Madonna

Madonna was once a mere mortal. A scholar, he was looked upon with suspicion for his interest in the humanities, yet lacking in desire to join the church. Luckily, he was of highborn stock and ill-fated parents, and his noble title allowed him to research his interests in peace. He was a timid and gentle soul, fond of educating children when he could in the finer points of philosophy and mathematics, or more often the rudiments of literacy.

He would have led a very sweet, if not noteworthy life. He was content with books, his only excess, and kind to those he met. No greater tragedy could it have been, then, when he ancestral home was burnt to ash and ruin, and the young master nowhere to be found.

Madonna came to in a slaughterhouse. The smell of fire hung heady in his mouth, and bile rose up to meet it. His body was beaten and lacerated, and he was trapped deep within the earth, below a monastery with dark creatures. As their lifeless eyes examined them, so shaken was he that he could hardly mutter a prayer to god, eliciting a chorus of laughs as he was picked up by one of them in a single band, and tossed-into a charnel out of grue, blood and organs. A macabre ritual of rebirth that would brand him as the devils own, an undead abomination known as a Ba'ali. One of them-one of the night.

He clawed his way to the top of the charnel pit and stood, sinking, in the bloodbath, and futilely scrabbled to take breath into now dead lungs. He has no choice in the matter-he understood, with a sinking feeling, that he was a monster. The sickening churn in his gut was like a swarm trying to force itself out of his skin, but he had no choice but to take refuge in the damned clan he had been adopted into.

He became a creature of the night, and preyed upon the fresh blood of mortals.

The limitations of his new undead form wore on Madonna, a chafing yoke that controlled his new, immortal life. He was at the mercy of the sun, and his own base hunger. The scent of blood or the presence of another vampire could drive him mad. As centuries passed on, he spent the enlightenment period methodically uncovering the secrets and truths of the night society, researching ancient, fragmented manuscripts that spoke of higher states that a monster like he could achieve.

For centuries this research was meaningless. It took Madonna all over the world-to the enochian cities of the middle east, where humanity and the nightfolk rose in tandem, to the ruins of Carthage where vampiric philosophers once ruled. He broke bread with the strange, inscrutable shapeshifting Laibon of Africa, and even crossed the sea into the new world.

At the turn of the 19th century, Madonna turned his gaze to the east, where he heard rumors of enlightened undead, known among their kind as Arhats. These legendary, rare bodhisattvas could transcend the limitations of vampirism. Madonna sought them out, and eventually found one high in the mountains of Asia. He prostrated himself before the guru, and pledge himself to his teachings.

The next century was grueling. Madonna was forced to deprive himself of the precious blood, starving his body to the point of emaciation. He would learn mastery over his hunger, or he would perish. Every morning, he was forced into the sun, even the mere seconds of exposure scalding his skin, and every night the guru inflicted grueling, tantric tortures on him. And through the years, Madonna remained steadfast. He learned to draw the essence of life energy, known to him as vitae and his master as Qi, from mortals without the need of blood. His pale skin hardened to the sunlight through meditative practices that cleansed his soul of the taint, and he stood in the light of day once more. His vampiric limitations faded, and his power only grew.

The century turned. Mortal life crept forward while he was in isolation. Madonna deemed he had learned everything he needed from the Arhat, so he struck his master down. In a burst of violence from the otherwise serene monster he broke the guru and supped on his life blood.

This paltry enlightenment was merely another way for him to become the perfect predator, a being that lorded over both kine and kindred.

Madonna has now walked the earth for a century more in this enlightened form. His hands are slick with blood, ever fresh from his feeding. Flies buzz and pick at the deep gore, and he welcomes them, for insects are sacred to the Ba'ali clan. He is fond of crafting his flesh to take on the appearance of an angel before his followers and other members of the night society, and considers himself a perverse angel of mercy that will free vampires from their curse, if only they had an open mind...

Madonna has grown into a fierce monster with centuries of experience under his belt, fusing the raw physical power of his eastern Kuei-jin masters teachings with the infernal diabolism that runs quite literally in his blood. He treats with demons and brokers power to humans, but in other vampires he attempts to seek those who can appreciate his truth, cultivating a sect of night feeders for him to pass down his teachings to.

-Madonna was originally written for Vampire:The Masquerade, and many concepts from that universe are core to him. However I am willing to work him into different settings:as long as it has both vampires and demons, it has a place for Madonna.

-as such, keep in mind that Vampire was originally written in the 90s, and as such there's certain elements of the setting that don't sit well with me personally. The term for vampires specific to Africa is "Laibon" which, a cursory Google search can tell me, is a shamanic religion still practiced to this day. I make passing mention of African vampires in Madonna's background, and don't wish to alter it, but if someone more familiar with African cultures could inform me of a better fitting term for nocturnal undead I'd feel a lot more comfortable with it.