"Hot as Fire..."

"Cold as Ice..."

Sta: 7, Eva: 6, Str: 8, Wis: 6, Arc: 6, Acc: 7

Got permission from Linda Ramirez to use her character Kaya Bennet in this ency.

Pending (Lear) June 11
We just need some edits on your abilities. You have basically written them as super powers. People are inexplicably drawn to you for no reason and in fact there was an absence of reason and in the other you just simply have no boggart. We are looking for character development and refinement with these abilities. Example: your character is very polite, saying "please and thank you", they have a pleasant and placid expression and they do not agitate easily. Because of this people are at ease around the character, hence they have a calming presence.

Pending (Magdalena WD) 12/6/23
Your edited applications are almost there, the only thing I will ask is that you remove the reference to the boggart. The ability fearless doesn't render you entirely without fear, and boggarts will transform into what you fear most, even if that is something that is a somewhat minor fear when compared against other people. Once this is done, we can approve the application.

Approved (Lear) June 13

Here is a link to your Encyclopedia.

NPC Name: Cyrus Darsel

Link: Here!

Year: Rising 6th

Stats:

Reducio

Stamina: 10
Evasion: 10
Strength: 10
Arcane Power: 15
Accuracy: 10
Wisdom: 10

Changes & total:

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Added 5 to wisdom and ArcPower. Total matches Koko's 6th year total (60 due to +5 from Quidditch wins: i, ii, iii, iv, v) plus five since he's human. =]

Abilities:
1. Poison Resistance (WC 809)

Reducio

Cyrus has never been known for his intellect. In fact, to some, he is known for his lack of brains. He does not make up for his lack of book smarts by any common sense. So far, he has managed to get by due to sheer brawn and laughter, but the day was bound to come when he would no longer be able to joke his way out of a nasty situation.

The summer before his fifth year, multiple instances challenged his ability to stay alive.

The first: cleaning.

Cyrus’s aunt made him get a summer job in order to gain a ‘work ethic’, whatever that was. Cyrus personally didn’t think he needed a job─after all, his parents and aunt were filthy rich. Nonetheless, his aunt deemed work ‘good for him’, so he looked at open positions. One was a janitorial position at a hotel, and he decided he might as well apply. He did not expect to be hired, but two weeks later, he received an email telling him he’d gotten the job.

Although Cyrus was trained on what every chemical did, he had never been the smartest. He had never had the greatest memory. He soon forgot which unlabelled bottle had what, so he tried to stick to the labelled bottles. However, when a sink didn’t clean itself fast enough, Cyrus glanced down at his cart full of soaps. He thought about every bottle and noted that vinegar could disinfect counters and bleach could whiten them, so if he mixed them together, the sink would be disinfected and whitened. His supervisors would be so proud!

He put the stopper in the sink and mixed the chemicals. His gloves were on, so he assumed there would be no problem. However, soon after he began to mix the chemicals, he started coughing and found it increasingly difficult to breathe. He stumbled around the bathroom for a bit, wheezing, before he remembered he had a phone (perks of being a no-maj born!) and quickly dialled his boss’s number as he fumbled his way out of the bathroom.

His boss dialled 911, and Cyrus didn’t remember much after that. He woke up in the hospital and was informed that his very not clever mixture had created chlorine gas, which was toxic to breathe in. The hotel had needed the gas removed from the floor he’d been on, and Cyrus’s clothes were no longer any good. His hospital gown wasn’t nearly as cool as his duck-themed T-shirt.

He was promptly fired from his job after that ordeal.

The second test of Cyrus’s will to live? Driving.

Since Cyrus had been sixteen for a while, his aunt decided it was high time he learned how to drive. His aunt took him up to Lake Placid, where she had a vacation home, and began to teach him how cars worked. One day, she was visiting some of her friends, and Cyrus thought it would be nice of him to bring the car to pick her up. He was pretty sure he had done everything right─the car was on, the mirrors were all in the right places, his seatbelt was on… But the car wouldn’t move. The garage door was still shut because he didn’t know where his aunt put the garage door opener.

He began to panic, looking through the glove box and the other compartments before realising that he had no idea at all where the opener was. And when he pressed the gas, the car still wouldn’t move.

Once again, he remembered he had his phone, and he called his aunt to ask, but his vision wavered, and he passed out.

Luckily, his aunt had gotten the garage door open, and she had called 911. He woke up at Adirondack Medical Center with an oxygen mask over his face. The doctors informed him that he had given himself carbon monoxide poisoning, and his aunt tiredly told him he had forgotten to take off the parking brake. The garage door opener had been on the kitchen counter this entire time.

Cyrus was okay, though, if not a bit shaken up by the entire ordeal. His body didn’t feel as weak as he had expected it to. In fact, a few weeks later, he swallowed mouthwash─completely by accident, he would tell his aunt, since he had genuinely forgotten that Listerine was not meant to be swallowed. She had stared at him in complete and utter exasperation before asking if she should call the Poison Control hotline. Cyrus thought about it, and although he knew he was probably making a mistake, he shook his head. He had swallowed a fair amount of mouthwash, but he felt fine.

Maybe, he thought, the poison caused by the chlorine gas and the carbon monoxide had hardened his body against the future clumsiness that would almost certainly come someday.

2. Spell Spread (WC 696)

Reducio

Cyrus had always had a bit of a dramatic flair. This was exemplified by his choice in clothes (duck-themed everything, often thousands of dollars worth) and his style of speech. However, Cyrus wanted to channel this into his magic as well.

He was not the best spellcaster. Even simple spells, like Lumos, tended to give him grief. But Cyrus wasn’t popular amongst his peers, and he wanted to defend himself if stolen rude glances and muttered ’Mudblood’s turned to something more serious.

Thus, Cyrus practised. He practised more than he thought he was able to, finally becoming familiar with the feeling of his wand in his hand. He read book after book until he thought maybe he could feel his brain cells multiplying─or perhaps that was just him being tired because it was three in the morning. He studied spell movements until his Lumos was perfect most of the time. He practised evasive footwork, and sometimes he wished he had more friends who could throw things at him so he could evade even better.

His movements became precise, no longer a jumble of jittery motion but instead a dance-like agglomeration of knowledge. Cyrus was an actor, and his spellbooks made up his stage. He found himself imagining he was a conductor, waving his wand in precise movements to command an army of musicians, and that was when the thought came to him: he could be an army.

Cyrus’s studies multiplied. Instead of learning about how spells were performed, he learned about why they were performed the way they were. Magic was an art, he realised, a type of performance not unlike singing or acting. And actors could play multiple parts. He read about spell theory and how one could focus one’s magic into a single spell, how spells would differ in their outcome depending on the person and their preferred style of casting despite ultimately being the same spell doing the same thing.

He also thought a lot. He thought about what one of the old Hogwarts professors had once told him: ‘Making more questions is a good thing, not a bad thing.’

He had lots of questions about magic. Where did it all come from? His parents didn’t have magic, and he wasn’t blood related to his aunt, so why did he? His uncle, also a no-Maj, was dead now, so he couldn’t ask his uncle about what coincidence might have made him have magic.

It didn’t matter now. He knew he had magic, and he hadn’t embraced it as much as he wished he had in retrospect. Cyrus began to attend classes in earnest, to write down notes on even the most arbitrary of things. He would be a proper wizard.


Gradually, his spells grew stronger. He learned how to channel his emotions into his spellcasting, yet keep them in check so he remained in control. He poured his grief over his uncle’s death, his repressed anger at his parents and his appreciation for his aunt into his spellcasting.

And then there was the real test. Cyrus had set up two dummies to practise on, and so far, his spells had only been able to hit one. His accuracy was fairly decent, and his spells packed a punch. But his ability to cast spells was never consistent. Cyrus hoped that after all of his studies, this might be better, so he thought long and hard and decided on a spell he’d known for a long time─flipendo.

Cyrus held out his wand and focused. He imagined his uncle alive and well, smiling and telling him he was proud. He imagined his aunt nodding at how he had grown. He imagined his parents happy with his existence, willing to look away from their work. He imagined his spell, fuelled by his heart, knocking both of the dummies over.

Then he waved his wand and said the word. ’Flipendo.’

It took a moment, as if his magic were hesitating, and Cyrus thought for a second that all of his studying had been for nothing. But he watched with wide eyes, willing to have patience, and he heard a satisfying plonk as the dummies fell to the ground.

Extracurricular: Not sure if he's still a duellist. If he isn't, I'd like for him to be. =]

Content Changes:
1.

Reducio

During his fourth year at Ilvermorny, his uncle died. Cyrus lived with his no-maj uncle and his magical aunt, so this is a major blow for him. He's become angrier and more impulsive, but he keeps the anger hidden. I intend to write a solo in which he receives an owl informing him of his uncle's death, but I haven't gotten around to it yet and I wanted to get it approved first. His uncle's cause of death was pancreatic cancer.

2.

Reducio

Cyrus has begun to realise that his studies are important, and he wants to become a better wizard to make his aunt proud. Because of this (and reflected in his stats), he's become smarter as of the end of his 5th year at Ilvermorny. He's still not the best with common sense, but he's more academic now. Wasn't sure if I needed to detail this but decided to add it anyway.

Trunk Coding: Under reducio

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Code: Select all

[quote][quote][center][img]images/upload/lf9mq0.gif[/img][/center][/quote][quote][quote][center]🦆 [b]Stats:[/b]🦆[/center][/quote][quote][center]+5 to Stats from Quidditch wins: [url=https://hogwarts.io/viewtopic.php?f=40&t=8714&start=50#p149357]i[/url], [url=https://hogwarts.io/viewtopic.php?t=15344&start=180#p255616]ii[/url], [url=https://hogwarts.io/viewtopic.php?f=40&t=16400&p=269317#p269317]iii[/url], [url=https://hogwarts.io/viewtopic.php?t=19424&start=170#p373361]iv[/url], [url=https://hogwarts.io/viewtopic.php?t=23357&start=70#p522642]v[/url]
[b]Stamina:[/b] 10
[b]Evasion:[/b] 10
[b]Strength:[/b] 10
[b]Arcane Power:[/b] 15
[b]Accuracy:[/b] 10
[b]Wisdom:[/b] 10[/center][/quote][quote][center]🦆 [b]Abilities:[/b] 🦆[/center][/quote][quote][center][b]Year 1:[/b] Fearless
[reducio]Cyrus was the type of boy who was full of chaos; the type of boy who would answer the "if someone jumped off a cliff, would you?" as "absolutely". Cy would do anything to prove himself, and he began running around Manhattan at the young age of seven. His parents didn't care, and he feared nothing. The world didn't scare him, so he did as he pleased.

By the time his aunt and uncle became prominent figures in his life, Cyrus was used to doing things by himself. He made breakfast without fear of burning himself on the pan, although he needn't make lunch or dinner - his parents always ordered things for him. While the boy might have lived a moderately sheltered life - what child of businesspeople didn't? - he was lonely, and there was always a bundle of energy manifesting inside the child's heart, waiting to be set loose.

After ending school one day Cy came across a group of kids. They weren't usual schoolboys; he could see that from a single glance. Their beat-up leather jackets stood out in stark contrast to his school blazer, and the fact that some of them didn't wear shoes let Cyrus know he'd ventured into the "wrong area of town". They surrounded a much smaller boy, one that wasn't in Cyrus' year; no, he was quite a bit younger. This kid was maybe nine, if that.

Cy wasn't deterred; he wanted that child out of the situation. "Hey, idiots!" yelled the blond, only glancing down to make sure his duck-print shoelaces were tied. A brazen grin decorated his expression as he charged forward, imagining he was a knight in medieval times and that the other boy was a lass, or lad now that he thought about it, in distress. "Make way for the king!" he shouted, his words echoing around the alley.

Now, any other child would have noticed how stupid the plan was. With Cyrus, however, there really was no plan. He did things on impulse, having no fear of the consequences that might arise from his actions. Putting one foot in front of the other, he charged at the other kids, shoving one of them as hard as he could.

He wasn't quite strong enough to knock the kid over, but he got the group's attention away from the young'un and onto himself. "Get out of the way!" he whisper-yelled to the smaller boy, and he was pleased to see the other kid running out of the corner of his eye as he felt a blow land on his arm.

Cy hadn't been strong enough to fight off the kids, but it had been your average schoolboy fight - everyone got hurt, to some extent. When Cyrus returned home, a triumphant grin on his face, his aunt shot him a questioning glance as he flopped down on the couch, exhausted, and shouted "No Regrets!"

Because really, he had no regrets. The feel of adrenaline in his veins had been amazing, and he would do it again. Cy wasn't a wimp. In fact, one might call him fearless.[/reducio]
[b]Year 2:[/b] Obnoxiously Strong
[reducio]Cyrus always possessed an unmistakable amount of energy. In fact, it was one of his defining traits. His feet would always tap the floor during his Muggle classes, and his hands would [i]always[/i] be moving.

He couldn’t help it. He just had too much energy.

Since he didn’t have very many friends (he was simply an unapproachable lad sometimes. It may have been his parents; he didn’t know), he didn’t have people who would listen to his endless chatter about who knows what. His parents were always far too busy to listen to his ramblings, so he sat quietly and allowed his appendages to move as much as they liked.

After a particularly embarrassing visit to his aunt’s where he had shattered a glass while dancing as he put up the dishes, Aunt Teresa had shown him an advertisement for child memberships at a fitness centre down the street.

At first, Cyrus hadn’t been at all interested. He was perfectly fit, and he saw this… [i]flyer[/i]... as an insult to his amazing physique. 

After thinking about it for a while, though, he asked his parents - who he had still lived with at the time - to sign him up. They obliged relatively quickly, probably glad to have to worry about him less, and he began to take classes.

He started out with swimming classes, but those didn’t really stick - Cyrus was already fast, and swimming didn’t really challenge him that much. The private lessons his parents had invested in made that certain.

He then went on to both weight lifting and kickboxing. He was interested in learning how to fight, both because his parents said it was something he should never learn and also because he was reminded of his favourite movie characters whenever he thought of it. Weights, though? He wanted to build up his muscles so that any fighting he learned would have an effect on whoever he used it against - not that he would attack anyone, of course.

As the years passed, Cyrus began to develop muscles, [i]real[/i] muscles. When he moved in with Aunt Teresa, he began to help around the house, and he easily surprised his aunt with how easily he could lift things. He got into fights more often, but usually to protect people [as mentioned in previous fearless app], and he changed from an annoying idiot who managed to [i]irritate[/i] bullies away to someone who could actually fend them off. He didn’t even have to punch them; he would flex his bicep and watch with a goofy grin as the spindly bully ran away from whatever younger kid they were bothering.

Cyrus was strong, but he was never [i]just[/i] strong. No, he was [i]obnoxiously[/i] strong.[/reducio]
[b]Year 3:[/b] Charmer
[reducio]Cyrus was always too much.

His parents sometimes thought it; he knew that. He didn’t mind, though. Often, he embraced it. After all, he was liked well enough, and ‘too much’ wasn’t always a bad thing.

He began to flaunt it - he would use his parents’ money to buy the most ridiculous things, such as his trademark duck-print garments or his designer jeans. He even bought a solid gold duck tie tack for his school uniform.

Things changed when he moved in with Aunt Teresa. She never thought he was too much, at least not openly. 

This meant Cyrus needed to try [i]harder[/i]. He wore the most flamboyant clothes; he cut his hair into a mullet. These things never fazed Aunt Teresa, but when he went to school with a green mullet and a clown nose that squeaked, no one could stop looking at him. He was eventually sent to the headmaster’s office because he was distracting students during a test.

He received a letter from Ilvermorny the following year.

The headmaster, Lazarus Plott, was a good example in Cyrus’s mind. A very extravagant man, his mannerisms encouraged Cyrus. Cyrus grew even [i]more[/i] dramatic, into even [i]more[/i] of a class clown, until he was certain everyone would notice him.

The thing was, Cyrus didn’t know when to stop. Not by a long shot.

He dumbed himself down sometimes, trying to make people gawk. It worked, sometimes. He adopted ducks as his trademark even more, wearing them no matter what. No one would be able to look at a duck without thinking of him, nor would they be able to look at him without thinking of ducks. 

He never felt the need to explain himself to anyone, although to a certain Thea Knott, he did try. ‘Regal,’ he had said about ducks, ‘strong.’ He had said they reminded him of himself, but was that true?

It was as true as he had wanted it to be, he supposed, because then maybe he could be seen as regal. He was strong. Right?

Maybe some people - Aunt Teresa - saw him as those things: elegant, regal and strong. Some others most certainly didn’t - namely his parents - but he had long since trained himself not to care. What others thought didn’t matter as long as they were thinking about him, as long as they were [i]noticing[/i] him, as long as he [i]meant[/i] something.

Cyrus was a [i]distraction[/i], and that, for now, was enough for him.[/reducio]
[b]Year 4:[/b] Impartial
[reducio]Cyrus’s Muggle teachers had always called him selfish, and for good reason. Cyrus simply didn’t care about others, or so it seemed. He was always flaunting his clothes, bragging about his wealth… Simply put, he seemed like a jerk.

Throughout the years, Cyrus had learned to only care about himself. He wasn’t necessarily self-centred - he was still [i]polite[/i] to others, after all - but he never complimented others’ appearances, never smiled without reason. One might have called him cunning had they not known that he never really had a plan in mind, that his ‘calculated’ smiles were really just his following social cues.

Because Cyrus wanted [i]himself[/i] to stand out, he tended not to notice when other people did, at least not unless they stood out more than he did, which was incredibly rare. Even the most brazen of people didn’t meet Cyrus’s standards. They had to be bold, flamboyant and witty, but they also had to possess a certain type of charm that wasn’t necessarily superficial in order to pique Cyrus’s interest - and even then, it was usually brief at best.

For example, the first person who had made Cyrus interested in them was none other than his Aunt Teresa. She was as unassuming as could be - petite, with lightly tanned skin and average features, but there was a certain kindness in her eyes that had interested him. Her nature was sweet, and she helped people without strings attached. Seeing a person so obviously good had interested Cyrus - she had not stood out. She was one with the crowd, but he was still interested in talking to her, in knowing more about her.

The only flamboyant person whose name Cyrus could easily remember was Headmaster Plott, AKA his role model. From afar, Cyrus watched in awe as the man made spectacles, and he hoped that one day he could do the same, that one day he would be powerful enough to. Once he surpassed Headmaster Plott’s abilities, something told him he would no longer feel the same level of awe. He [i]was[/i] pretty sure, however, that he would remember Headmaster Plott’s name, and not just because it was a name he heard daily as he roamed the halls of Ilvermorny. No, a role model was someone special, someone to be remembered.

He often remembered no one else.

He did remember Thea Knott, but she, like his Aunt Teresa, did not stick out in a crowd. She was shy and quiet, and that intrigued him. He was not distracted by pretty girls or pretty boys; he did not often raise his eyebrows at amateur wannabes of class clownery. He did not care what they were doing because their attempts at flamboyance could never match his own.

He really was quite impartial to those sorts of things.[/reducio]
[b]Year 5:[/b] Poison Resistance
[reducio]Cyrus has never been known for his intellect. In fact, to some, he is known for his [i]lack[/i] of brains. He does not make up for his lack of book smarts by any common sense. So far, he has managed to get by due to sheer brawn and laughter, but the day was bound to come when he would no longer be able to joke his way out of a nasty situation.

The summer before his fifth year, multiple instances challenged his ability to stay alive.

The first: cleaning.

Cyrus’s aunt made him get a summer job in order to gain a ‘work ethic’, whatever that was. Cyrus personally didn’t think he needed a job─after all, his parents and aunt were filthy rich. Nonetheless, his aunt deemed work ‘good for him’, so he looked at open positions. One was a janitorial position at a hotel, and he decided he might as well apply. He did not expect to be hired, but two weeks later, he received an email telling him he’d gotten the job.

Although Cyrus was trained on what every chemical did, he had never been the smartest. He had never had the greatest memory. He soon forgot which unlabelled bottle had what, so he tried to stick to the labelled bottles. However, when a sink didn’t clean itself fast enough, Cyrus glanced down at his cart full of soaps. He thought about every bottle and noted that vinegar could disinfect counters and bleach could whiten them, so if he mixed them together, the sink would be disinfected and whitened. His supervisors would be so proud!

He put the stopper in the sink and mixed the chemicals. His gloves were on, so he assumed there would be no problem. However, soon after he began to mix the chemicals, he started coughing and found it increasingly difficult to breathe. He stumbled around the bathroom for a bit, wheezing, before he remembered he had a phone (perks of being a no-maj born!) and quickly dialled his boss’s number as he fumbled his way out of the bathroom.

His boss dialled 911, and Cyrus didn’t remember much after that. He woke up in the hospital and was informed that his very not clever mixture had created chlorine gas, which was toxic to breathe in. The hotel had needed the gas removed from the floor he’d been on, and Cyrus’s clothes were no longer any good. His hospital gown wasn’t nearly as cool as his duck-themed T-shirt. 

He was promptly fired from his job after that ordeal.

The second test of Cyrus’s will to live? Driving.

Since Cyrus had been sixteen for a while, his aunt decided it was high time he learned how to drive. His aunt took him up to Lake Placid, where she had a vacation home, and began to teach him how cars worked. One day, she was visiting some of her friends, and Cyrus thought it would be nice of him to bring the car to pick her up. He was pretty sure he had done everything right─the car was on, the mirrors were all in the right places, his seatbelt was on… But the car wouldn’t move. The garage door was still shut because he didn’t know where his aunt put the garage door opener. 

He began to panic, looking through the glove box and the other compartments before realising that he had no idea at all where the opener was. And when he pressed the gas, the car still wouldn’t move.

Once again, he remembered he had his phone, and he called his aunt to ask, but his vision wavered, and he passed out. 

Luckily, his aunt had gotten the garage door open, and she had called 911. He woke up at Adirondack Medical Center with an oxygen mask over his face. The doctors informed him that he had given himself carbon monoxide poisoning, and his aunt tiredly told him he had forgotten to take off the parking brake. The garage door opener had been on the kitchen counter this entire time. 

Cyrus was okay, though, if not a bit shaken up by the entire ordeal. His body didn’t feel as weak as he had expected it to. In fact, a few weeks later, he swallowed mouthwash─completely by accident, he would tell his aunt, since he had genuinely forgotten that Listerine was not meant to be swallowed. She had stared at him in complete and utter exasperation before asking if she should call the Poison Control hotline. Cyrus thought about it, and although he knew he was probably making a mistake, he shook his head. He had swallowed a fair amount of mouthwash, but he felt fine.

Maybe, he thought, the poison caused by the chlorine gas and the carbon monoxide had hardened his body against the future clumsiness that would almost certainly come someday.[/reducio]
[b]Year 6:[/b] Spell Spread
[reducio]Cyrus had always had a bit of a dramatic flair. This was exemplified by his choice in clothes (duck-themed everything, often thousands of dollars worth) and his style of speech. However, Cyrus wanted to channel this into his magic as well.

He was not the best spellcaster. Even simple spells, like [i]Lumos[/i], tended to give him grief. But Cyrus wasn’t popular amongst his peers, and he wanted to defend himself if stolen rude glances and muttered [i]’Mudblood’[/i]s turned to something more serious. 

Thus, Cyrus practised. He practised more than he thought he was able to, finally becoming familiar with the feeling of his wand in his hand. He read book after book until he thought maybe he could feel his brain cells multiplying─or perhaps that was just him being tired because it was three in the morning. He studied spell movements until his [i]Lumos[/i] was perfect most of the time. He practised evasive footwork, and sometimes he wished he had more friends who could throw things at him so he could evade even better.

His movements became precise, no longer a jumble of jittery motion but instead a dance-like agglomeration of knowledge. Cyrus was an actor, and his spellbooks made up his stage. He found himself imagining he was a conductor, waving his wand in precise movements to command an army of musicians, and that was when the thought came to him: he could [i]be[/i] an army.

Cyrus’s studies multiplied. Instead of learning about [i]how[/i] spells were performed, he learned about [i]why[/i] they were performed the way they were. Magic was an art, he realised, a type of performance not unlike singing or acting. And actors could play multiple parts. He read about spell theory and how one could focus one’s magic into a single spell, how spells would differ in their outcome depending on the person and their preferred style of casting despite ultimately being the same spell doing the same thing. 

He also thought a lot. He thought about what one of the old Hogwarts professors had [url=https://hogwarts.io/viewtopic.php?t=8092#p123749]once told him[/url]: ‘Making more questions is a good thing, not a bad thing.’

He had lots of questions about magic. Where did it all come from? His parents didn’t have magic, and he wasn’t blood related to his aunt, so why did he? His uncle, also a no-Maj, was dead now, so he couldn’t ask his uncle about what coincidence might have made him have magic.

It didn’t matter now. He knew he had magic, and he hadn’t embraced it as much as he wished he had in retrospect. Cyrus began to attend classes in earnest, to write down notes on even the most arbitrary of things. He would be a proper wizard. 


Gradually, his spells grew stronger. He learned how to channel his emotions into his spellcasting, yet keep them in check so he remained in control. He poured his grief over his uncle’s death, his repressed anger at his parents and his appreciation for his aunt into his spellcasting. 

And then there was the real test. Cyrus had set up two dummies to practise on, and so far, his spells had only been able to hit one. His accuracy was fairly decent, and his spells packed a punch. But his ability to cast spells was never consistent. Cyrus hoped that after all of his studies, this might be better, so he thought long and hard and decided on a spell he’d known for a long time─flipendo.

Cyrus held out his wand and focused. He imagined his uncle alive and well, smiling and telling him he was proud. He imagined his aunt nodding at how he had grown. He imagined his parents happy with his existence, willing to look away from their work. He imagined his spell, fuelled by his heart, knocking both of the dummies over.

Then he waved his wand and said the word. [i][b]’Flipendo.’[/b][/i]

It took a moment, as if his magic were hesitating, and Cyrus thought for a second that all of his studying had been for nothing. But he watched with wide eyes, willing to have patience, and he heard a satisfying [i]plonk[/i] as the dummies fell to the ground.[/reducio]
[/center][/quote][/quote]

Pending - Galahad Everything is good except the stat points, please update your post with a link to each Quidditch win so we can document that in your trunk post.

Update as of 1st July: Edits due by 15th July. If not edited in time to meet the above notes then you'll have to reapply next round. - Hjørdis

Approved - Lear (July 1)

NPC Name: Theodore Duncain
Link: Theopedia
Year: Fifth Year
Stats: +5 (Year Update) +1 (Opeila's Duelling Win)
Old Stats: Sta 10 | Eva 8 | Str 9 | Wis 8 | Arc 9 | Acc 12
New Stats: Sta 10 | Eva 10 | Str 10 | Wis 8 | Arc 9 | Acc 15
Abilities: Broken Broomshaft

Reducio

Theo Duncain had never been a weak child, always wrestling and getting into all kinds of shenanigans with his younger brothers. When he was younger, his dad liked to use the empty field near their home to play sports with his children as well (football, baseball, batminton, anything really). With this influence, Theo had always been rather athletic and strong and was often asked to help with more difficult jobs around the house, until he eventually got to join the junior baseball team at his elementary school.

Of course, with the children on the team all being around 10-11, there wasn't much going on in terms of competition, but Theo learned a lot about techniques, how to correctly use a bat, how to effectively hit a ball and all kinds of useful lessons.
These lessons are a blessing to him today.

Theo has quite the history when it comes to sports, broom sports in particular. First he had joined the broom racing team and stayed on until his third year, when he finally quit. While the young man did enjoy a good challenge, he always had the feeling to be canon fodder as a young racer. The whole concept of the sport was rather merciless to younger students and Theo went to look for a different challenge. Preferable one that wouldn't land him in the hospital wing after every game.

So he had joined his school's Quidditch Team as a second string beater. A position he particularly enjoyed as he felt like he could bring some knowledge from his time in muggle school into it and maybe actually make a difference. Yes, during his first game he had not been on the winning side, but if he only looked at his own performance, he was rather content. It was certainly something he could work with!

And work with it he did. When other students could be found practicing spells, Theo was training his body, creating a visible difference over the duration of his fourth year. Regularly he could be found in some isolated area, doing push ups, sit ups or training hitting techniques with his beater's bat.

And one day, during training for which he usually used some normal balls, he hit one with full force, but didn't aim properly. The ball went a different way than intended and ended up hitting a chair next to a tree, smashing the whole thing against the trunk. With wide eyes Theo had run over to fix the chair magically, but the force of his hit had effectively turned the chair into a pile of broken boards.
434 Words

Extracurricular: Second String Beater
Trunk Coding:

Reducio

Code: Select all

[center][/center]
[quote][center]Stamina: 10
Evasion: 10
Strength: 10
Wisdom: 8
Arcane Power: 9
Accuracy: 15
[revelio]Total: 62 Stat Points (7 from duel wins)
([url=https://hogwarts.io/viewtopic.php?t=16330&start=40#p274734]1[/url], [url=https://hogwarts.io/viewtopic.php?t=1744&start=130#p294539]2[/url], [url=https://hogwarts.io/viewtopic.php?t=18463&start=30#p300076]3[/url], [url=https://hogwarts.io/viewtopic.php?t=19523&start=10#p3485703]4[/url], [url=https://hogwarts.io/viewtopic.php?p=421845#p421845]5[/url], [url=https://hogwarts.io/viewtopic.php?t=23482&p=576988#p576988]6[/url], [url=https://hogwarts.io/viewtopic.php?p=679635#p679635]7[/url])[/revelio][/center][/quote]

[quote][center][b]Quidditch Player - Beater[/b][/center][/quote]

[quote][quote][center][b]Ability 1: The Muggle Condition[/b][/center] [reducio]
[b]Why does it fit my character?[/b]
Theo had no idea of magic before he was told of it and it had opened up a new world to him. He does not longer waste time on muggle abilities, which he can easily replace with magic, but he had to for eleven years. 
The young boy grew up in the muggle world, visited a muggle kinder garden and a muggle primary school. When he had still visited school, his only target had been to get to the best possible secondary school. And then magic got in between. But since he had never expected it, he acquired the skills that one just learns when one is young and spends a lot time with other boys. Not to mention simply loves to provoke others. And just can't resist to put a toe across the boarder, as soon as the consequences become acceptable.

Theo knows how to throw punches. He knows how to physically fight. He even learned how to do it secretly, after it got him and his parents in front of the principal a few times. 

Although he doesn't necessarily need those skills anymore, now that he learns many very interesting spells, he has noticed, that this seems to be exactly what all those purebloods are thinking. They didn't think it would be necessary to acquire certain skills that might be more important in the muggle world. Theo simply loves to get them by surprise through easy muggle tricks. 

Just before he went to Ilvermorny, he even took his time to learn simple muggle card trick to brag. It works perfectly and he is extremely proud of it. 
Through simple muggle games, Theo has made himself a name at Ilvermorny, used his bloodline for his own advantage. 
Sometimes he questions it. Sometimes he thinks that something might be wrong with him, as there are only very few muggleborns at Ilvermorny, secretly of course, Theodore Duncain has no insecurities. 

But in the end he is a creative and optimistic boy. He can see opportunities in almost every bad situation. Theo knows a lot about muggle technology as well and he just likes to show off the aditional knowledge he has. Of course he made sure to inform himself about the magical world before he started to  show his knowledge off, it would have been embarrassing if someone could have shut him off with one seemingly simple question about the wizarding world. No, Theodore Duncain, the muggleborn would not stop trying until his circumstances helped him go up in the 'hierarchy' of students.[/reducio][/quote]
[quote][center][b]Ability 2: Calming Presence[/b][/center][reducio][b]Why does it fit my character?[/b]
Theodore grew up, always carrying the responsibility one automatically carries being the oldest kid amongst a bunch of younger siblings. It was him, who was responsible for looking after the three others on their way to school, him, who made it his task to be there for his little sister, the only girl, as much as the two other boys, as hard as it was for a while. He always valued the bond he had with his siblings, and it was undeniable him, who convinced the three that they were invincible as long as they stuck together.

That dream image didn't quite work like he hoped it would. Theo's siblings would stick with him- but separately. Amongst themselves the twins and Anabelle were almost indifferent about one another. It was Theo then, who tried to be the counterpart for Anabelle, that the twins were for one another, and at the same time to be the cool older brother for the twins.
That on the other hand did work. Where other siblings might have tried to avoid there siblings in public, even pretended not to have one, out of puberty embarrassment, Theo was a cool older brother for them, who they went to when they had issues in school, with other children or were scared of something.

As the oldest, it was mostly him, who his parents asked for help or shared their worries with. Even after entering puberty, he was still the least troublesome of the siblings and took a great deal of stress off his parents' backs. The boy was pretty much carrying the whole family on his back, and while it might have stressed out other children, Theo was happy to make his family happy, or at least make things easier for them. While on the outside it looked like they were simply a family that could work perfectly well together, the family knew that it was Theo, who was keeping it together. It was visible when he was in school longer than his siblings were. When he came home, he would often walk in to his mother yelling at the twins, but it would most of the times stop immediately. At home it always seemed like Theo was radiating calmness. It was a place he knew, he felt safe at, a place where he always had things under control.

Things changed after he went to Ilvermorny. He exchanges owls with Ana, but although her vague responses never include any negative things, he is sure, that there is a lot of chaos at home. After he got used to the school, he went back to his rather calm self. At least when he is not provoked. If one doesn't know him, he can seem a little intimidating, as he likes to tease and joke around with people, but when it is serious, danger or simply the need to talk, he would not let anyone down. In one on one conversations, one would feel that calming presence particularly strong.
One thing, that his sister Anabelle said before he went to go to Ilvermorny, made him think for a long while.
[i]"Theo, you are the anchor of ship Duncain. We'll be drifting away for a while, without a doubt. But we'll get back on course. If there is no anchor, we have a steering wheel. If it gets serious, we can all navigate this ship."[/i][/reducio][/quote]
[quote][center][b]Ability 3: Blindvision[/b][/center][reducio][b]Why does it fit my character?[/b] Sometimes Theo himself cannot quite believe how sharp his own senses are, especially in the darkness. He is a person who enjoys colours, naturally he is more wary in the dark. Perhaps it has something to do with his family. The young boy is muggleborn and when he got his invitation to Ilvermorny, his dad sat at his bed and had a long talk with him. He had told Theodore that he always knew that his eldest son was different, that he always had a feeling that eventually something like this would happen. But in the first place he had warned Theo. Although Virgil Duncain had no knowledge of what would await Theo in the magical world, he had told him to be careful, to watch his back. For the muggle man, magic was a word that belonged into fairytales and stories, not into the real world- His Theodore was going to a place neither of them could imagine, a place that was separate from the world he knew. Maybe his father's words had made him be more careful.

Maybe it simply came with being an older brother. Steve and Elias are Theo's two younger twin brothers, and while he loves them, they have always given him a reason to watch his own back as well as theirs. It was quite possible that the two boys got the joy from playing little pranks from their older brother, Theodore learned very soon that it was a bad idea not to watch whatever he touched, ate or put on. Once they had collected some beetles and put them into his bed. Theo had hesitated to go to bed on that evening, all his senses telling him not to and so he found the insects und his blanket. 
After some years he had developed something like a sensor for dangers in the dark. Sometimes, although he probably only imagined it, he just almost smelled it, like a bad sent in the air. The hairs on his arms prickling for seemingly no reason. 

Theodore always got along with his younger Sister Anabelle very well, the two of them could as well be the same age, they would hardly be any closer. While the young boy enjoys every minute of his time in Ilvermorny, he promises his sister and himself every year to come back to her. That his father was right and things really tended to become dangerous in a way that... simply wasn't from this world was something he had especially noticed in Hogwarts. He didn't get into dangerous situation himself so far, but he had heard stories of murderous dolls, things he would prefer to stay in horror movies and not come to life. All that added to the slight paranoia he developed in the dark. Who was to say that the shadows wouldn't come to life?

It is not like the young Thunderbird could really see in the dark, while he was magical, he was certainly not Magic Mike. But since he had set foot into the magical world, his senses were sharp like they had never been before, he simply had a feeling. He didn't always need his eyes to know what was happening in front of him.
[/reducio][/quote]
[quote][center][b]Ability 4: Savior[/b][/center][reducio]If one thinks of Theodore Duncain, one could probably think of quite a few things. Starting with his seemingly always great mood, his love for adventures, his tolerance and patience, but not to forget, his desire to make sure that the people he cares about are fine. Being the oldest of four children, he had been taught to take care of them at a very young age already. It wasn't like Charlize and Virgil Duncain weren't the most loving parents imaginable, but with the little money the family had, both parents were working hard.

And while the Duncain parents were working to get six hungry mouths fed, it was often up to Theo to take care of the three youngest, make sure that they did their homework and keep them entertained after school so their parents could work in peace.
With his invitation to Ilvermorny, everything had changed. After the first mistrust in something so surreal, Theo's parents were actually really excited for their eldest son to take the chance he had been given and also successfully persuaded him to go after promising him repeatedly that they would be fine as well as his siblings.

So Theo left and naturally found some friends at Ilvermorny soon. Having taken care of his younger siblings all his life, there was suddenly a gap to fill and just as naturally his new friend from Ilvermorny began to fill that gap. Theo became the kind of friend that would always try and cheer people up, but also protect them in more serious situations.

Perhaps that made it all the more ironic that he joined first one dangerous sport in which trees were literally out to kill the players and next one that involved metal balls that would attempt to knock kids off their brooms. His task was clear, keep those metal balls in check, but that did not at all mean that Theo didn't pick a different task for himself. While he liked Quidditch, attempting to injure people wasn't really his thing, so he tried very much to just protect his team and hit bludgers somewhere, where no one was who could get hurt.

And if there was the occasional player falling of their broom, well... Theo left his post without thinking about it twice. If the young Thunderbird could help it, none of his classmates would ever fall to hit the ground, in fact he had become pretty good at spotting and catching them before they hit the ground- yes, unfortunately that did include one or the other opponent. [/reducio][/quote]
[quote][center][b]Ability 5: Broken Broomshaft[/b][/center][reducio]Theo Duncain had never been a weak child, always wrestling and getting into all kinds of shenanigans with his younger brothers. When he was younger, his dad liked to use the empty field near their home to play sports with his children as well (football, baseball, batminton, anything really). With this influence, Theo had always been rather athletic and strong and was often asked to help with more difficult jobs around the house, until he eventually got to join the junior baseball team at his elementary school.

Of course, with the children on the team all being around 10-11, there wasn't much going on in terms of competition, but Theo learned a lot about techniques, how to correctly use a bat, how to effectively hit a ball and all kinds of useful lessons.
These lessons are a blessing to him today.

Theo has quite the history when it comes to sports, broom sports in particular. First he had joined the broom racing team and stayed on until his third year, when he finally quit. While the young man did enjoy a good challenge, he always had the feeling to be canon fodder as a young racer. The whole concept of the sport was rather merciless to younger students and Theo went to look for a different challenge. Preferable one that wouldn't land him in the hospital wing after every game.

So he had joined his school's Quidditch Team as a second string beater. A position he particularly enjoyed as he felt like he could bring some knowledge from his time in muggle school into it and maybe actually make a difference. Yes, during his first game he had not been on the winning side, but if he only looked at his own performance, he was rather content. It was certainly something he could work with!

And work with it he did. When other students could be found practicing spells, Theo was training his body, creating a visible difference over the duration of his fourth year. Regularly he could be found in some isolated area, doing push ups, sit ups or training hitting techniques with his beater's bat.

And one day, during training for which he usually used some normal balls, he hit one with full force, but didn't aim properly. The ball went a different way than intended and ended up hitting a chair next to a tree, smashing the whole thing against the trunk. With wide eyes Theo had run over to fix the chair magically, but the force of his hit had effectively turned the chair into a pile of broken boards.[/reducio][/quote][/quote]

Approved - Galahad

Code: Select all

[u][b]Perfectionist II - Year 3[/b][/u]
[reducio]Perfection, he had heard many times over, was an impossible state of being. Though loathe to admit it, he believed that to be mostly true at a basic level. People were people and therefore fallible - even him. Real world situations were always complicated and dynamic, any one of which had myriad outcomes possible dependent upon a seemingly endless number of variables. Some situations allowed for more leeway, for more forgiveness, so to speak, to reach an acceptable outcome. The saying, "Close only counts in horseshoes and hand grenades," would speak to that very point. But by what metric would one find perfection in the game, or series of games, of horseshoes, for example? He supposed it [i]may[/i] be possible to throw nothing but ringers in a single game, maybe even in two or more, but could it be done in every single game one was to play? Highly doubtful. 

So what came to Stephen's mind was what would the new metric for perfection be when perfection itself was not truly possible? A slate of wins, comprised of less than perfect scores, but scores still good enough to beat a competitor? Maybe that was getting closer to a reasonable, working theory of perfection. Less "X" marks the spot and more of a here is the acceptable range.

When Stephen approached anything, he did it with the mindset to always hit the mark. "X" really did mark the spot for him. The idea of ranging out perfection was something he felt happened, and was acceptable, when learning a new skill, but the goal was to always hit the nail on the head. He was a strong believer that practice made perfect, so he devoted all spare time to perfecting the things he did. Not working to perfect everything, of course, because he also believed in living a healthy happy life. So when failing to attain a perfect result, he never beat himself up. It simply spurred him on to work harder. 

[i]And he did work hard[/i].

He practiced especially hard, daily, on his flying skills and Broom Racing maneuvers. He was diligent about his physical workouts to keep his mind and body sharp, but it was his studies where his efforts were directed more than anywhere else. He was a student who thrived on getting into the weeds in his magic classes. The "how" to cast a spell or transfigure an object was not enough for his brain. The "why" was equally important, maybe moreso. The more he understood about anything, and all of its complexities, the more he was able to apply his knowledge for optimum results. He was still the kid who always asked for more homework. It was just who he was and what he did.

Perfection was not simply a single result, borne from hours, or sometimes years, of repetitive practice, and it certainly wasn't a natural state of being. He had come to believe it was a state of mind so he had disciplined his mind and trained his body to achieve "his" highest state of perfection when it came to casting, potioneering, transfiguring, and flying. 

The reality was that he was a wizard. He saw no path from graduating Ilvermorny and getting an appointment to the United States Air Force Academy, so all his efforts had been turned and directed to being the best wizard he could be. But seeing no pathway did not mean closely held dreams faded away. It just propelled him onward to control variables in his current reality in the hope that there might still be, well, [i]hope[/i].[/reducio]

Thank you!!

Approved - Galahad

NPC Name: Miles Thatcher
Link: viewtopic.php?p=293904#p293904
Year: Fourth Year
Stats: +5 for moving up a year, +1 for broom racing win from Simon (proof: viewtopic.php?t=23368&start=70)
Old Stats
Stamina - 10 | Evasion - 10 | Strength - 8 | Wisdom - 7 | ArcPower - 5 | Accuracy - 8

***NEW STATS***
Stamina - 12 | Evasion - 10 | Strength - 9 | Wisdom - 8 | ArcPower - 6 | Accuracy - 9
Abilities:
1.) Advanced Casting (411 words)

Reducio

What made a wizard a wizard? Of course, it is the magic that they possess within them but how did it get there? Is it stronger in some more so than others? Well, Miles didn't usually subscribe to the pureblooded supremacy sort of thinking and yet, when it came to spellcasting, it seemed that he was one of the top of his class. Was it dedication and practice? Surely not. Was it his pureblooded genetics of generation after generation of wizard that made up who he was? Perhaps.

All he knew is that he didn't have to put much effort into learning new spells, nor did he have to worry how effective those spells were. All he had to do was the bare minimum to understand something new and then he could perform it above nearly everyone. It would never be something he would complain about and he would be thankful for his ancestors for providing him with such a rich magical background.

It had to be genetics, didn't it? Even his own parents were both more than efficient with their wands. They were both magizoologists who worked with the highest classification of magical creatures ever to be discovered and often worked with vicious dragons and yet with just the protection of their wands most times, they were able to be some of the best in their field in researching these brilliant creatures.

It's the way it always was. From the first time he sat in Charms lessons at Ilvermorny with his new wand that he was paired with, it came like magic (pun intended). In all seriousness though, he sat at the front left of the class and listened to his professor explain a rather basic spell and when it was time to practice it, the students began - all not getting something precisely correct because the spell did nothing for them until about the fifteenth try. Miles had picked up his wand, stating the right incantation and doing the right wand movements with the very first try.

And it seemed to continue that way ever since. Even as he was now entering into his fourth year and the spells more complex - he did them with ease.

Yes, successful wandcasting and Miles Riley Thatcher just seemed to go together. Maybe it was those genetics, or maybe he was just somehow naturally talented. All Miles knew was that he was gifted and seemed to hold the ability of advanced casting.

2.) Evasive Maneuvers (403 words)

Reducio

Evasive had a couple different meanings. It could mean tending to avoid commitment or self-revelation and while Miles fit this persona quite often with most of the people he met, that's not exactly what we're talking about here when thinking of his abilities that make him unique as a wizard within the magical world.

No, in this case we mean evasive as in directed toward avoidance or escape and maneuvers is a series of moves that require skill and care. In other words, he's stealthy. It would be a particular good quality for a secret agent or spy to have, but Miles was just a student at Ilvermorny School of Magic thus far with no intentions of a secret life in his future.

Still, evasive maneuvers could come in handy - especially on the quidditch pitch. Miles Thatcher enjoyed many of the broom sports but his main love would always be quidditch where he was on his house team, the Thunderbird House, as a beater. A beater had to have quick action to toss that bludger toward a distracted bloke and hopefully knock him off of that broom. There were other ways, too, but this was one of the most widely used and most widely satisfying.

Maybe he got his evasive maneuvers developed when just a small boy. He often was out left tagging along while his mother and father did their research and studies. This meant he was in the presence of many magical creatures at a small age and some weren't always the most tame. Sometimes he'd have to dart quickly out of harm's way of an angry animal that might breathe fire or have particularly very sharp teeth.

But while this evasive maneuvers ability may have been developed under duress, it helped shape him into the gentle giant that he really was. He was a lover of plants - a lover of all things nature. He would be walking through a forest and about to step on some rare exotic plant and quickly find a way to avoid stepping upon it. Again, stealthy.

Would it help him further on in life? Maybe. Maybe not. Sometimes one got odd abilities and talents and didn't know where they came from or they didn't know if they were particularly helpful, but it's what made all the witches and wizards within the wizarding world unique. Miles felt proud of it regardless of the outcome.

Extracurricular: still quidditch, left handed beater for Thunderbird
Content Changes: None
Trunk Coding: please place here any special coding you want for your trunk. keep it simple

Approved - Galahad

NPC Name: Phylicia Stanwood
Link: Here!
Year: 6th Year (IC she's in 5th Year)
Stats: +5 (Year Update)
- Stamina: 14 > 15
- Evasion: 11 > 13
- Strength: 12
- Wisdom: 9
- Arcane Power: 5
- Accuracy: 15 > 17
Abilities: Keeper's Catch (Word Count: 405/400)

Reducio

Quidditch had been Phyllis' thing for as long as she could remember. It had started as a little kid, wide-eyed and dreamy, watching colorful jerseys blur by high in the air, and not knowing what they were doing but knowing she wanted to do that, too. That had sparked a childhood-long obsession, pushing her toy broom to its (admittedly limited) limits and pestering her exhausted parents to take her to games. And now she was on her school team, first-string Keeper a role she treated with a certain reverence.

It was a certain kind of magical, the way owning a speedy broom and belonging to an enthusiastic team pushed her to new heights. Watching the professionals was cool, but taking pointers from friends was better, and really nothing beat the practical application in scrimmages and games.

The role of Keeper could be viewed as a more passive one. You stuck near the hoops and defended them, and while you could dive into the action, it usually came at the cost of points to the enemy team. Phyllis loved zipping around a little too much to play so statically. And so, in the risk-free environment of practice, she started experimenting. Maybe rather than batting quaffles away she could try catching them. Maybe, if she was fast enough, a solid block could become a pass, a speedy attempt to score. Maybe she could take greater control of the field.

It was definitely a bit messy at first, sacrificing defense for offense. She fumbled balls and got a bit ahead of herself, moving faster than she could survey the field. But she'd played enough Quidditch to know that every setback was a lesson, and if you could tweak one detail of your approach after every failure, slowly your tangled mess of effort would weave into a pretty tapestry of skill. She wasn't one for flowery language, but that seemed a good way to put it. And tapestries were an appropriately large project, fitting of the way her team's support helped her pull it all together.

So now, with her silly tapestry put together reasonably well, she was gaining confidence to play as Keeper a little differently. A little more aggressively, a little more directly. A little more like the professionals, if she let her mentality go there. And, in her personal opinion, it was more fun this way, and wasn't that what Quidditch was all about?

Extracurricular: First String Keeper
Trunk Coding:

Reducio

Code: Select all

[quote][center][size=125][b]Trunk[/b][/size][/center]
[b]Stats:[/b]
- Stamina: 15
- Evasion: 13
- Strength: 12
- Wisdom: 9
- Arcane Power: 5
- Accuracy: 17
[right]+9 stat points from wins | [[url=https://www.hogwarts.io/viewtopic.php?f=40&t=8714&start=50#p149357]x[/url]][[url=https://www.hogwarts.io/viewtopic.php?f=16&t=13818&p=221038#p220798]x[/url]][[url=https://hogwarts.io/viewtopic.php?f=16&t=15254&p=243297#p243249]x[/url]][[url=https://hogwarts.io/viewtopic.php?f=16&t=16317&p=262149#p262116]x[/url]][[url=https://hogwarts.io/viewtopic.php?p=294534#p294534]x[/url]][[url=https://hogwarts.io/viewtopic.php?p=317191#p316921]x[/url]][[url=https://hogwarts.io/viewtopic.php?p=357116#p354933]x[/url]][[url=https://hogwarts.io/viewtopic.php?t=20754&start=30#p424177]x[/url]][[url=https://hogwarts.io/viewtopic.php?p=576988#p576988]x[/url]][/right]

[b]Abilities:[/b]
- Calming Presence
[reducio]Phyllis, even though she didn't realize it, had a presence about her that set people at ease. Despite her reputation, which wasn't the best and would normally lead someone to be unsettled when first meeting her, she just had this easy-going nature that lent others a sense of calm. Yes, her family had associations with Dark Magic, and, yes, she was known as a troublemaker, but be it her smile, relaxed posture, or something else, perhaps intangible, she had a calming presence.

The presence first became apparent when she was four. Her family, being wealthy Pure-bloods, had a number of house elves working for them. On that day another family high in status was visiting and one of the house elves spilled tea on one of the guest's dress. Naturally, he was kicked from the room and told to go punish himself. Phyllis, feeling badly for the creature, followed. She couldn't stop him from banging his head repeatedly against the wall, but she was successful in calming the poor elf down.

Such instances came up throughout her childhood in similar manners. When she moved with her mother to Canada, Phyllis became the peacemaker in the ring of friends she found in a magical urban area. The kids she hung around were far from well-mannered and had a tendency to get into fights even amongst themselves. Phyllis was the one to break those fights up and help everyone calm down.

And in situations where Phyllis and a friend were setting up a prank, she made it easy to relax. Sure, they were in the middle of doing something that could get them into trouble, which could be a bit stressful, or one might be overly excited, but with Phyllis around they were able to execute their prank without blowing their cover.

The same carried over to Quidditch. As a first year, Phyllis hadn't made the team but even just when playing for fun her teammates found it easier to play. Even when they were down, the girl was unflappable, never getting frustrated or giving up. In her mind, so long as you kept trying there was always a chance of coming back, of winning. They just had to focus and around her doing just that was much easier.

Even without each and every situation that made it clear her presence had an effect on people, her personality alone lent itself to helping others relax. Phyllis could be intense when she wanted to, but most of the time the redhead was laid-back, carefree. Grades weren't a concern; in fact, not achieving top marks aided her goal of irritating her mother. Plus, the way she saw it, things just [i]happened[/i]. You couldn't always do anything about it, so why not just go where things took you?

To those she cared about, Phyllis was solid, unchangeably loyal. In every other aspect of her life she was unpredictable, but when it came down to her friends counting on her she wouldn't let them down for anything. It was another aspect of her that helped her friends, her allies, not worry and instead focus there energy on succeeding.

It was true that Phyllis wasn't the smartest, hence the reason she hadn't identified the aura of calm she possessed. But she didn't have to know about it for it to be there. Without a doubt, Phyllis had a calming presence.[/reducio]- Fearless
[reducio]No one was truly fearless. It simply wasn't possible for a human to not be afraid of [i]something[/i], be it spiders, the dark, losing a loved one, or one of the other numerous things there were to be scared of. All that considered, Phyllis was as close as you could get to fearless.

Growing up the way she did, Phyllis [i]had[/i] to be fearless. It was that or be scared out of her wits of what her mother might do with all her Dark Magic next. Not letting anything get to her was probably not all that smart, but Phyllis wasn't exactly known for sharp intellect. Her sometimes reckless bravery led to many a not-so-great circumstance. For instance, climbing a tree too high without checking if the branches could hold her weight. That had been a painful day, what with tumbling to the ground when the branch under her snapped and breaking her arm. It was a good thing indeed that she'd grown up with magic to fix such accidents. Or, another time when she'd jumped into an icy lake to save one of her friends even though she had no clue how to swim. She'd been awfully lucky to survive that.

Still, not being scared of just about anything had its benefits. She didn't dread big occasions, didn't have to deal with stage fright, and wasn't afraid of just walking over to someone and striking up a conversation. In relation to that calming presence she possessed, the fact she wasn't scared made it that much easier for the people around her to relax.

When the Ilvermorny students had been invited to Hogwarts and fights had broken out at the Masked Ball, she'd charged straight into them. It was far from the smart thing to do, especially since she had next to no spells under her belt and all, but that didn't mean it hadn't been proof of her lack of fear. Maybe it was just the sort of bull-headed bravery you'd expect out of Gryffindors. Maybe it would get her killed someday. It wasn't as though she were scared of the potential repercussions, so what did it matter?

There were, of course, the things she was scared of. Being in the dark alone, for instance. Her childhood had taught her full well the horrors that hid in the shadows. Water, too--when she'd tried to save her friend, she'd learned just how terrifying it felt to drown. Neither of those fears would stop her from anything, though. Phyllis would still plunge into the shadows, still jump into water if it meant saving a friend or if it needed to be done. Perhaps that was the most important thing about her, more important than being mostly fearless in the first place: when she did get scared, she faced her fears anyways. Between the fearlessness and the bravery, Phyllis would not be stopped by fright.[/reducio]- Statistically Relevant [+2 Stamina]
[reducio]Phylicia Stanwood was tough. It was apparent even when she was a toddler; if she fell down, she was going to get back up. Throughout a childhood full of often reckless pursuits of excitement, scrapes, bruises, and the occasionally broken bone were common. She was quite the adventurous little thing, and when she played, she played hard. She was always outside, running around, climbing trees, doing cartwheels, flying her toy broom, and generally looking for any way to have fun.

Over time, her outdoor activities strayed away from simple playing and more into improving her physical abilities. Her endurance was possibly the only thing she admired about her family; Stanwoods were known for never giving up. Granted, the things her parents worked at until they got what they wanted were hardly admirable, but she was going to be different. Better. And that started by being the best broom flier out there.

Zipping around the grounds surrounding her family's manor brought a whole new set of dangers. See, when Phyllis flew, she only had one speed: fast. The little girl didn't know how to go slow; she was in it for the rush of adrenaline, the feeling having the wind streak past you. Instead of the occasional tumble out of a tree, now she was running straight into them, along with boulders and the occasional fence. Perhaps the resulting head trauma caused her to become even more reckless and stupid, but she never once cried. Instead, she always got back up, grabbed her broom, and walked back to the house to get fixed up.

This resilience wasn't just physical, though. Sure, she could take her fair share of hits and keep going, but getting up required a mental aspect. She knew how to shake things off. She chose to be optimistic, to believe even through growing up with parents that mostly ignored her that things could and [i]would[/i] get better. And if she believed there was always a light at the end of the tunnel, it was easier to get back up.

In addition, over the course of her first year she took to running in the morning. It wasn't as amazing of a feeling as zipping through the air on her broom, but it still felt good, feet pounding on the ground, propelling her forward. By the end of the year she could go a pretty long time without having to stop or slow down. She felt ready to face whatever came her way. Felt ready to keep pushing through.[/reducio]- Savior
[reducio]Phyllis loved sports, and broom sports in particular. She loved winning, and even just playing, flying; the feel of wind in her hair and pushing her broom faster and faster still. But here was the thing: things like broom racing and Quidditch? They were brutal. You were playing one minute and the next you were plummeting to the ground below. A lot of the time, you didn't get back up after that. The brutality itself wasn't really Phyllis' problem with it; Merlin knew she got a little too excited to roughhouse. No, what she didn't like was losing a teammate. It happened, but no one wanted to see a teammate sprawled on the grass. No one wanted to win and then watch a teammate grapple with the delivery of the news and the fact they hadn't been able to finish the game out, and of course it was only worse when it was a loss to report. The redhead's philosophy, not that she was entirely sure what philosophy meant, was that no one should get left behind.

She lived it. In her first broom race, despite the buzz of nerves and itch to speed ahead, she hung back because her friend and teammate had a slower broom and she wasn't going to leave him in the dust. When things had gone wrong at that first Masquerade Ball, the thought of leaving without her friends never once crossed her mind. She'd never let a prank partner take the fall; either they both got out of there or they took their punishment together. Simple as that.

Maybe that was why she ended up leaving the broom racing team. It was too individual of a sport. Yes, you had a team, but the whole point was for someone to race out ahead to cross the finish line first, not so much to work together. If someone was attacked, too bad, let them be targeted so you could slip by. Combine that with the fact she'd been in love with Quidditch since she knew what it was and she had her mind made up.

As she took to the skies in a different sport, she had a new way to keep up her code. If ever a teammate was to be knocked off their broom and it was remotely possible, she'd swoop down, getting a little faster in her rapid decline each time, and tug them out of their fall. It was a lot of fun riding together, anyhow; you could hear each others' jokes that way! The team was what counted to her, rain or shine, win or lose. No one left to fall.[/reducio]- Wandmaker [Snallygaster Heartstring | Dogwood | 33 cm | Quite Flexible]
[reducio]Distant was probably the best word to describe Phyllis' relationship with her father. It was true, more or less, even before her parents split, with him so often caught up at work. Always work. Maybe that was why he didn't fight for Phyllis to stay with him, why he seemed content with only the handful of times they saw each other a year and the letters. And Phyllis was fine with that. Life held too many good things to get snagged on wishes her father wasn't so distant, literally and emotionally. She had more than enough amazing friends to make up for it.

So when one of his letters strayed from the usual, surface-level discussion of what they'd been up to, Phyllis was surprised. He wanted to see her face-to-face, to spend a few days over the summer together? They hadn't spent that kind of time, just the two of them with no social function attached, in... well, in forever. So why now?

(Phyllis knew why. It was because she'd been asked to be a part of Ilvermorny's Hexiwizard team. There'd been congratulations when she'd joined the Quidditch team, but this was different. This was enough to catch genuine attention, maybe even pride. But it hurt to think that only this was finally good enough, so she was going to keep on pretending it was just out-of-the-blue.)

Her father inquired specifically about her wand--Was she attached? Did it work well?--with an offer to take her wand shopping at the special place he'd gotten his, if she wanted. Once upon a time, he had promised a small Phyllis admiring his wand with bright, wide eyes that he would go with her to get her wand, and that hadn't happened. She'd forgotten about that. Phyllis was not hung up about this promise he was a good three years late on; she hadn't even thought about it until the letter knocked it loose from the dusty recesses of her brain. She couldn't say she even cared for these sticks wizards so treasured, for spell-casting at all. 

Actually... that wasn't true, actually. Phyllis did care, she saw things like Maxi hitting two people with one incantation and thought that was [i]so cool[/i], wanted to do it herself. But she was used to being passing, at best, with a wand, really a downright disappointment for a pureblood. So she made her identity friends and flying, instead, using magic only where she needed to. Cool things like splitting spells just weren't in the cards for Phyllis.

But maybe, just maybe, she could be better with a new wand. It couldn't be any [i]worse[/i]; there existed very little connection between her and her current wand. Something had sparked enough for it to pair with her in the first place, but something--Phyllis' lack of effort, just not meshing--had made the length of wood feel like little more than a stick. And maybe the time with her father would be nice. Somewhere inside, there was a little girl who [i]had[/i] cared, confused and missing her father, who did want that promised wand outing.

So over the summer, Phyllis would spend several days with her father back in England. On one of those days, he would take her to this wand shop. He spoke of it highly, and from what Phyllis gathered, it was prestigious, expensive. High-end was probably the right word. Thus commenced the hunt for the right wand, her father hovering excitedly at her shoulder and finding combinations for her to try. Whether to be annoyed or endeared by the interest, Phyllis wasn't sure. Some of that energy did seem to rub off on her, though, hope that perhaps she could find a new, better wand breaking through her lack of enthusiasm.

[b]Wood: Dogwood[/b]
First impressions were important, and it wasn't uncommon for people to come away from meeting Phyllis with the word [i]loud[/i] in mind. This was especially true when she was younger, the little redhead always having things to say and the projection to make sure people heard her. When she arrived at Ilvermorny, she got a bit better at managing her voice level and not talking [i]nearly[/i] so much, because she realized people found that annoying. Still, loud was a word people might think about her, and if not, extroverted, sociable, and enthusiastic certainly were.

She was talking when she picked up the wand that would become hers, making some idle joke to her father because it would be much too boring to do this in silence, and perhaps that was half of the battle in winning the wood's allegiance.

[b]Core: Snallygaster Heartstring[/b]
The wands being funneled her way were primarily of the strongest cores. It was a very intentional thing, so that even Phyllis, with her limited knowledge of wand components, could notice. That was hardly a surprise, she was sure her father would be happiest if she came out with what was the best possible wand on paper. But she felt nothing with those--she didn't really think she had the necessary power, or whatever--and eventually their search expanded, which is how she ended up with a wand of Snallygaster Heartstring in hand. Did Phyllis even know what a Snallygaster was? Not really.

But it was this core that chose her, and if she had known the traits this core typically bonded with, she wouldn't have been surprised. She had that physical aspect, speed and grace shining through when she spun through the air on a broom. She had the warmness, optimism and openness being how she carried herself and aggression something very rarely expressed. And she had the self-awareness, in touch with how she felt about things and remarkably cool-headed for someone who appeared so expressive. The wand knew what it was looking for in a good match, even if Phyllis didn't.

[b]Length: 33 cm[/b]
Phyllis barely even noticed the lengths of the wands she tried out, but a short wand was just never going to fit. She was loud, expressive, humorous. [i]Dramatic[/i] was not something she typically was, unless it was sarcasm, but otherwise she fit the bill of a longer wand perfectly. Phyllis had a bigger presence, and so would her wand. Plus, it just felt right in her hand.

[b]Flexibility: Quite Flexible[/b]
Beyond preferring her wand to bounce a little when she swished it, a more flexible wand was only fitting. Where many might get nervous to try something new, for Phyllis there was only excitement as she chased the adrenaline of novelty. Constantly she was pushing her limits on a broom, and she was fine dropping plans to do something else with friends last-minute. Going with the flow seemed to her to be the best way to live.

Phyllis was not, however, a pushover. She had defined lines on certain things; she wouldn't be cruel, or exclusive, or follow through with ideas that were nothing but bad. That kept her laid-back approach to life in check. Most things didn't hold too much weight to her, but she would hold firm on those that did.[/reducio]- Keeper's Catch
[reducio]Quidditch had been Phyllis' thing for as long as she could remember. It had started as a little kid, wide-eyed and dreamy, watching colorful jerseys blur by high in the air, and not knowing what they were doing but knowing she wanted to do that, too. That had sparked a childhood-long obsession, pushing her toy broom to its (admittedly limited) limits and pestering her exhausted parents to take her to games. And now she was on her school team, first-string Keeper a role she treated with a certain reverence.

It was a certain kind of magical, the way owning a speedy broom and belonging to an enthusiastic team pushed her to new heights. Watching the professionals was cool, but taking pointers from friends was better, and really nothing beat the practical application in scrimmages and games.

The role of [i]Keeper[/i] could be viewed as a more passive one. You stuck near the hoops and defended them, and while you could dive into the action, it usually came at the cost of points to the enemy team. Phyllis loved zipping around a little too much to play so statically. And so, in the risk-free environment of practice, she started experimenting. Maybe rather than batting quaffles away she could try catching them. Maybe, if she was fast enough, a solid block could become a pass, a speedy attempt to score. Maybe she could take greater control of the field.

It was definitely a bit messy at first, sacrificing defense for offense. She fumbled balls and got a bit ahead of herself, moving faster than she could survey the field. But she'd played enough Quidditch to know that every setback was a lesson, and if you could tweak one detail of your approach after every failure, slowly your tangled mess of effort would weave into a pretty tapestry of skill. She wasn't one for flowery language, but that seemed a good way to put it. And tapestries were an appropriately large project, fitting of the way her team's support helped her pull it all together.

So now, with her silly tapestry put together reasonably well, she was gaining confidence to play as Keeper a little differently. A little more aggressively, a little more directly. A little more like the professionals, if she let her mentality go there. And, in her personal opinion, it was more fun this way, and wasn't that what Quidditch was all about?[/reducio]
[b]Extracurricular:[/b]
Is your character a Broom Racer? No
Is your character a Quidditch Player? Yes - Keeper
Is your character a Duellist? No[/quote]

Approved - Galahad

NPC Name: Everett "Rett" Brooks
Link: Bing Bong
Year: 5th Year
Stats:
Wins +4
Quid 1 | Quid 2 |Duel 1 | Duel 2

Old Stats
♢ Stamina 10 ♢ Evasion 10 ♢ Strength 6 ♢ Wisdom 9 ♢ ArcPower 10 ♢ Accuracy 8 ♢

New Stats (+1 for duel win, +5 for year up)
♢ Stamina 10 ♢ Evasion 10 ♢ Strength 6 ♢ Wisdom 10 ♢ ArcPower 13 ♢ Accuracy 10 ♢

Abilities:
4th Year - Perfectionist II, 410 Words

Reducio

An element of stress came from being one of the members of the Hexiwizard team of Ilvermorny. Representing the whole of their school and backing Miles with it. He was one of the proudest members of Ilvermorny, boasting the school's achievements and how lovely it was to- live on top of a misty mountain. That part wasn't great, he'd rather the school be located in the ever-sunny south instead of dreary Massachusetts. He was proud, proud of his wizard heritage, of his house, of his school. While he was already a studious boy, he became even more studious in the past year if that was possible. Extracurriculars became sparse as he dedicated himself to his studies. The two things that took up most of his time were letters to his dear Rafa who was being dreadfully homeschooled and who he missed dearly, and practicing with whatever Professor would give him the time of day.

He was already a slightly advanced caster, backfiring less often than other students in his year. There was something about him and his wand that just got each other. An ease of learning that took the stress off of practice. Though, sometimes he really felt like he was putting his wand through the wringer. Essays still had the expectation of getting done on time, and letters home became more infrequent. The worry that lived between the lines of his mother's letters was apparent. Ever the worry wart she was. His free time became stretched thin, his current romance novel The Quidditch Captain and the Peach Farmer (a working title) being left unfinished for the time being.

Of course, when inspiration struck he still took the time to scribble a line or two. He accidentally became an expert at idly twirling his wand around his hand just from fiddling with it during practice. Spellcasting started to feel like an extension of him, truly. It was easy. In class, he picked up spells like he had known them all his life. Wand movements felt more fluid, though incantations still felt hard depending on the Latin. Why did all of the incantations have to be Latin? At a certain point he almost felt more like a nuisance to his professors rather than an asset and joy to have in class. But there was a general understanding that this was the betterment for him as a wizard, and for him to succeed as much as possible in Hexiwizard.

5th Year - Evasive Maneuvers, 412 words

Reducio

It would be silly for Everett to think he was a graceful boy. He wasn't. He wasn't a particular fan of sports or playing in them, his mother made him learn some social dances but that doesn't mean that he was any good at them. So once again, it was a fault in his repertoire for the Hexiwizard tournament. The boy moved slowly, and not in a way that made him harder to hit. Dodge and weave was- well. Lightly skitter away and hope for the best. He didn't know honestly if he would have to battle anyone, but if his time in the chess game was any indication, he needed to improve and fast.

He did what he does best when it comes to this kind of stuff, and he studied. This time it wasn't books though, it was people. He attended more sports games. Broom racing, quidditch, dueling. He watched their maneuvers in the sky and on foot. He winced more than once watching people take brutal hits and hurl toward the ground, often being quickly escorted off to the hospital wing. He participated in sports, but it was mostly for the accolades than anything. Of which he didn't have any so far so it received the least of his attention and dedication. When he and Rafael D'Spacito first started dating he played sports and ran so fast and quick for him during a capture-the-flag game that he ultimately lost, all in the name of impressing a jock. But Rafa liked him even if he wasn't a sporty boy like him so he quickly dropped the façade.

For all intents and purposes, he was in Horned Serpent. Which was the house of the brain, about knowledge, smarts, and quick thinking. Not quick movement. Otherwise, he would've thought there was some kind of mistake in sorting. He had friends of his throw things at him during downtime. Small items, large items, it didn't matter. At first, he was battered and bruised by various shoes and other effects. Over time though, he grew quicker. He was able to maneuver in multiple directions. Ducking or jumping rather than just moving side to side. Of course, he was still hit, but he was still just a novice at this! What mattered is he was much better off than he was before and he didn't feel like he would be quiet as big as a target in Hexiwizard competitions, should he need to battle again.

Extracurricular: Duellist (I'll be switching sports come September, also I should technically be off the team since my duel is over and I missed 2 posts)
Content Changes: Just updating his year and age.
Trunk Coding:

Reducio

Code: Select all

[quote][center][img]/images/upload/2u43fs.webp[/img][/center][/quote]
[quote][center][b]|| Stats ||[/b]
♢ Stamina 10 ♢ Evasion 10 ♢ Strength 6 ♢ Wisdom 10 ♢ ArcPower 13 ♢ Accuracy 10 ♢
[revelio][url=https://hogwarts.io/viewtopic.php?t=9842&start=50#p149360]Quid 1[/url] | [url=https://hogwarts.io/viewtopic.php?t=12164&start=160#p199722]Quid 2[/url]
[url=https://hogwarts.io/viewtopic.php?t=13765&start=40#p217884]Duel 1[/url] | [url=https://hogwarts.io/viewtopic.php?p=667782#p666493]Duel 2[/url]
[/revelio]
[b]|| Extracurricular ||[/b]
♢ Duellist ♢[/quote]
[quote][quote][b]♢ 1st Year Ability ♢ Charmer ♢[/b]
[reducio]It was no secret in the US that the South was known for their charm and hospitality. This didn't stop when it came to Everett. In his pureblood family they had raised him from an early age to be an exemplary practitioner of this. There was no lady that would open her own door around him, no person to be left unescorted if they needed assistance wherever they needed to go. He was quite the, well... charmer. 

His smile left grandmas pinching his cheeks, and girls his age developing the cutest of young crushes on him. Although, he always had to politely turn them down due to his early discovery of his gayness. It really didn't come as surprise to anybody around him and he was lucky to be in a supportive environment, but generally he was still in the closet for the most part in his town. This almost added to his charm, the unattainable preppy boy. People tried to get him to crack, to be his first girlfriend, but they never succeeded and they always seemed to leave feeling dazed by his soft words and silver tongue. He was a horned serpent after all. 

In addition to his training in politeness and grace, he also spent unending hours in his families library, reading anything that he could get his hands on. Which wasn't hard, his library was huge and he was lucky enough to have the wealth that could get him any additional book at the snap of his fingers. This only lent a hand when it came to Everett's smooth talking and expansive vocabulary. Romance novels taught him to be suave, how to pull a girl in. Granted, they were adult tactics that he had to mold to suit his childish desires. A signature of his was greeting someone new with a kiss upon their hand if they let him. No gender was safe from this greeting, he believed anyone should get the joy of being pulled in by him. Not just the ladies.

Everett already had a pretty big ego for someone his age. Growing up with people around him giving him such high praise for such little things gave him the confidence he needed to glide through life without a care. Granted, he was learning the hard way that he could definitely trip up and fail in making relationships with others. Learning how to interact had been a slippery slope, but even then he managed to charm his way out of nearly every awkward situation. Or, if all else failed, just never spoke to that person again.
[right][i]Word Count || 432[/i][/right][/reducio][/quote]
[quote][b]♢ 2nd Year Ability ♢ Perfectionist I ♢[/b]
[reducio]Everett felt lucky that he grew up in a household that always pushed him to succeed, but not to any degree that caused him an unneeded amount of stress. He was allowed to still be a kid, to mess up every now and again, with constant encouragement to try better the next time. It felt right that he ended up in the house of the Horned Serpent, the house of the mind and of scholars. It was a continuation of that encouragement to succeed, to always be doing better. 

While studying by the book was more his speed, his essays and speeches alike being his specialty besides spellcasting, as a wizard he knew the importance of doing well in his practical studies too. When he wasn't reading or writing, he was practicing. He took diligent notes in class about everything about a spell. While some saw the etymology of a spell as useless in casting, he saw it as another bit of information to help him perform the spell perfectly. Sure, he did love learning etymology in general, but he approached spell learning with a type of respect towards the craft. 

If anyone were to catch him, he would vehemently deny giving his wand a little pep talk before practice session. But his wand was his instrument of success, and his parents emphasized how important keeping a good relationship with your wand was, as if it was its own sentient entity. Every part of his spellwork took patience and dedication. There was no part that was undervalued, no part that was skipped. If he was in a rush to practice he didn't practice at all, for a rushed practice was practically useless to him. There was a mindset that was involved, a deep breath, and practicing the components separately. The incantation, the wand movement, the concentration, then all together. 

By no means was he a particularly naturally gifted spellcaster, it is why he practiced so hard outside of his studies. Something many of his friends didn't really even know about him. It wasn't something he was ashamed of, but it was something that he cherished in his private life. 
The countless hours of practice he would put into spells made backfires rarely happen. A well practiced headspace of his craft, muscles that had memorized every wand movement he had learned so far. To his classmates he seemed like a flawless natural, but he and his family knew just how much work he constantly put into his studies to succeed and fly above the rest of his class.
[right][i]Word Count[/i] || 427[/right][/reducio][/quote]
[quote][b]♢ 3rd Year Ability ♢ Paragon of Health ♢[/b]
[reducio]The young Horned Serpent was a keen people watcher. He quite enjoyed relaxing in a public area by himself to watch the others around him. His mom and himself quite enjoyed doing it during the hot Georgia summers, either at cafes or the occasional beach trip. While they did talk, she taught him how to notice different things about people. To look at a whole person, their movements, the way they stood, the look in their eyes, where they were looking. He valued his time with his mom and felt like that time with her helped him now in Ilvermorny. While he was absolutely a novice at reading people since he was still... well a child at heart. Sometimes he believed the best in people when they would later lead them astray. 

This keen skill of observation had turned into something else in his time at Ilvermorny. An aura of control over a situation, of calm and assuredness, surrounded him. Even in a group of Hogdorks during a Wizard Chess Combat, he stayed calm and alert as the [s]Princess[/s] Queen.  Despite one of his compatriots being constantly set on fire. He had taken the role of firefighter, putting her out as needed. Staying aware of who needed assistance. Who was moving as if they were injured, did someone need just some emotional motivation. He certainly was not winning any awards for extraordinary kindness, but when he was with people he knew he needed to take care of he would. It was something that always made him wish that he had younger siblings, people to take care of from a young age so he could've harnessed this skill at an earlier age. With parents by his side all of his life there was really no need for it. But Ilvermorny had changed him for the better, and going into his third year he was getting better and better at being competent for others.

In times of stress or strife he was there for the people that he cared for, they could trust him to be the one that was hypervigilant, in control. Inside he would be stressed out of his mind, panicking at trying to maintain a collected composition to lead everyone to safety, or to victory. But it was a burden he happily took upon his shoulders. It was something that made him feel capable, like the leader that he was meant to be. 

If you were by his side you were taken care of and that was a fact.
[right][i]Word Count[/i] || 421[/right][/reducio][/quote]
[quote][b]♢ 4th Year Ability ♢ Perfectionist II ♢[/b]
[reducio]An element of stress came from being one of the members of the Hexiwizard team of Ilvermorny. Representing the whole of their school and backing Miles with it. He was one of the proudest members of Ilvermorny, boasting the school's achievements and how lovely it was to- live on top of a misty mountain. That part wasn't great, he'd rather the school be located in the ever-sunny south instead of dreary Massachusetts. He was proud, proud of his wizard heritage, of his house, of his school. While he was already a studious boy, he became even more studious in the past year if that was possible. Extracurriculars became sparse as he dedicated himself to his studies. The two things that took up most of his time were letters to his dear Rafa who was being dreadfully homeschooled and who he missed dearly, and practicing with whatever Professor would give him the time of day.

He was already a slightly advanced caster, backfiring less often than other students in his year. There was something about him and his wand that just got each other. An ease of learning that took the stress off of practice. Though, sometimes he really felt like he was putting his wand through the wringer. Essays still had the expectation of getting done on time, and letters home became more infrequent. The worry that lived between the lines of his mother's letters was apparent. Ever the worry wart she was. His free time became stretched thin, his current romance novel The Quidditch Captain and the Peach Farmer (a working title) being left unfinished for the time being.

Of course, when inspiration struck he still took the time to scribble a line or two. He accidentally became an expert at idly twirling his wand around his hand just from fiddling with it during practice. Spellcasting started to feel like an extension of him, truly. It was easy. In class, he picked up spells like he had known them all his life. Wand movements felt more fluid, though incantations still felt hard depending on the Latin. Why did all of the incantations have to be Latin? At a certain point he almost felt more like a nuisance to his professors rather than an asset and joy to have in class. But there was a general understanding that this was the betterment for him as a wizard, and for him to succeed as much as possible in Hexiwizard.
[right][i]Word Count[/i] || 410[/right][/reducio][/quote]
[quote][b]♢ 5th Year Ability ♢ Evasive Maneuvers I ♢[/b]
[reducio]It would be silly for Everett to think he was a graceful boy. He wasn't. He wasn't a particular fan of sports or playing in them, his mother made him learn some social dances but that doesn't mean that he was any good at them. So once again, it was a fault in his repertoire for the Hexiwizard tournament. The boy moved slowly, and not in a way that made him harder to hit. Dodge and weave was- well. Lightly skitter away and hope for the best. He didn't know honestly if he would have to battle anyone, but if his time in the chess game was any indication, he needed to improve and fast.

He did what he does best when it comes to this kind of stuff, and he studied. This time it wasn't books though, it was people. He attended more sports games. Broom racing, quidditch, dueling. He watched their maneuvers in the sky and on foot. He winced more than once watching people take brutal hits and hurl toward the ground, often being quickly escorted off to the hospital wing. He participated in sports, but it was mostly for the accolades than anything. Of which he didn't have any so far so it received the least of his attention and dedication. When he and Rafael D'Spacito first started dating he played sports and ran so fast and quick for him during a capture-the-flag game that he ultimately lost, all in the name of impressing a jock. But Rafa liked him even if he wasn't a sporty boy like him so he quickly dropped the façade.

For all intents and purposes, he was in Horned Serpent. Which was the house of the brain, about knowledge, smarts, and quick thinking. Not quick movement. Otherwise, he would've thought there was some kind of mistake in sorting. He had friends of his throw things at him during downtime. Small items, large items, it didn't matter. At first, he was battered and bruised by various shoes and other effects. Over time though, he grew quicker. He was able to maneuver in multiple directions. Ducking or jumping rather than just moving side to side. Of course, he was still hit, but he was still just a novice at this! What mattered is he was much better off than he was before and he didn't feel like he would be quiet as big as a target in Hexiwizard competitions, should he need to battle again.
[right][i]Word Count[/i] || 412[/right][/reducio][/quote][/quote]

Approved - Galahad

NPC Name: Elowen Fernsby
Link: !!!
Year: Third Year
Stats: +5 Graduating & +1 Duel win [link to duel]
Old Stat = Sta : 10 | Eva : 8 | Str : 6 | Wis : 5 | Arc : 3 | Acc : 9
New Stat = Sta : 10 | Eva : 12 | Str : 6 | Wis : 5 | Arc : 3 | Acc : 11
Abilities: [Evasive Maneuvers 1] [wc 402]

Extracurricular: Quidditch [second string chaser]
Content Changes: adding year change, stat and abilities
Trunk Coding: [everything under reducio]

Pending - Galahad Please update with a link to the duel win.

Update as of 1st July: Edits due by 15th July. If not edited in time to meet the above notes then you'll have to reapply next round. - Hjørdis

Edited!

Approved - Lear (July 1)

[quote][img]/images/upload/352aib.webp[/img]
[quote][center]
[size=150][b]☆S T A T S ☆[/b][/size]
[size=125][i]○Stamina: 7○  ●Evasion: 8● ○Strength: 5○ ●Wisdom: 9● ○Arcane Power:  5 ●Accuracy: 6●[/i][/size][/center][/quote]
[quote][center][size=150][b]☆A B I L I T I E S☆[/b][/size][/center]
[left][size=125][i]~Terrible Presence~[/i][/size]
[reducio][size=75]Estelle had a goal to make others feel bad. If it was something small, or big, she could make you regret you ever said or did that thing. But she wasn't always too bad, it was when her parents left each other that made her have a certain distaste for seeing people happy. Every morning since she was eight, she'd see kids being dropped and picked up from school by [i]both[/i] their parents. Or atleast they all talked like both their parents live with them. Whilst Estelle, stayed with her mother and her father was very absent from her life, and when Paul moved in, something occurred to her; it wasn't fair that people got to laugh while she had to deal with Paul and Charlotte at home. It wasn't fair. From then on, it was Es's life mission to be rude to people. At school, kids didn't even approach her anymore, because they learnt well to leave Estelle Hughes alone.

Estelle knew her purpose and she knew she didn't like people. Was it because of her parents divorce that she was unhappy with her life, really? Yes, partially. Because the few occasions the small girl tried to make friends, she was shunned out. She wasn't a cool kid. Even the teachers didn't like her. The young redhead who sat in the back of the class, who never bothered to answer any questions in class. The young redhead who sat by herself at lunch. But did she care? Not the slightest- but for a while, she wondered why she had such a sharp tongue, why she always pushed people away. Why, whenever someone approached her, the first thing she does is make the person leave her alone, and they left her alone alright, they left in tears.

It wasn't just her peers she was rude to. It was also her family. Austin (her father) was the only person Estelle had ever felt close to. And he wasn't there. Even her mother, Estelle talked rudely, acted like she cared about nothing in the world. Estelle couldn't be ruder to Paul and Charlotte, she hated the pair. The day they moved in, even Charlotte knew that she wouldn't manage to be friends with Estelle, just from the aura the young girl radiated when she walked around the house.

Over time, Estelle got used to the fact that her presence was so intimidating, as matter of fact, she [i]liked[/i] it. As long as people stayed away and she got to have things her way, things didn't turn ugly.[/size][/reducio][/left][/quote][/quote]

Approved - Galahad