![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
amenohabakiriPlayer: Ken
Contact:
Age: 30
Current Characters: Alice Yotsuba (
rosettawall)Character: Tsubasa Kazanari
Age: 19
Canon: Senki Zesshou Symphogear
Canon Point: After GX/Season 3
Background: Episodes and summaries.
Born to the noble and influential Kazanari family, Tsubasa was conceived with an intent - to become the family's heir and lead it forward. Her desire however, became rooted in song, and these things - for better or worse - intersected when she was found to be adept and compatible with being a wielder of power born from Relics scattered across the world. It led her to being able to adopt the "Symphogear" armor to combat the forces of seemingly ruthless monsters called "Noise." This of course was not before, at a young age, her song woke an undying being named Finé who overtook the body of one Ryoko Sakurai. With her partner Kanade, she fought hard against the Noise until the young woman's untimely death, leaving Tsubasa alone.
Tsubasa fought alone for a couple years until Hibiki Tachibana, the girl Kanade died saving, appeared with Kanade's Symphogear. Through a series of hardships and battles, what starts out as animosity towards Hibiki becomes understanding, and confrontations with Finé's servant Chris Yukine also in turn shift her into being their ally. Together, they stop her from her ambitions to literally shoot the moon and save the planet.
Later on, an organization named F.I.S. and a treacherous scientist named Dr. Ver spark an incident that begins with holding countries of the world hostage with their power, and ends with Ver threatening to obliterate most of the life on the planet. In the previous incident, there was disorganization and subterfuge to throw them off - this time, the Mobile Disaster Response Corps act far more efficiently, with Tsubasa acting often at the forefront as the senior Symphogear user. During this time, she's faced with battling Chris again, and diverting her from a path that would have ended in her own death had she failed. Together with the F.I.S. Wielders - Maria, Shirabe, and Kirika - they defeat Ver and - surprise surprise - save the world again.
The third major incident happens some considerable time later. An alchemist Carol Malus Dienheim and her servants struck out against their organization, now named S.O.N.G., in order to "dissect the world." She used the Symphogear Wielders to her own ends, setting up a situation in which their powers were destroyed and reconstructed in a way that would only further her plans via a crafted, yet convoluted, sequence of events that involved throwing the lives of her servants away. During this, Tsubasa was faced with the reality of her family and forced to finally come to terms with it, before the six united Symphogear users managed to defeat Carol... even if it was at the cost of basically all Shinjuku. And seemingly millions upon millions of lives at Carol's hands.
Personality: On the surface level, Tsubasa Kazanari would seem to be a rather simple to read person. Outwardly, she is cool and collected at almost all times, passion springing forth only during battle and song. Intellectually sharp and wise of the world around her. A stalwart protector of the weak, strong and unflinching. Some of these things are... well, correct. Others? Not so much.
There are few people who know Tsubasa beyond the pop idol/perfect school princess. Fewer still, even among those she would call friends, who truly know everything that makes her tick. Even beyond that, there are things that she keeps close to her chest, things that only she knows - because they are either that deeply rooted in her fears or concerns, or she mistakenly tries to tell herself they aren't important.
Throughout various stages of her life, Tsubasa has acted very differently. As a young child she was impressionable but put upon by family politics and the expectation to be the Kazanari clan's true heir. Still, her love of music persisted, and her natural acclimation to the Relics and ability to wield the Symphogear armor made her an ideal candidate as a Wielder. She was caught between two worlds - her dream of music that could bring joy to both her and others, and using that music as a weapon, as she was molded into a "sword" to fight and protect those same people she wished to entertain.
When faced with Kanade Amou, a young girl whose family was taken from her by the Noise and driven to be a Wielder and annihilate them with a resounding vengeance, young Tsubasa was sort of enamored. She took after Kanade, looked up to her, followed after her. With Kanade she was able to embrace her dream of being a performer, which was used as a cover at the same time to further research on the Relics. Even then though, she was still like a scared little girl, no matter how well she could sing, no matter how hard she could fight. It wasn't enough - Kanade sacrificed her life to save a girl named Hibiki Tachibana, and Tsubasa was almost instantly hardened.
She became that very sword her family had pushed her towards, and while she did not abandon her dream, it was pulled back to a degree. She was still this successful, top charting pop idol, and yet would not reach beyond the borders of her own country due to her mission. It was too important, and anything that got in the way of that would need to be removed. Such as ... Hibiki, when she appeared two years later wielding Kanade's Symphogear. Tsubasa was enraged, spiteful and cruel towards the girl, treating her with contempt and threatening to remove her. In time however, as Hibiki proves herself and Tsubasa comes to realize the person she was becoming, she begins to lighten. To become much more like the girl she was, even if she never truly can go back there. Her memories of Kanade drive her, but not towards vengeance - at this point, she'd still considered herself a weapon, but saw where she could maybe grow beyond that.
It's by the end of the first season that she truly and honestly becomes the person she will be for the rest of the series - strong and stoic, and yet with an unflinching kindness towards those she will reach her hand out to. Be it Chris where she happily tried to literally extend a hand of friendship to after they'd spent half the series trying to murder one another, or Hibiki whom... Well, when the berserk nature of the girl's Symphogear engulfed her, rather than truly fight her, Tsubasa subdued her by taking a brutal hit from her, hugging her, and then pinning her shadow to the ground so she could try and defeat their opponent herself, nearly sacrificing her life. Tsubasa is hard willed, but with a softness she tried for a long time to hide - and doesn't always let out except for those she's closest to.
Except... well, even there she does still retain some difficulty. Circumstance through her life has sort of emotionally stunted Tsubasa in some ways - her father, or who she was supposed to view as her father seemingly treated her in a harsh, dismissive, and demanding manner. Even if his intention was to push her away from her family obligations, such a thing does not play well with a child's mind. She was at her most bright eyed and optimistic with Kanade, but then she died. She spent the next couple years shutting herself off emotionally from everything, and has spent her entire life training to be a warrior, that "sword" that... She never had time for anything else. Fun with friends. Love, dating. For a long time, Tsubasa was only her career and her duty.
As such, social situations and cues that others may have a strong reaction to can leave Tsubasa almost not realizing she should react. When Ryoko once spoke of her stories of love and romance, Miku and Hibiki were are sparkles and blushes - Tsubasa merely stares on with a look of dull surprise. When she tries to console Hibiki, she admits to not being very good with it. She finds herself overjoyed when getting to have a day on the town with Hibiki & Miku, and thus times when she gets to act like a normal girl do seem to spark something in her. It's just... something she had buried for a very long time.
However, practice makes perfect and Tsubasa is perceptive enough about certain things to pick up when someone else is struggling. Namely, her former rival and enemy, Chris Yukine. When Chris enrolled in their school, she was uncertain of her place in it, having difficulty fitting in. Tsubasa - someone who had never really engaged her classmates on a personal level before, had never had time for "fun" - encouraged Chris to put herself out there. To sing and make friends and act her age, effectively. This led to Chris opening up more, acting less generally nervous about certain things, singing before the entire school. In effect, Tsubasa slid into a role for Chris much like what Kanade was for her - someone who could guide her, from someone who had also suffered in the past. In a way it can be seen as a subtle, final way she's moved on from Kanade's death, and done so almost entirely of her own power - she became that mentor, that "senpai" who could truly make a difference for someone. This led to Tsubasa and Chris being able to rely on each other...
...which was handy when dealing with Chris' suicidal bid to infiltrate their enemies, which probably would have just thrown her life away pointlessly and not worked if she HADN'T been there for the girl. So, Tsubasa by this point had not only learned the value of trust and understanding others, but had taken great leaps to instill it in Chris, something which then dictates her actions later on in the series.
For all of the younger Symphogear Wielders, Tsubasa has become someone to look up to, and she tries to abide by that. The exception to this being Maria, who was at one time a peer in the music industry, and then new rival working for their enemies, before finally allying with them and becoming an ally and friend. Maria shows that people who are already strong and mature, who don't need her guidance, who are her peers and equals are the sort that Tsubasa via her development has actually become easily comfortable being around. Maria is the only (living) person she refers to by their first name, and the only person she's opened up to about her family. Her trust to her newer stage partner is quite evident, and a very, very far cry from who she started out as - which is a fitting note to how far she's come.
It's been alluded to her, but her family is something that uniquely impacts her personality, and is probably the crux of the majority of her issues. Simply put, her father, grandfather, and uncle - the latter being S.O.N.G.'s Commander, Genjuro Kazanari - are ... none of those things. Her grandfather is her true, biological father, having impregnated her mother to keep the Kazanari bloodline pure and set her up as the new heir of their fortune and influence. Her half-brother acted as her "real" father, and led to him trying to present himself as a cruel man so Tsubasa would leave her clan's duties behind, which then led to her other half-brother and "uncle" to then probably be in her life far more than either the man who sired her or the one who was SUPPOSED to raise her.
That's a bit of an exposition dump, but it's important to describe the next part of Tsubasa's thought patterns, and probably the sickest thing of all - she went on through nineteen years of her life acting as if this was normal. She was clearly bothered by it, to be sure - but she would shrug it off. Make excuses for her "father," trying to justify it. "That's just the way our relationship is." It's only when Maria was exposed to this, to her childhood room being untouched and yet oddly... clean that Tsubasa got the clarity she needed. That even if his methods were kind of awful, her "father" was attempting to push her more towards her dream than her family. In a way, what was built for her was a life she would never want to return to, so she could pursue her true goals. Yet all that time, her room had been unmoved and yet, always cleaned - by her "father," her brother, who still wanted the best for her even if he had the worst way of demonstrating it.
Once Maria gets that through to her, Tsubasa realizes fully and at last she is not a sword, she is not a weapon. She is a force that can decide her own future, and from here on all of the experiences and growth she's gone through can give her the wings to do that.
...
So long as that does not involve picking up after herself. Tsubasa is, in actuality, in spite of her image? A complete and utter slob. Her assistant, Ogawa, is constantly tasked with picking up after her because no matter where she goes, be it her own home or a hospital, she inevitably leaves a mess in her wake that would send the crew of Hoarders running for the hills.
This is all very long winded, and goes through various stages of her development, but hopefully it demonstrates how important those evolutions are to the woman she's become. Because even the stuff that's left behind isn't forgotten - in Season 2, she slips back into her angrier, forceful self when Hibiki's health is putting her in danger, and in Season 3, nightmares induced by their new powers show she is still fearful of getting too close to people. That she will still inevitably bring their demise, just as she did Kanade. The woman she once was can always bubble back to the surface, for better or worse. Tsubasa is simply not a static character, for all her stoic image may present.
But in the end, Tsubasa is what she is - a protector who will defend all who need to be defended, and a young woman doing everything she can now to carry on with her dream the whole while, because she's learned one very important thing: These two roles are not mutually exclusive.
Abilities: Tsubasa is a rather fit and strong young woman, shown to have significant stamina and prone to unwieldy and significantly difficult acrobatics at a moment's notice even before summoning any of her power. She is clearly well trained in the art of swordsmanship, and some of her skill hails from influence of her assistant Ogawa's ninja clan, as they share at least one similar technique. That being an ability called "Shadow Weave" in which Tsubasa can throw a knife at someone's shadow, pinning them in place. (Or in Ogawa's case, replace the knife with a bullet.)
Beyond that, Tsubasa's greatest skill is her ability to wield Symphogear armor, born from a Relic piece of the ancient artifact Ame no Habakiri. Tsubasa is naturally adept to the armor, whereas some other Wielders - such as Kanade - had to inject dangerous drugs into their system in order to be compatible. In order to enable its transformation, she sings a specific, instinctive song in an ancient language that resonates with something called the "Aufwachen Waveform." Upon transformation, another song will be born from her heart, and use of it will continue to further empower her Symphogear as she fights, an act which is called "Phonic Gain." This can be increased by focusing her song, or amplified even further at times by joining and synchronizing with other Symphogear users, their shared songs leading often to even greater battle output. Of course, in turn this can be disrupted - while it will not prevent the Symphogear user from fighting, it can disrupt their Phonic Gain.
Tsubasa's armor is befitting her build - it is light but serviceable, and allows her to move fast and strike hard. Immediately present are swords on her legs, which she can and does utilize as weapons at all times, but more importantly is her Armed Gear - the primary weapon of any Symphogear user not named Hibiki Tachibana. Tsubasa's weapon primarily and initially forms as a long katana, but as with anything involving a Symphogear it is prone to changing. For her, it often will morph and grow into a giant cleaving blade. In either form she can summon the powers of both lightning and fire, manifesting them in a variety of both melee and projectile attacks. The katana can also be formed into either a twin double-bladed weapon or separately, though the latter is mostly reserved for later forms.
Outside this, she can also form her katana a rather giant blade (Heaven's Dragon Scale) the height of a small building, which she has utilized to drop on enemies, block incoming fire, or even forcibly kick and rocket into an enemy's position. Her armor is capable of minor propulsion that may not allow for complete unrestrained flight, but is fully capable of boosting a giant sword down someone's throat. As demonstrated in Season 2, she can summon this many times in a row in quick succession while fleeing enemy fire, even if the enemy keeps destroying them one after another.
That is sort of the thing about Symphogear armor - it changes. It is malleable, it will evolve based on its users abilities and gathered power over time.
Additionally, Tsubasa can call upon a rain of energy swords, which after initially aimed can't exactly be directed any further than momentum and gravity will carry them, but can be quite nasty as a distraction to more skilled and powerful fighters.
Of course, the armor also increases her natural strength, speed, and dexterity - all things that Tsubasa clearly excels at to start with.
She can preform a "Climax Song" (or however you wish to translate "Zesshou" this week) which will massively overclock her power, but at potential risk of her life. Used carelessly, she once was able to significantly damage Chris in battle, yet was hospitalized and barely able to walk for weeks to follow. To date, Tsubasa has never been able to safely use her Climax Song alone without suffering damage - it is very much POSSIBLE, given that Tsubasa's mental state at the time was questionable at best, suicidal at most. It's just not definite - more often she utilizes her Climax Song with the other Wielders, and through sharing the backlash of the power and their shared harmony, they are able to preform outstanding feats.
Such as in at least a couple cases, obtaining enough Phonic Gain to activate their "ultimate forms," the X-Drive. Every activation of their X-Drives throughout the series has so far been unique to the situation, with Tsubasa's most recurring theme being that she gets MORE swords and they get a LOT bigger. Under the X-Drive, their powers run on overdrive, able to take out entire armies of Noise and able to deflect an entire chunk of the moon hurtling towards the planet. Of course, there is a draw back - they are extraordinarily difficult to activate, requiring untold amounts Phonic Gain, usually with bonus requirements that usually involve a lot of hot blooded yelling. Essentially, they are the "season ending" final battle powers, and unlikely to be thrown around lightly or come up except under the most dire and VERY SPECIFIC (moderator approved) SITUATIONS.
(During Season 3 the girls also all purge their armor to empower Hibiki, so that is also a possible thing, if unlikely.)
Lastly, in Season 3 they obtain another super form, in between the state of their standard Symphogears and the X-Drive - the Ignite Module. It's easier to activate than the X-Drive, and while it may not be as powerful, it is still a significant boost. Still... there are drawbacks. Activating it starts a time limit of 999 seconds, which may SEEM like a lot, but if exceeded will deactivate the Symphogear transformation entirely. Further, the level they start out in - Phase Nigredo - may be the most stable and give the longest time to fight, but has the lowest power boost benefit. Two more levels remain, Phase Albedo and Phase Rubedo. In canon so far, Tsubasa has only utilized the first two levels, but it should be noted for an extra degree of compeltely obscene, their teammate Hibiki utilized the Ignite Module while in X-Drive form at the end of Season 3. This simply resulted in power she used to protect someone, but note it is possible.
A note on the berserk form - Tsubasa has never directly experienced it, but it plagued Hibiki for two Seasons, and Maria fell to it briefly in Season 3. The user's body if they lose control becomes nothing but a dark shadow of themselves, pretty literally - they become almost inhuman, lusting for nothing but violence and battle, even at the cost of their own body.
Lastly, she has some amount of ability with regards to
Alignment: Peromei - Tsubasa has become someone who instills hope in others, and almost a symbol for it in some ways. That said, she has dealt with much despair in her life, and while thanks to her hope and dreams she has been able to overcome it, it still creeps up now and then when she least expects it.
Other: Really, the X-Drive stuff is just for full reference. I don't expect it to come up much if at all, even if each additional Symphogear user makes it more feasible to attain as a group. But I mean, hey - if ever there's a time they COULD reasonably cut loose, it's there~
Sample:
Test Drive Meme
Also did this further on up, but it's not as substantial, hence why we did another!
Questions: NOPE.
