NERO ARCANGELO, Church Overseer

Post by Nero Giambattista Arcangelo on Aug 10, 2014 1:27:39 GMT

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[attr="class","charname"]Nero Giambattista Arcangelo

[attr="class","charinfo"]32
Male
Overseer
Neutral [Leaning Red]
Lawful Neutral
Merls
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[attr="class","blackheading"]BACKGROUND
Arcangelo is an old Italian family, who have always been intensely tied to the Church. Hell at some point they renamed themselves Arcangelo, which literally means "Archangel" in Italian, so clearly they thought they were the most devout things since broken bread. (Get it, because it's the body of Christ-- Oh nevermind.) Anyways, they thought they were awesome, and had close ties to the church. They only recently became directly apart of the association known as "The Church" in the world of magi after the whole "Priests can get married" thing became widely accepted within it. Due to their previous wealth and influence, they came in the doors swinging as far as political power within the Vatican went, and managed to carve a place for themselves pretty easily. They did however develop a particularly strong enmity between themselves and a predominant Spanish family within the church, the Salamanca.

Why do I mention this you ask? Excellent question my attentive reader!

Because clearly the best way to resolve a generations old rivalry and years of sexual tension was to just bite the bullet and arrange a political marriage between the two family heads, merging the families influence and power into one. Which actually ended up just becoming the Salamanca's vast influence being added into the even greater fold of the Acangelo, much to the Salamanca's chagrin.

Anyways, skip a generation or two after and out pops Nero, the most recent heir to the family. If you think to yourself of the stereotypical pampered child, raised into wealth and influence, you'd basically have Nero pegged. A spoiled brat easily almost grew into a similarly spoiled, pompous man. It was only the actions and influence of an eldery mentor, a Father within the Church who took an interest in the young man, that saved him from becoming an insufferably rich twat.

Instead, his upbringing was salvaged into making him a pompous twat who is intensely devoted to God. Woo.

Due to his families magical circuits, he was trained in ways to use this power to serve the Holy Church. He received extensive training in the practices of Exorcisms, the use and creation of Holy Sacraments, and even spent several years in the tutelage of an Executor [The same Father who had salvaged his faith as a child]. While he had extensive skill in all of these, he decided he didn't have "the persona" for any of them. The path of the Executor in particular grew the most repugnant to him despite his proficiency in his training, because why would an influential man of god devote his life to becoming a grade-A Murderer? That just doesn't make any sense.

Still, he was quite good at it.

Eventually Nero's dad kicked the bucket and croaked, leaving Nero as heir to the family and their fortune and influence. He has since come to be hated by the vast majority of his relatives, specifically the other Arcangelo's, because he is driving them virtually bankrupt. Due to his lack of giving a fuck about money, he has been rather loose with their expenditures in order to aid the cause of the Church and "to do God's Will." However, what he is losing in wealth he is gaining in both public prestige as a charitable man of god and political friends and influence within the Church. He's trading in his cash for favor, and it's doing wonders for him. He even managed to establish close ties with the Salamanca portion of his family, angering his Arcangelo kin even more. They're not exactly happy that he's spending all the families money to increase their "charitable reputation" and to do the will of God. Nero doesn't care-- His private opinion on his family was that they had become greedy and complacent, and no longer served in the Interest of God, only in their materialistic sense of power.

Nero spent most of the past few years in the Vatican itself, playing at politics within the Church and trying to oust those that he believed lacked in their devotion to God. He was present when the initial announcement came to the Church that the Greater Grail of Fuyuki had been found-- In China. A branch known as the Yggdmillenia had broken from the Mages Association, taking the Grail with them. This brought them into conflict with the Mages Association, but this was of no concern to the Holy Church; They still saw themselves as the official overseers of the Grail War, and so considered it their duty to immediately dispatch an Overseer to the area.

Seeing a chance to monopolize on an opportunity to do God's Will, it was fairly easy to make sure that when he "volunteered to oversee the situation", he would be assigned as the official church representative of the situation. This came as a shock to some, as the obvious choice was the aged Risei Kotomine, who possessed all the command seals of the previous 3 wars. Nero however, simply visited Fuyuki and arranged for the seals to be transferred to him instead, acquiring the seals from the aged man, and with them, the authority to oversee "the" Grail War.

He then hopped back on his plane and flew to Taxixuan, and here we are. [Arrives roughly mid day Day -1.]

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[attr="class","redheading"]PERSONALITY

Lawful Neutral: Type 1. Believes in the authority of the Holy Church, and deems them the ultimate interpreters of Gods Will-- To the point where he will even perform actions that seem morally against the Word of God in favor of their orders. He has an astounding lack of empathy for the material world. His morality is only salvaged by his faith in God, whom he derives as an ultimate authority on human life and morality; As such, he only follows orders that might seem to oppose it from those whom he considers even more holy or devout than himself. Nero views climbing the political latter in the Church purely as a means to better express the will and intent of God. Interestingly enough Nero has had a somewhat struggle in morality as the foremost authority of the Vatican in the public world, the Pope, has actually been shown to be far more accepting of the world at large than some of the more conservative officials of the Vatican. Nero has found himself straying away from the conservative doctrine, that which he has been raised on, to a more hospitable interpretation of God's Will-- But he's still working on it. Being raised on "Deliver God's Judgement and Burn the Heretic" takes a while to get over, after all, and he's still kind of a twat to anyone who isn't a White Christian. [Bigotry dies hard.]

Magnificent Bastard: How Nero acts. Nero almost always seems calm, collected, and in control. He wields the authority of the Church, money, political power, and always acts like he has all the cards. In truth, he views money and material power as worthless, mere tools in the service of Divine Will. He acknowledges the advantages money and power provide, but finds obsession with them unacceptable, as it corrupts the pure and leads to a degradation in morality. He's a lucky punk that he got so much money that he can legitimately hold this view and still have money to spare. He acts intensely ~fancy~, as one might expect from a snobby European official from the Church. This facade of power and materialism comes from an intensely wealthy upbringing and a desire to live up to public expectations. In truth, he acts a lot more prepared and in control than he usually ever is, if only because he knows no other way how to act. It also often causes a great deal of misunderstandings and surprise when they realize that it is, in fact, all a smokescreen for his devotion.

Good Shepherd: Nero sees himself as very much this, even if he sometimes fails at it. He finds himself concerned with the well being of others, and attempts to protect and guide them. However this is not due to any particular empathy for them-- If anything, Nero is struck by a particular lack of empathy for the world and all those within it. However, he cares for others because such is the Word of God, and while Nero's love for others may be a deception he attempts to convince even himself of, his trust in God is real. He believes so intensely in the idea of a "God whom loves all his subjects" that he protects and provides for those whom accept him in his stead, as a tool of God. As he might say, "An instrument might not care for the notes it plays, but it strums away nonetheless at the hands of the player, for only the player can know the symphony that will result." However, to those whom do not accept God's love or authority, he often has shades of Sinister Minister, as he feels no obligation nor desire to care for them. If anything, those whom are aware of the Word of the Lord and choose to refuse it are worse than ignorant heathens, a type of being that is unworthy of the love God provides and so, unworthy of his empathy or his protection. He is however getting better about this, as noted in the Lawful Neutral section.

Knight Templar: Has looooots of shades of this. While he views himself as a deeply flawed individual due to his notable lack of empathy and absurdly materialistic family, he views his devotion to his Lord as pure. While he knows he is not the singular most Devout individual, he believes that his faith is of the purest variety. Tell him his devotion to God isn't real, or worse, that his faith is wrong, and you will earn his eternal enmity. And probably a few "BURN THE WITH" and "SLAY THE HERETICS" to go with it. [He won't scream it at you because he's more composed then that. But he'll think it. He'll think it hard.]

Manipulative Bastard: Nero is not afraid to exploit people to achieve his goals, although he will usually only do it to "heathens and heretics." However, since he considers half the people in the Vatican, and the majority in the world, morally corrupt, this usually isn't a big issue for him. Whether it's just trying to get people to accept Jesus Christ as their Lord and Savior [Sometimes he's a veritable God damn Jehovah's Witness] or trying to achieve a more "spiritually important" goal, he's not afraid to exploit someone's emotions or inner insecurities to get what he wants. He also will throw money and influence around if he has too, as they are but tools in his arsenal.


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[attr="class","blackheading"]COMBAT
  • Holy Sacraments -- Nero is untrained in the "proper thaumaturgy" used by modern Magi. Instead he is extremely well versed in the use of Holy Sacraments, the thaumaturgical theory of the Church. While this makes him a less able caster of spells than most modern Magi, his use of holy and divine items and artifacts provided by the church is second to none.
  • Black Keys -- Black Keys are charms used by agents of the Church to repel demons. They take the form of long rapier-like swords (although they are generally thrown as a dagger or used to stab opponents). They are considered to be symbolic and have weak attack power, but its attack power is still enough to pierce through concrete walls. The amount of skill required to properly wield them causes the Black Keys not to be used often. They excel at interfering with and damaging spiritual phenomena rather than damaging them physically. The effect on beings like Servants is minimal but they are very effective against the creatures that are being hunted down by the Church, like the Dead Apostles. If they hit the shadow of a target, the target will be unable to move their body, leaving them to the mercy of the black key's wielder. It could also be used to track down and seal or injure a target until its wielder tells it to stop doing so, or unless it is destroyed or neutralized by an outside force. Expert Executors are capable of materializing the blades by passing prana through an object, such as pages of a bible, allowing them to carry and conceal hundreds of hilts at a time. This practice falls category of sacraments rather than thaumaturgy. Nero is well versed in their use, and while he's not on The Holy Hacker Kirei Kotomine's level, he is incredibly adept with them.
  • Holy Shrouds -- Holy Shrouds are clothes that were used to wrap the remains of saints. They are incredible conceptual weapons which possess powers that can [and have been] labelled as "Miracles" by the Church. Nero has acquired and brought with him the Shroud of Magdalene, the Shroud of Joanne, and the Shroud of Georgius.

    The Shroud of Magdalene is a red cloth which causes any who are bound by it to be unable to take action of any sort, but renders them impervious to all harm.

    Originally the cloth used to throw the remains of Joan of Arc into the Seine River, The Shroud of Joanne is a small, seemingly burnt piece of cloth, which causes the one who possesses it to become "isolated" depending on their degree of piety. It confers to the wielder the same degree of incredible resistance to magic and outside forces that Joanne of Arc was granted for her intense piety in life, but only to the same level of their own piety. It is a defense run purely by faith, and only those whom believe in God's ability to protect them will be saved. The wearer gains the ability to become unaffected by magical effects, granting a Magic Resistance on the level of EX-Rank. However, this only effects the wearer and does not cancel spells, it merely exempts the wearer from their effects.

    The Shroud of Georgius, from the venerable martyr Saint George, is a large red cloak, worn by Nero as his mantle. The cloak is conceptual weapon imbued with the ability to "reject that which is unnatural", or not within God's creation. Against humans, it has no effect. Unnatural creations however, [Any life form artificially created by man's will or in opposition to Man] such as Chimera, Homunculi, Demons [Imaginary Demons, not True Demons] and man made Spirits, will be incredibly weakened in the presence of the Shroud, losing most of their strength and ability to use magecraft. Additionally, beings created by Gaia [Phantasmal Beasts] but in opposition to the well being of Man Kind, specifically Dragons, are unable to wound whomever wears the shroud, and suffer extremely from any offensive action coming from the wearer.
  • Baptism Sacrament -- The sole mystery that is freely taught to all members of the Church. A simple ritual with an aria that falls on the Ten-Count category, it is capable of exorcising Demons and sending Wraiths back to the world of the dead. Possess weak capacities of physical interference, but its power is overwhelming against spiritual bodies. Ineffective against spirits on the level of Servants though, so long as they possess a contract with a Master. Servants whom possess no contracts however, are capable of being exorcised and banished by the Sacrament.
  • Command Seals -- Nero possesses all the Command Seals of the previous Greater Grail Wars, passed to him by Risei Kotomine. They cover his right forearm, but are mostly hidden from sight beneath his sleeves. Due to not possessing a Servant, or wishing too, these Seals are designed more to give away to deserving Masters than for personal use. While he is capable of using them himself to boost his own abilities, this is not their intended purpose, and would only be performed in extreme scenarios given the Church's strict neutrality policy on the War.
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Nero Giambattista Arcangelo Avatar

Nero Giambattista Arcangelo
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Tanz
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I play Ying Zhemg, Li Xin, Wang Ben, Marcos Amuro, Luca Barany, Kiritsugu Emiya-Yggdm., and Jin.
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