(no subject)

[temerate]

Player Information ;
Your Nickname: Brig
OOC Journal: twopoinsettias@lj
Under 18? No.
Email/IM: twopoinsettias@gmail.com / brigantinefranke (aim)
Characters Played at Singularity: Arbiter, O'Brien, Twosix-six

Character Information ;
Name: Eko
Name of Canon: KARAS
Canon/AU/Other Game CR: Absolute Threshold
Reference: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Karas_%28anime%29
Canon Point: post-death
Setting: Present day Tokyo. People go on about their ordinary lives oblivious to the supernatural world that is just underneath their feet, or over their heads, or otherwise right in front of them but invisible. All the myths and legends of youkai and "demonic" creatures from Japan's past are true, but human belief in them has dwindled to the point where it is making them ill.

In this world, a healthy land is balanced by the energies of the human population and also the supernatural population. Based on traditional Chinese medicine, too much of one energy or the other upsets the balance of the land, or specifically the living city. In order to maintain this balance, the will of each city (a deity known as Yurine) chooses an agent called Karas to keep the peace between youkai and humans. Karas is a doctor to sick youkai, Yurine's executioner, and general peacekeeper. He (or she) is strictly under Yurine's command, and under ordinary circumstances cannot use their full powers without her approval.

History: The only known facts about Eko's early human history are that he was born and lived during the Edo period, very likely as an upper class samurai. As a young man, possibly due to the injury that cost him his leg, he was approached by the female spirit Yurine (who represents the living will of Tokyo), asking Eko to leave his mortal life behind and become her agent as the armored warrior Karas. Every city has a Yurine and every Yurine has a Karas serving her. Karas are former humans whose souls are separated from their frail human bodies (the body apparently going into some kind of stasis) and manifest as their own physical form, much like a shinentai or youkai, which then are able to summon the powerful Karas armor with Yurine's approval. Yurine and Karas are master and servant, since Karas is normally unable to even draw his/her sword without Yurine releasing the locks on the scabbard. Karas is also a healer of sick or injured youkai, running a supernatural clinic for them, and is considered more a guardian than an executioner by the local youkai population, although he is in truth both. When a Karas is cut down in combat (or, presumably, when their human body dies for any reason), Yurine chooses a new human to fulfill the role.

Eko's appointment as Karas came at a changing point in history, though. Modernization was beginning to creep up on Japan along with an ever increasing human and urban population. Humans no longer respected old traditions and were beginning to lose all fear, reverance, and belief in the supernatural world, which in turn weakened the resident youkai. After years of unwavering service Eko, having an extremely strong attachment to his Yurine, grew enraged at unwarranted human arrogance that was both causing hardship for the youkai population he was sworn to protect and also disrespecting Yurine, their mistress. Eko watched the worst of human behavior occur as their numbers grew and modern technology like firearms led to cruelty and, in his opinion, barbaric corruption. Crime rates increased. People abandoned the cultural and spiritual traditions that Eko had grown up with and instead embraced science, and youkai were relegated to little more than the myths of uneducated peasants. Yurine, as an impartial guardian of the city, never blamed its human inhabitants for their choices, even though their decline in belief would eventually mean her death as part of the spiritual world that humans were steadily erasing from their lives.

Eko put up with this for as long as he could before finally snapping, unable to bear Yurine's indifference to her own fate any longer. Acting against her wishes he plotted to restore the youkai as overlords of the city, reducing humans to their 'proper' subservient status and punishing them for having ever dared to forget about the youkai that so graciously had allowed their species to survive. Through sheer force of will he was able to overcome Yurine's control of his armor until she was made his prisoner, enslaved to him instead of the other way around, while he retained all his powers as Karas.

When Yurine was compromised the city apparently birthed another, this new Yurine now considering Eko as a rogue Karas a deadly threat to the city's health and harmony. Yurine chose a new Karas to oppose Eko, but Eko cheerfully slaughtered every single successor Karas that tried to stand up to him all the way up to the present day. As part of the laws that apparently govern these things, a Karas is not allowed to interfere with the affairs of another city, so Eko was only challenged by newborn, inexperienced Tokyo successors. The longer he stayed in power, the less likely it seemed that any newborn Karas would be able to defeat him. But the other cities remained silent and Eko was grimly vindicated that his challenging of the system was not, in fact, bringing down heavenly justice on his head. Without Yurine's support the only encouragement he had for his cause was his own self-righteousness and the fact that he had never lost a battle, which he believed validated his crusade. If he had the strength to make it happen, after all, there was no reason it shouldn't happen, and hisorical precedent had been in the favor of youkai dominating weaker humans for hundreds of years before the humans began to make their slow progress to dominance. Eko's belief was that he was setting things back to their natural order, which humans by their very nature wrongly challenged.

But humans and modernization persisted and eventually Eko decided that the only way for the ever-weakening youkai to survive in a modern world would be for them to evolve and choose to become Mikura, cybernetic versions of their intangible selves that subsisted on human blood like vampires. In this way youkai would become powerful, physical bodies and could force humans to fear and respect them. Eko turned himself into a Mikura, no longer maintaining his body and powering his armor through Yurine but through consumption of blood. He also managed to convince five powerful elemental youkai (Nue, Tsuchigomo, Kamaitachi, Wanyudo, and Kappa) to do the same, all of whom became his generals. Although many youkai were initially appreciative of Eko taking a stand against humans, even they consider the Mikura terrifying and unnatural abominations. They fear that his long tenure as Karas, watching over a 'decaying' city, has driven him mad.

By the present day Eko has established himself as a prominent businessman, apparently by researching the Karas armor and converting some of its functions to human technology, and more or less runs Shinjuku from the underground with the mayor and chief of police both under his influence. Then the show starts, and one of his Generals defects and a new Karas turns up. In the end Eko kills his own Yurine apparently just to prove he can and irrevocably abandons all claims to being a protector rather than a crazy genocidal tyrant. There is an epic final battle and a lot of stuff blows up, and through the power of justice and being the protagonist, the new Karas defeats him. Predictably.

Personality: Eko is a traditionalist. If he were European he would be one of those aristocratic vampires that behaves a couple centuries out of date and ends up coming across as fashionable, gentlemanly, decorous, self-righteous, superior and utterly confident. He speaks in archaic formal style and surrounds himself with opulence and elegance, looking down on the city from the tallest of the Shinjuku skyscrapers. Rarely raising his voice in anger, he demands a certain elegance and professionalism of his followers and prefers to let his minions do gruntwork for him, expecting those around him to adhere as rigidly to their proper roles as he does to his. Though claiming to despise humans he's spent 400 years not simply burning the city to the ground in pure disgust, and it would have taken a great deal of charm, grace and intelligence to build the kind of fortune he apparently has at his disposal. He's not above making deals with humans to get his own way, whether he secretly despises them or no, and welcomes humans into his fold who also believe the city has become a cesspool of corruption that needs to be cleansed through revolution. Eko describes himself as a reformer, the only person willing to go to the necessary lengths to 'save' the youkai from their own degradation, and wishes to be supported by others who share his ideals. The defiance of his Yurine and the youkai of the city are terrible wounds to him, especially Yurine, who he regards as his goddess.

It's possible, given the character design that gave him an unexplained prosthetic leg and the fact that all Karas are chosen because they are "human souls that know sorrow," that Eko was injured while still human (and a loss of limb would have been debilitating during that time period) and that Yurine offered him, a doomed cripple, a second chance at an honorable life. On some level all of Eko's efforts have been for her sake, in hopes that she would chose him over her duty to the city that is killing her and become his empress. If there had been any way for him to take Yurine away from Tokyo and simply live quietly with her somewhere he would have seized it, but Yurine's existence is defined by the city itself and she is as bound to it as he is bound to her. He loves and hates her as he loves and hates Tokyo itself, desperate for her approval and and continually injured by her rejection, and considers every victory over a successor Karas or youkai-turned-Mikura as a gift to lay before her to try and change her mind.

His fall from grace was a long one filled with despair and personal anguish, watching two world wars and especially Japan's incredibly rapid modernization destroy all semblance of the world that he had lived in and originally sworn to protect. Like all samurai, Eko was faced with the decision to either change or become extinct in a modern world that does not respect traditional values. Karas is also a frozen, impartial traditional role that can't change and Eko, after a lifetime of constraining himself to his proper role, could take no more. The concept of the Mikura was a desperation move upon Eko's eventual realization that there was simply no way to force Tokyo back to its former state. No matter how powerful Eko was as Karas or city magnate the youkai were still dying. The Mikura might be called abominations by both humans and youkai and even Yurine, but if they were strong enough to accomplish his ultimate goal, they would have been the right choice.

Eko does not make snap decisions easily, mostly because of his self-assurance in his own power. For example, he's perfectly okay with letting an opponent live because he feels that opponent can be easily dealt with at a later time. He casually allowed all of his generals to die in combat before raising a finger himself.

At some point Eko probably realized that he had crossed the line from righteous crusader to tyrant, alienating even the youkai he was trying to remake the city for, but it was too late. There was nothing left for him to do except go forward and take what he wanted from his city by force. By the end of his reign he is not particularly kind to the Mikura he once seduced, or even to the weaker youkai who are the hardest hit by the imbalance of power caused by a city having two Yurines and two opposing Karas.

His final act while dying is to reach out to Yurine, perhaps for forgiveness, although he tells the successor Karas Otoha that someday he will feel the same bitterness for Yurine and the corrupt city and wish for the same vengeance.

Also he speaks in archaic formal japanese and the english sub/dub decided to translate that as Shakespeare style old english. I'm sorry in advance. And he thinks cities are alive and that's totally normal and he likes to make long rambly speeches to anyone who will listen.

Abilities and Weaknesses:
- Mikura body = faster stronger more durable, but HAS to be powered by human blood. No blood, no energy, and he loses the ability to manifest his weapons and armor and special abilities etc. Mikura can be damaged by conventional weapons the same way any mechanized thing can.
- expert swordsman. He's been doing this for over 400 years.
- the Karas armor can transform into a jet form and a vehicle form, both with PEW PEW guns or lasers or something because idfk why. For Sing these forms can be temporary and drain a lot of power.
- his sword is magic or whatever. More durable than an ordinary sword.
- Karas armor is also magic but has to be summoned, which draws energy, and loses its protective abilities the lower on energy Eko gets. Seriously the series refers to Mikura as having a gas tank that needs to be filled.
- He's a crazy bitch that would rather stand back than fight directly, since it's beneath him, even when he is obviously about to get screwed over/could have a major advantage if he just lifted a finger to do his own work.
- will not attack supernatural or non-humans, and will defend them if they need it. SOMEWHERE DEEP DOWN he feels kind of bad about screwing the youkai of his city over.
- biggest weakness is blood dependency, which I'll detail in his AU section.

Inventory:
- stupid j-rock outfit
- magic summon armor + sword

Appearance: Pictures here: http://temerate.livejournal.com/profile Otherwise in human form he looks like a blonde j-rocker with crazy purple tattoos. In Karas form he's got a lot of black armor that looks vaguely like a crow, and Mikura form is crazy white armored cyborg.

Age: over 400

OC/AU Justification ;
If AU, How is Your Version Different From Canon, and How Will That Come Across? He's coming from a long time spent in Nuadoria, the city in Absolute Threshold, where he had to learn how to live with a limited supply of humans. He was forced to ask for volunteers to feed on or otherwise not massacre everything in sight, or risk getting hunted down during his weak periods by all the resident good guys/heroes. While it's annoying and vaguely beneath him, he accepts this humiliation as a punishment during his exile from Tokyo. Waking up in yet another strange place will just be another trial to endure for having lost the battle with Otoha. His powers are strictly regulated by whether he can get someone to volunteer to feed him. Yes he has also killed people, but to butcher a human for their blood is uncouth when in his mind, people should be lining up to throw their bodies at him.

NOTE FOR THE APP TEAM: I also au'd him slightly to say that he can be influenced by drinking of a certain person's blood, especially if it's repeated with the same person, ala most other vampire stuff where blood drinking is super intimate and involves psychic crap. When Eko drinks of a heroic type or good person, his bad impulses are tempered a bit. When he drinks of a not-so-good person, well. He also has a tendency to become attached to his repeat victims, even to the point of offering them protection/his version of considerate behavior. IF THIS IS TOO UNCANON JUST SAY SO.

If OC, Did You Run Your Character Through a Mary-Sue Litmus Test?
And What Did You Score?

Samples ;
Log Sample:

In the end, it happened the way it did in his dreams. A memory from the life he'd led before, his ancient surreal life that seemed more like a fantasy with every passing year, and the fear that had used to drive him of simply, one day, being proven unworthy.

His sword had been cut in half. It was not an issue of being a second too slow. It was not that his armor was heavier, or that he'd been wounded, or set upon by multiple foes, or that he had faced the mechanism-driven weapons of cowards. He had not chosen a move that would end in sacrifice. He had fought with surety, with righteousness, and with the force of evolution behind him. He was better. He had proven himself better. The samurai that fought with determination and tested his limits and smashed them and never lost a battle had the right to call himself the best.

He was better than this. He was better than all of them, the upstarts that thought to test their resolve against his. His resolve was diamond and he shattered them as glass.

There was a breath of air against his cheek. Hot wind smelling of smoke, as the city burned in the wake of their fury. The blow that had sliced through his sword had cut open his helmet, leaving half his face bare to the elements. He stared out at the latest unworthy child, still standing there motionless as if Eko no longer posed a threat, as if this battle was finished.

Pathetic. Unworthy. It was not over until one of them was dead or could no longer hold a sword. It was not over until he let go of his--

The broken sword, the Karas sword that could not be cut by ordinary metal, could not be dulled or snapped because it was born of will, fell from nerveless fingers and vanished into black feathers and motes of gold before it could hit the broken earth. He noted this with vague but growing unease because he hadn't ordered his hand to open. Inside the armored confines of his gauntlets, his fingers shook.

There was something warm running down his face.

He considered the possibility of death, very briefly, before his mind turned it away. He didn't remember what it was like to be mortal, he told himself. He had come too far from that frail creature that worried about things like disease and sword wounds and instant death in a duel. He was no longer human. He was more than human, had made himself more in the service of his goddess, as was fitting, and he could not die here, he could not, his city and his revolution were at hand, if he could just recall the sword...

Death. It snuck closer, just beyond the range of his vision. He could smell the metal of his own blood and knew the eddies of smoke were not simply from his overheated armor, but the disintegration of it. He had killed enough of his successors to know what the death of a Karas looked like.

Someone else would have spoken. Someone else would have said 'not yet, there is too much left undone, this is impossible.' He did not speak. He had watched the graceless departures of too many, and silently honored those who kept their dignity. Even the humans.

He burned. Dignity was letting him burn. His sword was broken and his opponent had sheathed his own weapon and simply waited, as though for orders, as Eko himself had once done. Yurine had to give the approval to leave. Yurine had to give the confirmation that duty had been fulfilled, the kill confirmed. Yurine, the new Yurine, his goddess reborn with the same face and the same quiet bell voice, would congratulate her champion for Eko's death. She would have her way in the end. She always had her way. She was determined to die some day for the city that did not deserve her loyal service, and Eko had not been able to stop her for all his centuries of effort.

So be it. She had the final victory, walking into his sightline behind her new champion, her precious Otoha, who she had begged to survive and cradled his broken body in her arms and soiled her white hands with his filthy human blood. But her perfect gaze was indifferent when it fell upon Eko, her perfect face holding no amount of regret or sorrow as she coolly watched his body start to disintegrate.

She was beautiful still, dressed in the modern clothes that reflected the spirit of the modern city that he had always disliked. She should have been wearing silk and jewels. She should have been white faced and kneeling in perfect composure, the chime of her earrings and the bangles in her hair like bells. She should have stopped him. She should have taken his hand and told him, when his heart had been young and sick for her, that he was mortal trash to her and only fit to shed blood in her name.

She should never have remained silent and let him hope, let him grow stronger, give him the illusion that he could eventually make himself worthy of her notice.

He wanted to tell her that he hated her. He wanted to say that before he died and before she turned away, uncaring, content with her new devotee. He wanted to say that he had given everything to her and it wasn't enough, would she please accept his four hundred years of life as his penance for failure, would she please. Would she please look at him. Would she please say his name as she had said Otoha's, would she please be moved by something, anything he had accomplished.

Unsteady steps, past Otoha, who did not move and did not interfere. Otoha did not exist. The other youkai present did not exist, nor did the blood coating his face, or the steady stream of his self dissolving in the wind. There was only the girl-woman-goddess-demoness standing in the light, looking down at him without expression. He spoke her name, his hand rising in trembling supplication.

He died.

Network Sample:

[ The device kicks in, and look it's a guy, and he's blond and awful pretty and smiling slightly, but the irritation in his voice is palpable. He's not bothering to hide it that much. ]

What a trick this is, Magisters. Truly thou should be proud. This false world is indeed a well crafted illusion. I have greatly enjoyed inspecting it.

[ No he hasn't his hair is fucking wet and dripping down the back of his neck and there is no one to dry it for him goddammit. Nevertheless, he keeps smiling. ]

I should hope that thou wouldst know better, however. An illusion will not hold me forever, no matter how elaborate.

[ His voice turns cutting. ]

We have an engagement, Ice Magister. I will not be kept waiting.