[ Däta;APPLICATIOn ]

[knight_hart]

Name: Takumi Nishijou
Age: 17
Game Handle: Knight-hart
Canon: Chaos;HEAd

Appearance: He's so bishounen. Here's a full body reference as well

Personality: Takumi could probably be best described as a borderline shut-in who prefers to never leave his container housing whenever possible. Though he hates to be called a shut-in specifically, he can't deny that he pretty much fits the bill. His problem is his overwhelming anxiety; whenever he's around other people, he just can't relax. All he can think about is what everyone else must be thinking of him, and hey, he's realistic. He's a creepy otaku who shouldn't be associating with the public at large, and surely the rest of the world would agree. Because he's very set in this belief, it's hard for him to ever accept that someone might want to be genuinely nice to him. He suspects that there's always an ulterior motive, even if it's something as simple as getting a laugh at his expense. For example, if a girl were to start flirting with him and he responds positively only to have her laugh and say it was just a joke. That is a very real scenario of which he lives in constant fear and wishes to avoid at all costs. Public humiliation is the worst, and if he allows it to happen just once, it would all be over. He would be unable to leave his house ever again. It doesn't help that in a similar fashion, his trust has been betrayed. Just when he thought it was safe to reach out to someone, that he finally found someone who would actually accept him for who he was, he had every suspicion confirmed. One incident. That's all it took, and it set him back further than he started at.

However, I mentioned it's best to describe him as a borderline shut-in. This is because he decided of his own volition to finish high school, even though it's the place where his anxiety is at its highest. He did the math of how many times he was required to attend school in order to graduate, and it equated to 2.5 times a week. Therefore, he attends by his Minimum Attendance Chart, which means he must go twice a week, with one extra day every other week. At school— and really, anywhere he goes, his only goal is to become air. He just wants to get by without interruption from anyone else, although this doesn't mean he wants to live in a world with no one else in it. Even someone like him needs some basic social interaction to survive, apparently. He just prefers to do so indirectly. Most of his time in the past couple of years has been spent online playing an MMO, and in that world... he is a god. He is a widely recognized player known as the “Lightning Fast” Knight-hart, he's reached the maximum experience points so he's at the top level, and he spends hours at a time on many occasions hunting for rare items (simply because people will see him wearing them and be jealous). Online, he can talk to anyone. Online, his identity isn't his own— but that of Knight-hart's— and so he doesn't have to worry about what others think of him. Online, he is admired, and it's because of that that he's even had dreams now and again of switching places with his avatar. At least, that's how things were before Sword Art Online came along, but we'll get more into that later.

Takumi's greatest asset is his mind, for better or worse. He's capable of severe delusions, ones that feel so real he has difficulty discerning them from reality. These come in all sorts of varieties as well. When around girls, it isn't unusual for him to start having some sort of perverted delusion (although he does take liberties in altering their personalities to fit his moe tastes), but the paranoia haunting him often produces very vivid, horrifying imagery. He's affected deeply by his own visions, too. Even realizing that it was all in his head, he proceeds to take precautions in his everyday life to prevent them from coming true.

Essentially, Takumi has a lot going on upstairs. When talking with himself in his head, he could probably go on for hours about random topics and often contemplating his life as a whole. But when it comes to speaking out to others, it's so much harder. Physically, it's difficult. Even when he tries to clear his mind and respond as calmly as possible, he stutters excessively and his voice is quiet and often cracking. Of course, he's aware of this, and his awareness only makes him more self-conscious. As a result, he can get even quieter as a conversation drags, his eyes will start darting as he plans an escape route, and— yeah, he's not above outright running away if it's a plausible option. One may be able to get a bit more out of him if they could prove that they were an anime fan (and he knows how to sort out those who actually know what they're talking about) and were genuinely interested in his input concerning a show, a figure, or something of that nature. He can get a little carried away talking about the details, since inside his head, he is actually a rather talkative person. But once he realizes he's said too much, he will back down again and return to his usual hesitant stance.

Furthermore, he is able to gradually build comfort around a person if they can prove trustworthy enough. This, however, is an extremely difficult task and even Takumi feels that most would find it to be not worth the trouble. With his paranoia levels as high as they are, he can twist just about any event in a way that causes him to feel threatened. He can only start to relax once he feels 100% safe to do so, and those times are few and far between. Though this nature of his helps to isolate him, it isn't until he finds himself in trouble and unable to protect himself that he realizes just how much he needs someone to depend on. As his desperation rises, he can find himself forced to override his high standards in a pinch, but it takes tremendous willpower and can also leave him exhausted, physically and mentally.

AU History: For the past few years, Nishijou Takumi had become increasingly withdrawn, to the point where he even moved out of his family's house and into a storage container on the roof of his father's work building. That was his sanctuary. There, he would spend most of his time watching anime, playing eroge, or playing an MMO. The lattermost, incidentally, was how he was able to afford his own place, even if a low-budget one with zero utilities. In the MMO, he was like a god. He was a well-known, respectable player, and he had the flashy items to prove it. He had already reached the maximum level in the game, but he continued to play anyway, as he liked the attention and it was profitable to him. See, he participated in what's known as Real Money Trading, accepting actual cash in the real world in exchange for virtual items. It was against the TOS, but he wasn't an idiot and therefore was never caught.

Despite his desire to always stay in his home, hidden away from the world, he had decided himself that he would graduate high school, and so he continued to attend— but only as little as possible. He calculated the minimum days required and divided it throughout the school year, meaning that he only had to attend two days a week with an extra day every other week. At school, his only goal was to become like air. He simply wanted to get through life without having to deal with others because the anxiety of socialization was too much for him.

That was why he relied so much on online interaction. Even with nothing left to aim for in the game, his MMO was perfect for inflating his ego. He didn't care if he logged on just to show off his character. It worked every time. But gradually, he started to notice there were fewer players signing in. His information sources were pretty reliable, and so he investigated what the reason might be. Something which came up a lot was "Sword Art Online." It was supposed to be the next step up in gaming, but Takumi was comfortable with his current game. He didn't want to be one with the crowd jumping on whatever was new and "cool." But dwindling players meant he could lose his livelihood. If it meant having to move back home or— g-get a job? Maybe this "Sword Art Online" was worth checking into.

Of course, that proved to be a hurdle in and of itself. It required camping out with an absurd amount of people to pick up the necessary supplies, in person. There were so many times he thought he'd give up after all, but keeping his goal in mind, he was able to suffer through it. At last, he cleared the toughest challenge and returned to his container housing to set it all up. Once inside, he didn't think the world was half-bad, really. The graphics were really impressive, and he felt even more like he was being consumed into this other world than ever before. Not that... he'd admit so much outloud.

Things were going just fine until... that announcement. Without even his character model to hide behind, there was no fooling anyone that he was weak, helpless, and nothing but talk. He'd even joined with his previous handle so there'd be no saving his reputation now...

Samples
First Person: Previous sample from route_29

Third Person: The announcement seemed like such an easy joke to play on all of the people who must have been complete newbies to MMOs. After all, while researching the game, the statistics showed a number of people who were interested in the new technology despite being non-gamer types. Takumi, too, found himself rather impressed with the complete immersion one felt through connecting to this world... At any rate, the developer had a sense of humor. Haha, just look at everyone trembling, he thought. He wasn't dumb enough to fall for something so illogical.

Was he the only one smiling as he watched? He kept waiting for it and waiting for it. "Fooled you!" Hahaha, he couldn't wait to see the looks on everyone's faces. That's what he kept thinking, but this was one long, drawn out joke. It was losing its value. And finally, everyone was instructed to open the gift item placed in their inventories. This was it! He chuckled to himself a little as he activated the item, but it was... just a mirror?

"Nothing's even happening..." he muttered to himself, but as if answering to that, the mirror began to shine so brightly that he couldn't see at all. And in just a moment, it was over. What was reflected then was... the man behind the avatar. A pitifully perfect representation of his offline self. B-But why? For a joke, that was going way too far... Already, he tried to sink back into the crowd, hoping to blend enough until he could be by himself, but that was impossible to begin with. There were way too many people here— something which felt much more awkward with his true self revealed— and the exits were sealed off. But he couldn't take this; he had to log off. That's right! All of this could end before anything grew more complicated. Everyone would be too focused on the announcement and themselves to notice Knight-hart's identity. He could still salvage this.

Or so he thought, but that was when he happened to confirm that there was no option to log out at all. He felt sick. He wanted to escape. He wanted to be alone, but at the same time, if this was really happening... No way. There was no way he could protect himself. He felt his legs starting to give way beneath him; he was trembling too much to support himself. What was he supposed to do?