Preferred OOC Name : Septembersister Preferred Pronouns: She, her D&D Experience: I have been playing for seven years,
have completed two games. Anything of note you'd like to tell me: I am a LGBT player
too :) Discord info: Septembersister#0938 Character concept*, including: Character Name: An Zoúle Character Class: Sorcerer - Divine Soul Character Race: Aasimar (Scourge) Character Ability Scores: Str: 8, Dex: 10, Con: 16, Int: 12,
Wis: 10, Cha: 16 Character Alignment: CG Character Backstory: (Please note this backstory was written
for this campaign, but for different player characters and so would have to
have adjustments – but this should express the feeling of the character) Within the home of an
immigrant merchant family, a child was expected. The father, Guang Zoúle was a former Wu Jen practitioner
whose curiosity put him in possible opposition to the Celestial Emperor's
interests. A wizard of notable strength Guang always had an infatuation with
ways to enhance power through the quality of lineage. His envy for magically
born was an obsession, and also a source of lust when he discovered his wife. Hai's special characteristic had nothing to do with her
appearance, but with the line of succession from which she came from. Her
family had meticulously maintained their records which befell Guang's eyes once
he began his investigations of Uwaji's population. The Celestial Emperor had
wanted to know what persons were a part of his empire, never knowing Hai's
bloodline would ultimately seduce the Wu Jen first by mind and body afterword.
Hai was from a long line following back to heavenly beings which had once been
more active on Kara-Tur. Hai was fed emotionally by Guang's tunnel vision upon her
and the blood running through her veins. The woman of mild appearance and
daughter of comfortable (but not lavishly wealthy) inter-island merchant had
never had such a devoted suitor, especially not one of the Celestial Empror’s Wu
Jen. A relationship formed easily, Guang’s transpiring acts of
favoritism for Hai were caught shortly after their swift marriage. The Wu Jen
realized his career had been jeopardized by his need to keep secrets from the
Celestial Emperor, never thoroughly finishing the task of reporting to the lord
who among his people were of unique birth. Wanting to escape punishment Guang took his wife and fled
Wa, spanning oceans to toil their way to Amn’s harbor at the city of Athkatla.
While the city lived up to foreign reputation, drowning in affluence their
means were not able to sustain a life within the city nor did Guang find it
wise to stay at a harbor city with reputation reaching Kara-Tur fearing those
on his trail would guess his destination. The married couple continued through
Lake Esmel to Eshpurta where their exchanged purse held more purchasing power
and whose heavy prejudice against arcane researchers was perfect disguise for
his inter-continental escape. While languages and customs were different, Hai knew
mercantile methods: to the residents of Espurta the Zoúles were the sellers of
home goods: clothing, brooms, buckets, shovels, and much more that convinced
the population of welcoming and keeping these new residents. Life was humble but Guang didn’t let go his desire of Hai’s
blood and the potential of her blood becoming a part of his own descendants.
The fetishization of her body fed Hai’s ego into narcissism. After being among
the Eshpurta people for several years, learning their language and settling
themselves permanently into the city they conceived. During the summer nights
of early pregnancy the Eastern wizard manipulated and magically bombarded the
child in Hai’s womb. Gaung wanted the thing he had sacrificed everything else
for: a child of magical birth. Then, he theorized, he could make such related
blood his own source of power. Hai was sickly during her pregnancy. As she worked away wood
carving and weaving in the backyard the tea she drank was spiked with his
reagents. At night Gaung was casting magic upon her, and during the day
praising her each step of gestation. Hai never suspected what Gaung was doing
caught busy in the life of a working class woman. The result of the birth was
exactly what the Wu Jen aimed for. With white hair, silver eyes and a radiant presence Gaung
had brought out the Aasimar blood from Hai’s linage. This boy was named An. An
was a magnet of interest for the locals of Eshpurta, a blessing to welcome
foreigners some believed. As An was of Kara-Tur ethnicity, the people of Amn
did not judge the Aasimar baby on such lines. Goods sold in rapid rate now that
there was a unique baby to also see. Gaung’s passion was his weakness. An was not even two before
the Wu Jen began his first incisions. Careful extractions of the holy-touched
blood. It was to be an accidental fall, the slash of a branch, gradual
miscellaneous actions that children stumbled through as they matured. Hai saw
no deeper than the surface of her own greatness: the child of her line to give
birth to the renewed Aasimar power. Hai clung to her genetic greatness for the
loss of her economic prosperity. An screamed when his father approached, nothing happened
from it. An hid behind his mother and was punished for it, especially when the behavior
was around customers. The Aasimar child’s natural inclination to believe in the
warmth and trust of others ended when he understood he had no place to turn for
safety. His father cut into him and took what he wanted. An was dressed in
white to accentuate his Aasimar ancestry and features, and he felt more
comfortable to be entirely covered to cover the fresh incisions his father left
on his body. By the age of six An kept his head down, set his silvery
eyes on the back of his father’s skull only when the man was turned. Gaung had
changed their fortunes: they were moving from merchant living to wealthy
aristocrats. Gaung used the blood to create new magic which he spun through
politics in the background of the city to gain a new social position. Skin blemished with lines of eager greed, An hid himself
behind his clothes and shook with a quiet and vile rage. His body was never
safe and now his home was uprooted suddenly. He feared if he was no longer the
son of a merchant, he would no longer see the public who came often. There
would be no escape from his father and his mother who never helped him. The
six-year-old divine child watched hired men take away things. And by carriage
the boy was led away from his once small two story home, reliving the memories
of his treasured past. In the wealthier part of the militaristic city Gaung and Hai
were conducting men where to put their things, An watching from the new foyer
of the home. Each step through the house nurtured all his paranoia. The true
belief there was going to be no escape. In the mind of a six year old the mark
was dampening to his potential to be loving or joyful. Fear and rage boiled in
his quiet form. His parents had walked up the stairs, overlooking the curved
walls of their foyer and were discussing what to do to embellish their home
when as Gaung took a step An reached out his hand. Somehow his will, his fear
and pain manifested into a spell which pushed Gaung upon Hai and both toppled
down the stone stairs. At the bottom the loud cracks and sudden endings of
their screams called An to look. The mangled twist of his parents' bodies
caused him to tremble. Was it over? The affair was scandalous, his parents' death seen as a
tragic accident and people wept for the pleasant and blessed foreign merchants
who had assimilated well into their community. The orphan Aasimar boy was talk
of Eshpurta but to keep things neutral and avoid politics Brother Benitus
decided it was best if the church took the heavenly child rather than any vying
home. Bringing him into the care of his preferred Chapel, Helm's,
An was among faces very different to him. His parents never took him to church
despite his divine blood. The young child's first steps into a building free of
his hurtful parents sent him into a weeping spell. Later as Brother Benitus
personally helped An bathe and get accustom to the chapel did the holy man see
the cuts all over the child's body that had once been concealed. An was
painfully ashamed and when the brother cried, An felt a terrible sense of guilt
for the kind older man. He decided at that moment that baring his body would do
nothing but hurt others. That night as he laid in bed, looking at the moon
through a pane window he realized that what he had did to his parents was a
good thing and yet their teachings infected his heart. He shouldn't speak, to
not be a trouble. An committed himself to silence and fury, doing the tasks he
needed to do in Helm's Chapel with his heart poisoned by his past. The boy grew out his hair, and donned robes, doing
everything to hide and cover his body. The scars fascinated him as much as the
day his parents died. When he reached out and his father fell over, the zing up
his spine, he had to wonder if that was what Gaung was trying to cut out of
him? To take away? To get rid of? As he was getting older he was becoming aware
of a power inside but without the voice to ask if it was a good thing, the
peaceful feelings his power provoked him to feel were only tied to the death of
his parents: an act of murder. Not only until he was raised in the chapel did
he begin to realize he had done something morally abhorrent in the eyes of Helm
and Brother Benitus and thus only sealed his lips from ever speaking of the
event. At nine-years-of-age An tripped when he was tending the
chapel garden and cut his hand as he fell with the blade. It had been a while
since he was wounded, when he saw the faintly glowing blood the growing youth
realized how different he was from the Humans surrounding him. His blood was
unique, in some way he didn't know but felt. Laying on his knees he wondered
why his father cut him open, was it for that palpable thing An couldn't
comprehend? Still the boy kept to a self imposed oath of silence. (Fused backstory with Hope) As he laid in the grass a boy approached him, there was the
most fearsome and strange face An had ever seen. With skin red as darkened
clay, ears jagged and obtuse, and sprouting horns straight from his forehead
the Aasimar shocked out of his mind. At the time the reddish boy attempted to
speak but what was said never reached An's ears truly, he drew back his
bleeding hand, gasped and felt the sting of tears come to his eyes. The white
haired youth never gave any reply, intervention by a sister of Helm cut the
anxious meeting short. An was quick to leave the garden with the sister, yet he
glanced back as the distance grew. The Assimar was as afraid as he was intrigued. That boy too
had to have very strange, and very sick blood An believed. Brother Benitus
explained there were people with other lineages, from other places outside of
Eshpurta's walls or his god's reach. An was certain what made the boy in the
garden was from a sick lineage for he looked like a demon. The things Helm
smite and other goodly holy powers fought were able to become a part of people?
What did it do to them? Again the boy was quiet, asking questions he once only
thought about himself and his own blood. Brother Benitus only saw and heard the
silent, pensive, face of the Aasimar youth - never knowing the deeper dialogue
the child was having. Two months came and went, An tending dutifully to
maintaining the Chapel of Helm as guided by brothers and sisters. Finally a
brother asked him to buy basic groceries for some of the religious congress to
eat. Taking a basket with him to the market the Aasimar was stunned to find the
demon-boy among the crowd. An couldn't stop staring, eyes fluttering in shock
to see the fiend again. He truly existed, the strange youth and his warped
blood. At a distance An shopped, view not off of the unknown child for long. He had stared too long and the demon-boy noticed. On that
day An fled quickly. And soon this became a repeating pattern, somehow the two
moving to the market for their own reasons at a similar time weekly. It surged
An's anxiety, curiosity, and his judgments. They nodded occasionally, the
demon-boy started the cordial behavior and An felt uneasy and went along.
Gradually An was getting used to the face and in a strange way hoping to see
the thing that made him worry and question. Resistance was worn down by
persistence, and when An was able to keep eye contact with the demon-boy in
their unusual acquaintance, the youth vanished. He stopped arriving at the
market after a year of the pattern. Often An kept his affairs to himself but now with the fiend
gone the Aasimar asked his fatherly figure Brother Benitus where the demon-boy
had gone. An amused and curious Brother Benitus told An Hope was a squire on
his way to become a paladin and that his quests took him away from Eshpurta.
The brother asked why An was curious and the Aasimar fled without a reply. He
himself didn't have the answer, and the thoughts surrounding Hope didn't carry
the purity people claimed An represented. The divine-blooded boy kept in Helm's Chapel, studied and
practiced with other children and young adults: the orphans and wayward looking
for direction. An kept his eyes onto the holy book, followed the practices the
youths were going through to connect to Helm. The connection was hollow for An,
too many questions, too many disagreements within himself and the theology of
the benevolent god. Helm was oppressive to him, controlling in his virtue to be
good. On top of this An's magic was growing and blossoming from within giving
him holy gifts and elemental powers in an unexplainable strange mixture none of
the brothers or sisters understood or could explain to An. Hope's return was an unexpected experience. He arrived a
year later, oblivious to the time passed. And the squire was wounded. An at the
time felt very overwhelmed by Hope's energy and intention to do good, but built
a skepticism since learning of Hope's lineage. The two made a pact of
friendship, with An's hands stained in Hope's blood the Aasimar condemned the
Tiefling from lying to him ever again. Their friendship solidified over seven years. An while ever
prone to being quiet began to speak more with Hope, daring to leave his
silence. And Hope never broke his vow to be truthful to his friend. An met
Hope's family, becoming very acquainted with Hope's life and becoming a part of
it. He saw negative sides of the Tiefling, side the Aasimar
suspected would there. Through Hope's habit of drinking poked out the violent
evil that An was searching for conformation of at all times. Though Hope fought
for control, apologized for his mistakes, An remembered and kept them in his
heart with suspicion. An saw the positive, serving by the young paladin as agents
of good for Eshpurta's chapels of the benevolent deities. Working side by side,
An and Hope have developed a synergistic fighting style and understand of each
other's movements in combat. And as always, Hope was the one to get them into
the troubles, including the work which has exposed the duo to other strange new
people into their social circle. Now An, and Hope work with the others in work relationships
Hope stumbles into and An follows quietly
Anything else about the character you'd like to tell me: An
has a written personality too if you’d like that information. He is an LGBT
character :)
