Zel: History/Personality
Dec. 5th, 2011 09:33 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
nolongerslateFrom his application...
Canonical Background
Zelgadis's parents died when he was very young, so he was raised by his great-grandfather, Rezo, the Red Priest, a powerful and seemingly benevolent magic user, whose main flaws were blindness and a villainous name. Zel aspired to become stronger to assist his grandfather. When he was a teenager, Rezo offered to make Zel stronger, and didn't mention to his grandson that it came with 'by turning you part-human'. Or that really the change wasn't to grant Zel's wish, but because gullible grandson was a convenient subject to test his chimera research on. Zel found out anyway.
Having his only family betray him like that broke something in Zel. He kept working for Rezo, but when he came across a legendary magical artifact that Rezo wanted, Zel stole it instead with the dubious plan to use its power to force Rezo to change him back. Then it turned out Rezo's blindness was due to the piece of Dark Lord Shabranigdo sealed behind his eyes, and the artifact Zel had was the key. Thankfully the original (well, she stole it first) owner of the artifact was Lina Inverse and she and her partner, Gourry Gabriev, had the combination of spell and magic sword that could defeat Shabranigdo. Shabranigdo's destruction also killed Rezo, leaving Zel without obvious answers to how to restore his body.
To make a long story short, with the exception of an irate former subordinate of Rezo putting a bounty on his head, Zelgadis's adventures can be summed up as 'looking for a cure' and 'getting roped into helping to save the world'. Often at the same time. It was on one of these trips that he and his friends discovered Rezo wasn't as dead as everyone assumed, as he had found a way to preserve his soul (along with the piece of Shabranigdo) in a jar. While Pocota, another party member, wished to restore Rezo so that Rezo could cure the kingdom of Taforashia, Zel had other plans -- he stole the jar and threatened to kill Rezo if he didn't get the answers he wanted.
Rezo told his grandson bluntly that even his own extensive magical knowledge couldn't undo what had been done to Zel, and that he doubted that it was even possible. Which devastated Zel and allowed Pocota to steal Rezo's soul jar back. Which allowed for Taforashia's restoration, but also meant that the party had to defeat Shabranigdo again.
Personality wise, Zel is a dour person and rather a pessimist. In a comedic universe, he can usually be relied on being the 'straight man', if he's not the butt of the joke. He's got a decent chunk of both intelligence and common sense, tempered with the cynicism.
On the other hand, he does have a bit of an ego -- he's skilled at his job and knows it. Zel's relationships with others tend to be self-serving. He seems to take delight in being seen as a 'heartless sorcerer swordsman' and being distant, and he avoids cities when he can. He's not above inconveniencing his allies or former allies if something comes along, and can be rather ruthless. He does seem to be faithful to his job (mercenary work), and on the big things.
Sabra La Tau
I played Zel for several years at Sabra La Tau. Basically, SLT was a horror/survival amnesia game with a strong plot element. Characters slowly regained memories (and out of order), so between that and the horror elements, often forced character evolution. Zelgadis got the 'good ending' -- as part of SLT's premise, characters who had been present for a while could be retired with all their memories returned and a wish granted.
Zelgadis, continuing his record of doing dubious things to become human again, made a deal with a being known as Surgeon, a god (Judge) from a dying world named Sabra La Tau. Zelgadis would temporarily give up his memories, and play in games that ranged from harmless to embarrassing to painful/traumatic/both! In return, his memory would be gradually restored and, at the end, he would have a wish granted. Zelgadis agreed, knowing that an otherworldly god probably was his last, best hope.
Zelgadis woke on the team of Vulpecula, one of the first twelve to awaken in this round of Sabra La Tau. Without memories and in a deadly place of killer lizards and death games, it was easy to become comfortable in his own skin.
Unexpectedly, Rezo had also been recruited by the Judges, and Zel was slow to remember his grandfather. Rezo quickly realized who Zel was, and used their shared ability to learn spells to get close to him and bolster his own limited memory. Rezo was one of the first to seriously consider killing the Judges, and recruited Zel to assist. As an experiment, Rezo also killed several members of Hydra, Vulpecula's allies, without Zel's knowledge, to see if the Judges would notice his actions. The realization of Rezo's selfishness and the utter failure of his plot caused Zel to resent Rezo even before the memories of his transformation resurfaced.
As part of one of Surgeon's experiments, Zelgadis was changed into a human again. Even with fragmentary memories, he found himself missing his chimera abilities -- and was even more distracted that several members of Hydra assumed he was a plant. After he lost his life by being attacked, drained of half his blood, and then eaten, Surgeon restored his chimera-ness. (Though with minor modifications -- the original brau demon was unavailable, so Mao from Disgaea was pressed into providing a sample. The less said about that, the better.)
The final bit of important Zel plot was another Surgeon experiment, one that revealed the backstory of the planet. Zel received the memories of Blue, a nomadic mage alive when the caves were created and the planet started to die. While most of the memories are dreamlike, Zel can call on them. Since, unlike him, Blue had a happy childhood, Zel has a big of cognitive dissonance when it comes to that, and almost a bit of 'I wish this were this true'. Even when the world ended in a horrible fire and everything was eaten by the ground.
Zelgadis did finally leave Sabra La Tau with his wish: changed to be the ability to take on human or chimera form at will, the ability to worldwalk -- to visit friends -- and the ability to know when serious trouble was brewing in the Slayers universe, the last a wish to make up for the fact Lina Inverse, Zelgadis's friend, had lost her freedom to the rock of Sabra la Tau.
Sabra made him a bit more willing to bend his self-servingness for allies, possibly because his team's injuries would come back and bite him. He's still willing to be ruthless and a bit of a dick to strangers, but once you are in Zel's good graces, he'll be less prone to treat you as 'Useful Person #1'. Now that he won't do it, but he's careful of the line between 'you don't mind me imposing' and 'that was a dick move'.
Important Sabra Relationships:
Excel (Excel Saga): Zelgadis and Excel woke up on the same team, and spent months and months together. In a sense, Excel took on the role of Lina Inverse, in that Zel would totally attempt to moderate her craziness but usually would follow her leadership. Or at least when she was paying attention. On the other hand, the fact that they had woken up together means he has a good idea how much of Excel's bluster covers for insecurity.
Gokudera (Reborn): Vulpecula was partnered with Hydra, and Hydra was effectively led by Gokudera. Zel considered Dera a bit more sensible and smart than Excel, but still occasionally a kid who could use some sense talked into him. He did respect Dera's skills as a leader and for knowing a boatload about poison and how to kill things. And he was kind of bummed Dera didn't say goodbye properly. (Dera was brainslugged at the time.)
Kuroba Kaito (Magic Kaito): Kaito was... complicated. Zel appreciated having another smart person on the team. On the other hand, Kaito was also in Zel's book as mentally fragile between the time he spent being eaten by rock and the fact Mirror had broken him several times. So Zel would take anything Kaito said with a grain of salt, but still would rate his plans as some of the better ones from Vulpecula.
Chika (Zombie Loan): Chika may have ben Vulpecula's dumb teenager, but he was Vulpecula's dumb teenager. And Zel did respect Chika's abilities to survive in murdercave.
Yuffie Kusinagi (FFVII): Zel was pretty fond of Yuffie, since she reminded him a lot of the women he worked with back home -- that is, egotistical but with the skills to back her up. Her obsession with pants was a bit odd.
Jace Beleren (Agents of Artifice): Oh, this is complicated. Zel and Jace used to be colleagues in that both were some of the more prominent mages. They weren't close enough in magic that they could swap spells, but they could talk shop and speculate about Sabra. Then Jace's teammate ate Zel, and Zel eventually figured out Canis had been keeping a cannibal demon as a teammate. Zel took this personally, simply because Jace hadn't told any one or taken precautions. (This was only semi-rational -- Jace hadn't known that Zel had been eaten until well after Zel had revived.) Zel mostly avoided Jace after that.
Cielo (Shin Megami Tensei: Digital Devil Saga), Mikaila (Count Cain) and Mao (Disgaea 3): As noted in one of the sample posts, these three inadvertently lead to the one time Zelgadis died outside of a game context. There will be irrational hatred even if alternates of these people show up, and really, any demon from DDS or Disgaea will probably get some of that as well.
There were more, but those are the most noteworthy.
Canonical Background
Zelgadis's parents died when he was very young, so he was raised by his great-grandfather, Rezo, the Red Priest, a powerful and seemingly benevolent magic user, whose main flaws were blindness and a villainous name. Zel aspired to become stronger to assist his grandfather. When he was a teenager, Rezo offered to make Zel stronger, and didn't mention to his grandson that it came with 'by turning you part-human'. Or that really the change wasn't to grant Zel's wish, but because gullible grandson was a convenient subject to test his chimera research on. Zel found out anyway.
Having his only family betray him like that broke something in Zel. He kept working for Rezo, but when he came across a legendary magical artifact that Rezo wanted, Zel stole it instead with the dubious plan to use its power to force Rezo to change him back. Then it turned out Rezo's blindness was due to the piece of Dark Lord Shabranigdo sealed behind his eyes, and the artifact Zel had was the key. Thankfully the original (well, she stole it first) owner of the artifact was Lina Inverse and she and her partner, Gourry Gabriev, had the combination of spell and magic sword that could defeat Shabranigdo. Shabranigdo's destruction also killed Rezo, leaving Zel without obvious answers to how to restore his body.
To make a long story short, with the exception of an irate former subordinate of Rezo putting a bounty on his head, Zelgadis's adventures can be summed up as 'looking for a cure' and 'getting roped into helping to save the world'. Often at the same time. It was on one of these trips that he and his friends discovered Rezo wasn't as dead as everyone assumed, as he had found a way to preserve his soul (along with the piece of Shabranigdo) in a jar. While Pocota, another party member, wished to restore Rezo so that Rezo could cure the kingdom of Taforashia, Zel had other plans -- he stole the jar and threatened to kill Rezo if he didn't get the answers he wanted.
Rezo told his grandson bluntly that even his own extensive magical knowledge couldn't undo what had been done to Zel, and that he doubted that it was even possible. Which devastated Zel and allowed Pocota to steal Rezo's soul jar back. Which allowed for Taforashia's restoration, but also meant that the party had to defeat Shabranigdo again.
Personality wise, Zel is a dour person and rather a pessimist. In a comedic universe, he can usually be relied on being the 'straight man', if he's not the butt of the joke. He's got a decent chunk of both intelligence and common sense, tempered with the cynicism.
On the other hand, he does have a bit of an ego -- he's skilled at his job and knows it. Zel's relationships with others tend to be self-serving. He seems to take delight in being seen as a 'heartless sorcerer swordsman' and being distant, and he avoids cities when he can. He's not above inconveniencing his allies or former allies if something comes along, and can be rather ruthless. He does seem to be faithful to his job (mercenary work), and on the big things.
Sabra La Tau
I played Zel for several years at Sabra La Tau. Basically, SLT was a horror/survival amnesia game with a strong plot element. Characters slowly regained memories (and out of order), so between that and the horror elements, often forced character evolution. Zelgadis got the 'good ending' -- as part of SLT's premise, characters who had been present for a while could be retired with all their memories returned and a wish granted.
Zelgadis, continuing his record of doing dubious things to become human again, made a deal with a being known as Surgeon, a god (Judge) from a dying world named Sabra La Tau. Zelgadis would temporarily give up his memories, and play in games that ranged from harmless to embarrassing to painful/traumatic/both! In return, his memory would be gradually restored and, at the end, he would have a wish granted. Zelgadis agreed, knowing that an otherworldly god probably was his last, best hope.
Zelgadis woke on the team of Vulpecula, one of the first twelve to awaken in this round of Sabra La Tau. Without memories and in a deadly place of killer lizards and death games, it was easy to become comfortable in his own skin.
Unexpectedly, Rezo had also been recruited by the Judges, and Zel was slow to remember his grandfather. Rezo quickly realized who Zel was, and used their shared ability to learn spells to get close to him and bolster his own limited memory. Rezo was one of the first to seriously consider killing the Judges, and recruited Zel to assist. As an experiment, Rezo also killed several members of Hydra, Vulpecula's allies, without Zel's knowledge, to see if the Judges would notice his actions. The realization of Rezo's selfishness and the utter failure of his plot caused Zel to resent Rezo even before the memories of his transformation resurfaced.
As part of one of Surgeon's experiments, Zelgadis was changed into a human again. Even with fragmentary memories, he found himself missing his chimera abilities -- and was even more distracted that several members of Hydra assumed he was a plant. After he lost his life by being attacked, drained of half his blood, and then eaten, Surgeon restored his chimera-ness. (Though with minor modifications -- the original brau demon was unavailable, so Mao from Disgaea was pressed into providing a sample. The less said about that, the better.)
The final bit of important Zel plot was another Surgeon experiment, one that revealed the backstory of the planet. Zel received the memories of Blue, a nomadic mage alive when the caves were created and the planet started to die. While most of the memories are dreamlike, Zel can call on them. Since, unlike him, Blue had a happy childhood, Zel has a big of cognitive dissonance when it comes to that, and almost a bit of 'I wish this were this true'. Even when the world ended in a horrible fire and everything was eaten by the ground.
Zelgadis did finally leave Sabra La Tau with his wish: changed to be the ability to take on human or chimera form at will, the ability to worldwalk -- to visit friends -- and the ability to know when serious trouble was brewing in the Slayers universe, the last a wish to make up for the fact Lina Inverse, Zelgadis's friend, had lost her freedom to the rock of Sabra la Tau.
Sabra made him a bit more willing to bend his self-servingness for allies, possibly because his team's injuries would come back and bite him. He's still willing to be ruthless and a bit of a dick to strangers, but once you are in Zel's good graces, he'll be less prone to treat you as 'Useful Person #1'. Now that he won't do it, but he's careful of the line between 'you don't mind me imposing' and 'that was a dick move'.
Important Sabra Relationships:
Excel (Excel Saga): Zelgadis and Excel woke up on the same team, and spent months and months together. In a sense, Excel took on the role of Lina Inverse, in that Zel would totally attempt to moderate her craziness but usually would follow her leadership. Or at least when she was paying attention. On the other hand, the fact that they had woken up together means he has a good idea how much of Excel's bluster covers for insecurity.
Gokudera (Reborn): Vulpecula was partnered with Hydra, and Hydra was effectively led by Gokudera. Zel considered Dera a bit more sensible and smart than Excel, but still occasionally a kid who could use some sense talked into him. He did respect Dera's skills as a leader and for knowing a boatload about poison and how to kill things. And he was kind of bummed Dera didn't say goodbye properly. (Dera was brainslugged at the time.)
Kuroba Kaito (Magic Kaito): Kaito was... complicated. Zel appreciated having another smart person on the team. On the other hand, Kaito was also in Zel's book as mentally fragile between the time he spent being eaten by rock and the fact Mirror had broken him several times. So Zel would take anything Kaito said with a grain of salt, but still would rate his plans as some of the better ones from Vulpecula.
Chika (Zombie Loan): Chika may have ben Vulpecula's dumb teenager, but he was Vulpecula's dumb teenager. And Zel did respect Chika's abilities to survive in murdercave.
Yuffie Kusinagi (FFVII): Zel was pretty fond of Yuffie, since she reminded him a lot of the women he worked with back home -- that is, egotistical but with the skills to back her up. Her obsession with pants was a bit odd.
Jace Beleren (Agents of Artifice): Oh, this is complicated. Zel and Jace used to be colleagues in that both were some of the more prominent mages. They weren't close enough in magic that they could swap spells, but they could talk shop and speculate about Sabra. Then Jace's teammate ate Zel, and Zel eventually figured out Canis had been keeping a cannibal demon as a teammate. Zel took this personally, simply because Jace hadn't told any one or taken precautions. (This was only semi-rational -- Jace hadn't known that Zel had been eaten until well after Zel had revived.) Zel mostly avoided Jace after that.
Cielo (Shin Megami Tensei: Digital Devil Saga), Mikaila (Count Cain) and Mao (Disgaea 3): As noted in one of the sample posts, these three inadvertently lead to the one time Zelgadis died outside of a game context. There will be irrational hatred even if alternates of these people show up, and really, any demon from DDS or Disgaea will probably get some of that as well.
There were more, but those are the most noteworthy.
