Ryu Akino

Higure (father)

**Prince** **Ryusei Akino** is the current heir to the Mistral throne and one of the members of team WNDR. He is the son of Lady Akino and older brother of Shiro. His weapon of choice is a double-bladed axe and shotgun combo named Ardent Bloom.

He made his first appearance in "We're All Mad Here", accompanying his mother to the annual World Leader's Summit. While there, Ryu becomes involved with Narcissus Melyn, Wofiirira, and Diane Glas when he asks for their help in searching for answers about a mysterious assailant Ryu encountered.

## History

Ryu was born into Mistral royalty. Ryu, being the eldest, was the one set to inherit the throne and thus had a lot more expectations put on him, leading him to be a little distant from his four-years-younger brother Shiro. Despite this, the two still had a bond and comforted each other as their parents started to drift apart. When Ryu was about 14 years old, the conflict between his father and mother came to a head and his father left for Menagerie. When Shiro chose to leave along with him, Ryu took this as a betrayal and built up ill feelings for his father and brother, ignoring all the letters the latter sent him over the years.

## Appearance

Ryu is a fair-skinned young man with dark red eyes and pale pink hair. He has a thick streak of white in the front of his hair, but usually keeps it hidden from view. Due to its color and "fluffy" texture, Melyn has taken to comparing Ryu's hair to cotton candy. Ryu's face flushes heavily when he is angry or embarrassed, essentially telegraphing his emotional state to everyone in view, much to his dismay.

Ryu is first seen in his "prince attire", which consists of a white high-necked top worn under an open-front long jacket; both are covered by a shrug with a raised collar and elbow-length belled sleeves. The jacket has a long train in the back that splits at the sides to form two thinner "front-tails" over his legs. Around his waist is a thick belt resembling a corset. He also wears black pants and knee-high boots with a heart-shaped design at the tops. His hair is brushed back, and he has bright red makeup around his his eyes. Though he tries to appear as formal and proper as possible while in this outfit, he has on several occasions tripped over his own coattails.

## Personality

If there's one word to describe Ryu, it's "passionate". He feels, does, and believes in things at 100%, never doing anything halfway. Despite being naturally sensitive and affectionate, it's been drilled into him by his mother to keep his composure at all times, and with his lack of interaction with "regular"people, he doesn't know how to properly handle his emotions. Instead of expressing himself honestly, he tries to hold in his emotions until they build up so much that they all spill out at once, usually explosively. Because he expects perfection, especially from himself, he is easily frustrated and tends to have outbursts when something goes awry. Incredibly competitive, Ryu is ready to throw down at any time. Though he seems sure of himself on the surface, he is easily thrown off by personal digs. He doesn’t like not being taken seriously or people assuming he’s a spoiled brat because of his bringing. Contrarily, though, he tends to make snap decisions about people that are hard to change. He's stubborn, though some would say "bull-headed" is more like it, and doesn’t know when to quit; when he’s got his mind set on something nothing’s going to stop him. Past his hard candy shell, however, Ryu has a marshmallow center - he has a genuine longing to feel loved and strong sense of loyalty to his team...even though it’s a little hard to tell.

Ryu is a huge sap when it comes to romance. He spends a lot of time reading trashy airport romance novels, and genuinely liking them. He becomes extremely flustered by flirting or anything even resembling romance; he goes completely red and pretty much forgets how to speak.

## Powers and Abilities

Despite Ryu's problem-solving method seeming to be more or less "hit it until it dies", he does have a recognizable technique in battle. Combining his self-taught combat skills with his learnings from all his extracurriculars, he treats battle almost like a dance.

If something happens to set off his temper, all precision goes out the window, and he attacks without thought or restraint. Being in this state makes him more or a physical threat, but also makes him less careful and thus liable to making mistakes or counterattack.

### Weapon

> *Main Article: Ardent Bloom*
>
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Ryu's weapon began as a family heirloom that, despite being suitable for combat, had been mounted on the wall as decoration for most of his life. Partly out of pity for the weapon and its lack of real purpose, but mostly out of spite, Ryu eventually took it down and had it modified. The changes included retrofitting it with a more modern shotgun form and "inactive mode" for portability. It can transform between a battle-axe and a shotgun and can fire Dust rounds in either form with massive force.

Ryu tends to fight in close combat, using the strength lent by his semblance to strike heavy hits on his opponents. The size of the axe blades is substantial enough that he can use them as a rudimentary shield. Not having trained much with the ranged mode of his weapon, Ryu's aim is poor, so he tends to avoid using the weapon's shotgun form if he can help it.

### Semblance

When using his semblance, nicknamed "Meteor", Ryu creates a "cloak" of aura/energy and launches himself at a target at high speed like a cannonball. The impact causes high damage and a knockback effect. It can only be done in midair and with sufficent "buildup", so he usually has to awkwardly jump first, recklessly jump *off* something, or be thrown. Though he can’t change direction after the initial movement, he can cancel it at any time - if he’s calm enough, which he almost never is. If he runs at something with this active and misses and hits something else it hurts like a bitch.

He can concentrate the effect to his limbs to enhance the strength of his strikes, but doesn't do this often because it wears him out pretty quickly. This power can be used defensively by making a sort of armor with his aura and directing the acceleration power downward, which keeps him in place while taking otherwise displacing hits.

Combining his semblance with Dust gives it additional affects - Fire makes the impact explosive, Earth solidifies the "cloak" to increase damage, Wind increases his height and speed, and Ice shatters the "cloak" into damaging shrapnel upon impact.

## Relationships

### Shiro

Though they were close as children, Ryu took Shiro's choice to leave with their father very personally; he started to believe Shiro abandoned him to their unforgiving mother because he didn't care about him.

### Melyn

On their first meeting, Ryu found Melyn's lackadaisical attitude unsavory, and his jokes at Ryu's expense didn't help either. Even though they actually often agreed on things, Ryu would still choose to fight, since he couldn't look past the idea of Melyn he had in his head.

Getting lost together in Forever Fall, however, forced the two to look after and open up to each other. Upon seeing more of Melyn's caring and earnest side, Ryu caught feelings and almost immediately started to act flustered and lovestruck around his teammate.

## Trivia

* Ryu alludes to the Queen of Hearts from *Alice's Adventures in Wonderland.* For more information on his character allusion and other creative choices, see Ryu Akino/Behind the Scenes.
* Ryu's full name, Ryusei (流星), refers to a meteor or falling star. His nickname (竜) means "dragon".
* Akino is a Japanese surname that can mean "of brightness", "autumn field", and other meanings depending on what kanji is used.