Zechs Kotsu

Character Information

Name:
Zechs Kotsu
Gender:
M
Appearance Age:
Late 20's, Early 30's
Soul Age:
1227

Appearance:
Bald head, covered by a red baseball cap with a blue bill, a small norse, viking-like goatee of black hair with 4 braids, always wearing a half-square pair of Rayban sunglasses, and has Mayuri's old ear pieces from before Hueco Mundo.
Personality:
Think Mayuri Kurostuchi mixed with Shinji Hirako. A take-charge research freak with a balance of obsessive-compulsion and a laid-back chill demeanour.

History:
Imagine there's this not so noble, yet fiercely respected family of the Kotsu's living in the 15th Rukongai District, South-West Side. As a kid growing up, Zechs was quite hard headed. Basically thought he was a Kenpachi. With the 15th District being not too shabby, he led a fairly normal life for a soul-born. While along with a few friends as teenagers exploring a deep & dark cave in the woodlands that bordered the prisons watched by 2nd Division, they stumbled into a nest of venomous snakes. Later during the nights for the rest of that week, he began having vague dreams. Zechs was seeing something small, but attempting to grow to try to get his attention, saying something twisted and menacing but only hearing half the conversation. Something like
"do you think ... what it takes ... overcome this power?! … Know my name"
After that week he fully regains consciousness and tries to find his friends that went with him. In a sordid state of affairs they weren't as lucky as him to survive. Nearly driven to psychosis by blaming himself, he was about to check into a mental asylum near the Seiretei when a patrol from the 7th Division notices he is giving off intensely odd and dark spiritual pressure. They tell him he'd be better off enrolling in the Shinigami Academy, so he does. Sometime into the first year of his 3-4 year stay at the academy, he ponders why he didn't die from the venom, learning why in a more vivid vision-quest. It was his Zanpoktu’s spirit, Fang, who intervened and gave him a dose of her own bufotoxin that counteracted it.
It turned out that the snake that lunged at and latched onto Zechs still had a dying frog in its gullet, and it was the secretion gland of it that saved him. After the second year, realizing how stupid and hard headed he had been all his life, he spins his life the other way around and smashes his head into the books, as often as he could. The remaining year and a half he applies his intellect and graduates the Academy in just a little over the 3 year mark. Zechs opted to enroll in the 13th Division, being a secretive smart-arse for at least a few centuries before Kisuke Urahara took over Squad 12 and made a dream come true - the Shinigami Research and Development Institute.
Immediately afterwards he files transfer forms and changes squads (didn't have a Seat at the time in 13) and remains a shadow; but learning from his Captain, Kisuke. Aizen saw he switched divisions and figured he wouldn't be missed being a seatless soldier. The traitor lured Zechs into the trap that was the Hollowfication experiment, but his was the first case that didn't result in immediate death. Aizen would utilize this same formula and apply it to Mashiro, Kensei, and all the other known Vizards. Before the inner hollow wholey consumed him, Kisuke sensed him while gathering the other vizard lieutenants and captains.
Zechs turned a blind eye to it all, having Mr. Urahara help him and in fact relishing in the world of possibilities that came with being half hollow. He hid his Vizard status until after Aizen would attempt to become god. Sticking to the back of the crowd for years now paid off, as he was the only one spared the misplaced wrath of the Central 46. He stayed behind in soul society and remained everyone’s intel, their own inside source, since he was largely unknown. Mayuri takes over the 12th Division, and Zechs’ intelligence skyrockets being made a 4th Seat and working so close with the captain. But sometime after the Aizen epidemic Mayuri would leave the Gotei 13, grumbling something about having a better lab in Hueco Mundo with less restrictions and responsibilities. So with the Captain's chair available, Zechs takes a Captain's Proficiency Test and reveals his bankai. His story now continues ....

Division:
12th Squad
Seat:
Captain, also President of the Shinigami Research and Development Institute

Stats:
Strength: (5/10)
Endurance: (10/10)
Sword handling: (6/10)
Shunpo: (9/10)
Kidou: (4/10)
Intelligence: (10/10)
Hand-to-hand: (2/10)

Strengths:
Master Scientist/Inventor - After learning at the feet of both geniuses and inheriting the 12th Division, his intelligence is quite considerable, and has invented certain works of his own creation.
Master Strategist - Zechs has a talent for being well prepared. He takes various precautions before engaging in personal combat with a foe, usually studying them through his various methods in order to gain a clear advantage, as he always has been a sore loser - as such tilting the battle in his favor is the only way he can truly win. He seems to always have a contingency plan for his contingency plans if something doesn't work out the way he expects (Vaporizing gas, you'll see)
Enhanced Durability - Zechs has shown himself to have a high tolerance to pain as shown when battling, having almost half his body blown off as a test subject for Kurostuchi multiple times, giving him his own cybernetically reinforced structure.
Immense Spiritual Pressure - Being a captain, he boats enormous spiritual pressure. Since becoming a Vizard, he now has the dual type spiritual pressure, similar to the Espada.
Flash Step Master - Although having been taught by, but never beating the "Goddess of Flash" Yoruichi Shihōin, he is still easily one of the most proficient users of this skill in all of Soul Society, rivaling Captain Byakuya especially after placing bionic and neural implants into his eyes and legs which take considerable maintenance on a daily basis.
Weaknesses:
Expert Swordsmanship Specialist - While not masterful in swordsmanship as some other Captains, Zechs is skilled enough to hold his own in a fight. His expertise with his Zanpakutō lies in his effective use of its abilities while its in either the Shikai or Bankai release states, rather than his swordsmanship skill. He heavily relies on those abilities or his pre-planned strategies rather than actually engaging in melee combat with his opponent.
Kido Expert -  Being a Captain he knows enough about Kido, but just never had the desire to master it, and still doesn't know much of it to be bothered effectively utilizing it while in a fight.
Hand to Hand Combat - Knows very little, and will rather use his shunpo to keep him safe and properly distanced.
Brute Strength - Being a weakling above the waist, he has the normal strength a Captain would, but nothing compared to Sajin Komamura, the Kenpachi’s or even Shunsui.

Mask Appearance:

‘Army of Two’ skull on one side, acid-burn scorched on the other.
Mask Duration:
When under normal circumstances, 7 hours. When fighting to his absolute limits, only about 12 minutes.

Zanpakutou Information


Zanpakutou Name:
Fang
Zanpakutou Shikai Command:
"Sink your teeth"
Inner World:
A deep, dark and murky cave, with spider webs running across everywhere but the puddles floors with a dark purple tinted fog at chest height all around.
Zanpakutou Sprit:
A small toad nearly the size of a fist, with black widow forever lodged in it's mouth, (as it's what drew the frog to the cave in the first place) and can grow itself up to 27 feet wide by 27 feet tall.

Shikai Appearance:
Closest to the actual blade as I could find, except imagine a small scythe at the end of each tonfa. Basically a dual-bladed scythe staff, capable of snapping in half for two handed proficiency.

Shikai Abilities:
1.) Both ends of the staff have empty vials on one side; once one or the other or both fill green, Fang has woken from her slumber and produced venom. This requires blood, be it his own or his opponents. The poison will drip from the blade, is acidic texture modified in different ways with an arsenic compound in it, meaning Zechs can slice an opponent, or fling the liquidic acid poison, and it will melt skin to a various degree, but where sliced or hit with the venom, that area goes numb. The numbness stays in effect for at least an hour, so unless you're a Quincy using "Ransōtengai", there's no way around it. The venom variety is so overpoweringly unique with Zechs’ modifications even other poisons’ anti-venoms can't undo it's effects. Only his own serum made specifically for whichever batch he's utilizing is the cure.

2.) “SPIN, Fang”
If the staff is snapped in half, (working like the hind end of a spider) Zechs can drag around both bottom ends of the sword's handles and create a thick kido-like spirit spiderweb. Sticky and tricky is its limits, so if a hand isn't free to cut yourself out, or your spiritual pressure is weaker than that of a powerful Lieutenant, you aren't going anywhere. As well, when an enemy is actually caught in the web Kotsu can press a button on either of the staffs and Fang's venom will run dripping throughout all the web, so that even if a person gets free of the trap but has some on their clothes it'll still begin the melting.

3.) When snapped in half, Zechs Kotsu can slam the bottom staff ends of his Zanpaktou into the ground, creating a large 27ft by 27ft area effect of the webbing all around in whatever shape he chooses to create, be it spherical, a prism, etc. The command call for this that Zechs must say is “SPEW, Fang.”

Bankai Command Name:
Miasma's Embrace
Bankai Appearance:
1. Imagine Doc Oc from spider-man. Essentially, that's what goes down. When he activates the bankai, he licks the venom from the sword and stabs both blades of his shikai into his shoulders and they fade into his body. From there, his back sprouts what looks like 4 very large and slightly wide metallic spider's limbs. Each metallic limb is 7 feet long by 7 inches wide around, can extend to 27 feet long, all 4 of which have scythe heads on the ends of all 4 legs like the shikai. His actual sword reverts back to it's unsealed statw in his sheath on his lower back.
2. That red hourglass shaped marks that black widows have on their backs is painted on Captain Kotsu's face, and his throat enlarges to 4 times the normal size.
Bankai Abilities:
While able to control and walk around with the new appendages, Zechs loses the ability to toss his venom at will. He goes for a more direct slice/dice fight. But being the bankai, the poison now changes from a liquid acid to a misty gaseous form, and rather than acting as a paralyzing spider's venom it's now the psychoactive bufotoxin of the frog. The main ability happens when the outlines of the hourglass mark on his face begin glowing a few seconds after activation. Zechs opens his mouth and spews forth a mini-tornado of misty poisonous gas that envolops and surrounds him, slightly reminiscent of Konjiki Ashisogi Jizo. The only time he runs out of poison to spew is when he runs out of oxygen, and because of the frog-like throat extension he can rival the amount Ashisogi does. But rather than blow it at the enemy he utilizes it as a defense to surround him, and if Zechs were to don his hollow mask It becomes a as big as an actual tornado. It doesn't matter if the gas is inhaled, as stated above it's also a mist and thus both a liquid and a gas. Except rather than cause internal organ failure like Mayuri's bankai, Zechs' poison is the powerful real life chemical Dimethyltryptamine, aka DMT.
(If you don't know what it is, a Google search is suggested. Long short - it's the chemical found in some frog/toad secretions but primarily its the chemical that floods the human brain upon death) This causes immediate cerebral hallucinations, varying from person to person. Whether they begin seeing multiple Zechs, perceive time itself as a physical monster, get their directions mixed up, see spirits/people/things that aren't there, feel spiders crawling all over them, seemingly spiral into a dimension of differing shapes/colors, witness their own bodty melt, etc. The fight is, by definition, over if someone is in the immediate area to be affected by it. No death, the person merely has an overly powerful acid trip for about an hour or two.

Approved, and welcome back Mr.Kotsu.

EDIT'd!

Shikai and bankai have been re-arranged.

Nice. I have to say I like the new Bankai better than the previous one.

Me too =p mainly i was tired of not being able to have an open bankai, and though I sacrifice safety with losing a more secure place for the vizard powers, I figured they'll come into play whenever I deem them ready to.