(no subject)

[doveseeker]

Player
Name: Okami
Personal Journal: fairyblue
E-mail: ouuuuka [at] gmail [dot] com
AIM/plurk: ouuuuka / okami_kun
Timezone: EST
Current Characters in Route: Vanitas shadowdive, Cheria Barnes fairycircle, Jane Crocker healium

Character
Name: Nier
Series: Nier Gestalt
Timeline: Just before the endings split into four parts. (Spoiler)Just after killing the Shadowlord (End Spoiler)
Canon Resource Links: Grimoire Nier contains all information, backstory and even some short stories on both the Japanese and English versions.

Personality:
Kind hearted but level headed, Nier's kindness is tempered by his age. He's not out to cause any trouble, but if it finds him, he'll deal with it as he sees fit. Living in a world where it's run down and decaying, he works any job that anyone will give him to provide for his daughter. She is his world, and the fact that she's ill from the beginning of the game... well, Nier has been trying to find a cure for her for a long time. He didn't know it was Black Scrawl until after gaining Grimoire Weiss as a party member, but Yonah being sick at all had him concerned and always looking for a medicine that could end her cough and ease her pain.

Nier is a bit jaded about the world around him, just because of how much it's broken down. He's seen people come and go in life, and the idea that a parent could abandon her children to search for a better life doesn't surprise him too terribly. There is the slightest bit of optimism though, just the tiniest bit. For example, in the Junkyard, the kids there were abandoned by their mother. Offering to search for her for them, he tries to believe she was just lost, or trapped. It's only after finding the body with a man, finding that she had money and things to let her travel, that he had to believe she was abandoning the kids. It was disgusting to him, but it's because he can't stand the thought of ever leaving Yonah like that. That also shows just how responsible he is. He loves his daughter and leaving her is never a thought that would cross his mind, even if he could live a less stressful, less painful life.

His real personality starts to shine through with the people he meets. When rescuing Yonah from the Lost Shrine, he encounters a floating, magic, sassy book. That, was Grimoire Weiss. Nier never really calls him anything but Weiss, but it's not out of disrespect. In the beginning, it was only because he had more things on his mind; he's very grateful that Weiss helped him at all. Even when they brought Yonah home after diagnosing that she had the Black Scrawl, Weiss tried to comfort Nier when he quietly begged that the disease take him instead of her. He's selfless, but selfish at the same time. Nier really thinks so much about helping his daughter, that sometimes, he doesn't realize the things going on around him.

Another encounter that shows his selfless side is when he encounters Kaine. Originally, he was in the Aerie just asking questions, and found a shack outside of the town. Inspecting it, there were no people inside, but there were flowers; Lunar Tears. The same flowers that led Yonah to the Lost Shrine in the first place. The owner of the shack, Kaine, appeared though, and aggressively attacked him. He and Weiss were able to avoid getting hurt too badly, but Kaine is a rough and tumble girl who can do more than cleave with her two big swords; she also uses magic. It's a rather rare thing for a human to do. They were interrupted though when a large shade attacked, and Kaine saved them from a bad blow. It knocked her out and ran off, but Nier had enough kindness in him to simply pick her up and take her back to her shack to rest; he owed her that much. That wasn't the end of helping Kaine though. When Nier came back to the Aerie, that large shade was back and Kaine was fighting it. He helped her take it down, especially since it kept trying to run off. In the last stage of the fight, he found out that the monster had crushed her grandmother to death, and Kaine was only wanting to live long enough to get revenge. When she fell and was trying to let herself die, Nier was there trying to convince her to live. To find a new reason to live. He may have given her the new goal of helping him find a cure for his daughter, but it was enough for her to agree to.

The last example I'm going to use to show Nier's selflessness is through the last party member, Emil. He only met the boy because Yonah had a pen pal that she begged her father to help, and he wasn't even the author of the letter. Emil surprised him in recognizing his age, simply through footsteps, because the boy was blindfolded. It was to protect people, because his ability was to look at something and turn it to stone. It's after the timeskip occurs and Emil searches for a cure for Kaine, who he was forced to petrify, that Nier is forced to watch the boy let himself be eaten by a skeleton monster. The creature had amazing magical powers, but used to be Emil's sister; she was the result of scientist experiments with magic in trying to create an ultimate weapon. While Emil manages to absorb his sisters power, it came with the price of becoming a skeleton himself. In his horror, he tried to hide, but Nier simply sat down next to him, held him, and said "Welcome back. You've been through a lot."

After rescuing Kaine from her petrification, Nier was so estatic that they were a group again, that they could look for Yonah together, but the villagers were afraid of both Kaine and Emil. Kaine, they likely heard of as cursed from the Aerie. Emil? His appearance alone was terrifying, being nothing but a floating skeleton. It was only then when Nier was demanding that they be allowed to stay, that Kaine simply says "I'm used to sleeping outside." The two left, and that's when Nier realized his selfishness. It wasn't until that moment that he never really asked where Kaine slept; he knew she never came into the village except for the fight that led to her petrification. Emil, the lonely boy from the empty manor, was now shunned from society, and not by choice this time.

I apologize if that was a lot of storytelling, but I felt those explanations were very necessary to explaining Nier's character. His actions are so much louder than the simple, blunt words he uses. He's a good person, simply trying to live his life with his sweet daughter, and Nier is unknowingly a pillar to the friends around him. Nier takes things seriously for the most part, but he can lighten up with his friends when it's simply good natured bantering. He's curious enough about the few things he doesn't know, and will quickly learn how to do what it takes to get a job done.

Nier does have flaws though, like any other human. He's very driven and because of all that questing to find a cure for Yonah? The girl is lonely and left at home very often. It's not anyones fault, and she honestly would rather he stay home, but she never tells him so, knowing he is just trying to find help for her. Another negative trait is that he does not like shades; they all need to die, in his opinion. It even leads to when he learns that Kaine is half shade, he says that if the shade takes over and she can't come back, he'll cut her down like the rest. There are two points in the game where he nearly has to keep his word; the first time, Kaine took a life threatening blow and transformed into a shade. Emil and Nier worked together to bring Kaine back to herself, and she returned to normal. It was not without a promise that if she transforms again, they really do kill her. The second time is part of the true endings, C and D. For the father!Nier timeline, it's written in the Grimoire Nier that he follows ending D, where he does finally have to kill Kaine.

The largest flaw may be that Nier himself is a replica of the Shadowlord; the original Nier. That man gave up everything, even his soul, to become the Shadowlord, and to put Yonah in a cryogenic sleep to find a cure for her when her soul began to decay from being gestalted (having her soul removed from her body to avoid catching WCS *white chlorination syndrome*). It lasted 1000 years and there was still nothing that could be done; her replicas always gained the black scrawl due to the corruption of her soul. Nier, the replica, would likely have done the very same thing, had he the opportunity.

Strengths/Weaknesses:

+ Older, so he has experience under his belt about life on ones own.
+ Quick to learn how to do just about anything; It's life or death if he doesn't.
+ Strong willed. Even if he has to cut down everything in his way, he will do whatever it takes to save his daughter.
+ Physically strong, for his age. Nier is very much shaped from the harsh life around him, and while doing odd jobs brings money, killing Shades makes the most.
+ Emphathetic, to a degree. If the person tried to hurt his friends or Yonah, that's a different story.

- Nier is 44 years old; that is living a fairly long time, considering how broken down his world is. Most people can barely reach their 60s before black scrawl overtakes them. Then again, Nier is the only replica who will not gain the black scrawl, since the Shadowlord is the only Gestalt who hasn't lost his mind. His age, combined with the hard way of life, has taken enough of a toll that he is already past his prime though.
- Stubborn. Shades are evil, and as far as he is concerned, they all should die. This mentality never changes, even when he faces the Shadowlord at the end. Kaine, at least, requested that he kill her when the shade took over. It's an unfortunate issue for him, because Shades? Were the original "humans". Not that he knows, though...
- Oblivious to some things going on around him. Nier never catches on about Devola and Popola until they stop him in the Shadowlord's Castle. It takes the phrase of "I'm use to sleeping outside" from Kaine, for him to realize how selfish he was being. He never realizes how much Emil and Kaine both grow to love him, even when Emil sacrifices himself so they can escape, and when Kaine continues to fight until Yonah is freed.
- He can't swim, and there hasn't been anything called "rain", "snow", or "night" in hundreds of years, in his world. The swimming issue is due to water being a precious resource. From the planets climate being ruined, there is no change of seasons, or precipitation; the planet isn't turning, either, it seems, because it never grows dark enough to be called night. Sure, there's cloud coverage, but that's as close as it gets.

Pokémon Information
Affiliation: Trainer
Starter: Snivy
Password: Scrambled Eggs

Samples
First Person Sample:

What the hell is this place? [An older man is shouting, trying to get anyones attention, though the gear is face down in the snow. His shoes crunched about, his tone especially concerned.] Kaine? Yonah! [The footsteps moved about again, before one solidly stepped on the gear; it doesn't do much to muffle the frustrated grunt coming from the older voice.]

Where are they.. [Raising his voice sharply, yelling, his concern is turning into anger; screaming at the sky, as if it has done something, is all he can do.]

Where is my daughter!?

[He goes quiet for a long time after that, a good ten minutes passing before the gear is finally being picked up. Looking absolutely weary and older than he is, Nier regards the strange screen with a scowl. Crouching down, something offscreen is tapping the tip of a green tail against several little functions, as if explaining them without words. Eventually, Nier carefully moves that tail and squints at the red light, before speaking.]

If anyone has seen a young girl with long blond hair, wearing a white dress, please tell me as soon as you can. [There's a soft sound from beside the man, just below the view of the screen again. Glancing, his scowl deepens before he turns the camera down to reveal a chilled looking Snivy, who snuffs quietly at being shown. Turning his head and somewhat posing to look less like he's cold and more like he's JUST AWESOME, Nier speaks quieter, still wearing a heavy expression.]

I'd like to know what this is, as well.

Third Person Sample:

Staring hard for some long moments, Nier read the dex entry out loud, shifting his gaze from the text to the creature hovering quietly less than a foot away.

"These Pokemon arose from the spirits of people interred in graves in past ages. Each retains memories of its former life. Each of them carries a mask that used to be its face when it was human. Sometimes they look at it and cry."

The Pokemon in question was most definitely a Yamask, cradling its mask in one arm and trying to hide the tears the mask was producing with the other, quiet, but suspicious of the stranger who had found it. Nier closed the pokedex after another moment, before lifting one hand in a gesture to shake, his expression soft.

"You've been through a lot, haven't you."

Yamask stared for a minute, lowering the arm that had been hiding its mask and hovering a touch closer; just getting a better look at the guy. Lifting that mask then with both hands, the Yamask lifted it up to its face, before lowering the mask and tucking it under its arm again, as if trying to explain despite the language barrier. Nodding quietly, understanding enough to know that this is a human being, who clearly remembers everything about his or her life before they became... this. That hand stays extended, and it's only after a few more moments that the Pokemon extends its empty hand and returns the gesture.

To be treated human again, that's all it wants. With the handshake, Nier knows he isn't able to actually feel the Pokemon; all he can sense is something cold in his palm, but for a split second, it feels like there was the grip of a human hand. Cracking a tired sort of smile, he brings a pokeball out, but does nothing more with it.

"If you want, I can make sure that no one tries to take that mask from you."

Without needing any other prompting, the Yamask approaches the pokeball easily and disappears into it, letting itself be "captured".