Penny

With a stark gender imbalance of around 95% female to 5% male, pure-blooded elves were faced with a population decline. Many female elves, unable to find mates, began having children with adventurers. Children conceived with non-elven partners were born with a balanced sex ratio, and in the next generation, this led to a rise in unions between half-elf men and pure-elf women, producing three-quarter elves. Penny is one such offspring, born to a half-elf father and a full-elf mother.

Though Penny's father lived only twice as long as a human, he earned his place as a member of the Queensguard thanks to his exceptional archery skills, which Penny learned from him. Her mother worried about her child's lifespan, but Penny matured at the same pace as other three-quarter elves, showing little difference from her full-blooded peer, Daisy, who was born around the same time.

Elves, a species blessed with longevity, have little desire for material wealth and place little value on money. To them, it is only a means for trading with outsiders. Within their villages, communal living ensures everyone can live comfortably without coin changing hands.

Penny's mother, Lavender, was a gifted seamstress who sewed clothing for the village, while her father served as a member of the Queensguard. Being a young child, Penny knew only the elves' communal lifestyle, but as she grew older, she began to question it.

Since elves didn't use money among themselves, the only way to earn any was by trading with outsiders, and, as a member of the Queensguard, Penny's father had nothing to trade, and her mother only sewed for her fellow elves. Though poverty was hardly an elven concept, Penny felt that her family was distinctly poor, especially compared to her friend Daisy, whose father was a popular writer and the most well-paid man in the village.

Among the elves, joining the Queensguard was the highest honor one could achieve. As a little girl, Penny was proud of her father and aspired to join the Queensguard herself one day. However, watching Daisy casually splurge on whatever she liked whenever merchants came to town planted resentment in her.

One day, unable to afford something she truly wanted, Penny let her dream of joining the Queensguard die; even though Daisy bought her prize for her instead, her friend's kindness only made her own inability to pay sting more.

Other elves were fine with buying things when they had money and doing without when they didn't, but Penny had strong material desires and an even stronger drive to make money. That yearning left her feeling out of place in elven society.

One day, she caught a merchant offering an item to an adventurer for 15 Gold when he'd sold it to her for 20. When Penny called him out on it, the merchant brushed it off, saying adventurers got special discounts. But as Penny turned to leave, she heard the merchant mutter, "Never had an elf argue over prices before." In that moment, Penny realized that merchants had been ripping off elves the whole time.

Still, there was nothing Penny could do with this knowledge. Other elves didn't care how much things cost, even if they were overpaying. The more Penny tried to raise the issue, the more she felt like her community thought she was the one being unreasonable.

Despite her misgivings about elven society, Penny had no intention of leaving the village while her family and her friend Daisy remained. She had given up her childhood dream of joining the Queensguard, but she still wanted to inherit her father's bow, a special weapon which required tremendous mana to wield.

But one day, her mother Lavender traded that precious bow for something called an Eastern Traditional Wellness Jade Mat meant to ease her father's declining health. While it did seem to help at first, even getting her father back on his feet, Penny felt unsatisfied. When her father passed away soon after, she made up her mind.

She tried to recover the bow, but the merchant who bought it demanded 1.2 million Gold to return it. Since she couldn't afford it, the merchant said he wouldn't sell the bow to anyone else for the time being and that she should find him in Hananis when she was ready to buy it back.

Leaving behind a single letter, Penny set off for Hananis, tracked down the merchant, and was referred to the Monster Tamers guild. She took on every job she could find, determined to earn the Gold she needed.

Eight years later, Penny finally saved up enough to buy back her father's bow. The merchant offered to give the bow back for free, but Penny insisted on paying in full.

It was the principle of the thing: proving to herself that she was different from the elves who had no understanding of money.