 * The Augmentor: gives user the ability to directly connect to any weapon's ammunition bolster its capabilities (i.e. specialized rounds).
 * The Replicator: gives user the ability to replicate  any analysed simple technological functionalities within the user's body, but can only have two active at a time (i.e. motion tracker, weapon read-out, etc.)
 * Resonance: a Star-Essence attribute that allows for the synchronization and amplification of power:
 * Artron-nexus Body Enhancements:
 * The user is physically more durable and strong.
 * Artron-nexus Power Enhancements:
 * The Generator: the wielder is able to produce massive amounts of Star-Essence, which allows for the use of constructs with high energy consumption rates.
 * The Augmentor: allows the wielder to bolster the capabilities of an entire weapon (i.e. electric blade).
 * The Replicator: allows the wielder to make constructs out of Artron cells and to make highly complicated constructs (i.e. combat armor).

Rileya Stohess
One of the three people Sythe has a close friendship, Rileya Stohess was the first target he saved, and the one who made him question his morals and what he was really doing. Stohess has many opposite qualities of Sythe, such as being outgoing, charismatic, and generally friendly which Sythe looks up to her for. Coincidentally, Stohess looks up to Sythe for his unwavering determination, calmness during battle, and dedication to the lives if those around him. Because of this, they are naturally together during their free time. Both Sythe and Stohess do not share this with one another even as their admiration grows into affection (much to their comrades' annoyance). Rileya attains the Artron as well as Star-Essence powers along with Acrion and is aliased the

Antoinette Toreth
Antoinette is one of Acrion Sythe's closest friends and they have known each other from childhood. When Acrion's mother was murdered, the only one to give him comfort and support was his friend Antoinette, who lived near-by at the time. After Acrion's father began his abusive "training", it made the Toreths scared that their child was friends with Sythe, and they moved away. This made Acrion lose trust in those around him, but harbored no resentment at her leaving. Antoinette was reunited with Acrion during the Rewaken Crusade, but Acrion was disguised as the Strike Blade, so she was unaware of his true identity.

Trivia

 * Sythe, like his creator, has a weakness/obssession with cookies.
 * Sythe, like his creator, can play the guitar.