Matthias

[Brother Monk]

Player Name: Kyle
Name: Matthias
Age: 21
Race: Human
Height: 5'10"
Weight: 175 lbs

Physical Description:

Matthias is a man of average stature -- he is neither tall nor short -- with a firm, conditioned body and simple appearance. His skin is dark from the rays of the sun, his head is shaved and his features are hardened. His warm and inviting amber eyes possess a quiet intelligence. His expression is relatively serene despite the world around him. His attire is aesthetic, being simple and becoming of a wanderer. He commonly wears sandals on his feet and is wrapped in loose wraps, his trappings tied with a loose sash in mundane colors. He does not particularly stand out though as a stranger to all, he can be a curiosity in the eyes of many.

Possessions:

Prayer Beads
Matthias wears a set of wooden prayer beads wrapped around his right hand, carved from a dark wood and polished.

Walking Staff
Matthias carries a staff, a simple but sturdy wooden pole, with him when he travels. The staff is about 6' long, 2" thick and is polished with a fair share of marks visible in the wood.

Haversack
Matthias carries a simple haversack on his back while traveling which carries simple and miscellaneous items such as a waterskin, a small amount of provisions, flint and tinder and other small items necessary for travel.

Powers and Strengths:

Hand-to-Hand
As part of Matthias' education in the monastery he was raised in, he was taught the martial arts of hand-to-hand combat. The monastic order believed that through physical exercise one is capable of attuning their mind, body and soul together. Although the study of the martial arts is not the path to enlightenment, it is believed that the lessons of discipline are key to finding the way. Matthias is proficient in unarmed combat, his distinctive style less aggressive and more defensive with a focus on preserving life and turning an opponent away.

Scholar
The life in a monastery is without change and one of the primary duties Matthias had growing up within his order was copying ancient texts from the outside world and transcribing them for record. Preserving knowledge was a daily task and over the course of his childhood and later years his young and impressionable mind absorbed the information from the countless tomes he copied, giving him a vast knowledge of the outside world. Matthias possesses a deep knowledge of history, literature and geography from the countless tomes he has read.

Athletic
The daily tasks of his upbringing has strengthened Matthias. The day-to-day chores of cleaning the abbey, farming the small fields within the complex and exercises has allowed him to tone his body. He is capable of lifting heavier objects, jumping further and higher and running faster and for longer periods of time than the average man. Exercise is important for the spiritual and emotional welfare of an individual so Matthias tries to maintain this.

Chess
One of the few leisures that Matthias was able to enjoy during his life in the monastery was the game of chess. Considered the game of kings, it was considered to be something that invoked critical thinking and strategy. In a small way it was believed the game could teach how to read a person and how they may react to a given situation. In his youth, Matthias took it as a rare pleasure to enjoy when all of his duties and lessons were complete.

Handyman
There are many lessons to be learned when raised by a monastic order of monks and such comes with the lifestyle. With cleaning the abbey he washed the stone floors, swept them and polished windows of dirt and grime. He learned how to make candles to provide light and how to farm and garden to provide food. He even learned how to work tools to repair doors and windows. Throughout his life he has done many, many things simply because they needed to be done and there was no one else to do them. Everyone had a hand in the welfare of the monastery so over time he in a since became a jack-of-all-trades, never truly mastering a craft or discipline but being competent enough to finish a task.

Storyteller
As Matthias has read many, many tomes of history and stories he has become well versed in the world's lore. As storytelling was a popular means of entertainment in the monastery, because it was a simple means to enjoy an evening, Matthias picked up on the art of spinning a tale. Sometimes the stories were about actual people and events that transpired long, long ago. Other stories were from the epics from long forgotten authors while others were new and completely his own. Stories bring people together, they teach lessons and almost everyone enjoys them.

Weaknesses and Flaws:

Soft Hearted
Preserving life was one of the key tenants that the monastery taught Matthias. All lives, no matter how important, have value in the greater scope of the world. From the small field mouse to the majestic eagle, every life has a purpose within the world. It is not one's place to take the life of another unless it is necessary for balance must be maintained. Matthias struggles emotionally when confronted with harming another if it serves no purpose. Furthermore, even when it comes to the point that his own life is threatened, he cannot help but feel overwhelmed in the need to preserve life. He is compelled to aide others who would be in a situation where their livelihood would be jeopardized.

Naïve
Cloistered within an abbey nestled high within the northern mountains and isolated from the world, Matthias knew little of lies and wickedness. Its somewhat hard to fathom that there are people in the world without good intentions or those who would lead you astray. Matthias trusts people on the principle that unless given a strong reason not to trust them, their words speak nothing but the truth.

Large Crowds
Stepping out of a small, secluded community into a vast and seemingly endless world is quite intimidating. Where it was common to associate with small groups of brothers and sisters who lived at the monastery, never had he encountered large groups of complete strangers as he has since he began his journey. The presence of so many people is quite overwhelming and instinctively he tries to avoid them unless he cannot. In the worst extremes he'll wait for the crowds of people to disperse or gather the courage to move through them.

History:

Matthias was raised in a monastery since he was a child where his day-to-day activities consisted of cleaning, reading and copying ancient texts, meditating, cooking, exercising, washing clothes and linens, and crafting necessary items for the welfare and self reliance of the monastery. He was left there by a mother who could not raise her child herself. It was within this monastery that Matthias was cloistered in for the duration of his young life. He was raised from infancy into a boy, his life beginning into a strict regiment of discipline. In his early youth he was taught how to read and write and proceeded to learn more and more as he grew older.

As he began his formal education at the age of 5, it would be as he turned 10 that his indoctrination into the monastic order of his monastery truly began. Where before as a child his sole duties were learning, cleaning and taking care of himself he was given a larger set of duties to. The focus of his chores became the monastery's small role within the world. The abbey nestled within the northern mountains had for many, many years cultivated the ideas of preserving life, knowledge and finding enlightenment. He began performing the tradition of maintaining copies of texts from the outside world and was taught a doctrine of discipline, respect for the world in its entirety and finding enlightenment. In the isolation of this monastery he knew little else of the world as the doors were always closed and everything they needed came from the inside of the complex and its grounds.

He had been performing physical exercises since he was a child amongst his brothers and sisters. As he was growing older these exercises evolved. Alongside the introduction of working the gardens of the monastery grounds to harvest crops, he began his education in the martial arts to reinforce discipline. It was believed within his order that bringing the mind, body and soul into harmony through the practice of martial arts is the first step to finding enlightenment. As part of his daily routine he practiced hand-to-hand combat alongside his brothers and sisters and following the session he meditated on what he had learned. The movements became drilled into his mind, carved in with repetition of a monotonous lifestyle.

Growing older, Matthias physically and mentally progressed as his young life blossomed into adulthood. With the spring he sowed seeds and with the summer he reaped the harvest; with the fall food was stockpiled for the winter that would be spent in deeper states of meditation and learning. Day in, day out Matthias studied and practiced all that he was taught. The rigid beliefs of his order became the tenants by which he lived by. By preserving knowledge and life, he would one day find enlightenment. He entered into his adulthood as an intelligent and strong young man instilled with the knowledge of the world and the strength he had forged within himself to defend what he believed in.

At the age of 20 the Abbot of the monastery approached Matthias and told him it was time for him to leave the abbey. Although Matthias had never seen a single one of his peers leave, he knew they had left throughout his life in the monastery. The coming of age ceremony marks the time for one to leave the confines of the complex and experience the world. Enlightenment cannot be found without personal experience and without knowing the world for one's self outside of the realm of books, one cannot acquire personal experience. Matthias understood it was time to leave the monastery despite how alien the concept felt.

In the middle of the night Matthias was brought to the closed gates where the Abbot and the elders gave him a set of prayer beads, a walking staff and a haversack loaded down with all the provisions and supplies he would need. The doors were opened which revealed a road that led down from the high northern mountains. There were no words spoken but Matthias understood. Bowing his head, Matthias paid his final reverence to the Abbot and his elders before to stepped outside of the gates. Behind him the door closed and with what little he had, he took the first step of his journey.

[Niabi]

Approved.