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OOC: Balance Application
Jul. 21st, 2019 07:20 pmOgata: Put my target within 300 meters, and I'll send a bullet through his brain without fail. | |
| APP HMD Ranger Caitie |
Player Name: Caitie
Age: 27
Contact:
Timezone: EST
Other character currently in game: NONE, previously: Kenpachi Zaraki
Character name: Hyakunosuke Ogata
Age:probably somewhere in his mid-late 20s
Canon: Golden Kamuy
Canon point: Chapter 170, after arriving at Akou.
History: Here’s the wiki, but the summary is both not comprehensive and overly detailed so here’s my version;
Hyakunosuke Ogata was born to Lieutenant General Koujirou Hanazawa and his mistress. Hanazawa promptly abandoned them both once his son with his legal wife was born, but Ogata’s mother clung to the hope that he might return, cooking Hanazawa’s favorite dish every night. This was once Ogata’s favorite as well but it was so continuous he taught himself how to hunt with his grandfather’s gun in the hopes she would cook something else, if he brought game birds home, to no avail. Eventually Ogata puts poison in her meal, killing her.
As an adult, Ogata joins the Hokkaido 7th Division of the Japanese Army, shortly before the Russo-Japanese war. There he meets his younger half brother, Yuusaku Hanazawa. Yuusaku seems eager to bond with Ogata, though Ogata only indulges this under orders from his superior, Lieutenant Tsurumi Tokushirou. Later, Ogata snipes Yuusaku in the back of the head while he leads troops into battle. After the disastrous Siege of Port Arthur, Ogata confronts his father before killing him. He stages the scene to make it look like Hanazawa committed seppuku to take responsibility for the losses at Port Arthur, again at Tsurumi’s request.
After the war, Tsurumi mobilizes his platoon to locate the stash of Ainu gold in order to fund a revolt against the government, stoked by the government’s unfair treatment of the 7th division after the war. The map showing the location of the treasure is tattooed onto the backs of 24 convicts who escaped Abashiri Prison. Ogata encounters a former soldier, Sugimoto Saichi, and an Ainu girl, Asirpa, having caught one of the tattooed prisoners in the woods. In the ensuing fight with Sugimoto, Ogata falls into the river, breaking his jaw and almost dying of hypothermia.
After he recovers, Ogata escapes the hospital and tracks down fellow 7th Division member Tanigaki, who he believes has killed some of their other comrades because Tanigaki found out that they were conspiring with Ogata to betray Tsurumi. After Tanigaki denies this, Ogata leaves and attempts to snipe him, but after a chase, Tsurumi’s men catch up and Ogata is forced to flee.
Later on, Ogata acquires one of the tattooed skins and propositions Hijikata Toshizo, one of the other escaped prisoners who is searching for the treasure, to hire him as a bodyguard. Ogata travels with Hijikata’s group to investigate rumors of another skin in Yubari and discovers that Tsurumi has hired a taxidermist to create fake skins to throw everyone else off. After a wacky chase scene where he enlists the help of Sugimoto’s group, the taxidermist is dead and Tsurumi’s right hand man has escaped with the fake and real skins being held there. Hijikata’s group and Sugimoto’s group agree to work together temporarily. Then the 7th division attacks the house they’re all gathered in. Ogata leaves along with Sugimoto, Asirpa, and Ushiyama, one of Hijikata’s men (and another tattooed prisoner).
In their travels, the group finds out that Tanigaki has been falsely accused of mutilating and defiling animals in the area by the local Ainu, and have to track down the real culprit to rescue him, in three days, or Tanigaki will be punished for the crime. Asirpa entrusts Ogata with the task of protecting Tanigaki while she and Sugimoto search, which Sugimoto feels is a bad idea because he does not trust Ogata. However, on the third day, Ogata helps Tanigaki escape so that he cannot be punished if Sugimoto and Asirpa don’t return in time. The real culprit (the tattooed convict they were looking for) is apprehended and Asirpa praises Ogata for successfully protecting Tanigaki.
The group then proceeds onward towards Abashiri Prison, where the goal is to meet the man who created all the tattoos, Noppera-bou. On their way, the come across a kotan that tells them about a group of blind bandits nearby that rob villages on the new moon. The group stops at a hotspring nearby as they wait for the new moon but are attacked by the bandits while bathing. Ogata is the only one with enough foresight (read: paranoia) to have stashed his gun nearby. After holding out until morning, Sugimoto and Ogata follow the bandits to their hideout, where they take out the remaining bandits, and finall Hijikata arrives to make a deal with the bandit leader, another one of the tattooed convicts.
Finally arriving at Abashiri, the combined forces of Sugimoto’s and Hijikata’s group hatch a plan to bring Asirpa to meet Noppera-bou to see if he’s really her father (and see if he will just tell his daughter where the gold is.) The plan goes awry, but eventually Sugimoto is able to find Noppera-bou and get him to where Asirpa can see him. Noppera-bou is in fact her father, but before she can talk to him, Noppera-bou is sniped dead, and Sugimoto is shot in the head. Unbeknownst to everyone else, this was done by Ogata, working on the orders of Kiroranke, Noppera-bou’s old partner and friend. In the chaos, the group ends up divided, with Asirpa, Shiraishi, Kiroranke, and Ogata leaving to head north. Asirpa only leaves everyone else behind because Ogata falsely reports Sugimoto dead and the other’s captured.
This group heads to Karafuto (also called Sakhalin) and travel north, while Kiroranke and Ogata work to try to unlock the secret to where the treasure is hidden by jogging Asirpa’s memories of her father. As they cross the border into Russia, one of the locals they were traveling with is sniped by a border guard. Ogata engages in a standoff with the Russian sniper, holding his position for so long that the other sniper mistook him for a dummy and shot somewhere else, giving away his position and promptly being shot by Ogata.
When Ogata returns to the group, he’s come down with a terrible fever, and hallucinates Yuusaku standing before him, talking to him. They head to a nearby village and Asirpa helps take care of Ogata and help him recover. Ogata dreams about the past. Once he’s recovered, the group head onwards to Akou Prison.
Three key adjectives: Attention-Seeking, Warped, Pragmatic
Influential Events:
Killing his mother; The first of many people Ogata has killed was his own mother. While he says he thought that Hanazawa coming to her funeral might make her happy, he also says she was unwell mentally and thus likely not taking care of him properly. Ogata says at one point that it is easy to kill people without remorse if you have a good reason, and that seems to be the case here. His mother did not care for him, or even seem to notice him, and thus wasn't providing the love and affection any child would want from their only parent. However it is also the fact that he was able to consciously take another person's life, his own mothers, at such a young age, that contributes towards his perspective that he's abnormal, lacking empathy.
Joining the 7th Division; Ogata became skilled with a gun, and became a sniper in the army. Among the other soldiers, he was not particularly well liked. He's standoffish and frequently condescending. Ogata has been praised as incredibly talented as a soldier for his marksmanship and shrewdness, but he's not humble about it at all. He's very "un-japanese" in the way that he speaks, blunt and to the point. Manners only waste time and he cannot be bothered to care about other people's feelings. He is far more concerned with things like the specs on rifles and who can get the most use out of them. When Sugimoto later demands Ogata return the newer model rifle he was carrying, Ogata refuses, decrying Sugimoto's terrible aim and that the rifle would be "wasted" on him.
Killing Yuusaku; Ogata is resentful of people he considers “normal” and “happy” because he feels he is incapable of being either of these things. Because he was deprived of affection as a child, he decided to believe things like kindness, empathy, and altruism didn’t actually exist. Ogata, internally, recognizes his own behavior as abnormal, but as a defense mechanism to drive off self hatred, he projects his own flaws outwards, telling himself everyone is like him, they just pretend like they're not. He doesn’t want to be abnormal. He wants to be validated and accepted. When he shares his worldview with Yuusaku and is summarily rejected, his response is to snoot Yuusaku in the back of the head at the next available opportunity. He doesn't examine his own thoughts. He lashes out at the person who caused them. In his own, strange way, he'd tried to be vulnerable with Yuusaku, and only got rejected for it.
Killing Hanazawa; Killing his father is something Ogata did on Tsurumi’s orders. However, Ogata is like a cat. He can be convinced to do things, but only if he also wants to do them. Ogata stabs his father in the stomach as it’s to be staged like a ritual suicide. And then he milks it. He doesn’t just let Hanazawa die, he tells him all about how Hanazawa’s absence has made his life terrible. He blames him for everything. He tells him how he killed his mother, and Yuusaku, just to torment him. Ogata does this because, as much as he tries to act like he doesn’t have emotions, he absolutely does. He wanted to have a father that cared about him like everyone else, but at this point, he knows it’s not something his father is willing to give him. Ogata's unpleasant personality is founded entirely on the premise of driving people off before they can properly reject him. So he taunts him until Hanazawa calls him a cold blooded monster. He goes out of his way to make absolutely sure Hanazawa hates him, to elicit some sort of strong emotion. He can't have his love, so at least he'll get his hatred.
Betraying Tsurumi; Ogata describes Tsurumi as a charmer, a man who knows how to manipulate young men’s hearts. For a time, Ogata was one of them, to a certain extent. He responds to praise, a tactic Tsurumi knows how to use. Particularly, Tsurumi represents a male authority figure, a paternal figure, the lack of which Ogata feels like is why he is Flawed. Most of Tsurumi’s men are incredibly loyal to him specifically, and will thus do anything he says despite the fact that he’s kind of out of his mind. But Ogata is not one of these people. He’s far too clever and far too distant from others to be blindly loyal. Even Tsurumi, clever as he is, admits he never really figured Ogata out, and thus couldn’t fully manipulate him. You can't keep a cat on a leash and expect it to cooperate. Love and trust aren't things Ogata believes are real, so he can't really dedicate himself to someone else's cause. When Tsurumi’s plans no longer suit him, Ogata plans to revolt. He knows this choice could easily get him killed, but he makes it anyway.
Becoming Hijikata’s bodyguard in Barato; Ogata looks at things in a very utilitarian way. Because love and kindness is fake, the only reason to interract with others is if they have a use. Hijikata represents the same sort of sought after paternal attention Ogata got from Tsurumi. But he doesn't expect something for nothing. His crude concept of affection has to be earned with actions, likely from how Tsurumi would have praised him for following his orders in the military. Hijikata caught his interest, so Ogata spent the entire scramble over the skin in Barato trying to prove his worth. He makes a point to perform a challenging trick shot when he knows Hijikata is watching, then does it again. He’s showing off. Rather than making himself vulnerable, he seeks to make Hijikata want to take him on.
Travelling with Sugimoto and Asirpa; Ogata travels with these two and various other people for a long time. Out of the gates, Sugimoto doesn’t trust Ogata, like most people. Sugimoto is hostile, and because Ogata is comfortable and used to that, he either does nothing to dissuade it or actively encourages it by being rude to him. At the same time, he seems fascinated by “Immortal” Sugimoto, this archetypal unkillable berserker identity Sugimoto’s obtained through rumors. When Sugimoto displays his ferocity by almost singlehandedly taking out a group of yakuza posing as Ainu, Ogata comments on how impressive it is. Sugimoto is overall a good, earnest man, but Ogata is fixated on his darker side because he wants other people to be like him, twisted, deep down.
Meanwhile, Asirpa and Ogata develop an odd sort of friendship. Asirpa is wary of him at first, but after he does what she asks and protects Tanigaki, she praises him and says she “sees him in a new light.” She makes an effort to include Ogata, who habitually lingers on the sidelines and stays quiet, in the group, such as when they prepare the Ainu meal Citatap, where everyone must take turns chopping while saying “citatap.” Ogata participates at Asirpa’s request, but refuses to say it at first. A later time he does, but only loud enough for Asirpa to hear, because it makes her happy. An avid hunter herself, she is quick to praise Ogata for his marksmanship, and in turn, after the group heads to Karafuto, he starts to warm up to her, inviting her to come with him when they hunt. After all, Ogata does actually want affection, he's just developed mostly terrible habits to both seek it out and control how he recieves it. He likes being praised, and it's in his best interests to play nice with Asirpa, at the moment.
Ogata’s hallucination; It’s possible this has happened before, and it’s a key point in unraveling the lies behind what Ogata says. He claimed he doesn’t feel guilt when he kills, and maybe that’s true in general, say when he kills an enemy soldier. Empathy is learned, and Ogata wasn’t raised well. But it’s been at least several years since he killed Yuusaku, and he’s still clearly haunted by it. It’s stayed with him. Because a part of him regrets it. Yuusaku’s death wasn’t a job given to him like Hanazawa’s. It had been, initially, but then Tsurumi changed his mind and told Ogata not to. Ogata murdered Yuusaku for personal reasons as an impulsive emotional act. He may not have liked Yuusaku, but doing what he did only makes him more the monster many people think him to be. Ogata took Asirpa’s father away from from her just when she had the chance to reunite with him. His own issues are routed in not having had a father. Once her father dies dies, Asirpa has no parents, just like Ogata. Ogata is always seeking people who he things are “like” him, but with Asirpa she may be similar but she’s also more “normal” and kinder. She’s smart and capable, and her traits along with her kindness that asks nothing in return means Ogata can’t help but respect her. But he can only receive this sort of treatment for so long before he has the urge to push it away.
Link to Samples: Sample 1; Sample 2;
Chosen path: Ranger
5 Abilities:
Sniper
Hunter’s Mark
Create Trap
Favored Enemy (Humans)
Dark Vision
Why this path?: Ogata is an incredibly talented sniper. He’s able to shoot accurately from such long distances that when he sniped Sugimoto, Sugimoto knew it was Ogata because “no one else could have made such a shot.” On top of that, he’s adept at setting traps or otherwise tricking others, and has the mental fortitude to wait out an enemy sniper in the woods to the point that he gave himself a fever from all the snow he ate to hide his breath. Also he’s constantly compared to a cat so I wanted him to get dark vision.
blurb code by photosynthesis
