Rayne Lucaneus
Color Theme:Red
Age: 17
Gender: Male
Species: Human
Appearance: A bedraggled man who doesn’t put that much care into his appearance, even for special occasions, unless forced. His raven-black hair compliments his dark colour theme while the piercing azure-blue eyes contrast the red and black tones in his clothing.
Build: Slim
Height: 168 cm
Weight: 81kg
Personality: A relatively cold person with strangers, Rayne originally became a hunter out of a sense of familial duty, but despite this he still wanted to keep the general population safe from the Grimm if he could. Never one to play nicely with others, this frequently put him at odds with the strict teachers at the Atlesian schools he attended. With a drive to succeed no matter the cost, and a sharp, tactical head on his shoulders, he is good at making split-second decisions in the heat of battle - providing no-one’s lives are at stake.
If someone is in danger, he will risk life and limb to ensure they survive the encounter, even if he himself would not. This extends to strangers as well. While he may not give them the time of day, he would lay down his life for them, if the situation called for it. The singular potential exception to this rule are the faunus.
Rayne harbours a deep resentment of all faunus. With a burning hatred for the White Fang, it will occasionally bleed over into his interactions with other faunus. While he certainly can put aside his feelings to work with them, he’d really rather not, as he believes that they are highly untrustworthy. On missions, he will always watch his back with a faunus around - both in case they stab him in the back, and because deep down, he doesn’t trust their skills either.
In combat, he fights with the disciple of an Atlesian military student, but with a wilder and more unpredictable nature. Instead of doing the obvious thing, he tends to take the extra second to weigh up alternative means of attack, prioritising ones which he believes the enemy will least expect. It’s due to this that he has come up with so many creative and colourful ways to use his weapon and Semblance.
He also has several claw scars on his back, which he tries to keep hidden at all cost.
Backstory: The son of an Atlesian weapons developer and the ex-heiress of a large weapon manufacturing company, one might expect that Rayne’s younger life would have been filled with lavish luxuries and dinners with company executives.
In truth, he spent his childhood in the arms of a cosy little village, deep within the Atlesian icefields.
Ciane, his mother, turned down her right as the next in line to own the family weapons business to become a huntress herself, cutting her way through the Atlesian wilderness as a travelling village guard. This led her brother - Cornell - to take over the company in her stead. Not satisfied with being outdone by his sister, however, Cornell struck out as a hunter himself while also managing the business. In recent years, with the passing of their father, he has been forced to take over more and more roles in the business personally, and has retired from hunting, for now.
On the other hand, Rayne’s father Reginald spent most of his days down in his development lab underneath the village, toiling away making and testing weapons for eventual use by the Atlesian Military. In his spare time, he continued work in the lab, fabricating weapons for use by Ciane and the rest of the guards to better protect themselves from the Grimm.
Rayne, then, managed to stay away from the pomp and ceremony that may well have become a staple of his daily life. Being the son of a huntress had the eventual effect of him developing the same aching wanderlust - that desperate need to see more of the world than a simple plain of ice. This same desire would also pass on to Rayne’s sister, Celeste, with both children already wanting to be hunters by the age of 6.
When the time finally came to pass from basic school onwards, naturally Rayne begged to attend the combat schools for which Atlas was famous. Reluctantly, his parents agreed, but because of how far Voreios was from the school, he had to stay at campus dorms during the week and only travel home for the Saturday and Sunday.
It was here that his icy nature towards strangers began to melt, under the command of Carmine, his first-year squad leader. She was a fox faunus, and a girl of brilliant intelligence. Her only failing was her ability to deal with unforeseen situations. Their missions generally went well, and the two became fast friends, but problems did arise on occasion.
When something did go wrong, Carmine floundered. Into the gap, Rayne stepped forward and turned the situation around - but only by directly disobeying his squad captain’s orders. Although she admits her directions were lackluster, going against orders is a cardinal sin within the Atlas Military, resulting in two black marks on Rayne’s file.
Atlas wasn’t for him, though. The strictness of the rules stifled any chance for creativity. However, it wasn’t like he had any other choice. Voreios needed his mother to protect it, and the military needed his father’s weapons. He hated it, but if everything hadn’t changed, there was where he would have stayed.
But it did.
One saturday night, around halfway through his second year at the combat school, he was out on a mission with the town guards. Routine stuff, breaking up a potential nest of Beowolves to deter them from coming back. The mission went without a hitch. What they returned to, on the other hand, was hell.
The town was ablaze. Grimm wandered the streets, cutting down and eating his neighbours and friends. White Fang soldiers gunned down survivors while avoiding the creatures they had loosed upon the village. A group of injured faunus that the people had welcomed in were actually agents of the faunus terror organisation - and they’d struck from within with a vengeance.
Rayne made locating his family the top priority, however by the time he located his father, it was too late. He told the boy to run, before giving him his pendant and passing away by the side of the street. His mother fared slightly better, going toe-to-toe with a large, sword-wielding Grimm in a fight she eventually lost. All while Celeste looked on in horror. Grabbing his sister and running, the two headed home to stock up on ammunition and for Rayne to give her a weapon, before they attempted to escape the carnage.
Ducking out of the village, trying to lose a pack of Beowolves that were following them, they came to a stream. Hiding in it while the pack passed by, they figured they were in the clear. Until the Grimm caught up. Rayne’s aura was already pretty spent from the mission, and several claws tore open his back as he tried to throw Celeste clear. As her brother wrestled with the Beowulf, she turned to fight and was cornered by several more. They attacked - giving her a scar across her nose - before she used her Semblance to drive them off.
Stumbling onto an abandoned bike, the two hopped on and sped away from the village.
For the next several months, their home would be the road and sea as the pair began an epic voyage from the far north of Atlas to the Vale heartlands. Their father had, with his dying words, steered them away from their capital city. Instead, he implored them to head south. Neither expected that the journey would take several years, but it did.
Once they had reached Vale, Rayne found himself badly injured after a Grimm attack. Waking up in a strange and unfamiliar village, Celeste had found them aid nearby. Feeling guilty for inconveniencing these strangers and grateful for their time and effort used to help him, he remained their faithful guardian in return for a number of years. Throughout all his time there, the drive to continue onwards pulled at him, but the chance to do so never appeared.
Until, by a complete stroke of luck, his Uncle visited the village.
Stumbling across the niece and nephew he thought long dead, he whisked them off to Vale City where they have been living ever since. The time spent out on the roads was not a waste, however, as both hunters have developed a keen sense for danger and ample practical skills - the kind you can’t really pick up in a classroom. With their natural talent shining through and a little under-the-table help from their uncle, Celeste found herself heading to Signal Academy, with Rayne starting at Beacon this coming year.
Weapon: The Requiem
Weapon Description: A sword-shotgun combo, Rayne has never really considered long-ranged strategies. In gun form, the Requiem is simply a normal pump-action shotgun capable of firing dust ammunition. In sword mode, though, it has a much wider array of uses. Pulling the trigger near the top of the handle fires a buckshot round just as it would as a gun, with the pellets flying out a small opening at the tip of the sword. The recoil from the shot does just as much damage as the shrapnel from the round, however, and both together can shred a regular Grimm to ribbons with a single trigger-pull.
The more impressive feature of the sword is its ability to absorb the dust energy from ammunition and spray it from vents located along the side of the blade. Holding the trigger down engages a reaction within the blade, pouring elemental energy from a number of holes designed to cool down the inside of the gun barrel when fired, and essentially coats the cutting edge with whatever kind of dust was within the ammo used. The effect this has on the blade can vary wildly depending on the element of the dust used. Fire dust simply bathes the sword in blazing-hot fire, searing closed any wounds opened, whereas ice dust exits the vents and crystallises to extend the length of the cutting edge with a brittle covering which shatters on impact. Naturally, some dust is incompatible with this technique, either through actual physical restrictions or that the resulting effect is detrimental to the weapon, the user, or both.
Semblance: Time Dilation
Semblance Description: To outside observers, Rayne has two entirely unrelated Semblances. The ability to teleport short distances, and the ability to mark a space and move back to it at will.
This, of course, is nonsense.
Both abilities are actually two sides of the same coin, and come from a central ability. Rayne can control his own position in his timeline.
To explain it in an awesome way, time is like a river which constantly flows in the one direction. Each person is like a leaf on that river. One use of his Semblance is that he can mark a point in that river, and providing he doesn’t move too far from that point - too far through time, not space - he can return to it. This doesn’t reverse any physical damage or exhaustion received during the time between shifts. If you were to set the leaf on fire, it would remain on fire despite being further up the river. This ability extends to all items or people Rayne is touching, but only if he was in direct contact with them when he marked the point and when he moved back to it. These ‘marks’ are actually visible to the naked eye as a sort of ephemeral clone of him, wavering slightly in the air - potentially allowing enemies to plan around it if they are aware of what he can do.
The second use is the ability to simply freeze the river. By stopping the flow of time for all but himself and those he is touching, Rayne can dodge attacks, queue up a barrage of shots from The Requiem or drag an ally to safety. However, what he is essentially doing is negating the flow of time on whatever he is using his power on. This places enormous strain on anyone involved and cannot be kept up for very long. The most he’s been able to hold this ability active for in one sitting was roughly 23 seconds.
Extended use of the ability can improve the symptoms as the body gets used to being without time - but only by so much. For instance, someone who has never undergone the process before will be racked with pain during the stop, and feel violently sick and lightheaded afterwards. Rayne always feels the same symptoms, but lessened by around half, however frequent use in a short timeframe increase the repercussions dramatically.
Combat Outfit Image/Description:A heavy, dark red, leather jacket decorated with various pieces of black leather for additional protection and straps to hold them in place. Black combat trousers and boots, for practicality. He wears several bandoliers, each one holding two different elements of dust-infused shotgun rounds. A worn leather scabbard hangs down across his back to hold The Requiem, with a pouch across the back of his waist to hold it in gun mode.
Casual Outfit Image/Description:Basically always wears a combination of black trousers with red and gray tops - sometimes both together. Somehow manages to put even less care into his hair when out of combat - although that might just be because of how hectic his combat gear actually looks that the scruffy hair kinda fits.
Theme: JerichoQuote: ‘People say that with enough time you can solve any problem. If that’s true, why do I regret so much?’