BasicsFull Name: Ryoken Hamaguchi
Nickname: The Hound of Komatsuzaki
Age, D.O.B.: 24, June 8th, 1996
Gender: Male
Category: Wild Card
Grade/Career: Enforcer and lieutenant of the Komatsuzaki family.
Ethnicity: Japanese
Family: Masanori Hamaguchi, estranged father and owner of a karate dojo
Appearance
Ryoken is a fairly handsome man, standing tall at 6’1” (185.5 cm) and weighing in 180 pounds (81.6 kg). Ryoken has a muscular physique developed through martial arts training. He has short jet-black hair that he keeps slicked back, and reddish-brown eyes. He normally keeps a stoic expression, but when he smiles, it’s warm and reassuring.
Ryoken is often seen wearing a light gray suit and a blue shirt underneath, and sometimes a pair of dark sunglasses. Whenever he expects a fight to break out, he puts on a pair of black leather gloves- he finds walking around with hands covered in blood uncouth.
There is a highly detailed but unfinished tattoo of a
shi shi (a Chinese guardian lion) that covers his whole back. The line work is done, but only parts of the tattoo have been colored in.
As is tradition for yakuza, his tattoos are done with the irezumi method, a slow and painful process that requires the work to be spaced out over weeks or even months. Ryoken has a pretty high pain tolerance, but even he has a hard time with these tattooing sessions.
PersonalityRyoken lives by a code of honor that dictates every word and act. Though he is a criminal, he tries to do what is right, even if that puts him into conflict with his line of work. This may be due to his relative lack of experience in the criminal underworld, but Ryoken’s nothing if not adaptable: while many yakuza have hang-ups over what has happened in the past, Ryoken focuses more on the here and now.
Ryoken’s greatest weakness is that he has a tendency to act rashly. He often comes across challenges that could have been avoided with some foresight or planning. This is especially true when it comes to his childhood friend and boss, Touma Komatsuzaki. Ryoken is blindly loyal to Touma, and sometimes his willingness to go out of his own way to serve and protect Touma will put Ryoken into sticky situations.
Likes: Savory foods, quiet walks, spending time with Touma
Dislikes: Sour foods, people who betray his trust
Hobbies: Working out, bonsai maintenance, riding his motorcycle.
Goals: Protect Touma, bring down the Kajiyashiki.
History Ryoken was born in Okinawa to a widower father who ran a karate dojo of some renown. Ryoken began learning martial arts under his father, until word came to Okinawa that Ryoken’s grandmother in Sanyo had fallen gravely ill. Ryoken’s father immediately closed up shop and moved to Sanyo to support his dying mother, opening a much smaller dojo to make ends meet.
It was in Sanyo that Ryoken met the boy who would eventually become his closest friend and sworn brother: a nervous, often bullied boy named Touma Komatsuzaki. Touma was skittish and jumpy due to emotional abuse suffered at the hands of his father, who was the patriarch of the Komatsuzaki yakuza family and the sixth chairman of the Nomiya Alliance, a coalition of yakuza families from throughout the Japanese mainland. In the eyes of Touma’s father, only a son with a will like tempered steel was worthy of being his heir, and berated Touma constantly for his supposed weakness, crushing Touma’s self-esteem. This led to Touma being an easy target for school bullies. However, Ryoken stepped in and defended Touma from his bullies, in the process giving Touma the courage to stand up for himself. Touma stopped taking the abuse of his father without a fight, which slowly caused Touma’s father to respect his formerly frail son.
Touma and Ryoken became like brothers over the years, and Ryoken began to get glimpses of the criminal underworld through Touma. When they were in the final years of high school, Touma was formally brought into the fold of the Komatsuzaki yakuza family, named by his father to be the next patriarch of the family. But only a year after that, tragedy struck: a rival family known as the Kajiyashiki clan lashed out on the Komatsuzaki clan over a money dispute, sending footsoldiers to crush the Komatsuzaki. Touma survived by the grace of being out of town with his girlfriend at the time of the massacre, and Ryoken’s affiliation with the Komatsuzaki wasn’t widely known.
Touma’s father was murdered by the first lieutenant of the Kajiyashiki, a vicious killer named Sadaharu Shigi. Touma was furious, and came to Ryoken seeking help with rebuilding the Komatsuzaki family and getting even with the Kajiyashiki, even offering Ryoken a place as his right hand man. Ryoken accepted almost immediately, more of wanting to protect Touma than to be part of the Yakuza. Many members of the Komatsuzaki resented Ryoken, seeing him as a greenhorn who was only given his position because Touma was inexperienced as an patriarch. However, Ryoken quickly proved himself to be a powerful asset to the family, able to hold his own in a fight and use his intimidating stature to convince loan takers to pay up without making excuses. Ryoken’s undying loyalty and viciousness earned him the name ‘the Hound of Komatsuzaki’.
Now that the Komatsuzaki family has finally regained its former power, only time will tell if Ryoken will be made to lead the fight against the Kajiyashiki.
Equipment Ryoken fights with his hands and feet, or the closest heavy object he can pick up and hurl at the enemy.
Notes