Brand

Brand is a 4th edition Ars Magica magus who is not only weak and sickly, but also dead. The worrying part is the way he still insists on moving about and interacting with the rest of the world as if nothing is wrong. He has an unexplained tendency to recover from nearly any situation and has suffered the following deaths:

1) The PC magi were hunting down an enemy who had summoned a variety of elementals to guard his lair, which was carved out of the inside of a mountain. After defeating an air and earth elemental, there were some injuries and most of the party went back to get healing and reinforcements. Brand stayed behind because walking back was too tiring.

On his own, he got ambushed by a fire elemental which he knew he could not scratch in any way and had to run. Unsure of the way out, he decided to go up. Flying as fast as he could while dodging this elemental, he repeatedly cast spells to destroy large parts of the mountain and tunned over 400' until reaching the surface. Whereupon he was dazzled by the sudden light before being engulfed and turned into ash by the elemental.

2) The covenant where the PCs are based can only be accessed by a portal leading to the real world. One day, the portal became frozen and impassable. Various magi cast spells and failed to destroy the ice covering the portal and got attacked by a few minor ice spells.

Brand decided to touch the portal with a stick to see what happened and got hit by a particularly nasty effect which covered him in a thick layer of ice. As a so called "helpful" measure, another magus there decided to break the ice by magically throwing a large boulder at him with great speed. A servant aided his recovery by collecting him in a bucket.

3) A group of PCs had gone to Arcadia to shop in a faerie market. Brand's loyal and very valuable servant, Jim, was under orders to look for a wife. Knowing this, another PC kindly bought a golden ball for him from a faerie who said "this item has been researched and thoroughly proven by legendary precedent and statistics to encourage attractive young princesses to find and marry you".

After activating the item by sleeping with it under his pillow for a night, Jim was turned into a frog. Brand was furious and called the group together to search for a solution. It was suggested that according to legend, once a princess kisses the frog, then he will return to normal.

Some detail of Brand is necessary at this point. He is a hunched figure dressed in a black, full length robe of human skin; smells of rotting flesh, speaks in a low sinister voice with air pumped from putrid lungs, and radiates an aura of such evil that most people who have the misfortune to meet him assume he is a demon come to eat their soul. As you may expect, he is not the most socially aware of people not having much chance to practice. (A -23 to social interaction in game terms)

So this undead nightmare storms over to the local noble, whose disfavour would mean serious trouble for everyone, with the rest of the PCs rapidly following. Brand disintegrates the wall, walks through and magically holds the lord up against the wall while shouting "I Want Your Daughter. Give Her To Me. Now."

Guards stabbed him with spears, he didn't notice. A desperate PC drew a sword and cut his head off. Despite this stopping him in the past, a headless Brand continued to bang this noble against the wall but at least the shouting stopped. In a last ditch effort, a PC priest held up a cross and prayed for divine intervention, at which point Brand was vapourised.

Jim was indeed kissed by the daughter and returned to normal, and in an ironic turn of events, ended up marrying her.