Ness

Ness
Profile
Species:	Diel
Pronouns:	it/they
Height:	149cm
Professional Status
Affiliation:	Alcyon Corporation
Type:	Diel
Division/Rank:	Benthic Strike Team

Ness (ネス, Nesu) is a diel and a member of the Benthic Strike Team.

Appearance

Ness's shell resembles a teenager of short stature, made even shorter by its constant slouch. It has pale, greyish skin, shaggy white hair that flops over its left eye, and pointed teeth. Its bar code is printed horizontally underneath its right eye. It wears a Benthic uniform jacket that is both noticeably oversized and tattered at the bottom hem; the rest of its outfit is non-regulation, consisting of a graphic t-shirt, sweatpants, and slip-ons.

Like the rest of the Benthic team, a pair of cylindrical power limiters are attached to its shell's head (though this is largely for aesthetic purposes, as the limits have been built directly into the shell). When deactivated, a pair of enormous green tattered antlers emerge from them.

Ness seems to be much more comfortable in its "human" form than many other diels. It displays surprising dexterity for a creature whose natural form has no human hands, and multiple characters have noted its natural-seeming body language and facial expressions.

Demon Form

Ness's demon form is an enormous, sinuous monster covered in shaggy white fur stained brown at the ends. Tattered black scraps poke out from beneath the fur, and some of these are long enough to serve as appendages, which it uses to crawl and lope. It can also fold out two longer sections of its fur and use them as wings. Its face is flat and resembles a cross-section of a fish tail, but in bright yellow and green, with a single eye in the center where the "spine" would be.

Personality

Ness is generally bad-tempered and uncooperative. It is devoted to DREAMSTAR Maho Idols, a rhythm gacha game which it became a diel in order to play; it spends most of its paychecks and time off on this game, and vocally decries everything else to be an annoying distraction. It only participates in missions occasionally and begrudgingly; however, it does try to get things done as fast as possible so it can get back to its game, so it can make for an efficient teammate.

Despite affecting an uncaring attitude, Ness seems to have a competitive streak. When Akagi suggests a body-count competition, it claims to think the idea is stupid, but visibly starts trying harder in an effort to beat him and becomes very pleased when it wins.

Powers & Abilities

Immeasurable Mist Capacity: Ness is a Benthic-rank demon, and the member of the Benthic Team with the single largest mist capacity. It can disable lesser demons simply by flaring its aura, and its mist-boosting is effective enough that it often tanks attacks without even noticing or breaking its concentration. Its aura is bright lime green.

Wake: Ness is confirmed to have a wake, but its details are unknown as it generally does not use it.

Eject: Ness can eject and comfortably operate both its shell and its demon form, splitting its attention enough to perform tasks that require fine motor control and concentration with both at the same time.

Lair

Ness's lair is called Whalefall. Every surface within Whalefall is covered in a roiling mass of small fish- or worm-like pseudodemons, which seek out anything that has a mist signature within range and attempts to swarm and devour it. This includes Ness itself, but Ness's enormous mist capacity and size make it so that several layers can be stripped from its flesh with little effect on its overall health.

Ness's overwhelming aura gives it the ability to establish its lair extremely quickly. When ejected, Whalefall automatically forms around its demon form as an area of effect, allowing it to set the worms on opponents simply by moving close enough to them.

Trivia

• Ness's demon design seems to reference globsters, particularly the Zuiyo-maru carcass (which was also nicknamed "New Nessie"). Many of these rotted corpses are covered in decayed muscle fibers that give the impression of white fur.