Kostas Popov
The Basics
Name: Kostas Popov
Nickname: N/A
Species: Human
Gender: Male
Age: 113
The Physical
Height: 5'9"
Weight: 150lbs
Hair Color: Dark gray
Eye Color: Gray-blue
Distinguishing Features: N/A
Physical Description: A gaunt, serious older man with a hawkish face and sharp nose. Gray hair, a short beard, styled with a curled moustache and pointed chin that gave off stuffy old professor vibes. A long, dark peacoat and uniformly a silhouette of blacks and grays; don't look at me colours. There was an air of sickliness or general unwellness that aged him, like he'd been washed out by some lingering illness. Smells strongly of herbs.
Alternate Form Description: An unimposing bundle of fabric at first glance. Kostas wears dark robes and a veil over his head with only holes for eyes. The little skin that is visible of his face looks pallid and unhealthy. Under the robes, he keeps his body and limbs wrapped up in what looks like some kind of medical gauze. It's changed regularly and stuffed with fragrant herbs and flowers; though it's unable to completely mask a faint, pungently sweet aroma wafting off him. He carries a sleek, black staff that is polished to a shine. It's hard to guess what the material is, but you'd assume not wood - the exterior, that is.
There's a foggy blankness in the eyes that peer out from the thin veil. More often than not, Kostas is trailed by a little, black cat, weaving in and under his feet, or she sits upon his shoulders. Her name is Zolotse (meaning "my love.") She has big, green eyes that project a calm an intelligence. Has one white paw and a small patch of white on her chest.
Under The Hood
Personality: A once promising magical practitioner and a strong contender for a White Council big wig. That was all a long time ago and all that's really left of Kostas is an egomaniacal warlock hellbent on bending all laws of magic and reality to his will. The years have taken an undeniable toll on his mind. While he's intelligent he's prone to bouts of absentmindedness and forgetfulness. A recluse at heart, he is happiest when he is alone, working on "experiments." There's a duality to his nature where he detests being in the spotlight while at the same time secretly craves notoriety and recognition. For his work to be accepted into magical canon would be some great vindication for Kostas. He's so off the deep end he genuinely doesn't see his research as inhumane or cruel. He just thinks the wider magical canon is stuck in archaic ways.
Goals: Secretly, he does crave recognition from his peers. Less abstractly, he just wants to pursue his research. He's deeply interested in the anatomy of all creatures, the borders between life and death, and chaos as a conduit to push people to their limits. A great deal of the ruckus he causes is because he wants his work to be noticed and respected. Granted, it is impressive but very, very morally unsound. Most importantly, he hopes to find out what happened to Sasha.
Fears: Being forgotten, being ignored, his cat dying, dying himself (ironically), large birds. Why are they so big? Ostriches? They're unsettling. Purely demonic.
Talents
Mundane Skills: Really good at researching, knows a lot about mundane medical practices, decent at fencing.
Powers: Necromancy, magic in general (particularly things that deal with kinetic force, rituals, natural elements, and illusions.) Does not require food or water. Can heal himself so long as his stores aren't depleted.
Vulnerabilities: Requires people to create necromantic energies, is blind without use of his familiar. Is quite physically weak and a poor martial combat if paired against someone with proper, formal training.
Society Info
Length Of Time In New York: A few months. He's there at the behest of some vampires he was researching with and has already been causing trouble; has been kidnapping people from vulnerable populations.
Occupation: Researcher and pioneer!
Organizations/Factions: A Russian faction that loosely translate to "Life Research and Development." He has a handful of pupils back home in Russia.
The Juicy Bits
Backstory: Kostas was born just over 113 years ago in Russia and has understandably seen some crap. He has been entrenched in chaos and death since he was young. His mother died when he was young from an illness. His father was executed during a riot.
At the age of 7 he was sent to live with his grandparents in a rural village (which by the 1990s was completely abandoned.) There he began to understand something was different about him. Due to his deeply religious upbringing, he thought the latent magical talents were the work of the devil. He tried to ignore them and live his life out in the village. By the time he was 9 his grandfather died of a heart attack.
It seemed death was determined to follow him. He began to get his first inklings of a fixation on death and the macabre then. How strange it was for life to be taken so simply yet so difficult for it to be given back. Around this time he began dissecting dead animals he'd find around the countryside. He never had much luck manipulating life's energy to reanimate them though.
When he got older he became aware of the magical underbelly of the world and left home after his grandmother passed away to pursue proper teachings as an apprentice. His powers of perception and intelligence made him a natural and he was a fastlearner. He even met a girl, Sasha Aleksandrova, and fell in love. They worked together under the same mentor. And if everything had stayed like just like that, things would have turned out good.
But Sasha was killed as a result of them playing with powers they shouldn't and her soul was lost to the ether. And when Kostas' mentor announced his intention to report Kostas to the Council, Kostas, driven mad in grief and anger, killed him. Then he went into hiding in Russia for a long time. He lost himself in his research and pursuit of power, trying to find a way to recover Sasha's soul; if he could familiarize himself with the fabrics of life, death, and reality, maybe he could find her again - or at least save her from whatever void she'd been doomed to. In trying to find this one person he consumed and doomed countless more.
Years of this followed. Kostas' mark on the world were leaps in the field of necromancy (though the knowledge is still underground); reports of mass graves being resurrected; and rural Russian villages being mysteriously razed and devoured.