It was hideous beyond words and the very idea Masakii was going to have to bear it for however many years it took to properly heal was nearly as painful as the gash itself. The stitches stretched from the right side of his temple to slightly before the top of his left eyebrow in a small arc and still stung wretchedly anytime his forehead creased, which it was certainly doing now as the fifteen year old keeto stared at the ornate golden mirror apprehensively. It should have been exciting to leave the house for the first time since The Incident, but he was already nauseous at the thought of how others would react and he could clearly imagine the other party guests staring and gossiping behind cupped hands.
He tried to comb his bangs over it but they were too side-swept to cover the entire thing, and so the gossiping in his head grew louder as they mocked how poorly he was attempting to hide it. Masakii frowned and tried to further adjust his bangs again and again before setting down the ornate golden brush (it matched the mirror) and sighing into his hands. He considered lying to his parents and saying he still wasn’t well enough to attend the party, but he doubted they would listen. He had already spent long enough avoiding venturing out and his parents didn’t want any rumors beginning to flit about after how much effort they had spent burying The Incident from record. Masakii stared at his reflection and it continued staring back with that disgusting laceration impossible to ignore.
After what felt like a decade later, Masakii emerged from the safety of his room, bangs carefully pulled back into a small ponytail so the stitches were on full display. If they were going to gossip about it regardless, he may as well be the one to start the conversation.
Stats
- Full Name: Masakii Treven
- Alias N/A
- Species: Cream Keeto
- Age: 19
- Gender: Cis male
- Sexuality: Pan
- Height: 5'10"
- Origin: Outside Niryn, Mirais
- Occupation: Heir
- Status: Necromancer
- Theme: Necessary Evil -Motionless In White
Likes
- Necromancy: His parents teaching him necromancy is one of the few genuinely good memories he has with them, so he's sentimental about the arte even without the super special lineage thing making him biased. He's a little more bitter about it currently since his parents would die before admitting he's surpassed them and takes credit for anything he does, but he still enjoys practicing it and trying to find ways to improve it even further without the seal's suffocation interfering.
- Deciphering Tomes: What started as a spiteful search to cure the seal on his bloodline quickly became his favorite (non-necromancy) hobby. Masakii collects any old tomes he can get his hands on, legitimately or not, and will spend as long as he needs to figure out how to read them. He's fairly adept at reading varying degree of ancient texts and symbols as a result, which he finds fascinating and uniquely satisfying on its own. At times he wishes he had someone to discuss it with (besides Lucille, of course), but that would require camaraderie with someone else so never mind that, it's nice to have a quiet hobby for just himself as well. Better, even.
- Confrontation: He loves arguing and he will take nearly any opportunity to do so, regardless of how much he actually cares about the topic or if he's completely bluffing the entire thing. It's fun seeing what he can convince other people (furries) of and, more importantly, Masakii is in a constant state of wanting to prove other people wrong and himself correct. Also he's stubborn enough to make a brick wall seem yielding and refuses to admit he might perhaps not be completely correct, even if he has long since realized otherwise.
- Gold & Victorian Gothic Aesthetics: Appearances are EVERYTHING and nothing says rich, refined, and elegant like gold and black everything (apparently). While the aesthetics were already started by his parents, he also goes out of his way to collect gold paraphernalia, especially if they relate to the occult in some way (skulls are a popular one). Any items of a darker nature are kept secret, but he'll happily brag about the rarity and cost of any others. And, of course, any fashion pales in comparison to Victorian Gothic and he rarely ever wears anything else, regardless of where he is. He must look fancy and high class at All Times. Don't say he looks like a vampire though, he hates that.
Dislikes
- Being Second Best: Being number two in basically everything growing up was perhaps not the best for his self-esteem in his formative years, especially with how overbearing his parents were about it. He cannot stomach failure and will obsess over any perceived loss or slight until he's able to prove otherwise. It's been ingrained into every fiber of his being by his parents that he must be perfect in every feasible way to deserve to be part of this family, and any evidence that he isn't is one of the quickest ways to get under his skin.
- Vulnerability: Both the physical and emotional kind, but especially the latter. He never mentally recovered from being kidnapped and the idea of being weak and helpless ever again terrifies him like nothing else. He's scared of trust, he's scared of opening up, and, most of all, he's scared that the emotions and doubts he's trying so hard to suppress mark him as inferior and worthless after all. He wants to be his confident and unflappable mask so badly.
- Physical Labor: He's too rich for having to walk anywhere or do any chores, ok. Masakii has zero stamina and maybe a two in coordination on a good day and he doesn't like to be reminded of it. However, he also has no plans to do anything about it ever and don't even imply he should try running anywhere or lift anyway heavier than his (gaudy as hell) phone. How undignified. Thankfully, one of the many lovely advantages of being a necromancer is that your myriad of zombie servants can take care of any task for you.
- Rabbit Jokes: Listen. Listen. He is aware he has magnificently fluffy ears that are perhaps a little, just slightly, larger than others, but if you compare him to a rabbit in any way, he is going to hold it against you forever. This includes offering him carrot cake. He is not a rabbit. This is perhaps one of the pettiest (and stupidest) reasons to end up on his revenge list, and yet here it is.
Masakii is the poster child for overcompensation. For all intents and purposes, he is narcissistic, self-centered, arrogant, pretentious, and all around an unbearable prick who is more than willing to enact revenge on a 10+ year grudge if the opportunity should arise. Also attention-seeking. Masakii could not care less if the attention is positive or negative as long as it is being noticeably directed him, though he will be significantly more polite in public if someone Important is there or if he is planning on using them in the future. Which, of course, brings up that Masakii is borderline incapable of maintaining actual relationships due to both his condescending nature and his belief that everyone else is as ruthless and willing to stab anyone in the back for their own gain as he is. Masakii has no trust in other people and would rather do everything himself than rely on other people who would certainly just screw everything up (or try to screw him over which he considers more likely), which is unfortunate because Masakii really doesn’t like working or moving in general and is much better suited to the role of yelling commands.
BUT. If someone (for some unfathomable reason) went past the first ten/fifteen layers of all this terribleness, they would discover that- - -!
Masakii is still a prick. But he’s a very distressed and lonely prick who is driven by the need to prove that all those disgusting feelings of self doubt and worthlessness that are constantly bombarding him are COMPLETELY UNFOUNDED and he did not (somehow) completely delude himself into thinking he was The Best just to falter due to his own insecurities. Despite his attempts to completely block them out/suppress them with his unyielding smarmy narcissist shtick, they are still running in the background and are the reason Masakii is so easily insulted and takes everything so seriously.
***Timeline and locations are still being worked out and will likely need updating at some point***
An indeterminate amount of centuries ago, the Cadaurums were the rulers of a tyrannical empire that was constantly seeking to expand its domain and power, as tyrannical empires do. To exacerbate their rise in power, they had developed a unique strain of necromancy that allowed them to greatly expand their armies and created new opportunities for subterfuge. Instead of merely reanimating corpses to control, the Cadaurums were able to completely restore their appearances to normal living beings regardless of how severe their decomposition had been, and they could even speak and use any magic they had while alive, despite still being soulless puppets. In addition, they were stronger and faster than normal mortals and could be augmented even further with spells, making them a nightmare to fight or escape from. If they concentrated, they could even see through the eyes of their thralls, making them useful spies as well.
With their armies only growing with each battle, the Cadaurums continued their conquest with a complete disregard for anything else, such as stomping out smaller kingdoms like Cloveshire for petty reasons, until they turned their sights on Kivvia, a distant land with a ton of resources that sure would be cool to add to their own. It started out well enough with them conquering Drahten and setting up an occupation in their capital, which was enough to make the other countries nearby start paying attention. Still, things were going well for the Cadaurums until their sweet precious golden child, Valerian, ruined all that for them.
This had been the first time Valerian witnessed his family’s delightful methods firsthand and, long story short, was disturbed by their lack of mercy and defected to join a small party on their unrelated quest that will not be covered in this section in the interest of brevity. It was very dramatic though, trust me. Anyway, that all snowballed until enough of a resistance was formed that, with Valerian’s expertise on how they could stop their super special undead, the Cadaurums were forced to retreat back to the mainland. Before they left, Valerian’s younger sibling, Florian, entrusted him with their child they had from a probably very tragic romantic tryst since they knew their parents would never accept the child as a true heir, and they knew Valerian would be staying in Kivvia since their parents would, y’know, murder him on sight for his betrayal. Valerian accepted and he and his (eventual) husband, Xyaire, raised her as their own with an abundance of love and care under their new surname of Aphelion.
The Cadaurum’s suffered heavy losses from their fun time in Kivvia that they had not recovered from when, around a century ago, a new rebellion started in the empire that gained more traction than ever before. The linchpin of the rebellion’s plan was the help of super powerful sorcerer or whatever who placed a seal on the entire family’s magic that severed their connection to the occult and they lost control of their own undead, which rampaged until they ran out of magic and were reduced to normal corpses once more. Only one family member was able to escape both the undead and the rebellion’s carnage and were forced into hiding to survive, putting as much distance between them as possible.
Unfortunately for literally everyone else, the bloodline did not die there and eventually someone was able to marry into the super rich family, the Trevens, before eventually killing their spouse and claiming control of whatever they had that made them so rich, I don’t know what era this is in at this point, whoops. Over the years, they continued growing and became a prolific industry name, backed by any number of underground deals they could make, both mundane and occult-related, to regain their status, money, and power as quickly as possible. Repeat this for as many generations as possible until they eventually become the lovely cutthroat billionaires they are today who have never forgotten their roots as rightful rulers.
The Start
The current era of the Treven family is led by Tsubaki, the direct descendant of the former empire; her husband, Giovanni; and their only son, Masakii. The seal has weakened over time to the extent that they can now see weaker spirits, but for the most part they are still lacking in the sixth sense department and their necromancy is still locked to only raising the dead and giving them basic commands to follow automatically. If they try to force it any further, it feels as if something is blocked like a particularly stubborn pipe clog and becomes painful. This has not stopped them from being obnoxious about anything in their history, unfortunately, though their exact connections to the fallen empire are left unspoken.In an attempt to weaken the seal faster since any magical remedies have failed, they’ve been mixing their blood with other necromantic families in hopes it would bolster their abilities faster, which is where Giovanni comes in. Giovanni was the youngest of three children and therefore the last to inherit their own family’s company, but he managed to screw over his siblings and gave it to Tsubaki’s conglomerate or whatever as what was surely a very romantic wedding gift. He’s a little estranged from his family, to say the least, but hey, he’s also the richest and most powerful and isn’t that what REALLY matters? Yes, the answer is yes. Also they’re all necromancers. By the way.
Between the two of them and their perhaps “unsavory” histories, they managed to expand their riches even further through their expansive underworld connections and cutthroat attitudes towards… everything in general. Sometimes literally! Anyway, they have a foreboding reputation but nothing can be proven against them since they keep sneaking their rich little fingers into every pot and either bribe or force anyone they want to go along with it. All in all, they are excessively rich and powerful, living in an ostentatiously kinda gothic mansion off the edge of Niryn, Mirais.
But who cares about any of that, we’re here to talk about Masakii. As can surely be surmised from the above, Masakii was born under optimal conditions by two individuals who could definitely be trusted to raise a child in a healthy environment. This was proven by having the usual parental expectations placed upon him since the time he could breathe, such as being perfect in every way, always ranking as superior in comparison to others, and never embarrassing them in any conceivable way. This wasn’t as suffocating when he was still a young child since he learned quickly under close tutelage and greatly admired his parents who paid great attention to his progress. From the outside, he was borderline creepy with how unchildlike he was already beginning to act, but obviously they were just jealous their hideous progeny couldn’t spell and define “subterfuge” like theirs could.
Masakii obviously could not have realized it at the time, but the highlight of his entire childhood would be learning necromancy from his parents personally, instead of it being delegated to tutors like everything else was. He picked it up quickly and thrived under the rare genuine encouragement and praise he received from his mother especially (his father didn’t care nearly as much), and dedicated the little spare time he had to practicing it further. And then things started going to hell!
Alaster Slate
His parents had a sort of friendly rivalry with another family, the Slates, and the Slates had a son of their own named Alaster, though he was around six years older than Masakii and had the general disposition of a small, shaking dog. An academically gifted small, shaking dog. The mother, Parvati, and Tsubaki were constantly trying to one-up each other (but also liked the other enough that Tsubaki wasn’t going to, like, kill or ruin her), and this eventually spread to their sons, who were more or less forced into competition with each other to see whose child was superior. Since Alaster was significantly older, Masakii was mostly competing against his old test scores that were intimidatingly near perfect in most subjects (literature being the exception), and his already intensive tutoring sessions increased even further because he was Not Allowed To Lose.Unfortunately, being banned from losing did not actually stop him from losing, and no matter how much Masakii studied, his test scores were either always slightly less than Alaster’s, or they had both scored perfectly, deflating any pride that could have otherwise been gleaned from that. Feeling himself plateauing and beginning to stress about receiving anymore of his mother’s lectures about his failures and wasting his potential as a Treven, Masakii realized he had to change tactics. While Alaster could maybe possibly potentially perhaps be considered smarter than him, he was a mess when it came to social interactions and spent most of his time at the frequent galas and parties the upper echelon were constantly throwing hiding in corners or lingering by the snack table. It is probably not called a snack table at fancy parties, but I don’t have internet right now to google this so it’s a snack table. Anyway! If he couldn’t beat Alaster academically, he could at least ruin him socially to make himself look better, and maybe that would be enough to rattle Alaster into scoring worse as well. Please keep in mind he’s like, seven at this point so he’s effectively bullying a thirteen year old while looking like a particularly smug baby.
Masakii had been spying on Alaster constantly at this point, either at parties where he was constantly underfoot or at their homes since their parents made frequent visits to each other, so he knew the root of Alaster’s insecurities and why his parents were so severe on him. Despite being born into a normal family who were, of course, oblivious to anything magical existing, Alaster had a tremendous sixth sense and was constantly being besieged by ghosts who were excited to have someone to talk to or whatever and he was absolutely garbage at hiding it, frequently looking off to the side or above him and mumbling quietly to himself. This was, of course, one more point of contention to Masakii who could not see ghosts at all, and honestly it was really unfair that this magic-less child surpassed him in that as well. But society at large not knowing ghosts existed was convenient for Masakii who made this his favorite subject for harassment, going as far as recording Alaster having a conversation with what appeared to be several different empty spaces and spreading it around until it eventually reached Alaster’s parents, who were not amused to say the least. He showed up to parties less after that and seemed even more anxious when he did, which was really saying something. It was funny though, trust him.
Masakii also engaged in lesser “pranks” to make Alaster seem worse in public, such as having one of his undead servants push him into a flower patch at a garden party to both ruin the plant and his suit, with the added bonus that no one would believe that a grown adult would shove a little kid off the sidewalk, but the ghost ones were his favorite. Also it made him feel slightly better as the lectures from his mother became colder and colder as he continuously failed to meet her expectations for him to the extent that he felt an awful dread anytime he was called over to speak with her and avoided her when he could (which was easy with how frequently his parents were on business trips at least).
After a couple years, Alaster, now fifteen, had a breakdown somewhere that Masakii was never able to learn the details of, but was apparently severe enough that his parents had finally had enough and sent him to an institute to deal with his ghost problem, effectively disowning him in the process. This was hilarious to Masakii until it dawned on him that his parents might do the same if he continued to under-perform for them as well. It was much less funny after that. But on the bright side, this meant there was only two more years of Alaster’s wretched test scores to contend with and, in the meantime, Masakii made a point to visit him at the institute so he could lie about how much better he was doing now. Alaster didn’t believe him of course, but whatever, it’s not like he could prove it and, if he became rude about it, then Masakii could rub in his face that he was his only visitor and that always seemed to get under his skin. He won either way! Four years later, a nineteen year old Alaster made a baffling and violent escape that should not have been possible, and Masakii was never able to learn the truth of what had happened, which was frustrating on several levels since he’d been obsessed with him for over half a decade at this point and then he was just completely off the radar. At least he was gone?
Kidnapping
Soon after, Masakii finally reached fifteen and had officially caught up with the remainder of Alaster’s tests, effectively freeing him from the shadow that had loomed over him for so long. Since his parents were on another of their frequent trips, Masakii decided to celebrate by sneaking out to a party somewhere (“sneaking” referring to avoiding the servants since his parents were gone). This was a common occurrence for him, though it was perhaps too common in retrospect since he was becoming predictable about it. At the party, he was offered a drink by some older guy, accepted it because he sure can’t get alcohol on his own at fifteen, and the next thing he knew he was waking up bound and gagged in the trunk of a car.His captors, four of them total, brought him to some abandoned farm in the countryside near a forest and unceremoniously dumped him inside the decrepit farmhouse, only ungagging him later to give them his parent’s number so they could demand a ransom for his return in however many pieces as required to get the full sum they wanted. Masakii did attempt not tell them anything and demand they let him go, do they know who his parents are (obviously), and etc etc, but, uhhhh, he has no pain tolerance. He very, very quickly became more compliant with some Gentle Persuasion and told them whatever they needed with no further objections or defiant comments.
Thankfully, these were just normal mortals and had no idea how thoroughly wrists need to be bound to prevent enough movement to cast magic. That night, after three of them had fallen asleep with only one standing watch, Masakii managed to move his hands enough to raise a rat skeleton to chew through his bonds out of view of his captors. While Masakii was careful not to move too much or make any noise that would attract their attention, the noise outside certainly did. It turns out it’s common practice for farmers to bury deceased dogs on their land and forests have some exciting remains in them as well. When the one on watch went outside to check what it was, shutting the door behind him to Masakii’s dismay, he was promptly mauled by skeletal dogs, foxes, and whatever else could be summoned in a hurry. The others jumped to their feet, jolted awake by their companion’s screams, and grabbed their guns or whatever they could snatch in a hurry as they tried to figure out what was happening. Masakii tried to use this opportunity to run for it, but, unfortunately, did not make it far with how bruised his ribs were, and one of the captors had enough presence of mind to grab him. And then the door broke down.
The fight against the undead creatures did not last that long considering bullets aren’t particularly effective against the undead and, with how severely Masakii was panicking, his only order was the phrase “kill them” over and over again. Unfortunately, the one who had grabbed him had his arm in a panicked death hold and Masakii was dragged into the scuffle, resulting in a giant gash across his forehead that he barely even registered until it was all over and there was blood dripping over his eyebrows. He gazed upon his really cool handiwork of several mutilated bodies that were barely distinguishable as people (furries) at this point and passed out cold.
When he awoke again, he was in his bed alone but bandaged up and in clean clothes. Everything was sore and his head especially hurt, but soon the family physician realized he woke up and provided both pills and the explanation of how his parents had been able to track the call and found him unconscious in the farmhouse. They had already disposed of all the bodies and any evidence that the kidnapping had ever occurred and that was the end of story. If anyone asked (as they certainly would), there was cover story about a car crash to explain his injuries and recovery period. Masakii was a little touched his parents had bothered returning home early from their trip to see him, but it didn’t last particularly long considering how furious they were, especially, as it was repeatedly pointed out, about how none of this would have happened if he hadn’t left the mansion without their permission in the first place. This more or less cemented Tsubaki’s opinion that he was beyond salvaging and gave up on him ever reaching the standards of their family.
Masakii was on strict bed rest until the bruises and rope burns mostly healed and the bandage around his forehead could be removed. The gash across his forehead had been deep and stretched from the right edge of his forehead to the beginning of his left eye. The gash and the stitches holding it together were hideous to him and he avoided looking in mirrors whenever possible. This was a drastic change to an otherwise extravagantly vain teen, to say the least.
Even after the physician declared he was good to go (the official verbiage, of course), Masakii was deeply traumatized by what had happened and was unable to even leave him room without his anxiety spiking. After a couple days worth of excuses as to why he needed to stay in his room, his parent’s servants quite literally dragged him out since he had spent quite enough time moping and needed to get his act together before anyone started questioning the story. He did try to comply, but he could no longer see anything in the same light. Instead, every interaction began to feel like the other person (furry) was searching for a weakness to exploit and every compliment was an attempt to lower his guard. It was at this point that instead of simply spreading rumors and ruining reputations out of petty disputes, he became actively vindictive and vengeful in the name of preemptive self-defense. Masakii already had existing ties to Less Savory pursuits due to his family being what they were, but this was the first time he starting paying closer attention to the more underhanded tactics happening around him and figuring out how to use them for himself. Over the years, blackmail and planting/forging evidence would become his favorites, and he found ruining other peoples (furries) lives was actually very cathartic whenever his own felt like it was spiraling out of control. They deserved it anyway for insulting him, or plotting against him, or trying to use him to get to his parents, or whatever else his very healthy brain decided they were trying to do. To be fair, a number of the perceived threats were likely real considering there really wasn’t a shortage of grudges against his family (and now also him specifically). Anyway, the point is that it was definitely all justified since they were going to do something worse to him if he didn’t do it first, and if he happened to gain a significant amount of money from doing so, it was only happenstance. But we’re getting a little ahead of ourselves.
Lucille
In an attempt to prevent any future incidents, Masakii began looking for different ways to protect himself and make up for any deficiencies he might have. While this mostly took form in studying runes, sigils, wards, and so forth, he also researched ways to make up for his lack of sixth sense just in case someone tried to assail him from a more spiritual angle. He didn’t have any concrete plans at the time, but while he was trading blackmail with someone, they offered a rare animal called a soulfox that had quite a few magical abilities and whose smoke could be used as a magical property if nothing else. Since it could be trained to act as a replacement sixth sense and alert him if there was trouble while remaining invisible to the general public, Masakii accepted the deal and got a smoky little fox in a bottle.The smoky little fox, unfortunately, turned out to be a baby one and was absolutely terrified when Masakii later released her into his room (which was carefully warded so she couldn’t escape. A good call in retrospect, but of course it was when he made it). After freaking out and realizing she couldn’t escape, she hid underneath his bed, which he was (loudly) cross about until he actually looked under there and saw her cowering in the corner, shaking heavily. The sight was, to his eternal mortification (and denial), eerily reminiscent to how frightened he had been after he was kidnapped and in recovery. He was more patient after that.
Since she was still a baby, there was a hard limit to how much she could be trained, but she eventually got enough of the basics down for Masakii to declare it was good enough. He had named her Lucille and having something actually genuinely excited to see him when he returned home, eager to spend time with him, and love him unconditionally did something awful to his brain that was probably called friendship or affection but he wouldn’t know. Anyway, he is physically incapable of admitting it, but he loves this stupid, cowardly fox and would die for her, which is really dumb because she’s already a ghost. Despite his initial plan to use her as an outsourced sixth sense, he rarely lets her leave the mansion to prevent anything from happening to her, especially since she’d be the world’s most obvious weakness if anyone learned how much he cared about her.
Speaking of which! In a shocking display of accurate paranoia, he did, in fact, have first hand experience of Lucille being used against him. His parents were less taken by this beautiful and perfect dead baby fox, especially since Masakii had not asked permission to get a pet, least of all a shabby ghost instead of something Regal & Sophisticated (TM). Not that they would have let him get a pet regardless, mind you, which may or may not be related to the reason he didn’t ask and tried to hide her as long as possible. Regardless, they found her and weren’t happy about it. During their arguments about it, Tsubaki ultimately decided to allow Masakii to keep her after seeing how defensive he was about it, clearly attached to her already. This was unexpected for Masakii who had already been trying to figure out how to secretly keep her regardless, but then it clicked into place the next time he got into trouble. Instead of the usual punishments like getting his allowance cut off (which didn’t matter now that he was making his own), or having his possessions destroyed, Tsubaki simply confiscated Lucille, shoved her into a tiny magic vial so she couldn’t escape, and carried her with her until her idiot son shaped up for once under the threat of exorcising her. It worked great! He was so much more respectful and attentive afterwards, she should have tried this sooner.
Current Standing
Masakii is now nineteen and is still being trained to take over the company some day, despite his shaky relationship with his parents. He has zero friends and his only allies are the ones he bribes and he’ll likely screw them over at some point too because he is more or less incapable of maintaining relationships. And who needs them anyway when he has so many enemies who are ideally obsessed with him and hopefully think of him often, which is basically the same thing anyway (??????). Attention is attention! He has approximately one moral scruple, which is that he does not condone murder of any kind and he most definitely does not want to see it, but anything outside of that is more or less fair game. It’s a fairly dangerous lifestyle and odds are he’ll either burn out and crash before long or make a mistake and actually have to face the consequences of his actions (spoilers: it’s the latter).His current goal is to find a way to fully break the seal on his bloodline because, not only is it annoying when he’s trying to cast and embarrassing when comparing himself to other magic users, but, most importantly, his mother had never found a way to do it herself. If he managed to break the seal himself, it would be impossible to deny that he was, in fact, better than she ever was and she might even have to acknowledge it. She never would, of course, he knows that she would likely still manage to downplay it and take credit for it SOMEHOW, but imagine…… imagine. Anyway, he’s collecting as many old tomes as he can get his mitts on to scour for information, but hasn’t had any luck so far.
Over a year or so in the future, Masakii learned about a Mysterious Someone who had access to a particularly ancient and volatile tome that seemed promising for breaking his seal, and all they wanted in return was information on a certain cult called the [CULT NAME]. That seemed simple enough and Masakii was able to discover a family named the Avgruns, who were on the outskirts of his social echelon and high ranking members in the cult, making them an easy place to start.
More specifically, the Avgruns had a daughter a few years older than him. Since they had never interacted before, it was simple enough to pretend he was an affable person (furry) with the purely innocent intentions of getting to know her for whatever reasons. Mintrias proved to be rather bizarre and he suspected not all there, but everything worked out easily enough. “Worked out” in this context meaning he was able to drug her with a truth serum, get all the information he needed, and then use a memory potion so she’d have no recollection of any of it, and then they’d all be on their merry way. Or at least they should have been, but unfortunately for Masakii and his cool normal hobbies, Mintrias was no longer completely mortal and so her dosage was not enough to keep her memory from returning and, shockingly, she was not happy about it. Ignorant of the newly cognitive chipmunk, Masakii relayed the information about the cult’s aspirations involving eldritch beings to the Mysterious Someone and received the tome in return and set to work deciphering it.
He did not have a chance to get very far, however. When he returned home one night (if around 3 a.m. still counts as night), he noticed immediately upon entering the grounds that something was wrong. According to his sweet necromatic senses, instead of the normal amount of undead servants going about their business, the entire mansion was full of corpses of the non-thrall variety. It turns out, angering a big secretive cult is not the greatest idea and they had staged an inside attack that had killed everyone inside in order to prevent their secrets from being exposed. After noticing none of the corpses were his, a few of them were kind enough to wait for him to return, which Masakii learned quickly after ordering his undead chauffeur to park away from the mansion’s entrance and entering through the servant’s quarters due to his growing apprehension. He hadn’t gotten very far when he stumbled upon what he had been sensing and, while he managed not to scream, he did stumble back in shock so abruptly that he bumped into a display case that rattled noisily. The sight of your parents dead, bloody bodies will do that to you. Apparently, they had returned home early from their most recent trip without warning and walked into a trap meant for him.
The noise, unfortunately, was loud enough that there were soon multiple sets of footsteps approaching and he had to move, carefully stepping over the bodies of dead servants that had also been strewn about, but the exits were, of course, blocked, and he couldn’t go back to the servant’s entrance without meeting those footprints, SO he was soon cornered after managing to find dear, sweet Lucille who was terrified out of her mind. Masakii bought enough time by talking that he came to the conclusion that there was not a way out of this without doing something very, very stupid. And so he did! With the hidden basement still being, uh, hidden, Masakii had one of the thralls down there tamper with the furnace enough to cause an explosion on the other side of the house, shaking the entire building. With the intruders thoroughly distracted to say the least, Masakii seized the opportunity to raise the corpses around them to attack and restrain the cult members while he ran for the closest exit as the fire rapidly spread.
The fire was on the news the next day, which Masakii found out in the hotel he had checked into after his dead chauffeur drove them as far as half a day could taken them. He only had his phone, wallet, and whatever was in the limo at the time, but he was alive and had Lucille and was only mostly still in shock when he saw pictures of the charred remains of his home. Many bodies had been recovered, including his parents, and the investigators were still sifting through the ashes to discover what had happened, but little progress was made so far and it was noted there was no sign of their son’s body yet. That was about as much as Masakii could watch without hyperventilating. It didn’t help that any time he looked at the news on his phone, people (furries) were largely enthusiastic about the Treven’s deaths since they were, y’know, awful. He stopped looking at his phone too.
The plan had been to stay at the hotel and lay low for a while to compose himself and try to figure out what to do, but that was cut short by the public announcement that one of his relatives was asking for any leads on his whereabouts with a sizable cash reward, which would have been nice if that relative had actually existed. Suspecting further cult involvement and heavy with the knowledge that anyone who had been paying attention when he checked in (under a fake name at least) would know he was here, he left once more, this time abandoning the limo and having the corpse chauffeur dispose of it and then itself. Masakii then resigned himself to the painful experience of trying to blend in with the crowd by cutting and dying his hair and buying hideous commoner clothing that he would have otherwise never been caught dead in. His new plan was to find a hotel in a different town to crash in until the initial heat died down, but then his card was frozen for suspicious spending and he had his very first encounter with someone he had gleefully double crossed in the past finding him, intent on reuniting him with his parents so to speak. While he managed to escape, the give and take of thinking he found a safe place to breathe only to be assaulted by either someone he or his parents had wronged or someone who was just trying to get that cash reward was going to become a reoccurring trend for him. He eventually destroyed his phone which he suspected of being used to track him and gave up on the prospect of contacting his credit card company or bank account since he didn’t need his survival broadcasted any more obviously to the world.
Eventually Masakii found himself sticking to graveyards for protection from sudden attacks, going as far as sleeping in mausoleums as humiliating as that was. He managed to scrape by for food by “recovering” (stealing) jewelry from buried bodies and pawning them while thinking about how much easier this would be if he could safely sell organs instead, but that wasn’t quite feasible for his situation.
During a particularly close encounter with some people (furries) wanting revenge for his blackmailing (who were CLEARLY overreacting), Masakii's leg was injured and, in desperation, gave what could be loosely interpreted as a prayer to the goddess of darkness, his family's patron, to save him. To his utter bewilderment, his prayer was actually heard by an angel of darkness, Jibril, and he saved his sorry butt and whisked him on outta there to his apartment since Masakii had nowhere he could go. It was supposed to be a temporary arrangement and went rocky enough in the beginning that Jibril nearly kicked him out, but after a bunch of Events, things smoothed out a bit and Masakii was free to stay with him as long as he needs to (in exchange for helping around the house like a disgusting commoner) and Masakii is free to plot how to get his old life back.
This has not been going even remotely well and the attempts on his life have not subsided nearly as much as he would’ve liked considering he has bodyguard now. On a somehow even more annoying note, now that he actually has time to think about things beyond survival, the gravity of his family’s collapse is haunting him and part of him realizes it will be practically impossible to rebuild but he doesn’t know what else to do with himself and the guilt will kill him before anyone else gets the opportunity to if he doesn’t at least try. He would scream if he wasn't so busy trying to pretend he has everything under control and wasn't about to fall apart at the slightest inconvenience.
LucilleLucille is a soulfox Masakii traded for when he was sixteen. He had originally got her as a tool since she'd be able to sense spirits he couldn't and ideally fight them if need be, not to mention their smoke was supposed to be a useful ingredient for spells. HOWEVER, none of that really worked out since she was only a cowardly little baby, but by the time Masakii realized this was a waste of time, he was too attached to find a replacement. Having something around that was actually genuinely happy to see him was sort of a game changer and the fact that she was just a silly little animal incapable of things like betrayal meant he could lower some walls for once and, OOPS, he immediately loved her more than anything else in the world and he spoils her as much as one can spoil a ghost (this mostly involves attention and candles). Unfortunately, that makes a very obvious weakness so he avoids bringing her anywhere and downplays any attachment to her unless they're in private. Emotional support dead baby fox ghost who is absolutely the main reason he hasn't snapped yet.
Alaster Slate
The physical manifestation of all of Masakii's shortcomings in one convenient form. It's been six years since Alaster vanished, but Masakii has yet to get over or even accept that he never surpassed him in anything that mattered and even the slightest reminder of his existence is a surefire way to tank Masakii's mood. Alaster has been turned into a scapegoat in Masakii's mind to blame for his tumultuous relationship with his parents, his pretty, uh, questionable mental state, eternal Number 2 status, and basically everything that went wrong in his life ever. He might be just a little bitter, but who could say.
Esterel Cazenave
Esclarmonde's less annoying twin. Esterel seems completely spineless which makes him an easy but also boring target, so Masakii generally considers him beneath his attention unless there's no one else around to interact with. He has 100% hit on him solely to make his sister mad.
Rosario Elmahdy
Rosario was the son of some annoyingly religious couple (light goddess worshippers are insufferable) who was aggravatingly friendly with Alaster when they were all younger, which was enough to make Masakii hate him on principle. They didn't interact much, but they did always end up sneaking out to the same parties, which was rather weird to be quite honest. Rosario eventually ran away from his own family and they were spared from further interaction.
Iain
Iain is a smuggler Masakii's been working with for a few years. He isn't even slightly reliable, but every once in a while he manages to find something that at least appears to be dark artes adjacent to sell to him. At some point, Iain began to suspect Masakii was ripping him off (he was), and started bargaining through a curator, which would have been a good idea if Masakii hadn't been bribing the curator to also undersell him, claim his goods were forgeries, etc etc, a large portion of the time, and so that made approximately zero difference in the end. It was funny to Masakii at least and Iain was really annoying and pushy anyway so it was basically deserved.
Time Skip
Jibril
Jibril is a cherub of darkness who took Masakii in after he heard Masakii's frantic prayer to be saved when he was injured and about to be murdered. They didn't get along at first since Masakii was on the verge of a mental breakdown at approximately all times and was not a particularly graceful guest, but Jibril felt guilty enough to not kick him back onto the streets after Masakii still managed to get hurt more than once under his watch. Over time, they warmed up to each other and Masakii was dragged kicking and screaming into opening up as he experienced positive reinforcement and genuine altruism for the first time in his life. Eventually Jibril's patience and unwillingness to tolerate Masakii's nonsense wore his walls down, annnnnd that was a dangerous and terrible idea because it led to him developing a wretched, unrequited crush on Jibril, who was not even remotely interested and trying to find his missing partner anyway. Masakii is dealing with this in a very mature way by trying to crush (haha) that under his heel and ignore it so he doesn't ruin his first friendship ever and disgust Jibril with his disgusting feelings (which are disgusting). This was easier before he found his childish jokes charming and stupid smile adorable and his presence safe in case anyone was wondering. Life was so much simpler when it was intentional that everyone hated him instead of fearing it may happen by accident.
Amoret
What is a polite way of saying friends with benefits except they aren't friends and Masakii is only tolerating their bombastic and overbearing personality for one predictable reason. Amoret is a cupid who is obsessed with love and telling him all the ways he's deficient in it (barring sweet Lucille, of course, which was a mortifying conversation and he'd rather hear about how dead his heart is) and lying about how desperate he is for it. Which he isn't, by the way. He did eventually warm up to them a little bit more after they toned their love thing down and Masakii toned his assholery down in return. And then he ruined that anyway as he started to avoid them at all costs because they would know in an instant how badly he was falling for Jibril and he will actually die if he has to have a conversation about that with them.
Claudia Aphelion
Claudia shares a common ancestor with Masakii, but it is notably on the Detestable Filth side of the family. Her great (great great etc) grandfather was Valerian, a traitor to the family who they believed to be dead but nope, he had a family in another country and now here's Claudia and her parents back in this one for whatever reason that Masakii refuses to ask about. As annoying as her "friendly but lonely" act is (and he's certain it's an act to lower his guard), the worst part is that their branch never had their magic sealed and is operating at the full potential Masakii would never reach. He hates them so much. Luckily he has a ton of experience pretending not to hate people (furries) he wants dead, so he has been able to play nice despite this, mostly so they don't murder him for revenge and his inheritance like he's certain they're planning to. But despite Masakii's many, many (loud) protests, Jibril insists on them getting to know each other better since Masakii could perhaps use a non-traumatizing family experience. He refuses to trust them and is baffled at just how uncomfortable they make him for the aforementioned "family" thing they keep trying to do considering he rarely ever had issues faking fitting in before. He doesn't belong there and it's unbearable waiting for the shoe to drop.
Mintrias Avgrun
Masakii still isn't really sure where he went wrong here. He was always careful with dividing dosages and normally triple checked them at the very least, so it doesn't make sense how she remembered what had happened, though he finds it safe to assume she had something done to her with the cult, which would likely explain how permanently out of it she seemed as well. Either way, saying he hated her was the understatement of a lifetime. As much as he fantasizes about revenge, however, the issue of the cult very much wanting him dead was going to need to (somehow) be settled first, and he doesn't want to think about what they would do to him if their first instinct had been to set a trap at his home of all places to silence him. She's going to need to be avoided at all costs for the foreseeable future.
By Me:
Broke Timeskip:
By Others (hover for credit):
Masakii is a keeto by default, but I also have him as a desert kyrii on Neopets so he gets both species as adoptables! Isn't he special. Anyway, normal rules: don't take adopts that aren't yours, link back, etc etc. Send kyrii requests/trades to Katdrea @ Neopets or Wyverns @ ModernNeopets. If you want a keeto adopt... I assumed that would not happen and have not accounted for it. Send those to either account as well, I guess, because I rarely use Subeta.
Trades: Open
Requests: Open
Keeto
Kyrii
Keeto
Kyrii
Patch Link:
Uhh, links out will be here eventually. I have not finished any other petpages yet. :')
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Credits: Coding - Background - Header - Bullets - Divider