Kolanin

Kolanin is an old mansthein diplomat, a major POV character in The Brightest Shadow, and commander for the city of Bundlin.

Appearance and Personality
Kolanin looks slightly younger than his real age, but he's still a weary old man. As a mansthein he has red eyes, and as a seinan he has gray skin and silver hair, swept back and kept short. Though thin and not particularly tall, he's still physically fit due to his training. Mostly he wears practical robes in a mansthein style that doesn't match the Chorhan Expanse.

Though internally weary and worn down by his work, Kolanin is still at the core an optimist attempting to improve the world. He always returns kindness to those who offer the possibility of peace, even to his detriment. An able diplomat, he can use rhetoric, humor, and various modes to resolve conflicts.

History
Kolanin was presumably born on Orphos and had a strong upbringing as a seinan mansthein. Since he's roughly 60 years old at the beginning of the first book, he has a long history that isn't entirely known. It's implied that he was committed to being a warrior when he was younger, and obtained the Catai ranking, but left that path to become a diplomat.

UNFINISHED

Relationships
Tani: Slaten and Tani have a strong platonic relationship, frequently running together and sharing sein arts. When Tani goes through difficult experiences, Slaten struggles with knowing how to provide support.

Celivia: From their first meeting, Slaten is struck by Celivia. He offers her respect and trust where many others didn't, and Celivia teaches him her unusual self-damaging training technique.

Melal: The two young men have not gotten along from before the beginning of the story, and the rift between them only increases over time.

Teren: The girl from Slaten's village is one of Slaten's major motivations during the first book. He cares for her and she seems to view him as an older brother figure.

Abilities
Combat: Slaten is a naturally talented warrior with a work ethic that intimidates many others. He was originally trained with an Oken blade (noted to be an odd hybrid weapon) but is skilled with any sword. Most of his abilities focus on making him a better swordsman, but developments in his sein led him to develop a ranged sein burst.

Languages: Slaten speaks fluent Okeni (his mother tongue) and Coran. He is also actively trying to learn Futhik in order to speak to mansthein.

Games of Skill: Eraes notes that Slaten is a skilled player of Yenith, even though he was still learning, and noted that he was better at a game called Shiil.

Healing: By all accounts, Slaten was a very bad healer, capable of learning basic skills but helpless with sein arts. One imagines his bedside manner didn't help either.

Sein
Slaten's sein is noted to be effective but somewhat unbalanced, due to his fractured experiences and poor understanding of himself. It is a matter of some humor to Tani and others that his sein perceptions tend to be almost laughably stereotypical.

Taste: His primary experience of sein is the taste of blood.

Touch: A less developed sense, Slaten feels it as the sharpness of a blade.

Smell: In the first book Slaten gains the ability to smell sein as fire. This sense connects poorly to his others, leading to him developing it into a different technique.