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PLAYER
NAME: Mordrid
CONTACT: MomeMordrid
OVER 18? yupyup! 36
CURRENT CHARACTERS: n/a

CHARACTER
NAME: the Ring-Spirit
* (more commonly called "Yami Bakura" by fandom, but that's technically not his name, and "the Ring-Spirit" is what I use in narration)
CANON: YuGiOh! (manga/DSoD)
CANON POINT: post-DSoD
BACKGROUND:
CW for links include: mass murder, human sacrifice, plurality-adjacent soul-fusion, amnesia, possession, harm to children, soul theft, blood, self-injury, apocalyptic ambitions.

- Upon their initial deaths, the Thief-King and the dark god (demon) known as Zorc fused their souls to become the Spirit of the Millennium Ring. (Primary history for the Ring-Spirit as an individual is in the Spirit/"Dark Bakura"s article.)

- While the wiki articles for the Ring-Spirit and Zorc claim they both perma-die at the end of the manga, well before the follow-up film "Dark Side of Dimensions", the original Japanese version of DSoD is ambiguous on whether either is still active and the English dub insists that "Corrupted Aigami" is the Ring-Spirit. The Ring-Spirit wouldn't have been active for much of the film outside a flashback (covered in "Dark Bakura"s article) and the finale (mostly covered by "Corrupted Aigami"s article); but I'd still like to take the Ring-Spirit from post-DSoD as that little bit of screen time would both strongly effect on his attitude on arrival and somewhat affect overall characterization.

- The biggest change in his characterization: the Ring-Spirit gets Exploded by Holy Light, and then at the end of the finale the pharaoh Vanishes the Millennium Items from the mortal plane, potentially freeing the souls still trapped within but definitely severing their connection to Zorc (and thus the Ring-Spirit). With the Items taken away like that, the Ring-Spirit no longer has the ability to even try opening the Door to the Afterworld. That's been his guiding purpose for his entire existence - to open the Door to let the full power of Zorc into the mortal realm and wreck havoc upon it. The Ring-Spirit's "I still exist, so imma just try Again" attitude doesn't apply if the Items do not also still exist - he'll have to find something new to be his purpose. Having been exploded by Holy Light, he's got some Issues with overly intense light; and not knowing the fate of the souls in the Items is a source of some concern and angst.

(Here is a... needlessly thorough "summary" of DSoD, while this is much more succinct but slightly less accurate.)

SUITABILITY:
Despite its reputation as a kids story/card game commercial, Yugioh is actually a pretty dark canon. As such, I've found that I have more fun and staying power when playing the Ring-Spirit in darker/more mature games, such as Bottlecap Bay is intended to be.

I'd like to explore him finding a new (hopefully more benign!) purpose in life on his own, without the overwhelming intent from his component souls' fusion or all of their baggage represented by the existence of the Millennium Items. I'd also like him to have to grapple with both Socialization and Handling Social Fallout on his own and as himself, without having a host to hide inside. Primarily though I just want to see him have to figure out what to do with himself when he has to exist, as himself, as a person, rather than simply as a tool for his component souls' revenge plot.

QUESTIONNAIRE:

⟡ Your character is on an exploration quest when they find an injured Pokemon in need of help. This Pokemon appears to be in distress and is quite dangerous, posing a risk to your character even if they mean well, and putting your quest mission at risk. What do they do? What are some possibilities of how they work with teammates to address this, or do they go at it alone?

I'm assuming the injured pokemon is a stranger, as if it's someone he actually knows then it's highly likely he'd let his personal biases make his decision, original quest be damned. The Ring-Spirit has always been a very egocentric person; even if he's making a choice that he believes to be self-sacrificing or selfless, the reasoning behind it has always been mired in his viewpoint and opinions. He also tends to be greedy about people he's decided are "his".

But anyway, stranger-pokemon: if his teammates make a strong case for this pokemon's rescue being more beneficial to the town or him personally somehow than just completing their mission, he could be persuaded to stop and help the pokemon, even if it puts him in personal danger. He keeps an eye out for his personal gain (and coming out of a mission looking even better than just successful would count) and gives zero shits about his personal safety. If he didn't have teammates making a good case for rescuing the injured pokemon though, he'd most likely just ignore them and complete his mission as originally described. He might have a reckless disregard for his own safety, but isn't big on sticking his neck out unless he'll get something out of it.

⟡ Your character's worst enemy has recently appeared in game, and has joined the guild your character is part of. They both want to tackle the same quest, and your character's enemy suggests that they work together as a team to accomplish this goal. How does your character respond to this?

CW: references to mass murder
Most likely he would outright refuse to work with his worst enemy. There is a LOT of resentment (and trauma) there - he would probably try to "steal" the quest from his enemy, completing the task before the other could regardless of who's officially supposed to be doing the task. If however his worst enemy went out of his way to be diplomatic and talk the Ring-Spirit down... there is a small chance that the Ring-Spirit would cool down enough to agree... and then attempt to backstab his enemy while they're busy.

However, I will note that it's not inconceivable that the Ring-Spirit could learn to get over himself and his issues and cooperate with his worst enemy; it's happened in a previous game I played him at. (They even became good friends!) It's just that it couldn't happen immediately on arrival as the scenario is described, instead requiring unique circumstances and/or lots of time.

Also note that his "worst enemy" is in a different class from simply "an enemy": there's a level of magnitude involved with his "worst enemy" that would be especially difficult for the Ring-Spirit to get past. In his mind, his worst enemy is responsible for the grisly deaths of his entire village (and potentially their damnation beyond that) as well as his own painful erasure from existence. And as half of the Ring-Spirit is the personification of a metaphysical force, there's also some residual tension due to having been metaphysical opponents (Light/Life (the worst enemy) vs Darkness/Destruction (the Ring-Spirit's demon-half)) as well.

⟡ The leader of your character's guild has just approached your character with an offer: they will provide your character with extra supplies, reputation points, and help them with any of their current struggles. In exchange, they ask for your character to do a favor for them that may harm the other guilds, and will not specify what the favor is in advance. It sounds shady, but it's the deal of a lifetime in your character's path to get back home, and refusing it may cause strife for your character within their current guild. What do they think of this offer? What do they ultimately decide to do?

This is the easiest question to answer: the Ring-Spirit would accept the deal. He'd think it sounds VERY shady, but also it sounds like a deal that's decidedly in his own favor: he gets something out of it, and he's not adverse to harming others. He might later on end up regretting the deal (especially if over time he's made friends with people in the other guilds), but that thought wouldn't occur to him in the moment as he doesn't really Do Plans, he just kinda Does Stuff and then however it turns out is what he claims was The Plan All Along. Depending on how much harm (and most importantly to who) the favor involves when it comes due, it's not outside the realm of possibility for him to... just. reneg his half of the deal. His word is only his bond if that's magically enforceable. (And no, he would not think ahead to "what do I do if they sabotage me in retribution" or anything like that. Not a Planner.)

⟡ Due to shortages on supplies, the city is facing issues deciding where to cut corners during this rough time. Somehow, the responsibility has fallen on your character's shoulders, and they have to make a decision. If they send out an extra team of Pokemon, they will be able to gather more food, and through that, save the lives of dozens of starving Pokemon that were in dire need of nutrition. However, the only Pokemon available to scout for food are those working at the pokeclinic, and sending them out would mean certain death for at least two ill patients. What does your character decide to do? How do they feel about this choice, and how would they deal with the pushback that comes from either side?

CW: much discussion of death including starvation
The Ring-Spirit would actually have a tough time with this one. It partly depends on how starving is "starving". Is he killing the sick pokemon to avoid killing a dozen deathly-hungry pokemon, or would he be definitely killing two pokemon in exchange for a dozen pokemon who might still survive for a while longer? The ultimate problem is that, due to past personal trauma, he's allergic to the idea of "sacrifice the few for the good of the many". (In canon, his human-half's village was brutally slaughtered, supposedly in the name of saving the rest of the kingdom; and his human-half promptly teamed up with his demon-half in order to wipe out those he deemed responsible... firstly the king, and secondly the, uh, rest of the kingdom.) If it's truly "kill two vs kill dozens" then... he'd probably try to solve the problem by donating his own food supplies but refuse to actually send out the extra team. Even if he knows for sure that he's killing dozens for two, he'd still do it. He might later claim he didn't actually know how close to death the starving pokemon were. (Not to assuage his own conscience - if he'd gone hungry too then in his mind he'd literally have done all he could - but just in efforts of shutting up whoever was whining at him.) (But yes, he would likely felt obligated to do something if these pokemon are being considered his responsibility; fuck Kings, but fuck Bad Kings especially.)

The one exception is if the two sick pokemon happen to be viewed as somehow "more important" than the average pokemon - then fuck the ""few"". He's extremely "eat the rich" in mentality, and in a society with minimal material wealth differences he'd most likely default to despising whatever standard is used to deem anyone "better" than others. And if anyone objected to this method of decision-making he'd have a huge philosophical spiel for them.

Whichever decision he made, he would view himself as having actively murdered whoever died as a result of the decision. But... he's also killed people for far less, and long viewed himself as "the bad guy of his own story" so he's unlikely to feel particularly bad about it in the aftermath.

POKEMON:
Mimikyu! (for customization, he has a small "scruff" in the fabric in front of each "ear")

Him being a Shadow-Demon-Thing that's disguised as a Cute Smol Friend just fits his vibe. I do have suggestions for alternate pokemon if mimikyu is deemed unsuitable for some reason, but I really feel like it fits him the best. It's also a Ghost-type, which fits with his card decks in canon being undead-themed and the fact that his human-side was raised by ghosts.

One thing I'm enjoying with playing a mimikyu is describing the silliness of his costume and the creepy hidden beneath it; as well as describing his confusion regarding how strongly attached he is to his costume and stick. I'm also glad mimikyus have the ability to eventually learn Shadow Claw and Shadow Ball, as those are essentially canon powers of his.

GUILD OPT-OUT: Cheri Berries (he would end up starting a revolution if he got stuck with Ribombee)
SAMPLES:
TDM Top-Level + threads
TDM thread with Shoka
Bonus: TDM thread with Dion