Hisao Susumu
| |||||||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| |||||||||||
| |||||||||||
| |||||||||||
| "We all start somewhere. It's my job to make sure our roots aren't cut. That is bravery." |
| — Hisao, during a confrontation with a racist station car rider in Chapter Five (Lost My Heart in Soyokari) of Strange Chemistry |
Hisao Kitadōro Susumu is a human hailing from the Euthorica Islands region of Euthora. He is the main protagonist of the Alter Timeline plot, Strange Chemistry, and is one of the youngest ranking captains of the Azuman colony Navy.
In the Alter Timeline, he is introduced during the aforementioned sideplot story as a sort of guide and companion to Emma Isokoski after encountering her in his own home island of Azuma.
Contents
Appearance
Hisao is tall with a body type of a lean man, standing at 6'3" but having some more developed muscles on his legs, despite being rather slow.
He has sea-green eyes that will sometimes shift to a sort of teal and to sea blue, slightly wavy dark brown hair neatly combed with a good portion of it combed frontwards and styled up like a sort of horn. Hisao is rather organized, showing that kind of personality trait with the limited amount of clothes he wears on a day-to-day basis. Not one to really stray onto wearing extravagant and often out-worldly garbs, nor traditional ones of his people, Hisao usually sticks to just a white button up shirt, dark brown or black pants with straps that rest on his shoulders to keep them from falling, black worker shoes and a fabric ivy cap (also known as a newsboy cap)
When at work or generally when he is deployed somewhere, his basic attire is replaced with a black thick coat neatly tucked in with his equally colored pants, midnight blue shoulder pads and white short fabric gloves. The ivy cap is replaced with a white captain's hat with the classic black visor and gold adornments.
Personality
A gentle soul to many, Hisao does not carry himself highly as he should with the position he carries in the navy. There is a general positive aura around him that often makes it easy for the man to communicate effectively and form connections with little to no effort. Generally fearless in putting himself "out there" and not taking any offense to anyone who criticizes his tastes, Hisao is seen as someone who generally marches under his own drum.
There is a sort of kindness within him that he spends his time trying to use and gain a general sense of self-fulfillment. As shown with his encounter with Emma in Strange Chemistry, Hisao often pushes himself towards self improvement in keeping relations and making sure people around him are happy, even though inwardly he constantly feels insecure about his attempts at being kind.
Though having the potential to become great, the young Captain has little to no desire to be that way. There is a general satisfaction he carries with himself, showing that he is confident and well of self-esteem. Out of the entire cast, Hisao seems to be the most average and mild-mannered... and prefers to keep it as such.
Apart from all that, complexity does not escape him. Under his general happy and gentle demeanor lies a fiery will and passion. It is almost easy to offend him with very sensitive issues that are personal and he takes fierce guardianship over protecting marginalized groups and cultural ideas. Though willing to put his all in helping, as shown in Chapter 9 of Strange Chemistry, at one point in his childhood Hisao was a rather timid coward when he failed to stand up for his cousin Goro from abuse.
Skills and Abilities
Magic
Inherent Abilities
Learned Skills
Special Powers
Soul Phantasms
Domains
Possessions
Combat
Relationships
- Emma Isokoski: Hisao shows a deep curiosity and fascination towards Emma the moment she arrives in his home port city of Soyokari. Having never met an outsider before, Hisao finds it very hard to keep away from her. Wanting to know her reasons for being there, her name, and so on. Beyond that, Hisao feels a strange, unspoken sense of understanding with Emma, to which the feeling is also mutual on her end. The two of them seem to trust each other rather well and Hisao genuinely takes interest in trying to see her happy but most of all, make her feel like she belongs. To him, she reflects a lot of qualities he seems to be all too familiar with, but never really clarifies if those qualities are his or someone else who was/is significant in his life.
- Takao Susumu: There is a lighthearted and strong bond between Hisao and his younger brother Takao. Hisao is often "babied" around by his brother despite their age gap, mostly out of Takao's general maturity level and worry over his brother's well-being. Both Susumu brothers hold a high degree of trust between each other, with one notable example being that Hisao can easily stay at his brother's home unannounced and not get in trouble for it. Despite that, Hisao enjoys Takao's company and acts completely natural around him.
- Goro Kodotsuta: Revealed in Chapter 9 of Strange Chemistry (Paint Him Red), Hisao and Goro have a special bond that transcends that of cousins. Goro had always been his mentor while they were children and Hisao often looked up to Goro for examples of strength and, of course, tenacity. Although he does not fully agree with much of Goro's rather hateful view against Sky serpents, Hisao cares deeply for Goro's safety and is visibly disturbed and worried once learning about his arrest.
History
Early Life
Quotes
Trivia
- Hisao's full name can be roughly translated as "Proceeding the long lived man of the Northern Gate."
- He is an exceptional tap dancer.
- Despite living in a world where dragons and serpents can speak along with people having Soul Phantasms (himself included), Hisao can be easily disturbed by unusual phenomena.
- Hisao's character was loosely inspired by Zaiek Kierrmi, ironically a character who completely contrasts him in terms of morality. It is said that he'd be a Zaiek who might have turned out well had he not met Starr and was born and raised in Azuma Island.
- In addition to that, Hisao's free-loving persona and some of his skills were inspired by two 1920-style cover songs covered by the Postmodern Jukebox group, one literally having a tapdancing portion incorporated that inspired his eventual trait of being an exceptional tap dancer.
- Hisao Susumu was formerly known as "Unnamed Father." However in August 2015, it was decided that he was to become a full-fledged character.
- Hisao was originally supposed to appear in Vera's intro (Cult of Ustream's Season 0), but after some thought it was decided that his brother should take his place instead.
- During his early concept stages, Hisao was originally supposed to be a double agent and a wildcard for Ivan and Eskar. This would have eventually put him at odds against Emma specifically, due to the sensitive nature of his would-be work and the people he would've worked with. The idea was quickly scrapped.
- Though he is an honorable position in the military, Hisao still uses slang quite a lot, though not intending to. He once had a speech impediment that didn't allow him to say "the" correctly, instead pronouncing it as " 'ta", but it seems that he eventually fixed it.
