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childofsardior · 1 month

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I was asked to share my current Ludwig's Headcanon, and I'll do it with immense pleasure, so here we are!

I'm actually going to talk about my personal take on Ludwig from my very self-indulgent HC/AU - so I'll warn you: you're going to find LOT of comfort/self-indulgent details and stuff here!

NOW PREPARE YOURSELF TO BE INFODUMPED ABT MY HC FOR LUDDY FROM MY AU!

General Info:

Full name: Ludwig von Koopa. He specifically put the "von" there instead of "van" to sound more like a noble. Chose this name after one of his favorite Human World's composers (after trying out a few different ones) when he was around 7 and stuck with it - yes, Luddy's been a musical nerd since he was an hatchling.

Gender and pronouns: He's a trans man. Pronouns are he/him. Very aware of this since he was very small, started to correct people with his chosen name(s) and right pronouns as soon as he realized that they were all wrong, and probably stupid from his point of view, even his mother - he had to bite her a couple of times before she understood it wasn't a game. Since Tarrasquins are related to dragons, his transition was a bit different from most species. Nowdays he almost never talks about his queer background, except made for people he blindly trust like his siblings - for occasional gender-related or name-related jokes, especially with Lemmy - or with his GF, usually for the same reasons. He's also confident enough to indulge in typically "feminine" behaviours time to time, without feeling ashamed, especially when hanging out with his sister Wendy. He's Ludwig von Koopa after all, he doesn't gives s**t about other people's opinions.

Sexuality: He doesn't like to use labels, but if asked to pick the closest one to describe himself Lud would probably say "something close to pansexual, but only with people smart and sharp enough to catch my attention." Dated a guy when they were teen, for a while. Now he's dating a girl named Estrela. If Estrela was a guy or an enby-koopa, he would litterally not care.

Age: He's currently 19 (in "canonical" years) and the oldest among his siblings. Considering my Royal Koopas maturing faster than Humans and similar creatures during their first 20-25 years of life, you could compare Ludwig to a 21-22 years old Human in terms of mental maturity. (Could not say the same about sentimental maturity, but only 'cause Ludwig's always been a bit troubled in sharing genuine feelings even with trusted pals, and he has yet to learn how to manage it. But this is has nothing to do with his species development nor his age.)

Species: Tarrasquin (also known as "Royal Koopas" or "Dragon-Turtles") - that happens to be a powerful and rare species related both to Koopas and Dragons. The lack of horns at a young age and the number of spikes on the shell may point to the subspecies known as Plains/Field Tarrasquin, while some other details could suggest a "mix" with the Vulcanic bloodline. In addition, all the Koopalings seem to share an innate inclination toward magic and some other unusual details never found before in Tarrasquins, such as tail feathers or natural armors protecting the limbs, along with peculiar tiny gem-like scales scattered around their bodies in different patterns.

Physical appearance: He's a yellow-scaled Tarrasquin, resembling mostly the Vulcanic subspecies like Bowser. He's got blue long hair and tail feathers along with a sapphire-colored spiked shell. He has gray-blue eyes, and a single Royal Fang in the middle of his upper jaw - even if a couple of smaller Royal Fangs are recently growing on the sides of his mouth. Like most of his siblings, his head and shoulders are covedered of green scales/skin, and he also has some of it over the back of his hands. Sapphire-like scales appear all around his body, four of which can be clearly seen on his cheeks. He's quite short for his age, but if you compare him to the others you can guess he's among the oldest siblings, considering his body proportions and a more mature appearance.

Personality: Ludwig's arrogance is quite famous around the Dark Lands. He's extremely full of himself, and doesn't miss an occasion to remember you how superior he is. This is how most people see him from the distance. Actually, Ludwig's character is quite more complex than that. He surely likes to mantain his "I'm clearly better than any of you" mask, especially with his enemies, but he's actually way more chill than that if you start to know him - and if he consideres you your equal, he can actually show his softer and sillier side to you, and prove himself a nice company. He doesn't know what proper "anxiety" is, but he's quite nervous and always on the edge - trying to be perfect, to prove himself and his siblings to be the best leader, to prove everyone (but mostly himself, again) he's a great and talented artist and musician, and so on. He's also a bit lunatic, and had to train himself to be patient during the years, considering the amount of tiny Dragon-Turtles running and creating chaos around him. It's not so common for an insult to land on him - since he rarely cares about other people's opinions, even when they have actual good opinions about him - but when it happens he could grow red with anger or just give the cold-shoulders treathment for a while, depending on who you are. He also rarely feel completely calm or relaxed, his mind always trying to fix some problem or coming up with something new even on background, but from time to time he needs a break too and will probably spend some days playing some instrument in his room without a purpose, or playing video games alone or with Larry and Iggy, like he used to do a lot as a kid. Last but not least: he kinda looks like a guy that never cries or gets emotional, but it's inaccurate. Ludwig rarely cries or weep nowdays, but when he does it's always dramatic and theatrical - even his sibs become a bit afraid of him, never knowing what to say or how to help, when he breaks like that; he'll probably just go to his room playing his piano while crying until he's too tired to continue and probably will just fall asleep. But on the brighter emotions, he is also very much easier to be moved by kind actions than it seems. If any of the people he cares about surprise him with a special gift for his birthday, or prepare something cute thinking about what he loves most, or even just giving him a drawing about him and Junior conquering the Sky Kingdom together - this happened for Lud's 18th birthday, and was Junior's gift - he will probably be surprised, a little embarassed but mostly filled with a mute joy he'll do his best to hide... probably failing, considering those big wet eyes.

Hobbies and passions: They say he's a kind of prodigy, being so young yet skilled in dozens of different things - from battle and magical techniques to various arts - but the truth is that he works really, really hard for everything he wants to learn. He's a bit jealous of Iggy and Junior to be faster and more intuitive learners than him. His main passion revolves around music since he was a kid, but he actually likes to do A LOT OF STUFF - some in a "I'm sooo good at it" way, some other just as hobbies. He likes to play videogames (and even used to do it on a competitive level for a short while), enjoys TTRPGs with his siblings, likes to paint with spray paint from time to time, knows how to sew, learned how to fence and he's quite proud about it, loves to pose and even compete with his sibs (mostly Roy and Wendy) in some cool-poses showoffs when they all feel to... he also enjoys to hum and sing when happy, and he literally learned to speak German to make an impression with a perfectly-faked accent when needed. A current inside joke in the family is claiming that naming what Ludwig can't do would take less time to talk about what he can do - Iggy's even taking notes every time they find out something new Lud is not capable of - the first thing wrote down is "Luddy can't be humble". Talking about music only, his favorite genre has always been the classical one, but contrary of what everybody around him think, he actually enjoys a lot of other genres and also has a bunch of favorite contemporary singers and bands among his infinite list of musicians he likes or likes to take inspiration from. He just strongly dislikes that sort of "music" that only consist in "random and horrible noises, like the sort of thing that Larry listens to". He can himself play dozens of instrument, mostly are the classical orchestral ones but he knows how to play a bunch of modern and electric instruments too - he was the one learning-while-teaching Lemmy how to play the electric bass and the electric guitar, after all; his favorite and main instrument is the piano, followed with the violin and the cello just after. He likes to compose - or at least, try to - his own stuff since he was 10, just after learning the piano basic from Kamek and Bowser themselves. His own first pieces were not exactly... melodious, and now his "4th Symphony" is a recurring meme his brothers and sister like to tease him about. But nowdays he's getting quite good, and has even started to conduct a small orchestra on his own, all made of young people from the Dark Lands and all around the near Kingdoms. He's also fantasizing about making this passion his future main occupations, maybe as a composer in the film's industry or something like that...?

Relationships:

With his siblings: Being the eldest among 8 has not always been easy. Even if Junior has been mostly raised and educated by Bowser, Kamek and a bunch of loyal servants, the other 6 where very much his responsability after their mother sudden disappearance - of course Kamek and the others were taking care of the newly adopted kids, but you know... they needed time to settle in and Ludwig was their main point of reference for a while. So he had to force himself to grow up even faster than before, in terms of responsabilities and leadership. That said, nowdays he still consider himself the leader of the whole "Koopalings" gang - even if most of his siblings can perfectly take care of themselves and often laugh or complain if Lud tryies to impose himself too much, especially when he's doing that in his presumptuous and arrogant way. Still, when things get hard, they all know that they can ask their big brother for help.

Now, for each relationship with the siblings:

Lemmy: They are in good terms. They do not spend too much time together, but when combined can become the Unsufferable Duo Of the Eldest and literally use their Age Superiority to assert dominancte on the others. Lemmy is also one of the few Ludwig can actually confide in, Lemmy being the biggest heart and probably the more emotional mature in the family - but Lemmy's the one EVERYBODY confides in, so it's a bit of cheating.

Roy: They used to fight often when younger, Roy being the only one bold enough to confront the big bro authority. Now they just respect each other, and while Roy trusts Ludwig's cunning brain, Ludwig can fully trust Roy's loyalty, sharpness and strenght, especially for missions that involves fighting and conquering.

Iggy: They are engaged in a mutual, mostly positive rivalry about who is the real family genius. Spoiler: both are, but in different ways. Iggy is an intuitive type, and learns mostly by watching his sourroundings and experimenting, while Ludwig is a studious type, that prefers knowing all about theory before trying things out. Iggy can't really understand music and arts in general - he enjoys them, but in a very "superficial and bland" way, in Ludwig's opinion - and Ludwig can't understand what is so cool about classyfing rocks, animals and plants, and will never get the green-shelled brother curious hyperfixations. Ludwig is also refusing to aknowledge Iggy's higher IQ score than his. But they can actually work together if needed, especially when some project or blueprint or plan needs full-brain power.

Wendy: They get along very well. Their shared passion for music is a good start - when Ludwig tries to compose something more "modern" than usual, it's always to have Wendy singing along with him playing the piano or the violin - but they can generally do various things together and enjoy their mutual company - from going to the SPA to planning the conquest of the next Kingdom. Also, Wendy is probably the only one among them Lud doesn't dare to anger, and also the only one he consider *almost* equal to him.

Morton: Ludwig loves Morton's blind obedience. Then if he thinks too hard about it, he feels bad. Actually, Morton follows Ludwig's lead because he trusts his brother, not because he's a sort of perfectly obedient puppy like some other brother jokes about. The two are in neutral-good terms. They do not spend much time together normally, but during missions Ludwig can count on Morton's natural protective nature to be sure the younger ones won't get too hurt, especially Junior - and this applies to some of the older siblings as well, from time to time.

Larry: The relationship between the two is a bit strange. Like the most of the group, Ludwig can't really stand Larry for too long - the latter is a 13-years-old Royal Koopa acting as an average 13-years-old Human boy most of the times - but as the Big Brother he must set a good example and hide his irritation while he tries to teach his younger brother the art of war and such. But it's hard. Larry is easily distracted and doesn't like to listen to others anyway. Even if Lud manages to get his attention, the azure brother will probably stay on his cellphone all the time. Larry loves to work with and actually playing electronic/techno music, but also trash and YouPipe-worth-meme-songs, "an insult to real music" in Ludwig's opinion. Larry also wants to prove himself as a good leader for the group, even if "lacking with basic leadership knowledge", and tries to fight with Ludwig about it from time to time. When tired or in need of a day off, Ludwig allows Larry to "play the leader for a while", knowing that Wendy or Roy will actually take the real role instead.

Bowser Junior: This one is a complex field to navigate, full of bitterness and mixed feelings. Junior being the only biological child of Bowser makes him the official Heir, but also, somehow, more "important" than the others in terms of social rank and authority. And Ludwig doesn't like this. He can't truly behave normally around Junior; he hates the fact that a child has the right to tell him what to do, especially when he does so in a very bratty and unsufferable way - luckily, Junior is growing up nicer than in the past, but still a kid remains. Ludwig is also jealous of Jr. even if he's never going to admit it aloud, since the little brother still has one parent to take care of him and love him, and this parent is the King of the Koopas himself. "If only I was Bowser's son..." he finds himself thinking about sometimes, but tries not to elaborate further. Ludwig tries to avoid Junior when he can, and Junior does the same since he doesn't like the way Ludwig yaps about everything. But...! Very recently the two have started getting along a bit more. Ludwig noticed Junior proving himself to be much more clever and empathic than he thought, and is now searching for something in common to share. Lud tried to talk Jr into the world of music like he did with most of his siblings, but hasn't been very successful yet. Junior on the other hand convinced his blue brother to paint with him, and Lud discovered that, in fact, he likes it. So they do paint together, from time to time, or wander with Iggy, Morton and Larry around the Dark Lands metro to draw fancy graffiti all together. Ludwig too needs to feel again like a kid or at least a teen time to time.

* * *

With King Bowser: Ludwig is one of the few Koopalings that not address to Lord Bowser as a "father". He was almost 10 years old when they all were officially adopted by the Royal Family, and always saw the King as "the King". He is very loyal to the Crown and likes to think about himself as Bowser's first and most trusted general, and always showes his most serious and adult size when reporting to him. On the other hand, Ludwig feels a bit nervous and insecure in everyday life situations he spends along with the adoptive parent, when Bowser's just acting as Dad-Bowser and not as King-Bowser-Koopa. Behind his back, Bowser desperately and secretly hopes Ludwig will start addressing him as "dad" one day.

With his mother: He had a very good relationship with his mom (OC)- taken aside that short period of time she couldn't understand why he wanted to be "addressed as a boy" - but it ended well anyway. He also liked to think of himself as their mom's favorite child. Now he doesn't want to talk about her, especially with Junior.

With his girlfriend: He and Estrela (OC) met almost a couple of years ago in Ludwig's personal orchestra, and they have been dating for one year now. Before meeting Estrela, Lud had a poor opinion on Koopa Troopas/Common Koopas in general, especially if civilians or commoners. Then he met this super skilled violist, they started to flirt a bit after some time but then Ludwig kind-of-insulted her for trying to reach "a Royal" and... well, she decided to make him pay for that, planning something quite "funny", and in the end Estrela proved the Royal Koopa that even "commoners" can outsmart the "great Ludwig von Koopa". He was startled by this to the point he totally fell in love. They are both enjoying their relationship now, sharing interests and passions and all, joking all the time and being silly together when none can judge them, even if Luddy still has to learn to be less arrogant with his loved ones - lukily for both he's doing enough progresses already to prevent the relationship to become toxic or bad. Ludwig loves Estrela's strong personality and the fact that she can literally - and will likley, if needed - stand up to him from her 1,40 m (around 4.5 ft) of height and cute Common Koopa appearance. And he loves the way she plays the viola, of course. In his mind, maybe influenced by Lord Bowser's way to think, he's already picturing is future wedding... along with their royal palace and personal realm in the Kingom of the Sky.

Relationship with the Mario Bros., Princess Peach and the Mushroom Kingom in general: He strongly dislikes the two plumbers, and do not approve his sib Lemmy's friendship with them. He mostly hates Mario, considering him the real threat among the two. He would very unlikely call a truce between the Koopalings and the two Humans, unless it was his last option. Peach knows him since he hatched - and she tries her best to treat well the young Royal Koopa siblings, since she used to know their mother - but he doesn't really care about this, claming that since he can't remember it, it doesn't count. He is not very excited by the possibility to have Peach as their step-mother, but during her forced staying at Bowser's place after the occasional kidnapping, he sometimes asks her if she wants to take a look at his last music sheets or if she wants to listen to some of his new pieces. And for the Mushroom Kingdom, he merely saw it as the future Dark Lands' personal granary until he met his GF, who's from said Kingdom. Now he is a bit more aware of it, and nervous about eventual future attacks King Bowser could plan against it.

Peculiarities & co.

Ambidextrous: He trained himself to be almost perfectly hambidextrous, mostly thanks to his piano training. Nobody remembers if he was naturally right or left-handed in the beginning.

Senses: In contrast to what his name could suggest, his sharpest sense is hearing - he can not only hear a whisper on the other side of the royal dining room, especially if it's about him or something he may be interested in, but also got an almost-perfect pitch. If he looks like he didn't hear you, he was either too concentrated on his own toughts or just... blantantly ignoring you.

Body quirks and special abilities: He is way lighter than it looks like, probably due his shell peculiar conformation and unusual lightness, and sometimes it even seems like gravity isn't working on him as it should - he can in fact jump quite hight, flutter jump and even floating in the air for a short time when fighting. He can also walk on clouds without any power-ups or magic, a privilege usually related to winged or sky-born creatures only, such as Paratroopas or Lakitus. Nobody seems to know why, since Ludwig has no wings (even if he secretly wishes he had) and such. Last but not least, he is also able to control thunders with his own hands when things get really hard - in a similar way Luigi can do after knowing the secret technique in Mario&Luigi Superstar Saga.

Random Facts:

His Royal Fang is one of his weak points. He doesn't really like it, and mostly tries to ignore the fact that, of all the possible Fang patterns, *that* specific one happened to him. Mostly, it makes it hard to play woodwinds instruments - he only plays his portable harmonica without much trouble - drinking from everyday glasses - he almost always drink from straws, but gets easily embarassed if he needs to order one when dining in a fancy restaurant - and kissing his GF. This one specifically frustrates him a lot.

His GF finds his Royal Fang cute.

Like most Tarrasquins, he can purr. But since purring only occurs when they are extremely satisfied or happy or comfortable, it's very rare to hear him purr.

He's base respect for any other living creature not related to him is 0, especially with Goombas or other "simpler species". Once beated, outsmarted or both at the same time, he will probably reconsiderate your existance and include your kind in his "this one earned my respect" list. Hopefully, he'll grow out of this when he gets older and wiser.

He owns something like 14 pianos (one of which is possessed), around his various fortress and all. He wanted a super fancy piano for his 18th birthday, like one with a custom color, made by hand and with his name engraved in gold on the front of it, from the best piano brand of the world. Bowser gifted him a huge, golden pipe organ instead, thinking it would have been cooler.

Ludwig is scared as heck of pipe organs.

In the end, Kamek was the one gifting him his "best piano". Bowser is the one that loves to play it the most.

Ludwig is also super scared of deep water. That is funny considering he once piloted a submarine. If asked, he will give a bunch of explanations about that claming that staying inside an advanced submarine is very different from swimming in open sea where you can't see nothing under you. Plus, your hair can't get wet as long as you remain inside of the submarine. His brothers and sister often speculate about how to convince their big brother to learn how to swim.

He likes to act fancy and classy when he's at social events and similar. His pompous attitude helps a lot with that. But he has the tendency of stain his clothing without noticing and does so almost every single time he dines out.

Even with the adult and serious appearance, he would never give up French Fries when there is the option in the menu.

He can also legally buy and drink alchool now, following Dark Land's laws, but even if he enjoys some champagne from time to time, he's more a juice type. His favorite one is orange juice, and always keeps a bottle of it near before an all-day-playing-music session.

He hated brushing his hair when he was a kid, and hated even more the idea of cutting it. His mother gave up when he was 3, and Kamek and some servants tried to run after him once, following the little blue rascal around the whole castle for the whole evening. Kamek was the one that eventually convinced him into taking care of his curly bush of blue feathers - but it took him 2 years.

His natural hair is actually curly, like his mother's was. He straightenes it with an hair straightener after every bath, and uses tons of hair spray every morning to recreate in his iconic hairstyle. This hairstyle was actually heavily inspired by Madame Flurrie's one, after a 12-years-old Ludwig watched one of her theatrical perfomance (on TV) for the first time. He was fascinated by her hair that looked like wings and looked very elegant at the same time, and decided he would have based his personality around that style for the next years.

He didn't know at the time that that specific winged hairstyle was very popular among actors and artist of a certain level, especially from the musical field. When he found out, he was even more amused and claimed it was "destiny" that his tastes happened to be so refined and elegant.

Only recently Lud started to try out new hairstyles, or to be more accurate, some "custom variants of his classic one". He likes to keep them looser when conducting his orchestra or playing in public. He keeps it "sharper" for fights. He would NEVER tie them up.

His GF actually loves when Lud has uncombed hair, and thinks he's way cuter this way. He hates it.

He also loves and hates being called "cute". He actually got angry when Estrela called him "cute" or "adorable" the first times. Now he secretely enjoys it, but still gets quite embarassed.

He'll grow a tuft of feathers under his chin when he'll grow up. Since it's not too common for Koopas to grow facial hair, he will keep it with pride and add it to his style.

When he's sourrounded by his siblings when in need of some peace but can't escape the situation, he takes his professional headphones and put on some classical concerts, german heavy metal music by unknown indie bands or Pure Cosmic Silence, depending how desperate he is.

He loves the smell of ginger. He also likes the smell of gingerbread. One time he ordered a ginger perfume, but the store mixed his order and sent him a very unusual gingerbead perfume instead. He tried it anyway and found it amusing. He would now put gingerbread perfume on himself from time to time. He claims it's a peculiar but great scent, just like him. His siblings mostly thinks he smells like a cookie.

He is also secretly almost-parent-like proud of his siblings any time they manage to do well something he teached them first. This applies mostly with Larry and Junior, especially for the latter being a very quick learner.

He sometimes has a recurrent dream in which he finds out he's actually an only child and goes to party just after. For some *unknown* reasons this mostly happens after spending a very long and tiring day with Junior or Roy.

Four violinists in his orchestra are Piranha Plants, named, respectively, "Todd, Justin, Scott and Ashby". They joined Ludwig's orchestra in an attempt to escape military service, but they didn't know how to play a single thing at first. With time, the quartet became very good with the violin. They will still be present in Ludwig's personal orchestra when he will be a professional composer, as some of the best musicians of the orchestra.

He really dislikes the harpsichord as an instrument. There is not a specific reason about that, he just... really doesn't like the sound it makes, and thinks of it as an overrated baroque instrument. His GF really likes it instead, and they sometimes have silly fights about that.

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