The game asks you if you want to save your characters imprint at the ending section. Doing so saves all your stats and atributes, but not your skills you learned from other NPCs/ Things like basics of hunting and so on.
When you create a new character, go to the secret cave (It's right next to the bridge guard) and use the machine in the top right corner of the cave.
This will replace the stats of your new character with the stats from your old character. Replace is the key word here. It won't add them, it will replace them.
You can also use an imprint, get even stronger, finish the game and save that new imprint. Doing so will make your starting characters become stronger over time.