Belfry

Belfry

Summoning specialist and utility alchemist
Draconic SURGE and mage
Discord	@acai.0
Reddit	Acai___
Metatype	Human (Class III SURGE)
Street Cred	0
Notoriety	0
Public Awareness	0
CDP	4
D.O.B.	February 3rd, 2058
Age	27
Folder	Drive Folder
Priority	Metatype - E Attributes - B Magic/Resonance - A Skills - B Resources - E
#Max IGs/Ascension	6

Character Information

Summary

A rebellious young adult now grappling with the aftermath of her SURGE and her girlfriend's death at the hands of a blood mage and cult leader. Trying to overcome her still not-fully-processed grief and become stronger in her magic.

Goals

• Turn her humble home into a proper mage's laboratory.
• Find a spirit willing to mentor her and give her spiritual guidance.
• Become better at defending themself from magic.

Background

Erika was born in Charlotte, North Carolina, CAS, to an Ares corporate family. Their parents were alchemists working in R&D, and they were extremely strict in upholding the company values and their own Humanis-leaning beliefs. Erika Awakened at a young age, and her parents immediately decided to take greater control over her life in order to mould a good mage to boost their image. Erika rapidly discovered that she did not like this, and rejected her parents' control as best she could, leading to her getting expelled from high school, twice, and never graduating.

The second expulsion sparked an explosive argument with her family, and ultimately resulted in her SIN being burned and Erika being disowned and forced out onto the streets of Charlotte. She drifted for a while, using her magical talents to secure small bits of money and food, before meeting a woman named Ashley, who was also Awakened, and who offered to let Erika stay in her apartment as long as her landlord didn't find out. A little suspicious, but grateful for the kindness, she accepted and lived with Ashley for a few months, becoming close.

After Erika stayed with her for a while and helped her with a few unrelated magical tasks for her day job, Ashley decided to divulge to Erika that she was planning on leaving Charlotte. Apparently she had found this network of Awakened from the Appalachian area that were intending to form a commune on Attakulla, or Mount Mitchell, in the mountains to escape the reach of the corporations and government and to take advantage of the minor dragon line that originated at the mountain. Eager for the chance to leave the stuffy city environment and explore the naturalistic tendencies of her magic, Erika asked to go with.

While the mountain wasn't nearly as isolated as Erika had wanted, what with scenic roads passing quite close by, it was far enough from the sprawl to see relatively little scrutiny, and to provide a good view of the stars every now and then. The total group numbered about forty, with the leader, a man named Simon Boyd, being a very charismatic druid who gathered the magicians each weekend to discuss their progress in honing their power.

Simon was the founder of the commune, and was the organiser who put together most of the training undertaken by the magicians living on the mountain. His promise was that the mountain's naturally powerful magic was the perfect place to learn to channel greater power. He was very insistent on the members becoming more powerful as mages, something that didn't bother Ashley since she had come to learn to become stronger in the first place. His speech made Erika a little nervous, though. His way of talking about the separation between magicians and mundanes, and his insistence on power as the fundamental basis for magical knowledge made him sound like a mage supremacist to Erika, or at the very least dangerously dismissive of mundanes.

Erika held these thoughts in to please Ashley for a long time, learning as best she could to live in harmony with nature and the spirit world, and cobbling together her own little bag of tricks from other summoners that lived there. Eventually, though, Simon began making plans for some kind of "event" after an upcoming lunar eclipse, something he didn't explain in detail but promised would make their magic shine brighter than an aurora. Erika did not like the sound of that, and tried to convince Ashley to leave. Ashley, however, was sucked in by the rhetoric, and didn't want to go until she had seen what Simon's ritual could do. Frustrated and tearful, she resolved to leave before whatever event could take place, the day after the eclipse.

She woke up in the night to the sound of screams. She was wrenched out of her tent by powerful bound spirits of roiling bones, and brought to witness Simon and several of the more powerful mages, bathed in the light of the blood moon, performing a ritual over the dragon line. Erika was tossed to the ground next to the other surviving mages who weren't participating, and bound. She could see a pile of bodies at the centre of the ritual circle, Ashley's among them, soaking the mountain with their blood.

Fortunately for Erika, while Simon had made for a good cult leader, he wasn't nearly as experienced of a mage as he had claimed to be. The power that bled out of the ritual raged wildly out of control, and the dragon line erupted with mana before Erika could be sacrificed. Raw energy surged up from the ground, forming a powerful mana storm that cloaked the mountain peak. Her memories of the event are foggy, but she remembers Simon screaming in fear, a host of illusory forms of Ashley and the other sacrificed mages calling out for help, a red, sticky rain, and crawling down the mountain to the nearest road, where she was able to take stock and realise that the intense mana flow had triggered a SURGE in her, and she now had a form reminiscent of a feathered dragon. Panicking, she ran into the woods before any drivers could see her, and stumbled on one of the other mages who had managed to escape in the chaos of the mana storm.

Quickly explaining the situation and that she wasn't actually a drake or dragon, she managed to calm the other mage enough to try and figure out a plan. Erika had nowhere to go, with her entire support network presumably dead or horribly injured during the ritual, and unable to rely on kindness with her new appearance. Thankfully, the other mage had connections, and wanted to leave the entire experience behind. She intended on pulling some strings to get herself smuggled to Tír Tairngire on the west coast, and offered to take Erika. Not feeling like she would be safe in the Tír, Erika instead requested to be dropped off in Seattle.

Finding herself once again wandering the city, Erika gravitated to Snohomish, dealing with the sour attitudes evoked by her appearance as best she could in order to have a slightly less polluted astral space, and took up residence in an abandoned church. She fixed it up so it functioned better as an actual home, and started putting out feelers for jobs that required mages. She wasn't a career criminal (yet), but she was a competent mage, and that led to enough successful jobs that she earned herself a recommendation to ShadowHaven.

Narrative Significant Qualities

Positive

Seaworthy Dragon (Biosonar, Functional Tail (Paddle), Gills (Air), Technosense, Thermal Sensitivity, Vomeronasal Organ, Webbed Digits)

• Belfry's SURGE made her a good short-distance swimmer despite her lack of muscle mass, and have greatly expanded her senses.

Harmony Seeker (Dedicated Conjurer, Spirit Whisperer)

• Ever since escaping Simon's cult, Belfry hasn't been able to bring herself to cast traditional spells. Spirits seem oddly drawn to her, though, and she has taken that specialisation quite well.

Negative

Draconic Complications (Bioluminescence, Impaired Attribute (Strength), Scales, Striking Skin Pigmentation, Symbiosis, Unusual Hair)

• The SURGE wasn't all good. Belfry's appearance is unique and easily recognised, and she has become deeply tied to the environment around her.

Lingering Memories (No Man Left Behind, Social Stress)

• Belfry can't allow herself to leave someone behind again. Their nerves are also heightened around people who remind them of Ashley (blond elf women) or Simon (muscular human men), or when discussing either of those people.

Spirit Sympathy (Code of Honour: Harmony with Nature)

• Belfry views spirits in the same way as people, and always makes sure to allow spirits to request tasks of her in return for the tasks she requests of them. (See below for the kinds of requests her usual spirits make.)

Run History

Name	GM	Metaplot	Threat	Date of Run
Blitzkrieg Bop	Fangblade_		Medium	27 September 2084
Birds and the Bees on the High Seas	lov.euphoria		Medium	13 September 2084
The Burden of Possibility	Fangblade_	Sign of Zeta Amatsu Kaze	High	1 September 2084

Affiliations

Contacts

Contact	Connection	Loyalty	Archetype	Profession	Aspects	Chips
Adowa "Moria" Webster	4	2	Fixer	DIMR Scientist	Hermetic Mage, Decker, Nerd, Draco Foundation Fixer, Arcane-Archaeologist	Even
Juniper Jones	2	3	Gear	Talismonger (Wiccan)	Awakened, Wiccan, Suburban Witch	Even
Informer	2	2	Legwork	Private Investigator	Truthseeker, Magical Expert, Trid Aficionado	Even
Mr. Mirabel	Contact Not Found. Please create contact using Template:Contact.	1	You may also see User:Free Sprite for bot instructions.			Even

In Character Information

Matrix Search Table

Threshold	Result
1	A belfry is the part of a building that encloses a bell, usually in reference to a religious building.
3	Several complaints have been made by anti-meta accounts on social media starting a couple months ago about some kind of dragon-person lurking around an abandoned church in Snohomish.
6	The handle "Belfry" was the social media handle of an Awakened elf named Ashley from Charlotte, North Carolina. Ashley disappeared from the Matrix after a mana storm on Mount Mitchell.

Shadow Community Table

Threshold	Result
1	She's either an unlucky SURGE or a really brazen sea drake mage with a penchant for summoning spirits.
3	They're from somewhere in the CAS. They don't like to talk about their story much, but they do have a burning hatred for blood mages.
5	Seems to have been present for the intense mana storm that rocked Mount Mitchell in early 2084. News reports vagued about how there might have been some kind of blood magic cult up there.

Assensing Table

Threshold	Result
1	Generally healthy, and Awakened in the Wiccan tradition. Usually nervous but friendly.
2	No cyberware. A full magician.
3	No alphaware. Her aura has a faint tether to the background due to metagenic expression of symbiosis.
4	No betaware or bioware. Has both essence and magic of 6.
5	No 'ware of any kind. There's a whiff of something dark clinging to her aura, faint enough to be only barely detectable.

SINs

SIN	Issuer	Rating	Licenses
Lindsey Greene	CAS	4	Driver's, Mage, Weapon

Appearance

You would be forgiven for mistaking Belfry for a sea drake, so long as that mistake didn't prompt an attack of any kind. She has draconic features that include dull claws, digitigrade legs, a covering of pale lavender scales across her back and yellow plates on her front and throat, a long, almost serpentine neck, a long, broad tail, and a draconic head. Rather than hair, she has a pseudo-mane down the back of her neck, as well as patches of fur on her inner arms and the bottom of her tail, all of which are naturally a light violet colour, and which glow dimly in the dark. They have several flimsy barbels on their face, and external gills, similar to but sturdier than an axolotl's, at the base of their skull.

Clothing

Belfry prefers loose clothes that accommodate for her unique frame. She has a wide variety of aesthetic interests at home, mostly in greyscale as well as pinks and purples that compliment her scales, but in public sticks to brown and black long coats and cloaks to cover her features as much as possible and avoid drawing attention.

Matrix Persona

Belfry's Matrix persona appears similar to her astral form. It's a slightly larger, more "feral" looking version of herself.

Belfry's Spirits

These are the spirits Belfry most commonly summons, though not the only ones. It's intended to make it easier for GMs to come up with payment for Belfry's code of honour, but it can be disregarded if GMs have their own ideas for spirits and their requests.

Spirit of Fire: The Librarian

A vaguely humanoid mass of candle wax with lit wicks sticking up out of its shoulders and head, and burning orange eyes. Flames of the wicks correspond with force: orange at force 1-6, blue at force 7-10, and white at force 11+. The Librarian is a bit unusual for a spirit of fire in that it embodies some of the more gentle aspects of fire: the warmth, the light, and its ability to figuratively illuminate the darkness of ignorance. The Librarian is a collector of knowledge first and foremost, and likes to be offered bits of information in any form: spoken, written, digitial data, or any other method of transferring knowlege.

Spirit of Water: Myredwen

A bipedal, saurian creature that looks similar to a spinosaurus, though it has colourful, fish-like scales in patterns of blue, orange, and yellow. Water constantly streams from the top of its sail like a waterfall on its back. Myredwen is an emotional creature, and requests the witnessing of or the display of strong emotions, whether by Belfry or someone nearby. For extreme tasks, Myredwen might ask that Belfry not express a particular emotion for a period of time, claiming that she is "saving it for herself".

Plant Spirit: Reclaimer

A mass of vines wrapped around an ancient stone statue of some indistinct king. The statue is inanimate, and the vines audibly crack and break it in order to move and fight. Reclaimer values destruction or defacement of anything that it holds to be vile. The only consistent thing that it views as vile is vanity, in whatever form that takes. Otherwise, what it has distaste for is variable and largely arbitrary, from a particular herb that it wants burned, to the entirety of the direction North that it wants Belfry to avoid facing while doing magic for a month.

Spirit of Air: Ghostwise

Takes the form of a hovering, always-burning censer surrounded by a pale blue glow, as though held by a ghost. Manipulates the smoke into animated forms to emote, or to attack. Ghostwise is intrigued by the material world, but not in the same way as the Librarian. Ghostwise is fixated on physical experience. She likes to be present while getting Belfry to do things that she can't and living vicariously through their link. She is particularly fond of anything thrilling. She wants to go skydiving someday.

Spirit of Earth: Betty Breaker

Looks like an elderly human woman made of a single cut sapphire. Wears traditional clothing that seems to be made of flexible glass, and carries what appear to be a tyre iron and a brick made out of packed rubies. Betty refers to herself as a chainbreaker, and her interests lie in breaking the yoke of authority and setting people free. Whether this is metaphorical or an actual jailbreak depends on the situation. The actual nature of the oppression or binding doesn't matter, just that it is destroyed.

Guardian Spirit: Rhyfelwr

Metahuman in wooden plate armour, covered in vines and moss. Antlers like those of a stag protrude from their helmet, and their eyes glow blue. Rhyfelwr refers to themself as the "Guardian of the Wood", and desires actions that protect nature and the environment. Captive animals being set free, forests being saved from corporations, or just a shrub being planted somewhere it will thrive, anything that increases the life and vitality of nature.

Guidance Spirit: Memory

Appears as the silhouette of a feminine metahuman holding a staff and outlined in scarlet fire. Never speaks verbally. Belfry seems stressed when summoning this spirit. Memory's goals are somewhat inscrutable, but she always requests that Belfry does something altruistic and selfless.

Task Spirit: Lillian

Appears as a domesticated cat with an additional set of legs and paws shaped in such a way that it can hold and manipulate things. Lillian is a lover of art and artistry in all of its forms. Payment for her varies between taking her to an art gallery and spending time, effort, and money on crafting an original piece of creativity for her.