Empatheias App

[countryspellcasting]

⌈ PLAYER SECTION ⌉

Player:Mel

Contact:robotsforbrains

Age:33

Current Characters:N/A





⌈ CHARACTER SECTION ⌉

Character:Sigyl Frey

Age:25

OC Type: Pure

Point Taken: A week after reuniting with Galinda, came in during 4th wall



World Building:

Sigyl lives in the world of Terrha’in, that consists of six continents inhabited by varying cultures and governments. Magic is done by channeling the natural energies of the world through one's body and expelling back out to achieve certain effects. However, wizards tend to get extremely used to one kind of energy and the four quarters of the world contain slightly different energies so, while there may be areas where they mix (And only one relatively small area where all the energies converge) for the most part it's rare to see magic users outside of their native parts of the world unless a) they're very good, b) They're actively training or c) are doing something of great importance.



Humans also live alongside other races such as elves, dwarves and "beastfolk," people who resemble bipedal animals. Monsters exist alongside regular animals and are often treated as normal, if not more dangerous, parts of the regular wildlife. Certain monsters have been domesticated and are occasionally raised as farm animals.



Sigyl is specifically from the continent of Thornspane, a medium sized continent with around half of it belonging to the Leahdour Kingdom. Many decades before Sigyl was born, a monster rampaged through the continent, and especially terrorized the Leahdour Kingdom and the surrounding area. Four young adventurers took it upon themselves to slay the monster and bring an end to the suffering it inflicted on the citizens. After a difficult adventure, they sucessfully defeated the beast. Though rewarded by the kingdom, they remained mostly anonymous to the general populace.
Soon after, the King appointed a young woman his new Court Magician. No one knew who she was as she wore a mask during any public appearances and spoke only to the king in whispers. She also seemed to be very influential in regards to swaying the King's opinion and his son the prince seemed very fond of her as well. This young woman was secretly one Elda Frey, who was one of the adventurers that slayed the mysterious beast, having chosen to be anonymous to keep something of a private life. Many of those in the king’s court did not like her as her suggestions are into what they perceived as their own wealth and “mysteriously” soon rumors began to spread that she had wicked intentions, that she would use her influence with the king to bring ruin to the kingdom. The citizens began to become concerned and expressed these concerns loudly and, occasionally, angrily. This went on for several months, until one day, the Court Magician seemingly disappeared with no one else being appointed to the role.
Many years later, the people of Leahdour kingdom were becoming increasingly agigated. The gap between the rich and the poor was widening and conditions for the common person were growing worse. The current king, Alwyn, was inexperienced having become king at a young age, after losing his father to illness and his mother to a magic accident. He relied increasingly on advice from the nobles that made up the court; instead of appointing them himself, he still had the court his father and mother had in their service. A year or so into his rule, citizens from the edges of the kingdom came to the king to plead for help; a large dragon, the likes of which were not native to Thornspane, had been eating their livestock and generally annoying everyone.
Seeing an opportunity to raise his approval among the citizens, the court did their best to track down the adventurers who killed the beast that plagued the kingdom years ago, or if not possible, their nearest relation. They made a big show of sending them off to defeat this terrifying dragon that they built up into a terrible menace...only for almost all of them to end up dying. As one of the adventurers was Lady Seline, an incredibly popular and influential religious figure, there was an uproar in the kingdom. The people had had enough of what many percieved as an incompetant king. The most extreme accusations called it an indirect assassination and there were threats of violence towards the king and the nobles of his court. Several days later, it came out that the king had been assassinated himself. After his death, his sister Princess Olivine, would be crowned queen and dismissed her brother's court. In reality, she had faked Alwyn's death so he could run away, using a magic item to disguise her brother’s appearance, threatening his court with punishment should they divulge this information.
Backstory:
Born in the countryside, a few hours outside the small town of Silverdyne, Sigyl lived with his mother, Selia, and his grandparents, Elda and Addleby, on a farm. He never met his father who was, in his mother's words, "some slimy conman asshole" who ended up swindling more than a few Silverdyne residents and then bolted as soon as mercenaries working on behalf of another town's residents showed up looking for him. Sigyl did, however, enjoy semi-frequent visits from his Uncle Brand, Auntie Hilda and cousin Annifred who lived in town. He never went to a formal school, but was taught by his grandparents, with Elda, a witch, teaching him about magic and Addleby teaching him how to read and write, though Sigyl often took his lessons less than seriously. Otherwise, he would spend his days doing chores on the farm or running around the surrounding fields, playing with other children from Silverdyne.

At the age of 6, while playing outside, Sigyl and a few other children were set upon by a relatively small wyvern that ended up snatching Sigyl up. They managed to get help and Selia gave chase on a flying broomstick and used her skills with magic to wrench her son from its grasp and drive the beast off. While he recovered fairly quickly, this event left him with a lifelong wariness towards wyverns, causing him to grow a little nervous at the mere suggestion that they may be nearby. In addition he began to take his grandmother's teachings in magic more seriously to avoid being unable to defend himself should such an event occur again.

Over the next several years, Sigyl began to grow as a magician and found that he actually really enjoyed improving his ability to cast spells. He learned mostly offensive spells and took up the job of using them to drive predators away from the farm animals and protect himself from weak monsters when he was out and about. His mother also began teaching him how to use a flying broomstick, though he found it difficult to get very high off the ground due to his previous wyvern-related flying experience, and mostly used it to ferry items back and forth between the farm and nearby villages.

When Sigyl was 10, Alwyn Albrend, the young king of the Leahdour Kingdom sent a messenger to the farm, asking that Elda assist in defeating a dragon that was supposedly terrorizing an area of the kingdom, despite the fact that the Frey family lived outside the kingdom's borders. Elda was against it as it wasn't any of their business and she was generally wary of the Leahdour royals as a result of her experience working in the castle decades ago. However, Selia insisted. If it was hurting people, she couldn't stand by and let it happen if she was being asked to help, even if she wasn't sure why her mother was being asked specifically, having always been under the impression that her mother had worked as a maid and magic tutor.

Selia would leave a few days later, along with Sigyl's Uncle Brand who decided he would help out as well, as he was gifted at creating and enchanting armor and weapons. Sigyl did extra farmwork to help out in his mother's absence and redoubled his efforts to improve his skills with magic, occasionally making extra trips to town to bring materials to his Uncle's smithy where his cousin was filling in and creating weapons in her father's stead. A few months later, Brand returned, missing an arm.
Sigyl's mother didn't return at all.

Unfortunately, it would turn out the dragon was much more powerful than King Alwyn realized. Of the five adventurers that went to slay the dragon, only Brand survived. Selia had channeled all the energy she had into attacks to hold the dragon back in an attempt to save the others and was ultimately killed. Young Sigyl, in his grief, vowed to slay the dragon...until his grandmother put some sense in his head.

"Your mama couldn't kill that thing, you think you're gonna? Besides...dragon's just doin' what it's gonna do. You'd fight back if someone was tryin' to kill you, wouldn't you?"
For the first time, Sigyl knew what feeling powerless was like. He also realized that strength wasn't absolute; even strong people could be weaker than someone or something else.

Several weeks later in the wee hours of the night, Sigyl awoke hearing a conversation between his grandmother and another unfamiliar voice. He couldn't make out exactly what was being said, but his grandmother sounded angry. Before too long he heard the other person depart, the sound of a horse's hooves fading into the distance. It would only be in the following days that Sigyl and his grandmother would learn that King Alwyn had been assassinated in the dead of night.

Sigyl would never see anyone one from the court ever come to express condolences or to offer an apology for what the king had done. He began to understand why his grandmother had expressed disdain for government and the rich. While the queen declared a day of mourning for Seline, the other adventurers were seemingly forgotten, with neither the Queen nor any other government spokesperson even bothered to refer to anyone else besides Seline by name in official statements.
"They'll make a big show for someone with a big name, but if you ain't no one, they'll step right over ya. N' sometimes, right on ya, too."

Still, in the years that followed, Sigyl would lead a relatively quiet life on his grandparents' farm; making deliveries, running errands for them and caring for the animals. However, he would develop something of a fear of dragons after his mother's death. He would occasionally experience nightmares about the incident and about dragons in general. He eventually decided he was going to seek out the dragon that killed Selia; not to kill it, but just to see exactly what kind of creature it was in an attempt to gain some kind of closure and to try and overcome this fear.

About a month into his travels, he would reunite with his childhood friend Galinda, who had left Silverdyne at 7 years earlier to study in the city of Pearlbarrow. Now using magic through music, she would decide to help him knowing how deeply it affected him. They would later be joined by a hunter of the name of Arthur Wyndelwax. After staying one night in his forest cabin, he unexpectedly insisted on assisting them.

Personality:

Having grown up on a farm, along with being raised by his relatively strict grandmother, Sigyl got used to doing work as a normal part of his life and didn't get away with misbehaving much (usually due to his grandmother using hexes as punishments) and grew up to be honest and hard-working. However, his grandfather, who is a little more mellow, kept him easy going and generally upbeat. However when it came to keeping his mouth shut, Sigyl took a very "do as Granny does and not as she says" attitude. He sees no good in keeping his opinions to himself when something important is on the line, even if his opinion is unpopular; it's not uncommon for this to work to his detriment or make him seem insensitive. Before her death, his mother Selia imparted to her son the value of helping others, especially in a small community like theirs. Despite the fact that she died trying to help others, or more likely because of it, Sigyl strives to live up to this ideal.

Sigyl is confident in his own abilities and has some measure of pride, but he's not arrogant. He understands himself to be competent and knows he can generally handle himself but he also understands that strength isn't absolute. No matter how strong one gets, someone or something is always stronger and he knows that he may not be able to do things alone. However, it's this view that gives him the courage to push a little further against a strong opponent than some others may not, following the idea that even the strongest opponent isn't unbeatable, and isn't afraid to get roughed up. Unfortunately, when he really gets going, his courage can easily turn into recklessness; he charges forward and rarely thinks ahead. He's also not terribly clever; he generally prefers the most straightforward solutions to problems and isn't one to think creatively. For example, if locked in a room, he'll sooner break down or blow a hole through the door than find a different way to open it.

He's friendly enough and gets along with the average person, but he usually doesn't immediately trust people who are wealthy or are otherwise in positions of great authority. After the death of his mother, he came to believe that those with wealth or power will step on those with less to obtain more for themselves; he's more likely to trust an authority figure if he feels they're similar to himself, i. e. someone who works hard, an everyman kind of person. This is also why he's willing to stand up for the little guy; every day people ought to stick together against those that would step on them for their own benefit. His experience with "city folk" throughout his life has also informed these opinions, as many people passing through Silverdyne from big cities, especially those who considered themselves "high class", treated it as some backwater hick village and the people in it as a bunch of dumb country bumpkins. He can take someone he perceives as being from a similar social class as himself ribbing him a little bit, but he hates being looked down on by those who decide they're better than him without knowing him.
Abilities:

Physical Strength

Having grown up on farm, Sigyl spent a good part of his life doing a lot of physical labor and is probably a little stronger than the average person; he won't be single handedly punching out monsters, but he can hold his own in a brawl.



Magic

(cw: mentions of accidental death and self-harm)





Sigyl has magical abilities. Magic in Sigyl's world consists of channeling the ever-present energies of the world through one's body and expelling it back into the world in a different form, though it puts some strain on the body. It's something that pretty much anyone can learn, but it's easier when one has magical lineage, i.e parents/grandparents/other blood ancestors that have learned and can perform magic already.



The more energy one channels into a spell, the stronger it is at the cost of longer casting time and greater strain on the body; it's not unheard of for magic users to accidentally physically harm themselves or die from trying to cast too powerful a spell to the point where they overwhelm themselves or cannot expel the energy fast enough. For example, someone that tries to cast too many fireball spells in a short period may start experiencing heat exhaustion. Pushing the example further someone who tries to pump more energy into a fire spell than they can handle may end up immolating themselves.

There are typically two ways to gain the ability to handle magic: study endlessly and learn how to properly regulate the flow of energy and/or become physically strong enough to handle it. Sigyl primarily used the latter method, though he's still working on the former. Multiple wizards can cast a powerful spell together to alleviate the strain, but they have to maintain some form of physical contact and also they all have to generally know what they're doing.





There are of course, other forms of magic but Sigyl primarily knows what is called "burst" magic wherein the energy expelled from the body takes the form of bursts of energy, ex: fireballs, blasts of cold wind, blasts of lightning, etc. He still can't cast spells that are too powerful without hurting himself, though. For example, He can blast a hole in a wall large enough to walk through, but he's not going to be knocking down a building with a single blow.





Alignment: Thras. Sigyl's journey starts with the intent of facing a fear that's sat within him for many years, but the bravery to face this fear is what pushes him to continue.



Other:





⌈ SAMPLE SECTION ⌉



General Sample: General sample



Emotion Sample: Emotion Sample