Hisoka

★ Character Information ★

Character Name: Hisoka Morow
Character Age: Adult (no one's business)
Character Species: Human
Current Health: Fine
Outfit: Hisoka is wearing his outfit from the election arc. His outfits usually contain similar design: a crop top tank top with two suit symbols on each side over a complementary undershirt, trousers of some length, tights matching his undershirt, and some level of pointy shoes with a heel. Sometimes he has armbands and wristbands or other accents. Somehow, somewhere, these outfits have unseen pockets.

Character Canon: Hunter x Hunter (2011)
Link to History: Wiki
Canon Point:End of Season 6 aka The Election Arc | June 2019
Canon Iteration: Original canon

★ Folkmore Roles & Attributes ★

Skills:

♠︎ Hobby Skills: Fashion. Games. Makeup.
♣︎ Mental Skills: Analysis in combat. Creative thinking. Intellect. Math. People watching. Planning ahead. Poetry. Situational awareness. Strategy.
♥︎ Performance Troupe: Acrobatics. Card Tricks. Juggling. Magic Tricks. Mimicry. Performance. Puzzles. Riddles. Show Business. Sleight of hand. Tightrope walking.
♦︎ Physical Skills: Agility. Endurance. Fighting. Flexibility. Hand-to-hand combat. High pain tolerance. Mimicry. Perception. Reflexes. Running. Speed. Stamina. Stealth. Strength. Survival Skills. Tracking.

Canon Abilities: Wiki Links: Nen & Hisoka's Nen Abilities

Nen User
♠︎ General

Hisoka can manipulate his life energy (aura). Aura also carries desires and emotions; it's affected by mental condition/state. Aggression and malice channel into bloodlust that can do physical/emotional harm if not properly defended against. Sometimes nen can last after death, purposely or accidentally, to further effect, including potentially bringing someone back to life.

♣︎ Major Principles

Ten prevents leaking aura, creates a shroud of energy around someone, reduces aging, and offers basic defense against nen attacks.
Zetsu closes aura nodes, makes it hard to impossible to sense someone using nen, and relieves fatigue. This leaves then vulnerable to nen attacks, and they can still be perceived by normal senses, though they can look transparent.
Ren outputs more aura, increases strength and durability, and provides an aura pool for attacks. It uses up aura and requires training to sustain over long periods of time.
Hatsu expresses nen personally and is referred to as one's nen ability or ability. These range broadly and reflect the nen user's personality and idiosyncrasies. How well it matches them affects its power. Users can also place special conditions or restrictions they have to meet to make an ability stronger.

♥︎ Advanced Techniques

Gyo concentrates aura in one body part, weakening the rest. Typically used with the eyes to see aura/nen constructs and faint aura.
In hides aura/aura constructs without shutting down aura nodes.
En extends ren & shapes it with ten to sense shape/movement of anything within the area.
Shu shrouds objects with aura to strengthen/protect them.
Ko uses all basic techniques and gym to make one body part incredibly powerful while leaving the rest undefended.
Ken uses ten and ten to defend against attacks in all directions.
Ryu redistributes aura by percentage between body parts and bridges between ko and ken.

♦︎ Hisoka's Special Abilities

Bungee Gum || Elastic Love (transmutation) This ability changes the properties of Hisoka's aura, giving it the characteristics of rubber and gum. It's durable, flexible, adhesive, shrinks/expands, etc. It can stop or reflect extremely fast projectiles (normal or nen). He can attach it to opponents, makes weapons, and layers traps in advance. Its maximum stretch range is 10 meters. He can run along walls, 'walk' in the sky when secured above, cover woulds, etc. He can even separate it from himself. In all, its flexibility, perfect type-match, and strong personal affinity makes it a powerful ability.

Texture Surprise || Flimsy Lies (conjuration) This ability manifests imagery to change the appearance (including the appearance of texture) of any smooth surface—paper, cloth, even bungee gum. It makes him like a walking talking photoshop. Once active, no aura is detectable.

Role: Myth
Role Qualities/Attributes: Fangs. Multiple tails ending in suit symbols or other characters Hisoka uses. Typical myth traits (darkvision, threat detection, reflexes, speed, & resistance to poison/gas). Beyond his abilities in canon, he will manifest like a genie—turning to gum, paper, or powder at will.
Role Reasoning: Look no further for someone to proudly possess the traits of a myth. Hisoka is selfish, emotionally distant, greedy, arrogant, inconsiderate, and sometimes cruel. He's open about what he's interested in but more opaque at the complex behaviors that inspires. He breaks the rules he wants to break and only works together when it suits him. He's hyper focused on what he wants and sends morals screaming into the sunset.

Hisoka doesn't care about roles, but he will gladly wield it as it suits him. His attachment to those he sees potential in and other matters will slowly build a more complicated web around him. It won't be easy, but in time, that will push on his buttons and development. Getting what you want isn't always as good as you think it is. These may end up perturbations back to regular myth stereotype baseline or create some shifted center of gravity. We'll see how the cards land.

★ Personality ★

CW: implied child neglect/trauma, serial killer, sociopathic behavior, sadomasochism, violence against children, objectification of people, obsessive behavior, possessiveness

Option 2.

♠︎ What is a headcanon (or two) you feel strongly about and that you prefer playing your character with? How is this supported in canon and why do you think it benefits the character's story?

Sui Ishida's one-shot canon status unknown comic about Hisoka's past.

Hisoka is a misfit not accepted by his region's performance troupes' found families of orphans and misfits. Few give him the chance, and his mimicry skills terrify them, the same as they terrify a licensed hunter during the Hunter exam. Seen as a threat to their own survival, he's briefly tolerated, nothing more.

Hisoka's attention to detail reveals that Moritonio, the troupe leader, is the serial killer attacking anyone, even his own prize pupil. They fight to the death, showcasing Hisoka's canon habits of figuring out people's abilities in combat. Though not his first, second, third, etc trauma, this story showcases the way the entire world let Hisoka down until he develops a self-reliance, releases any pretense of morals, and focuses only on what he wants.

Gon and Killua explore the world, supported by families & communities back home, much like Ging (Gon's dad) before them. Even the Phantom Troupe has had the backing of Meteor City and each other as found family. By that time, however, Hisoka rejects the world and long term attachments before it can reject him. That behavior's a self-fulfilling prophecy. Hisoka and Gon both love and hyperfocus on a fight—figuring their opponents out, puzzling how to solve the problem, and growing stronger. Hisoka is a narrative foil for who Gon could have become without that loving support. The comic makes that all the more clear.

While the comic explains Hisoka's sociopathic behavior, it also demonstrates that Hisoka's behavior is amoral, not immoral. In contrast to Hisoka's focus on fighting strong opponents who stand a chance of winning, Moritonio kills for the pleasure of the act. In fact, by killing Moritonio, Hisoka stops a nen user serial killer law enforcement cannot handle and saves lives.

♣︎ What are your characters dreams and nightmares? Do you believe they are more likely to obtain one rather than the other?

Hisoka is a sadomasochistic hedonist focused on fighting—mental, physical, and magical elements of it. His enjoyment of picking up magic tricks and skills moved cleanly into nen. To this day, people regularly try to kill him. It would be quite the dream save that so many of them are so boring. The cycle of violence fuels itself, and Hisoka explores the world for people worth fighting, people capable of challenging him.

He always keeps at least one interesting person in reserve because the nightmare he knows is boredom, nothing of interest to do or look forward to. Oh, there's always interesting fighters in the world, yes, but those he lacks the means to get into a fight—such as the former chairman for the Hunter Association—don't count. Therefore, despite being in the Spiders for a couple years, Hisoka doesn't make a move to betray them or attack Chrollo, the leader, until he meets Gon. Since he does that, between these two, the dream is more likely.

The problem Hisoka's not aware of stems from the dream itself. Someday getting what he wants could get him killed. Hisoka has a technique he's ready to try to come back from the dead, an impressive showing of alignment and affinity between him and his skill. However, it still involves the trauma of dying. Hisoka, who hasn't reflected greatly on his death, hasn't thought through the effects of that. Sometimes, there's no greater nightmare than getting exactly what you want.

♥︎ Is your character capable of forgiveness or will they hold a grudge until they die? Would anything ever make them change their mind?

Since Hisoka likes fighting and expects backstabbing, he doesn't hold grudges the way most people do. if you managed to capture and torture him, that only goes to show how exciting and worthwhile an opponent you are. Yes, he'll try to kill you, but not because of a grudge.

There's one surefire way to get Hisoka to hold a grudge: break one of his toys. Worthwhile people are rare, and when found, they're frequently not at their peak (aka ripe enough to pluck). Therefore Hisoka keeps tabs and steps in to prevent their early demise as need be. If someone killed them? They're dead. Simple as that. He will track them down and kill them—even those that do not meet his typical requirements for being worth his time, even friends. The point is to teach a lesson to anyone else who might consider such a mistake in the future. When Hisoka says someone is off limits, he means off limits.

Hisoka warns people who express interest in harming people he's claimed, but there's no way to change his mind once the act is done. As he sees it, they've significantly materially harmed him and made his life worse. Though he lies as naturally as breathing, the warnings he gives are sincere, along with the threat behind them. His track record of following through on his threats helps convince the next person not to make the same mistake.

♦︎ If your character could change one thing about their past, what would it be and why? Or why not?

The past has happened. It's settled. It's, dare he say it, boring. Even with fights, he analyzes them so quickly that he completes any desired or useful reflection before the thing is through. The knowledge, like the experience, contributes to keeping his abilities sharp and active, but Hisoka doesn't care to take a trophy or to ruminate on his past glories. It's always the current situation or next fight that stays on his mind.

Other people may look back and identify a pivotal moment, but Hisoka's history doesn't hinge on any single moment. Instead, his trauma and his adaptation to it and the world comes from a long series of variably violent moments. It's a pattern, a repetition. Remove any one of them, and the rest still stands. He would have to want something that didn't happen. He may wish he'd heard about the chimera ants and gotten the chance to fight them as strong opponents, but that's not worth changing history. It's only cause to find a manager.