WORLD DESCRIPTION
| Through the Doors Write-Up
| Coven of the Eternal ( cw: references to incest and abuse )

PERSONAL BACKGROUND

• Born in 1999 to the Coven of the Eternal. Zoey was the second child of the current living embodiments of the Rurikid bloodline. The first had been a boy named Vasyl, and the pair were likely to be the next embodiments of the bloodline.
  
• Nearly a year after Zoey's birth, twins were born to the current Rurikid bloodline. Zoey's little sister and brother, John and Lucy, were quickly chosen to replace their parents as the subject of the Coven's obsessions. Their parents were killed.
  
• Being spare children, Zoey and her brother Vasyl were marked for death as well. Zoey never saw Vasyl again after the birth of the twins, but she was so young she doesn't even remember the incident. What she does know is that even at such a young age, she showed potent signs of magical prowess. It was decided Zoey would live for the time being, her potential being too great to spare currently.
  
• Zoey is raised as a Coven member, rather than a Coven subject. She is taught how to care for the twins and any magic the Coven might need of her. Regularly the limits of her abilities are tested. Thus far, few limits are found in the child. The twins continue to grow under the strict rule of the Coven, and none of the children are allowed outside contact with the world.
  
• Through the years, Zoey never bonds with Coven or twins. The twins are alienating in their own right, and Zoey knows they practice darker magics than she wants involved in. The Coven Zoey has never loved or trusted. She's just another tool to them, and if she had a choice she would readily leave the cult-like coven.
  
• When Zoey is 16, the Coven is attacked by an unknown creature. There's only one thing Zoey does recognize of it, and that's that it is made purely of blood. The twins follow close behind it, not just spared it's horrible machinations but controlling it. Guiding it. Zoey locks the Coven members in with the twins and their monster and flees before she can be caught.
  
• For the next two years, Zoey lives on the streets. Having learned no translatable life skills to prepare her for life outside her Coven, Zoey spends most of her time learning about the world outside her coven as much as she can.
  
• During this time, Zoey learns about the openness of vampires outing the supernatural world to the general populace. Finding interest in this topic, especially in one of the vampire leaders, Zoey begins to migrate west out of Russia and towards Prague.
  
• On her journeys, Zoey is set upon by demons frequently. Not understanding the reasoning behind it, Zoey eventually manages to catch one of the demons tracking her. After a difficult interrogation, Zoey discovers that Vasyl was not killed. Smuggled out of the Coven, Vasyl grew into more of his own power.
  
• Vasyl had been aiding demons in experiments to bring more of the demon populace into the human world. Recently, he had vanished from the demons' control. In search of a suitable replacement for aid, the demons had tracked a similar source of magic to the exposed and alone Zoey.
  
• Knowing that now she's being doggedly hunted, Zoey makes a faster journey to Prague. Though her initial reasons for going to Prague were to simply observe a new and budding culture she might fit inside of, her new goal becomes one of survival.
  
• Uncertain of the vampires of Prague, Zoey throws herself at the mercy of Nikolai Rurikid, a king among vampires. Explaining that she wants rid of her magic, a constant source of struggle for the girl, Zoey begs to be turned vampire.
  
• After much debate and questioning, Nikolai eventually agrees to Zoey's request to turn the girl.
  
• Zoey's turning was not as simple as expected. Overwriting her magic proved difficult for the vampire to do alone, and Rafaello d'Este was called to assist in the turning. It took a whole evening, and many blood bags, to be able to fully turn Zoey. Eventually the turning took, and Zoey's magic was permanently gone.
  
• Once turned, Nikolai invited Zoey to stay. She was descended from him, and he felt some familial connection to her. Zoey hadn't intended to find a home in Prague, but she decided to stay with Nikolai and his family.
  
• Since staying, Zoey has been learning how to hunt and control her thirst as a new vampire.

• + PERSEVERING: Only until recently, Zoey has only ever had herself to really depend on. Even in her coven, her life was barely guaranteed so long as her magics was still powerful and served a use. Her actual self was not wanted, but was tolerated. As such, Zoey built an independence that taught her to believe in her own inner strength and not necessarily depend on others. That didn't mean she was willing to shut aid out, only that she would guarantee she would survive if she never received help. As such, she's used that same perseverance to withstand demons hunting her and boldly ask vampires she's never met before that moment to turn her. Her perseverance gives her the strength and courage she needs to press through the hard times.
  
• + CHEERFUL: Zoey tends to be very bright in the face of adversity. Her cheerfulness can almost be infectious. The young vampire smiles easily and is more than willing to socialize with others. She's not afraid to put herself out there, and her cheerfulness is another way to bolster her strength. Even in the face of cruelty from others, Zoey prefers and smile and shake the world off her shoulders. This sort of mentality came in handy when the twins battered her with insults and pranks, hating her and forcing Zoey to either adapt a better outlook on life or succumb to the darkness that surrounded her. Her siblings all tend to be weighed down heavily by their past and their obsessions with magic, and Zoey refuses to let herself become entrenched in the weight of the world.
  
• + ADAPTABLE: Perseverance and cheerfulness grew strong in Zoey because of her strong ability to adapt to her surroundings. Part of that may have to do with never feeling at home in her coven, and part of it is due to her lack of education of the external world beyond the coven. Zoey is a bit of a wide open because because of those reasons, though, and she tends to absorb the world around her as much as she can. She's willing to be open to new thoughts and ideas and take everything in stride. This helped her survive more readily on the streets of Moscow when she left the coven, learning the new world quickly and adapting as best she could.

• - ALIENATING: Zoey tends to keep people at arms length emotionally. She's always ready to cut ties or let ties be cut at any second. This is a self-defense trait for her, a way to protect herself from being hurt by the world around her. Building off her lack of self-esteem, Zoey has never known people who actually cared for her as a person. So she finds it hard to imagine a world where people think of her beyond their immediate need of whatever use she has to offer. As such, she can be friendly and cheerful and will happily be with others, but she's always ready to sever ties without a second glance to protect her own heart.
  
• - SELF-CONSCIOUS: Due to being raised in a sequestered society, Zoey had no interactions with people outside the coven. And the coven was very quick to define Zoey's role within the compound, and the twins were very quick to share their hatred of the girl. This sort of environment led Zoey to have a lower self-esteem, making her constantly question whether people are only talking to her because they need something out of her. It's led her to lead a more lonely life and made it difficult for Zoey to see the value in herself outside of the immediate physical world. It was her magic, but now she has other advantages as a vampire. While she's not self-conscious of her physical appearance, she just doesn't expect people want much more from her than their immediate needs demand. She's most often willing to concede to these demands, but she doesn't tend to think people care about her beyond them. This sort of mental attitude is what leads to her being so alienating of others.
  
• - PESSIMISTIC: Masquerading as realistic, Zoey tends to be quite the pessimist. She always expects the worst outcomes to be the most probably outcomes. Even when visiting the vampires to ask to be turned, Zoey expected to be turned away or killed outright for who and what she was. When asked about her negative outlook on life, she will shrug and say she just has realistic expectations. Despite her cheerful nature, she doesn't seem to expect much out of the world. In fact, she seems to be cheerful as a way to spite the bad situations that have made up her life. She's always open to the contrary of her pessimism, she just doubts good things happen frequently in the world.

VAMPIRE -> while once a witch, Zoey is currently a vampire with no residual traces of her original magic. Vampires come with a number of strengths and weaknesses, nature's natural attempt to bring balance to the magically created creatures.

STRENGTHS

DURABILITY: Vampires tend to be particularly durable to physical attacks. Typically, another enhanced creature, magic, or a human item imbibed with one of their weaknesses is needed to really injure a vampire through outside force. Because of their durability, they are also immune to diseases and poisons that are nonmagical in nature.
IMMORTAL: There is no natural death for vampires. All vampires must be killed through external factors. Their immortality also gives them accelerated healing capabilities, leaving no scars of injury. With fresh blood drunken after an injury, it can help bolster their healing. The longer it's been since they've fed, the more reduced their healing rate is.
ENHANCED SENSES/STRENGTH: Vampires are blessed with a number of enhancements to their body. Their senses are finer tuned, giving them the ability to identify scents, hear and pinpoint at greater distances than a human could, and see in the dark with minimal lighting. They also have the strength to lift the size of a car with little strain, a truck starting to push harder limits on them.
BLOOD ADVANTAGES: Vampiric blood can be used sometimes to help bolster another creatures healing and strengthen their own senses temporarily. Too much vampiric blood can become addictive, especially in mortals. The more addicted one is to vampire blood, the more susceptible they become to orders given by a vampire. If let on for too long, the person becomes a thrall, completely willing to serve vampires. There are few ways to reverse enthrallment. ( this ability will have a permissions post )
PROCREATION: Vampires have the ability to create more vampires through their blood. There are varying degrees of success depending on the type of person attempting to undergo turning, with humans having a 100% success rate. The more mortal one is, the easier it is. ( this will also be under a permissions post )

WEAKNESSES

SUNLIGHT: Sunlight means immediate death for a vampire. Vampires that go out in the sun burn to ashes. there is a very minor window to retreat from sunlight before bursting into flames completely if only partially exposed to sunlight. But the seconds will still leave burning effects that will need to heal.
RELIGION: Religious artifacts tend to be dangerous to vampires, burning them if in contact with holy symbols. They also cannot enter sacred grounds, even if invited.
FIRE: Similar to sunlight, fire is deadly to vampires and sure way to kill them.
NATURAL STAKES: Wooden stakes, take from the earth, can kill a vampire. One of the few ways to overwhelm their durability with little effort.
INVITATION: Vampires cannot enter owned ground without invitation. If owners die and deeds are never transferred, a vampire is capable of entering once again.
GARLIC: Another natural repellent to vampires. While it does not outright kill them with little contact, it does make them ill till it leaves their system. And large quantities can become fatal.
BLOOD/THIRST: Lack of blood can make vampires desperately thirsty. Too much deprivation will reduce their natural abilities until eventually they are unable to move or function. Vampires call this a "living death." It can be recovered from with the introduction of blood.
MAGIC: Being created from magic through unnatural methods, vampires greatest weakness tends to be magic. It is poisonous and can burn them severely. Sometimes irreversibly. Demon magic is the only exception to this rule, tending to be more sweet to them. God magic, faerie magic, earth magic, etc. all tend to be dangerous.