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Info

❀Huen Kong


❀Personality

__________•Dissociative Disorder
Huen doesn't think of people as 'people' to begin with. You must prove yourself to him, flaws and all. Though his perfectionism is near-obsessive levels, just because you have PERSONAL flaws doesn't mean he'll never consider you a more perfect being, and therefore worthy of his respect and comradeship. Which is a hard thing to attain in any right. People are more 'things' to him, and don't really become people to be listened to until they die. He has many friends that are dead, but not quite as many that live and breathe as he does.

** This disorder is enabled by his and his sister's constant need to be together, not out of their power connection exactly (that's only a side effect, albeit a nasty one), but out of their belief that they are the only beings worthy of eachothers time and affection. As a sidenote, almost everyone they meet and befriend goes through a period of severe jealousy. If one twin becomes friends with someone else, the other will often become callous and nasty, and their powers tend to flare up a little when they're feeling neglected as if someone is stealing their sibling away. They're so entrenched in one another and care for one another so much publicly, if you didn't know they were siblings you would think they were lovers, and they act like scorned lovers in almost all situations involving other people.

__________•DutyBound
Huen will see a job through until it is finished. Period. He doesn't care if his 'higher ups' tell him to cease and desist. Until HE sees the sense in it, he will stick with his initial promise to fulfil a job to it's height of perfection. That's not to say that he won't eventually carry through with your changed orders, just that he'll look out for his perfect record and family mantras first. To his family he takes special care to his duties as co-head of the family, solidifying their political and financial states. It is his first and virtually only priority to keep the family in high standing so that all sons and all daughters may have good, affluent marriages, and make even sturdier political connections to gain more power and sway for the family itself. While he is officially on the Noble side of things, he's purposefully planted sons and daughters in marriages that are loyal to the Emperor for the sake of information and what it may be worth. No matter what side wins, you can rest assured Huen will make sure his family is on whatever side that wins.

What does this mean in relation to his perfectionism? Because of the convoluted way his mind works and his loyalty only to himself and Xiao, there are times where he simply will not listen to anyone, believing that he has a better answer than they do. In his mind, the first order you are given is the one you execute, and there is no reason to call off an order unless it has been compromised beyond repair. He's also been known to ditch partners in lieu of seeking out Xiao if she doesn't automatically come along with him. In short, he thinks 'oh, well they're just changing their minds, I'll do this anyways' unless he sees the sense in stopping.

((FYI, I plan on doing this to someone at least ONCE. Probably early on in rp, because the two of them will not be at the point yet where they want to spend time with anyone but each other. This isn't a permanent fixture, just a temporary beginner's eccentricity. ))


__________•Idealistic
Huen has made it a penalty in his own family to come back home with anything less than a perfect job done in any trade the family participates in. He strives for perfection himself, and while this makes him a strong leader and motivator at times through various ways of manipulation, it also makes him slightly ruthless. While he finds no flaw in himself or his sister (they are a bit narcissistic.....okay, they are a LOT narcissistic) he finds every minute flaw in every other living creature. He prefers the dead because of this, as they have attained spiritual perfection and are no longer bound by their earthly flaws.

__________•Loyalty
Huen can either be very loyal, or very crafty. You generally never know which, unless it concerns Xiao. To her, he is dutiful and doting, and would move the heavens and hell itself to please her. To anyone else, it's up for debate. He feels no true allegiance to anyone but family, and even then they're still up in the air about his decisions and motives. In truth, Huen is loyal to Huen, and by extension Xiao.

__________•Pensive Genius
Huen is an inward thinker. While his sister usually convey's their wishes to others, even if he usually gives equal part, the overall 'scheme' of things usually starts as his plan. His sister is more of a creative 'wall' to bounce off of. Because of this, he is usually quiet when he and his sister are in larger crowds. Let her deal with meaningless small-talk while he figures out the next move on the chessboard. While he is brilliant on his own, it is only with his sister's ideas together that they attain genius-level moves that keep them at least three steps ahead of the rest of the pack.




Unique Attributes :

❀Hobbies

__________•Painting/Artistry
Sumi-e mostly, of which he learned from an old spirit of far eastern prefect decent. Though he does draw tradtionally. His favorite subjects are birds and Xiao in various states of undress. He's been known to have her charm living birds to her just for one of his pictures.

__________•Landscaping
Of both the zen, and wild flower variety. In the Honke's closed yard, almost every inch that doesn't have a walkway or pond has some kind of plantlife, most likely put there by Huen. He refuses to let the groundskeeper touch his flowers, as he feels no one but himself can take care of them properly. The Zen garden is mostly there for aesthetic value, and to help him destress after a long day. He carefully selects every plant that goes into the yard, and changes them with the season. Meaning every year, there are four new gardens that no one has ever seen before on the Ren estate. It's very feng shui, and everything has to be 'just so' for it to work with those principles. He's a very picky planter.

__________•Kendo
Not his preferred weapon, but as a Noble and a son from a warrior's line, Huen was required to learn the craft of swordsmanship at an early age. He could have dropped it once he became head of the family, but he found he enjoyed the strictly defined rules and regulations of Kendo, and the artform that it truly was. He is still not perfect at it though, and his occasional clumsiness irks him in profound and odd ways. He is constantly going through Kendo masters to teach him, but hasn't found one that he enjoys yet that's still living enough to hold a sword in their hands.

__________•GO
Go is the sport of champions. Or it was hundreds of years ago in the Chinese bureaucracy. Usually considered an 'old man's sport', Huen enjoys the game of strategy, and often plays it with his spirit companion Ichi. Ichi, being the soul of a fallen warrior, often lectures Huen on the obscure facts on how Go was once used by generals and emperors to plot out attack strategies. Coincidentally, some of these ramblings have sunk into Huen's information storage subconsciously, and he uses the strategies that Ichi teaches him through the board game quite frequently in life.

__________•--

❀History


The Ren family. Nobles and courtiers to the Emperor for centuries, a most affluent family indeed. Their lineage is mostly affiliated with warriors and mercenaries alike, though their grandmother was once a powerful healer and Dead Soul Conduit. As their name means 'Duty', so too does the family take this mantle seriously in their alliances.

The family is set up in a hierarchy system, not unlike the bureaucratic system found in the emperor's court. At the top are the 'elders', council to whomever happens to be the 'Family Head' at the time. A step down from the council is the Family Head, whom makes the final decisions as a general whole for the family's monetary, political, and cultural gains. Generally this title is male, though in the past, quite a few female warriors have disposed of their elder brothers to take on the mantle. From there are the warriors of the family, then the artisans, then the merchants, then the mercenaries bringing up the bottom flank. Each branch of the family is equal, though they are all below the Head and Council.

Xiao and Huen were both so close together that no one quite ever knew whom was the elder, it is the family folklore that they were born of the same body and split in two as they entered the world, their soul dissatisfied to be chained to one solitary form. This is not true, but it gives the gifts of the children great weight with the family.

At the age of seven, the twins were taken on a trip with their father to a secluded summer home in the northern prefects. While they were away, the main honke was taken under seige by one of the first waves of Noble retaliation to the Emperor. As the family had always studiously followed the emperor under their mother's rule as Head of the clan, the Nobles took it upon themselves to remove them from court by slaughtering her and the rest of the council of elders. Their father was of less importance, but as he got word of the small vandalisms starting around the estate, he went into hiding. This left the two children to travel home alone, only to find their mother's decaying corpse in the council hall, strewn about her chair in a vulgar fashion, not that you could even recognize her body anymore.

Upon clinging to one another and touching both the body and 'soul' of their deceased mother, the children's emotions ran wild, triggering a sort of 'fight or flight' response from their natural channeling 'gifts'. Making a circut of power and ki changing hands from the living to the dead and back, it created a moot 'void' of sorts. A complete and momentary nullification of all power. In this cauldron of sorts, part of the twins souls 'fused' with one another, linking their abilities in intimate and dangerous ways, while at the same time bounding their mother's ghost to her corpse. Horrified by the purgatory they'd condemned their dear mother to, and with no father or council left to turn to for guidance, the children turned their mother's bones into one of the ivory puzzle spheres she loved so much.

Over time, they've learned to 'lock' and 'unlock' the sphere so that each twin may 'speak' with their mother seperately and convene together to make a decision based on both her advice as the new elder council, and thier will, as the new shared Heads of the Family.

They've reestablished the family financially, and politically they quietly support the Nobles, as the crown no longer pays as affluently for loyalty as it once did, despite their mother's insistence to stay loyal to the Empire, and their family's mild resistance to help those that would once slaughter them. With the breakdown of the court's bureaucracy, the Ren family has almost solely taken on the duty of 'mercenaries for hire' as a black market business. They keep their strong merchant and artisan front up for apperances, but the family's real coin comes from hired jobs. And these jobs are taken seriously, and finished with deadly precision. Xiao and Huen will take nothing less than.

But particular members of the family that have been cast out for one too many mistakes have been starting to leave quietly, in lieu of secretly working for the crown......

❀Ask and You Shall Receive:: Q&A


What about their weapons? (Academy Level)

At present Huen has one soul each that is bound to his primary puzzle boxes, though Huen has the added bonus of attracting a like-minded fiend that hardly ever listens and is only marginally useful in battle or practice, mostly he's just there to torment Huen and be a sort of love/hate friend relationship.

In detail::

Huen, likewise, has an elemental friend to balance out Xiao. His first main spirit's affinity is with water and mist. Ichi, meaning one, was a centuries old warrior who drowned by some odd circumstance. The only thing he remembers is going so deep that all the air in the water simply ceased to be, suffocating him while the pressure crushed him simultaniously. His spirit now aides Huen, and he has become good friends with his master. They often play 'GO' with one another.

Huen's second spirit, sort of anyways, is an artist named Muiru. Drawn in by Huen's skill with the paintbrush and pen, Mui is a wily creature that hardly ever listens to his masters bidding. As an odd occurance, his abilities are ink-based. Although Mui is a strong ally, his disobedience at the current time makes him virtually useless. He's really only there to torment Huen and poke fun about his sister and their relationship.

What about Xiao's weapon?

Xiao's mirror acts as its own conduit for 'ki'. Used offensively (on higher levels, not academy level) it can 'catch' someone else's ki to be used to her advantage.

At a basic level, she can use it to channel her own ki, or to look into the mirror and enhance herself. She can also 'scry' Huen in the mirror at Academy level. She cannot scry anyone else at this level. But as she reaches Priestess level, she will be able to scry for anyone who's ki she comes into contact with.

What's in those nifty little puzzle spheres that keeps a soul attached to them?

Muiru=his solidified ink. It's a little square of ink, like any period artist used for the art of Sumi-e.

Ichi=a scale from his old armor. It washed up on the beach one day while Huen was watching Xiao swim and look for seashells. Ichi's spirit approached him, and they started talking, so Huen agreed to pocket the scale and take it with him so that he and Ichi might have more amiable conversations with one another. He often plays 'GO' with the fallen warrior.



HIS OTHER SPHERES ARE NOT NAMED YET BECAUSE THEY DO NOT HAVE ANY OBJECTS INSIDE THEM AT THIS LEVEL.

Where do the twins TRUE allegiances lie?

In short. To themselves and their family. OFICIALLY they're with the Nobles because the nobles pay more. And they're still trying to totally recover their family's financial and political state from when the raid totally decimated their clan. They really don't give a damn about either side, just who pays more and who's easier to manipulate, or will just let the two of them be.

How big is a chinese puzzle ball?

Chinese Puzzle Spheres

As shown above, they come in various sizes. The smallest I've ever come across (and personally own in RL) is about 2x2 inches, give or take a half inch. They're very detailed though, and true marvels of artwork. Usually made out of bone or ivory. Sometimes resin.

Likewise, as the objects they carry around are incredibly small (I was using my personal, tiny little puzzle ball as my example point, sorry for not posting that sooner), they can also be hella large.

Ex:: Their mother's ball, being made out of a combination of human bones and elephant ivory, is HUGE AS HELL. It's a bout three foot by three foot, and stands on a huge cherry lacquer pedestal (fit for a ball so it can move, but still be secure, I'll try and find a picture later) exactly where their mother's Head of Clan seat was.

How long can the twins stay apart without going haywire?

The twins can go extended periods of time without being together. About four hours, give or take. Anything pushing that and they start to get jittery, unless they're with someone they know. Their emotions level out more and they can stay apart longer if they're comfortable.

Now, just because one twin is alright with someone they know/are comfortable with/consider a sort of friend, doesn't mean the OTHER twin isn't freaking out. This process can vary, depending on who they're with and their emotional state. But when they're totally alone with nobody who they're familiar with, it's about four hours tops at the moment. Almost everything else they do together, short of going to the bathroom in front of one another. ((their honke has a bath-house style bath. So it's like a hot spring, one big pool-like tub kinda like in Harry Potter. Lawl, lame refrence. So yes, when I say they do everything together, they do almost EVERYTHING. Even bathe.))

So what's REALLY the deal with the whole 'clingy thing' and why is it different from other rp twins?

Quite frankly, Huen and Xiao are a bit on the incestuous side. No matter WHAT relationship they will ever have in the future, the two of them will always love each other in a non-sibling way on the side. No one truly understands the way they think except for them, and that natural 'twin' closeness evolved into deeper feelings, and will eventually lead to a relationship that is as physical as any normal one. That's not to say they won't have relationships apart from one another, when they're angry at each other they would date others on purpose, simply to make each other jealous.

As it pertains to their 'disorder', one twin will NOT always approve of another twin's choice in company. When this happens, either the jealousy period will be extended/permanant, or that twin will simply act as if that third person does not exist, and will refuse to acknowledge them in any way. This strains the twins relationships, and often leads to fights between them, which leads to a 'cool down' period in their relationship.

The two of them are kind of like an 'on again, off again' couple. Lovey-dovey when together, hateful and cruel when split up.

Twins eh? Very creative!
I would like to wish you luck before hand on RPing these two. Twins are certainly a handful.

Now then, this critiquing session will begin now. C:
I would like to comment that I have not read the other critiques you have received and for that reason might repeat something that as already been pointed out. I request that you smile and take it with grace.

Very interesting name choices. It intrigues me. I'd say you're off to a good start.

Their reason for joining the nobles seems firm. I would like to say that your post implies possible switching of sides in the future. I would like to say while it might seem creative, we have several other quest lunarians who are thinking of switching sides or working as back door agents. It gets old after a while. Even if it is fueled by the desire of wealth and not a personal vendetta or ideals.

Regarding weapons, chinese puzzle balls are certainly unique. It makes sense for Huen to use them as he is a dead soul conduit and dead souls lack a physical anchor. However, I see a problem with Xiao using them. If Xiao is a live soul priest, it mean that the souls she will be dealing with are anchored to a physical body. She will not be able to carry the souls in a puzzle ball unless the soul is removed from its body complete. By then, I suppose it would be in Huen's jurisdiction then. Do you get my point?

Not much to say on appearances as it's still being constructed.

Huen's personality is very solid. Kudos.
Instead of saying perfection is key, perhaps demanding would be the better word? Just a suggestion. Or perhaps idealistic?

Aside from that, once again, good job on his personality. I see good flaws that could be to his immediate disadvantage on the field. His hobbies are varied as well.

Xiao's personality is equally impressive. For Family First! I would like to say it isn't practical for a younger person to chaperon someone older no matter how practical they are. Just a note.

Xiao's hobbies are interesting. Once again, gambling seems to be a very common hobby. Perhaps Mahjong? I know people bet on that but it is also a favorite game amongst nobles and commoners alike. It is just more specific and Mahjong can be brainsplode hard at times.

History... You really had me there while I was sitting and reading it. I don't quite understand the power that was unlocked when Huen and Xiao touched their mother's dead body though. ; ___; my bad. I would like to say, Huen and Xiao have and impressive power when 'channeling' each other. I know you're smart, but I hope you use this to your discretion wisely and instate several restrictions on it to prevent it from being something similar to god mod. C:

I would also like to say, Huen and Xiao will not see souls until they become soul conduits so please keep that in mind as well. C:

You should probably talk to Zephuu regarding a fox soul. That is out of my jurisdiction and I can't offer much. You should probably start thinking in advance the power and duration, pros and cons of their soul's powers.

That is all.
Overall, 8.5/10
Good job.
C:

CRITS FOR CHU RURI oh bby!!
(btw i am crappy Critique sooooo answer what you can and ignore everything OTL)

Thoughts on Huen/(some of twin powers):
I love this character, one of the most original characters I have the pleasure of reading about, though I think the twin clinging is a little overdone as far as Twin characters go, I think that you can incorporate so that it is not overly clinging. I by far think Huen’s take on other people is creative and intriguing, it makes me excited to see what kind of character would break his 99.9% barrier of perfection and become true friends. Other than that, I find his personality absolute, its one of kind to me.
(Side note:
I like the twins “disorder” albeit creepy at the same time, its bound to bring about major influences during an RP, my major question is though is, Once one befriends another person, even after the fit of jealousy and whatnot, does the other twin automatically accept that said friend as being worthy of their presence? If so, Is it only because one twin has approved of the friend? Or because they genuinely start a relationship with them? And what happens if the other twin does NOT approve? What kind of tension does it bring to the twins relationships? (edit: I wasn’t sure if this could be covered by the disorder section? If it does just ignore this.)
End Side note)

Any way back to Huen, I love his weapon, the idea of it is complex and genius, I like the idea of him housing souls for his aid in the little boxes and only having himself know the combination to unleash their powers, it’s even more touching that he finds the company of his souls to his idealism, I think its endearing to see him engage his souls in his everyday activities.

His hobbies are…I don’t how to say…Blah in a way, I’m not much of an artist so I’ll leave that to itself, Kendo was a nice throw in, not something you’d expect from a dead soul conduit who are usually perceived as less physical Lunarians, though you could change up on the gardening idea, maybe give it landscaping idea? He could find stress relief in the idea of changing the scenery of his garden, you know the whole feung shu idea via Landscaping, it would give him a more thoughtful and even time consuming hobby, including that he grows all the plants he uses. You should consider Go one of his hobbies as well, since he enjoys playing it with his Drowned solider.

Well that’s all I got for Huen, I think he’s a great character so 9/10

NOW ON TO XIAO
I’m not much a girl Rper xD it’s a little hard for me to get into the characters when I feel like I’ve read something like her a bunch of times
That being said, Xiao is a constant surprise to me.
Starting with her personality:
Her goddess complex is interesting purely in the fact that I would assume it comes from her matching her brothers 99.9% ideals of a perfect being, though I was more surprised that she gets it from her social situations. She didn’t strike me as the Socialite as I read Huen’s info, so back to my assuming, I thought she would be like him, less social and more up right, even stiff.
Though she fits the role of Socialite perfectly and she completes the whole twins image, I like the almost ice queen image I get of her. I like that she is the match maker of her family, often making pairings for both genders, my questions being, Does she do it out of love? Does she want to see the rest of her family happy? Or does she do it cause of family duty? Is it like a job? Does she enjoy it? Can you consider it a hobby? (lots of questions!!)
Other than that, I enjoy her personality, its much better than a whiny crying girl *cough*
Now to her hobbies
I love flower arranging, partly because I am a florist, it’s a fabulous hobby and can never be over used in my opinion, as long as they have the creativeness and heart to do it, it’s really relaxing. I like that you are mingling it with her clothing designing hobby, which is unique as well, not a lot of people think it is, but I don’t meet many people these days that take the time to create an outfit complete of their own design.

Ahhh Gambling, by far one of the most over used hobbies or indulgences, not a bad thing but a little stale and something I wouldn’t expect from Xiao at all, however it might be a little early to beat down on it, if you can find a way to make it more interesting than just typical gambling, such as its like way to get information on certain things or something, I might give it a chance (sorry Ruri oAo OTL)

Overall I think she’s another great character, and suits Huen perfectly, so 9/10

(dies from crappy crit)