Waiting for the timeskip. Don't think anyone wants to watch/read Takahashi's brooding while he builds king rex in real life. He won't have anything to say about it until the next day, and he probably won't care much about the open challenge. 'Hype men' aren't usually Takahashi's thing so a challenge to the king won't interest him all too much unless the plot deands it.
Even if he doesn't care about it, viral videos tend to get spammed in people's inboxes and on message boards due to, of course, being viral. It'd be pretty hard for him to not at least see the video or overhear a bunch of people talking about it.
Edited my post to include Adam's video going live later that night. Feel free to have your characters view and react whenever and however you think they should.
By the time Takatora had made it to the store, it was close to its closing time. He'd spent so long logged into GBN that he wasn't going to have enough time to really do much today. He didn't let that stop him, though. He could at least ask Sento to teach him starting tomorrow if necessary. Thankfully the door wasn't locked yet and so Takatora entered the shop. No customers were around, probably because it was only minutes before closing time and the sign had even already been flipped over from "Open" to "Closed", meaning that Sento was wasn't expecting any more customers. Takatora looked around and his gaze became focused on the central display case, causing his eyes to widen. There must have been dozens of Gunpla on display in that case. From varying series, movies, and other official sources. And true to Sento's reputation, they were all beautifully constructed, each one almost perfectly emulating the model's look and feel. Some had battle damage added for artistic effect. Some even had sprinkles of dirt on them to simulate how heavily utilized they were in the lore of the series they came from.
"Ah, I'm sorry to say that I've closed for the day-" called a voice from the back room. The door to that room opened, and a young man emerged into the main room of the store. His expression shifted slightly when he realized who it was that entered. Not one of negativity, in fact if anything he became rather intrigued, "I was wondering when I'd see you..." said Sento, scratching his head briefly as he stepped closer to Takatora. Sento looked to be be in his early twenties, like someone of college age. Or perhaps a year or so older, with him it was difficult to tell, "He came to me too, after all. It's only natural that you would eventually follow his footsteps."
"Sento..." replied Takatora, brief hesitation in his voice before he seemed to regain his determination, "...I need you to tell me the secrets of the Hayabusa." he said simply, even holding up the Gunpla case for Sento to see.
"I'm not sure what I could tell you," Sento admitted, "you know that I am not the Hayabusa's builder."
"But you taught him what he knew!" exclaimed Takatora, raising his voice slightly but then continuing in a more apologetic tone, "You more than anyone can help me understand it. Don't you always claim that you appraise a Gunpla with a single glance?"
Sento allowed himself a prideful smile, "Well... that is true." he replied, seemingly forgetting to show humility of any kind, "Are you saying you want me to appraise it? You do realize that usually requires me to take it apart...?"
Takatora hesitated again. The idea of someone dismantling the Hayabusa was frightening to him. But there was no other choice, Kiyotaka was no longer around to tell anyone the secrets of his Gunpla. After a hard swallow Takatora nodded, "You'll be able to reassemble it, right? So... do it." and then he noticed Sento snatching the case without any further hesitation or confirmation.
"Ah, what a nostalgic build. Brings me back. The black paint job, the incredible fusion of two body frames..."
"Two body frames?!" asked Takatora, genuinely surprised by this, "You mean it's a hybrid build?"
"Of course," Sento said, raising an eyebrow, "surely you could tell that much on your own by looking? The Hayabusa is a combination of two different base models..." he paused, eyes scanning the shelves before he snatched a pair of boxes and showed them to Takatora, "...these two, to be precise." the boxes were for the MBF-P02 Gundam Astray Red Frame and the MBF-P03 Gundam Astray Blue Frame, "I'll appraise the build for you, but I'll need to keep the Hayabusa for tonight. It'll take me a couple of hours to get a more thorough look at it, and it's already closing time. Don't worry, you'll have it back first thing tomorrow exactly as it was when you brought it in, you have my word."
"Are you sure?" but before any further conversation could be made, Takatora was practically shoved out the door and it was locked behind him, "I guess that's it then..." and he started for home.
Brother... please forgive me.
Later that Night
In the middle of the night, a certain video went live. It was viewed, and shared, and then re-uploaded. By morning, virtually every inbox in GBN was buzzing with messages about the video, links included. Discussions began to murmur, and then after a while some of them turned into heated debates. Anyone who clicked the link, no matter where it circulated from, was treated to the following:
As soon as the video begins to play, viewers see a figure belonging to a European Caucasian. His features are handsome, relatively speaking, and his medium length hair was neatly tied into a ponytail. In the corner was what at first looked like a photo. But closer inspection reveals the "photo" to in fact be a screenshot of the person's GBN Avatar. The person and the avatar looked very much the same, meaning the young man likely used his real life likeness to create his avatar. His avatar wore a red Zeon uniform, but also a mask accessory inspired by the Lightning Count himself, Zechs Marquis. The figure in the video wasted no time before he spoke, "My name is Adam Roman." he said, offering a short bow to the camera, "I'm a Rank A pilot of the European Server, and it's about time I formally issued my challenge to you... King" he paused a moment, as if having the foresight to allow the viewer a moment to take in what they were hearing, "Yes, you heard me right. This challenge goes to the mystery man himself, the current Number 1 player in GBN. It's high time someone exposed you for the fraud and coward that you are." again Adam paused, as if allowing viewers another moment to take this in, "Again, you heard me right. King is a coward and a fraud. He hides behind his anonymity, too afraid to show his face. Or maybe that's just the opinion of a GP Duel veteran? What a system that was, forcing pilots to face each other in person like real warriors. Clearly King does not hail from that era of Gunpla Battle. But his cowardice aside, King is a false hero, propped up on his pedestal because the GBN administrators put him there. Did he truly reach his rank of his own accord and skill? Or was it because the admins outright gifted him his Gunpla and Rank on a silver platter? It's high time King answered for himself." Adam turned around, and took a step as if he were going to walk away from the shot. But he stopped, then craned his neck so that he could turn his head slightly back toward the camera, "Of course, King is more than welcome... to prove me wrong."
Also I would like for all Gunpla, alternate or main to be placed in your character sheet whenever possible. If you plan on using it in the future of the RP or just get inspired (at your leisure) dump it into your Gunpla section.
Please say that Sento is an exception to that rule. I don't think either of us can actually come up with 100 different builds. Not unless we're doing it slowly over the course of the game whenever Sento is brought in to battle for any reason.
Edit: Also the wording I used in describing Adam's video? It also very conveniently be used against Takatora as well. The Hayabusa isn't his. Someone else made it, and that's the only reason Takatora has won any battles. A nice little way kickstart Takatora's character arc in earnest.
True. I think Riku upgraded 00 Diver into 00 Diver Ace after only like five or six episodes. That's not even mentioning the upcoming the character in the RP - Sento Sakuraba - who despite not battling anymore has literally 100 custom gunpla builds in his personal collection. Plus another 100 straight assemblies kept on display in his store.
To clarify something, the Adam thing doesn't need to resolve immediately. In fact it makes more sense for it to be something that builds up over a bit of time, like building hype and publicity in a highly anticipated grudge match.
@Renny My idea for the tomorrow-timeskip simply boils down to this: During the night Adam posted a video that pretty much went viral. In it he calls King out. He accuses him of being a coward who hides behind internet anonymity and being too afraid to actually show his face. Adam even goes as far as removing his own mask, letting all of GBN see the face of the person who would dare do this. Then he does something else. He accuses King's Gunpla of not even being his own. That it's just a blatantly overpowered machine that GBN provided him. He accuses King of being a fake, a false hero, one who has only reached his rank because it was handed to him on a silver platter by the admins, and not because he actually earned it for real. He ends by telling King that he is welcome to prove him wrong, and then the video cuts off.
@Double I didn't know that the downtime was for conversation. To be honest I was waiting for you to post again lol.
So the fact that Viper left to investigate a hunch and specifically told you guys to investigate in whatever way you deemed necessary wasn't enough of a clue?
Well my character is a one note egotistical jerk who cares more about the stats of the gunpla that he sees than the people flying it. He's already proven himself to be a stick in the mud. If you got a problem with way other people are thinking about your character then you'll either have to express him in a different way, and or ask people kindly to just stop referring to him in such a way. Angry outbursts aren't going to do you any good. I could say any number of things at the moment. In a kingdom hearts roleplay I'm in, its pretty much living dead at this point but thats besides the point, the gm called my character edgy, probably due to his sucky childhood, before I even got a chance to post I just told him I didn't think of it that way, and moved on.
If you wanna keep on raving at us that's your choice but in my opinion you're not doing yourself any favors by doing so.
Not even relevant, so why point that out? It's almost like you're trying to get a reaction out of me. Well I guess it sort of succeeded, but I digress. If you want to compare situations, then okay, let's compare the two scenarios. In the game you mentioned, the GM didn't even use the term edgy. That was one of the other players who, I must stress, is not a GM and therefore whose words were without real weight. The term the GM used specifically, I believe, was "brooding loner". And no, I'm not arguing semantics, I'm arguing that there's a legitimate difference between using a term like "brooding loner" and just straight up calling someone an edgelord. The former is not a negative term, nor does it suggest any sort of negativity. Edgy or Edgelord on the other hand? Those are clearly meant to be insulting and not constructive in anyway.
Oh and by the way, that game is not dead. I'm still very much keeping tabs on it. It's stagnant right now, yes, but that's because I made the mistake of allowing downtime that everyone decided to ignore which of course leads to the current stagnation.
Alright can we take a chill pill before things get out of hand here?
Well pardon me for not wanting to get slapped with a label early on that isn't even remotely accurate. I've seen how this crap plays out. The minute one or two people refer to someone that way, they basically become stuck with it for the rest of the game, regardless of the actual accuracy of the label. And I refuse to be this game's edgelord when my character isn't even remotely in that ballpark.
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