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One bright sunny morning during the most sweltering stretch of the hottest summer in the monastery’s records, a monk of the Temple of the Agile Soul found a half-orc child on the temple’s doorstep. The child’s discovery had been heralded by distant thunder and heat lightning on the eastern horizon the night before, or so the head monk claimed, and thus it behooved the monks to take the child in and raise her as one of their own, as Kord had declared as much with that sign.

(This wasn’t the first time a child had been left in front of the temple’s doors, especially a half-orc child, and the monks were very much in the habit of taking all those children in. It was just, there had to be a sign to herald the child, it was tradition. The heat lightning was a much shorter stretch than some omens had been.)

As was the monks’ custom, they gave the girl a Celestial name touching upon the events surrounding her arrival--and given that the extreme heat and dry weather had been all anyone in the region had been talking of for months, she was dubbed Vasuvinti, or “Bright Summer Sun.” She was at least seven or eight, though, before she realized that was her actual name, because several of the monks affectionately called her “Summer’s child,” and the rest disdained the mouthful they’d saddled her with and simply called her Vaz.

Though the monastery itself was somewhat isolated, Vaz was never lonely growing up. There were several other children being raised in the monastery at the same time, mostly the children of the monks themselves, as well as an aasimar girl a bit older than the rest who had been given over to the monastery as soon as her nature had been discovered and whom Vaz hero-worshiped more than a little bit. And the children had plenty of entertainment, for the Temple of the Agile Soul devoted themselves not to Kord’s more famous aspect, that of the warrior, but of his equally powerful but less well-respected aspect of the athlete. Children who had no interest at all in athletic pursuits were gently guided into more suitable monasteries or non-religious apprenticeships as soon as they were old enough, but for the rest, those who were willing or enthusiastic, the monks went out of their way to develop their athletic skills.

It took some work, with Vaz; despite her innate strength, she was a clumsy child, and poor at the centering exercises and meditation that the monks considered an essential part of a true athlete’s life. But she had dedication, and as her teachers told her every day, that was the most important thing: all the natural talent in the world could be wasted by a student who didn’t apply themselves, but building ability, whether the ability was dexterity or finding inner peace, was a matter of study, attention, and practice. And despite some rough waters in her adolescence, as growing pains and the trials of puberty seemed to her to threaten to undo all the progress she’d made in her youth, Vaz eventually came out the other side of her tutelage as an able and creditable athlete. Like her two closest childhood friends, Reyhan and Bahvna, she also willingly took on the robes and responsibilities of a junior monk.

While she was skilled at most of the games and sports that the temple pursued, participating eagerly in their daily practices and weekly and monthly games, Vaz turned out to have a talent for the less competitive arts of the temple that she never would have expected as a child playing kickball with her friends, nor as a frustrated adolescent trying and failing to center herself according to her teachers’ instructions. Any exercise where she challenged herself, trying to surpass her own previous accomplishments, caught her attention. The monks called these the “meditative arts,” believing that being in tune with one’s own body at the depth they required helped the practitioner to attune themselves with the spiritual world and the energies of their god, and they took Vaz’s interest them as a sign of spiritual growth and potential.

This was, in fact, the only way that they taught martial skills. No temple of Kord would have ignored them, and the study of either some kind of combat art was mandatory for the junior monks, but study rarely involved one-on-one sparring; the student studied the stances and forms of their chosen art, going through katas and unopposed exercises, and when their teacher did pit them against each other, no blood was to be shed. Vaz’s chosen teacher was an aging dragonborn named Komang, the temple’s healer, who taught her the standard unarmed skills, some spear-work, and, as she grew more and more skilled, some basic spiritual offensive talents--the last in secret, for the senior monks disagreed with using spiritual power for a base reason such as causing harm, instead of more elevated uses, such as healing or sport.

But Vaz was good at it. That wasn’t just her teacher speaking, or her own enthusiasm; she could tell what it felt like to tap into her inner reserves and propel it outward to aid her strikes, and she could see it happening when other people did it on the ballfield, and she knew that she had more than them, both more power and more adeptness with it. Komang confessed that he’d been drawn to choose her as a student for just this reason; he’d known she had great potential, and he dreamed of helping her bring it out. As she grew more and more enthusiastic about her martial talents, she pushed harder and harder to be allowed to truly test it, first by sparring with her teacher, then by dragging her childhood friends into her secret and sparring with them.

That last part was the mistake. Her friends were trustworthy--otherwise she wouldn’t have trusted them--but they shared her enthusiasm. A couple of them didn’t just want to help her grow her strength, they wanted to learn the art themselves. And if Vaz had taken them to her teacher, who had been so firm that this was a secret to be kept from the other monks, he would have known and punished her. So she tried to teach them herself how to reach this power inside of themselves, this hot crackling thing that felt like a thunderstorm inside her chest, and use it. And as a student herself, with an imperfect understanding... she knew an accident in progress when she saw it, but she didn’t know enough to be able to stop it when Bavhna channeled far too much power into a strike on Reyhan, and left him mortally wounded.

They took Reyhan, her injured friend, immediately to her teacher, but while Komang was able to save his life, he had taken an injury to his spine that even a healer’s skills could not restore. There could be no more keeping secrets. Even if Vaz had wanted to, Bavhna was too painfully honest not to admit what had happened--and Vaz couldn’t let her take on the guilt, when it really rested on Vaz’s own shoulders. She went immediately to the head monk and confessed the whole story, her own mistakes and her teacher’s disobedience, and begged that they let her take on the fault. She would exile herself, leave the monastery and go forth into the world, and undertake a pilgrimage of contrition to clear the stain left on her soul.

The senior monks were uncertain about whether to grant that to her; to them she was still the child they’d so affectionately helped raise, and they feared that a half-orc brought up in their peaceful temple would have a hard time handling the prejudices and violence of the world. But she had done wrong, though from their older, wiser perspective, Komang was far more at fault than his student for what had occurred. And it was clear that Vaz needed the spiritual aspect of such a pilgrimage, herself, to deal with the accident that she had been a part of and the guilt that she felt about it. So the head monk, after some deliberation, permitted her to go forth on her journey.

Race: Half-Orc

Ability Score Increase: Strength +2, Constitution +1

Age: Half-orcs reach maturity around 14 and rarely live longer than 75. Vasuvinti is 15.

Alignment: Lawful Good

Size: Medium (5′8″, 190 lbs)

Speed: 30 feet

Darkvision: 60 feet

Menacing: proficiency in Intimidation

Relentless Endurance: Once per long rest, when you are reduced to 0 HP but not killed outright, you can drop to 1 HP instaed.

Savage Attacks: When you score a critical hit with a melee weapon attack, you can roll one of the weapon’s damage dice one additional time and add it to the extra damage of the critical hit.

Languages: Common, Orc

Class: Monk (Way of the Sun Thunder Soul)

Monastery: Your monastery is built into the side of a cliff rising over sunbaked flats, and accessible only by a long unguarded staircase (perfect for practice sprints).

Monastic Icon: Squirrel. Agile movement, a playful nature, and the foresight to prepare for the future are the most admirable qualities of the squirrel to your order, and monks commonly keep them as pets.

Master: Your master was a gentle but driven teacher who saw you as the best possible heir to his secret and difficult school of martial arts.

Weapon proficiencies: Simple weapons, shortswords

Tool proficiencies: Alchemist’s supplies

Saving throw proficiencies: Strength, Dexterity

Skill proficiencies: Acrobatics, Athletics

Unarmored Defense: While not wearing armor or wielding a shield, your AC is 10 + DEX mod + WIS mod.

Martial Arts: While unarmed or wearing only monk weapons and not wearing armor or wielding a shield, you can use DEX instead of STR for attack and damage rolls, you can use a d4 in place of the normal damage of your unarmed strike or monk weapon, and you can use an unarmed strike as a bonus action when you use the Attack action on your turn.

Ki: Starting at second level, you can use ki points to empower ki features, starting with Flurry of Blows, Patient Defense, and Step of the Wind.

Unarmored Movement: Starting at 2nd level, your speed increases by 10 feet when you aren’t wearing armor or wielding a shield.

Deflect Missiles: Starting at 3rd level, you can use your reaction to deflect or catch the missile when you are hit by a ranged weapon attack. When you do so, the damage you take from the attack is reduced by 1d10 + DEX mod + monk level. If you reduce the damage to 0, you can catch the missile if you have a hand free and it is small enough to hold in one hand. If you catch it, you can spend 1 ki point to make a ranged attack with it, as part of the same reaction. For this attack you have proficiency and the missile counts as a monk weapon, with a range of 20/60.

Radiant Sun Bolt: Ranged spell attack, range 30 feet, using DEX mod; radiant damage with a d4 die. When you take the Attack action on your turn and use this, you can spend 1 ki point to use this again as a bonus action. (Note: this appears as a lightning bolt rather than light when Vaz uses it, though all game stats, including the radiant damage, stay the same.)

Background: Acolyte

Skill proficiencies: Insight, Religion

Languages: Celestial, Draconic

Feature: Shelter of the Faithful

Personality Traits:

Nothing can shake my optimistic attitude.

I’ve spent so long in the temple that I have little practical experience dealing with people in the outside world.

I fall in and out of love easily, and am always pursuing someone. (from Charlatan)

I would rather make a new friend than a new enemy. (from Criminal)

If someone is in trouble, I’m always ready to lend help. (from Folk Hero)

I often get lost in my own thoughts and contemplation, becoming oblivious to my surroundings. (from Hermit)

I face problems head-on. A simple, direct solution is the best path to success. (from Soldier)

Ideals:

Charity: I always try to help those in need, no matter what the personal cost.

Aspiration: I seek to prove myself worthy of my god’s favor by matching my actions against his teachings.

Adventure: I’m far from home, and everything is strange and wonderful! (from Far Traveler)

Bonds:

I will do anything to protect the temple where I served.

I’m still seeking the enlightenment I pursued in my seclusion temple, and it still eludes me. (from Hermit)

Though I had no choice, I lament having to leave my loved ones behind. I hope to see them again one day. (from Far Traveler)

Flaws:

My piety sometimes leads me to blindly trust those that profess faith in my god.

Once I pick a goal, I become obsessed with it to the detriment of everything else in my life.

If there’s a plan, I’ll forget it. If I don’t forget it, I’ll ignore it. (from Criminal)

Despite my best efforts, I am unreliable to my friends. (from Entertainer)

There’s no room for caution in a life lived to the fullest. (from Outlander)

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