Morana

## Morana Morningstar

The Blood Demon

> Let’s see how well you bleed.
>
> ―Morana Morningstar

**Morana Morningstar** is one of the main members of the Spectrals. She is a blood demon from the hell dimension of Astoroth, and a witch raised in the ways of the Umbrilith. While technically the oldest member only second to Morpheus, her youthful appearance and sullen behavior lead her team members to treat her more like a teenager, much to her own annoyance.

## Physical appearance

Morana is described as having a morbid, timeless beauty, not unlike common descriptions of contemporary vampires. She is slender, with ghastly pale skin; dark red eyes; and somewhat thick eyebrows. She has dark red hair with black roots which she often wears in different styles. She also has black markings engraved on the skin around her eyes, with the outline of a four-pointed star located on her forehead. Being a demon, her appearance turns increasingly monstrous whenever she loses control of her emotions; her demonic appearance features either black or red, lit-up eyes, dark veins, and prominent fangs.

Her outfits commonly feature her signature color red and are usually either goth-like and quaint in a morbid way, accentuating her supernatural nature. She sometimes wears a hooded cloak, which covers her entire body, and gives her the appearance of a giant bat when in flight.

Morana can sometimes be seen wearing a red gemstone encased in a silver spider necklace. It has been suggested that this was given to her by Morpheus to help contain her emotions, though it exact function is unknown.

Due to her supernatural nature, Morana does not age. She is technically eons old, but has always maintained her teenage appearance, leading most others to treat her as such.

## Personality and traits

> I don't really do friends.
>
> ―Morana Morningstar

Morana is easily the most withdrawn member of the team. She is quiet, troubled, brooding, grim, moody, seemingly devoid of emotion, intelligent, studious and sarcastic. Her apparent love for violence and destruction sometimes seems to border on outright sadism, and she often replies to her teammates’ attempts at humor with snappy comments and smart remarks. However, as much as she may seem distant and anti-social, she will not tolerate any effort to hurt her friends, claiming that this right only belongs to her.

Morana often resorts to sarcasm in social situations and generally comes off as the most rude and insensitive member of the team. However, there is some reason to assume that her pessimistic attitude and overall emotionless demeanor are in fact deliberate, meant to control her volatile demonic nature. She has admitted that she needs to meditate at least every day to maintain control over her powers, and has appeared to be more prone to outbursts whenever she indulges herself in her emotions too much.

Despite her anti-social character, Morana does at times display great emotional maturity and empathy. She relates well to Oz’ struggle with his lycanthropy and sometimes meditates with him to help him control his emotions; she has also become somewhat of a close friend to Lily, despite their opposite personalities, and has on certain occasions even agreed to engage in human activities with her, like shopping. Overall, Morana appears to be not so much cold-hearted as introverted, caring deeply about those close to her. While she seems to not care one bit about their hobbies and personalities, she does show her friends that she does care about them and values their friendship when it matters most.

## Powers and Abilities

As both a blood demon and a capable witch trained in the ancient ways of an interdimensional coven, Morana possesses powerful innate abilities which on certain occasions even seem capable of rivaling Morpheus’. However, unlike Morpheus’ and Zeke’s magic, Morana’s powers are much more dependent on emotion; while she is able to achieve a greater release of energy when she taps into a powerful emotion like rage, this will almost certainly come at the cost of her control, leaving her vulnerable to her own powers.

* **Blood Magic:** Morana is capable of wielding powerful Blood Magic, also known as Thaumaturgy. Generally reviled for its barbaric source of power, Blood Magic is shunned by other magic practitioners and is so forbidden that only select members of the Umbrilith can wield it. The practice is so distrusted because it relies on an egregiously unnatural control of the user’s own blood to achieve its ends.
	+ **Telekinesis/possession:** One of Morana’s most powerful abilities is the power to manipulate both animate and inanimate objects through infection with her own demonic blood. The limit to how much matter she is able to control is unknown, though she has said that it is easier for her to possess living matter than non-living matter. Also, the more a mind attempts to resist the effects of her control, the more damage they are likely to suffer; in such instances, she even seems capable of fracturing a being's psyche to the point of driving them to insanity.
	+ **Matter projection**: Morana is able to project blood outside of her body and manipulate it to form solid matter. She can mould this matter into any shape, from giant hands to razor-sharp blades. She can send solid bolts as projectiles and create force-field domes. Furthermore, she is able to use blood matter to augment her physical maneuvers, either increasing her raw power or adding slashing damage to them.
	+ **Divine Sin:** If Morana loses control and gives in to her demonic self, she is capable of draining the life spirit of living beings, causing them to lose their memories and identity and turning them into but a shell of themselves. With enough loss of restraint, she can even fully drain their life and absorb their soul, though there are indications that this usually causes her a great deal of pain and mental torment as she will be forced to live through an entire lifetime of memories.
	+ **Empathy:** Morana has shown to be able to use a more restrained and controlled form of her Divine Sin power to analyse memories of a recently deceased being through their blood.

* **Levitation:** Morana is the only member of the team other than Lily who is able to levitate off the ground and hover without use of any tools or vehicles. She frequently uses levitation while meditating, and can sometimes be seen sleeping in a floating position.

* **Durability:** Morana is capable of withstanding lethal physical damage that would ordinarily cause death to regular (human) beings. However, she can be physically harmed under certain conditions (see: “weaknesses”).

### Abilities

* **Capable combatant:** Though not the most physically talented of the team, Morana seems to be a fairly competent hand-to-hand-combatant, although she only occasionally uses this skill during battle and is more reliant on her powers for her fighting styles.

* **Teleportation**: Morana is capable of teleporting from one place to another within a short range by dematerialising and materialising in the form of black mist.

* **Intelligence:** Being at least centuries old, Morana is greatly knowledgeable about a range of subjects. Although she frequently characterizes human culture as inane and trivial, there are some aspects that seem to interest her, most often morbid ones like serial killers and death rituals.

* **Multilingualism:** Morana speaks at least English, German, Latin, Romanian, Ancient Sumerian, and Sanskrit. She also knows a variety of demon languages, often acting as the team’s translator in dealing with demonic matters.

* **Occultism:** Due to her upbringing as an Umbrilith, Morana has considerable supernatural knowledge, and seems to specialize in occult matters eschewed by more conventional magic users like Morpheus and Zeke. She keeps a library of numerous spell books in her room and can often be found reading whenever she is not meditating or sleeping.

## Weaknesses

* **Distraction:** If Morana cannot concentrate or give full attention to her powers, they may either fail her or result in unpredictable effects. Additionally, certain advanced forms of her magic may require items, tools, and/or special events during casting, meaning she cannot invoke them on a mere whim.

* **Emotions:** Morana’s primary weaknesses are her own unbridled emotions, which could potentially prove dangerous and even lethal. Anger seems to be her most volatile emotion and though she exhibits great power in an enraged state, her loss of control will often leave her vulnerable.

* **Magic:** Despite being versed in magic herself, Morana is still susceptible to the effects of certain forms of magic, especially those capable of countering demonic influence. It is likely that she would have not even stayed with the team had Morpheus’ powers not been able to outmatch hers.

* **Verbal restraint:** Morana sometimes appears to be heavily dependent on incantations to cast her magic. If a gag is placed over her mouth and she cannot recite her incantations intelligently, she struggles to connect with her powers and will generally be unable to cast more advanced spells. (This method of restraint is usually attempted by other teammates if she gets too irritated.)