{ app for noctium }

[drawsblood]

« PLAYER INFORMATION »

Name: Megan
Are you over 18?: Yes
Contact: fairandbright
Other characters, if any: Ashe

« CHARACTER INFORMATION »

Character: Joric
Canon: Original Character
Canon point: traveling in search of a mage who can cure him
OU or AU?: OU
Age: 31
Species: Human

« RECORD »

Disposition:

• Irritable: This personality trait is mainly magically induced. The spell in his mind pushes out rage while trying to suppress his own consciousness and to do that it slowly builds from irritation, to anger, to rage. Therefore, small things that wouldn't feel like a big deal to others are a trigger for him because it sets off the spell. A person knocking into him, a baby's cries, tripping over something are all things that can make him more irritated than one could reasonable expect. However, at this point being irritable is second nature to him. He can recognize the signs of the spell activating and if he feels that irritation he engages in activities to try and distract himself from focusing on it. If he thinks about it, he increases the irritation, but if he's able to ignore it, it may die down on his own.
  
  
• Protective: Joric became a soldier to protect those who couldn't protect themselves. He feels there's not much he's good for, but he was built tall and strong, so he might as well throw his physical form at threats and hit them. He sees it as simply something he can do, so he should. While he's aware of how society works and if he does a job for someone, he should be paid, he also recognizes that sometimes you have to step into a situation to save another and expect nothing in return. The gods favor those who are brave and risk their lives, knowing it could end at any moment, so they welcome all brave people to their afterlife of Folkheim.
  
  
• Honest: The people of Joric's mountain home are hardy, brave, and true. A liar in their society is a coward, and cowards can't go to the afterlife, therefore they are raised from the crib to be honest people. This leads them to come across as blunt and sometimes rude, but the truth is far easier to own than to construct a winding path of lies that are easy to mix up or forget. This doesn't mean, of course, that no one in his land has ever lied, but when discovered in a lie of some severity, the person (if they're an adult, a child can be taught better) is banished from the mountains to live with their shame elsewhere while knowing they will never achieve Folkheim. Also if Joric doesn't want to reveal something he just... doesn't say it. It's not lying if you choose to stay silent.
  
  
• Stubborn: Being a seasoned soldier that's survived everything life has thrown at him so far, Joric believes his way of doing things to be right and has a hard time backing down from that assumption. While he'll listen to different points of view, his will is like the unmovable mountain: no matter how much the wind blows against it, the mountain stands tall. So too does Joric. Especially now that he has this magical curse on him, he feels better with sticking to what he believes, because his will alone isn't strong enough to suppress the spell, and at times he feels weak because of it. Being stubborn is his way of exercising some control when he feels he has none.
  
  
• Self-loathing: And of course, this inability to exert his will over the spell and control it means Joric has a heavy dose of self-hatred going on. Warriors in his land are fierce, praised for their strength and cunning, yet nothing he's done has been able to brute strength or outwit the spell laid on him. It makes him feel like a failure and also pathetic, because he went into this volunteering to protect his people and thinking that this was the right thing. It turned out to be the worst thing that could have happened and he considers himself gullible to have trusted those mages in the first place.
  
  Under pressure: Joric's main motivation in his story is to find someone who can reverse the magic spell laid on him and cure him of his excessive rage. His backstory is one of pride in his homeland and people, which led him to become a soldier to protect them. This led to his skills and strength in battle catching the eye of the Fjelldalr army's council of mages, who were toying with the idea of placing a spell on a person to enhance their berserker rage. Joric volunteered, but unfortunately the spell was too powerful and he was difficult to control, both on and off the battlefield. The mages claimed they couldn't figure out how to reverse it, and Joric felt himself deteriorating as the rage episodes became more frequent. The penalty for abandoning the army was death and he would be branded as a coward (those who are barred entry to the afterlife) until caught, but he ran off anyway in order to find a cure. Along the way, he took work as a mercenary, soldier-for-hire, etc. in order to prove to the gods that he was still brave and willing to risk his life, but always searching for someone with enough talent in magic to cure him.
  
  His personality shifted from a man who was fun-loving, carefree, and passionate, to someone reserved, sullen, and afraid to get close to others for fear he might hurt them. Not long into his journey, he found an alchemical potion meant to calm a person that could hold back his rage if he took it the moment he felt it building. This helped him to take on odd jobs where he would be around people for longer periods of time. Despite this, he still preferred to keep to himself and not get close to others emotionally. And it was only a bandage to the wound; not the cure he was hoping for.
  
  There will be a big shift once he arrives in game to discover that his rage is being held back (much like with his potion) but not cured. There will be the tentative desire to get to know others and reach out to form connections. At the same time, he'll be dealing with the fact that the spell is still inside him and trying to do its job: manifesting rage. He'll be prone to dark moods, irritation, and bouts of anger. There will definitely be a weighing of his options and whether it wouldn't be best to not expose others to the way he is while knowing that making connections here is necessary and how far he can go without needing to before his body starts to go into Chrysalis. Eventually he'll find some sort of balance and hopefully find people to engage in Synchrony with who understand his nature. He'll have to open up and explain his situation like he hadn't had to before now.
  
  Condition upon arrival: Joric suffers from the effects of a magic spell placed on him that's meant to enhance his berserker rage in battle. The spell affects him outside of battle, ramping up his anger until his conscious self is suppressed and the spell activates berserker rage mode. He can't tell friend from foe and will kill everyone in his path unless restrained, he runs out of bodies, or his body wears itself out and he reverts to himself again. I'd like this to be somewhat suppressed in game, so there's no danger of him going into a blackout rage, but the spell still affects him; for example it makes him more irritable and liable to lash out, but it's a mild case of anger.
  
  Abilities: Joric was trained as a soldier and has skills with a greatsword as well as hand-to-hand combat. Non-combat skills include horseback riding and living off the land, including building a campsite. He's built strong and hardy, and coming from the mountains the cold bothers him much less than the average person, though on the flip side, he gets overheated easily.
  
  Inventory: A backpack containing a few sets of clothes and a cloak, food, hygiene items, and glass bottles containing a calming potion for his rage. He also carries his sword in a scabbard.
  
  Gembond: Amethyst
  Gem Location: centered at the top of his back
  

« MISCELLANEOUS »

Sample: One | Two

Notes: Some additional personal history: Joric comes from the nation of Fjelldalr: a loose confederation of mountain clans that band together in times of war or to trade women between clans. In his late teens, Joric left the Vængrskr clan to join the nation's army where he showed a knack for military tactics, especially coming up with new plans on short notice. After years of service, he volunteered for a magical experiment to enhance a warrior's berserker rage in battle to make him a living weapon. Unfortunately, the magic laid on him worked too well, and he was deemed too dangerous to remain unsupervised. His rage episodes would manifest outside of battle and would cause him to black out while his body took over, trying to destroy everyone around him. He was assigned a mage healer to be his handler, but once it became clear that the mages didn't know how to reverse the spell they put on him, he ran away from the mountains in search of a cure. As he traveled, he discovered a calming potion from an alchemist that could often hold back the rage if he caught it early enough, but after a year of taking the potion regularly, he began to notice it no longer worked as well as it once had and he continued his search for a cure, often taking short mercenary jobs to make a little gold in between stays alone out in the wild away from people.