King Cosmos

Shugo Tensei Samurai - A Cyberpunk Fantasy RP

Hiroto Chiba

Hiroto Chiba

 

____________________________________________________ C H A R A C T E R I N F O R M A T I O N Name: Hiroto Chiba Nicknames/Aliases: N/A Birth City/District: Sakanoshita District, Neo-Tokyo Age: 21 Height: 7’ 2” Racial Background: Japanese Race: Y.S.G Natural Born Hair Color: Black Eye Color: Red sclera with white irises. Appearance: Hiroto is large; not just tall, he is also broad shoulder, wide across the chest and has a naturally muscular build. He tends to slouch and hunch his shoulders, rarely standing at his full height, but due to his stature this does little to bring him down to others level. The tattoos at his neck extend to his upper torso, covering his shoulders, uppers arms, chest and back in similar patterns. The mask that he wears is rarely removed, so as to hide the mutation markers that he would prefer to keep hidden; when does remove it, a small but deep scar can be seen on his jawline. Mutation Marker(s): Hiroto has three mutation markers; his eyes, his height and his lower jaw. The first and second are obvious; his eyes are an unnatural colour, with red sclera instead of white, a white iris and no visible pupils. His unusually large height and large build are also most like due to his Yokai Genes as well, considering that his parents were both relatively short. The final mutation is less obvious, as he keeps it hidden beneath the mask that he always wears; his lower jaw is covered in a bone-like exoskeleton, giving him a skull like visage. Personality: Softly spoken and even softer in the way he treads, Hiroto is the textbook definition of a gentle giant. He is a man of simple needs and simple pleasures, someone who prefers to enjoy a quiet existence and who will never find that with Kurosagi, yet finds that he cannot pull away from them so long as they will be putting themselves in danger without him there to try and protect them. Big-hearted, he cares about others, sympathises with people more than he should and proves himself an oddity in the city by being willing to help anyone he meets in any way that he can. He’s been bitten by this behaviour more than once, yet continues to do so anyway; he is not naïve, he knows the risks, but he is always going to give people the benefit of the doubt. Hiroto doesn’t like hurting people, which makes him ill-suited as a gang member, but also isn’t the type to stand by while others are being harmed, being victimised, being oppressed, or putting themselves in harm’s way. He finds himself hurting people regardless and always feels guilty afterwards. If he can help it, it will always be him who is the one getting hurt and not others; he can take it, a sturdy body like his has to be good for something. Aspirations: - What Hiroto wants is a quiet life. One where he doesn’t need to look over his shoulder, one where he doesn’t have to fight for every scrap, one where he doesn’t have to worry about the safety of his friends. He fights for that kind of life. - More than a quiet life for himself, he wants everyone else to get what they want so that they can stop fighting. Fears: - Losing his friends - Becoming a killer - An endless cycle of violence Vehicle: Not everyone needs a vehicle in Neo-Tokyo, but most that are in gangs or in social circles will typically have a vehicle as an extension of themselves. Because Neo-Tokyo does have a very confusing and jumbled street system as the city expanded faster then it could plan, those who can afford it, will typically take to the Hoverzones above the cities streets. Most vehicles will typically be a hybrid of hover and standard road types and all will run on YoFuel, or a synthetic fuel made from the bodies of Yokai. P O W E R / C Y B E R N E T I C S I N F O R M A T I O N Strengths/Natural Abilities: Hiroto is strong. Even for someone possessing a Y.S.G, his physical strength and his durability are exceptional which, combined with his stature, make him an imposing threat in a fight even if his actual skill level is low. He is connected. Not to anyone is particular, but he is well known and even liked with the local community of Sakanoshita. Being someone willing to help others has its benefits and there are many in the area, particular is more law abiding residents and business owners, who he is on good terms with. He is good with machines. The more analogue kind at least. While he is not much better with complicated technology and cybernetics than the average person, working and living in a mechanic’s shop means he is quite well practiced at repairing vehicles and other large machines. Weaknesses/Flaws: Hiroto is a pacifist. Of a sort at least. He does not like to fight or to hurt others and would like to avoid doing so as much as possible; that is not the course his life has taken however and he often finds himself needed to compromise his morals in order to protect himself or others. His reluctance to do any real harm to his opponents is often a detriment to this however. He is slow. For a Y.S.G. holder at least. His large size means he has a long stride and his speed is enhanced like any other Shogun, it takes a lot to get that much mass moving and with no real way to fight at range he can find it difficult to actually reach an opponent at times. Y.S.G Ability: Base Ability: Armour To enhance his toughness even further, Hiroto is able to cover his body in a sturdy, bone-like exoskeleton similar to the mutation marker that naturally covers his lower jaw. This armour is tough to break and capable of blocking most mundane forms of damage, but is not unbreakable. It is also heavy, further reducing his mobility even more than normal, but can be discarded just as easily as it was summoned once it has served its purpose; weakening and crumbling away from his body once he stops using this ability. The armour can be created to cover his entire body or just a part of it, depending on the situation. First Awakening: Invincibility Hiroto can, for a few brief seconds at a time, make his body completely immune to harm. There is no visible sign that manifests when he is using this ability, which makes it hard to tell when or if he is using it other than the fact that he takes no damage. This ability on affects his body and does not extend to the armour he creates nor the clothing he is wearing or any items he is holding. Using it drains a lot of his stamina and it cannot be used too often in succession; furthermore the duration of its effect seems to be consistent, but Hiroto has not quite gotten the timing of it down, meaning he is reluctant to rely on it too much in fights unless he has no other choice. He fears using the ability too early or too late and getting himself hurt because of it. Second Awakening: Giant -Locked- Soul Binder/Weapon(s): Kanabō - A large wooden club covered in vicious spikes. It is heavy, carrying a noticeable weight to it even when Hiroto is the one swinging it around. When it manifests it forms from the hilt downwards, starting in his hand before the spiralling yellow script that cover it spreads out like growing vines and the weapon forms inside of it. Cybernetics/Gadets/Accessories: None; though some people sometimes mistake the exoskeleton on his jaw for some kind of implant, Hiroto has no cybernetics to speak of.

H i s t o r y Orphan's Tale Hiroto was fourteen years old when his parents died. They worked at a gambling den, one of the many establishments in the Sakanoshita district where people could risk their money on games of chance and try to profit from their poor life choices; his father was a bouncer, there to deal with any troublesome elements, while his mother was a Chō-han dealer, throwing the dice that decided men’s fate. It was good, dishonest work; hardly the worst thing people could do to earn a living and not even that dangerous. They earned enough to afford a place to live, a small and dingy apartment in the district, along with food and other necessities; they weren’t rich but they had a roof over their head and weren’t starving. It was good enough. Better than most. Until a patron at the gambling den lost everything they had, accused his mother of cheating the dice and drew a hidden gun; his father took the first bullet. His mother the second. No one thought to tell Hiroto what had happened. His parents just didn’t come home one day and he didn’t know way, until he went to the gambling den to look for them and found out himself. Once his parents’ landlord found out, he was evicted from his home without a second though, without a chance to try and make the rent by himself. The landlord already had another family lined up to move in; a more reliable source of income than a newly orphaned teenager. He had no choice but to leave. He went back to the gambling den, the only other place he could think of, but they turned him away. Violently. His father’s fellow bouncers threw him out themselves. Even at that young age Hiroto’s Y.S.G. meant he was over six feet tall and looked a lot older than he really was. He was big and strong and that meant most people assumed he could take care of himself; he could not, but he at least looked intimidating enough that most people were willing to leave him alone at first. That fact was enough to keep him safe for a while, managing to get by through begging and the rare bot of kindness from locals; a bit of food or water here, a few coins there. Hiroto still remembers the people who helped him the most back then and tries to pay them back whatever way he can. For eight months he survived alone on the street, doing his best to avoid any run-ins with the local gangs and the criminal elements that were so common in the Sakanoshita district, but he couldn’t avoid them forever. Someone like him, someone large and powerful even if the past year had taken its toll on him, was a tempting target for the type of people who liked to prove and flaunt their strength over others. The gangs caught up with him eventually, but rather than be his end like he expected, it might have been the thing that kept him alive. It started with a few gang members who were looking to have some fun by beating up homeless people; even young and scared as he was, Hiroto couldn’t stand by and just let that happen. He intervened and though they were older and more numerous and armed, his size and his Y.S.G. traits were enough to let him win against a bunch of thugs. He was marked after that; his presence known, his description spread around. Either due to wounded pride or just to prove that they could beat him where the others couldn’t, the gangs came after him in force. For a month they hounded him, hunted him; he couldn’t stay on the streets to beg, couldn’t risk going to those friendly locals for help. The gangs were starving him out. Hiroto kept fighting, he kept winning, it almost seemed like a daily occurrence with each victory only spurring them on, until finally the boss of one of the gangs found him. Unlike the others he was another Y.S.G. holder like Hiroto; someone that an untrained, desperate teenager couldn’t beat. As he lay there, bleeding and beaten for the first time in his life, he thought he was going to die. Instead they dragged him back to their base, gave him something to eat and ‘recruited him’. He couldn’t exactly say no, not with nowhere else to go, not when he knew what kind of life awaited him if they went back to hunting him. For almost three years he was a member of that gang; fighting people, mugging people, hurting people. Never killing people, for what it was worth; not that it made much of a difference when the people he was with did the killing instead. In return he had a place to live, regular meals, clothes that actually fit. All it cost him were sleeping nights and an endless weight on his conscience. Every time he ended the day with blood on his knuckled he told himself he’d leave when he was able to, when he had enough money stashed away to make a new start or was strong enough to survive deserting the gang. That day never seemed to come. In the end, the situation ended up solving itself in a way. The district was abuzz with word of the new mechanic shop/bar that had just opened up, or more specifically about its owner; there were all kinds of rumours about the mysterious woman who owned it and who or what she used to be. The leader of the gang got it into his head that she must be rich, hiding a bunch of money or something valuable in the bar itself somewhere. He wanted them to go and take it. Hiroto wasn’t on that job himself, which was probably the only thing that saved his life. He doesn’t know exactly what happened to the ones who did go, only that he never saw them again and the strange owner of the bar came looking for him and gave him a choice. Join her, or join them. That wasn’t much of a choice.

The Friestan Incident, a Fantasy Sci-Fi Fusion RP

Sumiye King – Acting Chief Engineer

Adventurers, huh? Just when she was starting to get used to the idea of talking to a dragon their conversation was interrupted by news that the Fellowship was on the way to their mountain; not too surprisingly really, they must have made quite an entrance when they breached the atmosphere going a few thousand miles per hour. The only surprisingly part was how quickly this supposedly medieval world had put together a party and made it this far into the mountains.

Curious.

Of course, their captain wanted to immediately hop of the back of said dragon to go intercept them; if Sumiye didn’t know any better, and truth be told she really didn’t, she would think they Almira was enjoying all of this. “I’ll pass captain, if it’s all the same to you. I have duties back at the ship to return to.”

If they were going to have guests then she had better make sure they actually had power and running water by the time they arrived. And working guns… just in case. Their impromptu little weapons test earlier had gone well, but she had yet to check the data herself. “I can have someone look at the data from the rovers once you’re back if you want.”

@Kumbaris

Deleted

@King Cosmos I do like this character... and I think it works in overall concept. I just have a couple of things I'd like to work out better. How is she gaining spirit power? Is this something anyone can do if taught, or is she being imbued by spirits somehow? What is her motivation for mastering basically every spirit power? Is there a distinct focus that her powers trend around? Again I'm not crazy about this "easy immortality" among percievers.

The beginnings are there this just needs some more work.

@Dead Cruiser

I've made a few changes to her sheet; hopefully it clarifies a few things. I'll summarise things here though.

Her abilities can be learned by anyone, technically, though most who try to do so fail. The idea behind the power of the spirits was that it came more from a better understanding of the world more than any innate abilities they might have; being more in tune with the world I suppose. Her teleportation ability, which was the first one she learned, is probably the best example. She's not teleporting exactly, nor is it super speed; it's more like a wormhole I suppose, the bending of space so that her current location and her destination are right next to each other, achieved by simply recognising that distances are irrelevant and that your destination was always right next to you. The more I think about the more I think she's basically Neo experiencing the Matrix for the first time; 'there is no spoon' and as soon as your realise that you can jump over mountains too. I included some dialog in her backstory between her and the fox spirit she met first which goes into that a little.

That dialog also expands on her motivation a little, shows how it was the first spirit she met that set her on that path. It's honestly pretty simple though; she doesn't like having barriers around her. She doesn't like having things kept from her. At first it was the walls and rules of her city keeping her from seeing the world, then she made it past that and found another barrier, that being the knowledge that the spirits could teach her that had either been kept from humans or that they denied themselves. The further she travelled and the more barriers she crossed the more she found, until eventually she makes it to the top of the world and finds one final barrier keeping her from ascension. I suppose I'd call it a villainous bend on a sense of adventure, the possessive desire to see and experience everything and to have everything be within her reach.

I've tried to give some clarity on the kind of powers that she uses most often, the ones that will make up her main kit; if that's still not clear I'll just rewrite that whole section. I changed her agelessness to be more like a static appearance though; it was mostly only there to explain why she still looks like a twenty year old when she's in her fifties anyway. I've made it so that she will still die of old age, she'll just look like a young woman when she does.

Shugo Tensei Samurai - A Cyberpunk Fantasy RP

Posting this early as it's still a work in progress. Will update it with the history later.

Hiroto Chiba

Hiroto Chiba

 

____________________________________________________ C H A R A C T E R I N F O R M A T I O N Name: Hiroto Chiba Nicknames/Aliases: N/A Birth City/District: Sakanoshita District, Neo-Tokyo Age: 21 Height: 7’ 2” Racial Background: Japanese Race: Y.S.G Natural Born Hair Color: Black Eye Color: Red sclera with white irises. Appearance: Hiroto is large; not just tall, he is also broad shoulder, wide across the chest and has a naturally muscular build. He tends to slouch and hunch his shoulders, rarely standing at his full height, but due to his stature this does little to bring him down to others level. The tattoos at his neck extend to his upper torso, covering his shoulders, uppers arms, chest and back in similar patterns. The mask that he wears is rarely removed, so as to hide the mutation markers that he would prefer to keep hidden; when does remove it, a small but deep scar can be seen on his jawline. Mutation Marker(s): Hiroto has three mutation markers; his eyes, his height and his lower jaw. The first and second are obvious; his eyes are an unnatural colour, with red sclera instead of white, a white iris and no visible pupils. His unusually large height and large build are also most like due to his Yokai Genes as well, considering that his parents were both relatively short. The final mutation is less obvious, as he keeps it hidden beneath the mask that he always wears; his lower jaw is covered in a bone-like exoskeleton, giving him a skull like visage. Personality: Softly spoken and even softer in the way he treads, Hiroto is the textbook definition of a gentle giant. He is a man of simple needs and simple pleasures, someone who prefers to enjoy a quiet existence and who will never find that with Kurosagi, yet finds that he cannot pull away from them so long as they will be putting themselves in danger without him there to try and protect them. Big-hearted, he cares about others, sympathises with people more than he should and proves himself an oddity in the city by being willing to help anyone he meets in any way that he can. He’s been bitten by this behaviour more than once, yet continues to do so anyway; he is not naïve, he knows the risks, but he is always going to give people the benefit of the doubt. Hiroto doesn’t like hurting people, which makes him ill-suited as a gang member, but also isn’t the type to stand by while others are being harmed, being victimised, being oppressed, or putting themselves in harm’s way. He finds himself hurting people regardless and always feels guilty afterwards. If he can help it, it will always be him who is the one getting hurt and not others; he can take it, a sturdy body like his has to be good for something. Aspirations: - What Hiroto wants is a quiet life. One where he doesn’t need to look over his shoulder, one where he doesn’t have to fight for every scrap, one where he doesn’t have to worry about the safety of his friends. He fights for that kind of life. - More than a quiet life for himself, he wants everyone else to get what they want so that they can stop fighting. Fears: - Losing his friends - Becoming a killer - An endless cycle of violence Vehicle: Not everyone needs a vehicle in Neo-Tokyo, but most that are in gangs or in social circles will typically have a vehicle as an extension of themselves. Because Neo-Tokyo does have a very confusing and jumbled street system as the city expanded faster then it could plan, those who can afford it, will typically take to the Hoverzones above the cities streets. Most vehicles will typically be a hybrid of hover and standard road types and all will run on YoFuel, or a synthetic fuel made from the bodies of Yokai. P O W E R / C Y B E R N E T I C S I N F O R M A T I O N Strengths/Natural Abilities: Hiroto is strong. Even for someone possessing a Y.S.G, his physical strength and his durability are exceptional which, combined with his stature, make him an imposing threat in a fight even if his actual skill level is low. He is connected. Not to anyone is particular, but he is well known and even liked with the local community of Sakanoshita. Being someone willing to help others has its benefits and there are many in the area, particular is more law abiding residents and business owners, who he is on good terms with. He is good with machines. The more analogue kind at least. While he is not much better with complicated technology and cybernetics than the average person, working and living in a mechanic’s shop means he is quite well practiced at repairing vehicles and other large machines. Weaknesses/Flaws: Hiroto is a pacifist. Of a sort at least. He does not like to fight or to hurt others and would like to avoid doing so as much as possible; that is not the course his life has taken however and he often finds himself needed to compromise his morals in order to protect himself or others. His reluctance to do any real harm to his opponents is often a detriment to this however. He is slow. For a Y.S.G. holder at least. His large size means he has a long stride and his speed is enhanced like any other Shogun, it takes a lot to get that much mass moving and with no real way to fight at range he can find it difficult to actually reach an opponent at times. Y.S.G Ability: Base Ability: Armour To enhance his toughness even further, Hiroto is able to cover his body in a sturdy, bone-like exoskeleton similar to the mutation marker that naturally covers his lower jaw. This armour is tough to break and capable of blocking most mundane forms of damage, but is not unbreakable. It is also heavy, further reducing his mobility even more than normal, but can be discarded just as easily as it was summoned once it has served its purpose; weakening and crumbling away from his body once he stops using this ability. The armour can be created to cover his entire body or just a part of it, depending on the situation. First Awakening: Invincibility Hiroto can, for a few brief seconds at a time, make his body completely immune to harm. There is no visible sign that manifests when he is using this ability, which makes it hard to tell when or if he is using it other than the fact that he takes no damage. This ability on affects his body and does not extend to the armour he creates nor the clothing he is wearing or any items he is holding. Using it drains a lot of his stamina and it cannot be used too often in succession; furthermore the duration of its effect seems to be consistent, but Hiroto has not quite gotten the timing of it down, meaning he is reluctant to rely on it too much in fights unless he has no other choice. He fears using the ability too early or too late and getting himself hurt because of it. Second Awakening: Giant -Locked- Soul Binder/Weapon(s): Kanabō - A large wooden club covered in vicious spikes. It is heavy, carrying a noticeable weight to it even when Hiroto is the one swinging it around. When it manifests it forms from the hilt downwards, starting in his hand before the spiralling yellow script that cover it spreads out like growing vines and the weapon forms inside of it. Cybernetics/Gadets/Accessories: None; though some people sometimes mistake the exoskeleton on his jaw for some kind of implant, Hiroto has no cybernetics to speak of.

H i s t o r y Orphan's Tale Hiroto was fourteen years old when his parents died. They worked at a gambling den, one of the many establishments in the Sakanoshita district where people could risk their money on games of chance and try to profit from their poor life choices; his father was a bouncer, there to deal with any troublesome elements, while his mother was a Chō-han dealer, throwing the dice that decided men’s fate. It was good, dishonest work; hardly the worst thing people could do to earn a living and not even that dangerous. They earned enough to afford a place to live, a small and dingy apartment in the district, along with food and other necessities; they weren’t rich but they had a roof over their head and weren’t starving. It was good enough. Better than most. Until a patron at the gambling den lost everything they had, accused his mother of cheating the dice and drew a hidden gun; his father took the first bullet. His mother the second. No one thought to tell Hiroto what had happened. His parents just didn’t come home one day and he didn’t know way, until he went to the gambling den to look for them and found out himself. Once his parents’ landlord found out, he was evicted from his home without a second though, without a chance to try and make the rent by himself. The landlord already had another family lined up to move in; a more reliable source of income than a newly orphaned teenager. He had no choice but to leave. He went back to the gambling den, the only other place he could think of, but they turned him away. Violently. His father’s fellow bouncers threw him out themselves. Even at that young age Hiroto’s Y.S.G. meant he was over six feet tall and looked a lot older than he really was. He was big and strong and that meant most people assumed he could take care of himself; he could not, but he at least looked intimidating enough that most people were willing to leave him alone at first. That fact was enough to keep him safe for a while, managing to get by through begging and the rare bot of kindness from locals; a bit of food or water here, a few coins there. Hiroto still remembers the people who helped him the most back then and tries to pay them back whatever way he can. For eight months he survived alone on the street, doing his best to avoid any run-ins with the local gangs and the criminal elements that were so common in the Sakanoshita district, but he couldn’t avoid them forever. Someone like him, someone large and powerful even if the past year had taken its toll on him, was a tempting target for the type of people who liked to prove and flaunt their strength over others. The gangs caught up with him eventually, but rather than be his end like he expected, it might have been the thing that kept him alive. It started with a few gang members who were looking to have some fun by beating up homeless people; even young and scared as he was, Hiroto couldn’t stand by and just let that happen. He intervened and though they were older and more numerous and armed, his size and his Y.S.G. traits were enough to let him win against a bunch of thugs. He was marked after that; his presence known, his description spread around. Either due to wounded pride or just to prove that they could beat him where the others couldn’t, the gangs came after him in force. For a month they hounded him, hunted him; he couldn’t stay on the streets to beg, couldn’t risk going to those friendly locals for help. The gangs were starving him out. Hiroto kept fighting, he kept winning, it almost seemed like a daily occurrence with each victory only spurring them on, until finally the boss of one of the gangs found him. Unlike the others he was another Y.S.G. holder like Hiroto; someone that an untrained, desperate teenager couldn’t beat. As he lay there, bleeding and beaten for the first time in his life, he thought he was going to die. Instead they dragged him back to their base, gave him something to eat and ‘recruited him’. He couldn’t exactly say no, not with nowhere else to go, not when he knew what kind of life awaited him if they went back to hunting him. For almost three years he was a member of that gang; fighting people, mugging people, hurting people. Never killing people, for what it was worth; not that it made much of a difference when the people he was with did the killing instead. In return he had a place to live, regular meals, clothes that actually fit. All it cost him were sleeping nights and an endless weight on his conscience. Every time he ended the day with blood on his knuckled he told himself he’d leave when he was able to, when he had enough money stashed away to make a new start or was strong enough to survive deserting the gang. That day never seemed to come. In the end, the situation ended up solving itself in a way. The district was abuzz with word of the new mechanic shop/bar that had just opened up, or more specifically about its owner; there were all kinds of rumours about the mysterious woman who owned it and who or what she used to be. The leader of the gang got it into his head that she must be rich, hiding a bunch of money or something valuable in the bar itself somewhere. He wanted them to go and take it. Hiroto wasn’t on that job himself, which was probably the only thing that saved his life. He doesn’t know exactly what happened to the ones who did go, only that he never saw them again and the strange owner of the bar came looking for him and gave him a choice. Join her, or join them. That wasn’t much of a choice.

Deleted

@Dead Cruiser alright, it's taken, me a while but here's my character. I feel like the mastery section is probably a little too vague, but let me know what you think.

Candice Rose Zahler - Devourer of Spirits

Candice Rose Zahler

Titles: World Walker, Devourer of Spirits, Master of a Thousand Paths

Age: 56

World: A large and sparsely populated world, where humanity is divided into small and scattered settlements with wide expanses of nature in between. It is a land where humans fit themselves to the environment instead of the other way around, where their reverence for nature have prevented them from expanding their holdings or encroaching too far into the wilds. Their reverence and their fear.

Spirits roam the land, spirits *are* the land and human are, if not subjugated to them, at the very least at the mercy of their whims and desires. Sometimes they act as guides, sometime they benevolently act as humanities protectors, other punish humans for their failings; some are even willing to elevate human and teach them who to use their powers for themselves, so long as they can walk the path shown to them.

Most people live their entire lives in the settlement that they are born into, never knowing much of what exists beyond their walls. Those who choose to leave their homes and venture out are known as Wanderers; out there, beyond the quiet safety of their walls and borders, they will find endless wonders ahead of them, endless adventure and opportunities, but they are also unlikely to ever return.

Race: Human; a black-souled perceiver. Candice was a little stronger than most, a little more daring, but she started her journey as just a human until she met the spirits and began to walk their paths and gained a power beyond what anyone expected from her.

Legend: Candice was born in a cage. Or at least, that’s how she viewed it. Like most of humanity she lived in a settlement that no one was ever allowed to leave; it had big tall walls to keep people inside, guards to make sure no one could escape and lots and lots of rules about what they should and shouldn’t do to avoid angering the spirits. Beyond those walls there was a forest and beyond the forest there was a mountain and beyond that mountain there was everything else; no one knew exactly what was out there because no one had ever been that far and returned. The only ones who ever left the cage were the Exiled; the criminals whose punishment for their crimes was to be freed from the cage.

They always looked so terrified as they were pushed out of the one gate built into the cages walls.

Candice was jealous of them.

Her position inside the cage was an important one; or so she was told. Her father was its ruler, its king or something to that effect, and as his daughter that meant she was expected to one day rule it herself. Or more likely marry the person who would. That was the expectation placed on her, one of many; her entire life decided for her from before she was even born, the course of her life pre-determined. Just like everyone else inside the cage.

She wanted out.

At seventeen years of age, she managed to get herself exiled. And unlike the other fearful criminals who begged and pleaded for death instead of being forced outside the walls, she walked out the gate with her head held high.

She would have died in the first month had the spirit not found her. A life of looking beyond the walls had not prepared her for actually surviving beyond them and acquiring proper food and drink had not been easy for an iconoclastic girl who nonetheless had had everything she needed provided to her from the moment she was born. The spirit saved her life, took pity on her, or maybe just took an interest in her lack of fear, and nursed her back to health. It became her first teacher; that sly, cunning fox. Sometimes she thinks back to the smile it had on its face when it met her and wonders if it did what it did because it knew what would happen.

It showed her the first path she would walk, the first of many, the path of walking. It taught her how to move like a spirit does, flitting from place to place with no regard for the distances in between. More than that it taught her that she could learn things, that a human could learn to do what a spirit could; their powers came from knowledge and understanding that humans lacked, not from any innate power that was theirs and theirs alone. It was ignorance that made humans weaker than them, nothing else.

“You know so little of the world child.” The fox had told her. “You lack understanding. If you wanted to leave your city so badly all this time why didn’t you just step over the walls? What was stopping you, other than the thought that you couldn’t?”

It wasn’t as simple as that, Candice would respond, a spirit could understand; humans couldn’t do things like that. They couldn’t fly or turn invisible or breath fire like spirits could. It was impossible.

“There’s no such thing. Impossible? You limit yourself with such words. You weakness is self-inflicted, just like all the other humans. You place yourself in cages of your own making and tell yourself there is no escape. Little girl, your body might be free now but your mind and soul are still shackled.” Its eyes glinted.

“Free them.”

Two days later, Candice mastered the ability the fox had to teach and used it to step right over the mountain that had always blocked her view of the rest of the world, no longer an obstacle to her progress. She had thought that escaping the walls would be enough to free herself, but now she had clarity; the world was much larger than she had ever imagined, with more dimensions than she even knew existed. Candice had other spirits to find, other things to learn; no longer would those things be kept from her.

The fox smiled.

Candice travelled everywhere that she could, seeking out the hidden places that other humans avoided and met as many spirits as she could; some she had to run from, others tried run from her, a small few tried to kill her and an even smaller few were willing to talk to her and teach her their ways. Every time they told her it would take months or even years to walk the path to its end. Every time she proved them wrong, mastering their skills in days or weeks at most. Every time the spirits watched her leave their territories with fearful expressions.

At twenty she learned the path of healing and never experienced another day of sickness or weakness.

At twenty four she learned the path of stability and no longer needed to fear old age slowing her down, even if it would still one day claim her.

By the time she was twenty five all of the spirits she met already knew her name by the time she found them, even the ones who had hidden themselves so deep in nature that they hadn’t seen a human in millennia. They spoke of her, told each other stories of the human who had walked every path put before her and learned everything that the spirits could teach her. Some said it with fear, others with anger, some with amusement or curiosity, but they all spoke of it; the girl who sought knowledge and power with an insatiable hunger. Watch out or she might devour you too.

At twenty seven they started to appear before her; the other wanderers. She hadn’t seen another human in years at this point, she’d avoided them as much as she could and there weren’t many who ventured outside their cages to begin with; the ones who did were like her, those with adventurous or rebellious spirits, those who had been fortunate to meet the less capricious spirits and gain power from them. Some wanted to speak to her, others to ask her questions, a few wanted to challenge her, even kill her. She defeated them all; her power and mastery over the paths exceeded theirs.

At thirty she killed her first spirit. A powerful thing, a violent thing, possessing a hatred of all things man; it could not even conceive that a human like her might rip its soul from its chest until it was too late. And in its passing a path was closed forever.

The next couple of decades passed in much the same way as the one before; Candice travelled the world, she walked the paths that were opened for her and forever closed those that weren’t. She defeated those that challenged her and those that tried to stop her. She found the hidden places and uncovered their secrets. She learned everything she could.

By the age of fifty, her appearance exactly the same as it had been the day she had learned to stop aging, Candice was powerful enough that no man of spirit in the world could challenge her. No place in the world was beyond her reach, nothing beyond her sight, nothing she cared to learn that she didn’t already know. The world, conquered.

And yet, as she stood there, she could perceive more. An endless sky and beyond that a veil and beyond that was everything else; no one knew exactly what was out there because no one had ever been that far…

Will: Candice perceived that she had not yet seen everything that there was and this stoked the fire inside of her. She perceived that the world she lived in was yet another cage, another barrier between herself and the outside and that this was not acceptable.

Mastery: The paths that a spirit can open for a human are as many and varied as the spirits are themselves; they are more in tune with the world, more knowledgeable of how it works than any other and this knowledge, these closely guarded secrets, allow them to do things that the closed-minded humans cannot. They can walk the paths once shown them however, though it is rarely an easy thing and many fail to reach the end; usually it comes as an epiphany, a sudden understanding and a change of perspective that forever changes the way they interact with the world. The ability to cross great distances, stepping over mountains and across oceans, becomes possible when you shift your perspective and realise that distance is an illusion and that your destination is always a mere step away. The ability to see what was once hidden from you becomes possible, once you simply accept that your eyes have been closed your whole life.

Candice has walked almost all of these paths and has gained a mastery over all of them. The ability to step, the ability to see, the ability to draw power from the world around her, to interact with the soul, to heal her body or stop the physical effects of aging, to manipulate the very world around her, to control what others perceive. For all that the paths are varied however, most of them lead to the same place; mastery of the self. Candice is stronger, she is faster, she is tougher, her wounds are temporary and her physical appearance is locked by her self-image. She can control the natural elements to an extent, fire and water and earth and air, but has an easier time drawing from them to enhance herself instead; she always was the selfish type, more willing to take than give.

Ascent: The ability to step was the first path that Candice ever walked, the one shown to her by a tricky little fox so long ago. The first step she took let her move right past the mountain that was blocking her path and her reach only grew from there. As she stood atop the world, staring at a sky that she now knew was not endless, as she saw with a clarity that had until that point eluded her and finally saw the veil that was keeping her from going even further…

She stepped past that too.

Ephemera: No one and nothing. Candice has no possessions other that the clothes that she wears and her family has been left so far behind that she no longer remembers their names or faces.

The Hunt, A Modern Fantasy Smorgasbord RP

Morgana Faith

The sun rose on the dawn of a new day and Morgana was greatly regretting her indiscretions the previous night. Not because of anything as mundane as a hangover, she could handle her drink perfectly well and had barely touched anything alcoholic at the restaurant besides; no she was simply regretting putting aside work for socialising now that she could see how much she had left undone. No less than fourteen messages from her lab assistants and colleagues back in England that demanded a prompt response, wards to purge of abyssal energy and rekey as well as a few interesting leads that she wanted to follow up on personally. Even though the meal had been… nicer than she had expected, she wasn’t sure it was worth the mountain of paperwork that was in store for her.

Then she walked into the meeting room and saw that there were yet undiscovered peaks of paperwork to deal with.

“Surely there is some kind of clerical staff who can deal with this instead of us?” Morgana eyed a nearby table with a look of suspicion, stepping away from it as the tower of paper began to wobble ominously in her direction. “A small army of clerks perhaps?”

Given the apparently sensitive nature of their assignment, she was worried that the answer might be no. More than likely she would only that anything in this room was too classified or potentially dangerous for anyone but themselves to see. “Fine, I’ll stay here in Frankfurt. But don’t be surprised if some of this evidence mysteriously disappears.”

@Kumbaris

Pokémon: Kalos Chronicles: Superstars of Friendship Edition

Wow, that was… a lot. A famous coordinator for a mother and a world-travelling champion trainer for a father; Regis said it so casually, like it wasn’t important, but his parents were incredible. Matt wondered if that was where Regis got his confidence from; not everyone could be so assured as to say that their dad would ‘no doubt be crowned champion’, even if the Orange Island were a smaller league than somewhere like Kalos. There just wasn’t a single ounce of doubt inside of him.

Nor could they so confidently offer to have their mom set their friends up with internships that he was sure more people would die to get their hands on. It was surprising and generous offer, the suddenness of it catching Matt off guard for a few seconds. “Oh, uh, thanks but I think I’ll pass. It’s just… I-I mean, it’s really nice that you’re offering but I don’t think that’s the kind of work I want to get into. It would probably be stuff like taking photos of Pokémon Contests and people performing right? People like your mom and models and famous people. That kind of thing would just make me uncomfortable.

“The kind of photos I take are less… personal I guess? Photos of landscapes, of sceneries, of wild Pokémon in their natural habitat. The kind of shots that show of the beauty of places.” Matt’s voice turned a little wistful as he spoke, remembering the photos he had been shown years ago that made him want to get into photography in the first place; the photos that made the city he was living in look like a place anyone would want, no had to see for themselves. The kind of photos he was still trying to recreate himself. “Yeah, those kind of photos.”

He was broken out of his reverie when Regis let his Teddiursa, Solace, out of his ball and sent him off towards a girl that it took Matt a few seconds to recognise as Kairi. She looked different; as out of place as he felt at first. He winced as Regis mentioned Andre and how he still hadn’t noticed them, an instinctive need to defend their friend rising up in him. It wasn’t like Matt didn’t feel a little of the same annoyance at the way Andre had invited them here only to not even notice them arrive, but it seemed harsh to call him a moron like that. “W-well, I’m sure it’s not easy dealing with fans when you’re an actor. Do you think this happens everywhere he goes?”

@vancexentan

Pokémon: Kalos Chronicles: Superstars of Friendship Edition

Matt tried not to let his smile falter as Regis spoke; the other boy had always been a little bit difficult for him to speak to, due to his rather flat way of acting. It was just, no matter what Matt said or did Regis wouldn’t ever give him much in return, his reactions were always so subdued it was hard to tell how he really felt about anything. Their interactions always felt kind of… business-like, in a way. Looking into those black glasses and seeing nothing but his own reflection staring back at him, he couldn’t tell if Regis was happy to see him, annoyed or anything else. Same as it had been back then.

“Oh, yeah, I’ve been pretty good I guess. I haven’t gotten up to much I guess; since moving to Coumarine I’ve just been going to school, getting to know people. Oh, I took up photography.” Matt hefted the small bag at his waist that held his camera up a bit as proof. “I was thinking of becoming a travel photographer or something after college; it would be cool to go to a bunch of different places. At least, that was the plan before Andre’s letter.”

As Regis mentioned working with his mother Matt nodded in understanding as the memories came back to him; both of his parents were talented trainers in their own rights and Regis had always planned on joining them from what he recalled. He was probably planning on going on a journey like this whether Andre sent him a letter or not, unlike Matt. “How is she? And you dad. Are they still doing the contest and trainer stuff?”

@vancexentan

Pokémon: Kalos Chronicles: Superstars of Friendship Edition

There was a crowd over there and Matt wasn’t going anywhere near it.

He knew what it was about, who was at its centre; he’d spotted him even before most of the people currently surrounding him had but hadn’t yet gotten up the courage to go over and say hi. As he waited more and more familiar faces showed up, changed by age but still recognisable, and with each one it got harder and harder to bring himself to walk over to them. Kind of silly really, considering that seeing them was the whole reason he had come here in the first place, but it had been so long and he was worried. He was worried that things wouldn’t be the same anymore, that they would have changed or he would be too different from how he used to be; that they wouldn’t be able to pick up their friendships just like that after six years of not seeing each other.

That they couldn’t be friends at all anymore.

The thought scared him. It scared him the longer he sat here and thought about it. He should just go over and get it over with; more than likely he was over thinking it and everything would be fine, everyone seemed to be getting along just fine so far. He could join them.

As he waited another person showed up, but stayed separate from the group like he did. He recognised them too. Matt stood up from his seat on someone’s garden wall and began to walk towards them; approaching one person was easier than walking into that crowd and he really did need to do something before he missed out entirely.

“Hey, it’s been a while.”

@vancexentan

Deleted

I'm still interested in this, just waiting on the main thread before I finalise my character.