I N F O

Jan. 3rd, 2012 04:40 pm
takeshome: lj - mewtube (sheepish ☀ so I want to say)
[personal profile] takeshome

OOC Information;
Name; Mimi
Personal Journal; [personal profile] peacefully
Contact; email – seerofheart@gmail.com | aim – misquared | plurk - misquared
Other Characters; Apple Bloom ([personal profile] grows)

IC Information;
Character Name; Rena Ryuuguu
Canon; Higurashi no Naku Koro ni
Canon Point; Post Festival-Music arc
Age; 15

House; Odin – While Rena might seem to be a simple-minded girl, she’s actually much more perceptive than she lets on. When I read the description saying that Odin is perfect for those who are ‘exceptional at reading people’ and ‘gifted in insight’ I thought that this describes Rena perfectly.
Power; Fire – A tribute to one of her nicknames, ‘the gentle blue flame’.

Personality; When you first meet Rena, it seems like there’s not more than what meets the eye. She’s a sweet, simple country girl with a kind heart and a gentle personality. She greets everyone with a sunny smile, and is constantly trying to make the people around her feel happy. She’s also incredibly innocent and easy to tease, which can lead people to think that she might be weak, or in need of protection. She blushes easily if you make fun of her, and has a child-like habit of referring to herself in the third person, and repeating what she says in a sing-song manner. It’s also clear that she can be a little bit of a ditz, and her train of thought doesn’t always seem to match up with the thoughts of everyone around her.

It is also impossible to ignore her affection for things that she considers to be ‘cute’, and her subsequent urge to take this object home. She often enters ‘kawaii mode’ where she begins to squeal and talk about how she is going to take something home. This mode can be triggered by anything… cute small girls, a pile of trash, the figurine outside of a KFC, drawings on the back of playing cards, and many other things. Most people respond by simply shaking their heads and shrugging their shoulders. “Oh well, that’s just Rena being Rena.”

Yes, it’s easy to assume that this is all that you need to know about Rena, but that is far from the truth. Just underneath the surface is a complex young woman who has been deeply hurt, and is still struggling to rise above her past struggles and forge a happy life.

How has she been hurt, you might ask. To understand Rena it is important to know about her past. She was born in the small town of Hinamizawa as the daughter of two successful fashion designers. When she was still young, her parents moved to a larger city for the sake of their careers. There, her mother’s career flourished while her father suffered, and her mother began to work more and more hours every day. Occasionally, she would invite Rena out, and introduce him to a strange man. While showering her daughter with gifts, Rena’s mother attempted to buy her loyalty… all because she was planning to leave her husband.

Devastated by his wife’s betrayal, Rena’s father asked his daughter if she knew about this other man in her mother’s life. Rena replied yes, and was hit by her father. The two began to cry… and for Rena, it was because she felt deep regret, regret that she did not stop this from happening. This incident turned Rena from a girl who innately trusted everyone in the world, into a girl who is cautious. She is still kind to everyone that she meets, but just because she is outwardly kind to someone, it doesn’t mean that she trusts them completely. She reserves that judgment, to assess if this person is a threat to either her, or her friends and family.

It’s at this point that Rena spirals into a dark hole of depression. She is a kind girl, the kind who tries to carry the burdens of everyone around her. So after the divorce happened, she felt that it was her fault… if she had tried harder, done something differently, then maybe her family would still be together. In this period of stress she fell victim to the dormant disease that hid in her blood—Hinamizawa syndrome. The disease caused her to feel great anxiety and paranoia, she believed that everyone was out to get her and she hated herself even more for it. This hatred turned into self-harm in the form of cutting at her wrists so that she could remove the ‘dirty blood’ of her mother, and turned outward when she attacked three of her male friends and smashed all of the windows in her school.

Lost, devastated, and unsure of anything, Rena heard a voice… It told her to return to Hinamizawa. Eager to cling onto any hope that she could fine, Rena realized that all of this suffering, it must have been Oyashiro-sama’s (the patron God of Hinamizawa) curse. Her family’s suffering was punishment for abandoning the village. This revelation stayed with her, and to this day she takes the legend of Oyashiro deeply seriously. She is quick to argue against anyone who dismisses Oyashiro as a myth, and urges others not to disrespect the God.

After this revelation, Rena and her father returned to Hinamizawa, where Rena swore to begin a new life. She changed her name, which used to be Reina, to Rena… determined to remove anything that was ‘icky’ from her life and start fresh.

And so the Rena that we know for the majority of the series is born. Despite what I said earlier, Rena is a girl who is genuinely kind… but not in a way that is naive or meek. She cares deeply for her friends and family, and because of that she will not tolerate when anyone threatens or tries to hurt them. Despite her kind smile and gentle demeanor, when push comes to shove Rena is unrelenting and strong. Other club members comment that she is a blue flame, one that burns quietly but hot enough to burn through anything.

This ‘quiet anger’ can also become quite loud if the situation calls for it. She is not above fighting against someone if it will protect herself or others, and she is not afraid to defend herself. In fact, in most fights of the series we see that she is actually quite aggressive, and shows no fear when wielding her cleaver against adults who are larger and stronger than her. She is also quite good at intimidating people, and is able to show incredible strength without loosing control of her emotions. This ability to control her emotions apply to other situations as well… when other members of the club are paralyzed with difficult decisions, Rena is often able to think clearly and offer the best and most logical solution.

Another thing that is not obvious when you look at her, is the fact that Rena is incredibly perceptive. She has been known to act as a sort of detective, and can quickly piece together a situation from just a few clues (for example, she realized that Rika and Satoko had gone to Mion’s house simply by examining their abandoned dinner). This intuitive nature extends to other things, and it’s always a good idea to assume that Rena knows more than she’s letting on. She is also very good at reading people, and is often able to tell when someone is lying or hiding things.

Reading all of these things… how she can be aggressive, logical, intuitive, calculating… I feel the need again to emphasize that Rena is a very kind and loving girl. You might assume, well, her happy face is only a mask, something like a façade that she uses to fool those around her. While this is partly true, it isn’t completely true. Rena is generally a happy individual, and she treasures those happy carefree times more than anything in the world. It’s just that she’s also likely to wear that exact same happy face when she’s feeling sad or troubled by something, because she’s the sort of person who doesn’t want to weigh down her friends with her problems. If she can, she’d like to deal with her problems on her own… although through the series she has learned her lesson and knows to talk to her friends when she is in over her head.

She is also extremely loyal, to a point where it can be harmful to her. In a certain arc in the series, Keiichi is plagued by the Hinamizawa syndrome, and believes that everyone is trying to kill him. Realizing that Keiichi is feeling the same way that she felt, Rena throws herself completely into the task of helping him. She follows him, asks him what’s wrong, and even goes so far as to assign herself as his personal bodyguard so that he might feel safe. Of course, Keiichi interprets this as more danger, and he eventually goes berserk and beats Rena and their friend Mion to death. However, even as he swings his baseball bat to her skull, Rena still reaches out to her friend, desperately trying to bring him back to those happy times. She never gives up on the people who are important to her, and will tirelessly work towards their happiness.

Ultimately, the reason why she’s able to work so hard towards their happiness, is because she understands what it’s like to feel true pain. She understands, and wants to do everything she can to ensure more happy days for her and everyone around her. And the amazing part is, she actually has the strength to do that hidden inside of her, just under the surface. She is truly an amazing young woman, and with the continued support of her friends, she will be able to blossom into someone who is truly strong.

Samples;
Network Sample; Ehehe, Rena’s sorry… thank you!

[the video clicks on as a girl is bowing to a random citizen (he seems to be from another district considering the cold way that he said good bye) as he walks away. She sighs and makes a ‘hauuu’ noise under her breath, before she notices that the video is on. Cue blushing in 3….]

Ah! H-Hello! Did everyone see that, did they? [Again, that ‘hauuu’ noise] Rena got a little lost, so she had to ask for directions.

[but she quickly smiles, even if it does look a bit sheepish] But now she knows where she’s going again! Asgard is much, much bigger than Hinamizawa! But I’m sure I’ll be able to get to Freya-san’s house soon without asking for help.

[but then she looks a bit thoughtful, and there’s a pause until she decides to keep the video on as she walks] Did others learn any tricks to remember where everything is? Any tips would be really helpful, they would! Or you can tell Rena stories about being here, I’d like to listen to all of it.



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竜宮 レナ || Ryuuguu Rena
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