Briza

Echo

@Mokley I didn't want him to be a boring introvert. :b Oh well~

Echo

Haha, I'm kind of under the impression I should have made Dr. Howell interact more.

THE UNDYING CRUSADE

Nikolai von Krähenvald

_NAME

Nikolai von Krähenvald

_AGE

23 years

_APPEARANCE

As an average featured man, standing at a good 1.87 meters, Nikolai is not exactly close to being considered a small creature. However, he is definitely not the tallest creature that resides in Operath, especially in terms of his agile appearance attributed to his lean but strong and firm form accentuated by his line of work and living situations. Nikolai has a fair complexion, tanned by an abundance of laboring outside, which has aged the younger man by several years. It is clear he is in the prime of his life despite all, especially for his clean shaven face (attributed to his embarrassing lack of an ability to grow a full beard). His dark hair is pulled into one braid that rests just above his upper back, bangs and other stray hairs hanging down randomly. A goldish color band is tied around his braid—a childhood gift from his father. Along with his dark hair, he also has dark eyes and thickish eyebrows. His mouth is small and generally pensive. Although, he is not humorless.

_RACE
Human

_DEITY

Belia, The Queen in the Mountain

_PERSONALITY

As the young idealist human male who is strong and sturdy like the majority of the creatures dwelling in the Operath Mountain range of Aithun, Nikolai bares a traditionally strong bond of honor in the name of Belia, the Queen of the Mountain, to uphold the well-being of his family, which (now) consists of a fallen father, a resolute mother, who took full reigns as head of the household upon her husband’s death (many years ago), and two sisters (both younger than Nikolai).

Upon his father’s death, Nikolai took up the title as the sole male of the household and thus wears the responsibility of some patriarchal duties but only under the heel of his weakened mother, which has warranted a repressed tension of violent idealization for some such naturally born rough and masculine tendencies. However, despite such a shadowed acquisition in his unexplored mindset, in front of his wonder for blood, there is a carefully built mask of chivalrous bravery and piety for survival and protection of not just his loved ones but for his kingdom, as well.

His projected attitude could be summed up as prude and straight-forward for all seriousness sake, as for a want of transparency in his core beliefs. Beating around the bush does not bode well amongst the many times that all too florally of language has butterflied around his home life due to the nature of the women struggling through the grimness of society. In such a hidden, contempt attitude towards the glass case of an atmosphere, even his poetic skills to attract a creature for wedding and reproduction purposes has become a rather more or less foul taste reminiscing the thought of the lure being an unnecessary distraction in his mental process (if anything, matrimony has failed to make any such sense to him, as his main goal is to stay alive on the battlefield, regain his family’s fallen status—such a procedure with a depressingly high failure rate). Nonetheless, if he is not being straight-forward, then it is because of some cowardly disposition to be sarcastic under the protectionist nature that he has unwittingly found himself amongst the minority during a social situation.

<sub>SKILLS

MASTERFUL -</sub> Purist
_{SKILLFUL -} Mace Weaponry , Athletics
_{ADEPT -} Horsemanship, Melee Combat
_{NOVICE -} Endurance, First Aid

<sub>TRAITS

PRIDEFUL -</sub>
Holding unwaveringly with a fundamentalist's faith in the traditions of Operath and her historical background with his family’s name, Nikolai has taken an almost hypocritical view of the religious order and pomp associated with Belia. While the external demeanor of Nikolai bares such a cross of hard contemplation dedicated to the thoughtful desires for the will of the Queen of the Mountain, his inward skeptical nature of disgust from belittling the noticeably fallen, imperfect nature of the creatures around him plays an heavy, shadowed hand in the puppeteering of his mental workings and inner thoughts. For such reasons, he often fails to see his own faults as he is too preoccupied in the shunning of other creatures’ unholy habits. However, a boldness in the belief of himself can also be attributed.

_{CONSERVATIVE -}
Despite any neglecting of his own imperfections, Nikolai is a rather conservative young man in more ways than just the driving need to uphold Operath’s traditions. His abstaining from many physical desires such as alcohol, over-celebration, indecent exposure of sexual recreation, or self-indulgent oral banter with other creatures are several other such examples of his self-restraint. To say he is perfectly conservative, would, of course, be incorrect.

_{SADIST -}
As every creature has his own addiction, Nikolai's bad habit comes from some blood lust fantasy of heroic victory. While others may be dreaming about lustful novelty conquers housed in their sheets or other alternate social events of pleasure, Nikolai’s mind is caught in the offensive realm of carnage. As many fantasies start off small and grow with time, this particular habitual idealization is still blossoming, having been planted some time ago. It is assumed his pleasure in gore could very well be the death of him as each kill on the battlefield becomes less and less thrilling as the last, and thus, leading his desire to become disturbingly unsustainable.

_{OBSESSIVE -}
What could appear to an outsider as a clear, focused, and determined spirit in Nikolai is actually an obsession with several ideas: helping reclaim the three kingdoms from the Undying, restore honor to his family’s name, practice piety towards the honorable and blessed Queen of the Mountain, Belias, and an unhealthy curiosity for manslaughter. The order in which these obsessions toy with Nikolai shift throughout whatever scenario or external environment he has found himself. Whatever the case, most things to which he has dedicated his time are all in some roundabout way a means to accomplishing his goals—no matter how hypocritical or similar onto which these fixations are held.

_BACKSTORY

It wasn’t so spectacular that the wealth of Belia’s Cardle had survived the War of Ruins, as Operath’s traditional politics and placement against Aith Anur gave the mountain kingdom an upper edged sword during the shocking and devastating blood bath. For such reasons, a little less than a decade after the War of Ruins, the wealthy heir of a prominent fortune and land in Operath’s capital, Belia’s Cradle, Roch von Krähenvald wedded Helena Grekova as his wife. After one miscarriage, Helena was able to bare Roch his first born son and child, Nikolai von Krähenvald. Unfortunately, as fate would have it, the surprise attacks that birthed the War of Perseverance stole Roch from his wife and son for a six long years as duty called him to battle (his very own father had died in the War of Ruins). Roch would have been gone longer if he had not been severely wounded during battle. It was for this reason, Nikolai barely knew his father until the age of eight when the first memory of his father as a bedridden man with doctors and nurses redundantly tending to him became engraved in his mind. As much as he wanted his father to live—holding family as an extreme importance and honor in which to participate, a detachment kept him from believing in sorrow from the man’s failing, crippled body. Even his mother was beginning to lose hope, fearing her husband’s fate would be the same as his father’s, and she, too, began detaching apron strings while picking up trails for alternatives on how to make ends meet.

However, as a strong and determined man of Operath, Roch made a full recovery just as the War of Perseverance ended. His recovery was so successful (almost invisible had it not been for the the outward scars) that Helena and he were able to bare two more children: two daughters, Esther von Krähenvald and Maria von Krähenvald. From the generous gift of Belias, the Krähenvald family cherished the blessing of Roch’s second chance of life. Helena made pious endeavors to rear their children in a strong and faithful atmosphere focused on Belias. It appeared that Belias not only brought about a full recovery for Roch, but she also blessed the family further with strong roots for optimistic convictions and a historical understanding of their family’s name and long-lived noble succession in Operath. The thankfulness and foolishly given blessings dissuaded the very thought of Roch falling ill or getting a fluke injury and dying before any of his children reached adulthood were secluded from their minds.

Of course, the grimness of the three kingdoms, perpetually enchanting in the constant reminder of the wars (past, future, and soon to be present), was a heavy tole on anyone born in such a bleak wasteland of war torn societies, and, therefore, Helena thanked Belias with almost every breath that her family was a whole one exulting in what cheerfulness they could scavenger and cherish for such a reason. However, when the news of Roch’s horse riding incident during a mere recreational outing that killed him on impact, the family was completely devastated. It was something akin to the straw that broke the camel’s back. Not only was Roch’s death a heartbroken tragedy, but their nobility was stripped from them—just as Helena had fretted so tirelessly during Roch’s bedridden days of recovery post his return from the War.

All was not lost, or so Helena would say to her grief stricken children. If it wasn’t for Roch’s war injuries, the family would have been in much further financial turmoil. Fortunately, Helena being a strong and capable woman, as many females of Operath may be, she led the family northward through the mountains of Operath to a humble city nested carefully in the workings of the kingdom. Life was anything but easy. Nikolai noted the difference more than his younger sisters, having been accustomed to the pillows of wealth he nursed from in Aith Anur. The sudden shift in family dynamics was a hard concept to grasp for Nikolai’s conservative mindset trying to adjust away from such a hard-earned and patriarchal household political system.

It wasn’t much help for his psyche that his family was turned into horse farmers for a family with decent monetary wealth. Helena reminded the family that Belias was taking care of them and allowing them a blessed opportunity to not bare any hatred or resentment towards the creatures that potentially caused their father’s death. Despite his mother’s pious words, her constant hand wringing to remind each other of the history of the Krähenvald family name, caused deep turmoil in Nikolai as his mind found violent relief in fantastically outlets upon which his body could not possibly act while under the influence of the matriarch of the household. The very backbone of Nikolai was the earliest memories of his childhood as being raised through noble etiquette, watching the successful struggle of his father’s survival through near fatal war wounds, and the pious prayers whispered from his mother’s mouth when she thought no one was looking. He was embarrassingly frustrated with his father’s death being on a stupidly fluke accident and the all too humbling of living arrangements.

He could see a class difference in the mindset between himself and his sisters. It was degrading to watch his sisters grow into lower-class skinned women weathered by the outdoors from constant labor. The owners of the horse farm, Alwin Engelhorn, must have taken notice and pity on Nikolai’s disposition because the man took it upon himself to help Nikolai continue his training in Swordsmanship and Arcane Purist, while also throwing in skills he himself deemed necessary for every male to know, Melee Combat and First Aid. Nikolai outwardly appreciated and thanked Alwin through respect, obedience, and kind hearted gestures, but these things were mostly done out of instilled politeness. It was in Nikolai’s mind that it was the least Alwin could do, and his pious, noble childhood deserved such a treatment.

Nikolai’s obsession with re-taking the nobility in the Krähenvald name only increased with Alwin’s steady guidance. Locked up impatience fueled the quite, pale rage in him. In fact, he was almost too excited at the news of the War of Reclamation. There was not much recklessness in his decision to obtain glory for the Kingdom of Operath and his family’s name, but there was much thought out determination and a taste for unleashing the impatient beast waiting for his first murder. Helena was no stranger to the honor of seeing a family member off to war, but she did have a worrying softness in her heart as she watched her only son leave with the promise of restoring the Krähenvald’s name to nobility. “If it is in the Queen of the Mountain Belias’ will,” became her mantra of pious comfort.

<sub>WEAPONS AND ARMOR

KURSIV -</sub>
A roughly 2 meter, all-steel Morning Star, a prominent component for bashing and crushing the the enemy by penetrating through armor, other tough exteriors, and, of course, bones.

_{KITE SHIELD -}
A roughly 1 meter long shield made from hardened leather and iron components. Nikolai managed to purchase this for himself and thus, the shield is insipid and has not outstanding markings on it.

_{LIGHT STEEL ARMOR -}
Breastplate, shoulders, wrist guards, gloves (combined with flexible leather gripping), and shin plates. Nikolai’s armor is what has been left as an honorably saved (and perhaps only) inheritance from his father.

_{BLACK LEATHER ARMOR -}
Upper arms sleeves and 3/4ths legs coverings, tough knee boots, and a leather hawk face helmet (a gift from Alwin having known his father’s helmet was destroyed in battle and in wanting to attribute something to the Aves class of Nikolai’s surname).

_{MISCELLANEOUS GEAR & POSSESSIONS}

▸ Small camel colored sack containing:

Scissors, bistoury knife, willow bark, honey, cobwebs, spaghnum moss, live snails, and other such small gadgets for survival.

▸ Small pouch for coins

▸ Goldish hairband tying his braid together.

▸ Handmade string necklace with a small tanzanite gem attached to it; a gift of good fate wished from his oldest sister.

THE UNDYING CRUSADE

Color me interested, s'il vous plaît.

Echo

Briza is mostly (patiently) waiting for other people to reply before attempting to write Dr. Howell's third post.

Echo

Doctor Quinn Howell

---

As the spritely voice answered his subtle inquisition, Dr. Howell tensed the muscles in his arms, abdomen, and thighs, and pushed his frame upward into a sitting position as his visuals were made aware of more people who had been seemingly awakened out of something similar to his own state of affairs (unless he was jumping to unruly and falsely thought of answers). It was during the explanation that the severe oddity of the disposition of which he had now found himself that he came to the embarrassing realization that he was nude. As a conservative man, the pod’s lap beneath his bare bum was unwarrantly distracting as his mind raced through theories for the extent of research and teeth that had been pulled to make this possible.

There were doubts, though. His fingers were rubbing his forehead, now—noticing miraculously to the extent of which the memory of his death and perhaps even his entire life before the fatal blow could have been a false one. There was no scar, no bullet hole… He remembered being a man of some sort of intelligence, yet grasping the entirety of how his current positioning had befallen him was quite puzzling and a flag for questioning the truthfulness of the statements being given to him by a man he knew nothing of made all too much sense by everything he had been conceivably taught. And yet, the tale end of his brother’s presence, as if maybe he had been part of the memory, which had eluded him so vigorously upon his push to consciousness, was keeping him relatively calm as his mind continued scrambling to make sense of the science and technology being thrown at him much harder than the soft robe which had fallen into his pod. It all seemed so believable despite the absurdity.

But, had the memory of his brother even been real?

Of course, he had been. Dr. Howell’s mind wasn’t ready to dismiss his brother’s life as something fabricated. He doubted it ever would, which coincidentally lead him to believe the man’s answers.

And, so, if the man was telling the truth—Dr. Howell’s eyes scanned the ceiling, the physiques of the other captives or patients, rather, as he mustered up enough hollow trust to endure the man as an honest one as opposed to the paranoid idea that something preposterous or unethical had sabotaged him, bestowed faux love for an imaginary family—then he was genuinely fascinated, giddy in the way a child would be if handed a lucrative amount of money to buy whatever candy he possible could carry out of the candy shop by himself. However, his eagerness was somewhat healthier than the desire of a child’s uncontrolled persistence to consume ungodly amounts of sugar and other such waxy preservative he generally avoided.

More than the death of his younger brother that had helped elevate his lust for knowledge, his own death and revival was coursing question after question after question of pure interest through his veins and awakening nerves. But first, Dr. Howell tucked his arms into the robe. The scent pressed through his nose as a token for a second chance of exploration and procedure experiments…

A stark grin more stoic than normal, as piece by piece the moments, before his death, connected each other in a suspenseful playback of how his pride to live undoubtedly killed a man, suddenly caused the inquiring questions on the subject he had just been exposed to drift away from him. Was he getting a second chance because he had been a good man? No, no, he had murdered a man. He knew the operation would fail, but he still did it…

Dr. Howell might have been lost for another half hour reviewing the past revelation of his first death if it were not for the jovially concerned tanned man, standing tall, confidently, going right to business, and questioning the affairs of Sink. The doctor’s dark eyes focused on the man, younger than him by facial features and bone structure, but he apparently was gliding through this transition of scientific necromancy much better than he himself was—and showing more awareness of the state of affairs the kingdom had been under than his own naïve self had been prior to whatever it was that was happening.

“I was dead for five years,” he spoke to no one in particular, astonished that this technology existed so amazingly. His excitement, again by the thought of his brother, subdued. The heaviness he had been feeling earlier was still present but shifting in tone at the unfortunateness of not having held onto the elusive memory because it occurred to him that he had possibly been comfortable being dead--in the same place with his brother, again. Nevertheless, Dr. Howell generally was not someone who lived primarily for himself—except in those last minutes, which he now had the opportunity to correct (assuming the answers being given were all true, and judging by the younger, more assertive male, the truth was more than likely given).

The rope around his robe was tightened into a knot; fabric shifted over his body before he pulled himself out of the pod and let the bottom of his feet touch the cool ground beneath the soles of his feet. His vision scanned the area once more from a standing point of view, observing the machinery, the workings. His heart was thumping quickly, despite his calm face. He wanted answers, but first, realizing the important ones and categorizing them was necessary. It was a fascinating situation; very fascinating.

Echo

Life hit me in the face this week; I am going to try and get a post up this coming weekend, though.

Echo

Doctor Quinn Howell

---

The tail end of a memory was swimming through Dr. Howell’s mind like an important piece of information he was about to lose and never recover, again, except as it slowly disappeared down the stream, it’s importance seemed to become less and less interesting and valuable. His need for the memory turned into a want and then it turned into nothing more than a misunderstanding that shouldn’t have warranted his attention in the first place. As the thought vanished, his eyelids were pried open by covered flesh that felt all too familiar like the movements of human fingers. The chase of that distant memory had now completely vanished in the wake of a blinding light.

Fluorescent brightness riddled through his dazed pupils while his eyes tried desperately to focus and unfocus at the same time. Remnants of confusion fostered questionably in his unbearably scattered mind. He could feel his eyebrows knitting together as his face tensed in a failing attempt to ease the pain of bright exposure puncturing his sight as several words were spoken to him--something of appraisal or pleasant satisfaction coming from a masculine voice that seemingly hovered over him. Right as the voice silenced itself, the light clicked off, and Dr. Quinn’s mind visually fell into the remembrance of a dark cave located inside the barrel of a gun staring at him straight in the face before a valve and a clicking sound administered some sort of shocking yet cliché-like fatal blow to his head.

Dancing blind spots pressed against his vision, which kept him from over reacting physically to the disturbingly exciting jolt of recollection playing out in his mind. Death. Yes, death. He was supposed to be dead, a lifeless corpse. His mouth opened; body reacting to some cheerfully spoken command as his mind began grasping for the tail end of that escaped memory he had just rendered useless and trivial before having his eyes forcefully opened. The feeling of a depressor touched gently down on his tongue before his mouth closed itself to the sound of another spoken command by the same voice. His fingers wiggled, slight stiffness unfolding oddly and continuing into the nerves moving the muscles in his toes. He had just died. That elusive memory, it was death wasn’t it?

Or was it?

The dark patches in his vision faded into the churning sounds of valves muttering steam and gurgling machinery hissing. His dark eyes tightly shut, again, scraping back the sensitivity that had just been invaded. His right hand found its palm pressed against his face, feeling the facial features that tightened from the perplexity and a mechanical need to answer the voice’s question. There were already too many of his own questions flooding his thoughts and trying to push inquiries, loud judgements, and hypothetical answers to stabilize the disarray of confusion overwhelming him. If only he could recapture that memory…

“Ah? Qu—Doctor Howell,” his hand drew away from his face and relaxed next to his nude body, still yet to be fully understood as completely exposed, “Doctor Quinn Howell,” the deepness of his voice sounded so distant to his memory as if he hadn’t heard himself speak in some time. Had he survived the gunshot by some rare chance and fallen into a coma? It seemed like the most plausible explanation as imperfect of a solution to his problem to understand the current situation as it was.

His eyes reopened, and vision registered the face above him. Gadgeted goggles stared down at him. They were not too foreign looking but very much futuristic in their own right. The machinery webbed above him and the man standing over him had its own age, rust, and the lingering stench of burning metal, copper maybe. Curiosity turned his head away from the pleased face and stared from the glass container around him. There were other pods—all identical in build and stature—assumed to be like the thing holding his own body. Several seconds of thoughts to alleviate the escalating pulse fluttering in his chest past through him before his attention came back to the sand haired man, “W-where are we?”

In all his years of practicing, this set up was much too abnormal to be a hospital, unless his predictions of the future had escalated incorrectly during his coma. A heavy sinking feeling rested against his chest, imagining his family, friends, patients, time lost. How long had he been out? He couldn't have been out for too long; his motor skills, reasoning, and response times were far too advanced and nimble for a prolonged state of anything worse than a minimally conscious state. Unless, of course, technology had taken a giant leap, which was disturbingly frustrating instead of intriguing in his flustered mind.

Echo

Let's do this.

Stuff! Things! Tragedy!

A very nondescriptive post that clearly exaggerates my lack of writing to properly introduce my character or further the plot. My post will also probably bring down the libido of other players, but at least, I posted in a timely manner.

That's the spirit.