PLAYER: Blair
ARE YOU AT LEAST 18 YEARS OLD?: Yes
CONTACT: flowerworks
CHARACTERS PLAYED: n/a

NAME: Shylock Bennett
CANON: Mahoutsukai no Yakusoku
CANON REFERENCE: Main story, affection story, character episodes, Bar Bennett substories. tldr Mahoutsukai no Yakusoku (or Promise of Wizard in English) is a Japanese mobile game which takes place in a fantasy world full of magic, spirits, and fantastical beasts. Basically, four chosen wizards from five countries are tasked to fight off the moon, dubbed the Great Calamity, from destroying their world. Shylock in particular is one of those chosen wizards -- the owner of a wizards-only bar in Western Country, Shylock is a sophisticated wizard who doesn't hide his own eccentricities, a trait all Western wizards share, such as raising his dear old friend Murr from scratch after the latter gets his soul destroyed by the moon... into a cat. Don't be fooled by his cool and sensual way of talking, he's an absolute weirdo.
CANON POINT: Post-West Rhapsody
CRAU HISTORY: n/a
AGE: Looks like a man somewhere in his late 20s, is actually 1500+ years old
APPEARANCE: x. 180cm. He has a wizard crest under his left collarbone, like so.
CONTRACT PAYMENT: A way to prevent his dear friend Murr from getting destroyed by his true love, the Great Calamity, once more.

QUESTIONNAIRE:

What is your favorite diversion? Hobbies, indulgences, vices? Would you put off important things for that diversion, or would you be more strict about how you spend your time and/or money?

I drink, I smoke my pipe. I do things at the beat of my own drum, as do most Western wizards. While I am someone who appears to be more put-together compared to my fellow Westerners, I am not immune from getting my attention swayed towards something that piques my interests more. It is very possible for me to quit a certain task if I no longer enjoy it, and I could not care less for the rewards or the reputation that will make an impact on me.

You've worked with your Faction awhile now and you feel like the reward of your contract is within reach. But at the last moment, you are told you have even more service to pay beforehand, an obscure clause in the contract being exploited to keep you under your boss's thumb even longer. Your Faction Leader hasn't spoken on this, and might be able to dispute it. Do you go to your leader? Do you argue the dispute yourself? Do you begrudgingly accept the additional work? Something else?

I would... gently persuade my leader for clarifications regarding my contract. [ his smile is a bit strained, but it's a smile nonetheless. ] I'm not one to be under somebody's rule, you know? I won't hesitate to leave my faction altogether if we cannot talk this through. It would be a huge loss of theirs if they decide that I'm not worth keeping, after all.

Your Faction leader, not just your boss but the leader, has asked you to carry out a hit. The target is a non-affiliated public leader, well-liked by the people of the city. Do you carry it out? Why or why not?

Carrying out an assassination attempt at once's life is rather boorish, don't you think? I am no bandit, first of all, nor an all-powerful Northern wizard for that matter. I'd be able to give it ago, provided that I have a partner with me together with my magical powers back, but I simply cannot see myself carry one out anytime soon, the target's reputation be damned.

Although, if we are talking about techniques, I am not one for brute force. That said, if I were to be in charge of their drinks, and I happen to drop a bit of hemlock in their glasses ever so discreetly... Fufu.

An oni of the Shuten Clan has gone completely berserk, and is going on a violent rampage through the city. You can't stop him, but you CAN lead him elsewhere, but you only have two choices: a road by a discotheque with a large crowd in front, or the nearby park that you do not know is unoccupied, and may have children present. What do you choose, and why?

The large crowd at the discotheque can be evacuated in time, as we lure the rogue oni into an enclosed area that should be cleared out as well. It'd be safer to trap it inside for the time being as we attempt to calm it down in someway. The compensations, for the meantime, will be taken care of thereafter the incident.

POWERS & ABILITIES:

Wizards in MahoYaku use their hearts to perform magic, so there must be a right balance of a wizard's own spirit and the environment they surround themselves in. The clearer a picture they can form in their mind, the more likely their magic will succeed, and a wizard can do typical enough magic like levitation, transformation, flight - any form of magic under the sun so long as they know what they're doing. A wizard can also use their personalized magic spell to tap into their inner magic, and utilize their magic tools to help enhance it further.

Still, it's all dependent on a wizard's strengths and specialties though, and even magic can't do the impossible such as bringing back the dead to life, time travel (freezing time is possible for a few moments though), and making something out of nothing (except sugar; a wizard starts out learning magic by making sugar first and it's not as easy as it looks). But the most important catch is that — if a wizard makes a promise and they break it, they will lose their powers forever.

Lastly, despite the fact that wizards can live for thousands of years, they aren't completely immortal and they turn into mana stones when they die - precious jewels that can be eaten to bolster a wizard's magical power or even power some of the magical technology in their world. Moreover they can sense their impending death, whether it'll happen tomorrow or a couple years later.

Shylock in particular is a capable wizard in his own right in terms of magical power, to the point that Figaro and Oz contemplated on killing him at one point while they were on a prowl for mana stones to eat. He specializes in "intoxicating" one's senses in his own words - using his fancy pipe, he can use the smoke to induce nightmares to a set number of people, or simply casting sleep on them to make them pass out. And of course as a seasoned bartender, he also knows how to make magical cocktails that has certain effects of a truth potion or a love potion and such. Lastly, he has a certain magical affliction from the moon where his heart would periodically be set on fire.

As for nerfs, Shylock will lose most of his magic upon entering the game, and is only capable of very minute cases of telekinesis and transformation if possible. He'll need to regain his magical artifact, amulet, and broom in order to cast more substantial magic, and his sensor abilities will be nerfed where he can tell that one has magic or not, but he won't know what kind it was nor whom it belongs to.

SUITABILITY: Fantastical the story may be, the world of Mahoyaku is rife with a lot of problems, wizard oppression notwithstanding, and Western Country in particular has cases of human trafficking in the poorer districts and the richer districts are far up in their ass with their wealth to give a shit about how magical science is affecting their environment.

Aside from being of age, Shylock is rather openminded and can go along with everyone's weird shit since he's also a weirdo himself despite his image as a refined gentleman, and he can use his inherent sex appeal to his advantage whenever he needs to sweeten someone up for information, among other things. Moreover, he manages a bar in Western Country which has a distinct class divide, and the inhabitants there are known to be rather eccentric thrill-seekers and are most likely to risk it all if it most pleases them. He, of course, is no exemption. He is very hedonistic but at the same time he loves troublesome things (to keep things exciting, possibly), so while he will be a tad bothered about his powers vanishing -- because he has to break a promise for him to lose his magic -- he'll mostly take it in stride.

FACTION SUITABILITY:

SHUTEN: He would certainly approve of the oni way of drinking hard and partying harder, and gambling is practically inherent in a risk-taking Western wizard such as him. That said, he is hardly the stickler for the rules and not to mention a shameless liar, though he could afford behaving for a while -- provided that the job at hand will pique his interest long-term. He is not one to flaunt his own strength as well, despite being powerful in his own right.

TAMAMO: Out of the four factions, the Tamamo clan would fit Shylock like a glove the most. Firstly he has managed a bar for several centuries, and he certainly wouldn't say no to a bit of debauchery or two. Western wizards are known to be individualists who are free to do whatever they want without a care and with style, and Shylock would certainly appreciate Tenko-hime's outlook of the world and how Tamamo-no-Mae would rather take away one's freedom as punishment, which parallels Shylock keeping the shards of his friend's former self in jars until he can make said friend whole again. The Tamamo Clan seems to have more freedom compared to the other factions, and Western wizards tend to hate being chained down to obligation unless they feel like it -- they're quite chaotic in their own way.

SUTOKU: Shylock does know a boatload of information, gleaned from what he can gather from his patrons of his bar, and as someone who's lived in the richer part of Western Country, Shylock would know how to handle his finances up to a point. Shylock would find the underdog faction quite adorable and he will do whatever he can to contribute. That being said, Shylock is incredibly self-indulgent, so he might not be able to vibe with the ascetism this faction has going on in longer terms; just because he loves hashtag-complicated things doesn't mean he's going to like it if it's going to damper his fun.

ENMA: ...Not sure what he can offer here that won't violate his lack of a moral compass. He'd be able to dole out punishment at least, but that would go against his love for chaos and fun.

SAMPLES

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thread w/ emily