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[moonlightfrost]

APPLICATION

Player Name/Handle: Sam
Plurk Handle: atkascha
Preferred pronouns (optional): she/her
Player Status: current
Other characters: Lloyd Bannings (cspd)


Character Name: Hayao Koshimizu / Tsukuyomi
Fandom: Shin Megami Tensei V
Character Journal: moonlightfrost
OU, AU, CRAU, Canon OC, or OC? OU
Canon point: Directly following the pandemonic summit.
Age: Looks maybe forty or so; is actually ??? really fucking old, over 2000 at minimum.


SETTING BACKGROUND
Per SMTV's mythology, long ago, the many gods in the world all had both Life and Knowledge, and the union of both was necessary to take the Throne of Creation. Whoever currently held the Throne could change the very rules of the world - and when the Abrahamic God deposed Baal and got his turn, He forcibly split the other gods from their Knowledge and hid it away, so that there could be no other god before him. He hid it in the fruit of a certain tree...sound familiar? So Lucifer got humans to eat it, godly Knowledge became bound to human souls, and now, the demons of the world seek out the humans who bear the Knowledge, so they can regain their old glory and stick it to God by taking the Throne themselves.

Also, Tokyo got destroyed in Armageddon, because that's what usually happens to Tokyo in these kinds of JRPGs. While God threw together an illusory duplicate to hide the survivors in, where they continue to live unaware that their real city is a desert ruin full of demons, Lucifer succeeded in killing God, and that replicated Tokyo is slowly unraveling. Someone could use the Throne to restore it...but they'll have to get there first.


PERSONALITY
As he's initially introduced, Koshimizu is something of an enigma. He's the head of the Japanese branch of Bethel, a supernatural organization that keeps demons at bay, yet he's the only human seen heading a branch - those of other regions are staffed with various deities and angels. He's the Prime Minister of Japan, but he's young for the position and nobody even knows where he went to college - one TV pundit you can talk to theorizes that he's actually an alien. He's remarkably competent at what he does - one Bethel employee notes that either of his jobs ought to be a full plate in itself, and it would take some kind of bureaucratic superhuman to handle both - but he's apparently just that good.

Given all of this, the revelation later in the game that he's actually Tsukuyomi, the moon god of the Japanese pantheon, explains an awful lot.

Both before and after the revelation, Koshimizu exudes competence, calm, and rationality - despite representing the Chaos ending in a series where the Chaos reps are mostly known for being volatile. His intention in pursuing the Throne of Creation isn't to exercise power over the rest of the world, but to restore the old way of things - where the gods all had their full levels of power, and all saw to their own corners of the globe. He's dissatisfied with how God has failed to protect Japan, and as he sees it, the Japanese pantheon are better suited to looking after their own turf - and the same applies to everywhere else, as well. He doesn't elaborate on his reasons for taking as his mortal disguise one of the most powerful people in Japan, but there's some mention of the good he's done for the country in that position, and given that the Japanese Prime Minister commands the JSDF - who are shown as having been let in on the supernatural forces at work - the obvious conclusion is that he saw that as the best way to maintain a defense without the power of a full pantheon behind it.

Despite the immense amount of power he holds, both in his mortal disguise and by virtue of being a god, he's never seen to lord it over his subordinates. He's polite and respectful, even when dealing with the high school aged members of the cast, and he gives them a chance to speak up and voice opinions, even as he's setting orders. When Bethel's leadership splits apart to pursue their own aims, the archangel Abdiel asks if he's pleased - despite being all but invited to gloat, he keeps it short and sweet, says he's quite satisfied and that entrusting the entire world to God was a mistake, and leaves. He's graceful about his death in the final dungeon, regardless of whose hand it comes by. He knows what he's after, he knows how he intends to get it, and he doesn't waste energy on showboating or risk alienating the people he needs to work with to get there. Although some demons are seen to try and kidnap or force the humans who hold their Knowledge in order to merge with them, Koshimizu clearly tells Atsuta that it's his choice whether to go through with that.

And despite his tendency to eschew displays of emotion, there's an interesting subtext to his relationship with the deuteragonist Aogami, who is actually the essence of his younger brother Susanoo, stuffed into a robot body. Aogami has no memories of his godly past, and a markedly different personality than the mythological Susanoo - there are not a lot of things to make the connection clear, and plenty of things that would make it easy not to treat them as the same entity. Despite this, Koshimizu addresses Aogami as "brother" in one scene, tells the protagonist (who holds Susanoo's Knowledge, and fuses with Aogami at the beginning of the game) that because of that connection, he feels a sense of kinship with him as well, and if the player decides to oppose Koshimizu's plan and take a different ending, he's clearly not pleased with the prospect of fighting his brother. It's explained at one point that most of the Japanese pantheon fell during Armageddon, and despite the fact that Koshimizu doesn't emote that much, there's a heavy implication that he values Aogami (and by extension, the protagonist) not just as means to an end, but as all the family he has left.

At the end of the day, however, he's a guardian deity, and that's his priority - protecting Japan and her people. If that puts him in conflict with old allies or his own family, he'll go through with it, and he won't make a display of any grief it causes him. If (when, even) that brings about his death, he expresses no regrets, and only hopes for whoever is on the Throne to do right by the people.


CANON POWERS
If fought as a boss, Tsukuyomi's power set is heavily based on ice attacks, but also includes light/holy magic, healing, debuffing enemies, and physical attacks. He also has one of those nasty little "here are some clones, better hit the real one!" gimmicks.

And that aside: you know, god. Gods can be killed in his canon, although it doesn't exactly stick - but it also seems to take them a good long time to come back from it.

POWER SELECTION

POWER TYPE
Canon powers.

FREEBIE POWERS
There is not actually a situation in canon where this has come up, so I don't have anything to cite for it, but I would make the argument that a moon god ought to have night vision on general principle, if I'm allowed to do that.

GAME POWERS
I'd like to keep the ice and light powers and ditch the rest; I'd also propose to offset the fact that he's keeping two kinds of attacks by making their power somewhat conditional on the current environment.

His ice powers would be reliant on moisture existing in the atmosphere - so in a dry environment like the current test drive, he can pull together a few attacks but he'd better make them count, because he's not going to have much to work with. Near a body of water, on the other hand, he'd be able to use them more liberally.

And for the light, I'd like to tie that directly into the lunar phase, given that he's a moon god. Daytime? No light attacks. No moon? No light attacks. Crescent moon? Usable, but it'll more be a distraction or irritant than a decent source of damage. If he wants to fight effectively against the kinds of monsters that are vulnerable to holy damage, he really wants that full moon.


ABILITIES
He fights with a scythe in his boss fight. Thanks to his human disguise as the Prime Minister of Japan, he has plenty of experience with diplomacy and politics, and it's mentioned that he got Japan out of a recession, so he presumably knows what he's doing with economics.


SAMPLES
test drivin'...

ADDITIONAL INFO
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