jiu & karteria

[rikoren]

OOC INFORMATION

Name: Kes
Are you over 18?: Yes
Contact: rikoren
Other characters: n/a
Permissions & opt-out: Permissions, Opt-out

IC INFORMATION

Name: Shen Jiu
Canon: Scum Villain's Self-Saving System
Age: 16
Gender: Male
Species: Human
Appearance: Black hair, grey eyes, reasonably attractive features, average height (will be 184cm at full adulthood), lean/slender build, long hair, long legs; on first arrival he'll be underfed and therefore look more lanky than he is.
Canon point: Shortly before reuniting with Yue Qingyuan

History: Shen Jiu's earliest known history is that he was an orphan belonging to a group of slavers. Whether he was sold, kidnapped, or picked up off the street is both unknown and unimportant; what matters is that "Jiu" is literally the number 9, signifying that he was the 9th child in their group at the time. He was probably barely four or five when the slavers paired him up with an older boy named Yue Qi (7) to beg on the street together, with Shen Jiu proving a master of faking tears to better earn the sympathy of passersby. The two boys quickly grew attached to each other, creating a familial bond that would last their entire lives.

Over the years, Shen Jiu not only showed a talent for acting, but was also ruthlessly brutal to his fellow slaves when it came to things like fighting over the most lucrative spots to beg. Yue Qi, however, grew to become a big brother figure to all the children in the group, and was often the one to try to pacify any fights that broke out or pull the other children out of danger whenever it happened. It was when Shen Jiu was around twelve years old that one of Yue Qi's attempts to rescue a younger boy from being trampled/whipped by a local noble led to Yue Qi himself also falling under the line of fire; the two boys had secretly discovered an aptitude for cultivation at some point over the years, and though Shen Jiu had been told to keep it secret so that the slavers couldn't take advantage of this discovery, he ended up using his as-yet untrained abilities to sharpen a fallen scrap of metal and stab it into the young noble's horse, rescuing both Yue Qi and the other boy, Shiwu (15). Shiwu, however, would rat him out later that same day, leading to Shen Jiu being sold to the 16-year-old Qiu Jianluo and consequently subjected to years of physical and emotional abuse. Yue Qi attempted to rescue him during the first days of his imprisonment at the Qiu Manor, but Shen Jiu told him to run, convincing him to go join a cultivation sect in hopes of returning to save him once he was strong enough to do so. Yue Qi, however, never returned, leading Shen Jiu to eventually conclude that he must have died.

Qiu Jianluo is described as having found amusement in seeing him as like a dog too fearful of its master to act on its hatred of him; he kept Shen Jiu further restrained by allowing his little sister, Qiu Haitang, to innocently treat the slave as a beloved pet, even going so far as to promise him to her as a future husband, which would in effect keep both of them bound to the house and under Qiu Jianluo's control. Shen Jiu learned to read and write during his time in this household, treating Qiu Haitang as his only safe shelter in the house due to her brother's refusal to let her know about the abuse happening beneath her nose. When Shen Jiu was around fifteen or so, a wandering cultivator stopped in the town, apparently looking for someone to take in as a disciple. The man recognized Shen Jiu's aptitude for cultivation and, with both of them knowing that he'd already passed the best age for starting such studies, Shen Jiu immediately went to Qiu Jianluo to try to get permission to leave. This altercation did not go well, with Qiu Jianluo threatening his life. In an act of desperation, Shen Jiu pulled a sword off the wall and killed his master with it; it is at this point that he finally snapped, the years of constant abuse leading to him killing every man in the entire household before setting the place on fire, though he did retain enough presence of mind to ensure that all the women made it out alive, having never been abused by anyone but the men. The cultivator who'd prompted this to happen, however, turned out to be an infamous convict named Wu Yanzi, and so Shen Jiu found himself once again trapped under a cruel master, this time being forced to assist him in robbing and murdering innocents as they traveled across the country, and learning very little actual cultivation aside from probably some of the basics. About a year later, Shen Jiu and his master are rummaging through the pockets of a small group of teenage cultivators they'd just murdered on the outskirts of the big cultivation convention (think of it like the cultivation olympics, between sects instead of countries), when he finds himself face-to-face with his long-lost brother Yue Qi, now head disciple of the Cangqiong Sect and with the fancy new name of Yue Qingyuan.

Though Shen Jiu ultimately risks his life literally backstabbing Wu Yanzi to prevent the man from killing Yue Qingyuan, his betrayal at finding the boy who'd promised to rescue him not only alive and well, but apparently thriving without him, is exacerbated further by the older boy's refusal to give him an explanation. Amidst the constant empty apologies, Shen Jiu declares Yue Qi dead to him, and though he joins the sect with Yue Qingyuan's help and ultimately rises to become second in charge of the sect, he never speaks a kind word to him again, his unwavering loyalty something he keeps locked away in his heart to the day he ultimately dies of it.

Personality answers:
What does your character think about physical appearances? Are they the sort to meticulously primp themselves, or could they not care less? To Shen Jiu, your physical appearance is less a part of who you are, and far more an aspect by which other people will judge you. As a child he was a dirty streetrat and purposely played it up to earn sympathy from strangers; in the Qiu household he was neatly dressed, hiding bruises beneath nice clothes and fear behind a polite demeanor; as disciple to Wu Yanzi, there was no real visual standard to meet, so he dressed simply and kept his hair tied mainly to keep it out of the way. In other words, he cares quite a lot about appearances, but only thinks of them on that surface level. Unless he goes back to being a beggar, he generally prefers to stay neat and clean, but will go out of his way to ensure that he looks perfectly suited to the status he's aiming to be seen as, if there is such a goal to be had. (He'll judge other people this way as well.)

What is your character most afraid of? What Shen Jiu fears most is loss—in general, but also more specifically the loss of the only person he's ever cared about. Everything he's ever gained in life was something he got through blood, sweat, and other people's tears. All he truly wants is to feel safe, regardless of what form that safety may take. If he loses a fight, that's a step back from his goal; if he loses his position, that's a step closer to the street; but if Yue Qi was confirmed dead for good, that would be the last remaining hint of warmth or happiness vanishing from his life. He'll gladly trample the hopes and dreams of children to preserve a cushy position and will keep living in a squalid dungeon just to spite the guy who put him there, but in canon, Yue Qingyuan's death was the final straw that broke him.

What would it take to truly upset your character, enough that they would act upon their feelings? Are they the sort to forgive? Shen Jiu is honestly pretty easy to upset, especially as a teenager. He's put a huge amount of effort into creating a veneer of calm composure, but being falsely accused of something he didn't do leads to him angrily reading a book upside-down in his attempts to pretend he's not angry, and betrayal of any sort tends to lead him to verbally lash out and/or actually start plotting your demise (level of severity depending on the level of betrayal). After everything he's gone through in life, it's difficult to make him world-endingly upset, but the best way to have him give up all pretense of a good upbringing is to threaten his sense of safety and (even inadvertently) mock his efforts towards it. His cultivation schoolmate Liu Qingge, for example, beats him in a fight in front of all the other students and—mistakenly assuming he's a pampered noble kid—insults him with words corresponding to that assumption. This leads Shen Jiu to not only become extremely rude to him for the rest of their lives together (though he doesn't want him dead, realizing that Liu Qingge's just dumb). He's not the type to forgive, at least not easily, and even if he does he'll never tell you that he's forgiven you.

What would be your character's lowest, darkest moment they've lived through? How did they respond to their troubles and face their demons? Shen Jiu's lowest, darkest moment was likely his time in the Qiu household. The trauma of years of mental and physical abuse was the main factor in his current inability to trust men, his tendency to think of women as an emotional safe haven (if not a physical one), and his belief that even a disgusting gutter rat can pass off as an elegant noble as long as he can act the part in public. He's internalized a lot of what he learned there and has never really stopped to question whether the beliefs instilled in him during that time might be wrong; after all, personal experience is clearly a far better teacher than the fancy manners and morals some sheltered well-off stranger might preach at him.


Inventory: A cheap sword, a small pouch with some (now-useless) coins in it, a couple cheap fire talismans (can create a single small fireball for use as a torch), and a stale grain cake
Powers/Abilities:
- Great at acting
- Fast learner
- Capable of cultivation (at present he can make objects sharp if he concentrates, but with training this can also involve creating magic talismans, conjuring fire, enchanting things, it's basically Harry Potter)
- Pickpocketing/sneaking
- He can use a sword, though he doesn't know any fancy moves

Samples: Here & Here
Player Goals: Shen Jiu spends the majority of his life basically thinking of himself as a rat pretending to be a heron; particularly up to his late teens, he'd only ever been treated as a human being by two people, neither of who was able to save him from his situation. I'd like to see how he handles being in a world where people actually put their hopes in him, rely on him, and think of him as a fellow person; it'd be interesting to see if he can manage to emotionally become more human even as his body becomes more monstrous.
Soul Choice: Can't decide between Aves, Carnivora, Ruminantia, or Glire...