Monastic

You were committed to a monastery, whether against your will or not. You have left the monastery behind under extraordinary circumstances that have changed you forever.

  • Torches (3 uses)
  • Rations (3 uses)
  • Quarterstaff (d6)
  • Rope
  • Prayer beads (petty)

How did you join?

  1. You wanted to avoid an unwelcome marriage. Take a treasure trove of courting gifts (a chest of jewelry (bulky), consisting of brooches, bracelets, necklaces, and rings worth 200sp in total).
  2. You were denied a lofty inheritance as a late-born child and sent away. Take a scroll of pedigree (petty) and a scroll of portable mansion (petty).
  3. You were caught practicing witchcraft. Take divination cards (petty) and Nightdust Powder, made from the ritual burning of six owls. When tossed into the air, it turns day to night for a short while (3 uses).
  4. You were possessed by a demon and exorcised, but it didn’t quite take. You joined the monastery to study how to get rid of the demon. As long as you wear the amulet (petty) that the exorcist gave you, the demon cannot gain mastery over you. The demon within you gives you helpful advice and warnings when consulted, speaking in a voice only you can hear but with motivations you do not know. Consulting it more than once per day requires a CTRL save. On a failure, the demon controls your body for a moment (long enough to remove the amulet). Demons see you as one of their own.
  5. You witnessed the statue of a Saint weeping blood and joined to research miracles. Take a vial of the wept blood. With it, you can speak with the dead (waking them for a moment) by taking a Fatigue per question asked.
  6. You were left on the doorstep of the monastery as a baby. You are literate in Woldish and literate and fluent in Liturgic. Take a hymn book (as grimoire, bulky), filled with songs and a spell (petty), Detect Magic.

How and why did you escape?

  1. You witnessed the Church Fathers summoning a demon. It did not go well. Take Treatise on Demon Summoning, which details how to summon a demon, and chalk.
  2. A band of raiders looted and destroyed the monastery. Take 2 throwing axes (d6+d6, bulky) you managed to steal from a dead raider as you fled.
  3. You conspired with someone on the outside to steal a relic. You kept the relic, betraying their trust. Take the seven-fingered Hand of Saint Eustace (7 uses). Push down a finger to turn away an undead creature.
  4. A series of murders took place and you were accused of being the murderer. Before your trial, you managed to escape. Take a paladin’s long sword (bulky, d10) that you stole on your way out and the manacles you were kept in.
  5. You and your fellow monastics faked a series of possessions as a joke. When a Church Father was accused of summoning the demons and subsequently executed, you left the monastery in shame. Take a pouch of hallucinogenic mushrooms (3 uses), which puts the user into a trance for an hour and leaves them deprived.
  6. While returning a relic to the reliquary room, you stepped through an impossible door which brought you to a glade, with the monastery nowhere to be seen. No one you speak to has ever heard of the monastery. Take the reliquary (bulky, worth 50sp) containing the Eye of Saint Wilhelmina (petty, 3 uses). Point the pupil at something and then cover the eye. The object or creature disappears from view, unable to interact with anything for about 10 minutes.

Go to Traits to round out the character.

Some entries taken from the Half-witch and Bonekeeper from Cairn 2e.