banjoanjo

Qualia: Mission Sub Rosa

LÊ BẰNG KIỀU

---

He fought the urge to rid himself of the sweat, directing his vigilance to ensure his serene smile didn’t turn to a grimace as they toured. Facility after facility, the uneven pressure between his soles made the walk more tiresome. The clack of his cane against polished road remained mostly even, the slightest variation in rhythm only noticeable to Bang himself. Hopefully.

Somehow it was easier when my foot was just metal, he sighed inwardly. Another bead of moisture ran down his temple.

The view of the city itself did somewhat compensate him for the ordeal. He could imagine himself sitting in a shaded pavilion with a cup of coffee, reading through a paper as his fellow students roamed outside. Ah, how peaceful that would be. Something to keep him feeling close to home, despite the empty streets, the way the lack of traffic and life seemed to echo onto itself. As their guide paused to speak at length about the hospitality available to the student body, Bang took the opportunity to pull out a chair and rest his feet. In his right shoe, his single toe flexed tiredly.

Not that there’s any need for this to be a home, he supposed. If anything, this is just another workplace.

--

A childish grin adorned his face as he watched the orchestra. It really was a Technologist sentiment, wasn’t it, feeling the need to embellish even the most mundane and unnecessary of tasks. Apart from creating a distracting whirlwind of brass that was always out the corner of his eye, was it functionally any different from just playing a particularly loud record player? Probably, if the priority here was spectacle rather than a listening experience.

He made his way to the catering area, remarking on the students he passed on the way. A pair conversing in German, which he couldn’t understand. A Middle Eastern fellow clearly not enjoying his drink. The Russian girl near the fellow, the smile on her face a far cry from the bored expression Bang had noticed during the tour. How nice that she was finally enjoying herself. His eyes lingered on the girl, her bare shoulders and exposed neck, only hurrying away once he’d decided that enough blood had rushed to his face. He still had a main objective for the night: testing the limits of this all-you-can-eat service. A little easier said than done when his cane left him with only one free hand. The boy uttered a gracious ‘thank you’ to the chef as a bowl was slid towards him. Aromatic, red, filled to the brim and just waiting for half its contents to get spilled to the shiny floor. He stared at the bowl and tapped his cane once, seemingly anxious. The sensible thing would be to ask one of the waiters for assistance, but Bang chose to look at this as a potential for connection.

He turned to the student next to him. “Ah, please excuse me. I’d hate to be an inconvenience but… would you be able to help me take this to one of the dining tables?”

Qualia: Mission Sub Rosa

Lê Bằng Kiều

Appearance

You would be hard pressed to find Bang in anything sloppier than smart casual attire. Presentation is key for first impressions after all, that's what his mentors would drill into him. Not a button unbuttoned, not a wrinkle unsteamed. Neatness is its own benefit but so is the coverage it provides for the compression layer underneath.

Besides his well-kept suit, a passer-by would also notice the simple cane he walks with to compensate for the limp in his right leg, along with the glove he only wears on his right hand. If one were to bump into him, they'd likely remark on how solid his gloved appendage feels.

LÊ BẰNG KIỀU

16 | Male | 168cm | 75kg
Vietnam | Egoism | Regeneration

Their Story:
It was a rather sudden thing. Foreseeable, he supposed (an observation tragic in its own right), but it was just like in the stories he’d read in the Egoist epics. His body simply moved on its own, and subsequently had 26% of its mass blown off from his brother’s abstraction.

Their father was a callous but ambitious researcher who expected his children to have the same drive as him. Early in his life, Bang was deemed the less viable of the pair, too soft and non-confrontational. He was spared from having to engage in the family’s Egoism studies. He didn’t know what his brother Khanh was put through, though his prodding around in later years told him that they were attempting more powerful but volatile experimental methods.

Bang watched his brother’s will corrode in real-time. Whatever they were doing to him in that campus, it turned a fiery-hearted young man into a seething, broken mess. His temper would snap at the slightest provocations. Whatever skin was exposed at home would be littered with tattoos and scars in equal measure. Bang could feel his heart breaking more for him with every passing week.

Fast forward two years to a tense family dinner. Another snide comment from their father about Khanh’s progress. An angry retort from the eldest son. Something was different this time though, more heated and bitter. The table and chair were toppled as he stood up, and heat began to swirl around the dining room.

“Why don’t you look at what I’ve done for you? Look at it!”

Bang recognised the way his brother flexed that hand of his, memories of their sibling brawls flashing red. Khanh was going to go all out. Little 12-year-old Bang dived in to tackle his brother away from the family and the next thing he knew he was on the ground, feeling more and more of his life force spurting out onto the tiled floor with every weak pulse in his partially erased ribcage.

They told him he was vegetative for nearly three months. That his coma was the easy part. What came afterwards would often make him wish he’d gone out in that tragedy. Occidental alloy rods were fused into his body to replace his missing bones. The new ribs were easily the worst part, but at least that was eventually done with. After that was the studying. Egoism was what literally tore his family apart, but it was also what would save his life. He took up the study of regeneration, one of the most primitive forms of Egoism. Through this, Bang was placed in debt to his father and, indirectly, the government organisation he served. As long as blood still flowed through his shamble of a body, his will was theirs.

---

Organization: The Con Rồng Ministry

Qualia: Mission Sub Rosa

Lê Bằng Kiều

Appearance

You would be hard pressed to find Bang in anything sloppier than smart casual attire. Presentation is key for first impressions after all, that's what his mentors would drill into him. Not a button unbuttoned, not a wrinkle unsteamed. Neatness is its own benefit but so is the coverage it provides for the compression layer underneath.

Besides his well-kept suit, a passer-by would also notice the simple cane he walks with to compensate for the limp in his right leg, along with the glove he only wears on his right hand. If one were to bump into him, they'd likely remark on how solid his gloved appendage feels.

LÊ BẰNG KIỀU

16 | Male | 168cm | 75kg
Vietnam | Egoism | Regeneration

Their Story:
It was a rather sudden thing. Foreseeable, he supposed (an observation tragic in its own right), but it was just like in the stories he’d read in the Egoist epics. His body simply moved on its own, and subsequently had 26% of its mass blown off from his brother’s abstraction.

Their father was a callous but ambitious researcher who expected his children to have the same drive as him. Early in his life, Bang was deemed the less viable of the pair, too soft and non-confrontational. He was spared from having to engage in the family’s Egoism studies. He didn’t know what his brother Khanh was put through, though his prodding around in later years told him that they were attempting more powerful but volatile experimental methods.

Bang watched his brother’s will corrode in real-time. Whatever they were doing to him in that campus, it turned a fiery-hearted young man into a seething, broken mess. His temper would snap at the slightest provocations. Whatever skin was exposed at home would be littered with tattoos and scars in equal measure. Bang could feel his heart breaking more for him with every passing week.

Fast forward two years to a tense family dinner. Another snide comment from their father about Khanh’s progress. An angry retort from the eldest son. Something was different this time though, more heated and bitter. The table and chair were toppled as he stood up, and heat began to swirl around the dining room.

“Why don’t you look at what I’ve done for you? Look at it!”

Bang recognised the way his brother flexed that hand of his, memories of their sibling brawls flashing red. Khanh was going to go all out. Little 12-year-old Bang dived in to tackle his brother away from the family and the next thing he knew he was on the ground, feeling more and more of his life force spurting out onto the tiled floor with every weak pulse in his partially erased ribcage.

They told him he was vegetative for nearly three months. That his coma was the easy part. What came afterwards would often make him wish he’d gone out in that tragedy. Occidental alloy rods were fused into his body to replace his missing bones. The new ribs were easily the worst part, but at least that was eventually done with. After that was the studying. Egoism was what literally tore his family apart, but it was also what would save his life. He took up the study of regeneration, one of the most primitive forms of Egoism. Through this, Bang was placed in debt to his father and, indirectly, the government organisation he served. As long as blood still flowed through his shamble of a body, his will was theirs.

---

Organization: The Con Rồng Ministry

Qualia: Steampunk Spies, School Life Scandals, and Eldritch Spice

@ERode

Just got a day or two left of class work stuff to wrap up, will try to get something to you soon-ish. If I don't have the brainpower to get a proper sheet done in that time I'll just send you messy dot points over DM. Already got the broad strokes of my character worked out.

Qualia: Steampunk Spies, School Life Scandals, and Eldritch Spice

What are the strongest things the body enhancers can do? Do they do stuff like go furry mode or get a Parasyte hand pal or plain ol' superstrength/speed?

Qualia: Steampunk Spies, School Life Scandals, and Eldritch Spice

Interested

Brilliant Fake Kaleidoscopic Prism

RIM MIKAGURA

Collab with @ERode

---

Rim looked at the coat in his hands, putting it on immediately. He tied his cloth around to secure it too, just in case.

"I... no. I'm alone. I don't need, um." How did he want to phrase this? "Is everything alright at the hospital?"

Zen tilted her head to the side slightly, then nodded. "Yes, the hospital's safe. I was actually gonna head over there again after squaring this place out. Are you sure you don't want to come with? You're not wearing shoes..."

And he had been running pretty hard.

"The staff too? They're okay?"

She tapped her fist against her heart. "Wouldn't be here if they weren't."

He stared unnervingly long. Tightened his cloth.

"Okay," he said. And more softly, "Thank you."

With one last look at the hospital past the girl, he sprinted off with inhuman speed.

Left in the dust of the sprinting man, Zen could only stare in silence.

"..."

She smacked her fist into her palm.

"Oh, so it was him!"

Brilliant Fake Kaleidoscopic Prism

RIM MIKAGURA

---

'Did he say he was working today?'

It was the only thought running through Rim’s head as he stared out across the bay, the dread in his gut growing in proportion with the number of monsters he watched approach the field hospital.

'He was still in bed when I left this morning…'

Fuck. He really had no recollection of what the schedule was like this week. Another failing to add to the pile. At least this one he could fix if he left right now, if he ran till his lungs bled. The usual magical troupe would be fine to handle the gate on their own.

Rim responded to Shinjuku with a half-hearted shrug before leaping off the ship, his cloth once again unfurling and trailing loosely with him. If he was to get on Shibuya’s good side then it would be best to heed her requests. As he floated, he could spot the floundering rookie on the left, just as she had said.

“Aight, let’s try this.”

Still airborne, he manifested a marble sphere about the size of a van below him, planting both feet on its top and straightening his knees with an almost supersonic snap. The giant cannonball rocketed down towards the oni and the girl but Rim did not stay to observe the result. Whether it missed or crushed the oni, or even the girl, there would be others to deal with that. The field hospital was his only priority.

He couldn't recall the last time he ran this desperately.

Brilliant Fake Kaleidoscopic Prism

RIM MIKAGURA

Interaction with @Yankee @Cu Chulainn

---

The driver turned the radio up, rousing the strawberry blonde passenger from an unpleasant dream.

“More o’ that magic nonsense, eh? On the…” The driver – Ta…Tamura? Murata? – dug at his ear with a pinkie. “On the river! Say, ain’t that too close to the airport?”

Despite the biting cold this morning, Rim had his window cracked slightly open, the wind helping to wake him up a little more. Tamu- Murata, like many in his line of work, reeked of smoke, and while today’s job wouldn’t have had him turning down a pack or two, Rim wasn’t looking to get any ambient scent into the fabric of his suit. His borrowed suit. A little frostbite was a worthy sacrifice to avoid the earful Grandfather would lay into him otherwise.

“I dunno,” he said, peering out at the skyline as the car sped along the highway. No magical children on the horizon yet. “Maybe Kim will appreciate the welcoming party.”

“Yeah, yeahh, nothing says Tokyo like a— shit!”

A resounding ‘BOOM!’ shook the car, sending it fishtailing into the roadside barrier. Shattered glass rained on Rim, only marginally blocked by the airbags that shoved a rough grunt from him. Then a monstrous laugh. No, not a laugh, more like… chittering. Rim finally opened his eyes to see a giant lantern bouncing on the car’s crushed hood. A cartoonishly large tongue flailed from it, bordered by enormous teeth.

“Shit!” Tamura screamed again, floundering his way out the door. Rim moved to do the same but unfortunately for him, the lantern must have sensed a good challenge. The tongue wrapped around his arm and yanked him out for a bite. Rim cried out too, and it was only in the nick of time that its teeth, underlit by a blue glow, could find no purchase. Letting out a confused noise, it bit down once more and, again, failed to pierce flesh. Rim took this chance to plant a fist into its face and send it spiraling down the road.

“What the… fuck,” Rim muttered. Blue light shone gently from between the ravaged cuts on his sleeve. The sleeve of the suit that he’d borrowed. Motherfucker. So much for avoiding that earful. A glance in the crooked rearview showed Tamura vaulting off the road, out of eyeshot, allowing Rim to kick the door off its hinges and step out with no issues. Of all the places for a monster to appear…

Another yelp escaped him as a second lantern latched on from behind, tearing his outfit up even more. He fell onto the freezing ground, grabbing at his back, dread clutching his heart as the first lantern locked eyes with him. That terrifying chittering filled his ears once more, and he began to grasp the situation he was in. His own human abilities wouldn’t save him for long.

He was gonna die unless…

He had no choice but to…

…

Ugh, and it was so cold too!

“God…dammit!” he grunted, a plumb bob materializing in his hand, a glowing card flashing into reality below it, before gold overtook blue in an eruption of light.

* ~ S F A V I L L A ~ *

It felt just like the first time, as if every atom of his being was torn apart and reconstructed, every miniscule prick of light in the universe converging into the magical being that was Rim Mikagura. The two lanterns were thrown by the blast that radiated from his transformation.

Where he was previously pinned, he now stood steadfast, naginata in hand and cloth floating gently. Icy wind swirled around him but there were no goosebumps along his exposed skin. The cold was an ambient, almost absent factor. His system was now surging with a vitality he could have never achieved before this. The adrenaline from a monster attack certainly wasn’t a drawback either. With a vengeful roar, Rim lunged at the two paper beasts, taking each of them out with a succinct series of slashes. No time to gloat however, as more monstrous sounds echoed down the road. Many more.

“No,” he said, looking around desperately and deciding to book it for now. Tamura mentioned a river, right? Time to get outta here. “Nope.”

Rim sprinted, bounding over storefronts with inhuman strength. Monster extermination was a magical girl’s job. There seemed to be an approximate fuckton in the area so where the hell was the cavalry—

"Hop on, everyone! It's time to bring the fight to them!"

That worked. The ship on the water was instantly recognizable. With the strength lent to him by his patron, Rim took a running leap. He tumbled onto the deck with a roll, immediately getting back to his feet and gauging the rest of the ship’s occupants. Chiyoda, male, late high school to early university age. Bunkyo, female… high school age.

…Boy, was it windier here than usual? It felt windier. Maybe it was the ship’s momentum that was really drawing his attention to the… swinging.

Clearing his throat and tearing his eyes from the two other magical people on the deck, Rim grabbed his cloth and methodically wrapped it around his crotch into what best resembled a sumo wrestler’s mawashi. Now what? What should he say? What could he possibly say here?

“Ah…” he cleared his throat again, “ 'scuse. Excuse me.”

Brilliant Fake Kaleidoscopic Prism

Rim

Rim Mikagura

( 御神楽 輪夢 )

--



_Credit

--

Appearance

Rim stands at an easy 5' 9". His hair is close cropped and bleached strawberry blonde. Both his ears are pierced but often he is seen with only one silver loop earring on his right. His clothing tastes lean to expensive streetwear with casual, loose silhouettes. Oversized tees and chunky sneakers are a staple. His arms are decently muscular from long days at the workshop but his mid-twenties have placed some flab on his stomach. His resting expression is an absent, almost sullen frown.

Magical

By the will of Il Divino himself, Rim's magic transforms him into a living work of art, rendering him into the human body's most natural state of being: complete nudity. The only relief granted to him is a long, white cloth that gently floats around his person and the silk tassels that hang from his ears. Rim's hair grows to a little shorter than shoulder length and turns into a more natural blonde, specks of glitter seeming to shine across his locks. His eyes turn blue and are bordered by a shimmering golden eyeliner.

Despite all this, Rim is not granted the chiseled physique of David in this form.

Age: 26
Personality: Rim is a man that holds himself with a quiet strength, passion that he has no intention on using for the sake of others. While a younger him may have had some sharp words (and heavy fists) against the injustices he'd encounter, the Rim of today finds that most people aren't really worth the effort. Everyone he meets is kept at arms length, crept around until they pass an invisible trial. Even then he is curt at best, at worst outright ignoring them. In a landscape of magical children and ugly territorial disputes, neutrality is golden. Rim will go to great lengths to preserve it for himself and the people in his inner circle. He holds his temper well with people he does not approve of, with the exception of his family.

Rim also considers himself measured and difficult to fluster but with... recent events being the way they are...

Well.

Background: Rim will insist that he’s satisfied with his life. Although pressured into a BMX career by his father for almost all his adolescent years, a particularly rough final year of high school gave him the excuse he needed to leave the professional circuit. Currently, he spends his days juggling himself between selling bike parts and getting the family trade (the first one) hammered into his skull by his grandfather. There is never a dull moment at Tokyo Steel – BMX and Bowls, nor a silent one with all sounds of clanging metal and generations of family resentment in the shared Suginami store space.

He lives in a penthouse suite in the neighboring Setagaya ward, afforded by convincing his grandfather to make a pivot to crafting lab equipment for anyone that can afford their hefty prices. On paper, the Mikagura brand technology is made of a family secret alloy that increases the potency of whatever is brewed or cultivated in the vessels. In reality, Rim makes sure that non-magical customers don’t overstep their bounds and ask too many questions, all while making a decent buck.

It’s a lot of work, keeping an eye on the magical climate, territorial disputes, the temperaments of other mage families, etc. The situation with the magical girls in particular is what made him refuse a patron’s call a number of times. It was just not worth getting involved in.

Until five days ago. Police are still urging people to come forward with any information about a naked blonde man seen fleeing a Shinjuku drug raid.

Patron: Michelangelo di Lodovico Buonarroti Simoni
Patron Tool: A plumb bob – a pointed weight of polished gold attached to a string. There seems to be Latin script engraved around it and glowing lightly, but Rim has not cared to decipher it.
Patron Weapon: A naginata with a blade shaped like a chisel. The blade takes up approximately half of the weapon’s length.
Patron Aspect: Foundational Shape
Aspect Magic:

Primitive - Rim is able to generate perfect marble spheres of varying sizes. They are the only decent shape he can make. Cubes are also an option but they come out with soft, misshapen edges. He can summon them partially clipped into preexisting objects, the result will be a sphere missing the parts where it was in contact. For example, Rim can summon a sphere halfway through the ground to produce just a hemisphere. The object in contact is unaffected. His summons have the durability and general qualities of standard marble.
Primary Form - By plunging his blade into a volume, Rim can gradually compress and reshape the silhouette of an object into what he sees in his mind's eye. It can take him several minutes to several hours depending on the extent of his work. This skill does not increase or reduce the volume of an object. He has great difficulty shaping the object outwards from its initial silhouette and there is a limit to the amount of volume he can reshape. This skill seems to work best against types of stone and metal.
Sacra Sindone - The thick, silken cloth that hovers around his being. It seems impervious to tearing or cutting. To Rim's chagrin, tying it into place or wrapping it around himself doesn't make it remain in place for long. It will gradually loosen itself back into its floating, usual shape. The cloth appears to have some innate danger sense when Rim is in the heat of battle, sometimes finding itself between the mage and a rough landing. It won't break his fall but it will at least mitigate some road rash.

Other skills:

Despite everything, he still dabbles in BMX tricks from time to time. Has a motorcycle license and a Bachelor of Science from Tokyo Metropolitan University. Begrudgingly, he does intend on continuing the family craft for his own ends.

Other Mentions:

His favorite food is kakigori.
His favorite band is The Blue Hearts.