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                                        █ █ B A S I C S

                                              █ NAME ▬ Ronan Rowan
                                              █ AGE ▬ 29
                                              █ NICKNAME ▬ Rose, Roan, Father, Thorne
                                              █ GENDER ▬ Male
                                              █ RACE ▬ Plant (Earth) Nymph
                                              █ ORIENTATION ▬ Pansexual
                                              █ OCCUPATION ▬ High Priest of a cult Alternative Lifestyle Pagan Commune
                                              █ PARTNER ▬ Free lover
                                              █ SLAVE ▬ None

                                        █ █ A P P E A R A N C E

                                              █ HAIR ▬ Silver
                                              █ EYES ▬ Blue
                                              █ BUILD ▬ Lean and soft. Fit, but no muscle definition to speak of. [5"10]
                                              █ TATTOOS ▬ ivy vines on one forearm
                                              █ SCARS ▬ None
                                              █ BIRTHMARKS ▬ None

                                        █ █ P E R S O N A L I T Y
                                        █ █ H I S T O R Y

                                              █ BACKGROUND

                                              Ronan Rowan was born to an exceedingly average family. He was the middle child of three brothers. They all went to public school, and tried to get good grades to earn a scholarship so that at least one of them could go to college. His father worked as a botanist, and his mother worked as a foreman with a construction company. Very very bland. In a household of unexceptional people, it seemed like Ronan alone had a desire to be something greater. But for most of his childhood, he was just... him. And everyone told him that that was okay. That was good. "Just be yourself" they told him.

                                              All of his life, Ronan felt... bored. Empty. He tried various means of escape. In high school he tried being a delinquent on for size. But the pressure and guilt from his family for him to try and get into a good school made that attempt half hearted. He carried on a string of short-lived romances instead, and even though typical highschool drama did wring a few tears here and there, it was hardly fulfilling. So he stuck to the path that was laid out for him. He and his older brother were very close, and wound up attending the same college. Perhaps somewhat enchanted by the old mythos surrounding them, Ronan became fascinated with Theological studies. His brother, on the other hand, showed an aptitude for political studies, of all things. They'd always been amicable as children, but in college the two of them really became friends. They would stay up late into the night talking about the world at large, how the social climate affected the people, how the people affected the religion, how they could use those tools in their favor. They wanted to make the world a better place, and they really believed that they could do it. They would send each other articles about crime rates, illegal slave trading rings being busted, and they'd shake their heads. Such a shame. People just needed guidnce. They needed leadership. People were, for the most part, panicky sheep. That was their conclusion. They weren't smart enough, enlightened enough, to govern themselves.

                                              It was the educated, they deduced, who needed to steer them in the right direction. Their family had never been particularly religious. Studying theology, Ronan found that he could find little bits of truth here and there in each school of thought. So, to him, the most logical path was paganism - just tossing all of them together, treating all religions and gods as facets of the same, universal truth. You found the energy that worked best for you and you followed it. After all, everything, everyone... at the end of the day, they were all energy, weren't they? Ronan graduated with a degree in Theological studies, and set to starting a career as a catholic priest. Sure, it wasn't actually his religion, but his brother was already on the path to becoming a strong political powerhouse in Saxon, having graduated two years before him with a degree in geopolitical studies. The two of them kept their pagan altars private, as they were meant to be kept, and kept up their public facades. Things went well, for a while.

                                              Incredibly well, in fact. Ronan became an ordained priest, and despite his young age, his brother was rapidly making headway in the political world in Saxon. He fought for more slave rights, for stricter regulations on ownership. He vowed to aid working class unions, and audit the Saxon PD. He was charismatic, energetic, charming, and he had a plan. Not to mention his brother Ronan had an upstanding reputation as well, and even their youngest brother, in college himself by then, was pursuing a degree in the sciences. There wasn't a spot on their records that could impede his older brothers progress. He was rapidly gaining support, and Ronan couldn't have been more proud of him if he tried.

                                              And then he was gone.

                                              Ronan knew that his older brother had been murdered. Knew it deep in his bones. But the police insisted that it was a suicide. He'd been found hanged in his flat, after all. There was no note, but there was no sign of a struggle, either. Maybe he'd been struggling quietly for years, they said. Sometimes the people who seemed happiest were the ones struggling the most. Everyone insisted that it was an open and shut case, no matter how loud Ronan protested. He knew his brother. They'd shared everything. He'd been so excited, both of them had, to change the world. It was their purpose, and they both knew it. Felt it deep down. The powers that be had put them on that path. But they hadn't changed anything. All that was different was that his brother was dead.

                                              Ronan left the clergy. He burned his altar, and his brothers, and turned his back on their pagan beliefs. What had it gotten him, anyway? What had any of it gotten them? Ronan abandoned everything that he had ever believed in and became... well. A shell. Little more than a wandering, vagabond drunkard. He took his brothers murder hard, spiraling into a deep depression that he couldn't seem to pull himself out of. His younger brother tried to help him, but he was young and naive, and he had no clue what to do. He'd lost a brother too, after all. In the end the two grew frustrated with one another, and stopped speaking. Eventually, Ronan was kicked out of his apartment when he couldn't pay rent. He lived on the streets for about a year. During that time he was mugged, beaten, and suffered.... other such indignities. But it hardly phased him. He'd already suffered worse, he felt. What did it matter if his body was battered or desecrated? He was arrested for vagrancy and public intoxication a few times, but for the most part the officers involved took pity on him. One or two had been members of his congregation before, after all.

                                              It was around that time that the dreams started.
                                              For the first time since his brother died, he had dreams. Pleasant dreams instead of nightmares filled with the sound of creaking rope.
                                              Soon enough, he looked forward to being asleep more than being awake. He drank to excess, stole cold medicine, anything to stay asleep. In his dreams he was safe, and he wasn't alone anymore. At first, there was no voice. Just a feeling. The feeling of someone with him, of warmth and comfort. Companionship. It was some time before he heard it speak. In his dreams, he almost felt like he had to coax it out. Like maybe it was timid. But when it finally did speak, it was friendly. Encouraging. Supportive in a way his naive brother could never have been. It was the voice who helped him get back on his feet again. Not his family, not his old congregation, not his brothers friends. It was the voice in his dreams that helped him see the world differently. Even if the old gods had abandoned him, if they'd ever been there at all, but the voice wouldn't. Their destinies were intertwined, it said. Wasn't that what Ronan had always wanted? Destiny? He was meant for something greater. He was meant to change the world, and he would. The path he had to take was just a different one. He needed to be a shepherd not to the masses, but to the outcasts.

                                              Ronan learned a different way of life. He learned to scavenge and live minimally. He learned to go without, like all those pompous priests he used to work with always preached but never practiced. He learned not to hold the aggressions of the other slum dwellers against them. He became a strict pacifist. It didn't stop him from being assaulted, but it was so much easier when the voice comforted him in his sleep. Oddly, it was in this way that he gained his first follower. It was another desperate slummer who thought Ronan might have something on him, drugs or something he could use to get drugs. The man was half high out of his mind, but when he struck Ronan, the nymph didn't lash out, or try to fight back. But he also didn't crumple and fold, didn't cower or look at him lifelessly. Ronans serenity was strange and foreign in the desperate slums. His attacker broke down and, reminded of his time in confession as a priest, Ronan could think of little else to do but comfort him. He became the first of a number of followers that Ronan would slowly gain over time.

                                              One thing he and his brother had always agreed upon was that people needed something to believe in. Ronan knew what people would think if he told them the truth, about the voice in his dreams, his only real friend. They would drag him off, take him to a caim who would make sure the voice disappeared forever. So, instead, he picked up the pieces of his old belief system and wore them like a mask. He no longer believed in the pagan rites, how they were all a part of a circle with no beginning and never ending. He did not believe in the rule of Three. But his followers could. So he picked up the old doctrine and twisted it to serve his own purposes. After all, that was what gods and men did, wasn't it? He put on the play of the deeply religious father, and the voice kept him serene. He drew the desperate and the lost to him - homeless slummers like he had been, misunderstood runaways, disillusioned adults desperate for purpose. He gave all of them what they wanted. Community, support, purpose. The promise of something greater. He built up a commune where people shared everything (especially with Ronan) and he taught his children his valuable lessons about how to live life. He made sure they were utterly devoted to him, and he listened to the little god in his head, until he could hear it even when he was awake.

                                              God, what beautiful music it made.

                                              █ ABILITIES
                                              ▬ PLANT SHAPE
                                              Ronan, like all nymphs, can alter his body into an elemental form. In his case, he can turn his entire body into thick roots, vines, and flowering plants covered in thorns. He very rarely changes his entire body. Most of the time, if he's using his abilities, he's turning his arms into long spires of winding roots, or growing thick roots and vines from his back to use a lot like tentacles. They are very powerful, and he uses them to restrain potential attackers. He is capable of completely wrapping someone in thick roots. While he is nonviolent, Ronan is very capable of inflicting serious damage should he choose to. Ever seen tree roots splitting concrete?

                                              ▬ PUTTING DOWN ROOTS
                                              Ronan very frequently fasts, declining to take any food except for the occasional drink of water. During these times, he will often sit outside and meditate. While he does this, he sinks his roots down into the earth beneath him, and will sometimes sprout leaves, drawing nourishment from the soil and sun and rain. He says that it cleanses him. While he cannot survive indefinitely like this, he can go for much longer without food or water than the average person can thanks to this ability.

                                              ▬ THE GIFT OF GAB
                                              Ronan is incredibly manipulative, and he tends to target the young and misguided. He acts as a nonjudgemental safe place in order to draw in the desperate so that he can indoctrinate them into his little circle of fanatics. He often uses his past as a priest to wriggle out of trouble with the law, and plays on peoples pity to get materials and supplies for his little community.

                                              ▬ A SECOND OPINION
                                              Ronan is actively in contact with a demon who has taken up residence in his psyche. He communicates with it most clearly in dreams, but through concentrated meditation, he has been able to hear it while awake as well. He actively encourages the demon to attach to him more. He keeps a spear of wire-wrapped quartz around his neck at all times to help host it, and always denies its existence to anyone. He frequently asks the voice for advice on hos to proceed, or how to handle certain situations. While thus far the voice has encouraged Ronan to be patient and nonviolent, it seems to be waiting for something...


                                              █ EXTRA
                                              -- Frequently encourages his followers to use powerful drugs and hallucinogens, but very seldom uses them himself.

                                              -- He always speaks in a slow, drawling, dreamy tone. It sort of sounds like he's always trying to lead you in a guided meditation. Or maybe hypnotize you.

                                              -- Will not hesitate to sow seeds (ha) of mistrust for people who try to divert his flock from his cult. Frequently uses lines like 'many people are more comfortable being blind' or 'some are fearful of enlightenment. It's a difficult path.' Makes his own out to be a kind of noble outcast, and everyone else is either blind, malicious, or a sellout.