The Touhou Character Alternate Interpretation Compendium

Hello!

Kind of new to the forum and this topic. I started this a bit ago, about two days, but I was busy, so I couldn't finish it now...

So it's late. I hope I haven't been too late, though.

I'm still on the Yuuka/Yukari talking ffff.

I've always seen of Yukari as some kind of weird mix of Marisa and Reimu, except with more hax powers. She has Reimu's Brilliant, but Lazy attitude, the relation with borders/boundaries, but seems to have Marisa's playfulness, carefree attitude and tendancy for simply taking whatever interests her. She's almost never serious and keeps an air of perpetual fun around her. Well, fun for her. When she truly gets serious, I see her as a calm, efficent and no-nonsense person with an emphasis on winning, irregardless of costs. She simply crushes the enemy with all might, and does not play around with anything truly dangerous to her unless victory is in some way assured.

Of course, the main conversation is about Yuuka(For now!), so I think I'll save a more in-depth Yukariness for later.

Yuuka...hmmm...

I see her as someone who is always very calm and collected. She probably acts very polite, perhaps overly so, and her expression frequently just changes from unreadable to somewhat offputtingly happy. Her thought pattern isn't on the same level of humans and, as stated before, is much more like a force of nature. She does things on whims, and odd things set her off. You could say she's a lot like the earth, calm and collected, and yet occasionally ripping over devastating disasters. Why? Simply because that's what it is. Yuuka probably does it for some sense of amusement. After all, battles can be beautiful things, and Yuuka, a long lived youkai, is probably going to be looking to face new things and keep life fresh and exciting. I don't really see her as a "sadist", in the sense of that word, as I don't think it's the pain she inflicts itself that she really cares for. The thrill of battle, the reactions, the interactment between two opposing parties...I'm not good at describing it, but it's something like that. She's probably always poking at people via conversations and generally toying around when she is bored, and masking it with backhanded politeness and formality.

I also generally see her as very smart. Perhaps not mathematically smart, but she's probably unrivaled in plant biology and well-versed in other forms of biology. She even would use this to help in battle, things like natural creature weaknesses and which parts of the body are most easily decimated. However, she's probably only adequate in things such as mathematics. I also imagine her as having some kind of sentamental, possibly somewhat irrational, attachment to her umbrella. Mostly because Po FV states it as the only flower in Gensokyo that doesn't wither, although we have no way of confirming that, and thus I imagine her having it for a long time and enjoying it's flowery company.

In battle, there's two types of Yuuka in my mind. The calm, playful Yuuka who appears in most matches where she has no real threat to lose and in danmaku matches, one who attacks with grace and elegance, painting the battle field like a piece of art and turning it into a beautiful field of battle. A true spectacle, both fun to watch and fun to entertain with, that also gives the opponent a chance to overcome. Then, there's a much more serious Yuuka, who only really shows up in any battle where she could actually be threatened in. In the case of an actual threat, she abandons concepts like grace and elegance for raw power. Master Sparks, Double Sparks, overpowering physical attacks and all manner of devious flower trickery come into play here. This style is a high powered, purely offensive strike with little in ways of defense. However, Yuuka's power and good battling mind means most cannot stand up to an unrelenting assault from her. This is probably why she only uses it when she feels she's in a serious danger.

Eheheheh...I was going to do a 10-page-late thing on Byakuren, but this post is already pretty long, and with Nue coming up that is a much better place to bundle my little bit on Byakuren.

I also like Nue, so it'll be fun to see what everyone things.

I hope this was a good first post here...

If I did something wrong, just says so~

edited 10th Apr '10 2:20:52 PM by Ruki Motomiya

First of all, welcome!

Second, Text-Formatting Rules for those little tricks like Pot Holes and italics.

edited 10th Apr '10 2:05:18 PM by Lemurian

Thank you for the help, Lemurian.

I've edited the link and fixed the italtics.

I obviously needed to make a new post to say this and give thanks. Obviously.

I don't mind doing Nue next. I don't really know much about her so it'll be interesting to see what everybody has to say.

^ Ditto.

...
...
...
...
...
...
Nue Houjuu

Theme:
Heian Alien

Traits:

• Trickster (capable of changing her own shape as well as the perceived form of other objects, which she uses to mess with people)
• Used to be feared, now more docile

Relationships/Shipping:

• Byakuren (lives at her temple)

Tentative write-up:
A great curiosity. An extremely mysterious youkai that flies the night sky. That is Nue. If you don't know who Nue is, don't fret; nobody does. She was sealed underground by a human long ago, then broke free and decided to fool around with the youkai trying to unseal Byakuren to enjoy her newfound freedom. Of course, she wasn't happy to realize that Byakuren was really on her side. Reimu sent her to go undo the damage she's done, and she now lives in Byakuren's temple, so one can assume she was repentant...

An exchange from UFO goes as follows:
Nue: "The only reason I've been hiding for so long is because I was shut away underground! A long time ago, I was beaten by a cruel human." Reimu: "You did something bad, right?" Nue: "I just made them afraid. That's what youkai do, there's no helping it."

Nue's "occupation" is scaring people, she likes to be mysterious, she relishes in her ability to strike fear in the hearts of people and mess with their minds with her abilities. What is the significance of this line? Does she believe that a youkai cannot go against its nature to scare people and accept that fate? Is she unhappy about being reviled by humans and scares them out of spite? Perhaps her encounter with Byakuren will open her eyes to new possibilities...

Let the Wild Mass Guessing begin!

Similar characters:

• Kogasa (they like to scare people, but presumably have different motivations for it)

Not really similar characters:

• Flandre (their personalities aren't very similar at all, so)

Welp, I sure know next to nothing about Nue. I read up a bit on her dialogue in UFO to prepare myself. I love how Marisa just takes some of her Seeds of Nonidentification to play around with, haha.

Mostly about Kogasa, but this doujin has Nue and Kogasa causing mischief together.

I've got nothing to say about Nue, really, so I'll just express my perplexity about fanworks always showing her in her real form. Come on, she's a nue*, don't be boring.

* Yeah, yeah, not exactly shapeshifting, but the result is the same

edited 11th Apr '10 6:29:49 AM by StillWaters

I'm actually surprised that more fanworks don't have Kogasa and Nue hanging together. They have similar motivations. Also, Kogasa is the Ex-midboss on Nue's stage. The fanon depiction of Kogasa could really use a friend.

I think its canon that she hangs at the Myouren temple after UFO but the little amount of fanwork I've seen tends to put her with Sanae. Probably because of Sanae's otaku-esque interests, I guess?

Umm... apparently her name is more of a description. Houjuu apparently means "Sealed Beast" and Nue is her species. So, exactly what it says on the tin, I guess.

I had a thought that she could shapeshift into other characters to mischief manage but I don't think the Seeds of Non-identification work that way.

You know, there's actually not that much to say about Nue, besides jokes about her power. Maybe this wasn't a good idea.

Speaking of joking.

Sure, why not?

edit: Did I really just say that. Wow, look at all that hardcore walking-into-it I just did. Come on, next poster, let me have it.

Two things I think are interesting:

In dialogue to Reimu, Nue sort of implies that she was sealed after her true form was revealed by some human in the past. Maybe she can only be sealed by a person who has seen her true form. She even attacks the PC for having seen her true form.

"A long time ago, when a human discovered my true form, they immediately captured me and sealed me away underground." Yeahhhhh.

Also: "It was terrible when my true nature was revealed. Nobody would be scared of a youkai that looks like this." Her true form is a Touhou/ZUN random cute girl. Most everybody in Gensokyo is a cute girl. She's insecure about how scary she is because she's a Touhou character. I just find that funny.

edited 11th Apr '10 8:03:06 AM by Bocaj

The human didn't see her "true form" so much as they saw her naked! She was powerless due to being flustered!

Nues was invited taken back to Moriya Shrine by Sanae after her EX-stage scenario, according to the fans. Sanae likes to think of her as an alien.

Between the giant robots and the alien fixations, Sanae sures sounds like she's channeling Haruhi. Perhaps Sanae was really, really bored with her life as a Living Goddess in the real world, and was really alone in class because she was unusual.

I see Nue as having some pride in her ability to be undefineable, so that time when her true form as a cutie was revealed was one of her worst moments in life. The time she spent sealed up was probably a little traumatic for her, which is why she'd rather be fried rather than get sent back underground.

Maybe Nue hates loneliness and being uncared for despite being undefineable, so she tries to attract attention by scaring people and reveling in her undefineability.

In other fancomic news, there's an ecchi fancomic on the hentai site FAKKU featuring Sanae speculating about what Nue wears under her skirt. Reimu saw bloomers, Marisa saw panties, and Sanae saw nopan. Features a rather scary portrayl of Byakuren, and a rather aggressive Sanae.

"I have no idea what you meant by this. sad"

She has the power to hide the truth about herself. What are we doing? Whether it's a good idea or not, surely it wouldn't be hard to provide an answer to the question "why not?"

oh

PS: Belated welcome, Ruki.

Let's see...Nue...

Actually one of my more liked of the UFO Cast, although I think I basically like everyone except Ichirin(Who just seems kind of average) from that game. I think her power is amazingly fascinating. Not only is it somewhat vague, leaving a lot of room for interpertation on how it works, but it leads to natural fun time and a plethora of various options.

As for Nue herself? Hmmm...well, she likes scaring people, and I see her as taking it both as a form of enjoyment and as a serious job. She loves toying around with people and screwing with lives. Somebody with a true trickster mentality, who probably has troubles forming bonds with people. A very lonely person. While she loves her job itself, she might be a bit tired and dissapointed with the seperation from people that comes with it. Being sealed for so long has only increased this problem and has given her at least some doubts about the direction of her life. She's probably taken in Kogasa as form of disciple or student to ease her loneliness, hence Kogasa appearing in the EX Stage, most likely because of Kogasa's powers. After all, surprise and scare are close enough.

I also see Nue as a bit of a racist against humans. Being sealed by a human probably helped dim her view of humanity. In addition, assuming from what we know of around Byakuren's times, we can assume that youkai hunting was probably more intense back then than it is in the games now. At the same time, she didn't know anything about Byakuren and seemed surprised when she found out Byakuren was a friend rather then a foe(Reimu A, Reimu B, Marisa B). Marisa B in particular seems to point to this("I just wish they would admit they're siding with the humans. That gets on my nerves."). You could also read the line "Now, human! Boil me! Bake me alive! Do anything you wish! Oh, but please, just don't seal me underground again." as this, in a way. She fully expects you to do quite a variety of nasty things to her. She seems quite shocked when any of the heroines don't seal her or such. Plus, read that line over, but imagine it with a contempous or mocking tone over it. It fits way too well. Byakuren's existance and the fact she seems to be helping youkai, combined with the "exterminators" not really sealing her has probably thrown her view of humanity into a certain amount of disarray and adds to her confusion. Given that she lives with Byakuren now(I think), it certainly opens up a myriad of possibilities on how that would work.

I also wonder if Nue's power, like Kogasa, serves as a kind of food source, almost solely because of the line "But if you're not afraid, my heart will go dry." seen in some of the EX Stages from Nue. I don't particularly think this, but it might be something to screw around with.

Unlike last time, I feel the need to go into a discussion on shipping here. Personally, I love shipping, and I'm the type of person who doesn't really care if your ship doesn't make sense if you do it well. Of course, this doesn't mean I don't have preferences. I didn't feel it was right to bring up last time, as Yuka has somewhat limited shipping options and it wasn't time for Yukari talking. Nue, however, I can do.

Hmmm...

My top Nue ship is probably Nue/Flandre. Not really because of anything like similarity, which I personally don't get(Nue and Flandre don't really look that alike, and Heian Alien seems fairly different from U.N. Owen for me.), but rather because of a possible application of Nue's power I thought of. I was wondering if Nue's power had metaphysical properties, such as hiding something not quite physical, which got me to thinking if Nue could hide the "Eye" that Flandre is usually depicted as crushing to destroy an object. If she could then she would probably be Flandre's best playmate. In addition, Nue would easily be able to get to Flandre if she wanted. She could shift into the appearance of Remilia, Sakuya, Meiling or even Patchouli(Most likely Sakuya, though), which would prevent things like others from noticing her get in, and then just go to Flandre. She could disguise herself in the room so that nobody ever found out she was there with Flandre, and simply leave whenever somebody came to check up on Flandre. After that, Nue and Flandre's personalities mesh somewhat well. Nue is a trickster, somebody who frightens people for fun and profit, with a somewhat serious deposition and confusion in life. Flandre is somebody who always wants to "play" and have fun, but always ends up breaking things. And, not being allowed of the Mansion really, she probably is somewhat confused with the world as well. And even though I imagine that, if we go with the fact that Remilia doesn't let Flandre out much(Most likely because Flandre would break us all), she still wants go out some even though she respects her sister's wishes. On that end, Nue could probably also help Flandre get out if she wanted...

I actually think I kind of lost track halfway through that, I guess. It doesn't seem as shippy trying to write it out as it does in my head. Ah, well~

I fully support Sanae/Nue for comedic value. I have no idea how a serious take on it would go, but the hilarity angle still seems fresh and makes me smile.

Not a big fan of Nue/Byakuren. The two seem to be too clashing in ideals and personalities to really fit romantically. I see them more as foes, or even as somewhat uneasy partners, with Byakuren trying to teach a confused Nue some of her ideals and Nue being shunted either further into confusion or miscomprehending it. At the same time, Nue probably tries to scare a somewhat unflusterable Byakuren, or even produces odd counterpoints.

I don't really see Nue/Kogasa as romantic either, but I can see potential in it. Although, personally, I see Nue and Kogasa as more of a student-mentor kind of thing. Nue being the teacher, someone who tries to teach Kogasa to be more frightening and just kind of sighs as Kogasa messes around with it, and Kogasa as the overeager student who tries way too hard. Whenever I try to imagine romantic connotations, it ends up with something like Nue being the teacher who really wishes she never took the job and tries to cut Kogasa loose, and Kogasa as an overeager student who will absolutely not get lost, and someone who probably pokes around with Nue's insecurities. Nue probably continually tries to push her away and is very unsure about how to react to the whole thing.

Nue/Murasa is weird for me. I mean, I kind of like it, but yet my mind doesn't really have a clear image of how it would go. And is it just me, or does this pairing seem to be the most steady of Nue's?

...

Oh, and I love her stage and boss theme, myself. Moreso the stage. UFO seemed like a really good game for the Stage Music, huh?

Should we do a Nue image or song dump? If so, I'd be fine doing so. I'm actually listening to some Heian Alien/UFO Romance in the Sky arranges right now, and I generally try to keep a healthy Danbooru account...

Also, hai Fawriel

P.S. I wonder why the Marisa B and stuff became links...I should go look at that text thing again and fix that.

P.S.S. derp derp derp I forgot to put spaces.

edited 11th Apr '10 12:56:35 PM by Ruki Motomiya

... Another one who puts a thousand times more effort into this than I! Egad!

Picture dump would be appreciated, though a fine selection would be even more so.

Ah, yeah. I need some Nue avatars, too. I only have like one. I'll get right on it.

Hahaha. Nah, it's not really effort. It's just me manifesting my laziness into taking a long time to do things like write up Touhou articles instead of doing important things.

Anyway, imagedump coming shortly. If you guys want, I'll do a songdump too(Although, since I just made a Nue Houjouu playlist, I could just add what I find and link to that...)

A quick test to make sure I'm coding this right.

Links to Danbooru if you didn't see. So Yeah.

edited 11th Apr '10 1:11:00 PM by Ruki Motomiya

I don't think she controls what she looks like when she uses her power. From what the Touhou wiki says, Nue's seeds of Non-identification obscures somethings true form and then the viewer's experiences and expectations fill in the details. This is why Nue looked more like the chimera-like nue in the past. And this is why the pieces of the Soaring Vault look like UF Os. Its like, Non-Identification is a crapshoot.

Nue picturedump tiem?

Nue only had 43 pages worth of images on Danbooru. So I decided to go from Page one to Page 43 and grab what looked good.

I hope I did well.

Also, I always figured Nue could control her own form, but that concealing the form of other things was more of a crapshoot. Most likely because you can't really control other things as well as you can control yourself.

Black and White Nue

Nue and Byakuren costume switching action!

A Nue hairstyle

A badass Nue.

A very cute image featuring Nue and Murasa. Love the art style.

I really like Nue's wings here.

Kogasa and Nue! The Dynamic Duo!

Ehehehe...hi...Nue...

The Nue is a Lie!

More badass black and white Nue.

Warning: Nue/Murasa ahead!

The best way to use a weapon.

Not much to say.

Nue's trollface.

Nue/Byakuren. But the image is sweet.

UFO girl in the sky, teach me, teach me, how to fly...

A happy Nue.

Uwaaaah!

This is amazing.

So is this

The terrible twosome returns!

Nue...is not difficult.

Nue and Koishi. Mmm.

This picture is beautiful

You have really fucked up!

Nue Nue...Kyun~

Awesome black and white Nue returns.

OH NUE

This Monochrome Nue is just black. It's also very nice.

Nue as a mecha. OH SHI-

I really, really love this image.

Nuember one!

UFO as pillow.

You can tell I'm running out of comments.

Another one of those really good images.

I see a red door and I want it painted black. No colours anymore, I want them to turn black...

Nue Sign - Rainbow Ascension

Nue and Sanae, Love...Shine!~

Despite her lack of a lot of art, I think I like Nue a lot.

Nue and Byakuren teamups always look amazing.

When Nue really screws with your perception...

Maybe I've been playing too much Persona 3. When I saw the cross to the left of Koishi, I thought World Balance...

This is so adorable.

Nue/Byakuren. It's really pretty. I like this one a lot, too.

Holy...

This year, Nue Houjouu stars in...

Like this, too. It happens to be a picture in one of my favorite Heian Alien remixes, too...

This Nue is incredibly awesome. One of my favorite images here.

Wow...

It's an invasion!

Oh dear.

Nue/Kogasa yumminess.

We really better hope Nue never gets pissed.

A green invasion.

Now you see me...

Undefined Sign ~ Unknown Girl Invasion

Nue, Geometry Major?

The invasion has already begun!

Adorable Nue/Murasa.

I'm afraid I've tricked you, my dear...

A happy Nue is a good Nue.

My bad. MINOR formatting error.

edited 11th Apr '10 2:05:14 PM by Ruki Motomiya

Oh! So that's why she looks like yer basic Touhou character. Because we expect her to.

...Wait. If she looks like how people expect her to, then why doesn't she have a hat?

Maybe we view the hat as some kind of security thing, so it's not there to...uh...scare us or something?

Because, you know, a lack of hat is terrifying.

Well that explains Kogasa's lack of hat.

Nue? Canonically she's like Kogasa except angsty and good at what she does. She doesn't show up in fancomics much, and when she does she's usually shipped with Byakuren, hanging out with Kogasa, or being chased after by Sanae. Mostly popular for her design.