Naoya’s Basic Design

• Name: Naoya Akasaki
• Hair Color: Brown
• Eye Color: Red
• Height: 178cm
• Weight: 70kg
• Blood Type: A-

Here is a basic idea for his character design as far as real photography goes:

Naoya – Examples of His Hair Style

Naoya has relatively short hair; spiky in the back and more straight in the front. His hair is parted from the right to the left rests just above his left eye. Not much hair hangs down over the right side of his face. (These are my own illustrations)

Commissioned Artwork

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The following are a mix of commission and gifted sketches, but I did the coloring.

Clothing Style

Naoya isn’t considered a fashion buff, but rather he’s cool without trying very hard. xD He tends to wear jeans or similar pants, somewhat loose-fitting shirts with a scoop or deep scoop neck or the top few buttons undone. Accessories he might wear would include an occasional necklace, digital watch (right hand), but no rings. He generally wears leather boots, but could also wear more casual tennis shoes.

The colors he wears are mostly dark colors with maybe an accenting lighter color like red, white, or gold.

Naoya’s History & Character Development

As a younger kid, he was cheerful and active, although a bit of a loner. He would go into the quarantined area of the city just for the fun of it, exploring and doing all sorts of parkour stunts. A tragedy occurs in his family that causes him to be a little more distant with people, enjoying more time alone.

Later when he becomes the leader of the Crimson Brigade, he still has that spark of adventure but this is also mixed in with the calm responsibility of duty. He wouldn’t admit it himself, but he does enjoy being needed or valued; that he’s able to help others. Sometimes this feeling can tend to get a little self-sacrificial, especially when he gets too confident in his own abilities.

Armor Types

The members of the Crimson Brigade wear basic types of armor, but Naoya’s is a little special since he’s able to adjust and upgrade it by using his own power. The Level 1 style is mostly just a leather suit and resembles a surfer’s wetsuit (?). The Level 2 is a little stronger and is based off of motorcycle suits. Continuing in this succession, the Level 3 armor adds a lot more protection but also allows for full range of motion.

For all armor levels, Naoya wears a type of gloves that resemble motorcycle gloves, although they’re mostly to protect his hands and help grip on to surfaces (parkour style). Likewise, he might have additional pads or guards on knees and elbows.

After the Assault on the Bay

This is a major turning point in the story, especially regarding Naoya’s character. His more cheerful side is almost entirely gone and replaced with a darker, more melancholy attitude. This is mostly because he views the failure at the Bay as his fault and he’s struggling to atone for that, even if it wasn’t entirely his fault to begin with (there was also a fair amount of sabotage involved as well as other circumstances that he couldn’t control).

Basically, he becomes much more of a masochistic risk-taker is not concerned with putting himself in danger. It’s almost as though he seeks out dangerous situations where he does get injured, but that’s his weird way of “paying” for his past mistakes.

His hair style after this point is a bit more messy and more in his eyes. His mood bounces back and forth from brooding melancholy to wild ferocity.

Partial Notes for the “Assault on the Bay” Sequence

• The monster will throw projectiles at him as he runs through town. He thinks it’s all a game at first and is thoroughly enjoying himself.
• Eventually, he gets hit a few times (slashed a bit across his right thigh; cut across his right shoulder). It bleeds a bit, but it’s nothing more than an annoyance at this point.
• He starts realizing something is wrong when the planned path is blocked. He keeps running, thinking the opening must have just moved further down (the area is surrounded in Nightmare mist that forms a sort of hard barrier that they can’t get past; it’s also a bit dangerous to touch).
• The next three paths to the left are all blocked and his only choice is to keep going straight, but it’s leading toward the bridge where the rest of the team is going to cross… so he has to wait for them to cross the bridge before getting the monster to follow him.
• But, stopping means he has to face the monster for a while… So, in order to hold it off for a little bit, he uses some Earth magic to both push the monster back and actually hold it in place, its feet stuck in sticky mud.
• Looking back to make sure the others have made it safely across the bridge, he continues on down the path and under the bridge just as the monster breaks free and chases after him.
• There’s quite a long straight-way here where the monster begins throwing projectiles at Naoya. He dodges most of them, but the monster is smart. It learns how he dodges the projectiles and it intentionally throws them in a specific motion to get Naoya in a specific position before suddenly blasting him with a huge energy wave that sends him flying forward and slamming him into the railing right in front of the Bay. He hits the railing pretty hard with his right shoulder, but he quickly recovers and hits the monster HARD enough to stun it and give him some additional time to run.
• He runs quite a distance without hearing or seeing the monster coming after him. He ducks under a bridge that crosses a small creek to rest and assess his injuries. He pulls out a sort of thorn or something (from where?) that oozes a dark, muddy black color (foreshadowing for later!).
• He’s a little banged up but nothing that bad. His armor has taken the most of the brunt and has protected him pretty well. At this point he’s mostly exhausted from running all this way. He knows that he needs to find the exit and fast.
• But before he can think any further, the bridge crumbles and falls down around him–he jumps out of the way just in time as the monster silently snuck up on him and used the huge decorative anchor as a weapon to destroy the bridge. Now the monster has a huge blunt weapon in addition to its other skills; it’s slow but deadly.
• This forces him to commit a bit more to the fight: either he puts his all into fighting or running away–maybe a mix of both? He brings out some ice claws–he slashes at the monster while dodging the huge anchor weapon. He does some cool acrobatics here and we fall into a false sense of relief that he’ll be able to best the beast…
• He manages to freeze & destroy the anchor, so that can’t be used against him any more, but that forces the monster to revert back to its previous attacks– fire & blunt-force attacks, including projectiles again.
• The monster hurls metallic shards crested in flame at Naoya but he deflects them with a shield barrier– but the monster rushes him just as his vision is impaired by the incoming projectiles.
• The monster breaks through his shield and grabs his neck, holding him up high, squeezing, before it chucks him into the creek area, sort of on the side of the stone steps you can take to cross the creek. He hits the side of one of the rectangular steps against his right side, kinda smashing his ribs.
• He crawls out just as the monster jumps and pounces down right where he had been.
• This is when he decides to head back toward the bay (which is down toward the right), hoping the path continues on to the exit point just beyond. He’s getting more and more beaten up and exhausted that it’s growing imperative to escape.
• He rounds the corner but enters a complete dead end with Nightmare mist on all sides with the only exit the way he just came… but the monster closes in behind him, trapping him there. He has no choice but to face the monster again.
• The first thing he does is use a bunch of buffer skills: speed, def, attack, evade up skills. The most important skills he needs is speed and evade.
• His armor has been greatly damaged and there’s nothing he can do to fix it, so all he can do is up his own physical defense temporarily.
• He doesn’t really have any healing abilities except for a Red Chain skill that dulls the pain for a while rather than healing it. (Red Chain skills are unique abilities that utilizes the caster’s own life energy).
• Next he forges two curved knives (max speed) –> The key is SPEED in this fight.
• The monster bears down on him with a huge fist that he defends with both knives before dodging off to the right, slashing at its flank.
• The monster screams in rage and swats at him, which he dodges with a nice backflip but again the monster rushes forward and just about catches him in its sharp teeth. He dodges to the other side, landing another blow to the monster’s other flank.
• The monster’s getting super pissed that it extracts a bunch of quills on its back that it hurls at Naoya. He twirls his blades to create a makeshift shield to deflect the projectiles. This technique will work for now but the monster will learn this move.
• Its quills still out, the monster shifts over to the side, entirely blocking the path out of the dead end area– it knows Naoya’s trying to find an opening to sneak past it.
• It shoots a bunch o of huge quills into the ground to block off the remaining area Naoya might have had to escape past the monster, but now that’s out… It even closes the gap behind it, trapping them both inside the area.
• So, now his options are fight or find a way over the wall of quills.
• The monster knows he’ll try to jump so it will direct its attacks toward Naoya’s legs/feet to cripple his mobility and speed.
• It grabs him by the ankle w/ a long whip-like thing and swings him around into stuff. He bashes his head into something pretty badly but the main thing is his left foot.
• The whip has some sort of thorns or barbs on it that cuts deep into his skin and the momentum by which the monster’s twirling him around effectively breaks his ankle.
• With his hands free but heavy from the momentum of the twirl, he severs the whip/vine with his knives at just the right time (luck?) for him to go hurling into and through the wall of quills blocking the area.
• He struggles to stand and is forced to use more Red Chain energy to be able to walk. Again, it doesn’t heal but dulls the pain enough or sort of surrounds it with a pocket of air that supports his weight. He can run and jump and stuff but it’s limited
• Now his goal is going to be going around the other way, hoping there’s an exit there…but along the way, Aki suddenly shows up…
• SHOCK! “What are you doing here!? Why didn’t you get out…?!”
• “I couldn’t just leave you– You, you’re hurt–!”
• “I’m fine; we need to find a way out fast! That thing is no ordinary Nightmare…”
• Naoya takes Aki’s hand and starts running around the bend but it’s another dead end.
• Naoya: “How did you get here…?”
• Aki: “Past the bridge; there’s a path that came down over there.” (pointing)
  It’s back in the opposite direction where they need to go & Naoya won’t be good for much longer (The Red Chain skills are only temporary and will eventually wear off).
• Then the monster catches up to them, throwing quills at them.
• Aki: “We’re gonna have to fight it! Are you good?”
• Naoya: “Not like we’ve got a choice.”
• Aki takes out her awesome fire sword as Naoya switches out the knives for two armored gauntlets adorned with long claws enchanted with electrical fire.
• Of course, Aki’s sword is good for close-range combat, but she mostly uses it to shoot long-distance waves of fire. Naoya’s claws are strictly a fast, close-range weapon that are fast and deadly, but is also pretty risky. He’s trading his own safety for a quick and powerful weapon. Aki is pretty clueless about this and doesn’t right away understand why this is a big risk or why he chose to do it (clearly he’s trying to take the brunt of the fight to protect her).
• Working as a team, Aki shoots out waves of flame while Naoya dashes in and out quickly w/ his electrical/flame claws. They seem to be holding their own until the monster pulls out hundreds of quills out and for a moment holds its stance, getting ready to send a barrage of quills of varying diameter raining down on them.
• Naoya raises his left hand, activating a sort of barrier or energy wave to deflect the incoming attack. As the quills begin raining down on them, he takes the brunt of the force as his sheer power alone blocks the attack. He can’t hold back the attack forever and begins to waiver. Slightly turning around to glance at Aki, he gestures with his right hand for her to run. “Get out of here!!”
• But before she had the chance to run, his barrier cracks and breaks, allowing a bunch of quills through. Moving slightly to the right, he stands in front of Aki, protecting her from getting hit. But several of the quills pierce through his right shoulder. The force of the blow throws him backward into Aki as they both fall to the ground.
• The monster’s attacks seem to stop at that moment; Aki rolls over on the ground to get a grip on her sword and manages to send another huge beam of fire at the monster, blasting it back, over the railing, and into the Bay.
• Buying them a little more time, Aki realizes how badly Naoya had been hit– several smaller quills are peppered all over his entire body (there aren’t that many but enough to be noticeable), but several larger ones plunged almost clearly through his shoulder, one quill piercing a muscle in his shoulder that will make it difficult/impossible to use his right arm and another one that pierces his lung, making it incredibly painful to just breathe; blood gurgles from his mouth. His left leg was also pierced with a large quill and he won’t be able to walk on his own–and he probably can’t risk using more of his Red Chain energy to help (since he’s already taken a ton of damage).
• Aki: “Oh, my god! Naoya–!” She she puts her sword down and rests her hands on his right arm. She doesn’t have healing abilities either, unfortunately.
• Naoya shakes his head silently, unable to speak, and tries to stand with Aki’s help. “We… have to…” [get out of here] His words were cut off as he nearly chokes on his own blood.
• Helping Naoya to walk, Aki helps guide him down the path to their last chance out of the area. It’s up a small curving path on the far side of the creek where Naoya fought the monster earlier. As time goes on, the quills piercing all over Naoya’s body begin to dissolve in a frothy, black goo, leaving large open wounds that begin to bleed profusely. He quickly begins to lose a lot of blood.
• The path leads them into a small wooded area, but unfortunately, they run into another dead end. The monster leaps out of the water and races after them, easily following the scent of blood. This will have to be their final stand.
• Knowing he doesn’t have much strength left, he uses more of his energy to forcefully trap Aki inside a spherical shield, entirely protecting her on all sides while also holding her in place (she can’t move). She begins to panic as she watches Naoya ignite blue and purple flame on both of his hands (with extreme effort, he manages to raise his right arm enough to be somewhat useful), thoroughly intending on fighting the monster. Aki screams but the sound of her voice is trapped within the shield.
• As the monster rushes at them, he throws a ton of icy balls of flame at it, but they do little to stop its momentum. As it reaches where he’s standing, it grips both of his shoulders in its vile hands and squeezes, its pointy finger-like appendages sinking into his skin. Screaming in obvious agony, Naoya glares up at the beast and pushes back, and as he falls backward, he brings up his right leg in a flash of yellow and entirely kicks it into the air. As he’s fall backward to the ground he shoots out a white beam of energy that cuts the monster in half at the waist. Both he and the monster thud to the ground, motionless.
• Shortly thereafter, the barrier around Aki wears off, and she runs to him lying in an ever-expanding pool of his own blood. They may be safe from the monster now, but if they can’t get out of the area to get help soon…
• Aki: “Why did you do that? I could have helped you!”
• Naoya just shakes his head and smiles. Most of the quills from the attack before have entirely dissolved by now except for one that he had hidden from Aki’s view with his left hand. It jutted out of lower left side only about an inch or two. It was a rather small, unassuming quill that didn’t seem to ooze with the same black goo as the others, but it was almost the same basic shape and and size as the thorn he had removed from his arm earlier when he was resting underneath the bridge.
• It was a sort of “master” poison quill that transmits its poison slowly through his blood and reacts with the other “dummy” quills, dissolving them and creating additional poison with the black ooze. If he doesn’t die first from blood loss, the remaining blood that he does have will become toxic to his body.
• But Aki wasn’t going to give up that easily. She took his left arm and draped it around her shoulders to support his weight (as much as possible) so they could walk. Hoping the others were trying to find them, they walked off to the edge of the area next to the closes exit point. There’s a huge tree here and Aki helps Naoya to sit against the tree.
• Naoya’s sort of giving up at this point as he’s thinking how this whole situation was his own fault, thinking they could take advantage of this unique situation (lost in the details for right now). He was a little too confident in his own abilities and put everyone in danger. He tries his best to apologize to her, but it kinda freaks her out, almost like he’s attempting to say good-bye.
• Just then they hear people shouting through a narrow hole through the Nightmare mist held open by Saki and Shin. Taku peers through the hole but he’s a little too big to fit through. Aki helps Naoya to stand as they walk toward the others.
• Just as they reach the exit, an entirely different growl roars from behind. Aki turns to glance behind and meets Naoya’s gaze. He knows what it is without turning around. Aki knows exactly what he’s thinking in that gaze, and her fears are confirmed when he pushes her through the hole, bumping into both Saki & Shin, nearly disrupting their combined effort to keep the hole open. Aki watches helplessly as Naoya smiles again turning around to face the monster. Everything’s happening so fast that none of them are able to do anything but watch.
• Naoya then raises both arms out to his sides, and as a coarse scream of pain echos in their ears, multiple red chains rip out of his back like bloody wings. Reaching his arms up and around the chains, he grabs them all in each hand, then using all the upper body strength he had left, he swung them forward at the oncoming monster, loosening his grip on the chains as they raced forward. Like sharp spears, the chains pierce the monster directly through its center and all the way out its back. Naoya then grips the chains and finally with the last of his strength, he rips them sideways, entirely ripping the monster in half.
• But as the monster falls in a heap of guts and black blood, Naoya’s red chains shatter and rain down like drops of blood. He begins to lose his vision as he falls backward and crashes in a pool of blood.
• Aki rushes forward as droplets of blood continue to fall from the sky. She reaches him but he’s already unconscious and barely breathing. She touches his face with both hands as tears stream down her face. Glancing back at the others with a complete look of helplessness, she cries, “Help him…”
• But she knows Saki & Shin are doing all they can to keep the door open, which leaves only Takuro… who manages to push his way through the hole. Nodding to Aki, he takes Naoya in his arms and he runs back to the exit, Aki following closely behind. Saki & Shin do what they can to make the hole large enough for Takuro carrying Naoya through. Once they’re through, Aki comes next; then Saki & Shin release their hold, exhausted.
• Aki looks at Saki– she’s the only one of the team that has some healing abilities, but she’s exhausted a lot of her energy just keeping the door through the mist open. Naoya’s injuries are far too great for any of her abilities to do anything much, but she at least manages to make his breathing a little less labored and shallow.

• The next segment follows the crew on a mad dash through the safe zone of town to reach their HQ about a 15 min walk or 7 min sprint. They’re relying on Takuro’s strength and endurance rather than his speed (he’s not slow!) to carry Naoya the whole way.
• Once at HQ, they’re met with a speechless doc & nurse…

To be continued…

Storyboards