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====== Hezekiah Mercer ======

[[pc:Hezekiah Mercer | Back]]

| **Nature:** Analyst |   - | -   | **Demeanor:** Bon Vivant/Critic |
| **Character Type:** Reborn |    - | -    | **Concept:** Occult Iconoclast |
| **Player Name:** His Infernal Majesty, Lord Vil |    - | -    | **Dynasty:** Udja-sen |
| **House:** Udja-sen |   - | -   | **Faction:** Independent |
| **Hamartia:** Self-restraint |   - | - | **Inheritance:** Nubkaura-ankh (High Priest of Ra) |

----

===== Attributes =====


^ **Physical** ^ ^ **Social** ^ ^ **Mental** ^ ^
|Strength | 2  |Charisma | 2 |Perception | 3 |
|Dexterity | 2 |Manipulation | 3 |Intelligence | 4 |
|Stamina | 3 |Appearance | 2 |Wits | 3 |
*Specialities: Intelligence (reading comprehension)
----

===== Abilities =====

^ **Talents** ^ ^ **Skills** ^ ^ **Knowledges** ^ ^
|Alertness | 2 |Animal Ken | 0 |Academics | 2 |
|Athletics | 1 |Crafts | 0 |Computers | 1 |
|Awareness | 1 |Drive | 1 |Cosmology  | 0 |
|Brawl | 1 |Etiquette | 0 |Finance | 0 |
|Empathy | 1 |Firearms | 0 |Investigation | 1 |
|Expression | 1 |Melee | 0 |Law | 1 |
|Intimidation | 0 |Performance | 0 |Medicine | 1 |
|Leadership | 0 |Stealth | 1 |Occult | 5 |
|Streetwise | 0 |Survival | 1 |Politics | 1 |
|Subterfuge | 1 |Technology | 1 |Science | 2 |
^Uncommon Talents ^ ^Uncommon Skills ^ ^Uncommon Knowledges ^ ^
|Intuition | 0 |Divination | 2 |Thanatology | 0 |
| | |Meditation | 0 |Enigmas | 0 |
*Specialisations: Occult (Satanism, Occult History)


^ Lores ^ Ratings ^
|Awakened | 0 |
|Gallian  | 0 |
|Undead   | 0 |
|Spirits  | 0 |
|Shapeshifters | 0 |
|Reborn | 1 |
|The Hunt | 0 |


===== Backgrounds Merits and Flaws =====

**Backgrounds:**\\

Contacts 1 (antiquities dealer)\\
Fame 2 (Satanic podcaster)\\
Influence (Occult) 2\\
Resources 3\\
Ba 1\\
Ka 1\\

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**Merits:**\\

Blessing of Ra (7)

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**Flaws:**\\

Curiosity (2)\\
Vulnerable to Eclipses (1)\\
Flashbacks: triggered by seeing multiple people assaulting an individual, tied to 2nd Death (2)\\
Dogged by Fringe Media: A conspiracy theorist, who has a syndicated conspiracy show on the radio, was "on to Hezekiah" after seeing him on an interview about the Church of Satan, well before he actually was supernatural (2)\\


===== Resources =====

**Willpower:** 7 / 7 \\
**Sekhem:** 3 / 3 \\

**Balance/Quest/Direction:** 3 \\

===== Hekau =====

^Path ^Rank ^
|Alchemy | 1 |
|Amulets | 0 |
|Celestial | 1 |
|Effigy | 0 |
|Necromancy | 1 |
|Nomenclature | 1 |
|Lung Tan | 0 |
|Feng Tan | 0 |
|Alitu | 0 |
|Sarandu | 0 |
|Saudade | 0 |
|Respiro | 0 |

==== Spells and Rituals ====

ALCHEMY (1)\\
(1) Analyze Material (S), \\
(2) \\
(3) \\
(4) \\
(5) \\

AMULETS (0)\\
(1) \\
(2) \\
(3) \\
(4) \\
(5) \\

CELESTIAL (1)\\
(1) Hanging the Stars (R), Hiding the Stars (R), \\
(2) \\
(3) \\
(4) \\
(5) \\

EFFIGY (0)\\
(1) \\
(2) \\
(3) \\
(4) \\
(5) \\

NECROMANCY (1)\\
(1) \\
(2) \\
(3) \\
(4) \\
(5) \\

NOMENCLATURE (1)\\
(1) Forgetting the Stone\\
(2) \\
(3) \\
(4) \\
(5) \\
*True Names: Self, Asp, Steel\\


**====Backstory====**

Physical Description:
          Hezekiah Mercer is 6ft 2in tall, with cobalt blue eyes, medium-length black hair that is usually combed back and had short, near-buzzed sides. He has a black Mephistophelean goatee, and a single, oval scar carved around his left eye socket.

Personality:\\
          Hezekiah is always trying to get to the bottom of things, looking past the obvious, in an attempt to have a greater understanding of things. It's at the root of his philosophy, and he's found it to serve him well in, if nothing else, not buying into the same bullshit as those around him. It keeps him level-headed.
          
          Even as one who is still newly immortal, he treats each day as though it can be his last, opting to live it to its fullness. He's equally critical o all things, taking into account what LaVey said, "He who is slow to believe anything and everything is of great understanding, for belief in one false principle is the beginning of all unwisdom." His analytical approach is at the very root of his personality, while his Bon Vivant and Critic sides, while being strong traits to be sure, are still not central to his personality the way that being analytical is (although they clearly tie together).

**Backstory:**\\
THE FIRST LIFE
          Nubkaura-ankh was a High Priest of Re, during the time of the Middle Kingdom, who had been personally blessed by the Sun God. Although his story is largely lost to history, Shemsu-Heru scholars tell tales of his great faith driving back vampires and even causing them to burst into flames. For the time being, Hezekiah Mercer remembers only occasional flashes of the past, but these are just flickers of images. (Plot hook. Cough. Cough.)


THE SECOND LIFE
          Hezekiah Mercer was born on Halloween night, 1980, in a cab that didn't quite make it from a Chinese restaurant to the hospital, given how bad LA traffic got, even back then. His home life was relatively unremarkable. His parents were neither severely restrictive nor even moderately abusive. No one could explain why young Hezekiah was so reserved, but this trait seemed to disappear (enough that even Hezekiah believed that it had) until later in his life. As Hezekiah got into middle school, he became attracted to the occult, although with a sceptical eye. When he discovered the Church of Satan, he felt right at home with their outlook on life.

          When Hezekiah reached his 18th birthday, he joined the Church of Satan and quickly immersed himself in C.o.S. and community activities. Over the next few years, he grew within the ranks of the Church of Satan thanks to his personal accomplishments in life, even founding his own Grotto ((from which, through role-play and the appropriate use of experience points, I intend to build his Neteru)). The Church of Satan eventually abandoned the Grotto system, but Satanists are individuals. His Grotto would remain in existence (and still does), even if they don't seek to bring in other like-minded people.

          Hezekiah became something of a mildly controversial public figure, known for his backing of random and relatively unheard-of charities, and for his videos on streaming services. The latter was never really done with any intent to make a name for himself. He wanted to present material for people interested in the Church of Satan, to help them to decide if the organisation was really for them, or, more likely, to help them see that it's not and let them, in turn, decide on something more fitting for themselves. It did, however, draw some *very* negative attention that would one day cost him his life.

          His public recognition from being on YouTube and similar streaming services led to the inevitable requests, by bored agents of news outlets, to do interviews. After speaking with the higherups in the C.O.S., he agreed to a few interviews, if for no other reason, to put to rest some sensational claims that were starting to rear their ugly heads due to the political climate and a slight resurgence in public hysteria. For the most part, these interviews served their purpose, but it put a couple of targets on his back.

          One such target came in the form of one Alex Neory, whose syndicated, late-night radio programme featured such topics as conspiracy theories, UFOs, cryptozoology, and similar, assorted nonsense. Neory, being the conspiratorial sort, saw Hezekiah Mercer as a mouthpiece for the infernal, if not a demon-in-flesh. When Hezekiah stated that he had no interest in being on Alex's show, this was just further proof to the radio sensation. He sought to expose Hezekiah to the world as an alien-demon subversive bent on corrupting the youth.

          The other target came from a group of Christian extremists, the likes of which make your average fundamentalist seem like a well-reasoned, rational individual. To them, Hezekiah was a threat to the spiritual wellbeing of the public at large, and a threat to the community that had to be extinguished. They began to watch him closely, in order to plan the right moment at which to strike for Christ.

          This combination proved to be a powderkeg that would ultimately lead to the end of his Second Life and a series of continual annoyances to plague him into the beginning of this Third Life. After he left a bar and was on his way back home, he was accosted by seven fanatics, three women and four men, who were not about to let him poison the minds of the public away from salvation. They dragged him into an alley, where they beat and kicked him repeatedly, briefly stopping to chastise him for his having chosen to worship Satan ((that the CoS don't worship the devil is and was seen by them as a lie)), before they returned to administering "justice". Once he was dead, they fled into the night, fearful of reprisal from the authorities.

          Soon thereafter, his dead body would sit up, and then it would stand. It would look around, and the Tem-akh piloting it would be unaware of the journalist snapping pictures of the fallen Mercer and the subsequently-standing-and-moving corpse of the same. He knew that this was just the beginning of the proof that he needed, of Hezekiah Mercer's inhuman nature. He was determined to gather more evidence and then expose him, both on his radio show and online.



THE HAJJ\\
          Hezekiah's killers got away, but that was of no concern to Nubkaura-ankh, the High Priest of Ra and Tem-akh to the Nehem-sen that was Hezekiah Mercer. That left Hezekiah, now guided by the angry voice that took over his body, to leave a bloody path through the city, until he was captured by some cultists operating out of a temple hidden within a local Mosque. These cultists then arranged for his transportation to Alexandria, and from there to Cairo, before being moved to Edfu, where the Great Rite was performed.\\

          The ritual took a left turn when, as the cultists were starting upon the carving of the assumed Sefekhi-to-be's scars, for the flow of black blood turned red before the darkness should have bled out. At this point, they had only just finished carving the first scar around his left eye. Fortunately for Hezekiah, this meant that they were nowhere near the point of castration. The cultists realised that something was wrong, and the high priest was able to discern what it had been, that Hezekiah would be, if allowed to return to life at all, one of the Judged Ones.\\

THE THIRD LIFE\\
          Hezekiah arose from the Resurrection confused and in a mild panic. He realised that he was remembering fading flashes of a life that he'd never lived, and suddenly he was aware of further means of divination than the simple parlour tricks that he'd picked up in his youth. Further, there was this realisation of the real-ness of vampires, and since gods weren't real, he was having a hard time believing that magic and vampires were. In short order, he would rationalise this as something that science simply hasn't yet been able to quantify, as do most Satanists who consider any aspect of the supernatural as MAYBE having some merit.\\

          Despite everything that he knew to be true, his head was filled with a rudimentary understanding of something called "Ren Hekau", or more commonly known as Nomenclature. It was decided by the Imkhu that he would be trained in the art of Nomenclature, since all that remained of Nubkaura-ankh within this Udja-Sen was the understanding of the Scribes' ways. Additionally, they would go on to instruct him in the basics of the Paths of Alchemy, Celestial, and Necromancy Hekau as well.\\

          While he and other Amenti were patrolling the outskirts of Edfu (which is really to say that some Sefekhi thought that it would be entertaining to push this failure, with a broken Khaibit, out toward certain doom in light of problems that they were having with local vampires) a surprise was in store. It came when vampires managed to catch their group by surprise, and two of the vampires, rather than falling to the Sefekhi as had the first few of their number, managed to kill one of them and badly maim the other, enough that they believed him to be dead, too.\\

          Hezekiah's gun ran out of ammunition (the Sefekhi only gave him 3 bullets, because he wasn't really worth that much to them), and then one of the vampires grabbed him. Hezekiah felt something within himself that he couldn't even begin to understand; more importantly, so did the vampire who grabbed him. He released Hezekiah at the same time as he burst into flames and found himself running as fast as he could, intent on being away from the young mummy. The other vampire, startled at what he saw, fled as well, out of fear that they'd attacked an enemy that could easily deliver them to Final Death.\\

          Hezekiah encountered a share of difficulties after leaving Edfu, for the few months that would see him remain in Egypt. After leaving Egypt, he returned to his home, in Tampa, Florida. The story that he gave regarding his disappearance was that he had been in a boating accident near international waters and woke up in a hospital, in the Middle-East. It wasn't a perfect story, but it was enough to let him reassume his life without annoying questions, at least from everyone that wasn't a conspiracy theorist hellbent on exposing him.\\

          While he turned down offers to work for Ashukhi, and similarly turned down the few offers that he had to come and see what other factions were all about, he wasn't rude about it by any means and did nothing to cut himself off from the Amenti. Within 6 months of returning to Tampa, he noticed that he was being stalked by someone. He knew that it was a reporter, but not that it was the crazy one whose interview he had turned down. One thing, however, was certain: this kind of attention could bring seven very angry people back into his life who he would rather not see again.\\
          
          Other Amenti suggested to him that he should consider a move to Starke, where he could continue in whatever fashion that he saw fit, but with safety that he was lacking in Tampa, both from the issues of his mortal life and from the growing presence of the Sabbat, who would have found out about him sooner or later. Hezekiah Mercer agreed. He packed up his belongings, sold his home in Tampa, bought a home on the unincorporated outskirts of Starke, Florida, and then he made his move.\\

**Notes:**\\
CHARACTER CREATION:\\
Stage One Freebie Points (5):\\ 
01 - Background: Fame (from 1 to 2)\\
02 - Background: Influence: Occult (from 0 to 2)\\
02 - Background: Resources (from 1 to 3)\\
Total: 5\\
 
Stage Two Bonus Attributes (2):\\
01 - Stamina (from 2 to 3)\\
01 - Intelligence (from 3 to 4)\\
Total: 2\\

Stage Two Bonus Abilities (5):\\
01 - Awareness (from 0 to 1)\\
01 - Divination (from 1 to 2)\\
02 - Occult (from 3 to 5)\\
01 - Medicine (from 0 to 1)\\
Total: 5\\

Stage Two Bonus Backgrounds (2):\\
01 - Ba (from 0 to 1)\\
01- Ka (from 0 to 1)\\
Total: 5\\

Stage Two Freebie Points (10 + 7 from Flaws = 17):\\
08 - Balance (from 1 to 3)\\
02 - Knowledge: Academics (from 1 to 2)\\
05 - Hekau Path: Necromancy (from 0 to 1)\\
02 - Willpower (from 5 to 7)\\
Total: 17\\


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[[pc:sc:Hezekiah Mercer Sheet|Sheet]]\\
[[pc:sc:Hezekiah Mercer XP Log|XP Log]]\\


====== Hezekiah Mercer ======

Player: [[app:output:his_infernal_majesty_lord_vil]]

===== Description: =====

          Hezekiah Mercer is 6ft 2in tall, with cobalt blue eyes, medium-length black hair that is usually combed back and had short, near-buzzed sides. He has a black Mephistophelean goatee, and a single, oval scar carved around his left eye socket.

===== Personality =====

          Hezekiah is always trying to get to the bottom of things, looking past the obvious, in an attempt to have a greater understanding of things. It's at the root of his philosophy, and he's found it to serve him well in, if nothing else, not buying into the same bullshit as those around him. It keeps him level-headed. 
          Even as one who is still newly immortal, he treats each day as though it can be his last, opting to live it to its fullness. He's equally critical o all things, taking into account what LaVey said, "He who is slow to believe anything and everything is of great understanding, for belief in one false principle is the beginning of all unwisdom." His analytical approach is at the very root of his personality, while his Bon Vivant and Critic sides, while being strong traits to be sure, are still not central to his personality the way that being analytical is (although they clearly tie together).


**Obvious Details:**



**Less Than Obvious Details:**



**Banality Score:**


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======= XP Log Markup =======
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[[pc:Hezekiah Mercer | Back]]

====== Experience Tracking ======

**Total XP:** 00

**Current XP:** 00

**This month XP Gained:** 00/00

===== XP Gain Log: =====


===== Current XP requests: =====

===== XP Purchase Log: =====
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