Ryudo Issei (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
unknownrival) wrote2009-08-20 08:15 am
unknownrival) wrote2009-08-20 08:15 am
[OOC - FAQ.]
This isn't really a 20 facts thing - I hope I don't have twenty questions that need explaining - more like a FAQ for stuff that comes up often.
First of all, why is he calling my character by their last name? Nobody does that!
Issei does. Canonically, he's shown to still call his best friend of almost two years by his last name. Emiya Shirou calls him by his first name in return, so they're obviously close enough that Issei could use his first name if he chooses to. In fact, in canon, Issei never calls anyone by their first name. This may differ in the sequel that isn't translated, but that takes place in la la la fantasy dreamland, so that technically doesn't count.
What this means for you is: he will call you by your last name. Even if he really likes you. Even if he really doesn't like you. Even if he thinks you are the embodiment of all the evils of the world, he will call you by your last name. He probably won't be very respectful otherwise (pronouns, honorifics), but you'll get the last name treatment.
Possible exceptions: if you have only one name, he'll call you that. If you insist on being called your first name, he'll eventually relent... or, more likely, not address you by name for a while, then go back to your last name when you're not paying attention. And I had him decide of his own free will to start calling someone by their first name... of course, it was his best friend of two years who'd been calling him by his first name forever, and it had just been established that Issei was willing to die for him. So, yeah, if he comes close to dying for you, he might consider you close enough to address by your first name.
You mentioned honorifics, but I haven't seen Issei use them?
That one's my fault. I, personally, don't use honorifics when writing Japanese characters unless they're things like -nii or -sensei. The thing is, we don't see Issei around characters he uses honorifics around (best friend, no honorific; mortal enemy, no honorific) except one time, when he's only just met her and calls her -san. So, if you want, you can assume he's using appropriate honorifics with you.
My character's a god/psychic/telepath/l33t haxor, so I'm going to look in his brain to find out what his secret is! Magic powers? Different species? Alien? Saved the world? Something?
Nope, nothing.
...Seriously?
Seriously. Issei has absolutely no special powers, no martial training, no feats of heroism in his background, no magic, no alien technology, nothing. He's just a guy.
So, uh, didn't I hear something about spiritual sensitivity a while back?
Well, he's a guy who's a monk, and that sensitivity's frankly hit-or-miss. He says a monk is good enough at sensing the aura of someone to make an accurate first impression, and he's usually right about someone... with one big mistake. (Tohsaka is a witch/mage and lying to the school, but she's also a good person; Saber is a good and trustworthy person, but she happens to be lying to him at the moment; Caster does dearly love Kuzuki-nii and can be a good housewife, but she doesn't mind getting Issei and other people killed.)
So basically, he's decent at forming first impressions, which isn't really a magic power, and if it was, it doesn't work over the internet anyway.
So my character's still a god/psychic/whatever. What can they know about him?
Oh, anything! There's just not much to him that he wouldn't ordinarily tell you if you asked. But seriously, if you need to know something, just send me a message saying 'hey, what's Issei's favorite flavor of ice cream, my character needs to know' and I'll tell you it's vanilla. Or whatever it is you're asking about.
What's with him and girls?
He is - well, was - equal parts scared of and disliking girls. It's not the standard misogynist 'stay in the kitchen' kind of thing; rather, he finds girls to be formidable opponents who are too powerful to be fully trusted.
Of course, online when he can better think out his responses instead of snapping at people (what he usually does to girls offline), he has no excuse for not being polite. And that led to him becoming friends with a bunch of girls, which led him to reconsidering his views on girls.
So basically, nowadays, if you're a girl, Issei assumes that you can be dangerous, but he's not much more likely to assume that you're out to harm him than he would be if you were a guy.
Isn't that blushing of his a little exaggerated from canon?
No.
To go into more detail: Issei blushes. A lot. He has fourteen different sprites, not including that one time he got possessed. Six of those, or nearly half, are blushing sprites. He blushes all the time, even at little things like worrying over someone's safety or at being thanked (by his crush, but still). I am probably downplaying his blushing tendencies, seriously.
Huh. He's pretty gay, isn't he?
Well, in canon he does think Caster and Saber are beautiful, and can be argued to have a crush on at least the former, but both times they're noted as the rare exception. So... technically he's bi? He's definitely much more interested in men, however.
What happened in his canon that I should know about?
Not much. Issei's only been told about most of it, since lol, minor character who's not in on The Secret.
Important Canon Event #1: His best friend, Emiya Shirou, suddenly ordered him to strip one day at lunch. Issei blushed like he'd never done before and didn't immediately comply, so Shirou stripped him forcibly. (He was looking for a magical symbol on Issei, but of course he couldn't tell Issei that.) This isn't really all that important, but it's good 'make Issei blush' fodder if you need something to bring up.
Important Canon Event #2: Kuzuki Souichirou, who Issei considered to be an older brother to him, was killed. (He kinda deserved it, what with accepting Caster sucking energy from the people of the town, but Issei doesn't know about that.) Issei only found out later (i.e. through here) that he was killed rather than just deciding to leave suddenly, and took it hard.
It's been a year since you apped him, shouldn't he be out of high school, and officially a monk with a shaved head and everything?
Yeah, uh, about that... Him being in high school gives me more options during viruses if he complains about missing school and everything, it gives him more people to be embarrassed around in day-to-day life, and it gives him stuff to do.
As for the hair, well, all of my icons have him with a not-shaved head, and I don't really have any of him the other way. So for right now, he's going to keep getting older on his birthdays, and at one point I'll probably decide that he's graduated, but we'll keep putting off his official becoming-a-monk. Okay?
From![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
dormition, paraphrased: You know he doesn't have to shave his head, right?
Yes, but in canon it's said that he wants to. Thanks for telling me, though!
Fromclockmaster, paraphrased: What's with that Archer and Shirou thing? I'm confused.
So are we. Um, all of this is going to be spoilerish for Fate/stay night.
When I say Emiya Shirou, I mean: Issei's best friend, and the protagonist of Fate/stay night. Also the narrator.
When I say Archer, I mean: An alternate timeline version of Shirou. Shirou grew up, had a royally sucky life, made a deal with the world, and got a royally sucky afterlife. He gets summoned into the timeline of Fate/stay night during the Grail War, and butts heads with the Shirou already there.
And if I ever say proto-Archer, I mean: The version of Shirou who became Archer, before he was summoned as the Servant class Archer, and thus was still called Emiya Shirou.
If anyone has any more questions, I can go ahead and add them to the list~ And should I pin this?
First of all, why is he calling my character by their last name? Nobody does that!
Issei does. Canonically, he's shown to still call his best friend of almost two years by his last name. Emiya Shirou calls him by his first name in return, so they're obviously close enough that Issei could use his first name if he chooses to. In fact, in canon, Issei never calls anyone by their first name. This may differ in the sequel that isn't translated, but that takes place in la la la fantasy dreamland, so that technically doesn't count.
What this means for you is: he will call you by your last name. Even if he really likes you. Even if he really doesn't like you. Even if he thinks you are the embodiment of all the evils of the world, he will call you by your last name. He probably won't be very respectful otherwise (pronouns, honorifics), but you'll get the last name treatment.
Possible exceptions: if you have only one name, he'll call you that. If you insist on being called your first name, he'll eventually relent... or, more likely, not address you by name for a while, then go back to your last name when you're not paying attention. And I had him decide of his own free will to start calling someone by their first name... of course, it was his best friend of two years who'd been calling him by his first name forever, and it had just been established that Issei was willing to die for him. So, yeah, if he comes close to dying for you, he might consider you close enough to address by your first name.
You mentioned honorifics, but I haven't seen Issei use them?
That one's my fault. I, personally, don't use honorifics when writing Japanese characters unless they're things like -nii or -sensei. The thing is, we don't see Issei around characters he uses honorifics around (best friend, no honorific; mortal enemy, no honorific) except one time, when he's only just met her and calls her -san. So, if you want, you can assume he's using appropriate honorifics with you.
My character's a god/psychic/telepath/l33t haxor, so I'm going to look in his brain to find out what his secret is! Magic powers? Different species? Alien? Saved the world? Something?
Nope, nothing.
...Seriously?
Seriously. Issei has absolutely no special powers, no martial training, no feats of heroism in his background, no magic, no alien technology, nothing. He's just a guy.
So, uh, didn't I hear something about spiritual sensitivity a while back?
Well, he's a guy who's a monk, and that sensitivity's frankly hit-or-miss. He says a monk is good enough at sensing the aura of someone to make an accurate first impression, and he's usually right about someone... with one big mistake. (Tohsaka is a witch/mage and lying to the school, but she's also a good person; Saber is a good and trustworthy person, but she happens to be lying to him at the moment; Caster does dearly love Kuzuki-nii and can be a good housewife, but she doesn't mind getting Issei and other people killed.)
So basically, he's decent at forming first impressions, which isn't really a magic power, and if it was, it doesn't work over the internet anyway.
So my character's still a god/psychic/whatever. What can they know about him?
Oh, anything! There's just not much to him that he wouldn't ordinarily tell you if you asked. But seriously, if you need to know something, just send me a message saying 'hey, what's Issei's favorite flavor of ice cream, my character needs to know' and I'll tell you it's vanilla. Or whatever it is you're asking about.
What's with him and girls?
He is - well, was - equal parts scared of and disliking girls. It's not the standard misogynist 'stay in the kitchen' kind of thing; rather, he finds girls to be formidable opponents who are too powerful to be fully trusted.
Of course, online when he can better think out his responses instead of snapping at people (what he usually does to girls offline), he has no excuse for not being polite. And that led to him becoming friends with a bunch of girls, which led him to reconsidering his views on girls.
So basically, nowadays, if you're a girl, Issei assumes that you can be dangerous, but he's not much more likely to assume that you're out to harm him than he would be if you were a guy.
Isn't that blushing of his a little exaggerated from canon?
No.
To go into more detail: Issei blushes. A lot. He has fourteen different sprites, not including that one time he got possessed. Six of those, or nearly half, are blushing sprites. He blushes all the time, even at little things like worrying over someone's safety or at being thanked (by his crush, but still). I am probably downplaying his blushing tendencies, seriously.
Huh. He's pretty gay, isn't he?
Well, in canon he does think Caster and Saber are beautiful, and can be argued to have a crush on at least the former, but both times they're noted as the rare exception. So... technically he's bi? He's definitely much more interested in men, however.
What happened in his canon that I should know about?
Not much. Issei's only been told about most of it, since lol, minor character who's not in on The Secret.
Important Canon Event #1: His best friend, Emiya Shirou, suddenly ordered him to strip one day at lunch. Issei blushed like he'd never done before and didn't immediately comply, so Shirou stripped him forcibly. (He was looking for a magical symbol on Issei, but of course he couldn't tell Issei that.) This isn't really all that important, but it's good 'make Issei blush' fodder if you need something to bring up.
Important Canon Event #2: Kuzuki Souichirou, who Issei considered to be an older brother to him, was killed. (He kinda deserved it, what with accepting Caster sucking energy from the people of the town, but Issei doesn't know about that.) Issei only found out later (i.e. through here) that he was killed rather than just deciding to leave suddenly, and took it hard.
It's been a year since you apped him, shouldn't he be out of high school, and officially a monk with a shaved head and everything?
Yeah, uh, about that... Him being in high school gives me more options during viruses if he complains about missing school and everything, it gives him more people to be embarrassed around in day-to-day life, and it gives him stuff to do.
As for the hair, well, all of my icons have him with a not-shaved head, and I don't really have any of him the other way. So for right now, he's going to keep getting older on his birthdays, and at one point I'll probably decide that he's graduated, but we'll keep putting off his official becoming-a-monk. Okay?
From
dormition, paraphrased: You know he doesn't have to shave his head, right?Yes, but in canon it's said that he wants to. Thanks for telling me, though!
From
clockmaster, paraphrased: What's with that Archer and Shirou thing? I'm confused.So are we. Um, all of this is going to be spoilerish for Fate/stay night.
When I say Emiya Shirou, I mean: Issei's best friend, and the protagonist of Fate/stay night. Also the narrator.
When I say Archer, I mean: An alternate timeline version of Shirou. Shirou grew up, had a royally sucky life, made a deal with the world, and got a royally sucky afterlife. He gets summoned into the timeline of Fate/stay night during the Grail War, and butts heads with the Shirou already there.
And if I ever say proto-Archer, I mean: The version of Shirou who became Archer, before he was summoned as the Servant class Archer, and thus was still called Emiya Shirou.
If anyone has any more questions, I can go ahead and add them to the list~ And should I pin this?
no subject
I wouldn't be surprised if he's so into it partially as a defense... by which I mean, he really can't do anything else with his life until he has another Ryudo set up to inherit after him, so he takes the practical approach and doesn't try to search elsewhere. That's all speculation, obvs, but Japanese society is extremely centered around fulfilling your obligations - particularly family ones.
Alright, I'll get on that then! :3 Looking up things about Japanese religion is challenging, so don't feel badly. The Japan Times and the Japanese Journal of Religious Studies (http://www.nanzan-u.ac.jp/SHUBUNKEN/publications/jjrs/jjrsMain.htm) are two places I can wholeheartedly recommend online, but honestly a lot of the truly helpful stuff is only in books or, even more likely, hasn't been translated. A lot of what I know just comes directly from my teacher and her husband, who's a monk himself, and their experiences and research living in Japan.
no subject
If Issei was really set against being a monk, he could probably get Reikan-nii to inherit. I think most of what he does is a genuine desire to focus on being a monk. (For one thing, he's really bad at lying or just not being up-front with anything, so pretty much everything he does is genuine.) ...He's going to freak out when he realizes he himself needs a heir, though. Thank you for reminding me to mention that some day.
I'll keep those places in mind! Thanks once again, you're a great help.
no subject
But um. Yes. I'm extremely not surprised to hear that the Ryudo family had magical talent - it was a very popular way of proselytizing centuries ago. Which is not to say the practitioners didn't believe in their magical talent, it's just that the magic in it was debatable. Things such as sword-swallowing, coal-walking and intentional starvation were said to be proof of quite literally supranatural power.
ffff glad to give him more things to freak out about XD ♥
No problem, lol, it's better than blathering on to my uninterested roommates. xD
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Because Issei can never have too many things to flail over~
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There's really quite a lot of disconnect between the origins of Buddhism in Japan as relying on innate cultural beliefs in the otherworldly and modern day Japan's profound skepticism.
Supposedly my teacher once asked a monk if the sacred object's history in the temple was accurate, and he just gave her this dour look and said, "I don't think that's what's important." Aka, no you bitch it isn't but we don't care so stop spreading your foreign doubt.
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A lot of statues or mirrors and whatnot are kept intentionally secret because it's believed that exposing them to daylight and common sight would lessen their power or actually be dangerous. There's some paintings like that too. So some of these artifacts LITERALLY haven't been seen in hundreds of years, and it's only belief that says what's there.
no subject
I'm going to guess that that doesn't happen in real Japan.
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...and it's in a cave with a covered entrance. /more facepalming. I could do an entire essay on Shinto's influence on Buddhism in Japan but I will spare you. xD Suffice to say, they are not separate entities.
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Oh also, do you already have Issei set for the OT3 virus? :O You probably do but I thought I'd ask, because we need a third for Umi and Gokudera~
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Hakuba/Issei/Akako, sorry. I hope you find someone, though~