Mela
| Gender | Male |
|---|---|
| Birth year | -30 |
| Birthday | 7/13 |
| Height | 168cm |
An obscure Holy Vessel who wanders the world, seeing the sights and learning as much as he can.
His curiousity and clear mind have made him quite capable, despite his lack of divine talent.
A stubborn, solitary person, he sees himself as an outsider to gods and mortals alike.
Born in the Taiyue, he was once a struggling artist who lacked the skill and insight as a mere human to make anything noteworthy.
He has since given up on fame and understanding.
He travels alone, leaving behind anonymous art installations depicting a forgotten era.
Appearance
Reference sheet
Mela is a man of below average height, with brown hair and tan skin.
He wears a long black coat with gold trim over his shoulders over a baggy gray shirt and gray pants, along with a bamboo hat with a white veil.
Underneath his shirt, he wears a black, long-sleeved undershirt and fingerless gloves.
He wears his hair in a messy ponytail, with strands falling over his face.
In flashbacks, he is shown wearing his school uniform- a long black robe with gold trim.
His hair, which falls to his shoulders, is untied.
Personality
Independent, stubborn, and direct, Mela can be difficult to get along with.
He acts stoic and cold; however, he is quite easy to fluster and susceptible to flattery.
He can come off as arrogant, but his confidence is backed up by centuries of knowledge and skill.
Mela actually doesn't think much of himself.
He knows that he has no special talent or destiny, that his freedom is a result of his selfishness, and has made his peace with it.
In the past, Mela was far more attention seeking and idealistic.
Inspired by the works of Yue Yuan, he wanted to achieve the perfection in art that they wrote about.
While he genuinely enjoyed art, it was also his way of seeking love indirectly.
He wanted to be admired and loved, which conflicted with his general self-loathing.
In school, he was a loner and spent most of his time reading or drawing.
Though intelligent, he only applied himself to subjects he found interesting.
After leaving Taiyue, Mela became more jaded and realistic.
His old ideals about the value of art or his wish to be understood have been long buried, or so he told himself.
In reality, he cannot live without these ideals.
After becoming a Holy Vessel, his sole outlet remains his art, which he makes out of compulsion and leaves behind anonymously.
This allows him to share his thoughts without obligation or confrontation.
Otherwise, he keeps his distance from others.
Background
Mela was born into a mostly human family.
Generations ago, one of his ancestors received a blessing from an Aeon, gaining divine talent in fire-related crafts, such as ceramics, smithing, and cooking.
The gift had become watered down through generations, however.
Most descendants were only exceptional at one or two crafts.
Mela's parents were potters who moved to Taiyue when Mela was seven.
They hoped to expand their business away from the shadow of their relatives; however, business was not as successful as they had hoped.
himself was born without any sort of talent; as a result, his parents paid little attention to him, affording him a great deal of freedom.
He was inspired to become an artist after seeing one of Yuan's paintings in the town square.
After significant effort learning and practicing the craft, he was accepted into art school.
He spent four years there, barely managing to graduate.
He admired and envied Yuan in equal measure, seeing them as the ideal of art that he could never reach.
After graduating, he traveled away from Taiyue hoping to earn fame away from the shadow of his family.
He worked as a painter, taking commissions in the day and working on his own art at night.
However, he never found any fame.
He was never satisified with his work, questioning his motive for pursuing art.
As the years wore on, he yearned to escape his life.
Hoping to end the purposeless life he led, he would end up signing his life away to a minor Aeon as they happened to pass by the town where he worked.
He would travel with them as an assistant of sorts, leaving behind everything he had known.
Like most of the population, Mela nearly died during the death of the Creator.
The Aeon he was travelling with died first, leaving him with no belongings or direction.
The moment the Earth finally died, however, he became a Vessel.
Puzzled by his miraculous recovery, he wandered around, observing the now emerging New World.
During this time, Vessels were highly sought after.
Life could only exist in their vicinity, so people would use any means necessary to keep Vessels by them.
Mela would help some people to existing settlements; however, he never wanted to be confined to a single place for the rest of his immortal life.
He instead pursued what had always been an impossibility; to have infinite time to learn and make art.
It was inevitable that he would eventually gain some amount of fame.
However, he eventually abandoned it all to become a wanderer.
Eventually, he would stumble upon the ruins of his old hometown, meeting Yuan in person for the first time.
Relationships
Yuan
Yuan's art was displayed around Taiyue; as a child, Mela was fascinated by a piece he saw in the main square.
Their art always spoke to him; he felt as if Yuan understood his ambition and loneliness.
Yuan was the reason he became an artist.
Yet, over time, they grew to represent the ideal Mela, as a human with a limited lifespan and skill, could never reach.
He admired and envied Yuan's skill and drive in equal measure.
After becoming a Vessel, Mela becomes much more indifferent towards Yuan.
He no longer holds lofty ambitions about art, only making it out of a compulsion to express himself.
Perhaps this is what art was alwys meant to be- personal and informal, rather than the great pursuit Yuan made it out to be.
He finds an identity in art without Yuan.
By the time the two meet as Vessels, Mela has lost most of his one-sided obsession with Yuan, seeing them as equals.
As fellow artists and the only remaining people from Taiyue, they easily understand the other.
Yuan is one of the few people Mela is comfortable confiding in.
He wishes Yuan was less eager to die, yet agrees to help look for a way for Vessels to pass on.
Trivia
- Mela had an older brother who inherited the most divine talent, and was thus the one his parents gave the most attention and pressure to.
- After he became a Vessel, a small group of people correctly guessed that there was one individual behind the works he left behind. Many of them assume he looks like Yuan because he frequently includes them in his art.
