Name: Joseph d'Arcensis
Aliases: The Holy Grail of Arcensis
The Defiler
Titles: Archbishop
Heretic
Age:53
Place of Origin: Arcensis
Kingdom: Ravnica
Gender:Male
Time of Death:7,000 years ago
Eyes: Golden Yellow
Hair: Pale Blonde
Day To Day Attire: Simplistic black garments that are modest for the eyes, with a visually pleasant white collar that is seamlessly attached to the neck. Such is his wardrobe which is fairly simplistic since his religious duties normally require such plain clothing.
Strengths: Magically Inclined, Knowledgeable, and Keen-minded
Weaknesses: Morally Ambiguous, Two-faced, Jealous, and 'Non-Physical'
Fatherly * Wise * Creative * Ambitious
Sexuality: Pansexual
Relationship Status: Single
Personality: A listing of skills, such as horseback riding or cooking. Levels include novice (0.5 pt), apprentice (1 pt), journeyman (2 pt), expert (3 pt), master (4 pt), grand master (5 pt). Each character can spend 21 points & only two skills can be mastered and one grand mastered. If your character knows magic, it counts as a skill.
- Animancy (Grand Master): The ability to wield the powers granted by the Light, bestowing health and well-being to those who require its charitable touch. One could consider Joseph able to bring a person from the brink of death back to life or even pull back those who have briefly slipped into the afterlife back to their bodies with his amount of skill in the healing arts. Despite his mastery, it is an impossible feat to restore a person's soul who has been separated from their body for too long.
- Necromancy (Master): The ability to wield the powers bestowed by the Darkness, pertaining to curses and bringing back the dead. Has had practice in using this form of magic during his darker days, trying to raise the dead as not a mindless corpse but living and breathing person before their deaths. His efforts in the end were fruitless for him despite the many discoveries that would've put glee in others. If pushed into a corner, he can use these magical talents of his but lacks the experience outside of his own experimentation. As life and death are two sides of the same coin, it gives him a deeper understanding of his own magic granted to him by the Light.
- Homekeeper (Expert): One's capabilities to run a household successfully with duties including cleaning, cooking, home maintenance, shopping, and parenting. Joseph despite not having biological children of his own, considers the families that come to him as the closest things to be able to have one. Being as charitable and hospitable he can be for the community, he has developed an ability to mentoring younger individuals as a father figure who don't have one. To manage such a large following of people is easily attainable at this level, being suitable to handle large groups of people fine with few problems. He has made close ties to the families that he has taken care of, with his time in the priesthood allowing to see such things happen.
- Determination (Expert): If a arbitrary scale was set up to measure one's stubbornness between various levels, Joseph would be considered to be an (Expert) in rank. With those having a high level in this skill may manifest mental anomalies for their one track mind. It allows one to dedicate their effort into accomplishing a certain goal depending on how passionate they are about it, allowing them to ignore distractions and maximize their efficiency or even push their bodies beyond their limits. Joseph is an example of what happens, when steeped in the dark abyss of his goal, nobody could stop him in his pursuits except for himself when he finally realized the uselessness of his efforts.
- Lorekeeper (Journeyman): One's dedication to absorbing information and retaining it for future use, even distant memories can be recalled when normal people forget. Having the ability to digest the church's teachings and their holy script, he is able to recite them without reading them from the book. Having a good grasp over his religion, he isn't afraid to understand more from other viewpoints and different subjects that may expand the knowledge he has about the world. His more innate knowledge surrounds the recollection of his own religion with the stories and teaching that have stemmed from it.
- Medicine Man (Journeyman): A combination of both Herbalism and Medicine at this rank, which allows Joseph to take care of someone even without healing magic through natural means. By being able to identify plants and other common medicinal ingredients, he is able to take care of ailments that may afflict a person through using what is around them. He also possesses the knowledge how to properly use them and treat patients with their injuries, making sure they reduce the probability of harming themselves further. The combination of these two skills is enough to call Joseph the title of a Medicine Man whenever he doesn't use his healing magic for whatever reason, whether it be fatigue on his part, long-term care that he can't be there for, and etc.
A listing of favorite or unique spells, if any. Maximum of four.
- Mercedem Vitae: One could classify this as any ordinary healing spell until Joseph draws upon additional energy with this spell. Capable of drawing life from other living organisms around him and being able to transfer it, allowing healing magic to be done in a large instance all at once in critical situations. He can draw upon the plants around him, to the animals jumping around nearby, to even himself to fuel the spell if needed. This spell allows life force to be drawn into him to restore vitality if he really wanted to, but found it only necessary to prolong the attainment of his goal.
- Cinis cinerem: A spell that extinguishes the life that Joseph finds to be guilty of such a punishment by combining both Light and Darkness magic. By severing the life force from the body through Animancy and exploding decay through Necromancy at the body leaves a quick death, resulting in a pale sickly gray light that is emanating from the victim's body. Withering the body away into dust without pain on the victim's part for how quick it happens.
- Oh Cruel Revival, The Depravity of my Efforts: In the last parts of his life, Joseph sought out magic to resurrect the dead not as mindless corpses but their original selves before their deaths. Burning bridges and tarnishing the image he had around himself, he experiment with the afterlife and the dead in hopes of bridging it back to the land of the living. In the end, he managed to do such a feat and bring back a person from the afterlife into their bodies again but in a tormented and horrified state of their existence. The results that he got from his loved one after reviving them scarred him to the bones, that once controlling the situation, he released them from their suffering and himself as well for he could not bear to remember the anguish he caused.
A listing of acquired artifacts. Maximum of three.
- The Holy Grail: A relic with many stories throughout the ages as it went from the possession of one person to another. The Holy Grail itself is not an actual object but rather a gift that comes from the Pale Lady that is a birthright instead to Joseph. It has the ability to produce Healing Magic of the highest caliber, going even beyond (Grand Master) level when called upon by the hands of fate to heal figures of importance for the Pale Lady. Requiring the Pale Lady's approval to use which Joseph currently does not have, means that currently, manifesting it requires a much more intense effort for even a single drop of its restorative properties to be summoned forth.
After his death, the Holy Grail did not pass on to the next host but stories of the Holy Grail have continued to live on about its divine nature and other abilities attributed to it even if the original is only a fraction of what the tales describe it to be. For what reason did this Artifact did not move onto the next host, Joseph didn't know why until know.
Myth / Legend: A man who came from humble beginnings, he was one of the most prominent people to have been recorded to wield the Holy Grail, being used in a war against the darkness. The stories passed on about him say that he was destined to a path of piety, blessed with the powers of the Light from birth and later when his father discovered the sacred relic that was retained within him. Solidifying his unwavering future, he was recruited into the Church from a young age and had the teachings absorbed into him.
From there, he became a traveling priest once he was of age, sharing the teachings of his religion in attempt to covert others to join. In his travels, he went all over the different kingdoms with the covenant that followed him and saw the many different sides that the world had to offer. He garnered both renown and infamy, for being a healer of great capabilities yet the attempt to spread his beliefs were not well taken by some. During his travels, not many events were recorded or preserved, leaving much for scholars to wonder what his journey contained for him.
The most substantial part of his legend comes from the his involvement in the Reclamation of Arcensis, where Kingdoms had fallen to the forces of Darkness and he survived the experience. It had started off as a wave of sickness that washed over the land, warping and twisting life that came into contact with it into gruesome monstrosities. Caught in the middle of what would be considered to be the start of the outbreak, he escaped the kingdom that he was in with the help of the church.
Parents: David d'Arcensis
Ruth d'Arcensis
Siblings: Single Child
Childhood: Joseph was born in a village with nothing too special happening, spending most of his time being able to enjoy his childhood and develop who he was as a person. Perhaps too young to fully understand but he was like any kid of his age, making friends, experiencing the joys of being young, as well as his own shares of childhood regrets as well. His time spent in the community was mostly dedicated to supporting the people around him, being able to help out as much he could possibly do. Involved with his father's church, he met all kinds of people both who shared the same thoughts as him and others who were on the opposite spectrum of him. Still, there were difficulties in this young period of his life where a plague struck the continent that turned people in monstrous beasts. Its looming presence over their community did not promote such a joyous place for a child to be raised in, with more and more signs of the virulent disease approaching, there was little his family could do for they lacked the money to relocate and start over.
Once disease fell into their home of Arcensis, a wave of people began to flow out of the city, spreading the disease further like a stack of dominoes while those stuck living inside were slowly killed off. Monsters roamed the streets as the village slowly crumpled away, the guards that protected them had long felled and the community that was once there had withered away even longer ago. In attempt to endure and survive, Joseph's family relocated themselves to the church where they offered sanctuary to those still in the city. It remained as a glimmer of light that lied on the bottom of this dark pool, with the head priest possessing the mysterious powers of light that were granted to him. While a healer, Father Zachary repelled the forces of darkness from the church in exchange for leaving the wounded to be tended to by others and Lady Hatori, another who was blessed with the power of the light and a paladin, organized the defense effort with the remaining survivors.
In attempt to help out where he can, Joseph tended to the sick while his father helped where he could, whether it be moving things to barricade areas or wielding a weapon to be the church's temporary volunteer militia with the residing paladin as their leader. They lasted for a good while, waiting for reinforcements that would have never came, the defense effort by both Father Zachary, the priest, and Lady Hatori, the paladin, proved to be a valiant last stand for those residing in the church with the rest of the town fallen.
When the volunteer militia fell apart, Lady Hatori retreated with what she had left of her forces into the interior of the church while Father Zachary futilely did what he could to prevent the monstrosities from entering the church. Eventually breaking into the church when fatigue overtook the priest, the rest of the older men gave a final last stand against the creatures who sought to lick the city clean of all its life. Stuck in the backroom were the rest of the women and children with Father Zachary who was exhausted from his previous efforts, Lady Hatori, and Joseph as the last line of defense. In the seemingly last moments of their lives, when Lady Hatori and Father Zachary fell gravely wounded, a pale blue light filled the room echoing with a flat and unemotional voice
"You are not destined to die today..." as a chalice made of magical symbols floated in his extended palms. Glowing even more intensely before the creatures of darkness were expelled from the room, leaving only scorch marks on the ground where they once laid.
As if he was a machine, Joseph walked over to both Lady Hatori and Father Zachary with the chalice in his hand over them, offering a prayer to the light before the vessel filled with glowing blue water. As the commotion outside had stopped in a eerie silence, the women and children peaked outside, seeing Joseph and the chalice overflowing with the pale blue water as it showered upon the two fallen which closed their wounds in front of them. With the surge of power now flowing out of him, Joseph began to lose consciousness as the chalice clattered to the ground before shattering into what almost looked like glass shards and into nothingness.
When he regained his consciousness again, he was in a lavish bed where Father Zachary and Lady Hatori were standing over him as they waited for him to process what was around him before telling him what had happen. It was only for a brief moment, before he was asked to join the church by the two of them, sponsoring him in consideration of his young age to which he took the opportunity and underwent the training.
Adulthood: After the completion of his training, he was officially acknowledged as a member of the church, but his status as the Holy Grail was another topic of controversy that had his peers divided on. Lady Hatori and Father Zachary who had gotten older after the events that fell upon Arcensis were his firmest supporters, moving up the rungs of hierarchy since then. They encouraged him to travel and learn more about the world while also promoting the faith in places where he can, he eagerly agreed to get himself out from the same daily routine, for as a young adult he possessed an adventurous spirit that could be put to good use.
A group of other youngsters also accompanied him, forming a small group of individuals who wanted to get outside the walls of the church for a little. It was made up of a group of paladins and priests, with five people to travel around was quite a handful but everyone found their roles in the party. Joseph was the most nurturing and took care of them, taking care of the cooking and other menial chores which he didn't mind doing. They traveled town to town where they got a taste of adulthood, learning more about the world outside of the confines of their church. As was the time for their period, travel on the road proved to be the most dangerous with evidence of the dark plague were evident on some parts of the countryside they traveled through. They got to handle several monstrosities on the road and see a glimpse of what the forces of darkness were capable of doing, going through small villages who were devastated by these monsters. As the group traveled, Joseph and the group got to know each other better and grew into a interesting group of friends where sometimes they butted heads but always at the end of the day came together even if a bit tense.
In one particular instance though, they were caught surprised in a mass gathering of these creatures, fighting their way to escape, to which they managed to briefly escape their pursuit. Managing to reach the walls of the kingdom where they intended to reach, they were surrounded by mountains on the horizon where the guards informed the group of their current situation and asked for their aid. Stuck too far into the mountains and managing to get through the congregation of monsters, they agreed to help and Joseph found himself in a familiar situation that he remembered.
The kingdom was taken under siege by these creatures, breaking through with a greater force than they could ever imagine. They retreated from the gates and walls back to the castle where the ruling lord, Issac, had done the same once his position had been compromised in order to regroup and manage his key resources. The several missions given to them by the lord were completed by them, but as the kingdom's forces dwindled down, the perimeter of safety they had began to reduce dangerously close. By the time the monsters had reached the castle's walls, Lord Issac had already evacuated the remaining people through tunnels underneath the castle, he was determined to slow the creatures as much he possible could for his people.
Holding for as long the Lord could manage to draw from the castle with the forces that stayed behind. The retreat through the tunnel was a difficult one, with the many entrances that led to them had been compromised in some places had placed resistance in them. In those small quarters they had a hard time fighting their way through the tunnels, with one of them falling in the attempt to escape.
After leaving the tunnel, the death never did leave Joseph who was the most sensitive and nurturing of them, it affected him to the very essence of his being. It was the key point in his life where he turn his eyes towards necromancy and its research, hoping for a way to bring his friend back to life. In the last moments, he develop a spell to raise their true self back to their body but a painful process that went against the order of the world. Coming back as a tormented soul, it scarred Joseph even more after his efforts that were ultimately for naught.
Special Moments: Current Events: * ☠Enemy * ⚜ Unfriendly * ☯ Neutral * ☮ Friends * ღ Ally * ♥ Crush/Significant Other *
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Character Quote: "What is life if it's not for experiencing everything?"
Theme Song: Aura Color: Assortment of white and black blended together
Scent: Earthy Warm Cinnamon
Anything Else: 
