Ivan Braginsky - Russian Federation

:Ivan Nikolayevich Braginsky:



:basic:

Age (Physical): 30
Age (Actual): 60
Country of Origin: Russian Federation, was the Russian Soviet Federative Socialist Republic

Strengths

[+] Very strong physically
[+] Rather imposing
[+] Clever, at times
[+] Multilingual (Russian, English, Ukrainian, Byelorussian)
[+] Well-read
[+] Manipulative, when he feels like it
[+] Normally can change forms at will

Weaknesses

[-] Can be forced to change when threatened, angry, or very hungry and presented with the smell of some sort of food or prey
[-] Can be killed by removing his head
[-] Goats
[-] Good vodka
[-] Changing forms is incredibly painful (bones, muscles, tendons, organs, etc. all stretching and popping into their new places)
[-] Gets very lonely
[-] Socially inept

Phobias

[x] Having his head cut off
[x] Freezing (won't kill him, just would put him in a stasis)
[x] Someone touching his scarf
[x] Being alone
[x] Never experiencing what it is to love

Quirks

[?] Dislikes being called the "Boogieman"
[?] Likes the color red
[?] Soft-spoken
[?] Puts on a happy face for the world when he really feels dreadful inside
[?] Minimalistic in design choices for decoration and clothes
[?] Prefers to be out at night, especially in the woods
[?] Generally benevolent despite some of his abilities, key word though is "generally"
[?] Violent when changed into beast form or when someone touches his scarf
[?] Unpredictable

Appearance: His canines are longer than normal when in human form, but not quite vampire fang length. His hair is a bit shaggier, almost like thick fur. He also has more noticeable body hair like on his arms, his chest, etc. He also has a bit of a five-o-clock shadow going on and has a few lines on his face from age. In his beast form, he is about two feet taller (8' max), covered in a mix of thick grey and beige fur. He looks otherwise like what someone would consider a werewolf with the tail and such, the only difference is instead of wolf-life claws, he has claws like an enormous kodiak bear.

:special:

Species: Bodark (a type of Russian werewolf)

The bodark is a very dangerous type of werewolf from Russian mythology. They are mostly seen as dangerous because they chose to be cursed with lycanthropy via reciting a spell and performing a simple ritual. They have no ties to the moon, but prefer to be out at night in the forest. Their curse is not transferred through bites and they eat humans, goats, anything really that is meat. They age very slowly and can eventually die of old age say... at around 300 years of age. They are unaffected by silver or disease. They may go into a temporary stasis when given lethal damage of some sort. Freezing for instance, will put them into stasis and pause their aging process. The only way to kill a bodark for certain is to cut off its head.

Place of Residence: In a small house with a bedroom, bathroom, kitchen and living room. It looks like a normal little dacha on the outside with little wooden fence around the property. He also has a small garden with some sunflowers. The entire thing is in a clearing in the woods.
Occupation: Bookkeeper/Book-store owner "It's A Trap", which is a little library-esque building in town.
Stance on Humans: Food and entertainment
How long have they been a resident of Mythos?: 40 years

:advanced:

Personality:

Ivan gets very lonely very easily and will frequently try to reach out to someone to make friends and then fail terribly, either by just being socially inept, creepy or... eating them. He's terribly afraid of never knowing what it feels like to love another person. He's also scared of having his head cut off, because that is the only way to kill him before he dies of natural causes in a hundred or so years. Overall, he has a hard time bonding with people and understanding them. In all of his years, he has never had an actual friend.

While generally benevolent towards others, his lack of social skills has given him the ability to be childishly cruel or manipulative when he feels so inclined. Normally this happens when he has been somehow upset by something. The most frequent thing that upsets him is when people treat him based on the stereotype that werewolves are heartless monsters. Sure, he likes eating people, but normally he eats goats or something instead. He only ever eats people by accident or if they have done something so egregious to just piss him off.

He really likes books and encouraging others to read, which is why he enjoys running the town's bookstore. It also brings in people so he has a chance to talk with them before they quickly buy their books and run off. He also loves sunflowers because they seem so happy and vodka because he can drown his sorrows in it every night.

As he gets older, it gets harder to control the beast inside and the corruption of his personality and moral fiber.

History:

Ivan was born in a rural community, not far from Saint Petersburg which was called Leningrad at the time, to a farming family. His mother strove to take care of three children, Ivan and his two sisters (one older and one younger) while his father worked the fields and cared for livestock... only to come home and drink heavily.

The children were frequently sent out to either help in the fields, with the animals or to go out to the woods to forage for fallen wood, berries, bird eggs and anything else potentially useful. At the age of twenty since they claimed they needed their son working with them more than he needed an education, Ivan had been sent out into the woods to search for summer berries before the bears could get to them. While out there, he encountered a strange old man in the woods who gave him a sheet of paper with some sort of instructions on it. The old man told him, "At midnight tonight, come out into the forest and follow the directives... You will have great power and long life!" The thought seemed harmless to him. Back then, Ivan was naive and content, having no idea that nothing could ever be truly without cost.

That night, out of curiosity, he came back to the woods with nothing but a knife. There was a simple ritual on the paper, just reciting the incantation, stabbing a certain kind of tree and jumping over a log. It was easy enough. He really had no idea this wasn't just some silly superstition as he followed every step to a 't'. He thought it was just some game the old man had wanted to play, but by the time he'd leaped over the log and landed in the moss, his body was wracked with transfiguring pain.

Fully changed for the first time, sore and aching on the ground, Ivan dared to look around and noticed that the log he'd just come over was no longer there... He wasn't even anywhere near where he'd left the ground. In fact, he was laying on a patch of moss next to an old building in what looked to be some sort of town....

RP Sample:

It was dark and kind of chilly, even though it was the summer, as a young man in a tan kosovo with red boots wandered out into the woods near his parent's farm. He had a small knife in one hand and a piece of paper in the other. The instructions on it, he could barely read, but he'd been lucky enough to attend primary school, so he knew what he had to do. An old, fallen ash tree lay before him as he started reciting.

"On the sea, on the ocean, on the island, on Bujan,
On the empty pasture gleams the moon, on an ashstock lying
In a green wood, in a gloomy vale."

The young man, Ivan, sang out the verses as he danced in a small circle before the log. He felt absolutely absurd performing this bizarre little ritual. Hardly anything was truly asked of him in the instructions, so what could it really hurt to try this? Nothing, right? Maybe a bit of dignity, but he wasn't concerned with that at the moment.

"Toward the stock wandereth a shaggy wolf.
Horned cattle seeking for his sharp white fangs;
But the wolf enters not the forest,
But the wolf dives not into the shadowy vale,
Moon, moon, gold-horned moon,
Cheek the flight of bullets, blunt the hunters' knives,
Break the shepherds' cudgels,
Cast wild fear upon all cattle,
On men, on all creeping things,
That they may not catch the grey wolf,
That they may not rend his warm skin."

Ivan stabbed the knife into the log as he neared the end of the song. It was almost over and soon he'd see the fruits... or the broken promises of the old man's words.

"My word is binding, more binding than sleep,
More binding than the promise of a hero!"

At last he threw himself over the moss covered log, expecting nothing more than to land on the moss on the other side of the log. No, that didn't happen at all. Howling screams forced their way through his ears as he tumbled through the air for what felt like an eternity. His body felt as though it were being ripped apart and reformed through the fall; his own screams joining the chorus of yells in his head.

The eternity ended when he did indeed land on his back in some soft moss... but not where he'd expected. For several minutes, poor Ivan lay there, unaware of what had happened to him. Slowly, he stood up, groaning and creaking as everything felt sore like each nerve was rubbed raw. The first thing he saw was a variety of structures... none of which seemed to match any other... This wasn't the woods... not at all. He'd landed... in some sort of town.

Looking down, he saw that even his body was no longer as he recalled. Thick fur coated every part of his body that he could see and feel. His face felt different and every time he tried to talk, growls and snarls were the only things he heard. His nice kosovo was shredded and no longer fit him... His boots had apparently just vanished, leaving a strip of red leather on the ground next to what used to be his feet, which were now long clawed paws. The only remaining piece of his life before was the long scarf that had been wrapped loosely enough to not be damaged by his sudden transformation.

Ivan screamed the moment he realized what he was seeing.

:ooc:

Name/Nickname: Ivan Robertovich Volkov, but I've also been going by Vilhelm because that is what my name will legally be changed to eventually.
Age: 20
Timezone: PST, GMT - 8
RP Experience: I don't want to list it out, but I've been a Russia RPer for a couple years now, I believe and have done a large variety of character concepts for him ranging from an innocent child to a serial cannibal. I can also pull Prussia periodically, Germany, North Korea (an OC obviously), and an America when I want to annoy myself.
Contact Info:
AIM: vodkaflowers

Lastly, I also fudged some monster details because there was very little lore on the bodark in English or German. My Russian is still far too pitiful to find really in depth information. Basically I made a lot of it up except how one becomes a creature, the incantation, dangerousness, and curse type. I also kind of whipped up the history. Histories are my least favourite part.