Walter
06-11-06, 02:59 AM
Name: Jon Walter
Age: Roughly 144, not that I count em anymore. Wouldn't guess that, wouldja?
Race: I'm human, buddy.
Hair Color: Black
Eye Color: Black
Height: Usually 5'9”
Weight: Now that depends. On a good day? Probably 194 lbs. On a bad day... Well, just subtract whatever's missing.
Occupation: Immortal
Appearance: I'm not really a looker. Hair's all messy, black eyes tend to creep folks out, and I can accept the fact I wasn't born pretty. Whatever. Typically, I wear whatever I can get my hands on. Rags, robes, riding clothes, anything. Holes tear in anything I wear, so I don't care if I come into town lookin' like the beggar down the road. But the first guy to throw me pity cash gets those coins shoved down his throat.
Equipment: Lessee here, got a carvin' knife, a whittlin' knife and a stabbin' knife (all made of iron, duh). Whatever clothes I c'n “find” are whatever clothes I wear. Easy enough to pick up a tunic some guy “dropped” on the ground, and pants are even easier if you know where the local bath spots are. Heh, I kinda like to think that bathin' folk are morons for trustin' something with legs to stay put if they leave it somewhere, am I right? Mostly, I use whatever I happen ta find, and drop it when I'm done. Like to travel light.
Skills: Skills, skills... does that include pickin' fights? I'm pretty good at that. There was this one time I got real smashed, so I punched the guy who was sittin' next to me because he was bein' really loud, right? Turn's out it's the barkeep's nephew! The look on the old fart's face was priceless.
But, I guess I'm not really that good at anything. Fightin' for me is also called 'throw yourself at the guy and hope he falls before you do.' If you gave me a puzzle an' told me t'figure it out, you'd probably be dead before I finished it, either cuz I spent too long working on it, or I got so frustrated I rearranged yer face ta look like the puzzle. Magic is like tryin' ta read a book backwards in the dark, from one room over. So I don't know that either. Y'know what, I don't even need that stuff either. Let some other chump waste his life figurin' it all out. So there.
----
Jon is immortal. This doesn't mean that he can't die; on the contrary, he dies all the time. However, his soul has been imbued inside of another object. As long as this object remains intact, he is incapable of 'shoving off this mortal coil.' Rather than becoming a member of the undead, however, Jon's body has a supernatural connection with the elements. Whenever his body dies, it is restored by the surrounding environment. This process takes anywhere from a few minutes to several hours, depending on how badly the body is injured or mutilated.
Then he regains consciousness and picks himself up as though nothing has happened. His body only regenerates after he has died, so if Jon loses an arm, but the wound is nonlethal, he'll end up walking around without an arm for a while. But as soon as he dies, it will restore itself.
There's one stipulation to this immortality. If Jon dies and salt is sprinkled on his dead body, the regeneration process is seriously stalled; instead of minutes or hours, it would take him days or weeks to pick himself up from an unlucky bar fight.
----
History: Long story short: Farm boy gets conscripted, nearly dies on the battlefield, some jerk wizard offers him immortal life, and he takes it. Hilarity ensues.
Short story long: Jon Walter was a bad seed from the beginning, but at least farming kept him honest. At the age of 15, his destitute family had arranged his marriage with the daughter of another destitute family; 'and so the circle continues.' But the country at the time was on the brink of war with some other country, and before this marriage could commence a mass conscription began.
Dragged into military service, Jon was quickly (shoddily) taught to use a weapon. What he used doesn't matter, since the boy fell in the first charge of the only battle he participated in. He was struck in the shoulder with an arrow, fell down, and spent the rest of the battle being trampled by armored soldiers and horses because he didn't dare get up. More arrows pierced him, but he lost blood very slowly. By the time raiders came through, slitting throats and taking anything of value, Jon was barely alive, though he had no right to be.
Jon's body was broken, yet his grasp on life was inhumanly strong. This was a strange thing to him, for he had played a very passive role in his own life. He had never needed to make a decision for himself, and as a commoner his destiny was decided from the time he'd left the womb. If war had never come, Jon would have worked for the rest of his life, begot a family full of children, and then died. There was nothing waiting for him that he couldn't foresee. And yet he remained conscious.
Eventually, a raider stooped next to Jon. The young man's eyes were closed, so he didn't see the face of the man who patted him down and felt for his pulse. Still clinging to his life like a tree branch, he was surprised to here the man whisper something in his ear.
“Stay down. I'll come back for ya.”
“Nothing on these ones either!” the man shouted to accomplices in the distance.
“Dammit!” One of them shouted back. “Why couldn't these bastards have the decency to die in their sunday best?”
The raiders left, and Jon stayed amidst the dead bodies for another day. The pain had constantly kept him awake, but he began to feel numb and cold as the sun set on the dusty field. It wasn't long before Jon simply lost consciousness. He awoke in a cave, wounds completely healed, sitting next to a giant bronze urn. As it goes, the man who spoke to him earlier was a powerful wizard, who had whisked Jon away to care for his wounds. The old man seemed to know a great deal about Jon, for he could see inside the young man's mind. He knew of Jon's plight as a commoner, and was inspired by his unusual will to live, so he had brought the boy to his wizard's study – he only looted battlefields as a hobby, it turned out.
Over the years, the wizard had learned an extraordinary amount of things. How to hop from one world to the next, how to boil water without making steam, and he had discovered the gift of immortality. It was this that he offered to Jon, without condition. Rather incredulously at first, Jon accepted the offer but did not believe the old man's words. A moment later, the boy's soul was embedded in the bronze urn he had been sitting next to. From that point on, Jon became incapable of permanent death. The old man, clearly a lunatic even if he was a brilliant magician, proceeded to usher Jon out of his cave at this point. There were many questions that he wanted to ask, but Jon never managed to get a word in as the wizard set him outside. And then the wizard and his cave promptly disappeared, along with the bronze urn that contained his soul.
As Jon walked the land, he came to realize that he was not in a world that he recognized. The wizard had not only whisked him away from the battlefield, he had transported him onto a completely alien realm! This certainly took some getting used to - by the time he was comfortable with the idea of never seeing his home ever again, Jon had developed into an entirely different person. But what took even more getting used to, however, was the dying.
His first death (and his most memorable) involved him becoming disoriented in a deep wilderness, before falling off of a cliff. When his shattered form recovered, Jon had no memory of what had happened before, and so he continued to wander the land aimlessly. With each passing death (he accumulated a fair number of these simply by walking around), he grew to master a small portion of his immortality. He could remember the events of his life before he became immortal, and what had occurred before each of his deaths. In this way, he came to explore the world of Althanas.
It's important to note that Jon's age was frozen when he became immortal. No matter how many thousands of miles he walks, he will always look like an ageless 25-year old. Apparently, it took the wizard ten years to bring Jon back to his lair and the heal his wounds. It's debatable whether his maturity was frozen at that age as well.
It's not terribly clear that Jon was a bad seed in this backstory, even though that was the first sentence in the history section. The truth was, he simply hadn't had many oppurtunities to be bad prior to his liberation. As he wandered an alien world and met its people, Jon came to a conclusion that stunned him; none of these people had anything to do with him. This world and the one in which he lived were completely different. As a result, Jon owed nothing to this world.
He saw people as oppurtunities to support himself, usually through petty thievery. Rather than be tied down to society as he had been raised to be, Jon flipped around and rebelled against the law. This has caused him to be apprehended and beheaded in several instances of common justice; you can probably imagine how well that turned out. In the end, Jon gets away again and wanders this world to which he owes nothing.
Age: Roughly 144, not that I count em anymore. Wouldn't guess that, wouldja?
Race: I'm human, buddy.
Hair Color: Black
Eye Color: Black
Height: Usually 5'9”
Weight: Now that depends. On a good day? Probably 194 lbs. On a bad day... Well, just subtract whatever's missing.
Occupation: Immortal
Appearance: I'm not really a looker. Hair's all messy, black eyes tend to creep folks out, and I can accept the fact I wasn't born pretty. Whatever. Typically, I wear whatever I can get my hands on. Rags, robes, riding clothes, anything. Holes tear in anything I wear, so I don't care if I come into town lookin' like the beggar down the road. But the first guy to throw me pity cash gets those coins shoved down his throat.
Equipment: Lessee here, got a carvin' knife, a whittlin' knife and a stabbin' knife (all made of iron, duh). Whatever clothes I c'n “find” are whatever clothes I wear. Easy enough to pick up a tunic some guy “dropped” on the ground, and pants are even easier if you know where the local bath spots are. Heh, I kinda like to think that bathin' folk are morons for trustin' something with legs to stay put if they leave it somewhere, am I right? Mostly, I use whatever I happen ta find, and drop it when I'm done. Like to travel light.
Skills: Skills, skills... does that include pickin' fights? I'm pretty good at that. There was this one time I got real smashed, so I punched the guy who was sittin' next to me because he was bein' really loud, right? Turn's out it's the barkeep's nephew! The look on the old fart's face was priceless.
But, I guess I'm not really that good at anything. Fightin' for me is also called 'throw yourself at the guy and hope he falls before you do.' If you gave me a puzzle an' told me t'figure it out, you'd probably be dead before I finished it, either cuz I spent too long working on it, or I got so frustrated I rearranged yer face ta look like the puzzle. Magic is like tryin' ta read a book backwards in the dark, from one room over. So I don't know that either. Y'know what, I don't even need that stuff either. Let some other chump waste his life figurin' it all out. So there.
----
Jon is immortal. This doesn't mean that he can't die; on the contrary, he dies all the time. However, his soul has been imbued inside of another object. As long as this object remains intact, he is incapable of 'shoving off this mortal coil.' Rather than becoming a member of the undead, however, Jon's body has a supernatural connection with the elements. Whenever his body dies, it is restored by the surrounding environment. This process takes anywhere from a few minutes to several hours, depending on how badly the body is injured or mutilated.
Then he regains consciousness and picks himself up as though nothing has happened. His body only regenerates after he has died, so if Jon loses an arm, but the wound is nonlethal, he'll end up walking around without an arm for a while. But as soon as he dies, it will restore itself.
There's one stipulation to this immortality. If Jon dies and salt is sprinkled on his dead body, the regeneration process is seriously stalled; instead of minutes or hours, it would take him days or weeks to pick himself up from an unlucky bar fight.
----
History: Long story short: Farm boy gets conscripted, nearly dies on the battlefield, some jerk wizard offers him immortal life, and he takes it. Hilarity ensues.
Short story long: Jon Walter was a bad seed from the beginning, but at least farming kept him honest. At the age of 15, his destitute family had arranged his marriage with the daughter of another destitute family; 'and so the circle continues.' But the country at the time was on the brink of war with some other country, and before this marriage could commence a mass conscription began.
Dragged into military service, Jon was quickly (shoddily) taught to use a weapon. What he used doesn't matter, since the boy fell in the first charge of the only battle he participated in. He was struck in the shoulder with an arrow, fell down, and spent the rest of the battle being trampled by armored soldiers and horses because he didn't dare get up. More arrows pierced him, but he lost blood very slowly. By the time raiders came through, slitting throats and taking anything of value, Jon was barely alive, though he had no right to be.
Jon's body was broken, yet his grasp on life was inhumanly strong. This was a strange thing to him, for he had played a very passive role in his own life. He had never needed to make a decision for himself, and as a commoner his destiny was decided from the time he'd left the womb. If war had never come, Jon would have worked for the rest of his life, begot a family full of children, and then died. There was nothing waiting for him that he couldn't foresee. And yet he remained conscious.
Eventually, a raider stooped next to Jon. The young man's eyes were closed, so he didn't see the face of the man who patted him down and felt for his pulse. Still clinging to his life like a tree branch, he was surprised to here the man whisper something in his ear.
“Stay down. I'll come back for ya.”
“Nothing on these ones either!” the man shouted to accomplices in the distance.
“Dammit!” One of them shouted back. “Why couldn't these bastards have the decency to die in their sunday best?”
The raiders left, and Jon stayed amidst the dead bodies for another day. The pain had constantly kept him awake, but he began to feel numb and cold as the sun set on the dusty field. It wasn't long before Jon simply lost consciousness. He awoke in a cave, wounds completely healed, sitting next to a giant bronze urn. As it goes, the man who spoke to him earlier was a powerful wizard, who had whisked Jon away to care for his wounds. The old man seemed to know a great deal about Jon, for he could see inside the young man's mind. He knew of Jon's plight as a commoner, and was inspired by his unusual will to live, so he had brought the boy to his wizard's study – he only looted battlefields as a hobby, it turned out.
Over the years, the wizard had learned an extraordinary amount of things. How to hop from one world to the next, how to boil water without making steam, and he had discovered the gift of immortality. It was this that he offered to Jon, without condition. Rather incredulously at first, Jon accepted the offer but did not believe the old man's words. A moment later, the boy's soul was embedded in the bronze urn he had been sitting next to. From that point on, Jon became incapable of permanent death. The old man, clearly a lunatic even if he was a brilliant magician, proceeded to usher Jon out of his cave at this point. There were many questions that he wanted to ask, but Jon never managed to get a word in as the wizard set him outside. And then the wizard and his cave promptly disappeared, along with the bronze urn that contained his soul.
As Jon walked the land, he came to realize that he was not in a world that he recognized. The wizard had not only whisked him away from the battlefield, he had transported him onto a completely alien realm! This certainly took some getting used to - by the time he was comfortable with the idea of never seeing his home ever again, Jon had developed into an entirely different person. But what took even more getting used to, however, was the dying.
His first death (and his most memorable) involved him becoming disoriented in a deep wilderness, before falling off of a cliff. When his shattered form recovered, Jon had no memory of what had happened before, and so he continued to wander the land aimlessly. With each passing death (he accumulated a fair number of these simply by walking around), he grew to master a small portion of his immortality. He could remember the events of his life before he became immortal, and what had occurred before each of his deaths. In this way, he came to explore the world of Althanas.
It's important to note that Jon's age was frozen when he became immortal. No matter how many thousands of miles he walks, he will always look like an ageless 25-year old. Apparently, it took the wizard ten years to bring Jon back to his lair and the heal his wounds. It's debatable whether his maturity was frozen at that age as well.
It's not terribly clear that Jon was a bad seed in this backstory, even though that was the first sentence in the history section. The truth was, he simply hadn't had many oppurtunities to be bad prior to his liberation. As he wandered an alien world and met its people, Jon came to a conclusion that stunned him; none of these people had anything to do with him. This world and the one in which he lived were completely different. As a result, Jon owed nothing to this world.
He saw people as oppurtunities to support himself, usually through petty thievery. Rather than be tied down to society as he had been raised to be, Jon flipped around and rebelled against the law. This has caused him to be apprehended and beheaded in several instances of common justice; you can probably imagine how well that turned out. In the end, Jon gets away again and wanders this world to which he owes nothing.