doumeki shizuka; information
Character Information
General
Canon Source: xxxHolic
Canon Format: manga
Character's Name: Shizuka Doumeki
Character's Age: not clearly stated, but approximately 18
Conditional: If your character is 13 years of age or under, please clarify how they will be played. n/a
Abilities
Character's Canon Abilities: Doumeki has two particular realms of abilities, both having to do with the spirit world, and one conditional "ability" depending on Watanuki's presence. While he has been developing more of an ability to see spirits and become aware of the spirit world, this is a recent development - he could previously only sense spirits as a sort of "pressure" in the air.
Spirit Repelling: His pure aura acts as a repellent to the spiritual forces in the world around him that may cause him or those around him harm, while seeming refreshing to the spirits who have no desire to do him harm. This is a naturally-ocurring genetic ability that lies in his blood.
Exorcism: Doumeki has the ability to channel his pure ki into a projectile that can destroy or injure spirits (depending on the spirit's strength) when it connects. He needs a bow in order to channel this ability - he cannot exorcise without this piece of archery equipment.
Shared Sight: This ability relies on Doumeki's canonmate, Watanuki, being in-game, and will be dormant without Watanuki present. In canon, Doumeki gave Watanuki half of his eye, in a spiritual sense. Because of this shared eye, Doumeki can, at times, see through his right eye what Watanuki is seeing through his right eye, particularly when the other boy is worked up. This shared eye, as well as some blood shared when Watanuki almost died, is what allows Doumeki to see spirits on occasion - without Watanuki present, it is unlikely that he would see spirits.
Conditional: If your character has no superhuman canon abilities, what dormant ability will you give them? Doumeki will have the ability to channel his exorcising ability through weapons and items other than his yumi - essentially, he will be able to use any item as an exorcising weapon. This additional energy, when used against the monsters in the Darkness, or spiritual/otherworldly characters, will cause additional damage above and beyond what a normal blow would deal - it will start out causing an extra 10% or so damage, and grow slowly through use to as much as 75% extra damage. Additionally, I generally assume that Doumeki's inherent spirit repelling abilities tend to drive away about half of the monsters in the Darkness due to their nature.
Weapons: Doumeki will bring with him his Japanese yumi (asymmetrical bow), glove, and quiver with arrows - they are not on his person from the time he's pulled, but it's his usual weapon.
History/Personality/Plans/etc.
Character History: Doumeki was born in Japan on March 3, a little girls' celebration day, and taken home to a Buddhist temple that his family lives in and runs. He was a bit of a weak child, whether this was emotionally or physically or both is never specified, but his grandfather, the high priest of the temple, corrected this through dressing the boy up in a girls' kimono - a rite that seems to have worked to toughen Doumeki up. Doumeki's grandfather, Haruka, was the strongest influence in his life until Haruka died when Doumeki was in 5th grade. Haruka had a similar set of abilities to the ones Doumeki has - he could exorcise spirits as well as see and converse with them, and he shared his vast treasure trove of knowledge about Japanese folklore and the spirit world with his grandson. Judging by Doumeki's traditional style of dress and his spoilt brat mentality, as well as how he speaks about his home, he had a stable, traditional, but very loving homelife, and was more attached to his grandfather than his parents.
Doumeki grew up into a pretty average high schooler. He was popular with the girls and other classmates, a member of the archery club and very important to his team in tournaments, a member of the student council, and at home he helped out with chores around the shrine. The only blips in this relatively normal school life were the death of his grandfather and the day he observed Kimihiro Watanuki standing in the rain, holding a dead animal and bemoaning the fact that he would die alone. This latter incident struck home with Doumeki, and though he didn't do anything at the time, it influenced his actions later on when Watanuki became more a part of his life.
Everything changed the day that Watanuki and his newfound (and more than a little crazy) boss, Yuuko the dimensional witch, asked to use a room at his shrine to tell 100 Ghost Stories. What should have been a simple double-date scenario became an encounter with the spirit world that almost resulted in Watanuki's death, and did result in Doumeki discovering his ability to exorcise spirits. From that point on, his fate was entwined with Watanuki's. Over the next while, he started assisting Watanuki with various supernatural incidents and 'missions' that Yuuko would send them on, things like guarding Watanuki while he investigated a haunted school or helping gather water from a well that had never touched pipes, all the while seeing the outcomes of various wishes that patrons of Yuuko's shop made, the results more often than not painful for the wisher.
A few of these incidents were particularly important to Doumeki's development as a character. The first was when Watanuki was tempted by a lonely ghost who sucked his energy when he was around her. Doumeki noticed the effects this spirit had on Watanuki and was forced to choose between risking being completely hated by Watanuki and the boy continuing to live - he chose to save Watanuki's life and destroy the spirit, one of the most difficult decisions he's made to date. Another was the incident of the spider, in which Doumeki inspired a spider's grudge and almost forfeit his right eye for it. When Watanuki tried to sacrifice his own right eye to save Doumeki, a series of events ended with Doumeki giving Watanuki half the 'spirit' of his right eye, as well as half the vision, and afterwards he started developing the ability to see spirits through Watanuki's eye. The next was when Watanuki fell from the second story of the high school with a pane of glass, a result of Himawari's bad luck, and Doumeki, along with Himawari and someone else, had to sacrifice to pay for a wish to save the boy's life, the first time Doumeki even considered asking for a wish, and the first time he was able to see Yuuko's shop. His price was a significant amount of blood that was given to Watanuki, and after this the shared vision became stronger, with Doumeki being able to clearly see spirits. The most recent events in the manga have surrounded a young girl named Kohane with the ability to see spirits like Watanuki. Doumeki helped Watanuki to rescue the girl from an abusive homelife, and he has decided to offer her similar protection to what he gives Watanuki.
Doumeki has been staying with Watanuki at Yuuko's shop while the boy adjusts to the fact that Yuuko is disappearing from the memories of everyone she interacted with - except for people with abilities associated with the spirit world - Himawari, who had a bird created from Yuuko's shop, Doumeki who could see and exorcise spirits, Kohane and the fortune teller she stayed with who were also cognisant of the spirit world, and Watanuki himself. This is the point at which he was taken to Salkia Island, though he was informed in Salkia Island of Watanuki's choice to stay in the shop, without being able to leave or age, to wait for Yuuko to return after her disappearance/death.
Point in Canon: chapter 178
Conditional: Brief summary of previous RP history: Journal reference: talldarknsnarky - most entries here chronicle Doumeki's progression in Salkia Island. I'm mostly covering events connected to Watanuki and Himawari, since the three of them are being pulled from the same game.
When Doumeki was pulled to Salkia he was there for approximately 5 months. He arrived to discover that Watanuki had already been on the Island for four months before he arrived, and had settled in relatively well. Doumeki was shortly followed by Himawari, who lived next door to him, and Ichijou Takuma, a blonde vampire who would become Doumeki's best friend on Salkia Island. Though Watanuki was there, he was relatively distant with Doumeki, and it took him a few weeks and prompting from Ichijou to realize that the other boy had found someone new to spend time with - Watanuki had fallen for a boy on the Island named Zero. Thus started a very tumultuous several months, during which Doumeki was put through a great deal of mental and emotional discomfort. When arriving on the Island, Doumeki hadn't realized the extent of his feelings for Watanuki, considering him a close friend, but being told that he was being basically replaced in the boy's life and frequently shut out of his personal affairs made Doumeki realize how much he wanted to be in those positions, and why. He became aware that he had feelings beyond the platonic for Watanuki, and also that he had to try to get over them.
During this time, Doumeki was often subjected to seeing Watanuki allow himself to be injured for reasons Doumeki couldn't fathom, and often he was left out of the loop until it was too late for him to do much of anything. When Watanuki became the object of a very powerful vampire's bloodlust, however, Doumeki found a way in which he could enable himself to find out the things he needed to in order to help protect his friends and Watanuki. He took lessons from a prominent hacker on the Island, Cissnei, and did research, gaining the ability to hack even entries that were very well protected. Armed with knowledge of what was going on in his friends' private posts, Doumeki felt a little more prepared to help the others. However, that didn't last very long, since they quickly worked out what was going on and, in some cases, particularly Watanuki's, he simply didn't write things on the network like he would have before.
This situation culminated in a day where Watanuki had an argument with Zero and shut himself in his apartment for an entire day. Doumeki went to him, and waited outside his apartment the whole time, only to have Watanuki leave with Ichijou through a window, leaving Doumeki sitting there. That evening, Watanuki left Doumeki a cryptic message and proceeded to commit suicide by entering an apartment haunted with violent ghosts, and though Doumeki tried to stop it, he was unable to. He witnessed Watanuki's violent death through a video post to the network, and this has been something that still haunts him. When Watanuki came back from that death, Doumeki went to take him home and they made up. Watanuki made up with Zero as well. The combined stress of various incidents that happened at this point, all very close together, triggered Doumeki into drinking far too much in the span of one night and accidentally dying of alcohol poisoning. When he returned from this, he took a very firm hold on himself and his life, and started disciplining himself more thoroughly, starting with a month of no drinking.
During all these events, Doumeki slowly grew closer to Ichijou and Himawari, the two people who consistently made sure he took care of himself. Both of them taught him that if he was feeling something, they wanted to hear about it, and so he became more accustomed to opening up to people who asked for his feelings.
However, before his month off of alcohol was even complete, Watanuki, Zero, and Ichijou all disappeared at the same time. They had left Salkia with no trace, and Doumeki was left feeling rather lonely - until both reappeared close to the same time two weeks later. While Ichijou was nearly the same, if a little more subdued and remembered everything, Watanuki was drastically different, much closer to what Doumeki remembered from home, and couldn't remember his previous time on the Island. After a few discussions with Watanuki about things that had happened and how they'd affected Doumeki, Watanuki decided to correct his past mistakes. This triggered a much more calm and much closer relationship than Doumeki had had in Salkia for several months - the two have shared many long conversations over the network and in person, and made a few admissions, the most important of which were Watanuki explaining that he was trapped in Yuuko's shop, Doumeki's assertion that he would stay with Watanuki despite their differing time, and Watanuki's grudging admission that he wants Doumeki to stay and that he worries about Doumeki wasting his life on him.
Character Personality: To sum Doumeki up in a short sentence would be easy - man of few words. Doumeki does not talk a great deal, nor does he show a lot of emotion. He has a generally stoic appearance, calm and collected even when hurt, never really speaking up much, more content to listen to others or think to himself. He's not given to outbursts, and finds them somewhat silly anyhow. But to assume that this stoic outward persona is all there is to Doumeki would be to vastly underestimate him.
Perhaps his stoic nature is primarily because he does have a deep well of emotion, and strongly held opinions, and he feels that throwing them out for everyone to see would be to devalue them. He prefers to show his feelings through actions, his solid presence, willingness to help people, or simple touches. Doumeki is quite protective over those he's taken time to care about, and seems to be drawn to people who who haven't experienced enough love like a moth to a flame. He is capable of deep affection and sympathy, shown by the fact that he sticks with someone who claims to hate him because he doesn't want the boy to be alone. Doumeki is also very rarely ruffled by anything, be it a strange supernatural occurrence or an interpersonal interaction, even if it involves someone who has authority or power over him. While remaining (mostly) respectful, Doumeki retains his firm determination that his opinion matters and that he has the right to choose his own path, speaking even to a very powerful being like Yuuko as an equal. He can be relentless when he wants something accomplished, stubbornly continuing to research and try to work out a way to do something on his own even when told that it's impossible to do so - he relies on his own abilities and knowledge rather than using supernatural fixes as a crutch. Doumeki is also very perceptive, and while he doesn't often say out loud what he's perceived through observation, he makes it obvious that he knows through actions. For example, he consistently inserts himself into any 'private time' between Watanuki and Himawari without explaining himself, because he understands that Himawari has bad luck that could end up harming Watanuki that his presence anulls. He also seems to be quite accepting of the quirks and strangenesses of others, though he may make a joke at someone's expense, he generally seems to see all people as equals and doesn't discriminate. He is rarely ruffled by anything - in fact, when he was first asked to help Watanuki on a 'mission' he simply went along with it, no accusations of insanity, just a calm acceptance. He's very good about simply taking things as they are instead of imposing his own version of sanity onto them. This is probably due in part to his deep and resourceful knowledge of Japanese folklore and matters of the spiritual world that he gained through spending time with his grandfather, a man who was the high priest of a temple and had the ability to see and exorcise spirits.
However, despite these positives, Doumeki has his own share of negative personality traits. The most noticeable is that he can be extremely egocentric at times, with a bit too high an opinion of himself. This leads to him being quite pushy with things he wants, such as a good meal cooked by Watanuki, or by assuming that people will do things for him without question - he can be sort of a spoilt brat, really. Also, Doumeki is stoic and quiet, and this combined with his egocentrism can make him come across as stuck up and uncaring of others. His dry, deadpan sense of humour is often overlooked, and he seems to get a lot of entertainment out of riling up others and watching the ensuing drama. He can be incredibly sarcastic at times, and insulting, and even when he's not really trying to be sarcastic he tends to speak with a certain forthrightness and bluntness that can make him come across as abrasive. He doesn't feel the need to explain his motivations or reasons for doing things, he simply does them, and this can make him seem like a presumptuous, stubborn jerk at times. Not that he particularly cares about others' opinions of himself - another problem in and of itself.
On the topic of food, Doumeki is very picky about it. It's not so much that he's a picky eater - he doesn't tend to dislike certain types of food. He is, however, very conscious of who made it and how it was made. He won't eat food he doesn't 'trust' or 'approve of' in the method of cooking and the feelings put into the cooking. He has a discriminating palate, and has been called an epicure - he can tell a lot about the person who cooked from tasting food and how it was prepared, and he doesn't like to eat things if they have no feeling, or the wrong kind of feeling. This is one of the main reasons he constantly demands that Watanuki cook for him, since he seems to enjoy the particular signature Watanuki has when he cooks. And on the subject of food and drink...Doumeki is a bit of a lush, enjoying alcohol and seeming to have a near endless alcohol tolerance despite being underage. He holds his liquor well, never seeming to act drunk or any different than his normal stoic self, even when he technically should be piss-drunk.
Conditional: Personality development in previous game: Though a lot of things have happened to Doumeki in the course of his time at Salkia Island, he is still, basically, a quiet person with a strong inner determination. The major changes to his personality are a slight increase in openness and a slight loss of self-confidence. If he feels that a person is interested in hearing about what's going on in his mind, he will be a bit more open about things he's feeling. This is because of consistent efforts on the behalf of other characters drilling this into his head, enough that it's sunk home and affected him as a person, even if he won't remember those people. Also, because of what he sees as his consistent failures on Salkia Island to help his friends or prevent death or severe injury to them, his self-confidence has flagged a little. Though he still has an incredibly strong and stubborn center of determination, he tends to express it in a more subdued way, and is slightly more prone to self-doubt and hesitation at times, when he feels like he isn't needed or wanted by someone. Though this started improving with Watanuki's return, it is still quite ground into his psyche at this point - he endured too much for this to be a minor effect. Also, because of this slight decrease in self-confidence and his failures, Doumeki has become a bit more overprotective, mostly to compensate for his previous failings. Finally, as a result of many of his friends shutting him out of certain important matters so he wouldn't interfere or stop them from sacrificing themselves or putting themselves in danger, Doumeki's developed a slightly more ruthless and underhanded manner of applying his protection to people - he has no compunctions about hacking private entries by close friends if it means he's informed of something dangerous he otherwise wouldn't be.
Character Plans: Doumeki is a pretty neutral and generally non-violent character, and I can't see either side really swaying him to loyalty - he will remain determinedly neutral in his stance on the Factions, and will retain it stubbornly even if threatened. The one exception to this is if Watanuki is kept safer by Doumeki helping one or the other faction.
Appearance/PB: Doumeki is quite tall, I would guess he's probably around 5'10" or 5'11" and built athletically, with broad shoulders and a good deal of upper body strength due to his archery. His skin is quite tan compared to other characters in the series, and he has black hair worn quite short, parted over his left eye and just long enough to fall over his forehead. His eyes are a golden or amber colour, and he tends to either stare intensely or look completely disaffected. His face is generally expressionless and stoic, and he very rarely emotes - he has only smiled once in the manga, for instance, and most of his expressions are only subtle variations on how his eyebrows are furrowed or how intense his stare is. Doumeki tends to slouch, when standing his shoulders are relaxed and his head is jutted slightly forward, and when he's sitting he generally leans forward with his elbows on his knees and his hands dangling, and has a sort of slow, laid back way of walking. In the manga, he tends to wear very traditional clothing when he's not dressed in his school uniform - uwagi tops and hakama instead of t-shirts and pajamas, geta or zori instead of sneakers, and any other kind of more traditional Japanese clothing is the norm for him.
General
Canon Source: xxxHolic
Canon Format: manga
Character's Name: Shizuka Doumeki
Character's Age: not clearly stated, but approximately 18
Conditional: If your character is 13 years of age or under, please clarify how they will be played. n/a
Abilities
Character's Canon Abilities: Doumeki has two particular realms of abilities, both having to do with the spirit world, and one conditional "ability" depending on Watanuki's presence. While he has been developing more of an ability to see spirits and become aware of the spirit world, this is a recent development - he could previously only sense spirits as a sort of "pressure" in the air.
Spirit Repelling: His pure aura acts as a repellent to the spiritual forces in the world around him that may cause him or those around him harm, while seeming refreshing to the spirits who have no desire to do him harm. This is a naturally-ocurring genetic ability that lies in his blood.
Exorcism: Doumeki has the ability to channel his pure ki into a projectile that can destroy or injure spirits (depending on the spirit's strength) when it connects. He needs a bow in order to channel this ability - he cannot exorcise without this piece of archery equipment.
Shared Sight: This ability relies on Doumeki's canonmate, Watanuki, being in-game, and will be dormant without Watanuki present. In canon, Doumeki gave Watanuki half of his eye, in a spiritual sense. Because of this shared eye, Doumeki can, at times, see through his right eye what Watanuki is seeing through his right eye, particularly when the other boy is worked up. This shared eye, as well as some blood shared when Watanuki almost died, is what allows Doumeki to see spirits on occasion - without Watanuki present, it is unlikely that he would see spirits.
Conditional: If your character has no superhuman canon abilities, what dormant ability will you give them? Doumeki will have the ability to channel his exorcising ability through weapons and items other than his yumi - essentially, he will be able to use any item as an exorcising weapon. This additional energy, when used against the monsters in the Darkness, or spiritual/otherworldly characters, will cause additional damage above and beyond what a normal blow would deal - it will start out causing an extra 10% or so damage, and grow slowly through use to as much as 75% extra damage. Additionally, I generally assume that Doumeki's inherent spirit repelling abilities tend to drive away about half of the monsters in the Darkness due to their nature.
Weapons: Doumeki will bring with him his Japanese yumi (asymmetrical bow), glove, and quiver with arrows - they are not on his person from the time he's pulled, but it's his usual weapon.
History/Personality/Plans/etc.
Character History: Doumeki was born in Japan on March 3, a little girls' celebration day, and taken home to a Buddhist temple that his family lives in and runs. He was a bit of a weak child, whether this was emotionally or physically or both is never specified, but his grandfather, the high priest of the temple, corrected this through dressing the boy up in a girls' kimono - a rite that seems to have worked to toughen Doumeki up. Doumeki's grandfather, Haruka, was the strongest influence in his life until Haruka died when Doumeki was in 5th grade. Haruka had a similar set of abilities to the ones Doumeki has - he could exorcise spirits as well as see and converse with them, and he shared his vast treasure trove of knowledge about Japanese folklore and the spirit world with his grandson. Judging by Doumeki's traditional style of dress and his spoilt brat mentality, as well as how he speaks about his home, he had a stable, traditional, but very loving homelife, and was more attached to his grandfather than his parents.
Doumeki grew up into a pretty average high schooler. He was popular with the girls and other classmates, a member of the archery club and very important to his team in tournaments, a member of the student council, and at home he helped out with chores around the shrine. The only blips in this relatively normal school life were the death of his grandfather and the day he observed Kimihiro Watanuki standing in the rain, holding a dead animal and bemoaning the fact that he would die alone. This latter incident struck home with Doumeki, and though he didn't do anything at the time, it influenced his actions later on when Watanuki became more a part of his life.
Everything changed the day that Watanuki and his newfound (and more than a little crazy) boss, Yuuko the dimensional witch, asked to use a room at his shrine to tell 100 Ghost Stories. What should have been a simple double-date scenario became an encounter with the spirit world that almost resulted in Watanuki's death, and did result in Doumeki discovering his ability to exorcise spirits. From that point on, his fate was entwined with Watanuki's. Over the next while, he started assisting Watanuki with various supernatural incidents and 'missions' that Yuuko would send them on, things like guarding Watanuki while he investigated a haunted school or helping gather water from a well that had never touched pipes, all the while seeing the outcomes of various wishes that patrons of Yuuko's shop made, the results more often than not painful for the wisher.
A few of these incidents were particularly important to Doumeki's development as a character. The first was when Watanuki was tempted by a lonely ghost who sucked his energy when he was around her. Doumeki noticed the effects this spirit had on Watanuki and was forced to choose between risking being completely hated by Watanuki and the boy continuing to live - he chose to save Watanuki's life and destroy the spirit, one of the most difficult decisions he's made to date. Another was the incident of the spider, in which Doumeki inspired a spider's grudge and almost forfeit his right eye for it. When Watanuki tried to sacrifice his own right eye to save Doumeki, a series of events ended with Doumeki giving Watanuki half the 'spirit' of his right eye, as well as half the vision, and afterwards he started developing the ability to see spirits through Watanuki's eye. The next was when Watanuki fell from the second story of the high school with a pane of glass, a result of Himawari's bad luck, and Doumeki, along with Himawari and someone else, had to sacrifice to pay for a wish to save the boy's life, the first time Doumeki even considered asking for a wish, and the first time he was able to see Yuuko's shop. His price was a significant amount of blood that was given to Watanuki, and after this the shared vision became stronger, with Doumeki being able to clearly see spirits. The most recent events in the manga have surrounded a young girl named Kohane with the ability to see spirits like Watanuki. Doumeki helped Watanuki to rescue the girl from an abusive homelife, and he has decided to offer her similar protection to what he gives Watanuki.
Doumeki has been staying with Watanuki at Yuuko's shop while the boy adjusts to the fact that Yuuko is disappearing from the memories of everyone she interacted with - except for people with abilities associated with the spirit world - Himawari, who had a bird created from Yuuko's shop, Doumeki who could see and exorcise spirits, Kohane and the fortune teller she stayed with who were also cognisant of the spirit world, and Watanuki himself. This is the point at which he was taken to Salkia Island, though he was informed in Salkia Island of Watanuki's choice to stay in the shop, without being able to leave or age, to wait for Yuuko to return after her disappearance/death.
Point in Canon: chapter 178
Conditional: Brief summary of previous RP history: Journal reference: talldarknsnarky - most entries here chronicle Doumeki's progression in Salkia Island. I'm mostly covering events connected to Watanuki and Himawari, since the three of them are being pulled from the same game.
When Doumeki was pulled to Salkia he was there for approximately 5 months. He arrived to discover that Watanuki had already been on the Island for four months before he arrived, and had settled in relatively well. Doumeki was shortly followed by Himawari, who lived next door to him, and Ichijou Takuma, a blonde vampire who would become Doumeki's best friend on Salkia Island. Though Watanuki was there, he was relatively distant with Doumeki, and it took him a few weeks and prompting from Ichijou to realize that the other boy had found someone new to spend time with - Watanuki had fallen for a boy on the Island named Zero. Thus started a very tumultuous several months, during which Doumeki was put through a great deal of mental and emotional discomfort. When arriving on the Island, Doumeki hadn't realized the extent of his feelings for Watanuki, considering him a close friend, but being told that he was being basically replaced in the boy's life and frequently shut out of his personal affairs made Doumeki realize how much he wanted to be in those positions, and why. He became aware that he had feelings beyond the platonic for Watanuki, and also that he had to try to get over them.
During this time, Doumeki was often subjected to seeing Watanuki allow himself to be injured for reasons Doumeki couldn't fathom, and often he was left out of the loop until it was too late for him to do much of anything. When Watanuki became the object of a very powerful vampire's bloodlust, however, Doumeki found a way in which he could enable himself to find out the things he needed to in order to help protect his friends and Watanuki. He took lessons from a prominent hacker on the Island, Cissnei, and did research, gaining the ability to hack even entries that were very well protected. Armed with knowledge of what was going on in his friends' private posts, Doumeki felt a little more prepared to help the others. However, that didn't last very long, since they quickly worked out what was going on and, in some cases, particularly Watanuki's, he simply didn't write things on the network like he would have before.
This situation culminated in a day where Watanuki had an argument with Zero and shut himself in his apartment for an entire day. Doumeki went to him, and waited outside his apartment the whole time, only to have Watanuki leave with Ichijou through a window, leaving Doumeki sitting there. That evening, Watanuki left Doumeki a cryptic message and proceeded to commit suicide by entering an apartment haunted with violent ghosts, and though Doumeki tried to stop it, he was unable to. He witnessed Watanuki's violent death through a video post to the network, and this has been something that still haunts him. When Watanuki came back from that death, Doumeki went to take him home and they made up. Watanuki made up with Zero as well. The combined stress of various incidents that happened at this point, all very close together, triggered Doumeki into drinking far too much in the span of one night and accidentally dying of alcohol poisoning. When he returned from this, he took a very firm hold on himself and his life, and started disciplining himself more thoroughly, starting with a month of no drinking.
During all these events, Doumeki slowly grew closer to Ichijou and Himawari, the two people who consistently made sure he took care of himself. Both of them taught him that if he was feeling something, they wanted to hear about it, and so he became more accustomed to opening up to people who asked for his feelings.
However, before his month off of alcohol was even complete, Watanuki, Zero, and Ichijou all disappeared at the same time. They had left Salkia with no trace, and Doumeki was left feeling rather lonely - until both reappeared close to the same time two weeks later. While Ichijou was nearly the same, if a little more subdued and remembered everything, Watanuki was drastically different, much closer to what Doumeki remembered from home, and couldn't remember his previous time on the Island. After a few discussions with Watanuki about things that had happened and how they'd affected Doumeki, Watanuki decided to correct his past mistakes. This triggered a much more calm and much closer relationship than Doumeki had had in Salkia for several months - the two have shared many long conversations over the network and in person, and made a few admissions, the most important of which were Watanuki explaining that he was trapped in Yuuko's shop, Doumeki's assertion that he would stay with Watanuki despite their differing time, and Watanuki's grudging admission that he wants Doumeki to stay and that he worries about Doumeki wasting his life on him.
Character Personality: To sum Doumeki up in a short sentence would be easy - man of few words. Doumeki does not talk a great deal, nor does he show a lot of emotion. He has a generally stoic appearance, calm and collected even when hurt, never really speaking up much, more content to listen to others or think to himself. He's not given to outbursts, and finds them somewhat silly anyhow. But to assume that this stoic outward persona is all there is to Doumeki would be to vastly underestimate him.
Perhaps his stoic nature is primarily because he does have a deep well of emotion, and strongly held opinions, and he feels that throwing them out for everyone to see would be to devalue them. He prefers to show his feelings through actions, his solid presence, willingness to help people, or simple touches. Doumeki is quite protective over those he's taken time to care about, and seems to be drawn to people who who haven't experienced enough love like a moth to a flame. He is capable of deep affection and sympathy, shown by the fact that he sticks with someone who claims to hate him because he doesn't want the boy to be alone. Doumeki is also very rarely ruffled by anything, be it a strange supernatural occurrence or an interpersonal interaction, even if it involves someone who has authority or power over him. While remaining (mostly) respectful, Doumeki retains his firm determination that his opinion matters and that he has the right to choose his own path, speaking even to a very powerful being like Yuuko as an equal. He can be relentless when he wants something accomplished, stubbornly continuing to research and try to work out a way to do something on his own even when told that it's impossible to do so - he relies on his own abilities and knowledge rather than using supernatural fixes as a crutch. Doumeki is also very perceptive, and while he doesn't often say out loud what he's perceived through observation, he makes it obvious that he knows through actions. For example, he consistently inserts himself into any 'private time' between Watanuki and Himawari without explaining himself, because he understands that Himawari has bad luck that could end up harming Watanuki that his presence anulls. He also seems to be quite accepting of the quirks and strangenesses of others, though he may make a joke at someone's expense, he generally seems to see all people as equals and doesn't discriminate. He is rarely ruffled by anything - in fact, when he was first asked to help Watanuki on a 'mission' he simply went along with it, no accusations of insanity, just a calm acceptance. He's very good about simply taking things as they are instead of imposing his own version of sanity onto them. This is probably due in part to his deep and resourceful knowledge of Japanese folklore and matters of the spiritual world that he gained through spending time with his grandfather, a man who was the high priest of a temple and had the ability to see and exorcise spirits.
However, despite these positives, Doumeki has his own share of negative personality traits. The most noticeable is that he can be extremely egocentric at times, with a bit too high an opinion of himself. This leads to him being quite pushy with things he wants, such as a good meal cooked by Watanuki, or by assuming that people will do things for him without question - he can be sort of a spoilt brat, really. Also, Doumeki is stoic and quiet, and this combined with his egocentrism can make him come across as stuck up and uncaring of others. His dry, deadpan sense of humour is often overlooked, and he seems to get a lot of entertainment out of riling up others and watching the ensuing drama. He can be incredibly sarcastic at times, and insulting, and even when he's not really trying to be sarcastic he tends to speak with a certain forthrightness and bluntness that can make him come across as abrasive. He doesn't feel the need to explain his motivations or reasons for doing things, he simply does them, and this can make him seem like a presumptuous, stubborn jerk at times. Not that he particularly cares about others' opinions of himself - another problem in and of itself.
On the topic of food, Doumeki is very picky about it. It's not so much that he's a picky eater - he doesn't tend to dislike certain types of food. He is, however, very conscious of who made it and how it was made. He won't eat food he doesn't 'trust' or 'approve of' in the method of cooking and the feelings put into the cooking. He has a discriminating palate, and has been called an epicure - he can tell a lot about the person who cooked from tasting food and how it was prepared, and he doesn't like to eat things if they have no feeling, or the wrong kind of feeling. This is one of the main reasons he constantly demands that Watanuki cook for him, since he seems to enjoy the particular signature Watanuki has when he cooks. And on the subject of food and drink...Doumeki is a bit of a lush, enjoying alcohol and seeming to have a near endless alcohol tolerance despite being underage. He holds his liquor well, never seeming to act drunk or any different than his normal stoic self, even when he technically should be piss-drunk.
Conditional: Personality development in previous game: Though a lot of things have happened to Doumeki in the course of his time at Salkia Island, he is still, basically, a quiet person with a strong inner determination. The major changes to his personality are a slight increase in openness and a slight loss of self-confidence. If he feels that a person is interested in hearing about what's going on in his mind, he will be a bit more open about things he's feeling. This is because of consistent efforts on the behalf of other characters drilling this into his head, enough that it's sunk home and affected him as a person, even if he won't remember those people. Also, because of what he sees as his consistent failures on Salkia Island to help his friends or prevent death or severe injury to them, his self-confidence has flagged a little. Though he still has an incredibly strong and stubborn center of determination, he tends to express it in a more subdued way, and is slightly more prone to self-doubt and hesitation at times, when he feels like he isn't needed or wanted by someone. Though this started improving with Watanuki's return, it is still quite ground into his psyche at this point - he endured too much for this to be a minor effect. Also, because of this slight decrease in self-confidence and his failures, Doumeki has become a bit more overprotective, mostly to compensate for his previous failings. Finally, as a result of many of his friends shutting him out of certain important matters so he wouldn't interfere or stop them from sacrificing themselves or putting themselves in danger, Doumeki's developed a slightly more ruthless and underhanded manner of applying his protection to people - he has no compunctions about hacking private entries by close friends if it means he's informed of something dangerous he otherwise wouldn't be.
Character Plans: Doumeki is a pretty neutral and generally non-violent character, and I can't see either side really swaying him to loyalty - he will remain determinedly neutral in his stance on the Factions, and will retain it stubbornly even if threatened. The one exception to this is if Watanuki is kept safer by Doumeki helping one or the other faction.
Appearance/PB: Doumeki is quite tall, I would guess he's probably around 5'10" or 5'11" and built athletically, with broad shoulders and a good deal of upper body strength due to his archery. His skin is quite tan compared to other characters in the series, and he has black hair worn quite short, parted over his left eye and just long enough to fall over his forehead. His eyes are a golden or amber colour, and he tends to either stare intensely or look completely disaffected. His face is generally expressionless and stoic, and he very rarely emotes - he has only smiled once in the manga, for instance, and most of his expressions are only subtle variations on how his eyebrows are furrowed or how intense his stare is. Doumeki tends to slouch, when standing his shoulders are relaxed and his head is jutted slightly forward, and when he's sitting he generally leans forward with his elbows on his knees and his hands dangling, and has a sort of slow, laid back way of walking. In the manga, he tends to wear very traditional clothing when he's not dressed in his school uniform - uwagi tops and hakama instead of t-shirts and pajamas, geta or zori instead of sneakers, and any other kind of more traditional Japanese clothing is the norm for him.