Character Base

• Character Name: Reigen Arataka
• Age: 28
• Canon (Date/Year Released)/Canon Point: Mob Psycho 100/end of season 2 anime OVA, which aired in 2019
• Items Coming Along: A tiny folding table & stool, his laptop, bear pjs, cursed spray (makes you pass out if you breathe it in).
• Content Warnings for Character: warnings for the canon, not necessarily Reigen himself: violence against children, problematic family relationships, loss of bodily autonomy via possession, manipulation

Character Background

• History: here
• Core Relationships:

Mob: Somehow, Reigen's closest friend is this weird little teenage psychic. Mob is the reason Reigen still runs his Spirits and Such business; from his own admission, he made the business on a whim and was bored of it within a year, but a much younger Mob wandered into the office asking for his help and advice at just the right time to inspire Reigen to keep going. The business is therefore largely for Mob's sake, as Reigen has dedicated a lot of time and effort to making sure Mob is content and doing well in both ordinary teen ways and very powerful psychic ways. It's a fine line; Reigen does need to be occasionally reminded that in lying to Mob about his own lack of powers and having Mob work for him, he's using the kid, but when it comes down to making a buck off Mob's abilities or taking care of Mob's happiness, Reigen will choose the latter every time. He may be a bumbling liar who barely pays Mob an actual wage, but Mob is the core reason Reigen has managed to see his own situation and grow as a person - without the presence of Mob in his life, he's a sweaty loser with no friends who runs a fake business. And like, he is all of those things to some extent anyway, but it's his friendship with and duty to Mob that help Reigen grow. He'll do anything for that kid up to and including run into certain death, and he'll be the first person knocking people out of the way who only want Mob to lose control and run wild with his powers. That would suck! Don't do that to kids! Not that Reigen can admit as of yet that Mob is like a son slash baby brother to him? But it's there.

His family: Reigen's relationship with his family is not great. They're fine, but he's constantly reminded that he's disappointed his parents by not being successful in a field they approve of, by still being single, by being a professional ghost hunter for a living... It's at the point that his mother sends him PDFs of office job recruitment ads for his birthday, and Reigen in his worst moments dreads even opening correspondence from her (in the form of, of course, Facebook messages only, because who calls). It's implied he hasn't been home in a while and in the OVA where he writes his will, he pretty dismissively jots down a half-assed "apology" for not being a respectful son before he tells his parents to please arrange to leave Mob the Spirits and Such business - so there's not a lot of warmth there. As far as we're aware, Reigen's family is overbearing and distant at the same time; his mother wants to tell him how to live his life but doesn't make any effort to actually see him if he doesn't come home, so in a word, the relationship is strained. The lack of effort to understand him and why he does what he does contributes mostly to Reigen's loneliness, because he doesn't even have his family to fall back on when the chips are down.

Serizawa: Reigen's only adult friend... Serizawa is an exercise in Reigen getting to boss more psychics around, but like, in a nice way. He barely knew anything about Serizawa besides he's psychic and also terminally lonely before offering him a job, and now Reigen likes to a) continue the lie that he's very powerful himself, actually, and b) set himself up as a mentor for Serizawa, who is older than him. Reigen cares about him because he's an employee and a good person, and he relies on Serizawa for psychic help (admittedly while terrifying him by pretending he messed up Reigen's "tests") and just for company. It's nice to have an adult to talk to! He offers Serizawa a different kind of life advice from what he gives to Mob, given again: adults, but the urge to look after his employees comes from the same place. He also goes out of his way to make Serizawa feel included and valued at the business, making him his own personalized business cards and insisting over and over that things like the OVA hot springs trip are partly to welcome him as a member of the team. He also definitely feels some kind of way when Serizawa makes night school friends, because Reigen only has Mob and Serizawa, but he supports him still...

Local weirdo doesn't have adult friends: This is the rest: Reigen just straight up doesn't have normal friends. He's put so much of himself into his business for the past few years, and before that kind of lived in his own head when he was miserable at his office job, that he just hasn't managed to make friends. The people he considers himself friendly with are all clients, so that relationship falls apart as soon as Reigen looks bad in the media; without the Spirits and Such employees, Reigen is desperately and thoroughly alone, and he really doesn't know what to do about it. When Mob quits S&S for a short time to work on his own things, Reigen goes into a depression spiral that ends in him deciding that the best choice is to throw himself even harder into his work - he doesn't really know how to make friends when he's not doing his "greatest psychic" song and dance, or looking after kids. Friends are what he needs to feel fulfilled, but he's convinced himself more than once that success is the key to fulfillment, and so he's made it to 28 without any long-lasting relationships. There's also the fact that he's built up so much of himself as a lie, and he has a genuine concern that his "real self" will be rejected, or that he won't be able to be around other people without "distorting" them. He would like friends! He doesn't know how to do that outside of work. It's a process.

Character Personality Through Key Moments

(2+) Positive Experiences:

Meeting a little psychic child: Mob again. To reiterate: Reigen was ready to pack up shop and move on to a different job on another whim, when little Mob happened to walk in and earnestly ask for his help with his psychic powers. This put Reigen in the unique position of lying to a child out of a desire to really help him, because he's not at all psychic, but he couldn't say no to the genuine hope and delight that Mob latched onto him with when believing Reigen had powers like his. Their relationship after this changes Reigen for the better: not only does he give the kid advice for how to live his life as a normal person who is just like everyone else, but he stands up for Mob every time someone else would have Mob simply give in to the raw destruction he's capable of. For Reigen, who seems to be the only person who realizes Mob has feelings about his abilities after the fact and is burdened by what he can do, it's very important that Mob knows he has somewhere safe and understanding to go. Reigen is proud to be the person Mob can talk to about anything, and through helping Mob has learned the value of putting other people before himself; he's given up fame, career opportunities, money - plenty of things, because he's been able to see the negative impact it would have on Mob. In less groundbreaking areas, meeting Mob also inspired Reigen to see the worth in the business he opened on a whim; rather than just fleecing some easy marks and moving on, Reigen now puts his all into his cases. He isn't psychic, but he has never once taken money from a client he didn't help; he has a very clear line he won't cross, and he endeavors in every way he can to help the people who come to him. Many of them don't even have a spirit problem, and so the other things he can do for them like... spa massages... and general life advice... do help, even if he insists on calling them spiritual services. He also refuses to overcharge, charging 20k yen where his "colleagues" in the business would charge 200k, so really, he's the most honest liar out there, and it's thanks to Mob walking in at random one day.

Being Somebody: Technically this doesn't immediately lead anywhere positive for him, but— Reigen has always wanted to be somebody significant. Ever since childhood, complete with writing an essay in college about wanting to be somebody, he's always had this vague dream of achieving some kind of status. This comes back around when, as mentioned above, Mob quits working for him for a little while because Reigen says some insensitive and incredibly projecting-his-own-shit things to him, and Reigen is left with the realizations that he's very lonely and has nothing, the exact same as how he was when he quit his office job. Faced with the realization that he's accomplished nothing, he throws himself into his work: this shows if nothing else his dedication to the things he chooses to do and a desire to prove himself. He wants to be somebody; he wants to prove to himself and to the world that he hasn't just wasted his whole adult life not achieving anything, and that his choices up until now have mattered. For a while, this really does make him happy! He's happiest when he has things to do, as idleness lets the old dread creep back in. Providing a service to others does genuinely make him happy and he takes pride in it, even if he childishly thinks about how Mob and people who didn't believe in him must really be eating their words now!! (They are not.) Reigen's determination and dedication do rocket him up to more media success, so it's not like he's incapable of making a name for himself; again, he doesn't actually con people out of their money, he doesn't take money without doing a good job, so his nebulous drive to Be Somebody is a boon for his productivity if nothing else. He's trying.

Hot springs bonding: Frankly, Reigen has a miserable time at the hot springs for most of the trip, because he's stuck in a spirit world. But! When he's not stuck in there, he's so earnestly and guilelessly excited about going on a trip with friends (3/4 of whom are teens he sort of takes care of, but never mind) that it reveals plenty about his personality outside of the Great Psychic work persona. He stays up all night planning trip itineraries complete with trip journals for everyone in the group, he goes bananas with delight over the unique foods and how to best enjoy them (much to the annoyance of the kids, who just want to eat), he wants to have a pillow fight and stay up all night and do fun trip things with the people he cares about!! Even if they do inevitably make fun of him and reject his super fun pillow fight idea, the essence of Reigen is there: ultimately, he would like to goof off and have a good time with his favorite people. He even prepares a surprise for Mob and Serizawa, the aforementioned business cards that he presents with genuine pride even as the other kids yet again make fun... Reigen is just a lil guy. Just trying to have a good time.

(2+) Negative Experiences:

Getting bullied on television: During the Mob Quits era, Reigen's psychic lie is finally revealed on live TV. This leads to him being the target of mockery online (which he tries to defend himself anonymously from, to no success) and even in his daily life, as he's followed around by media who want to rip him apart. His past clients turn on him and he has nobody left At All. Even his mother doesn't believe in him and writes him an apology letter he can read during a press conference before he bows his head and goes back to a normal office job. In response, Reigen derails the press conference by asking why anyone cares so much if he's a real psychic or not. He's tired, he's past the point of caring about his own reputation, he doesn't care anymore; if no one can prove he is or isn't psychic, and none of his clients have come forward saying they were scammed, can't he just be left alone? This is a truly low point for him in his life for obvious reasons, but his response to it really is ultimately not to care. It's at this point he has his epiphany that he was really shitty to Mob, and makes his apology to Mob only on live TV, refusing point blank to engage with anything else. This shows Reigen really doesn't care at all what people think of him beyond any snap reactions; sure, it doesn't feel good to be made fun of online, but the media circus means nothing to him as long as his actual friends are okay with him. He has a blatant disregard for smoothing things over for the sake of making the public feel good about mocking him and tearing him apart; he only cares about saying his piece for Mob and then leaving. Even in his moments of televised public shame, Reigen ultimately sides with himself and his own people rather than take the L so it will all go away.

Gun: Or: Terrorist psychics attack Seasoning City. During this incredibly dangerous time, Reigen goes through several mindsets: a) "let's leave it to the experts and not put ourselves in harm's way," b) "if Mob wants to do this, I'm not going to tell him what to do," and finally c) "holy shit I let a child go up against terrorist adults??? give me a gun!!" And that's how Reigen decided to face down a terrorist psychic leader with a handgun and 100% Kid Defense mettle. Not only does this show his objective bravery and willingness to defend his people despite knowing full well the opposition could break him in half with a glance, but it also shows the thought processes he's had about being involved with dangerous psychics all along. Mob is a middle schooler; Reigen's firm belief is that for that reason alone, Mob should not be solely responsible for defending anyone from all these other nutty psychics coming to town. This extends to the rest of the crew they gather along the way, as Reigen would rather none of them run headfirst into danger before doing that exact thing himself. He's realistic about his/the others' chances but also unwilling to leave Mob completely alone, and he will whip out a gun and try to shoot a man in the face for hurting his kid. The whole terrorists incident also shows that Reigen tends to inspire confidence in other people, who then admire his mettle and want him to be their leader...? He's as surprised as anyone else about that one. Either way: when the chips are down, Reigen will rush in.

Deer Country Attributes

• Canon Powers: Nothing at all! Except he can see ghosts.
• Blood Type: Warmblood
• Omen: an English pointer hound
• Blessed Day: 10/10, his birthday
• Patron Pthumerian: Cloverfield. He feels nothing about this at all because he's cool and collected and has never been plagued by a deep loneliness and yearning for companionship ever in his life. Which is to say: ouchie wowchie that one stings!! But he's absolutely never going to admit it out loud.
• Blood Power Manifestation: n/a

Writing Samples

TDM toplevel feat. multiple

The Player

• Player Name: Laura
• Player Age: 31
• Player Contact:

jojoveller
• Permissions: Here.

Other Characters

Link to Character 1 overall AC: Palamedes Sextus
Link to Character 2 overall AC: Hector

apps n such