# Pappy “Harlan” Football – History & Secrets
> **Use:** DM-facing lore. Don’t show to players as-is.  
> **PC Link:** Grandfather of Joe “Football” – action figure, war flashbacks, Root trauma.  
> **Optional Twist:** If you go with the “Joe is a golem” angle, Pappy was one too.

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## 1. Snapshot

- **Full Name:** Harlan “Pappy” Football  
- **Age at War:** Early 20s during the [[Leyline Crisis |Leyline War / Korrin Crisis ]]
- **Role:** Front-line infantry / field runner with minimal medic training  
- **Post-War:** Became a small-town, red-blooded, flag-waving “America but fantasy” grandpa; never really processed what he saw  
- **Current State:**
  - Mundane understanding: Dead veteran, remembered through a **magical action figure** keepsake.
  - Truth: A chunk of his **soul/imprint is entangled with the Root**, and the action figure is its easiest “handle.”

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## 2. Public Story / What Joe’s Family Believes

This is what Joe, his parents (Fork & Maum), and the sisters (Kevlar & Devlin) would reasonably know.

- Pappy fought in **[[Leyline Crisis| “the Leyline War”]]** decades ago.
- He was:
  - “Brave as hell,”
  - “Tougher than boiled leather,”
  - One of the guys who “stood his ground when the sky was on fire over Korrin.”
- He never talked about specifics, just:
  - “We pushed the line too hard,”  
  - “The mages in the nice coats broke the world and sent us to fix it with rifles.”
- After the war:
  - Settled in the valley / Green Gully region,
  - Worked a simple job (farm, factory, local guard – you can pick),
  - Became the archetype Joe is trying to emulate: meat, beer, football, god, country.
- The **action figure**:
  - Is a cheap, mass-produced “Heroes of Korrin” toy from just after the war,
  - Enchanted with a basic “recorded phrase / minor guardian” spell,
  - Pappy carried it as a joke/lucky charm once the kids were born,
  - On his deathbed, he pressed it into Joe’s hands: “You keep ol’ Pappy with you. He’ll set you straight.”

The family thinks any “possession” moments are:
- Joe being weird,
- Or just “that old toy acting up.”

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## 3. True History – Korrin & the Crisis

### 3.1 Before Korrin

- Harlan Football enlisted young:
  - Poor-ish family,
  - “Somebody has to go,”
  - More practical grit than patriotism at first.
- Quickly developed a rep for:
  - Doing the ugly jobs without flinching,
  - Dragging wounded out under fire,
  - Talking shit about officers but following orders anyway.

### 3.2 At the Front

- By the time he reaches **Korrin**, the war is in its late, desperate stage.
- His unit is stationed in trenches / ruined outskirts around the city:
  - They can see the **Convergence Engine** on the skyline,
  - They feel the Root pulses in the dirt under them.
- He experiences multiple “Engine surges”:
  - Spells going off wrong,
  - People half-teleporting and fusing with walls,
  - Time “stuttering” mid-charge.

He’s not a mage, but he’s not blind:
- He knows this is **not** just “stronger magic.”
- He hears rumors about “the pencil-necks in the tower” who keep turning the dial.

### 3.3 The Day of the Korrin Crisis (Your Cold Open)

- Pappy is in the trench on the day the Crisis peaks.
- He watches:
  - Soldiers torn by leyline tears (your “bisected by reality” scene),
  - Men fused with stone and infrastructure,
  - Spells and wards screaming as the Root bucks.

Crucial points:

- He sees the first unmistakable **pattern** in the pulses – the “heartbeat that isn’t yours.”
- He hears officers and Root techs shouting about:
  - “Convergence thresholds,”
  - “Stability models,”
  - “Branch cuts,”
  - Though he doesn’t understand the math.

He **does not** know the word “Coherence” at the time – that comes later or is buried in classified jargon.

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## 4. How Pappy Got Entangled With The Root

This is the hinge that explains the action figure, the visions, and the Joe link.

### 4.1 The Moment

During the peak of the Crisis:

- Pappy is:
  - Standing / crouched directly above a **branch junction** in the Root network near Korrin,
  - Holding onto a wounded soldier with one hand,
  - Clutching a warded dog tag or charm (his, or the kid’s) in the other.

- When the **decision** is made in the tower (D’serris / Oversight hitting the override that smears Coherence instead of letting it condense), there’s a huge spike in Root activity:
  - The pulse hits the branch under his feet,
  - Every charm, ward, and sympathetic link flares at once,
  - For a split second, Pappy is:
    - Fully “inside” the Root flow,  
    - While also being a big ball of raw human emotion: terror, rage, refusal to die.

That moment leaves a **copy / imprint** of him in the network.

Important nuance:

- He doesn’t die right then.
- His **soul stays in his body**, lives out his life,
- But the Root keeps a **ghost image** of:
  - His nervous system pattern,
  - His emotional state,
  - His basic “personality architecture.”

Think: Root took a snapshot.

### 4.2 The “Heroes of Korrin” Toy

- After the war, the Convergence Engine & Root ops are classified to hell.
- But the propaganda machine:
  - Pumps out toys, posters, and patriotic bullshit.
- The **action figure** Joe carries is:
  - Factory-enchanted with **minor sympathy links**:
    - Template: “bind to war dead, give comforting phrases, maybe a tiny shield charm.”

Problem:
- Sloppy enchantment meets a war where the Root itself is weird.
- Pappy, as a Root-imprinted soldier, is a **perfect target** for the toy’s sympathetic hooks.
- When his family buys one with his unit’s insignia and he handles it regularly, the toy’s charm latches onto:
  - The **Pappy-in-the-Root snapshot** instead of just a generic “hero template.”

Result:
- Over time, the figurine becomes a **focus**:
  - It can call up fragments of Pappy’s Root imprint,
  - Pappy’s actual, aging soul gets “pulled” toward that channel, especially near death,
  - After he dies, what’s left of him distributed between:
    - A normal soul afterlife (however you want that to work),
    - And **the Root-bound imprint**, now heavily linked to the toy.

That’s why:

- The action figure can:
  - Occasionally “possess” Joe,
  - Speak with Pappy’s voice,
  - React to Root anomalies and D’serris.

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## 5. Pappy, D’serris, and the Leyline Crisis

### 5.1 What Pappy Knows / Remembers

From Pappy’s perspective:

- “We were losing. The tower people wanted a silver bullet.”
- “They turned the grid into a weapon. The grid didn’t like it.”
- “Some analyst in the tower yelled about ‘pattern deviation’ and ‘non-random noise’… nobody listened until it was too late.”
- “Then somebody did something up there that ended the war overnight and broke everything underneath it.”

He only later puts a name to D’serris:

- He recognizes D’serris from post-war hearings / briefings / wanted posters / internal blame games.
- Pappy’s view:
  - “He’s the bastard who pulled the lever that saved Korrin and fucked the rest of us.”
  - That’s where the MAGA-esque “THOSE GODDAMN SORCERERS ARE RUINING THIS GODDAMN COUNTRY” energy comes from.

### 5.2 What D’serris Knows About Pappy (Optional)

If you want that connection:

- D’serris might:
  - Have logs of Root “snapshots” taken during the Crisis,
  - Know there’s a **cluster of persistent imprints** tied to a particular unit in the trenches,
  - Recognize Joe’s figurine / aura as:
    - “One of the Korrin ghosts that never fully resolved.”

He might not know it’s specifically “Harlan Football,” but he knows Joe is carrying **a Root echo from that day**.

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## 6. The Golem Angle – Pappy & Joe as Construct-Bloodline

If you commit to Joe being a golem, Pappy being one too is the cleanest way to do it.

### 6.1 War-Era Root Constructs (“Ley-Golems”)

- During the Leyline War, one faction:
  - Experimented with **Root-anchored constructs**:
    - Artificial bodies grown / sculpted to:
      - Be tough,
      - Be repairable,
      - Host a soul imprint that could be “backed up” in the Root.
- These soldiers:
  - Look human,
  - Bleed (sort of),
  - Age slowly or unevenly,
  - But have:
    - Subtle tells (odd healing, unnatural resilience),
    - A special reaction to Root spikes.

Pappy Football was one of these:

- Either:
  - Volunteered for an “enhancement program” and had his soul bound to a constructed body,  
  - Or was resurrected from near-death into a body grown to be Root-compatible.
- The Crisis at Korrin:
  - Supercharged this binding,
  - Made his Root imprint especially strong.

### 6.2 Post-War “Bloodline”

- After the war, Pappy:
  - Leaves service, tries to live a normal life.
  - Marries / has “kids.”
- Mechanically / lore-wise:
  - His children and grandchildren are:
    - **Hybrids** – human souls in partially construct-compatible bodies,
    - Or literal golem “descendants” grown with his template and implanted with new souls.

Joe being a golem:

- Fits his:
  - Weirdly average but absurdly tough vibe,
  - “Action figure inhabits me” moments,
  - Occasional disconnect from normal physical limits (you can lean into this later).

Pappy’s war-body:

- Was a **prototype Joe**:
  - Stronger,
  - More tightly bound to the Root,
  - Less stable.

When he died, the Root imprint had a strong template to work from.

### 6.3 How This Shows Up In Play

Signs both Pappy and Joe are golem-type:

- Joe:
  - Recovers from injuries faster than he should,
  - Maybe has faint “seams” or runes that only show under certain light,
  - Magic that targets “humanoids” still works, but constructs-related stuff feels off around him.
- The action figure:
  - Reacts to **Joe’s true nature** – it’s like two versions of the same pattern talking to each other.
- Pappy in visions:
  - Might look:
    - Slightly too symmetrical,
    - A little “designed,”
    - With scars that don’t behave like normal flesh.

You can also give Joe some “oh shit” moment later:

- Pappy: “You ever wonder why you bounce back the way you do, boy?”
- Root anomaly peels some of Joe’s “skin” metaphorically/visually in a vision,
- He gets a glimpse of what he really is.

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## 7. Pappy as a Table Tool (What You Can Use Him For)

### 7.1 Lore Delivery

- Pappy is your:
  - On-demand war flashback,
  - Walking testimony about Korrin,
  - Emotional vector for “the Root is not a toy.”

Whenever you need to:

- Explain a past decision,
- Show the cost of D’serris’s choice,
- Make the leyline feel like real horror,

You have Pappy “ride” Joe for a scene.

### 7.2 Moral Compass / Anti-Compass

- He’s not neutral. He’s *biased as hell*:
  - Hates magic bureaucracy,
  - Distrusts Oversight,
  - Sees Root stuff as tools that got out of hand.
- That’s useful:
  - Sometimes he’s right (“don’t overclock the node, dumbass”),
  - Sometimes he’s dangerously wrong (“cut the trunk, who cares about the casualties?”).

You can put Joe in situations where:

- Pappy urges the “war solution,”
- Friends / teachers urge the “school solution,”
- Joe has to choose.

### 7.3 Coherence Hook

- The Coherence recognizes Pappy’s imprint as:
  - A familiar pattern from when it was “born.”
- It may:
  - Use Pappy as a voice,
  - Copy his mannerisms,
  - Try to talk to Joe in Pappy’s voice even when the action figure is *not* active.

Creepy angle:

- Joe hears Pappy saying:
  - “We pushed the line too far…”
  - Then the voice shifts mid-sentence, same tone but wrong rhythm:
    - “…and we are still pushing. I remember you. You remember me.”

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## 8. Player-Facing Hooks (Teasers You Can Leak)

Stuff you *can* let slip in-game, piece by piece:

- Pappy:
  - Was at Korrin,
  - Saw the worst of the Crisis,
  - Calls D’serris “the bastard who saved the city and broke the world.”
- The toy:
  - Occasionally says things Joe never heard Pappy say in life,
  - Reacts to Root pulses,
  - Warms up or vibrates near subnodes.
- In visions:
  - Pappy sometimes seems to know more than a normal ground grunt should:
    - Glimpses of the control tower,
    - Awareness of the “heartbeat” pattern.

If you flip on the golem angle later:

- You can reveal:
  - Pappy’s body wasn’t entirely natural,
  - Joe’s never truly been “just a regular guy,”
  - The Root has a blueprint for “Football soldiers” tucked inside itself.

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