Sein's Brother

Round glasses and a center-parted head of wavy, medium-length brown hair give Sein's brother a scholarly look. He dresses in a long dark robe edged with gold and draped with a long white shawl, gathered at the waist by a sash-like belt, and wears black shoes. At his neck hangs a holy emblem, a pendant the Holy Capital bestows only on a region's most distinguished priests.

Gentle and warm by nature, Sein's brother loses his temper only once: when he learns that Sein has been refusing the adventurer's path not out of personal wish but out of obligation to him. He holds that there is dignity in living poorly, an outlook embodied by the threadbare country church he tends, where even the bathtub and scythe are bought in palm-sized miniatures.

After their parents died early, the elder brother brought Sein up on his own. When Bishop Heiter came through from the Holy City and offered him a prestigious priesthood in Strahl, he turned it down, unwilling to uproot Sein and convinced that an older sibling's duty was to preserve his brother's home. Roughly twenty-nine years after Himmel's death, he sends Sein out to gather herbs for the village harvest festival, and Sein ends up rescued from a swamp by Frieren's party.

The travelers later bring a snake-bitten Stark to the village. The brother examines him, decides the venom is past the point he can treat, and calls in Sein, who cures the poison at once. Seeing his chance, he quietly asks Frieren to take Sein along so the young priest can finally pursue his old dream. As the party works to persuade Sein, the brother learns the truth: Sein has been holding back to avoid leaving him alone. Stung and frustrated, he strikes Sein and insists he has never once regretted remaining in the village, refusing to let his brother shoulder a false guilt. The outburst, paired with his blessing, frees Sein to join Frieren's group in search of his lost friend Kreis, and the brother stands among the crowd waving the party off.