Emil

Character Information
Character Name: Emil
Canon: NieR
Canon Point: Popola's final attack
History: here
Personality: Emil is a soft-spoken, sensitive boy. He brings gentleness to the group of misfits consisting of Nier, the gruffly awkward protagonist, Kainé, an angry woman who's been wounded in every possible sense of the word, and Grimoire Weiss, a pompous spellbook with plenty of opinions on everything. He's the one who frets the most about his friends -- when the other three are in the most danger of dying or losing themselves, it's Emil who brings the tearful, heartfelt speeches of friendship and never giving up on them. At the very end, even during his sacrifice, he worries that the group is unstable and argumentative, and he hopes they can learn to get along after he's gone. And more than once, he tries to avoid fighting someone he could overpower because he doesn't want to hurt a person who could be saved. As a shut-in who only recently felt safe enough to leave home and explore the world, he approaches every new thing with a sense of childlike wonder and a lasting hope that everything will turn out all right. While he suffers from extremely low self-esteem -- first because his eyes made him too dangerous to be around people, and now because his monster body is horrifying -- Emil tries to be a friend to anyone he can. When the people around him are hurt or feeling low, he stays with them and talks to them, doing his best to cheer them up.

A big part of his personality is avoidance. Out of guilt for the people he hurt, and in an effort to ensure no one else could be affected by his powers, Emil decided the best course of action was to voluntarily blindfold himself and stay shut away inside to protect others from his curse. He tries more than once to talk his way out of fights, especially with people he knows. And he doesn't like to burden anyone with the inconvenience of worrying about him, so he bottles his feelings and hides his fears until the inevitable breakdown.

He hasn't had a lot of happiness in his life, and likely because of that, Emil has a deep affection for all things good in this world. He treasures his few friendships over everything, including his own wellbeing. He adores weddings, he swoons at the thought of love, and there's very little in the world that makes him more excited than hearing about other people's lives, especially their romances. He mentions in passing that he wishes he could be married someday, and he tries his best to get everyone as into the whole process as he is. The night before the king's wedding he asks Nier about his marriage, and if he had dancing bears and so on. Nier sort of brushes him off, but Emil still comments that he thinks his questions, and love, are very important. During the ceremony, he says he's a little jealous and tries to get Kainé to admit that she is too. Admittedly, most of his ideas on love come from old books and vaguely-remembered stereotypes, but it's a warm, beautiful thing and a lonely kid like him can't help but feel drawn to it.

Don't let his meek personality or physical weakness fool you -- Emil was built the way he was to stop the unstoppable, and even though he prefers to avoid conflict, he has the strength and courage to fight if he thinks is right. When he feels passionately about something, he’ll pour his heart and soul into it. And for better or worse, put under enough stress, he can lose control of his weapon instincts and cause a ridiculous amount of damage.

Items on your character at canon point: His cloak, scarf, and staff.
Abilities: - Turning things/people to stone
- Mild healing, including reversing the petrification thing
- Floating/Flying
- Magic attacks! Pew pew! These range from smallish magic pellets to solid bolts
- A ridiculously powerful magic blast that pretty much vaporizes everything in a one-mile radius, but he only used it once when he lost control of himself and was taken over by his weapon instincts. He'd never voluntarily do it, and if I’m allowed to keep it I won't bust it out without loads of plotting/mod permissions.
- Though it isn't really useful outside of his canon, Emil seems to have some ability to sense Shades, which are basically feral human souls.
- He also has some not-very-well-described ability related to bestial transformation. It’s only ever relevant when a friend of his succumbs to her Shade possession; Emil’s the only one who can call her back.
- Some sort of bubble that functions as a shield, but he can also use it to move people
- More of a skill than a power: Emil blindfolded himself for like a thousand years and some change to keep himself from turning anyone else to stone. Because of this, he's pretty good at getting around without his sight, and he seems to have sharp hearing -- he was able to give Nier a rough description of himself just from hearing him walk into the room.
- He can play the piano, blindfolded or not.
Strengths and Weaknesses:
Strengths:
- remarkably hard to kill. he's being somewhat nerfed for the game so he can be killable at all, but the body he has now was specifically built to adapt and survive in extreme environments.
- kind. Emil wants to believe there's good in everyone and value in every life. regardless of how he's treated, he tries to find the good in everyone.
- loyal. if he's your friend, he's your friend for life.

Weaknesses:
- outside of his magic, he's not very powerful. he can't hold his own in a physical fight, and he tends to get smacked around a lot.
- as noted, he doesn't always handle himself well emotionally
- naive. he IS still a kid, technically speaking, and a very sheltered one at that.
- technologically speaking, most of his world is basically stuck in the dark ages. the most advanced machinery he's familiar with is a water wheel.