[b]Character Name:[/b] Kuzco. ‘Emperor Kuzco, of the Kingdom of the Sun, is what you meant. We’re actually Incas, apparently. Thank you.’
[b]Player:[/b] BCLEGENDS/BCTheEntity
[b]Movie of Origin:[/b] The Emperor’s New Groove. ‘Oh hey, I remember that one! I got turned into a llama for most of it. And it sucked. But you know, it also helped me, ahem, “find a new groove”, sooo...’
[b]Additional Sources:[/b] -The Emperor’s New Groove 2: Kronk’s New Groove. ‘Yeah, I didn’t show up as much for this one, but Kronk got a wife and a house out of it. Me. I was the wife, a wife, very briefly, for one scene, and so were a whole bunch of other people there, it was a whole thing to impress Kronk’s dad, but the point is I helped the big guy out. I’m not a soulless monster, come on.’
-The Emperor’s New School. ‘Okay, here’s something you don’t hear about very often: an Emperor needing to graduate from school to be the Emperor. Well, it happened, and it, uh, wasn’t that bad, honestly. Helped me stick to that New Groove thing from before, DESPITE being turned into many, many animals, both other than and including llamas, and being subjected to various dumb shenanigans. Plus I realised that the best way to live isn’t to put yourself down, but to lift others up! Everybody who isn’t Yzma appreciated that last episode, and I now have a hottie-hot-hottie of a wife in Malina too.’
-The Emperor’s New Groove video game. ‘Aw, this one was great. Well, except for the jaguars... and the river... and, uh... you know what? Let’s just say, the events aren’t for realises, but it does inform you about things I can do. Hey, and that rhymed, nice.’
[b]Age:[/b] 20. ‘Well, hold on, let’s see. I was eighteen for most of the first film, I- wow, I was a llama for my eighteenth birthday... huh. Well, that all happened, then the thing with Kronk a while later, then I had to spend a year in educatioooon... okay, let’s say it’s an even twenty years, and not get into all the extra days, how about that?’
[b]Reference:[/b] https://vignette.wikia.nocookie.net/empeorsneworld/images/7/78/Kuzcodesigns.png/revision/latest?cb=20091107151933
‘Oh yeaaaah. I rock the royal smock and the peasant garb, baby. Doesn’t matter what I put on, I am gonna. Look. Gre-’
https://media.giphy.com/media/l35rWh9Fc7jPO/giphy.gif
‘-what the-! No, no, noooo, nonono. The llama in that one? That is not me. Okay, it WAS, but it’s not NOW, because I fixed that! New Groove, leave behind the old stuff from a less dignified time, including being turned into a llama again! I’m looking at you, whoever’s running this thing!’
[b]Personality:[/b] Once upon a time, Kuzco was a total jerk, willing to amongst other things destroy a peasant village to build his dream Summer home, fire loyal employees for semi-petty reasons, and even abandon formerly-stalwart allies to certain death. Nowadays, he’s changed, becoming a much kinder and more open person - and after a full year of education, it’s more or less stuck. ‘I had a whole movie dedicated to me becoming a cooler guy. I’d hope it’s stuck!’
As of his graduation, Kuzco is generally at least cordial to most people, rising to friendly, quirky, and typically quite a joker when pressed into talking with them for a greater period of time, though he forms preconceptions about things fairly quickly. Of course, he also shows a tendency for emotions to come and go quickly, so upsetting him may result in swift punishment, but he’ll just as swiftly reward you for making it up to him. ‘Uh, no, I don’t do the punishment thing anymore. I’d get mad if I got wronged, sure, who wouldn’t, but it’s not the errrr... you know that guy I threw out a window? Had guards throw out a window, really, also more than one guy. But yeah, that’s not a thing I do anymore. Don’t say I do it, please. I will go for being a joker, though, I can definitely be funny when I want!’
Frankly speaking, Kuzco’s not done much in the way of developing his own interests and hobbies. A lot of his life has been based around himself, and what everyone else can do for him, and the past two years of his life have been a bit too action-packed for him to expand his interests to encompass more people than himself. However, he does try to be involved in what others have him do, and he has begun considering what he really wants - coming to the unexpectedly-deep conclusion of “to make a major impact on history, cementing his own legacy and that of the Kingdom of the Sun”. Also, properly mastering some form of martial arts for the sake of self defense, though starting that has yet to materialise. ‘Yeah, that “impact on history” one shocked me, but think about it: I already have all the cash I could ever spend, I can buy almost literally anything I desire, and I have friends and family now, so what more could I want? To make myself more famous, that’s what. And better at fighting people, since people like fighting me. Mostly really old women, and I mean “as old as dinosaurs” old. Oh hey, another benefit: I can fight dinosaurs! Yaaay, Kuzco.’
[b]Abilities:[/b] For a skinny guy, Kuzco’s physical abilities are rather potent, comically so in fact. ‘Slender, thanks. Lean, in fact, because this is some tough muscle.’ He can offer both bursts of strength, to amongst other things boot open heavy doors or send people flying, as well as prolonged offerings of force to lift much larger loads than one might expect, as well as showing substantial speed and great blunt-force resistance. Combined with fairly minimal “karate skills” like rolling, kicking, and some sort of karate jump kick, he can be difficult to get a hold of. ‘I’ll have you know, my karate is legend. Not legendary, but, uh... well, it’s not that bad.’ The catch is, they are literally comical - that is, he is about as powerful as would be funny to match a situation, albeit within human limits, and even attacks that throw somebody across a room are extremely unlikely to actually injure them at all. ‘I- ...you know what, I got nothing. I have never thought about that too hard, and I don’t intend to start.’
Besides that, he might be ignorant and frequently come up with foolish ideas, but he’s certainly not an idiot. He’s occasionally able to craft devices of surprising complexity, albeit limited functionality; he is both quite good at disguising himself and avoiding notice when he wants to go unseen; and he is actually highly adept at diplomacy, showing a substantial ability to use his words to get his way, or at least come to a fair compromise - when he isn’t being self-centered and needlessly cruel. ‘Which I’m not going to do, because I have changed, how many times do I need to say that? I, uh, will take credit for building a rockbot one time, though. And like a rocket to the Sun, that was cool.’
[b]Flaws:[/b] ‘Ahahah, flaws you ask? I mean, maybe in the past, I was kind of a major jerk, but I’ve changed! I think so, anyway, I, uh... I get it, moreso than I used to. I get how I’m not the center of the universe, I got me some humility, that whole... uh... alright, maaaybe I should leave this to the guy writing all this out.’
For starters, Kuzco is still quite full of himself. ‘Hey!’ He’s certainly acquired a great deal of humility from his time as a llama and a student both, but in the end, he is frequently rather rash when taking action, often not asking for other people’s opinions, and greatly enjoys being the center of attention, for good or ill. ‘I mean… uh, mostly good, at the moment? Thank you.’
Whilst those he truly bonds with are held tightly to his chest, forming those bonds to begin with is an arduous and easily undone process unless he almost instantly likes the person, a rarity in and of itself. Partially, he fears to actually form close relationships, out of the worry that he’ll be badly burned by them, but despite himself, he still manages to “remain above it all” at times, finding himself at odds with the notion of mingling with most people, especially those who are obviously different from himself. ‘To be fair, I understand the plight of the peasantry! More, than I once did. I send out gold packages to a lot of places in the kingdom, anyway, but, you know... I can’t exactly make friends with everyone, right? Aheh, that’s- it’s not, erm, possible, come on, be reasonable.’
Kuzco is also quite... sheltered. ‘Uninformed, I’d sa- I mean uh, no I’m not.’ Manifold adventures have helped him gain a greater understanding and acceptance of the world than he previously held, but he is an Emperor through and through - that is, he is most comfortable in political or relatively civil environments, and anything outside of that can lead to ignorant assumptions, with a lack of common sense that would be baffling to anyone who knows anything about them. ‘I just said I’m not! Why would you keep... you know, how about you try living in a golden head for eighteen years and learning stuff about places you don’t care about?’
Not to mention, whilst he’s not exactly cowardly, and when it’s unavoidable finds humour or even excitement in many dangerous situations, he’d rather not go out of his way to look for them. In some scenarios, he’s even prone to panicked freakouts that detriment the situation rather than helping them. ‘Excuse you, but have you ever lifted a really fat guy with just your neck over a huge drop into a river of hungry crocodiles? No? Well then shut up, you don’t get to say what I’d do or not do.’
[b]Companion(s):[/b] N/A. ‘Yeaaaah, I don’t really have any animal companions... errr... I think if anything, I’d be the animal companion. But I’m not, anymore. That’s not a thing now. Really gotta emphasise how much I’m not a llam- oh wait, what about Bucky? Well, ehh... no, no, I hate that guy. And he’d be more of a Kronk companion, I guess.’
[b]Brief History:[/b] The summaries of all three sources can be found below:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Emperor%27s_New_Groove#Plot
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kronk%27s_New_Groove#Plot
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_The_Emperor%27s_New_School_episodes
Otherwise, I’ll leave the talking to Kuzco.
‘Thank you. I think it’s fair to say, I’m pretty sure I know what I’m talking about when it comes to, uh, my own history, ahaha, aha. Ahem.
‘Okay, so it all starts when I was just a little baby. I had everything I could ever want! Except my mom may or may not have died giving birth to me, and my dad may or may not have died out at sea when I was young, so, uh, I didn’t have them. But, I had everything else. Yzma even went so far as to practically raise me instead, and she doubled as my advisor for many many years! Which turned out well, I think. Maybe. No, yeah, it did.
‘So maybe you’d expect it, buuut my life was pretty peachy keen, up until the day before my eighteenth birthday. See, a lotta stuff happened that day - I did a little dance, threw a guy out of a window, rejected some brides, fired my advisor for rampant insubordination and just being plain old, aaaand I showed off my plans for Kuzcotopia to a peasant village leader. He, uh, didn’t take them well, so you can imagine why I thought what happened next was his fault.
‘My memory of the rest of that night is still, uh, pretty sketchy. I got some memories back, like how Yzma and Kronk invited me to dinner, but nothing about the dinner itself. Apparently, Kronk hit me over the head, so that’s where that came from. Point is, the next thing I knew, I woke up in some sack in the peasant village, with the same whiny peasant in front of me! I mean, I know Pacha’s nice now, but at the time...
‘Oh, most important part, nearly forgot: I WAS A LLAMA. You know, in case you forgot.
‘Speaking of, I didn’t forget about Yzma’s... ugh, “secret lab”. I figured I’d just snap my fingers and order her to change me back! The peasant leader wouldn’t help me, so I went into the jungle, the intrepid explorer, MASTER of survival! And got chased by a pack of jaguars tied to a loganddroppedoffofahugewaterfall BUT none of that is important let’s move on!
‘I guess Pacha had a change of heart, so he was a pretty steadfast ally from then on, helped me find Yzma before I realised she wanted me dead, I may have done some pretty mean things to him... uh, I tried some grass. That was gross.
‘Long story short, we made it back to my palace, into Yzma’s secret lab, turned her into a kitten and beat the snot out of her after a bunch of shenanigans, aaaaand we got the vial we needed! Apparently, friendship is a pretty strong, uh, force. Or something. I figured I’d move my new Summer palace to, ah, another, unoccupied hill. You know, no singing, anywhere, on the hills I was wandering around on. Maybe make it a bit smaller, too.
‘For a while after that, all was well. I was back where I belonged, I was doing, you know, more good, mostly, I think... Pacha asked me to help Kronk out with his dad, so I helped Kronk pretend he had, I dunno, fifteen wives. Apparently he wanted to be a ladies’ man! Who am I to deny the guy some help? And I do look good in a dress.
‘Uuuunfortunately, it turned out a little time after I turned nineteen that I needed to graduate from school, pretty sure it was college or something, and that if I didn’t, my ex-advisor got the throne by default as the one with the most experience. Yeah, Yzma came back from being a kitten. Seems like she built a brand new secret lab, complete with access to school funding. So, that was a fun year. It gave me some insight, though, and I managed to fall in love in the process, with a girl who I maintain is a hottie-hot-hottie.
‘And at the end of it all, I graduated. I finally really earned my place on the throne. I really did. I got married, hired Kronk as my advisor- partially to prevent Yzma from hijacking the job all over again, partially because, the big lug’s a nice guy! Just misguided, and dumb. A little dumb, smarter than he looks. Smart in non-smart ways, I dunno. I moved Pacha’s family in with me, too, we’d been friends for so long, I figured... and, you know, peasant leader, it’s not like he’s neglecting his village or family at all either.
‘Sooo... that was a heck of a ride. And the ride’s not even over yet. Turns out there are a ton of other kingdoms around, and half of them could probably conquer mine without really trying... which is a liiittle embarrassing to find out. So, as the Emperor, I took it upon myself to be the ambassador I know I am deep down! I’ve got my entourage, I’ve got Malina running the Kingdom of the Sun as Empress Regent in my stead, and overall, I’m pretty sure there’s nothing that can go wrong here. Seriously, what’s the worst that can happen?’