Eero Vainomaa was born inland among the Sisämaa, where his kin kept old stone circles and left offerings to the metsänhenget in the pine-dark groves. As a child, he survived a winter storm that should have killed him; when they found him, he was clutching a warm black shard of stone no one recognized. The elders called it an omen.

Now grown, Eero has come from Pakkaheim, answering the call to adventure not for glory alone, but because the world sees wrong—spirits restless, old oaths fraying, and whispers of the shattered Kirokivi stirring old powers beneath the snow and sea. He believes his fate is tied to one of those fragments, and he intends to prove his worth by deed, not birth—the Saarivalkea way.