#Guest Character: Akiren

[oraclememehacker]

The Trap

“Alright, everything is set up. I don’t know whether this is going to work or not, but unless they have some way of getting in here that I don’t know of, like using the metaverse, then it all should be fine.” Futaba had determined that they were going to kidnap the leader of the Phantom Thieves next, who was back in Yongen-Jaya because of various reasons. Everything up to this point was all about the metaverse and who else to get information from but the leader after all? So, Futaba had devised a trap, that way they would be caught and hopefully this whole thing could be nipped in the bud.

The plan involved setting up cameras in the attic, on him and then there was also motion sensors that when activated would set off alarms that would most likely alert someone to call the police. The plan was for a couple of them to stay up late that night, hidden in the cafe as they waited, hoping that the people responsible for kidnapping her, Sophia and Wakaba would appear to take Akiren. It wasn’t the best plan, but it was a plan, nonetheless.

Late that night, there was Futaba, Necro and Ann who was in the cafe, hiding behind the counter. Everything seemed to be all quiet, the only sound in the place was the occasional creaking of the attic floor and them shuffling around, and Necro’s weird breathing. They couldn’t risk using their phones in case the kidnappers suddenly arrived and were spooked by the light from the phone. Ann shifted around and quietly asked if tonight was going to be the night this happened, and Futaba just couldn’t answer because she wasn’t sure. 

Soon enough though, they would hear the front door being unlocked and opened. They couldn’t reveal themselves quite yet, as they could run off. But Futaba did peek over the counter and saw that they were in the hazmat suit, hiding their identity. Well, that was going to have to come off soon for sure. “Here we go...” The sounds of loud footsteps could be heard as they made their way across the cafe and towards the stairs. And then as they started to make their way up there was suddenly loud alarms blaring and that was when the plan got into action.

The trio made their way out from behind the counter and confronted this person in the hazmat suit, with Necro in front, ready to use her tentacles to rip that thing off them. They clearly were distressed and trying to figure out what to do, since they had the exit blocked now. What the trio wasn’t anticipating was that they would whip out a gun. Ann and Futaba flinched, backing up but Necro wouldn’t, and her tentacles would fly forward towards the hazmat person when suddenly...

*bang*

Necro had been shot around the chest area, not flinching still but there was definitely dark blood running down her, and she wrapped her tentacles around the hazmat suit person and then slammed them hard against the wall, leaving a visible hole there before tossing them upwards, watching as they hit the ground. “N-Necro! No killing! You know better than this!” Then again, she had just been shot so it was fair game at that point. Akiren was at the top of the stairs and was asking what was going on. That’s when he saw the hazmat suit guy on the steps, not moving but was clearly still alive.

“So, uh...what do we do now?” Ann asked, since this wasn’t going to end well one way or another. “We interrogate them and ask where my family is.” Futaba responded simply, though she was concerned about Necro. “Y-You’re going to be alright...I hope.” Necro just breathed, unconcerned about her health currently but also seemed to be in a lot of pain. Futaba made her way to the steps and would now slowly reveal the person in the hazmat suit. It wasn’t anyone they knew, but they seemed to be a scientist type...and were clearly in a lot of pain from the attack on Necro.

And that’s when they would hear sirens...

[thepstandsforpunk]

I've always wondered what the other Wildcards have as their Velvet Rooms. Like we see the protags and technically, in 2 at least, they can share one room.

Persona 1 and 2 share a very similar style of Velvet Room, so perhaps these specific characters were similar enough, or Igor was still growing his power after being animated. These residents also did not wear the signature blue like the rest, instead having Belladonna wear blue eye makeup and Nameless wearing a blue eye covering. The Demon Painter did not have blue, and Igor had none as well. In Persona 2 Innocent Sin, 2 of your party members, Eikichi and Lisa, can follow you into the Velvet Room. Seeing as they were also Wildcards, it makes sense in a strange way if they all share one room at this point. Maya specifically in Eternal Punishment had never seen it before, but can be invited. She was introduced to it by Baofu, and Katsuya could come too.

Persona 3 begins the blue Velvet Rooms, blue resident attire, blue Igor, and specialized rooms. Kinda. Makoto and Aegis share a room. Without getting into spoiler territory for Persona 3: The Answer, this is very significant to their stories and how much they truly overlap and teach both characters fundamental values to better themselves and ultimately do the right thing.

Persona 4 starts the splitting paths. We see two Wildcards, one we play as and one we fight against. Yu Narukami's Velvet Room is a limo, complete with a liquor cabinet and hot wife Margaret. We don't talk about Marie, she's a special case. We can see Teddie bust in here later in the story, not knowing how he got there. It seems he was invited, which leads me to believe that later in life he may graduate into becoming a Wildcard sort of like Aegis with hopefully a way that doesn't include the death of Narukami. However. Adachi is not mentioned or seen, to my knowledge, in any relation with the Velvet Room. Which leads me to believe he has a separate one entirely. If I had to design him one I would give him a blue bar, keeping the liquor cabinet from the limo, with Igor as the tender and Margaret acting as a "guest" in said bar down the bench from Adachi. This could also be used as a way to introduce a new resident or two instead of Margaret.

Persona 5 has this issue as well. We see Akiren's Velvet Room as a blue circular prison block with Caroline, Justine, and Lavensa as his residents. It specifically says that the fake Igor is trapped "somewhere else" which personally I would find very interesting if that somewhere else ended up being Akechi's Velvet Room. He wouldn't bat an eye at Igor acting strangely. If I had to design Akechi a Velvet Room, it would be an office designated for him. Igor and possibly new residents are dressed in blue business formal and the residents cater to Akechi instead of Akiren catering to the residents.

The Persona Q games have a platform connected to nonsensical staircases, and a cinema. Both doused in blue, but not having unique residents but instead pulling the residents from other games with the protagonist groups, who can also enter the Velvet Room at will without being Wildcards. Instead, while I would keep both these situations the same, I would also add residents to these rooms who fit the themes. A guide for the stairwells in Q1 and a pair of movie theatre employees in Q2.

I don't know enough about the characters in Persona 1 and both 2's to try and rebuild them a Velvet Room, and I am supportive of Makoto and Aegis sharing a room. However, I don't think the first two games need a new Velvet Room anyway. Igor is a puppet brought to life by Philemon, who chooses who gets invited to the Velvet Room out of the Wildcards and/or Persona users. Igor has no say in what happens, he only has to guide whoever walks in. Persona 3's Velvet Room starts with Igor saying that there hadn't been a visitor in a long time, meaning he has had plenty of time to get full bearings on his newfound life and how to use his borrowed powers. If Igor is a newer being for the first (technically 3 games) 2 installments, then it'd make sense that the Velvet Room is unpolished and ordinary instead of an extravagant deep dive into a character's heart.

However, the Velvet Room is very clearly an important part to the inner stories of Persona, what happens behind the scenes in the more SMT-esque Demon Realm the protagonists are shielded from, and Philemon's intentions with these humans. I'm looking forward to how they utilize the Velvet Room in future Persona games and will do my best to analyze these deeper. I could most likely write entire essays about the symbolism in these rooms starting from 3 that relate to both the characters who enter them and their meaning in the game as a whole.

[felikatze]

somebody tell meeee which of my fics i should fix up and finish i have too many and can't decide. ALL of these are in varying states of "i have like, 3/4 of the draft done" "i have several scenes written out" or "this idea haunts me constantly"

i offer you:

history makes the record stutter (legend of zelda): the trash historian au staring angry teenagers making stupid life choices in the wake of stupid life choices their preincarnations made. vaati and link are forces of mayhem, beedle tries to deal.

coworkers, of sorts (persona 5 x devil survivor 2 crossover): ping sequel staring yamato, hibiki, and al saiduq being general menaces to the phantom thieves. akiren panicking because holy shit government, futaba panicking because holy shit fumi's boss.

why we should leave.pptx (kingdom hearts): AI stands for Adventure Incoming prequel in which data sora and data riku have a shared existential crisis over the course of re:mind

stormy nights to remember (kingdom hearts): several nights in the life of sora's mom himiko, and all the shit the poor woman has to deal with (starring the elaborate family hcs i have come up with for sora)

kill your darlings and skip town (persona 5): post-canon akechi is alive fic, wherein he fakes his death and accepts fate as a department store employee in some hick town until he gets his shit together. akiren meets someone quite familiar when returning home to his hick town after the game's ending.

Four rooms, four guests, a few more deaths (witch's heart): sirius gibson character study. How did he assign those rooms so perfectly anyways? (and were there some times he didn't?)

cyborgs versus superheroes (azure striker gunvolt x my hero academia crossover): izuku finds a cyborg vigilante while cleaning the beach. copen finds out he's been unconcious for 300 years and shenanigans ensue as his brand of justice is unleashed on the world once more (featuring lola becoming a pop idol). mainly self-indulgent nonsense.

insulting foreign ambasadors is always a good idea (kirby): this fic is SO close to being done but i have 0 motivation. anyways, triple deluxe if it was in the kirby anime, starring taranza and dedede as enemies to friends, tiff, tuff and kirby as not that enthusiastic heroes, and sectonia as herself. set in the same verse as keeping enchanted mirrors in your basement is always a good idea. i almost forgot this fic existed again.

one step behind for every step ahead (kingdom hearts): one eye on the future sequel, a future seeing sora, now stuck in the past, tries to figure out how to self his past? future? alternate? self from meeting his doom. there are sacrifices that must be made.

bye bye, phantom thief butterfly (LiEat x miraculous ladybug crossover): LiEat 3's climax, but set in ML's paris instead. Teo gets akumatized, chat noir and ladybug discover that lies are not really an option anymore as mud covers the city. Efi is not a dragon in this au but she tries her best. no i have not watched ml season 3 yet, i probably should.

See you in eight years (1bitHeart): fourteen year old nanashi meets a seven year old misane, is a cryptic bastard for a bit, and leaves. 15 year old misane reflects on a strange encounter she had as a kid, and thinks "goddammit."

anime hair logic (kingdom hearts): riku reflects on his great-uncle, a mysterious family member who managed to leave the islands long before riku even dreamed of it. yes this is a "what-if riku and xehanort are related because they both have white hair" thing

put a face on mercy (LiEat): Teo is a man of many faces, and some faces acrue more hate than others. Letting hatred go undone is a mercy, he thinks. (character study thing on teo's many many disguised and why he switches names every game)

and that is.... all my drafts. that is so many. this post was actually just an excuse to put down how many drafts i actually have.

THAT IS THIRTEEN DRAFTS HOLY SHIT

[hamadynes]

I may have a way... go the way Morgana got out... The thieves' Cognition of Ryuji is still there (it is implied that Mementos and Reality were starting to merge since Shido's defeat) but the end of that fight it Ryuji just tells everyone that he was just a cognition of the thieves. XD

Hmmm, I mean that could work? I loooove the angst, but I just dunno if that’d make things overly Ryuji centric still?? Cause I love my boy, I want him to get more screentime and love, but again I think that stuff like this should be saved for fic where it’s totally fine and good and encouraged to let yourself be self indulgent and really see idea potential through to its end without necessarily having to worry so much about keeping the same themes and focuses and integrity of the source material.

Would I FREAKING LOVE to see Ryuji in a variation of Akechi’s scenario where the Dream that gets granted for all the Thieves is that Ryuji didn’t die in Shido’s Palace and they have to give him up to fully realize their justice? HECK YES. GIMME ALL THAT ANGSTY HURT COMFORT where Akiren holds a meeting after talking with Maruki about what giving up the Dream reality would mean cause it legitimately concerns the whole team, and it’s just this adorable love fest of Ryuji getting the affection he deserves... But it would just be so out of place in canon. As much as my biased heart wants Persona 5 Ryuji, there’s a lot else to consider. And yeah, 3rd term Akechi exists, but a similar Ryuji scenario would have to be treated differently due to his importance to ALL the Thieves as well as just being a different character altogether. This is also assuming that Ryuji would sorta just... take Akechi’s place of importance in the Royal content which has its own issues.

Orrrr, if you were actually talking about like, the Yaldy battle and keeping things within the realms of vanilla... in canon it’d really steal Mona’s thunder and dilute the emotion of that scene if BOTH of them suddenly were just like oh I guess we can’t exist anymore...?

Tbh though, I think the best fix if you’re just after some good Ryuji loving angst would be to change the post Shido sprint scene... Like let the PT sweat it out for a little longer. Let them find him passed out and actually seeming like he got hit by an explosion... hair singed, bruised and bloodied, weak heartbeat, barely breathing. Let them take him to a hospital where they anxiously have to wait it out to see if he’s really okay, watch his mom cry and fuss and beg to know what’s going on. Akira going absolutely INSANE cause he can’t sign into the hospital as a guest, but it’s his best friend so he sneaks his way in and they all take shifts sitting anxiously at his bed side, sending text updates on his condition. He makes a full recovery of course, and it doesn’t even need to be this drawn out, but it’d mean he’d get some good earnest love from the team and not make the whole endgame revolve around him in particular.

Just my two cents though. ^^;

[tmma1869]

Favorite SCVI characters + favorite Soul series guest character

Talim - Don't even ask. I'm just glad she's back. :3

Kilik - I actually had fun playing as him in SCII and SCIV (via Broken Destiny, but hey reused designs). And he's hot. :3 Destined rival of Grøh for some reason. I'm just scared of his Soul Charge transformation...

Raphael - Freaking hipster noble Frenchman. Yay blue eyes! He got better compared to his original counterpart from SCII :3

Grøh - My favorite newcomer. Sharing the same voice actors as Cloud (in Japanese) and Akiren Kurumiya (Akira Kurusu + Ren Amamiya)/Joker (English) definitely helps. :P And he's hot. :3 Glad he's attractive without the eyepatch, scars aside.

2B - First female guest character (I don't count KOS-MOS since she's only made through character creation), incredibly flashy, same VA as Talim (in English), her rivalry with Ivy is intense... and glory to mankind. :3

[oraclememehacker]

“December should be a month all about joy and celebration, but instead it feels more like a month where I have to deal with others pain and misery...poor kids. Why is it always the youth that are required to do everything...”