Character info
Dec. 29th, 2018 09:41 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
illegitimateinlazioName: Matteo Rosso Felici
Age: 21 (283 counting from his birth date in 1739 and up to 2022)
Height: 160 cm / 5'2"
Background: The illegitimate son to a nobleman in Rome and the mistress from a northern country he'd brought to Rome, Matteo grew up in relative privilege despite being a bastard. His father, who he met only rarely (his mother more than him, of course), was enamoured enough of his mistress to keep both her and her son comfortable and have him educated. When he's sixteen his father brings in a tutor for singing - one who is very good, but only holds lessons in the evening. Matteo slowly becomes closer to this tutor, Amando (whose original name, when Matteo asks because he figures the Italian is too newly learned for the dark-skinned man to have been born in Italy and thus speaking Italian not as someone born with it, is Amadi), and comes to understand the man's eccentricity about only coming by in the evening isn't just about when he wants to teach, it's that he never comes out when the sun is out.
Unfortunately he doesn't get the chance to really explore that since after a very happy and very drunken night with a couple friends, Matteo gets into an argument with a couple youths and the whole thing ends in a drunken fight and attempt at robbery, during which he's stabbed. Amadi finds him in time, not to keep him from dying, but to make sure he wakes up after having died, bringing him to his own house and draining the last of his blood, feeding him his own.
There are of course no explanations to his mother, just a miraculous survival (and pretending the stab wound wasn't as bad as it actually was) and Matteo from then on staying with his "tutor", with the vampire now teaching him as one who lives by night and blood, not merely in music.
They have five years before the house is torn through, Matteo pulled out before the house is set on fire. He's confined to a room in his home where he finds out his mother and father have figured things out and "dealt with" the "animal" who attacked him. He's next, for as much as his mother loves him, he's an abomination in the eyes of God. He gets out right before dawn, barely hiding away from the sun in time to avoid setting himself on fire. There's nothing to find in the ruin of his maker's house, and Matteo leaves Rome that evening.
Matteo spends the next... long good while just wandering, before he realizes he has to make a living somehow and get funds (if not to the same quality of life he grew up with, then better than what he's let himself end up with). Being visibly young doesn't make it particularly easy to get jobs, especially when one has a lack-of-sunlight requirement, but by jumping between singing and, thanks to his education, comportment and knowledge of noble estates, as an accountant for the same, he gets... something like stable. Stable, and able to start creating a safety cushion - he's hardly stupid, he's just not had to use the education he'd been given, so far.
In the early 1800's he starts attending universities again, though of course it initially takes some subterfuge to get him the documents he needs - it's first here Matteo actually starts exploring deeper into the supernatural end of society and what communities they've built up and the resources available (by goodwill, money or favours owed). He could actually pass for a functional, grown-up vampire by now, even if the damage left by his sire's murder (actual or apparent) remains deeper than Matteo would like to acknowledge to himself or let on to others.
By modern times, as aggravating as they are with the greater need for documentation everywhere and surveillance and whatnot, the internet also makes it easier to keep himself in free-lance accounting work when he needs to (though at this point, old work, savings and investments have built up so he truly wouldn't need need to).
He's mostly kept to Europe, the Middle East and Africa in his wanderings, particularly the northern half of Africa. He's been exploring Nigeria quite extensively since Amadi was an Igbo man, but he's been avoiding Rome since he left it, going no closer than Florence from the north and Salermo from the south. In the latter half of the 1900s he started to branch out into Asia and the Americas.
Looks: Blond, wavy hair that curls at the ends, far more obvious whenever he lets his hair grow long enough. Blue eyes. Slender build and a boyish charm, especially to his smile.
Notes: State of mind/maturity usually preserved from physical age at the moment of turning, even if, of course, lived experience tempers this. When it comes to feeding, Matteo doesn't kill except for in very exceptional circumstances. It is absolutely something of a thrill to feed until there's no life any more (there's a primal pleasure in it, they are predators after all), but he doesn't like the sensation when thinking about it afterwards, and Amadi's modus operandi was "only criminals (for killing)" and he's kept to that. It's not so much a hard and fast rule among all vampires as it's a question of honouring the choices and method of their forebear. Many, of course, do not care about such ridiculously sentimentality and "tradition", and do as they wish.
Matteo speaks Italian, Latin, English, Arabic and Igbo (though only the same dialect of it that Amadi spoke).
Powers: Matteo can hover a couple feet above the ground for... a very long time, can fly (at a relatively low altitude) for around two hours if he doesn't use a lot of speed. He's got touch-based telepathy, psychometry and can charm/hypnotise (some other vampires can straight up possess human victims; the charming is a variation on this) but has no mind-reading, and no illusions to talk about or any fire control (yet, anyway. He's actively trying to gain that one). He can turn himself intangible for up to ten minutes, but he hasn't dared trying to shape-change yet, despite that the intangibility means he should be reasonably good by now at taking at least one other shape - especially a firefly, at the very least, as that is the first form most vampires of this strain find natural to take. (He is of course stronger, faster, more durable and flexible than a regular human.)
Skills: Good head for math and is a competent accountant. Singing, plus playing flute, harpsichord and piano. Can both ride and drive a carriage; prefers motorcycles in the modern age for personal conveyance.
Worldbuilding: The vampire "curse" (of this strain, anyway) originates from a practitioner of magic in Africa several thousand years ago, where she made contact with a spirit and their developing partnership slowly turned more... personal. Unfortunately, humans are mortal, and age, and don't really live all that long - but spirits are ageless unless dispersed. The spirit was very much interested in keeping their human, and slowly worked on opening up her mind to certain magical skills, to get her to the point where she could "ascend". Not as a soul into a spirit, because the woman was not interested in that, but to last beyond death.
The method chosen was a ritual where the witch bled herself nearly dry, and the spirit supported her while she went out in the night and consumed someone else's blood (a criminal that was to be banished), and while this struck her with a need to forever subside on blood, she was otherwise immortal and gained a few other skills, as well as making most of the magic she'd already learned "native" to what she now was (she was made into an adze, basically). This woman (who is still alive, even if barely any of her "children" would know where she currently is), is the progenitor of every vampire in this strain, though killing her wouldn't have any effect on the others.
Vampires have a slow, faint heartbeat, and the need to consume blood lessens with age (but some blood drinking always needs to happen). Very little other bodily fluids are kept in production, so during sex lubrication is needed regardless of genitals, and male vampires do not produce sperm (dry orgasms only). The sun will burn them and can set them on fire nearly instantly (though the older the vampire the longer this takes), but only very strong faith can keep them at bay (as a form of simple magic barrier, they are sensitive to certain forms of magic used antagonistically against them). Things like garlic or holy water has no real effect, while iron and silver have some subduing/injurious effects.
Aside from setting them on fire via sun or more manual means, to kill a vampire you want to both behead and stake them (or behead and remove the heart, whichever); doing just one or the other won't be enough and they will come back from that.
Natural vampire powers in general are flight (the older the vampire the longer it can be sustained), hypnotism, telepathy/mind reading, fire control and illusions. Only very rarely and with old vampires does shape shifting appear (Matteo is a little young to be showing skills such as intangibility). Ones that pop up less often are precognition (of varying strength) and psychometry.
*Matteo would've carried the name Orsini if he'd been legitimate. As it is, the last name is his mother's, which was 'gifted' to her by his father when he took her with him to Italy.
Age: 21 (283 counting from his birth date in 1739 and up to 2022)
Height: 160 cm / 5'2"
Background: The illegitimate son to a nobleman in Rome and the mistress from a northern country he'd brought to Rome, Matteo grew up in relative privilege despite being a bastard. His father, who he met only rarely (his mother more than him, of course), was enamoured enough of his mistress to keep both her and her son comfortable and have him educated. When he's sixteen his father brings in a tutor for singing - one who is very good, but only holds lessons in the evening. Matteo slowly becomes closer to this tutor, Amando (whose original name, when Matteo asks because he figures the Italian is too newly learned for the dark-skinned man to have been born in Italy and thus speaking Italian not as someone born with it, is Amadi), and comes to understand the man's eccentricity about only coming by in the evening isn't just about when he wants to teach, it's that he never comes out when the sun is out.
Unfortunately he doesn't get the chance to really explore that since after a very happy and very drunken night with a couple friends, Matteo gets into an argument with a couple youths and the whole thing ends in a drunken fight and attempt at robbery, during which he's stabbed. Amadi finds him in time, not to keep him from dying, but to make sure he wakes up after having died, bringing him to his own house and draining the last of his blood, feeding him his own.
There are of course no explanations to his mother, just a miraculous survival (and pretending the stab wound wasn't as bad as it actually was) and Matteo from then on staying with his "tutor", with the vampire now teaching him as one who lives by night and blood, not merely in music.
They have five years before the house is torn through, Matteo pulled out before the house is set on fire. He's confined to a room in his home where he finds out his mother and father have figured things out and "dealt with" the "animal" who attacked him. He's next, for as much as his mother loves him, he's an abomination in the eyes of God. He gets out right before dawn, barely hiding away from the sun in time to avoid setting himself on fire. There's nothing to find in the ruin of his maker's house, and Matteo leaves Rome that evening.
Matteo spends the next... long good while just wandering, before he realizes he has to make a living somehow and get funds (if not to the same quality of life he grew up with, then better than what he's let himself end up with). Being visibly young doesn't make it particularly easy to get jobs, especially when one has a lack-of-sunlight requirement, but by jumping between singing and, thanks to his education, comportment and knowledge of noble estates, as an accountant for the same, he gets... something like stable. Stable, and able to start creating a safety cushion - he's hardly stupid, he's just not had to use the education he'd been given, so far.
In the early 1800's he starts attending universities again, though of course it initially takes some subterfuge to get him the documents he needs - it's first here Matteo actually starts exploring deeper into the supernatural end of society and what communities they've built up and the resources available (by goodwill, money or favours owed). He could actually pass for a functional, grown-up vampire by now, even if the damage left by his sire's murder (actual or apparent) remains deeper than Matteo would like to acknowledge to himself or let on to others.
By modern times, as aggravating as they are with the greater need for documentation everywhere and surveillance and whatnot, the internet also makes it easier to keep himself in free-lance accounting work when he needs to (though at this point, old work, savings and investments have built up so he truly wouldn't need need to).
He's mostly kept to Europe, the Middle East and Africa in his wanderings, particularly the northern half of Africa. He's been exploring Nigeria quite extensively since Amadi was an Igbo man, but he's been avoiding Rome since he left it, going no closer than Florence from the north and Salermo from the south. In the latter half of the 1900s he started to branch out into Asia and the Americas.
Looks: Blond, wavy hair that curls at the ends, far more obvious whenever he lets his hair grow long enough. Blue eyes. Slender build and a boyish charm, especially to his smile.
Notes: State of mind/maturity usually preserved from physical age at the moment of turning, even if, of course, lived experience tempers this. When it comes to feeding, Matteo doesn't kill except for in very exceptional circumstances. It is absolutely something of a thrill to feed until there's no life any more (there's a primal pleasure in it, they are predators after all), but he doesn't like the sensation when thinking about it afterwards, and Amadi's modus operandi was "only criminals (for killing)" and he's kept to that. It's not so much a hard and fast rule among all vampires as it's a question of honouring the choices and method of their forebear. Many, of course, do not care about such ridiculously sentimentality and "tradition", and do as they wish.
Matteo speaks Italian, Latin, English, Arabic and Igbo (though only the same dialect of it that Amadi spoke).
Powers: Matteo can hover a couple feet above the ground for... a very long time, can fly (at a relatively low altitude) for around two hours if he doesn't use a lot of speed. He's got touch-based telepathy, psychometry and can charm/hypnotise (some other vampires can straight up possess human victims; the charming is a variation on this) but has no mind-reading, and no illusions to talk about or any fire control (yet, anyway. He's actively trying to gain that one). He can turn himself intangible for up to ten minutes, but he hasn't dared trying to shape-change yet, despite that the intangibility means he should be reasonably good by now at taking at least one other shape - especially a firefly, at the very least, as that is the first form most vampires of this strain find natural to take. (He is of course stronger, faster, more durable and flexible than a regular human.)
Skills: Good head for math and is a competent accountant. Singing, plus playing flute, harpsichord and piano. Can both ride and drive a carriage; prefers motorcycles in the modern age for personal conveyance.
Worldbuilding: The vampire "curse" (of this strain, anyway) originates from a practitioner of magic in Africa several thousand years ago, where she made contact with a spirit and their developing partnership slowly turned more... personal. Unfortunately, humans are mortal, and age, and don't really live all that long - but spirits are ageless unless dispersed. The spirit was very much interested in keeping their human, and slowly worked on opening up her mind to certain magical skills, to get her to the point where she could "ascend". Not as a soul into a spirit, because the woman was not interested in that, but to last beyond death.
The method chosen was a ritual where the witch bled herself nearly dry, and the spirit supported her while she went out in the night and consumed someone else's blood (a criminal that was to be banished), and while this struck her with a need to forever subside on blood, she was otherwise immortal and gained a few other skills, as well as making most of the magic she'd already learned "native" to what she now was (she was made into an adze, basically). This woman (who is still alive, even if barely any of her "children" would know where she currently is), is the progenitor of every vampire in this strain, though killing her wouldn't have any effect on the others.
Vampires have a slow, faint heartbeat, and the need to consume blood lessens with age (but some blood drinking always needs to happen). Very little other bodily fluids are kept in production, so during sex lubrication is needed regardless of genitals, and male vampires do not produce sperm (dry orgasms only). The sun will burn them and can set them on fire nearly instantly (though the older the vampire the longer this takes), but only very strong faith can keep them at bay (as a form of simple magic barrier, they are sensitive to certain forms of magic used antagonistically against them). Things like garlic or holy water has no real effect, while iron and silver have some subduing/injurious effects.
Aside from setting them on fire via sun or more manual means, to kill a vampire you want to both behead and stake them (or behead and remove the heart, whichever); doing just one or the other won't be enough and they will come back from that.
Natural vampire powers in general are flight (the older the vampire the longer it can be sustained), hypnotism, telepathy/mind reading, fire control and illusions. Only very rarely and with old vampires does shape shifting appear (Matteo is a little young to be showing skills such as intangibility). Ones that pop up less often are precognition (of varying strength) and psychometry.
*Matteo would've carried the name Orsini if he'd been legitimate. As it is, the last name is his mother's, which was 'gifted' to her by his father when he took her with him to Italy.
