Quartz 4

Lord Arlo Santos

2 min read

Lord Arlo Santos

A smiling devil in fine boots, selling loyalty by the contract and betrayal by the clause.

What People Know

Lord Arlo Santos is the flamboyant, infuriating, and wildly successful head of the South Seas Merchantile Company, a globe-spanning mercenary and trade concern that blends merchant fleets, private soldiers, and deniable warfare into a single profitable machine.

He is Cajun-accented, silver-tongued, endlessly cheerful—and absolutely ruthless.

Reputation

  • Charismatic, slippery, and impossible to pin down

  • Trusted by no one, hired by everyone

  • Always arrives laughing, always leaves richer

Arlo Santos has survived wars, mutinies, coups, and clients who swore they would kill him.

He treats this as a résumé.

The South Seas Merchantile Company

Under Santos’ leadership, the Company:

  • Provides mercenaries for foreign wars

  • Escorts merchant fleets through hostile waters

  • Operates wherever official armies cannot—or will not

Publicly, it’s about protection and profit.

Privately, it’s about control of instability.

Arlo does not sell peace.

He sells outcomes.

Personality

  • Loud, theatrical, and endlessly amused

  • Treats danger like a shared joke

  • Never insults you directly—he lets the implications do the work

He calls everyone mon ami, especially people he intends to ruin.

Relationship with Torvold Alric

Torvold hates Arlo Santos, and with excellent reason.

Torvold is a former member of the South Seas Merchantile Company, and whatever happened between them was:

  • Personal

  • Unresolved

  • Absolutely Arlo’s fault

Arlo, for his part, speaks of Torvold warmly—like a man reminiscing about a favorite knife.

This makes it worse.

Power & Influence

Arlo Santos:

  • Has contacts in nearly every major port

  • Knows which wars are coming before they start

  • Maintains deniable assets everywhere the law thins

He does favors instead of alliances.

Favors always come due.

Rumors

  • Arlo keeps blackmail ledgers on every major client

  • He knows how to profit from the Infernal Empire without serving it

  • He has escaped execution more than once by changing sides mid-sentence

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