Talk about someone using your own words against you

This is not an XP request. These 3 threads will be part of a larger XP request or will be split between two separate XP requests that will come after I finish Prodigal Summer, A Night Time Relaxation, and Battle Arena Crackdown.

The Threads =========================

Chapter 1: This isn’t even my Final Form // Here we find Nao in the present day. She’s landed into a dead end job, is constantly behind on her work, and has an overbearing supervising officer and colleagues who abuse her meekness. On what should be a routine encounter, she’s brought into contact with Helena Akimoto, the relative of the man she injured so many years ago. Already terrified of disappointing another noble, she shrinks back in fear and has to be dragged out of her hiding place.

She finally finds that confidence when Helena admits uncertainty with the paperwork process, going as far as to exploit a little known process to help elevate her guest’s visibility at the time of her assignment to her new Division, feeling an itching at the back of her mind being scratched by her giving in to dispensing favors.

Chapter 2: A Cheap Ploy // Nao finds herself sent on patrol after having coasted by for years on her inability to perform in the field keeping her behind her desk. Either Helena made mention of it to someone or she was getting punished for not sending the noble on to someone better than her, Nao isn’t quite certain. Regardless of what caused it, this is when she runs into that son of a bitch Anatoly.

Anatoly uses his shaman magics to imprison Nao and draw her spirit out forcefully, resulting in a premature glimpse of her Shikai, watched from inside her inner world on a laptop. The man she sees identifies himself as Murat and he displays a confident and effective defense against Anatoly before boldly binding the two of them together in a high risk attempt to keep himself alive.

The gamble pays off and we see Anatoly returning Nao to her body, though not without taking something away from her. She, fearful of what he might do, attempts to make a stand, but he effectively dispatches of her with a torrent of rushing water. It is in this moment that she is sucked back to her inner world and Murat decides to tell her how to draw him forth.

Though Nao doesn’t get it, the reason why this happened now instead of during her attempts at meditation is that she’s always performed at too high a level for her own good. While many inner spirits might need to motivate their Shinigami or push them to better themselves through hard work, Nao’s is the opposite. To become better, she needs to slow down and take some time for herself. In her despair and selfishness at wanting to be free from the guilt and embarrassment at how worthless she felt, she finally did what he’d wanted, only much more morbidly than would have been preferable.

Chapter 3: Two Peas in a Pod // Here we see Nao meeting up with Zenji Hatayama in her daily work now that Murat is back. She has become irritated with her spirit’s insistence that she do corrupt or unethical things in order to make her life easier, but that irritation leads to her giving in to temptation as a means to shut Murat up prematurely.

Finally, after going on a century of absence, she has Zenji reach out to Testuya, waffling back and forth over what she wants from it and, finally settling on requesting a meeting. She also, unknowingly, plants the seeds for someone who might actually care about how she’s being abused in her position. Finally, at the end of the thread, she is tricked by her spirit into releasing her Shikai and allowing him to straighten out all of her paperwork so she can have her date. She still double-checks all of his work, but this will certainly buy her the one day off that she needs to meet with Testuya!

Zanpakuto & Power =========================

Spirit: Murat

Murat is a shameless, somewhat abrasive man who likes his booze, tobacco, and getting work done as efficiently as possible. He wears a nice tailored two piece suit and has medium length black hair that normally obscures an empty eye socket. He has a thick baritone voice, though it is occasionally broken up by coughing thanks to his frequent chain smoking.



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Inner World:: Nao’s inner world is Murat’s well furnished office. There are comfortable chairs, an expansive liquor and cigar collection, and even a little fold-out couch for napping. The whole room has a constant haze of smoke drifting about it, circulated by a large slow moving ceiling fan. There is a hallway that leads away from the room Murat seemingly lives in, but she has not been able to properly explore the rest of the complex.

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Sealed Zanpakuto: Murat’s blade form is a 10 inch tanto. Nao normally keeps the blade in an overlong sheath that she has padded in order to make it look as though she has a regular length blade, though she does have a smaller one that is properly sized which she has not used much since her days in the Academy. The blade itself is thick and has a handful of small jagged groves set just above the silver handguard. The handle is also made of an ornamentally carved silver, and Nao keeps two red tassles tied on the end.

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Release Command: Inin-jō (Power of Attorney)

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Released Zanpakuto: Nao is not one for fighting hand to hand, and her released Zanpakuto reflects that, taking on the form of a silver quill. The ornamental etchings the cover the handguard in its sealed form extend down the length of the metal part of the quill, ending in an overlarge tip that, in a pinch, could be used as a gruesome stabbing implement. The tassles at the end vanish and are replaced by a long silvery-gray hawk feather.

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Release Ability: Nao’s quill is able to control the written word. While this may seem to be the power contained in all writing implements, it extends far beyond that, as she is able to manipulate not just words, but also the things they are written on, grappling opponents with store awnings, hurling chunks of concrete with crosswalk instructions written on them as offensive weapons, and shielding herself behind a literal wall of text. The objects are fortified with her spirit, so tearing a sheet of a child's homework that she's used to bind your hands together is considerably harder than if it were a normal sheet of loose leaf.



You may respond to this publicly. Spank me hard, Daddy.

Nao, epitome paper pusher of the first division! A high power bureaucrat, who doesn't need to learn how to become better, she needs to learn to slow down! Let's see if she achieves this.

PASS - Writing - You have an interesting character premise delivered on earnestly. Keep it up. Nao is fun, Murat is interesting and further, they are distinctly human and alive. However, your threads can get a bit too wordy with back and forths. I'm not prepared to say it's too much or unnecessary, but Nao took ten posts to ask Zenji for favor with a lot of words in between. I think it served a good purpose and provided a bit more depth to Nao by the end, but when the central point about her nature is well established already, lingering on it can drag and absolutely butcher the pacing. I've seen you make paperwork fun and interesting, be wary of hitting that chord too much.
PASS - Release - Murats good, power is good. Not much to say, they play off each other well and I can see the way the themes of this power play off Nao's nature.
PASS - Moment - This is weird. Thread 2 is the moment, and then we have a third as denouement which also helps set up the arc. I don't feel she particularly earned it, but that was the point, sort of. Nao needs to cut loose but I only kind of see her doing this after she has obtained her power and certainly not before. Make sure you establish the effort of the character's growth as a path to the power and not the other way around as you move forward to Second Release.
PASS - Impact - You have three distinct threads, each with someone who Nao establishes a relationship with. The third thread ties to the first and if I'm not mistaken set up some delicious future conflict. Particularly I wanna call out A Cheap Ploy. Rolling over for Anatoly to establish his character is a big move, and I think it's always very cool when a character can take a fall, even if Murat dished it back out afterwards.

Congratulations, Nao, from me and the rest of staff, you are approved for First Release!!!