Today I’m excited to introduce you all to my character for the Magical Readathon. I participated in the novice path of this readathon back in September. I finished the path but didn’t get to the character creation prompts. I’ve been working on them over the last couple months, and everything is finally ready. This is great because there is a Gear Up mini-readathon this week, which will allow me to gear up my character to get ready for class to start at the academy. That’s right. I’m doing a readathon within a readathon. Two of the books I’ve chosen for Trope-ical Readathon will also be used for prompts in this readathon. Without further ado, I’d like to introduce you to Padwin O’Sohkan, one of the newest recruits at Orilium!

Character Description & Background

Padwin is a young male Iltirian who grew up in the underground cities of Darkmeadow. He has spent most of his life roaming the halls of the Great Underworld Library, where his parents work as researchers cataloguing occult knowledge. Padwin is extremely shy and would consider books to be his closest friends. However, he has always been fascinated by people and often perches in the stacks of the library while in his crow form to watch others as they spend time together. Part of him longs to be included, but he finds others too overwhelming and unpredictable to be worth the effort most of the time. He has decided to leave home for the first time to attend Orilium in order to learn new secrets about magic that are available only to those who join one of the guilds. He is nervous about this new adventure, especially being above ground for the first time and the necessity of meeting so many new people, but he is also excited to learn new things, which is something he is passionate about. He hopes his time spent learning in the library and honing his shapeshifting will give him an advantage in his new studies.

Padwin recently survived the journey through the novice path. In doing so, he showed considerable skill and was invited to join the Mind Walkers guild. He’s pleased with his guild because he knows they can help foster his interests in psychology, while also allowing him seclusion and space when he needs it. He is particularly interested in learning how to access alternate planes of existence to escape to when needed where he can ponder the great questions of existence.

The books I read while creating Padwin’s character are listed below:

Background	Urban: Book set in a city or town	Age of Ash by Daniel Abraham
Province	Darkmeadow: Read a dark academia	Ninth House by Leigh Bardugo
Heritage	Iltirian: Book with a crow on cover or title, or a red cover	Obsidian by Sarah Daley

Gear Up Readathon TBR

Now that Padwin has made it to Orilium, he must get his supplies before classes start and choose the gift he would like to begin learning from his guild. He has chosen to wield a staff as his conduit for magic. He also desires access the astral plane so that he can learn how to easily retreat to a safe space when he needs to get away.

The books I plan to read this week to help Padwin gear up are listed below:

Conduit	Staff: Book from a series	The Hollow Hills by Mary Stewart
Legacy Gift	Astral Plane: Read a book set in a different world than ours	Forestborn by Elayne Audrey Becker

Are you participating in Magical Readathon? If so, leave a link to your character in the comments below!