【 PERMISSIONS 】

CHARACTER NAME: Lloyd Irving
CHARACTER SERIES: Tales of Symphonia

permissions.

TRIGGERS. Lloyd has no triggers, but expect him to react to violence and people getting hurt. He's hot-headed as hell so you should also rest assured that Lloyd will get all Up In Your Business. MEDICAL INFO. No ailments to speak of! Lloyd is stronger than the average human, thanks to the Exsphere he wears on the back of his left hand. MENTAL INFO. He's not the brightest crayon in the box. But no actual mental issues, not really. ... WELL. You could easily argue the kid has some thread of ADD but it's never explicitly stated. FOURTH-WALLING. I can has Quick Jump? fun stuff like spouting video game mechanics is fine. telling him he's a video game character/not real/was from one of the best rpgs of all time isn't so cool. references to Tales of Phantasia (Symphonia's mommy) are also off limits unless you're actually playing a character from that series. in which case by all means break his heart PHYSICAL CONTACT. Lloyd's not unfamiliar with people touching or hugging him out of the blue ahem zelos so that's allowed of course! Hands on shoulders etc. He's tactile enough! ROMANCE/SEXUAL RELATIONS. If you flirt with him it will VERY likely go over his head and you'll just be wasting your time. That said, I'm not unopposed to ~*~romance~*~ but don't expect very much out of him HAHA we're all just friends right........... INJURE/KILL. Everything depends on plots. Sudden attacks or killshots without warning/speaking to me first aren't kosher, but if we've been discussing something then it's all fair game. Don't expect Lloyd not to fight back first!! DEVICE HACKING. He wouldn't know if you did anyway, so sure. THREADJACKING. Only if your character and Lloyd are already threading in the post. Or talk to me first! ANYTHING ELSE. Lloyd is pretty naïve. He'll trust anyone the moment he meets them, unless of course they give him reason to do otherwise right off the bat. Use this information as you please... D:

exspheres.

Short version: Lloyd has a gemstone called an Exsphere embedded into his left hand held in place by an accessory called a Key Crest. Together these items raise his combat capabilities to beyond what a normal human could possess, as well as unlock special fighting skills and techniques. Take away the gem and he’s just a regular dude. However, his is super special since it is "evolving" somehow. As a result, and partly because his mother stole the Exsphere, all the baddies want it. Long version: Exspheres are jewels that were once mined from various places around the world (in Lloyd’s time, only one place seems to have a natural flow of new Exspheres), although it may be slightly more accurate, if somewhat insensitive, to refer to them as parasites. Exspheres that are attached directly to a person’s skin feed off of a person’s life force – mostly their negative feelings and emotions, and while the user may not feel the effects day to day, the end results can be disastrous if not handled properly. In most cases, if an Exsphere is removed from the host body, the mana in the person’s body goes out of control and turns them into a rampaging monster, where they have extremely little or no control over their actions. These “exbelua” monsters will attack anything and everything in sight and are extremely difficult to kill – if only because it’s extremely possible that the transformed monster was perhaps once someone you loved. In other cases, Exspheres are capable of turning the host body into an emotionless doll, unfeeling and un-aging, merely going about the motions. Their skill and strength in combat is unmatched, but at the terrible cost of lost time. In one such case, one of Lloyd’s companions, Presea, had an Exsphere placed on her while she was a child that halted her emotions and growth for sixteen years, resulting in her alienation from the village she was born in as other children grew up around her. She’s referred to as a monster – it’s only a small blessing that while in this state, she can’t feel hurt or offended. So they sound pretty bad, right? Well, when Exspheres are equipped alongside a special accessory called a Key Crest made out of inhibitor ore, most of the aforementioned negative side effects are neutralized and the user can happily enjoy the various benefits. This includes our hero, Lloyd Irving, and each of the companions he takes with him on his journey to reunite the two worlds. Using an Exsphere in this manner (aka, properly) enhances a person’s skills in battle. Towards the beginning of the game, Lloyd and his companions mention that without the Exspheres, there’s absolutely no way they could continue their journey and live to talk about it. Exspheres enhance the user’s durability so they are capable of taking more hits in battle in addition to being able to dish out more powerful ones of their own. The gems increase agility to react to threats more easily, make them more receptive to Healing Artes, and ultimately allow the use of special techniques used often throughout the game. For example, Lloyd cannot use any magic per se, but with an Exsphere equipped, he can use special sword artes such as Demon Fang, which is where he swings his swords – not necessarily anywhere near his opponent – in order to create a shockwave projectile to hit enemies with from afar. There's also Sword Rain, where he's able to strike with his swords so fast it appears that he's using a dozen or more swords at once. Without an Exsphere, he can still use his swords normally but would be massively impaired with the loss of these types of skills and other benefits. Exspheres don’t sound too terrible anymore, do they? Well, wrong. Lloyd was ready to stop using his the moment he realized exactly how Exspheres are manufactured. Remember how the stones feed off of peoples’ negative feelings? This mostly happens in horrible facilities called Human Ranches run by a group of Half Elves who call themselves Desians. Desians capture humans from the towns and villages around Sylvarant – the elderly, men, women, children: it doesn’t matter – and attach Key Crest-less Exspheres on them the moment they arrive. The Desians “cultivate” the captives – or more correctly, the Exspheres – by putting stress onto the host bodies through various means such as overworking or flat-out torture in order to feed more negative emotions into the equipped Exsphere. Once the Desians deem the gem ready, the host body is disposed of, leaving only the newly awakened gem behind, with the Exsphere having completely absorbed the person’s soul. Bottom line: Exspheres are power enhancing soul jars, and Lloyd wasn’t incredibly kosher with the idea of using a stone that someone lost their life to empower. It didn’t help that it became clear to him that the life taken to power his own Exsphere was none other than his own mother, who had lost control of her Exsphere and turned into a monster. She unknowingly attacked her own husband and son, nearly killing the latter, and in the end had to be taken down. It was mere coincidence that she returned to her old self long enough to pass Lloyd off to Dirk the Dwarf – but Lloyd’s father went on to believe that his own son was dead. Oops. Still with me? It’s pretty complicated, but I haven’t even told you about Cruxis Crystals yet! For the beginning of Lloyd’s journey, Cruxis Crystals are considered to be holy items belonging only to the Chosen of Mana, but in reality they are actually “high Exspheres”; in other words, they are Exspheres that have been evolved for the sake of taking combat abilities even further and are capable of turning the user into an angel. Angels are winged beings that have exclusive, devastating abilities in battle – they also happen to be the seemingly endless leagues of henchmen belonging to Cruxis, the organization responsible for the Desians and their Human Ranches, and the beings that Lloyd directly opposes. At one time, Cruxis had very many Cruxis Crystals at their disposal, which is made more obvious by the amount of angels (formerly Half Elves, for the most part) they have in their ranks. Cruxis Crystals are also given to those of the Mana Lineage – Chosens – so that they, too, may evolve into angels over the course of their journey. However, their supply has become drastically more limited and the method to creating Cruxis Crystals from Exspheres has been lost over the four thousand years Cruxis has been in power. That brings us to the Angelus Project – the project designed by Kvar, one of the Five Desian Grand Cardinals, in an attempt to create Cruxis Crystals once more. It’s unclear exactly how the process between Exsphere and Cruxis Crystal manufacturing differs, but after failure upon failure, Kvar managed to finally successfully create a Cruxis Crystal – one that was equipped to a human named Anna. This woman is none other than Lloyd’s mother, who eventually lost her life losing control to the as-of-yet incomplete Exsphere, and is thus now in Lloyd’s possession. Many of Lloyd’s early problems stem from the Desian’s eagerness to get this Exsphere back into their grasp as an offering to their leader, Yggdrassil. Other iterations of the Angelus Project were attempted, though none really came close to being effective. One resulted in the aforementioned Presea’s predicament; the Exsphere she had placed on her was equipped with a Key Crest not made of inhibitor ore was the direct cause of her stunted emotions and halted internal clock. Presea’s experiment was considered a failure but she was left as is, of course, because Cruxis sucks. As far as we know, the only time the Angelus Project has been successful is with Lloyd’s Exsphere, formerly his mother’s, and according to the Desians he comes across who are aware of the project, the Exsphere in question is evolving. They never directly refer to it as a Cruxis Crystal, despite that logically being what it would evolve into, so… I suppose I always think of it like close, but maybe no cigar. I personally feel like Yggdrassil would have been more concerned with Lloyd’s Exsphere than he was had it suddenly become a Cruxis Crystal. On the other hand, however, at the very end of the game, Lloyd does gain the ability to use wings of his own – and boy, are they grand. At the very least, they’re the largest in the game, and are a strange mix of feathery like the lesser angels and Technicolor wonders like those of either Chosen or the Four Seraphim. Before sprouting these wings, however, Lloyd and his companions finally defeated Yggdrassil, and in doing so and destroying his Exsphere, it seems as though Yggdrassil’s own life force entered Lloyd’s Exsphere, and just before Lloyd’s wings appear, the gem shimmers in a way reminiscent of that same light. It’s extremely likely (and all but proven in the sequel) that it was Yggdrassil’s power that provided the extra push within the Exsphere in order to bring forth those wings. It’s complicated. And we never see the wings again – nor are they even really acknowledged in any fashion, so it’s tough to say if Lloyd can bring them out as he pleases after all is said and done. If it is, I don’t see him using the power too often anyway, except perhaps only in very dire situations. It’s also possible that he may still have the ability to use them, but has no idea how, and it’s completely involuntary. The world may never know. /rainbow A full list of Lloyd's sword artes can be found here.