Richard Gwyn ("Arthur")

Type
Person: NPC: Primary NPC.

Physical Description
Species: Human

Gender: Male

Age: 30s.

Heritage: Welsh.

Appearance: Tall, broad shouldered with a neatly trimmed blonde beard. Wears a leather bomber jacket, combat pants and a commando sweater.

Political Description
Faction: Camelot.

Personal Description
Camelot’s leader. A Welshman who came to London as a young man. His father was a trader and brought his family across Britain on the trade routes. He regularly visited London as a boy. He received a classical education and a military Schooling from Merlin, and organized the party with the help of Merlin. Started as a political agitator, but evolved into a military leader as well, after realizing how entrenched the Gentry were. Prefers diplomacy to violence, but is fully prepared to wage war in the service of the people of Britain.

History
Richard Gwyn was born to a pair of traders from Gwynedd in north western Wales. his childhood thereafter was spent upon the British trading circuit, learning the profession from them. This took the young Richard across the width and Breadth of Britain, once going as far north as Edinburgh. As such, Richard had a broad set of experiences to draw from and a diverse understanding of the many nations that had arisen upon the post-war isle of Britain. His father taught him to read, first Welsh, then English with the many traders in their caravan taking part in the education of the young boy as with the other children. Chief amongst these impromptu teachers was William Knight, a pre-war ghoul and caravan guard. Knight took a shine to the precocious boy and took an active part in his education, giving him access to his personal library and exposing him to the classics. Starting with tales of King Arthur and his Knights before branching into John Locke, St. Augustine, and Aristotle. The young Richard drank it in. When Richard's parents died of plague at the age of 11 it was Knight who took him in. Knight continued Richard’s education, teaching his survival techniques, combat skills and tactics. Richard would leave Knight sometime between the ages of 17 and 18 to travel. Usually making a living as a trader or caravan guard.

Many of these journeys would become foundational to his later philosophies. His time traveling as a trader through the lawless parts of Britain disabused him of the idea that lawless anarchy was any way to organize society. Returning to his native Wales and living for a time in the Kingdom of Powys discouraged any affection for an authoritarian monarch and this view was backed up by his experiences in the Duchy of York. Even the fair handed rule of king Malcolm of Scotland did not appeal to him as he observed that while Malcolm may well be a good king, who was to say his son would be. For a time he lived in the Manchester Republic, while he found much to appreciate in the Republic, ultimately he was disillusioned by their emphasis upon Plutocracy and the power of the trade families. a brief sojourn to Dubh Linn simply reinforced this view as he looked on in horror at the power of the pirate lords of the city.

[Richard traveled widely across Britain, even making a brief sojourn to Ireland and to the north of France. It is during this time that he began developing his own ideology.

He rejected the strongman rule seen in many wasteland states as well as the idea of trying to reclaim or rebuild pre-war states, instead choosing to view the pre-war world as something to be learned from and to adapt ideas from, but ultimately foolish to replicate. He advocated for representational democracy and for the idea that all should have a seat at the table.

London had long been a fixture of the young Richard’s childhood. The city had long been a fixture of the trade circuit and Richard had visited the city yearly throughout his childhood. It was a city that he adopted and that had adopted him.

Arthur’s first foray into London politics was spent mainly building a small movement in Eastminster, he quickly acquired a following and a small core of lieutenants. The movement’s philosophies were further distilled when Khajal Payyappilly, a Londoner who had her own pro-democracy movement, brought her own followers into the movement, soon becoming Arthur’s right hand, taking the code name “Bedevere.” Arthur found early on that his ideals of democracy and representative government were unfamiliar and confusing to the citizens of London many of whom were only familiar with the terms he was using in the context of the Gentry’s bastardizations. Drawing back to his childhood, Arthur and his followers began using Arthurian imagery and lore to represent themselves and their ideals. Where many might have only an imperfect idea of what democracy was, everyone knew the stories of King Arthur, this shift resulted in an explosion in popularity, finally drawing the proper ire of the Gentry.

The Gentry began a  violent crackdown on the Camelot Movement, scattering its followers. They failed to arrest or kill Richard or his top lieutenants, but much of the movement’s civilian following was scattered to the winds. Eastminster was subject to harsh reprisals that soured the perception of the movement in the area even to this day. Camelot still has sympathisers about London though, mainly in Camden and on the Isle of Dogs as well as a small following inside Westminster itself. For now, Camelot keeps their heads down, operating out of a Pindar Station in Peckham under nelson Mandela house, a bombed out council estate.

A reckoning is coming for the Gentry, and Camelot is ready to fight for what they believe is right, with London and all of Britain in the balance.[further edit]