On the island of her birth, Kaya was well known as a very skilled craftswoman at an impressively young age. 

But along with many others of her lower social standing, she had been taken from her family and brought to the mainland to be sold into labour. She was soon purchased by a wealthy couple traveling west and brought with them to the tiny village of Cholerny. Frightened and alone, she spent several years with them, reduced to repetitive chores and menial tasks until the family that bought her chose to leave the village and settle somewhere safer and less isolated.

Cholerny had become her home and many of the villagers her friends, and she resisted their efforts to move her. They reluctantly granted her freedom, and with nowhere to go and no desire to return to where she had come from, she chose to make a living on her own and remain in the village. There were some decent folk who had disapproved of her forced servitude that looked favorably on her, giving her various tasks enough to provide a living wage, until, assisting an old blacksmith, she showed an aptitude for ironworking.

Such an occupation was highly unusual for a woman, but the old blacksmith couldn't have cared less. Kaya was an excellent worker, and with little guidance, she began to produce some of the finest blades the old man had ever seen, insisting that she had surpassed even his formidable skill. Soon even some of the men who had scoffed at the woman wielding a heavy hammer had come to request weapons made specifically by her.    Sadly, the kind old blacksmith was injured in a ghoul attack and having never fully recovering from his wounds, died in his bed with Kaya at his side. Having no children of his own, and being very fond of Kaya, the old man left her his shop and modest home, encouraging her to continue his business, and live as she saw fit. Along with his other belongings, he also left her a beautiful stone which she