APP;
okay, so a whole fucking lot of this is recycled from my splendorocity app, BUT! (;
Player
Name: Amber
Livejournal Username: hieronymousb
E-mail: perjautse@gmail.com
AIM/MSN: (AIM) Ambre Nosmada
Timezone: EST
Current Characters in Route: N/A
Character
Name: Rokudo Mukuro
Series: Katekyo Hitman Reborn!
Timeline: Chapter 329
Canon Resource Links: KHR-specific Wiki and regular Wiki.
Personality: (Some of this references the TYL timeline, but Mukuro's personality is essentially the same throughout.)
What does one say about the personality of one who introduces himself as having come from from a place much like hell? A man who views human beings as toys, and who wants to drown the world in a beautiful sea of blood? You might well describe such an individual as one crazy fucker, and you would be correct in this! To cease at this description, however, would not adequately express the paradoxical curiosities which embody Mukuro's character. As the villain who singlehandedly transforms KHR from a gag manga about mafia shenanigans during daily life to a more traditionally shounen-styled fight manga, Mukuro's singleminded, obsessive goal during his first appearance is the possession of Sawada Tsunayoshi's body such that he may exploit Tsuna's role as Vongola Decimo to exact his revenge against the mafia. Mukuro wishes to use his unique body-thieving powers to destroy the mafia from within, and then he wishes to go even further, possessing world leaders in order to start an entire world war. Such grandiose dreams never come to fruition, but that's not the point. The point is, Mukuro at least claims, with a straight (if ever-smirking) face, that he intends to start a war and wash away the human world with its own blood.
Let's do a little background to put Mukuro's whacky tendencies into perspective: When he was a small child, Mukuro and other children were experimented upon by the Estraneo Family; to say he's pissed about that treatment at the hands of the mafia would be relatively accurate. After escaping from his childhood captivity (read: murdering all the scientists who experimented upon him and utterly destroying the laboratory in which he and the other kids were kept), Mukuro is adopted by the boss of a man named Lancia -- a man who is a member of a certain Italian mafia Family. Although Lancia comes to care deeply for the cute, ever-smiling child his Family takes under its wings, a strange "Incident" soon occurs: Lancia finds himself waking up to slaughters. Mass murders. His people have been killed. And guess who offed them? Lancia. Or, rather, Mukuro, now possessing Lancia's body and whispering from the shadows. We are left to imagine how Lancia must feel when his own body no longer controls his actions -- when he cannot even make the choice to die, to kill himself, without Mukuro's approval. Fast forward a few years. Fifteen years old, Mukuro is already an escaped convict who had been previously assigned to death row for his crimes against the mafia. Tsuna and friends defeat Mukuro and friends. Lancia is free at last. Mukuro ends up imprisoned for a second time.
The story could end there. But it doesn't.
Like many a shounen antagonist before him, when Mukuro re-appears in the manga, he is nominally on the side of the protagonists, i.e. Vongola. Nominally. Because, you see, he makes a pact with Sawada Iemitsu: in exchange for the freedom of his underlings, Joushima Ken and Kakimoto Chikusa, Mukuro agrees to take on the role of Tsuna's Mist Guardian. To Tsuna himself, Mukuro proclaims that he has only adopted this function to better position himself to take over Tsuna's body for his nefarious purposes; AND HE WOULD HAVE GOTTEN AWAY WITH IT IF NOT FOR THOSE MEDDLING KIDS, etc.. Mukuro's tentative association with Vongola does not change the fact that he is uneasy with his allies; he continues to be resentful towards the group and towards the mafia as a whole. Mukuro freely walks around saying that he loathes the title of Mist Guardian, openly insisting that he will betray Tsuna at his earliest possible convenience. Although Mukuro needs Chrome's body as his vessel by which he incarnates the illusion of himself, it can also be assumed that Mukuro positions Chrome as the other half of the Mist Guardian as a means of distancing himself from the role. Fast forward ten years into the future. We don't know everything about TYL!Mukuro or what he's been up to. Much of the past decade remains shrouded in mystery. But we do know that, when see Mukuro in the future, he's working to infiltrate Byakuran's organization. Byakuran catches him in the act; the two fight, and Mukuro is grievously injured, but he manages to escape, apparently via the use of his multiple bodies. He sends information of Melon Base to Chrome. Later, he again appears (as an illusion) in an attempt to thwart Byakuran and give Tsuna and the others time to escape. The real Mukuro shows up at the final battle with Byakuran, trolling the Varia and the Funeral Wreaths simultaneously as he uses illusions of slain Varia in order to gain information on the Wreaths' powers. Till the bitter end, Mukuro denies that he actually wants to help Vongola, insisting that Tsuna and Chrome are naive children who take his actions at face value.
What composite picture of Mukuro's personality can be drawn from the history described above?
Deceitful. Dishonest. It's tempting to say that these are Mukuro's most salient personality qualities. As an illusionist, his skills rely upon tricking the minds of others, and sometimes he even takes others' bodies, pretending at their identities in order to advance his own goals. When Mukuro first encounters Tsuna, he attempts to pass himself off as a normal human being, although his inherent oddness quickly causes Tsuna to realize that something isn't right.
And yet, amidst Mukuro's nature as a trickster, it is difficult to reconcile the fact that, at times, he appears paradoxically straightforward. He makes no secret of his outlandish goals. He tells Tsuna that he will someday betray him, which, if true, is also surprisingly honest about ill intentions. In one of the anime extras, Reborn notes that Mukuro has an uncanny tendency to actually uphold his obligations. Of course, this was an omake, but the joke does highlight an actual series point -- Mukuro, though he protests much, does come to the aid of those with whom he has been forced to work, and he does so consistently. Why? The most likely answer, it seems to me, is that Mukuro has found in Vongola a channel whereby he can oppose the mafia from within, albeit other parts of the mafia. Much as Hibari uses Vongola as a way of procuring battles for himself, it may be supposed that Mukuro uses Vongola to take down people like Byakuran. Shared foes. Mafia. But is Mukuro working both sides? Does he actually plot to undo Vongola, as he at times seems to suggest? Ten years is a long time; we just don't know what secret plans he may have been up to. We do see that he and Chrome were plotting something with respect to Glo Xinia, and Mukuro presumably continues to have goals which do not coincide strictly with Tsuna's. But we just don't know much of what these entail. Mukuro as a character is largely an enigma.
Mukuro's not a nice chap. He's selfish, mocking, manipulative, and essentially an unbearable douchebag. But he's not entirely terrible. He can help people so long as their goals converge with his; it won't be out of benevolence, but rather pragmatism and cunning, but it may be said to count. Then you have his relationships with Ken, Chikusa, and Chrome. If Mukuro is capable of caring about anyone, it's these three. Though he still takes Ken's and Chikusa's bodies as if it's no big deal (and they, too, seem to see it this way), he also sacrifices his own freedom to let them escape, and sacrifices it again when he agrees to assist the mafia he loathes in exchange for their freedom. In neither instance does Mukuro own up to this, however; he tells Ken and Chikusa to go on ahead because they're dragging him down, and he tells Tsuna he only agreed to be Mist Guardian to facilitate his own plans. So one could say Mukuro prefers to disguise his own occasional acts of benevolence. His relationship with Chrome is perhaps even more tricky in that regard; towards her, he acts openly encouraging, insists that she's capable, that he needs her, props her up, and so on. One must wonder whether he cares about these people as people or whether he simply does all this so that he may use their resources. The answer, as ever with Mukuro, is probably in between the two. He does want to use Chrome in much the same way as Vongola uses him, but in spite of what he says, he seems to see her/Ken/Chikusa as independent enough that he takes risks for them at times.
Finally, for all that Mukuro is terribly dark and creepy, especially during his original arc, he (like most KHR characters) has a few lulz qualities. For one, he himself is always lulzing, as with his signature kufufu~, but he also has a curious interest in school uniforms and makes all of his underlings wear Kokuyo school uniforms. There's a brief but on-going visual gag in the Future Arc when Mukuro repeatedly stabs Fran's frog hat because he won't stop saying ridiculous things like commenting on Mukuro's "pineapple" hair. Then you have the trolling of the Varia, and the possession of the Mist Owl. Mukuro's strategies sometimes become so outlandish as to become kind of amusing, and he's definitely in on the joke.
For him, the whole world appears to be one.
Strengths/Weaknesses: Mukuro would probably say his own biggest strength (powers aside) is his ability to manipulate others, considering he freely refers to others as his toys and appears to pride himself on puppeting them around accordingly. Outwardly, he can be calm and charismatic, seemingly lackadaisical, as he often appears with a smirk. In the most recent chapter, Daemon Spade remarks that Mukuro knows how to be angry, but he considers anger a weakness. Mukuro likes to keep people guessing about his intentions and probably regards ambiguity as a strategical strength (which in many cases, it can be). He seems to be quite intelligent and good at concocting strategies, albeit often rather unusual, roundabout ones, such as that which he used to defeat Glo Xinia.
Mukuro has never expressed any fears, per se, but as he claims that the human realm is the ugliest of his six realms, and the one he despises the most -- and as he is constantly separating himself from his own humanity -- it may be supposed that on some level, his biggest fear is "human weakness," and above all, he must appear not to have it. If this is a fear, however, it does not manifest directly as one. Mukuro appears to keep a very tight leash on such feelings, if he does have them -- which he probably does on some level, because despite his claims, he is still human. In terms of weaknesses, Mukuro's biggest weakness is undoubtedly his own arrogance. He over-estimated himself and his abilities during his confrontation with Byakuran and almost died as a consequence; however, even there, he found a loophole and a way out. Mukuro has fallen hard as a result of his high opinion of himself (one might put the original fight with Tsuna into this category as well), though it's yet to become an insurmountable loss for him, because another of his strengths is that he's good at working with what resources he has available. Even when he finds himself locked in a water tank in a prison below the ground, he is able to achieve some mobility through Chrome. Mukuro is nothing if not resourceful, although his pride does sometimes cause him to take falls along the way.
Pokémon Information
Affiliation: Trainer
Starter: Hoot Hoot
Password: Seasalt Icecream
Samples
First Person Sample: ( v o i c e )
[ Hello, Johto. Cue a laugh (クフフ).
Fluttering of wings audible over the PokéGear, then something which sounds rather reminiscent of a hoot (though it is daylight), and the slightest sound of fingertips (gloved, as it were) exploring the touch screen. ]
I believe it would be safe to say this is not the location I had in mind. [ -- yeah, is that the tiniest sliver of annoyance you hear? Because he is pretty fucking pissed off, timing considered. ] I have matters to attend to elsewhere, you see.
[ A pause. More laughter, but a little less jovial.
Wings SMACKING THE PokéGear, a slight struggle, hoot, and -- ]
One might say they are rather urgent.
[ -- which is to say: where the hell is this? Possibly a literal hell, knowing him, except that it does not look familiar. And he's never known hell to hold owls.
Divulge the location.
(Click.) ]
Third Person Sample:
In truth -- rare for him as the truth may be -- Mukuro cannot remember when last he awoke in a bed. Caught in the anaesthetized slumber of a timeless sea, all water and chains and perpetually closed eyes, it has become difficult to discern sleep from waking; dreams from reality, and the course of illusions flows like a river between both, carving a fair approximation of life and livelihood. Before this, before the chilly wet imprisonment, there were other imprisonments.
Stone shelves, dirty floors, laboratory tables, filthy couches, but only once -- once in the brief phase of the nightmare of boyhood, had there been a bed. A bedroom. Yet here one is, as if it crawled out of sleep and cocooned its surroundings (a real illusion taking itself slightly too literally): trite, simple, nearly empty. His first thought: another prison. And perhaps it is. Curiously, he feels no trace of his abilities. No trace of the girl. Reality has become mathematical and far too solid; immutable.
A cursory (perfunctory) examination reveals devices, including one which would appear to be for communication and broadcasts. Amateur Blackberry, as it were. Perhaps for the kidnapper(s) to give commands in a form best reserved for suspense and horror films --- but ah, perhaps this is simply the imagination running slightly too morbid? Forgive him. He inherits this history earnestly. Now, what shall be made of the circular object? With a slight inspection, it releases an animal, and Mukuro cannot help but presume this to be some form of Box Weapon technology (albeit shaped differently; strange, that), as Box Weapons each take the form of animals, and --
Oh, a laugh: Another owl?
Truly now?
Leather-clad tap of fingers to its wings.
Its personality already seems more agreeable than the one to which he is accustomed.
Rokudo Mukuro has little need of owls, beds, would-be prisons, or sub-par Blackberries.
On the last of these, however, he will provide the following --
(Cue first person sample.)
Player
Name: Amber
Livejournal Username: hieronymousb
E-mail: perjautse@gmail.com
AIM/MSN: (AIM) Ambre Nosmada
Timezone: EST
Current Characters in Route: N/A
Character
Name: Rokudo Mukuro
Series: Katekyo Hitman Reborn!
Timeline: Chapter 329
Canon Resource Links: KHR-specific Wiki and regular Wiki.
Personality: (Some of this references the TYL timeline, but Mukuro's personality is essentially the same throughout.)
What does one say about the personality of one who introduces himself as having come from from a place much like hell? A man who views human beings as toys, and who wants to drown the world in a beautiful sea of blood? You might well describe such an individual as one crazy fucker, and you would be correct in this! To cease at this description, however, would not adequately express the paradoxical curiosities which embody Mukuro's character. As the villain who singlehandedly transforms KHR from a gag manga about mafia shenanigans during daily life to a more traditionally shounen-styled fight manga, Mukuro's singleminded, obsessive goal during his first appearance is the possession of Sawada Tsunayoshi's body such that he may exploit Tsuna's role as Vongola Decimo to exact his revenge against the mafia. Mukuro wishes to use his unique body-thieving powers to destroy the mafia from within, and then he wishes to go even further, possessing world leaders in order to start an entire world war. Such grandiose dreams never come to fruition, but that's not the point. The point is, Mukuro at least claims, with a straight (if ever-smirking) face, that he intends to start a war and wash away the human world with its own blood.
Let's do a little background to put Mukuro's whacky tendencies into perspective: When he was a small child, Mukuro and other children were experimented upon by the Estraneo Family; to say he's pissed about that treatment at the hands of the mafia would be relatively accurate. After escaping from his childhood captivity (read: murdering all the scientists who experimented upon him and utterly destroying the laboratory in which he and the other kids were kept), Mukuro is adopted by the boss of a man named Lancia -- a man who is a member of a certain Italian mafia Family. Although Lancia comes to care deeply for the cute, ever-smiling child his Family takes under its wings, a strange "Incident" soon occurs: Lancia finds himself waking up to slaughters. Mass murders. His people have been killed. And guess who offed them? Lancia. Or, rather, Mukuro, now possessing Lancia's body and whispering from the shadows. We are left to imagine how Lancia must feel when his own body no longer controls his actions -- when he cannot even make the choice to die, to kill himself, without Mukuro's approval. Fast forward a few years. Fifteen years old, Mukuro is already an escaped convict who had been previously assigned to death row for his crimes against the mafia. Tsuna and friends defeat Mukuro and friends. Lancia is free at last. Mukuro ends up imprisoned for a second time.
The story could end there. But it doesn't.
Like many a shounen antagonist before him, when Mukuro re-appears in the manga, he is nominally on the side of the protagonists, i.e. Vongola. Nominally. Because, you see, he makes a pact with Sawada Iemitsu: in exchange for the freedom of his underlings, Joushima Ken and Kakimoto Chikusa, Mukuro agrees to take on the role of Tsuna's Mist Guardian. To Tsuna himself, Mukuro proclaims that he has only adopted this function to better position himself to take over Tsuna's body for his nefarious purposes; AND HE WOULD HAVE GOTTEN AWAY WITH IT IF NOT FOR THOSE MEDDLING KIDS, etc.. Mukuro's tentative association with Vongola does not change the fact that he is uneasy with his allies; he continues to be resentful towards the group and towards the mafia as a whole. Mukuro freely walks around saying that he loathes the title of Mist Guardian, openly insisting that he will betray Tsuna at his earliest possible convenience. Although Mukuro needs Chrome's body as his vessel by which he incarnates the illusion of himself, it can also be assumed that Mukuro positions Chrome as the other half of the Mist Guardian as a means of distancing himself from the role. Fast forward ten years into the future. We don't know everything about TYL!Mukuro or what he's been up to. Much of the past decade remains shrouded in mystery. But we do know that, when see Mukuro in the future, he's working to infiltrate Byakuran's organization. Byakuran catches him in the act; the two fight, and Mukuro is grievously injured, but he manages to escape, apparently via the use of his multiple bodies. He sends information of Melon Base to Chrome. Later, he again appears (as an illusion) in an attempt to thwart Byakuran and give Tsuna and the others time to escape. The real Mukuro shows up at the final battle with Byakuran, trolling the Varia and the Funeral Wreaths simultaneously as he uses illusions of slain Varia in order to gain information on the Wreaths' powers. Till the bitter end, Mukuro denies that he actually wants to help Vongola, insisting that Tsuna and Chrome are naive children who take his actions at face value.
What composite picture of Mukuro's personality can be drawn from the history described above?
Deceitful. Dishonest. It's tempting to say that these are Mukuro's most salient personality qualities. As an illusionist, his skills rely upon tricking the minds of others, and sometimes he even takes others' bodies, pretending at their identities in order to advance his own goals. When Mukuro first encounters Tsuna, he attempts to pass himself off as a normal human being, although his inherent oddness quickly causes Tsuna to realize that something isn't right.
And yet, amidst Mukuro's nature as a trickster, it is difficult to reconcile the fact that, at times, he appears paradoxically straightforward. He makes no secret of his outlandish goals. He tells Tsuna that he will someday betray him, which, if true, is also surprisingly honest about ill intentions. In one of the anime extras, Reborn notes that Mukuro has an uncanny tendency to actually uphold his obligations. Of course, this was an omake, but the joke does highlight an actual series point -- Mukuro, though he protests much, does come to the aid of those with whom he has been forced to work, and he does so consistently. Why? The most likely answer, it seems to me, is that Mukuro has found in Vongola a channel whereby he can oppose the mafia from within, albeit other parts of the mafia. Much as Hibari uses Vongola as a way of procuring battles for himself, it may be supposed that Mukuro uses Vongola to take down people like Byakuran. Shared foes. Mafia. But is Mukuro working both sides? Does he actually plot to undo Vongola, as he at times seems to suggest? Ten years is a long time; we just don't know what secret plans he may have been up to. We do see that he and Chrome were plotting something with respect to Glo Xinia, and Mukuro presumably continues to have goals which do not coincide strictly with Tsuna's. But we just don't know much of what these entail. Mukuro as a character is largely an enigma.
Mukuro's not a nice chap. He's selfish, mocking, manipulative, and essentially an unbearable douchebag. But he's not entirely terrible. He can help people so long as their goals converge with his; it won't be out of benevolence, but rather pragmatism and cunning, but it may be said to count. Then you have his relationships with Ken, Chikusa, and Chrome. If Mukuro is capable of caring about anyone, it's these three. Though he still takes Ken's and Chikusa's bodies as if it's no big deal (and they, too, seem to see it this way), he also sacrifices his own freedom to let them escape, and sacrifices it again when he agrees to assist the mafia he loathes in exchange for their freedom. In neither instance does Mukuro own up to this, however; he tells Ken and Chikusa to go on ahead because they're dragging him down, and he tells Tsuna he only agreed to be Mist Guardian to facilitate his own plans. So one could say Mukuro prefers to disguise his own occasional acts of benevolence. His relationship with Chrome is perhaps even more tricky in that regard; towards her, he acts openly encouraging, insists that she's capable, that he needs her, props her up, and so on. One must wonder whether he cares about these people as people or whether he simply does all this so that he may use their resources. The answer, as ever with Mukuro, is probably in between the two. He does want to use Chrome in much the same way as Vongola uses him, but in spite of what he says, he seems to see her/Ken/Chikusa as independent enough that he takes risks for them at times.
Finally, for all that Mukuro is terribly dark and creepy, especially during his original arc, he (like most KHR characters) has a few lulz qualities. For one, he himself is always lulzing, as with his signature kufufu~, but he also has a curious interest in school uniforms and makes all of his underlings wear Kokuyo school uniforms. There's a brief but on-going visual gag in the Future Arc when Mukuro repeatedly stabs Fran's frog hat because he won't stop saying ridiculous things like commenting on Mukuro's "pineapple" hair. Then you have the trolling of the Varia, and the possession of the Mist Owl. Mukuro's strategies sometimes become so outlandish as to become kind of amusing, and he's definitely in on the joke.
For him, the whole world appears to be one.
Strengths/Weaknesses: Mukuro would probably say his own biggest strength (powers aside) is his ability to manipulate others, considering he freely refers to others as his toys and appears to pride himself on puppeting them around accordingly. Outwardly, he can be calm and charismatic, seemingly lackadaisical, as he often appears with a smirk. In the most recent chapter, Daemon Spade remarks that Mukuro knows how to be angry, but he considers anger a weakness. Mukuro likes to keep people guessing about his intentions and probably regards ambiguity as a strategical strength (which in many cases, it can be). He seems to be quite intelligent and good at concocting strategies, albeit often rather unusual, roundabout ones, such as that which he used to defeat Glo Xinia.
Mukuro has never expressed any fears, per se, but as he claims that the human realm is the ugliest of his six realms, and the one he despises the most -- and as he is constantly separating himself from his own humanity -- it may be supposed that on some level, his biggest fear is "human weakness," and above all, he must appear not to have it. If this is a fear, however, it does not manifest directly as one. Mukuro appears to keep a very tight leash on such feelings, if he does have them -- which he probably does on some level, because despite his claims, he is still human. In terms of weaknesses, Mukuro's biggest weakness is undoubtedly his own arrogance. He over-estimated himself and his abilities during his confrontation with Byakuran and almost died as a consequence; however, even there, he found a loophole and a way out. Mukuro has fallen hard as a result of his high opinion of himself (one might put the original fight with Tsuna into this category as well), though it's yet to become an insurmountable loss for him, because another of his strengths is that he's good at working with what resources he has available. Even when he finds himself locked in a water tank in a prison below the ground, he is able to achieve some mobility through Chrome. Mukuro is nothing if not resourceful, although his pride does sometimes cause him to take falls along the way.
Pokémon Information
Affiliation: Trainer
Starter: Hoot Hoot
Password: Seasalt Icecream
Samples
First Person Sample: ( v o i c e )
[ Hello, Johto. Cue a laugh (クフフ).
Fluttering of wings audible over the PokéGear, then something which sounds rather reminiscent of a hoot (though it is daylight), and the slightest sound of fingertips (gloved, as it were) exploring the touch screen. ]
I believe it would be safe to say this is not the location I had in mind. [ -- yeah, is that the tiniest sliver of annoyance you hear? Because he is pretty fucking pissed off, timing considered. ] I have matters to attend to elsewhere, you see.
[ A pause. More laughter, but a little less jovial.
Wings SMACKING THE PokéGear, a slight struggle, hoot, and -- ]
One might say they are rather urgent.
[ -- which is to say: where the hell is this? Possibly a literal hell, knowing him, except that it does not look familiar. And he's never known hell to hold owls.
Divulge the location.
(Click.) ]
Third Person Sample:
In truth -- rare for him as the truth may be -- Mukuro cannot remember when last he awoke in a bed. Caught in the anaesthetized slumber of a timeless sea, all water and chains and perpetually closed eyes, it has become difficult to discern sleep from waking; dreams from reality, and the course of illusions flows like a river between both, carving a fair approximation of life and livelihood. Before this, before the chilly wet imprisonment, there were other imprisonments.
Stone shelves, dirty floors, laboratory tables, filthy couches, but only once -- once in the brief phase of the nightmare of boyhood, had there been a bed. A bedroom. Yet here one is, as if it crawled out of sleep and cocooned its surroundings (a real illusion taking itself slightly too literally): trite, simple, nearly empty. His first thought: another prison. And perhaps it is. Curiously, he feels no trace of his abilities. No trace of the girl. Reality has become mathematical and far too solid; immutable.
A cursory (perfunctory) examination reveals devices, including one which would appear to be for communication and broadcasts. Amateur Blackberry, as it were. Perhaps for the kidnapper(s) to give commands in a form best reserved for suspense and horror films --- but ah, perhaps this is simply the imagination running slightly too morbid? Forgive him. He inherits this history earnestly. Now, what shall be made of the circular object? With a slight inspection, it releases an animal, and Mukuro cannot help but presume this to be some form of Box Weapon technology (albeit shaped differently; strange, that), as Box Weapons each take the form of animals, and --
Oh, a laugh: Another owl?
Truly now?
Leather-clad tap of fingers to its wings.
Its personality already seems more agreeable than the one to which he is accustomed.
Rokudo Mukuro has little need of owls, beds, would-be prisons, or sub-par Blackberries.
On the last of these, however, he will provide the following --
(Cue first person sample.)