Played by Tony Jones in the early 1990s in a game run by Keith Grainge
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This game was one in which what the world thought of as superpowers were actually intrinsic magical powers. The mythical age of human prehistory was the last time magic was strong, and it was ended by the use of a powerful anti-magical ritual. Magical beings either coped with their loss of power, died, or fled to other dimensions. Some of the ancient magic users survived this low-magic period and were eventually able to undo the ritual and bring the magic back with themselves as the leaders of the DEMON organisation. As the world began to fall into superhuman-induced chaos, Europe founded the ASH (Anti-SuperHuman) organisation to recruit superhumans to protect and preserve the modern world. In this they were, eventually, successful, but at great cost...
Qiu Xilan was born in the city of Wuhan on the 29th July 1974, the only child of Qiu Feng, the personal physician to various high level Communist Party members in the city, and Qiu Szu. Both she and her parents were Roman Catholics. Because of her fathers occupation the family lived a comfortable lifestyle, and she was fairly well educated, mixing with many of the cities upper class as she grew up. She idolised her father, and was almost certainly going to follow in his footsteps when she grew up and become a doctor. Although she did not get on with her mother as well as she did her father, by and large they were a happy family.
In 1987, when she was thirteen, the first superhumans began to appear. Very quickly order and normal life in China began to break down as some of these superhumans set themselves up as warlords of their own little fiefdoms, despite the Chinese governments strenuous efforts to stop them. When, in early 1988, several of the superhuman warlords, in a rare moment of co-operation, managed to kill the entire central committee of the Chinese Communist Party, all the efforts of the government to maintain order were swept away in the ensuing struggle for control. Rampaging military forces swept back and forth across the country, some loyal to warlords, some just out for whatever they could grab from the wreckage. Nuclear weapons were used against their enemies by those of the warlords who had them.
Unfortunately, Wuhan, with its abundance of strategic industrial sites, was the target of several warlords and marauding army groups. As 1988 went by fighting swept back and forth over the city and the surrounding countryside. Supplies were cut off and there was widespread starvation and disease. Shelling and sniper fire, plus the usual 24 hour curfew by whoever was currently in control made it dangerous even to set foot outside the door. Xilans parents decided they would have to leave the city, and if possible the country. They set about building up supplies and bribing officials to obtain the correct documents to allow the family to leave the city. One day her father didnt come back from a foraging expedition, and although they waited and waited neither Xilan or her mother ever heard anything of him again. They gradually came to realise that he must be dead. Despite their grief and loss, they carried on their preparations and in the winter of 1988, along with thousands of others, they left Wuhan for the last time, heading for the coast, Shanghai and hopefully a boat out of China.
They trudged along the Yangtze river in atrocious weather. As they went Xilan and her mother learnt how to cope with living rough, as well as how to scavenge, steal or beg for food and other necessities. Many of the refugee column died, of illness or starvation, but somehow she and her mother managed to carry on. Xilan drew on unexpected reserves of strength in order to help her mother. As they went they heard that shortly after they had left, one of the warring factions, forced into retreat, had nuked Wuhan and there was now little left of the city after the firestorm the bombs had caused. With this news Xilan and her mother finally accepted that Qiu Feng was dead.
About a third of the way to Shanghai the column was caught in heavy fighting. While they sheltered in some buildings one night, the fighting rolled over them and Xilan, her mother and some of the other refugees were caught in a collapsing building, and trapped. They were stuck under the rubble for almost a day before some of the other refugees dug them out. Although she and her mother were not badly hurt, others who were trapped with them died. Ever since then Xilan has had a terrible fear of confined spaces and will do almost anything to escape them. The tattered remnants of the refugee column, now including people who had joined it since Wuhan, and with many of the original refugees having left, was forced to turn north by the fighting. They straggled cross-country until they reached the city of Hefei, but the local warlord, his supplies stretched thin by winter and the destruction of the croplands, forced them to move on at gunpoint. The column moved on towards the city of Huainan. As they went Xilans mother began to succumb to despair, and she started to gradually deteriorate; some of the things she had to do to help her and her Xilan survive, such as prostituting herself so that they could eat, which she adamantly refused to let Xilan do, despite her wanting to help, didnt help in this. Despite everything Xilan did, including selling almost all that remained of their belongings to buy medicines, nothing seemed to stop her mothers steady decline.
Halfway to Huainan heavy fighting ahead once again caused the refugee column, now including very few people from Wuhan, to turn back, although this time they were at least going in roughly the direction of Shanghai. Eventually, by the summer of 1989, they reached the Yangtze again and began moving along it to the coast. Xilans mother was still hanging on to life by a thread. The countryside seemed to be calming down again, a little, as the various warlords consolidated their hold on their territories and some agriculture began to start up again.
Eventually the remaining refugees approached Nanking, where they were stopped by the forces of the local warlord, General Zhu Yuwei (or Zhu the Mad as the locals called him, in whispers). The soldiers demanded a toll for passing through the warlords territory. No-one in the refugee column had anything like the sum they demanded, so the soldiers told them they would have to work for the warlord in order to earn it. The refugees were put into what were basically slave-labour camps. When they entered the camp each new inmate was tattooed with an identity number on his or her left arm, just below the shoulder; Xilan was number 465. In the camp they worked long hours for a pittance of pay, which they then had to spend on the necessities of life. It was a rare inmate indeed who was not soon owing the warlord even more money. Xilans mother continued to deteriorate; the lack of any kind of medical facilities in the camp did not help. Xilan considered escape, but the camps were well guarded, and the penalties, if caught, severe in the extreme. Life in the camp was brutal and corrupt, with a thriving black market; Xilan soon learnt how to deal with various of the criminal scum for things she and her mother needed. Several times she only narrowly avoided being raped, mainly by being able to run faster than them, and knowing where to hide.
After a few months in the camp, near the end of 1989, Xilans mother was no longer able to work. Xilan tried to do the work of two to cover for her, but she just wasnt strong enough. The guards came for her mother and, dragging her out to the central area to of the camp, the guard captain shot her through the head in front of a large crowd of onlookers, as an example of the dangers of laziness. As she saw her mother die, Xilan went almost insane with grief and rage, and tried to kill the guard captain with her bare hands. She was immediately clubbed down by the guards. The captain was about to shoot her too, when he saw, through the dirt and blood and tears, that she was in fact rather pretty. Rather than killing her there and then the captain just had Xilan brutally beaten (she still bears some of the scars), then taken away to become one of the warlords serving girls. She was fifteen.
Xilan was only semi-conscious as she was dumped into the back of a truck and driven into Nanking, in shock from her injuries and the death of her mother. She was cleaned up a bit and taken before the warlord; he ordered that she be given a bit of time to recover before he took her to his bed. Some time later (shes not sure how long) she was taken up to the warlords bedroom. However, she was still full of shock and grief, and fought back insanely. The warlord considered having her shot (she later found out), but instead decided to break her will instead. He had her severely beaten and locked up in a small cupboard. Given enough time this would make inroads into anyones resistance; given Xilans claustrophobia she was screaming for mercy within two days. She was willing to do anything but be locked up in there again. This time when Zhu had her taken to his room, although not quite submitting, she did not resist nearly as much (the thought of the cupboard was always there) and he raped her.
Time passed. Xilan became part of Zhus household. From talking to the other serving women there she learnt that, although some opportunists were there of their own free will, most of them, like her, were there under duress. Unfortunately her remnants of an upper class accent did not endear her to the other women, and she made no friends. Like the other women there she became adept at hiding her true feelings behind a mask of simulated emotion in order to avoid Zhus insane temper and the harsh punishments for displeasing him. Also like them she walled away her true feelings about what was happening to her in order to avoid their tearing her apart. Fortunately Zhu only rarely wanted the same woman more than once in a while. In order to help her relax she took up smoking, and soon became addicted to nicotine. At various times she has also smoked other things, but never on a regular basis.
After she had been in the warlords house for just over a year, another girl of the same age as Xilan, Lei Xiulan, was brought in. Like Xilan she was from an upper class family, and like Xilan she was shunned by the other women because of it. Xilan helped her through the inevitable traumas of her first days in Zhus house, and comforted her after the first time Zhu raped her. They became fast friends. All alone in the world apart from each other, they have come to think of one another as sisters and each is the comfort and support of the other.
As time went on and Zhu became more confident of his power, backed up by his nuclear missiles and his army, he relaxed some of the restrictions on his serving women, allowing them to go out about the town. Even so they were not allowed past the town gates, and the terrible punishments of several women who tried and failed to do so discouraged the rest from making the attempt. Their contact with the people of the city was also tense, as they considered the serving girls to be collaborators and only tolerated them because of their fear of General Zhu. Although they both hated living in the warlords house, and dreamed of leaving for new lives elsewhere, Xilan and Xiulan gradually, over the course of years, started to lose hope and accept that this was their lot in life and there was nothing they could do about it. Fortunately neither Xilan or Xiulan became pregnant during this time.
In early 1993 a new person joined those in Zhus house, the superhuman vampire Gotleib Zoiter, who, after a long talk with Zhu, became his new advisor. Surprisingly, he actually seemed to slightly moderate Zhus madness. Like Zhu, Zoiter soon acquired his own serving women, but fortunately Zhus jealously prevented any of his women from being among them. Then, in early April 1993, the superhumans of A.S.H. arrived, pursuing Zoiter. Xilan, along with many of the other serving women, was in Zhus throne room when the A.S.H. superhumans arrived and like them cowered on the floor in the battle which ensued. Then Panzerlilly exploded, after breaking her word sworn on the Magic, destroying Zhus house. Somehow Xilan gained superhuman powers while every other normal person there died, including General Zhu... Fortunately Xiulan was out of the house at the time, shopping, and so survived.
The only things that really matter to Xilan now are friendship and honour. She is also very loyal to A.S.H. as they helped her and Lei Xiulan get out of China. Despite her past, she has not become particularly angst-ridden but instead just accepts it and tries not to let it affect her too much. Although she knows they werent her fault she still feels guilt and shame over what happened to her, and over her mothers illness and death. However, with her powers she will now have something to say to anyone who tries to treat her badly again. She has little interest in romance and feels, with some justification, that her experiences have permanently soured her ability to have a normal relationship. Lastly, with her new-found power she feels far less inclination to let offences pass her by than previously... Because of the unpredictable way shes lived for the past few years Xilan has developed the habit of catnapping when she can on the assumption that you never know when the next time youll get to sleep will be.
Xilan feels a responsibility to use her powers to help try and stop the chaos and anarchy which have destroyed China from consuming the rest of the world. Both Xilan and Xiulan greatly enjoy the freedom and availability of goods in Europe, as such a great contrast from their previous lives. Several groups of Chinese exiles would like her to go back and try to impose order on the country, but she honestly believes things have gone far too far for her to have any effect; this doesnt stop the groups from keeping at her though... General Zhu had a son and heir, Zhu Kien, who was elsewhere leading an army group against the forces of another warlord when his father died. He is nearly as mad as General Zhu, and has now taken over his fathers fiefdom. Having heard garbled reports of the events surrounding his fathers death he now, for some reason, blames Xilan personally and is hunting her. Fortunately his influence is limited outside his part of China.
Xilan is obviously Chinese in origin, 5'2" tall and pretty with a slender build and very long hair in a long plait. She is rather quiet and looks considerably older than her nineteen years. Her eyes look older yet. The number 465 is tattooed on her upper left arm, and she was various scars about her body, though none that show when she is wearing clothes. She is always surrounded by a non-luminous swirling red-black aura which extends up to about a metre from her body (her Suppress). The degree of swirling of the aura is a rough measure of Xilans emotional state; the more agitated she is, the more it swirls. When she is consciously damping down the Suppress (which is a tiring process requiring a good deal of her concentration) this aura shrinks back until it barely extends beyond her skin. The aura also provides her with a great deal of protection from attacks (her Armour) and also lets her ignore the effects of pressure and temperature extremes and bright lights. She can also extend her aura far from her body and use it to manipulate very heavy objects (her Telekinesis). Somehow Xilans aura also diverts a portion of the magic out of magical beings and items which are within it and into her, boosting her telekinetic strength and resistance to harm, and increasing the rate at which she recovers. All Xilans powers are visible to Sight, Touch and Mental Senses.
Lei Xiulan is 5'4" tall with short hair in a page-boy type cut. She is the same age as Xilan, comes from the city of Xuzhou, is about as pretty as Xilan, is slightly short sighted (although she wears no spectacles), smokes, and speaks basic English. Like Xilan she has Acting skill, and tends to catnap when she can.
Since Getting Out of China
She and Xiulan are getting educated, including learning first aid etc. Xiulan has got some spectacles and goes shopping in Stockholm a lot. She met a Chinese-descended ASH member, Martin Tan, and had moved out of the ASH base into what was Shaitan's mansion.
Xiulan was still alive, though she had been mind controlled lots. Xilan stayed on Earth, and trained as a doctor. ASH (or its successors) kept her on a high salary (in case the magic came back on) but would not let her (or any of the other PC's) have anything to do with magic or politics (in case they tried to take over the world), and watched them constantly. Most of Xilans salary went to charities which helped China. After about ten years, Xilan has very probably become disenchanted with the prospect of living in an invisible box for the rest of her life, and persuades Jigsaw to take her off into the Planes (maybe the Plane of the Spiral Suns)...
| Miniature First Aid Kit | Swiss Army Knife | Radio |
| GPS Locator | Small Flashlight | Hip Flask |
| Credit Card | Cigarettes | Matches |
| Lighter |
Cháng Bì in Champions terms.