James Payne

"The sword is an extension of a person's character. If that character is weak, so is the sword."

James Payne is the leader of a demon hunting organization, known as the Guardians. He is an exceptional warrior and is known to take on most world-threatening demons. He doesn't like to make himself distant from his friends despite his rank and often switches between roles. To his friends and loved ones he is a good man and hard to beat, to his students he's an evil teacher that has their best interests at heart, and to his enemies... well, let's just say that he's worse outside than inside the walls.

Theme song: Run to the hills by Iron Maiden

History
James was born and raised in a southern Terra village, the eldest of six. He had three blood siblings, two who were adopted, all of them wanting to follow in their father's foot steps by joining the military, save for James. He trained with the sword and even did a bit of research into other forms of combat, but the army never interested him. When he turned nineteen and had been very well trained in the ways of the sword by then, he and his friend decided to resist the recent draft and opened a business. But this was no ordinary shop, it was a demon hunting shop, which was very much needed, it seemed, because of the surge in attacks from demons at that time. So James and his best friend, Parren, fought their way through countless hordes of demons, using mostly their skills at the blade and their wits. Until one day, when James had been researching ways to eradicate demons more easily, he came across a book entitled The Art of Magic. He looked into it even further and found the book to be a tome of ancient magic which was used mainly for combat, other times for survival, and still others for many different things. He brought this book to his friend and they read. It brought many things into sight that the two had never thought of doing, and they began to incorporate magic into their jobs and missions that were assigned to them. They also began to go on missions alone, now that they were more powerful and were getting more job requests. Eventually, they acknowledged the need to expand their staff and hired a new fighter, Megan Catzern, to help with missions. She seemed to be far more efficient than the two of them and James saw a chance. He and Parren would leave their hometown, looking for a better place to set up an organization for fighting demons. This, of course would leave Megan in charge of their business here, But she would be called to the place they found when she would be needed. So they set off. As they traveled the world, James and Parren learned new magic, increased their skills, and gained insight into the cultures of the world and it's people.

Founding the Guardians
After a year or so, the two felt satisfied with their progress, recruiting about fifteen people to head the new organization, which they called the Guardians, and settled down on the top of a mountain just a few hundred miles north of where they started. James, using his new earth magic that he discovered off of an old man, dug out a large crater big enough for a city and being careful to leave walls thick enough to defend against attacks. Parren then used new wood magic to grow a forest inside the crater to shelter him and James while they set their plans in motion. As they developed the land with help from a local village, a stone that Parren had set at the back of the city began to turn a deep shade of red. After a few days of this, a man arrived at the village, to see a large skyscraper in the back of the crater and some construction happening. This man was a swordsman, and stopped to take in the scenery. At his side arrived another man, who also stopped short at the sight of such productivity and the great city he had never seen there before. These two were going to be two of five captains, who would head the organization from this location. They walked to the back to meet James and Parren, who told them to wait at the board at the back of the main avenue. After an hour or two, two women walked into the city, who were also going to become captains in the organization. James explained to them what they were there for, and what their responsibilities would be. the first two would be second and third captains, and the two girls would fourth and healer. Parren and himself would be first and commander, respectively. At this, the organization started up, especially with help from the captains, and they went about demon hunting as they normally would.

Skills
God of War: Having researched the art of war thoroughly, James is extremely skilled at such dealings, providing expert strategies and powerful attacks when he is in the fray

Continental Swordsman: At least in the land of sun, James is the most powerful swordsman, and has very few who can stand up to him at full power. This fact is not helped by his fighting ability and magical capabilities.

Immense Power: James, being the leader of the most powerful organization on the planet, has immense power equivalent to the leader of such a gathering of fighters.

Unorthodox Mind: One of the many things people notice about James when they first meet him is his normal thinking is their unorthodox thinking. He calculates every aspect of a fight as he is doing so, always staying up to speed with his opponent.

James is a very skilled fighter, as mentioned above, and brought at least three of the captains in by defeating them at a duel. There are rumors of him once defeating an army of greenhorns from the feudal lands in an invasion attempt on the northernmost area of the land of Sun.

In terms of relative power, James likes to place himself between or with the same group as the yonkou, or at least his captains like to, much to his chagrin. He has a very modest personality, and dislikes arrogance, so he doesn't like it when others try to exaggerate his abilities, even though those exaggerations are more or less correct.

Appearance and Personailty
Brown semi-spiked hair with a white denim jacket and a gray tee-shirt with blue jeans. On the short side for his age.