Gunther

Information

Player: imagenashyun

Character Full Name: Father Gunther Colemann

Character In-Game Name: Gunther

Nickname(s): Gunny, Stepfather, "Bottles"

Association(s): Dalaran (former) Church of the Holy Light, Stormwind Cathedral, the Alliance

Race: Human

Class: Priest

Age: 49

Sex: Male

Hair: Short chestnut brown peppered with grays and whites due to age and illness.

Eyes: Green

Weight: 90lbs.

Height: 5'

Appearance

Usual Garments/Armor: Gunther often wears clothes that are loose flowing and large, primarily done to make himself look bigger. Despite his noble birth, he tends to prefer humble cloth over flashy garments, as he is not fond of being identified as a person of wealth.

On his face is a very large, thick, and heavy pair of eyeglasses. No matter if Gunther has them repaired, they often slide down the bridge of his nose due to their weight, which often prompts Gunther to habitually push them back up.

Other: Gunther has the physique of a lollipop -- he is not only rail-thin, but very small, very bony, and most certainly very frail. Most men tower over him in height if not width.

Gunther's face is partially paralyzed -- he is incapable of smiling, and thus, has a perpetual appearance of impassiveness. His eyebrows and hands are his usual cues for expression, though his brows' emotive range is narrow as well.

Personality

Alignment: Chaotic Neutral

On the surface, there is not much to Gunther Colemann. One can describe Gunther's emotional expressions to that of a rock -- solidly unmoving and unchanging. Gunther's general body language tends to match with that of his face; his hands are often seen tucked into his sleeves if they're not pushing his spectacles to his face every five minutes. With his body posture as stiff as a wooden plank and his vocal variation just as flat, there is seemingly no emotion in the man.

In actuality, Gunther is a man almost entirely driven by insecurity, jealousy, and an inferiority complex. The frozen face serves as a protective mask that disguises his internal conflicts, which lie on the Light and Shadow, as well as other people. Gunther lacks warmth, even when he craves it. To him, everyone is selfish, even when they're being selfless.

Despite these, Gunther fully acts within the doctrines of the Light genuinely -- there are no ulterior motives when he performs selfless acts. Kindness and compassion does exist, and as such, Gunther is fully capable of warmth. The fact that his face does not emote, however, gives off the impression of aloofness. Gunther cannot approach other people well, and it frustrates him. He endures everything with a stiff upper lip, otherwise. He never yells, never raises his voice, and never acts in any outlandish manner. His movement and expression is very restrained and composed, his body language as expressionless as his face.

At present, Gunther's insecurities and complexes have been magnified by the posthumous presence of his wife's first husband, Derrick Hunter. Due to constantly living in his shadow, Gunther becomes easily irritable whenever around others who even vaguely remind him of Derrick. Traits such as courage, friendliness, warmth, and bravery in better looking and stronger men will set his berserk button off, usually urging him to break something.

History

The House of Colemann's history can be traced in many different areas of history, though by the time Gunther was born, they were primarily composed of wealthy arcanists living in Dalaran. As people of intelligence, Gunther's parents, uncles, and aunts often pushed him into academics and worldly knowledge; they would go as far as getting him to an older child's reading level almost as soon as he could start talking. However, something was wrong -- before he turned five, Gunther was becoming sick often, even to the point of collapse. As Dalaran was a secular city, Gunther's family would have to travel to Lordaeron to drop him off at the Church of Holy Light in the Capital City. Though Gunther would be healed by the priests there, as soon as he would leave, he'd fall ill shortly again. Travels to Lordaeron became expensive, and eventually, Gunther was simply dropped off there permanently to be directly cared for by the priests. As a result, Gunther was moreso surrounded by priests and clerics than his own family, and visits from them became sparser and sparser. As he grew older, family connections eventually devolved to not much more than letters and books in academia.

As the Colemanns were secular in practice, Gunther was torn between the two worlds as he was a Dalarani living in a church -- his parents were insistent on the priests that they raise him secularly as well, yet the priests never relented in teaching him the ways of the Light. In hopes to obtain a semblance of family warmth by increasing the frequency of incoming letters, Gunther would write that he has rejected the ways of the Light often as he lives among the priests who care for him. However, he was still living among priests within the Church of the Light; thus, Gunther also had to give in to their teachings and follow their doctrines. This torn life resulted in a very conflicting form of faith -- he is distant and aloof from the Light to please a family whose faces he hardly sees, but he also follows the doctrines to avoid the disapproval of priests who heal him daily. This lack of true faith may be what contributed to the lack of progress in Gunther's health; even as he would enter adulthood, Gunther remained very sickly. The falsehood of his faith, added with the fact that his face was frozen to impassiveness even before being admitted to the church, produced a false sense of coldness that enforced distance between the man and everyone else. Gunther had no friends, and his family are mostly words scrawled on paper.

The First War would happen. Gunther's human brethren would flee from the south to live in the Capital City. Seeing this as an opportunity to contribute to the wars, Gunther volunteered to assist by learning how to use the Light to heal the wounded. Using his experiences from observing the priests in the church, Gunther learned quickly, and he would leave the church for the first time for a greater purpose. Sadly, his service hardly lasted -- after a few months, he would find himself back on the cots of the church from overexertion. Soon after, his family learned of his complete conversion, and for the first time, he would see his parents' faces... filled with disapproval. His family would present an ultimatum -- disavow his connections with the Light and take up the arcane in Dalaran, or stay in Lordaeron and never see his family again. Gunther chose family over faith. With a heavy heart, he leaves Lordaeron for Dalaran, having to rely on enchanted healing potions to maintain his health instead of the Light.

Gunther would soon come to regret his choice; the arcane arts grossly disinterested him, and he came to learn that his family, the House of Colemann, is composed of power-hungry degenerates who only want to cling to their wealth as wars would rage on. He soon learns as to why his family came to retrieve him after just about abandoning him in the Lordaeron church: he is to marry the daughter of a highly-ranked Stormwind Army soldier, herself ranked officer of the Guard. Gunther immediately saw through this plot, recognizing it as a power grab for political and legal protection. Gunther seriously considered declining the marriage arrangement, planning to sever his bonds to the family and return to the Church... until he saw his bride, Elsamina Crews. He would learn that she was previously married, now a widow to Derrick Hunter, a brave soldier who fathered two sons. Both boys were to be taken away from her -- the Colemanns do not want the sons of a poor commoner, and the Crews will do anything to obtain the Colemann's wealth. Gunther decided, once more, that his own needs and wants come second to family. Gunther goes through with the marriage, promising Elsamina that he will help find her sons while being her new husband.

Though Gunther's love for Elsamina was genuine, his frozen face and faith crisis, as well as family despotism from both sides, have prevented their marriage from being a happy one. The Colemanns would play with legal loopholes that would prevent consequences in Dalaran and Stormwind alike, and the Crews family would live in hedonistic luxury in the Colemann's wealth. There were no leads as to where Elsamina's sons were, and attempts to have children of their own were also met with death. Two miscarriages and a stillbirth later, Elsamina decided to give up on having any children, which produced a great rift in her relationship with Gunther. Not even the Light could help him, no matter how much Gunther would pray and pray in secret. Gunther's world would finally crash down altogether when the Third War came to be: Archimonde would destroy Dalaran, slaughtering all the other Colemanns living there. All of their collective wealth came to Gunther, now the sole Colemann sitting on a mountain of wealth. Though the obliteration of familial pressure brought Gunther relief, that pressure was only his own side of the family; the Crews were in Stormwind the whole time, and thus, they became the more dominant vultures flying over Gunther. By this point, Elsamina retired from the Guard, tired of being forced into conflicting roles between her service and her corrupt family. While Elsa transferred to SI:7, Gunther turned to the Cathedral of Light, deciding to resume priestly duty. The return did not comfort the aches of his soul--the Crews were increasingly becoming hungrier and hungrier in their gluttonous spending, and Elsamina hardly talks to him. The Virtues of the Light hardly matter to Gunther now.

As darkness loomed over his soul, he would discover the nature of that darkness itself: the Shadow. At first read about to satisfy curiosity over a doctrine rejected by the Church of the Holy Light in his youth, Gunther decided to give this sect of faith a try. Secretly, he would dabble into the dark arts of mind manipulation, especially those regarding striking fear into men's hearts. When he learned how to soothe the mind, he decided upon using it on Elsamina. Dreams, visions, and fears would strike Gunther, however, as he realized that he is becoming corrupted by the Shadow. After some years of studying and using the Shadow in secret, Gunther stopped. He turns back to the Light, though by this point, his faith in himself and the Light itself has been entirely broken.

A sliver of hope came to be when a long-lost relative came back into Elsamina's life: Matthew Hunter, the youngest brother of her first husband, Derrick, has found her first son, Kitson, and a reunion was to be made. Upon realizing that a Hunter has come to possibly take his wife away, Gunther was thrown into panic. He plots with Elsa's brother, Parker, to prevent the discovery of the second son by doctoring orphanage papers after following leads to the identity of the brothers. A change of heart came, however, when Gunther remembers his promise to Elsamina years ago; deciding that Elsa's happiness is more important than his own, Gunther allows the second son, Kogan, to be discovered and reunited. The priest realizes his mistake in allowing a Crews in identifying Elsamina's sons -- with children in her life, that means the Colemann inheritance would be going to them, not the Crews. Predicting his life would be ended, Gunther sets up his will to have his estate go to Elsamina and the Hunters, ready to die should the time come. It almost did -- his food was tainted with earthroot, to which Gunther was severely allergic to. Just as Gunther was ready to accept his fate, his life was saved by Matthew and his nephews as he was taken to the Cathedral once again. Parker is arrested, and Gunther would overcome his near-death experience.

Now having two stepsons and a brother-in-law, Gunther continues to live in service of the Light within the Stormwind Cathedral, but the corruptioin of the Shadow has already taken hold -- he has proven to be a far more effective shadow user than he is the Light. With Gunther's selfish nature coming to realization after many years of unrewarded altruism, Gunther's crisis of faith still holds. He now has to be wary of the fact that he is a fence-sitter: he genuinely believes in the goodness of the Light, but his insecurities and fears prevent him from losing his connections with the Shadow. Gunther now has to search for where his heart -- and soul -- truly lies in before he loses it once more.

Skills and Abilities

Gunther is capable of tapping into both the Light and Shadow, but most of his abilities lie in predominantly the Shadow. This is due to the Shadow being more compatible with Gunther's internal strife, which thrives off his negative energy. As a priest living in the Cathedral of the Light, however, most if not all of his Shadow practices are kept in absolute secret. The only times he would openly use the Shadow are in cases his life is in danger.

Of all the areas of Shadow magic, Gunther taps into mind manipulation the most. Fear spells, soothing, and minor control are within his grasps, even if used rather sparingly. Otherwise, his connections with the Light are used only to heal and to pray.

Because of his conflicting faith, his abilities in other spells are rather weak. Gunther, while a typical priest in practice, is fairly weak in magical application.