Durgan is a compact, broad-shouldered male dwarf with ash-blond hair and a thick ash-blond beard braided with plain iron rings. The sides of his head are shaved close, while the longer hair on top and at the back is tied into a short working knot. He wears well-maintained chain mail beneath a heavy smith's apron, broad steel gauntlets, and a large, slightly rectangular shield scarred by furnace heat. His warhammer has an unusually oversized head, built more like a compact forging maul than a soldier's weapon. He walks with a deliberate, heel-first gait and keeps his shield arm slightly raised even when speaking, as if every room might contain a falling beam.

Durgan is patient, exacting, and more observant than his blunt manner suggests. He dislikes grand speeches, ornamental weapons, and people who confuse confidence with competence. He is unexpectedly gentle with damaged tools, apprentices, and animals that have been worked too hard. In danger, he becomes calmer, narrowing every problem to weight, leverage, timing, and the strongest point at which to strike.

Durgan Qar forged his first blade from a broken wagon hinge, not because anyone needed a blade, but because he wanted to learn why the metal had failed. His mother, a respected guild armorer, taught him that a good smith listens to flaws before striking them. Durgan became known for making ugly but dependable weapons, pieces with thick tangs, reinforced joints, and handles wrapped for hands that had already known too many winters. He never chased beauty, though his work often acquired it accidentally through balance and restraint. His place in the guild ended after he refused to sign off on a shipment of ceremonial arms whose steel had been secretly weakened to meet a noble client's deadline. The guild buried the dispute, the noble blamed Durgan for delaying the contract, and his own master advised him to leave before the matter became a blood feud. Durgan now travels as both guard and independent smith, carrying the oversized warhammer he forged from the rejected batch. He seeks contracts that let him test his craft against real danger, and evidence that the guild's corruption was not an isolated compromise but part of a larger scheme.