Application form
Character's Name: Era Shîel (don't worry, it's often written as just Shiel, but it's to show that it's really Shiel. Stress on the first part, long i, followed by a very soft j and then the el part)
Series: Based on Chaos Mages from D&D, but adapted and she's still from my mind
Age: 15/16
Grade Level: Sophomore
Character Type: Chaos Mage (sub-type of Mages)
Backstory:
Era Shiel is one of the six children of the Shiel family; she has three sisters and two brothers. She comes from a small tribe somewhere on this world, though places and races have little meaning for the Chaos Mage. Perhaps it's her upbringing with five other siblings or because of her rather chaotic and carefree nature, but Era believes that in the world there is room for everyone.
Her whole family is strongly connected with the magical world; Era's oldest sister is a Slayer and captain of the militia of the tribe. The others show more signs of being mages, though her younger brother has shown to have talent for wizardry, after having sleep-flying several times. Her mother uses her talent as the community healer, and her father's talents aren't great enough to mention, though he makes a great farmer.
It is also tradition in her family - mother's side - that at least one member of the family will be a Chaos Mage. One of her uncles was a Chaos Mage before her until he died a slow and painful death (he walked the Path of Screaming Pain). Now the blessing - or curse - had fallen to Era, though it is not yet certain with of the nine Paths she is walking.
Era is a very carefree, friendly and cheerful girl, though sometimes a bit absent-minded. Even if her mind has not been exposed to the Chaos Magic enough for the first step on one of the nine Paths, it has already left a small mark, of which absent of mind is one of them. Like the wind and chaos, she is unpredictable and even if she's normally cheerful, she can have dangerous moodswings, often without any warning.
Her personality will change as the story progresses, however. Since Era wanders over the Path of Whispering Shadows, her mind will be slowly filled with voices and hallucinations. Nothing serious at first, but the further she'll go on this path, the crazier she'll get. Starting to lose sight of reality, Era will become suspicious, paranoid and her cheerful nature will disappear. But it will take a while before she's that far, don't worry.
Her most remarkable feature will be her hair. She looks absolutely normal for the rest, but not her hair. It's white blonde and with coloured streaks of hair in it in whatever colour imaginable. Pink, blue, green, brown... Anything. This is as a result from previously failed spells; whenever a spell fails, something random happens. Most of the time, nothing happens, but every once in a while something like a change of hair colour can happen. And although it happens rarely - in the beginning anyway - a failed spell can result into taking one step further on the Path (so getting a little more crazy).
Sample LJ Post:
It was a beautiful day. That was the first thing Era noticed when she stepped through the portal on the grassfield of what would be her new school. The sun shone warmly upon her face and the girl returned it with a bright smile up at the sky. Askal - her older brother - had teased her endlessly about the cold and bad weather of New Hampshire. Oh boy, he'd be having such a bad time when she told him about the nice weather.
Blue eyes scanned the area curiously and Era noticed some girls further on the field. Thinking it could be her class, the chaos mage strolled casually towards the group, humming Beethoven's Ode to Joy to herself.
As she got closer, she could distinguish two professors from the group of girls and the new student approached the professors with a smile.
"Excuse me, but is this Elemental Magic, by any chance? I'm supposed to be in that class right now."
A/N: I know I probably don't need a sample LJ... but I'm gonna put this up as her first entry anyway. =P So why not write it here as well?
Preferred Room Type: No preference yet, but she might apply for a single room when she starts to get paranoid and all.
Preferred Roommate: No preference either. Anyone will do.
A/N: I won't throw in Era yet, but yeah... Just wanted to apply before I forgot about it. She'll wander into the story next semester, unless we desperately need a crazy person to keep it all interesting. She's absent-minded enough to confuse dates. ;)