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[muse]: new character
Sep. 17th, 2003 09:23 amAnd he came to me in a dream. Or perhaps a nightmare; but whatever it was, it was a waking affair before I fell asleep last night.
Anyway, here's his vitals:
Name (upon manifestation): Chanticleer
True Name: None (yet).
Species: Human
Fandom: Soul Blade/Soul Calibur
Nationality: French
Age: 25
Height: 5'8"
Weight: 156 lb
Bloodtype: O
Hair: Strawberry blond
Eyes: Gray-blue
Weapons: Ankle and wrist spurs.
Fighting Style: Rooster-Style Kickboxing
Physical Description: At a solid five feet and eight inches tall, Chanticleer is not the most imposing man you'll ever meet. He is, however, a particularly handsome physical specimen. Athletic by dint of his chosen profession, he is lean and quick and muscular.
His hair is strawberry blond, usually kept swept back into a long ponytail. In proper anime fashion, his bangs, while unusually long, stay out of his face. His eyes are neither overlarge nor too small, a slatey blue-gray that sits well in the planes of his face. Like all people with his eye and hair color, he's prone to sunburns and freckling, and so tries to keep his pale hide out of the sun. But that doesn't mean he's without blemish--his back is a mess of pox scars, where it's not torn up from fighting. Likewise his hands are hoary and roughened from years as a combatant, with split scars along the knuckles. His face is nearly untouched, though he has several impressive scars up near the hairline from guarding a little too low.
Like most blonds, he can wear red and it suits him quite well. He's something of a dandy when he's off the field of combat, prefering fine clothing to impress the ladies. When in battle, he prefers gear that won't get in the way, so baggy pants bound above the knees and at the ankles are the order of the day. Vests or leather harnesses cover his bare chest.
His chosen weapons are a matched set of 'spurs' for his ankles and wrists. They are adapted from similar weapons used on actual roosters in the 'sport' of cockfighting. The spurs are wicked weapons; sharpened, hooked steel between four and six inches long. They're mounted on broad leather cuffs affixed to his wrists, middle and fourth finger, or ankles, third and fourth toe by leather thongs. Flexing his palms or soles pulls the spurs into better position for fighting.
Chanticleer's fighting style is quite fluid, if unusual. It focuses on forcing his opponent's guard down by a flurry of quick strikes, then several raking strikes with either the ankle or wrist spurs. He also fights no holds barred--it's not uncommon for him to go for the eyes or throat very early on in the fight. Because of the speed and energy he throws into his flashy fighting style, he focuses on fight-enders. Prolonged fighting can often turn into a battle of attrition, and unless Chanticleer can land enough strikes to wear his opponent down early on, he usually loses. If he has one flaw, it's his tendancy to guard his face a little too closely. Can't be getting all scarred up or haing his nose broken; it could ruin his looks.
Background: Vague, at best. Chanticleer was the scion of a lower-echelon noble family, though close to the king. As a younger son, he was doomed at best to dandyism or at worst to a slow death from venerial disease. Neither thought appealed much to him, and so one day he struck out on his own on Paris' streets--and didn't come home. He was a little old to be a gamin or a beggar, but was more than willing to do whatever it took to survive on his own, thinking that--with enough will and wits--he could do it. In short, he romanticized the life of a street person, like so many noble youth. The key difference was that he also had a great deal of will, and the streets found him a tough mouthful to devour alive. It was very difficult going, especially throughout the winters, but he struggled through.
At some point, he got into fighting. The trigger incident was actually watching a cockfight, and later being pulled into a fistfight over the outcome and the bets. He found he enjoyed the rush of battle, the sublime dance of blows and blocks exchanged. He began to linger around rougher parts of the neighborhood, then picking fights. It would probably have gotten him killed, except some mentor-figure took him aside and asked him just what on God green's earth he was doing. The revelation that he was doing it for 'fun' led him to the few rings of fighters that existed in France's underground, where he gradually learned to kickbox. The addition of the spurs and the assumption of the ring-name Chanticleer came later on, as a sort of salute to his roots in cockfighting.
When the rumors of Soul Edge got to France, Chanticleer suddenly saw his chance to step onto the world stage. At first, he lusted after it simply for its repute, and the possibility it could make him an unparalleled fighter. Then he began to see it as an opportunity to become a true hero of France, which his romantic soul longed for. At last, and to the present day, he has come to see himself as a suitor to France, and Soul Edge the best courting gift he could bring her.
Personality: Chanticleer has much of his namesake's personality. Strutting, prideful, arrogant, and ever-mindful of his looks, the French bantam often thinks of himself first and others second. Much of his life has been something of a display--at first, a display of defiance for the life his parents would have had him live; later, a show of power for the succession of women he was constantly courting; now, a demonstration of heroism for his country, as he strives to find Soul Edge in France's name.
In many ways, his pride is typically French. He loves his country, and having experienced both what heights and depths he can aspire or sink to, has a great breadth of it to love. At one point quite the lady's man, he now sees France herself as the ultimate object of his romantic aspirations; he wishes to bring to her Soul Edge as a courting gift. Of course, his aspirations for the cursed blade are somewhat confused--he has heard of the curse, but also of its renown as the fountain of youth and a great healer. He isn't quite sure what he'll do when he gets with it; it's literally on a near-daily basis that he oscillates between destroying the blade and becoming a hero for France, or bringing it home and using it to conquer the world in his country's name. The point, of course, is actually moot until he finds Soul Edge.
He does have a good chance, despite his arrogant insistance that he's one of the best fighters alive. He is stubbornly determined, and despite his showmanship, can put up a very good, very dirty fight when in the ring. Despite his considerable swaggering, he can negotiate his way out of a paper box without resorting to his fists, and his years on the street have taught him that he cannot view anyone as his lesser. He still maintains a veneer of noble charm, however, a way of looking down his nose at everyone no matter their position. In a way, Chanticleer's view of being egalitarian is to insult and belittle everyone equally.
Like many of his countrymen, Chanticleer is a study of opposites--he can be both a profound romantic and a profound cynic, sublime or venal in the same breath. He enjoys the 'fine' things in life--good wine, good cheese, pretty hookers--and at the same time isn't adverse to getting into a violent scuffle to pass the time. He is both polished and rough and tumble, honorable (to a degree) and a cheating rogue. In a way, he picks what suits him of both the underworld and the court, and rolls it all together in an individual patois that can be charming.
Flirtatious to a fault, Chanticleer is an idiot around the opposite sex. While he can often woo the ladies with a show of romantic flair, his overbearing arrogance and chivalry has been the end of many 'long-term' relationships. Naturally, Chanticleer is as promiscuous as his namesake as well, so 'long term' is usually two to three weeks. He has little or no interest in settling down, though in true romantic style, expects that some day he will find the 'one' for him. But of course, he's also courting France herself, and she is an unattainable bride.
Relations to the Canon Characters: Chanticleer hasn't actually met any of his fellow seekers of Soul Edge; and, unlike most of them, he has yet to encounter anything with the blade's taint. Actually finding some of the shards should be sufficient to send him out of France on his quest. He HAS heard rumors, however, and knows of Raphael Sorel--though not his reasons for seeking the cursed blade. In all likelyhood, should Chanticleer learn of what Raphael is up to, he would sorely disapprove. The fact that the man's also a willing ex-patriot does not sit well with Chanticleer, who is nearly jingoist in his inclinations.
Most of the seekers from any further east than Germany are also a mystery. He has never heard the foreign names of Xianghua, Yunsung, Maxi, Mitsurugi, or Kilik. Seung Mina, Sophitia, Cassandra--as he has never occasioned to meet these ladies, he knows and cares nothing for them. Charade--unknown to almost EVERYONE save as a very distant rumor--is completely unheard of in Chanticleer's part of France. Likewise Astaroth. Sweet and gentle Talim comes from a country that Chanticleer doesn't even know EXISTS, let alone her village of wind-worshippers.
His fellow Europeans are about as mysterious, though he knows somewhat of their doings. Siegfried Schtauffen and his band of mercenaries, as well as Nightmare's bloody swath through western Europe, were the talk of all of France not so long ago. The three who stood to oppose him are never mentioned by name in any of the rumors, but Chanticleer does know--somewhat distantly--that they exist. Cervantes de Leon is a hiss and a byword in the parts of the port Chanticleer frequents, though he knows only that the old pirate is supposedly dead, as is his crew--and of course, there is an impressive rumor of ghost ships and damned crews that surround Cervantes. The Money Pit is another similarly fantastical rumor, as is its (supposedly) monstrous guardian. Surely that creature could not be a HUMAN! (In certain circles Chanticleer has contact with, 'Il Mastino da Vercci' still has a following, though there is active speculation as to where the blind fighter WENT prior to his master's death. Most say he's dead.) Isabella Valentine is also an unknown quantity, though Chanticleer has heard the usual rumors--of her beauty, her strange sword, and what little love she seems to hold for men as a whole.
Inspiration: Chanticleer the rooster from The Book of the Dun Cow. Which, I suppose, would make Soul Edge Wyrm and Nightmare Cockatrice, with Voldo as Mundo Cani (or whatever the spelling was).
Still need a real name for him, though. The only precedent in Soul Calibur of someone using a name other than their given one is Isabella/Ivy.
muse
Anyway, here's his vitals:
Name (upon manifestation): Chanticleer
True Name: None (yet).
Species: Human
Fandom: Soul Blade/Soul Calibur
Nationality: French
Age: 25
Height: 5'8"
Weight: 156 lb
Bloodtype: O
Hair: Strawberry blond
Eyes: Gray-blue
Weapons: Ankle and wrist spurs.
Fighting Style: Rooster-Style Kickboxing
Physical Description: At a solid five feet and eight inches tall, Chanticleer is not the most imposing man you'll ever meet. He is, however, a particularly handsome physical specimen. Athletic by dint of his chosen profession, he is lean and quick and muscular.
His hair is strawberry blond, usually kept swept back into a long ponytail. In proper anime fashion, his bangs, while unusually long, stay out of his face. His eyes are neither overlarge nor too small, a slatey blue-gray that sits well in the planes of his face. Like all people with his eye and hair color, he's prone to sunburns and freckling, and so tries to keep his pale hide out of the sun. But that doesn't mean he's without blemish--his back is a mess of pox scars, where it's not torn up from fighting. Likewise his hands are hoary and roughened from years as a combatant, with split scars along the knuckles. His face is nearly untouched, though he has several impressive scars up near the hairline from guarding a little too low.
Like most blonds, he can wear red and it suits him quite well. He's something of a dandy when he's off the field of combat, prefering fine clothing to impress the ladies. When in battle, he prefers gear that won't get in the way, so baggy pants bound above the knees and at the ankles are the order of the day. Vests or leather harnesses cover his bare chest.
His chosen weapons are a matched set of 'spurs' for his ankles and wrists. They are adapted from similar weapons used on actual roosters in the 'sport' of cockfighting. The spurs are wicked weapons; sharpened, hooked steel between four and six inches long. They're mounted on broad leather cuffs affixed to his wrists, middle and fourth finger, or ankles, third and fourth toe by leather thongs. Flexing his palms or soles pulls the spurs into better position for fighting.
Chanticleer's fighting style is quite fluid, if unusual. It focuses on forcing his opponent's guard down by a flurry of quick strikes, then several raking strikes with either the ankle or wrist spurs. He also fights no holds barred--it's not uncommon for him to go for the eyes or throat very early on in the fight. Because of the speed and energy he throws into his flashy fighting style, he focuses on fight-enders. Prolonged fighting can often turn into a battle of attrition, and unless Chanticleer can land enough strikes to wear his opponent down early on, he usually loses. If he has one flaw, it's his tendancy to guard his face a little too closely. Can't be getting all scarred up or haing his nose broken; it could ruin his looks.
Background: Vague, at best. Chanticleer was the scion of a lower-echelon noble family, though close to the king. As a younger son, he was doomed at best to dandyism or at worst to a slow death from venerial disease. Neither thought appealed much to him, and so one day he struck out on his own on Paris' streets--and didn't come home. He was a little old to be a gamin or a beggar, but was more than willing to do whatever it took to survive on his own, thinking that--with enough will and wits--he could do it. In short, he romanticized the life of a street person, like so many noble youth. The key difference was that he also had a great deal of will, and the streets found him a tough mouthful to devour alive. It was very difficult going, especially throughout the winters, but he struggled through.
At some point, he got into fighting. The trigger incident was actually watching a cockfight, and later being pulled into a fistfight over the outcome and the bets. He found he enjoyed the rush of battle, the sublime dance of blows and blocks exchanged. He began to linger around rougher parts of the neighborhood, then picking fights. It would probably have gotten him killed, except some mentor-figure took him aside and asked him just what on God green's earth he was doing. The revelation that he was doing it for 'fun' led him to the few rings of fighters that existed in France's underground, where he gradually learned to kickbox. The addition of the spurs and the assumption of the ring-name Chanticleer came later on, as a sort of salute to his roots in cockfighting.
When the rumors of Soul Edge got to France, Chanticleer suddenly saw his chance to step onto the world stage. At first, he lusted after it simply for its repute, and the possibility it could make him an unparalleled fighter. Then he began to see it as an opportunity to become a true hero of France, which his romantic soul longed for. At last, and to the present day, he has come to see himself as a suitor to France, and Soul Edge the best courting gift he could bring her.
Personality: Chanticleer has much of his namesake's personality. Strutting, prideful, arrogant, and ever-mindful of his looks, the French bantam often thinks of himself first and others second. Much of his life has been something of a display--at first, a display of defiance for the life his parents would have had him live; later, a show of power for the succession of women he was constantly courting; now, a demonstration of heroism for his country, as he strives to find Soul Edge in France's name.
In many ways, his pride is typically French. He loves his country, and having experienced both what heights and depths he can aspire or sink to, has a great breadth of it to love. At one point quite the lady's man, he now sees France herself as the ultimate object of his romantic aspirations; he wishes to bring to her Soul Edge as a courting gift. Of course, his aspirations for the cursed blade are somewhat confused--he has heard of the curse, but also of its renown as the fountain of youth and a great healer. He isn't quite sure what he'll do when he gets with it; it's literally on a near-daily basis that he oscillates between destroying the blade and becoming a hero for France, or bringing it home and using it to conquer the world in his country's name. The point, of course, is actually moot until he finds Soul Edge.
He does have a good chance, despite his arrogant insistance that he's one of the best fighters alive. He is stubbornly determined, and despite his showmanship, can put up a very good, very dirty fight when in the ring. Despite his considerable swaggering, he can negotiate his way out of a paper box without resorting to his fists, and his years on the street have taught him that he cannot view anyone as his lesser. He still maintains a veneer of noble charm, however, a way of looking down his nose at everyone no matter their position. In a way, Chanticleer's view of being egalitarian is to insult and belittle everyone equally.
Like many of his countrymen, Chanticleer is a study of opposites--he can be both a profound romantic and a profound cynic, sublime or venal in the same breath. He enjoys the 'fine' things in life--good wine, good cheese, pretty hookers--and at the same time isn't adverse to getting into a violent scuffle to pass the time. He is both polished and rough and tumble, honorable (to a degree) and a cheating rogue. In a way, he picks what suits him of both the underworld and the court, and rolls it all together in an individual patois that can be charming.
Flirtatious to a fault, Chanticleer is an idiot around the opposite sex. While he can often woo the ladies with a show of romantic flair, his overbearing arrogance and chivalry has been the end of many 'long-term' relationships. Naturally, Chanticleer is as promiscuous as his namesake as well, so 'long term' is usually two to three weeks. He has little or no interest in settling down, though in true romantic style, expects that some day he will find the 'one' for him. But of course, he's also courting France herself, and she is an unattainable bride.
Relations to the Canon Characters: Chanticleer hasn't actually met any of his fellow seekers of Soul Edge; and, unlike most of them, he has yet to encounter anything with the blade's taint. Actually finding some of the shards should be sufficient to send him out of France on his quest. He HAS heard rumors, however, and knows of Raphael Sorel--though not his reasons for seeking the cursed blade. In all likelyhood, should Chanticleer learn of what Raphael is up to, he would sorely disapprove. The fact that the man's also a willing ex-patriot does not sit well with Chanticleer, who is nearly jingoist in his inclinations.
Most of the seekers from any further east than Germany are also a mystery. He has never heard the foreign names of Xianghua, Yunsung, Maxi, Mitsurugi, or Kilik. Seung Mina, Sophitia, Cassandra--as he has never occasioned to meet these ladies, he knows and cares nothing for them. Charade--unknown to almost EVERYONE save as a very distant rumor--is completely unheard of in Chanticleer's part of France. Likewise Astaroth. Sweet and gentle Talim comes from a country that Chanticleer doesn't even know EXISTS, let alone her village of wind-worshippers.
His fellow Europeans are about as mysterious, though he knows somewhat of their doings. Siegfried Schtauffen and his band of mercenaries, as well as Nightmare's bloody swath through western Europe, were the talk of all of France not so long ago. The three who stood to oppose him are never mentioned by name in any of the rumors, but Chanticleer does know--somewhat distantly--that they exist. Cervantes de Leon is a hiss and a byword in the parts of the port Chanticleer frequents, though he knows only that the old pirate is supposedly dead, as is his crew--and of course, there is an impressive rumor of ghost ships and damned crews that surround Cervantes. The Money Pit is another similarly fantastical rumor, as is its (supposedly) monstrous guardian. Surely that creature could not be a HUMAN! (In certain circles Chanticleer has contact with, 'Il Mastino da Vercci' still has a following, though there is active speculation as to where the blind fighter WENT prior to his master's death. Most say he's dead.) Isabella Valentine is also an unknown quantity, though Chanticleer has heard the usual rumors--of her beauty, her strange sword, and what little love she seems to hold for men as a whole.
Inspiration: Chanticleer the rooster from The Book of the Dun Cow. Which, I suppose, would make Soul Edge Wyrm and Nightmare Cockatrice, with Voldo as Mundo Cani (or whatever the spelling was).
Still need a real name for him, though. The only precedent in Soul Calibur of someone using a name other than their given one is Isabella/Ivy.
muse