deathinvitation @ 2006-02-11T15:22:00

2007-02-12T00:24:05Z

Character you're applying for: Sephiroth
Strangely enough, in Books of Moses (religious texts) Sephiroth is referred to as a Power-Angel of the Fifth Seal. Sephiroth or Sfirot also is a Hebrew word meaning "counting", or "number", or "statistics". Sephiroth are the ten "Divine enumerations, or emanations" in the Kabbalah of Judaism. Each Sephiroth represents a path of ideas, attributes and concepts that one must realize and understand within oneself. Once that is done a person will have reached divine perfection, realized their Inner Christ and so forth. Interesting considering that Sephiroth does exactly that, going along his own path and striving for his own vision of perfection. This explanation also matches up with the midsection shield which has Yggdrasil engraved on it.

Call him ‘Sephy’, and nurses be damned, he will kill you.

Series the character is from: / Final Fantasy FFVII. I don’t think there’s a FFVIII game/movie he isn’t in yet even if it is just a cameo. Even Dirge of Cereberus although he’s just in a flashback. He also appears in other games such as Ehrgeiz, Kingdom Hearts, Kingdom Hearts 2, and Itadaki Street Special. I am using the Final Fantasy VII version though since concealing a wing such as he displays in KH1/2 would be difficult to hide.

Character's age: 30

Character's gender: male

Character’s “Real Name”: Fred Rogers

How long have you roleplayed your character, if at all?: Yes, I did for The Sweet Trade RPG. Really didn’t ever get to play him but he was accepted. I’ve rp’d him before in AIM and the like as well if that counts for anything.

Where have you roleplayed in general and/or with this specific character?:
In general: Paixao RPG: http://community.livejournal.com/paixaorpg/ (mostly dead) Rufus Shinra, Vexen, Repliku, Player B/Rod
The Sweet Trade: http://community.livejournal.com/thesweettrade/profile (dead) Sephiroth, Rufus Shinra, Tyki Mikk
Toujours Hotel: http://community.livejournal.com/toujourshotel/profile (Quit when it became more crack than rping) Rufus Shinra
Landel’s Damned – Rufus, Bast
Sanzensaki - http://community.livejournal.com/sanzensekai/ (dead)
On the Edge - http://community.livejournal.com/ontheedgerpg/profile (This one is mine and just started) Rufus, Reeve, OC evil

Have you played the game/watched the movie or anime/read the book or comic, etc. that your character hails from?: Yup. Only ones I haven’t is Dirge of Cerberus since it was only a few seconds he was in it as well as Before Crisis because that’s only available in Japan at present. With DoC, since Sephiroth is pre-DoC, coming from the end of AC, it’s not a huge lacking. The only part he plays in that whole game is a flashback and mentions of files at the end of the game. I have read the scripts though for Before Crisis even though that story has been told quite a few times through the FFVII series for Sephiroth’s side. The other one I haven’t, but I have read over the summaries and information for is ‘Crisis Core’. I don’t have a PSP.

Please give us a detailed personal history of your character:
Sephiroth is the son of Lucrecia Crescent and Professor Hojo, both employees of Shin-Ra Electric Power Company. Brought together with Professor Gast and Vincent Valentine, they begin work on what is to be known as the Jenova Project. The idea of this originally was to produce a Cetra or Ancient. The Ancients were a race of creatures that lived on the planet prior to humans. These people were able to speak to the planet itself and when they passed on, they went to the Promised Land. In a bit of flawed logic, President Shinra (Rufus’ father) believed that this Promised Land must be an actual physical place that would be rich and Mako and thus a great find for Shin-Ra. The idea was that Sephiroth would be an Ancient and lead them to this Promised Land.

The initial problem can be seen from the outset in that the remains that Hojo found and named ‘Jenova’ was not a Cetra as he thought. Jenova is, in essence, a space-born virus, infecting worlds and destroying them. Not knowing this, the team plowed on ahead, injecting the fetus in Lucrecia’s womb with Jenova cells. It’s only after the birth of Sephiroth that Ilfana (the last full Cetra since Aerith is only half) tells Professors Gast and Hojo the truth about Jenova.

Born December 25th, Sephiroth was removed from Lucrecia shortly after being born by Professor Hojo, raised by him and various people provided by Shin-Ra Company, passing most of his younger life through the hands of various nannies, nurses, and governesses. No amount of money was too great for them to see if their great experiment for an Ancient would work or not. If it was the best for clothing, food, or education, Sephiroth had it. As to his parents, Sephiroth was merely told that his mother’s name was ‘Jenova’ and that she died giving birth to him. To his knowledge, he didn’t know of a father (and didn’t need one really if someone asked him). From that early age, his loyalties laid with the company.

Most of his childhood and teenage years were spent training in military matters as well as being educated. Kept apart from other children, he learned to depend on himself and not feel the distance between him and the rest of humanity. Despite his stoic nature, this did manifest later in feeling that he was different from other people, special somehow.

Sephiroth: I've always felt, since I was small...that I was different from the others, special in some way. But, not like this. Am I...human?

He graduated early from the Shin-Ra Military Academy and rose rapidly through the ranks, thanks mostly to the enhanced speed, strength, and other superhuman abilities from the Jenova Project. While those involved with the Jenova Project knew that these would be the most likely side-effects, they weren’t as much on the lookout for the bad ones which occasionally caused madness or other mental damage. To all appearances, Sephiroth was the perfect SOLDIER. Young men wanted to join Shin-Ra just to be like him. He was admired and revered all over the planet for his exploits. With the Shin-Ra/Wutai war winding down to a win for Shin-Ra, his popularity couldn’t have gotten any higher.

A year after the war’s end, Sephiroth was sent with a SOLDIER named Zack to investigate Mako reactor in the Nibelheim Mountains. ((It’s shown to be Cloud in FFVII, but it is actually Zack who later tells Cloud all of the following events)) This was pretty par for the course, a good deal of his time since the war spent defending villages and the like. Arriving in Nibelheim, the two of them head into the reactor where they discover the capsules containing humans twisted by Mako, Hojo’s experiments.

It’s Sephiroth who first understands what the creatures are, some of them so mutated that they aren’t recognizable as humans in the first place. Normal SOLDIERs are only showered with Mako, enough to enhance their abilities, those who have had this process done to them readily identified by their glowing eyes. The things that Hojo created have been infused with Mako on a larger scale than the SOLDIERs ever were. He explains this all to Zack what they are and that Hojo created them, piecing it together in his own head that he has more in common with these creatures than to humans themselves. Along with the capsules of mutated humans is another, one containing a female figure with a helm attacked to her head. Written across it is ‘JENOVA’. This is the beginning of the end for Sephiroth, the point where he begin to question his own existence, who he is, and what he is.

Sephiroth leaves at this point after a shaking mental breakdown in front of Zack, fleeing to the Shinra Mansion that is near Nibelheim, locking himself away in the secret library to study over the information he found. Once again, the error made in classifying Jenova comes back. Back in the time of the Cetra, a disaster happen that threatened to destroy everything on the planet. This disaster was Jenova. Some of the Cetra fled (they would spawn the human race) while others stayed behind on a suicide mission to destroy Jenova and preserve the planet. After studying all the papers Hojo left behind, Sephiroth mistakenly believes that Jenova was a Cetra and one of those that were left behind to die while the others escaped. This in turn leads Sephiroth to the mistaken belief that he is the true heir of the planet while humans were nothing more than cowardly traitors given that their ancestors were the ones who ran away.

Sephiroth ends up flying into a rage here, betrayal coming from all quarters in his mind. The company that raised him had stolen his mother from him and used her to their own ends. Then again, what could he expect from humans, those who had already betrayed his mother (and himself by extension) once already. In Sephiroth’s logic, he was being used by them as well. What he had based his entire life on had suddenly been ripped away.

In his fury, Sephiroth destroyed the entire town of Nibelheim, killing everyone there but Zack, Tifa, Cloud, and Zangan (supposedly wasn’t within the town itself at the time) He then heads for the reactor itself, meaning to free ‘Mother’. Zack tries to stop him, ending up critically wounded and left for dead. Tifa Lockhart soon joins him in that state after she challenges Sephiroth. Discovering this, Cloud Strife (who had been in town with them) takes up Zack’s Buster sword and runs Sephiroth through with it as he tries to leave the reactor with Jenova’s head. The battle is on then, ending up with Sephiroth falling into the Mako pit with the head still in his possession. (Last Order says he jumped willingly. The game itself says Cloud threw him).

For the next four-five years, there is peace, everyone thinking him dead. Meanwhile, he was in the Lifestream learning about Jenova, how to control these new abilities, and planning. After Sephiroth’s ‘death’, Hojo begins experimenting anew on the survivors of the Nibelheim massacre, making what some call ‘Sephiroth clones’. In truth, these are not clones. These are simply people with high levels of Mako made in the same way Sephiroth was. Cloud is something of this, having been captured after Nibelheim and experimented on for years with Jenova cells.

(This gets shorter here because we all know the events of FFVII – the good guys win, Sephiroth gets banished back to the Lifestream, the end)

Sephiroth leaves the Lifestream (where he absorbed Jenova and thus her knowledge of the Cetra) later when ‘he’ attacks Shin-Ra Company single-handedly, killing off any employees in his path as well as leaving his sword through President Shin-Ra’s back. In truth, he had been around the world a little more than that, ending up in the Northern Crater where Jenova had first arrived. The plan was simple: damage the planet badly enough to where it needed to heal itself, be there at the site of the healing, and absorb that Lifestream energy to become a god. Sephiroth remained at the Northern Crater, not going anywhere while letting Jenova’s remains do the work as well as these Sephiroth ‘clones’. He is later seen encased in his mako cocoon.

The battle continues on through various places on the planet until Sephiroth summons Meteor (the device to scar the planet badly enough for it to need to heal itself) by gaining the Black Materia. This continues until the final showdown where Cloud kills Sephiroth, sending him back into the Lifestream.

Sephiroth more or less took Jenova into himself, evolving into a creature that is both of them. Her will is his will and vice versa. Because of this strength of will, he doesn’t dissipate in the Lifestream like all other entities do. He stays there, looking for a way out, trying to come back and finish his work. This escape later comes in the form of three remnants of himself, not to be confused with the ‘clones’ he had running about before to do his bidding. Kadaj, Loz, and Yazoo are pieces of Sephiroth brought to life basically by his force alone. Their goal is to seek out Jenova cells to return Sephiroth himself back to life. Unfortunately, since they possess none of Jenova’s cells themselves, they end up wandering for awhile to try to locate her.

Eventually they discover that the Geostigma carriers have those cells (which are drawn to other Jenova cells according to the Reunion theory) and end up using them to try to find her via Kadaj’s black water, ending up at the Meteor memorial. One could argue the point that they were heading towards Rufus since he had Jenova, and the remnants misunderstood their target.

During the course of Kadaj’s battle with Cloud, Sephiroth escapes the Lifestream once more because Kadaj did touch the Jenova cells leaking out of the damaged box that had held her. Although Kadaj is consumed during this, Yazoo and Loz are not. Sephiroth and Cloud fight before Sephiroth returns to the Lifestream, saying that he will never be just a memory.

Please give us a detailed description of your character's personality: (*cries* We’re going to be here for awhile)

In short, Sephiroth has a god-complex. Chances are this was formed back before he had his mental break with reality given how the world looked to him as the icon of Shin-Ra and the SOLDIERs’ power. From a very early age, he was given by virtue of the Jenova Project outstanding performance in the physical and most likely mental aspects of life. He was able to move faster, be stronger, and think quicker than anyone else around him. As he states in FFVII, Sephiroth always knew he was someone special, someone better than those around him.

After discovering that the false version of who he and Jenova were, that already egotistical aspect was inflated even further. Suddenly, he was the heir to the planet itself, the only truly worthy creature since his mother had stayed behind to defend it while others fled. For that reason, all humans are traitors and lowly creatures to him. Add into things that he has four ‘puppets’ running about, and that makes that sense of self-worth even higher. His ego would be his downfall.

Relationships with humans in general suffers for the above reason. When one thinks themselves a god of sorts or destined to take over the planet, it tends to make relating to or even desiring to relate to lower life forms difficult. It would be like a regular person attempting to converse with a cockroach versus step on them. If everyone on Gaia died, he would be quite happy. Well, except for Cloud. He wants Cloud to suffer first in revenge. Sephiroth really doesn’t understand the concept of doubting himself. He is always sure that what he decides to do is the best course of action at all times, and if he fails, it is because someone either tricked him or screwed things up in some way, shape, or form. In turn, defeat is not an option he recognizes. He may need to withdraw for a time, and has done so to return to the Lifestream, but he will always return.

Despite what most fanfiction authors do to him, Sephiroth is not a nice person. He doesn’t care about much of anything except for his own desires and aims. Even Kadaj, Loz, and Yazoo are simply what he feels he is entitled to and there to use for his own wants since they are …well, him. Sephiroth doesn’t cry, doesn’t whine, doesn’t worry, and doesn’t fall in love. If it annoys him, he will hurt or destroy it in the most efficient way possible. In the case of hurting and leaving alive, he wants to do it in a way that will remind this person at a later date exactly why crossing him is a bad idea. It’s doubtful if he even loves Jenova considering that his will is her will at this point because of how he has evolved after being in the Lifestream with her head.

Sephiroth has an incredibly strong will, one that has endured over three years past ‘death’ for now. After being tossed into the Lifestream by Cloud the first time, his willpower was enough to allow him to escape and reform in the Northern Crater while overpowering Cloud’s to gain the materia. Such was unheard of. That same will was enough to overtake Jenova’s and absorb/become one with her. This manifests once again later when the remnants arrive, they being extensions of his will.

In person, Sephiroth is removed from the average person in the way he conducts himself and reacts to those around him. He’ll never be heard swearing or engaging in any sort of vulgar behaviour. That doesn’t mean that he won’t resort to low tactics. It’s just that the other person will probably never see it coming. To act like a human would be against his own code, lowering himself to their level so to speak.

Sephiroth has a brilliant mind for strategy. Having served his entire life in the military and distinguished himself repeatedly, he’s used to plotting his way around others and sending out the troops to fight the battle although he is capable of doing so himself. He remains calm and doesn’t get upset. Even in battle, he continues to speak in a calm and controlled manner, letting the person he’s fighting hurl insults or pant for breath.

Cloud Strife is a person that he must take revenge on simply because he can. Sephiroth doesn’t feel as if Cloud is a true threat (his ego once more in that no one is a true threat to him) but that Cloud has defied him and his plan and therefore must pay for it. He’s in no real hurry to do this, as he says in AC that he wants to know what Cloud cares about so he can destroy it first. He wants Cloud to suffer long and hard before killing him. Cloud surprised him when he wasn’t expecting it, and for that alone, he needs to die. Things like that aren’t supposed to happen.

One last note is that Sephiroth would not be the sort to help out fellow patients unless given a good reason. He looks at it as natural selection if the weak and stupid die. Saves him having to take them out later.

Please give us a detailed physical description of your character: You all do realize that it breaks my brain to consider Sephiroth in Landel’s wear, right? Debatably the video game fandom’s best known villain walking around in grey sweats with a bright yellow smiley face never fails to crack me up.

Sephiroth was born with the colour of hair that he has now, a white-grey shade that has been left to grow down to his waist. It's not exactly the most intelligent of things for a warrior to let happen with his hair, but then again, few people get close enough to Sephiroth to grab onto it. His eyes are green due to the influence of the Jenova cells as well as the Mako infusions that he was exposed to as he grew older. Unlike most people, his pupil is not circular but slit in shape like a cat's eye or a snake's. He has high cheekbones and clear features with almond shaped slanted eyes and an aquiline nose as well as thin lips. Angular is the kindest way to describe his face, harsh planes set against pale skin with slash eyebrows of the same unrelieved gray.

((Just FYI thing here, in AC, Sephiroth never blinks. According to the Reunion files, ‘We made sure Sephiroth would never blink, in order to give him this sort of supernatural, ghost-like quality. (Moriizumi)’))

For clothing, he prefers a long black trenchcoat with white metallic pauldrons on the shoulders to prevent any strikes in that area from giving him much damage. Two leather straps cross his chest in leiu of a shirt, something he prefers although he will occasionally walk around with a white shirt undone to midchest. He dislikes have material constricting him. Belted black boots cover his feet, four clasps running across them. He generally wears black gloves if he's working on desk, two more clasps holding those in place. Across his back is Masamune, his sword. It goes where he goes.

Sephiroth projects an air of majesty, one that says that he is not like the common man. He doesn’t worry about control because in his mind, he is always –in- control. Nothing can beat him, nothing can bring him down… although Cloud can ‘delay’ him.

What point in time are you taking your character from when he/she appears at Landel's?: Post Advent Children after his battle with Cloud and being sent back into the Lifestream.

What kinds of magical/special/crazy powers does your character have, if any?: With materia, he can do quite a few various things such as lightening, ice, and so on.

If present, how do you plan to tweak those powers to make him/her appropriately hindered in the setting of Landel's?: In Landel’s, Sephiroth will have no materia. That cuts off anything magical right there. Masamune (sword) is missing as well. It would be a little noticeable if he started toting around a sixty-eight inch katana/fifty inch blade. (Don’t ask me how a 6’1 guy carries around, not to mention uses a five and a half foot long sword that weighs around thirty pounds. I don’t know. Welcome to the wonders of video games. The drawing room alone for a sword like that would be about six feet all around him just to get it clear, not to mention use it.)

Does your character have any other non-magical skills or abilities that we should know about?: Given the Jenova cells in his body, Sephiroth is above a normal man’s strength and speed as well as his ability to take damage. This has been lessened greatly since coming in to Landel’s. Before, he could take a head-on fire attack and not even flinch. That would make him useless here. The general plan is to leave Sephiroth with some of his extra strength and speed. Because he is easily the most hated person in the FFVII universe, if I leave him at a human’s level, he’s going to die very quickly. Very, very quickly with Barret, Vincent, Yuffie, Rufus, the Turks, and the others there. Strength wise, he wouldn’t win at a wrestling contest with the likes of Pyramid Head, but he would be able to hold on for awhile and get the hell out while the getting was good. Being that he’s a soldier and has been his entire life, he can take damage and keep going, although it was dropped down from take-a-sword-and-keep-going to he can take some moderate hits and not stop. Someone walking up and punching him is not going to stop him overly and will most likely result in a return strike. Bruising will be a new experience for him given that the past few years in the Lifestream have left him thinking he’s nigh undefeatable. He’s definitely not going to be happy to discover that he does take injury or that he can no longer do the things he could before likes stand in the middle of fire and not get hurt.

How about improbable appendages?: Nope

Please give us an idea of where you'd like to take your character within the scope of the Landel's Damned RP: Landel’s presents an interesting problem for him in that the remnants are there. He probably will defend them because they’re part of him and to see part of him get beaten up/insulted is one to himself. Like I said, huge ego. Once he realizes that he’s there and he can’t simply push his way out, Sephiroth will set about this like he would any military campaign. He’ll get himself armed and then try to get out. The hints from Mr Radio will probably be listened to closely and followed up on. Any information he can get from the remnants as well as other patients will be carefully recorded and he will attempt to make his own maps to navigate the place. This would be like a giant wargame to him given that he does believe himself undefeatable. Most likely, he will come to believe that this is simply a test of sorts to see if he can return from the Lifestream, a waystation if you will.

What kind of psychological effect do you see Landel's Institute having on your character?: Sephiroth will take this all in stride, even if his first reaction would be to smite the first human that lays hands on him. Getting used to being weaker will be a new experience for him, one that will be counterbalanced by that ego and the belief that when he wins, all will be restored to as it should be. On the whole, it will be a wargame to him, one that has to be won. If he can manage to get rid of a few things on the way, all the better. If not, he can deal with that once he has defeated the puzzles of Landel’s.

Given that this RP takes place in an unsettling and outright horrific environment, how do you justify your character as being appropriate in both body and mind for this kind of setting?: I already play two characters there plus help with the monsters, so I don’t think it’s going to be a real problem. Sephiroth is a warrior, so he’s probably seen as bad out on the battlefield during the Wutain-Midgar war. He probably did worse when he killed everyone in Nibelheim and burned the town.

Third-Person Sample:

Sephiroth missed the sound of his boots on the floor when he took a step. They had a click of authority that had sent underlings running to look busy in the old days. These slippers that this place had provided him with simply didn’t have the same effect. The clothing left much to be desired as well. Whoever had thought up sweat pants and shirt with those horrid yellow smiley faces on them should have been destroyed in the most painful way possible and would be shortly if Sephiroth had his way. He wanted his own clothing, not this foolishness. While Sephiroth wasn’t one to worry about appearances or suffer from vanity, he did find that it was difficult to be intimidating clad like this.

Appearance might not bother him, but not having Masamune’s comforting weight in his hand did. For that, someone would have to suffer.

The nurse that had greeted him upon waking went ignored. She knew nothing of him and his physiology, and she refused to answer any of his questions. As a rule, he chose not to interact with lower life forms unless there was some purpose to it. When his third question had gone ignored and she made a casual reference to medicating him if necessary, Sephiroth chose to ignore her presence.

Stepping into the cafeteria, his mind was already trying to map out this place. Wandering blind would do him no good, and whatever test this was for him meant that he had to pass it. The question was more to the point of who would dare to put him in this situation. Mother? What would she have to gain by him being restrained? The traitor? Something of this scale was not only beyond Cloud’s ability but also his imagination. Some outside force then? That was the most likely answer. While he had been in the Lifestream, some outside force had caused him to leave it and come here. In time, he would find out what had done so. At present, there seemed to be nothing outwardly threatening. Sephiroth had enough confidence in himself and his abilities to deal with it should such happen anyways.

What he had noticed about this strange place was that his usual abilities were dampened severely. The door should have been nothing for him to send flying and yet he had felt pain when he had struck it upon awakening. In his world, that was a new sensation. Frustration had been experienced when battling with that puppet, Cloud, when the remnant had drawn him out of the Lifestream with Mother’s cells, but not pain. Pain was new. Even now, he flexed his hand, feeling those darts of it running up and down his fingers and knuckles.

Before his eyes took in what he saw, Sephiroth felt it. It wasn’t Cloud, no. It was them, the parts of him that had made it out of the Lifestream and failed at their mission. He didn’t stop to wonder if they had felt his presence, known when he had formed here. It was taken for granted that they had. After all, wasn’t his return to life their entire reason for being? It was then that he noticed the silence around the room, his attention sweeping over them all. A hint of a razorblade smile rose to his lips.

“Should I take this quiet as a sign that I have been missed?” he asked.

First-Person Sample:

((Sephiroth would not make personal journal entries. He will use it to record information and try to get a map in his head to later draw.))
First floor – stairs are to the south and south-west beyond the doors of this cell block, just past a nurse’s station. Four rows in this block. Unknown if there are others. Door to block is on the south and on the south-east cornre of the block. Out in that hallway, a door lead to the north (unknown where it leads to) and to the south. Out the south door led down another hallway where there were two doors at the west side, near the bottom. One was a nurse’s station, the upper one is unknown.

---

Finally, please attach a of your character to your email so we can get an idea of who you're talking about.:
AC image - http://i109.photobucket.com/albums/n61/talionisshinra/Sephirothfull.jpg
FFVII game design - http://i109.photobucket.com/albums/n61/talionisshinra/7-sephiroth-a.jpg