Bakugou

Name meaning: His name is composed of the Japanese kanji "baku" (爆) from "bakuha" (爆破 lit. "explosion").

ROLE: Warrior, Demolition/Explosives Expert (singlehandedly the onsite destruction crew). MATE: N/A FAMILIAR: Dire Hyena NOTABLE RELATIVES: Rosette (adoptive mother/grandmother figure), Zar (brother) Note: Outfit: Spikey Explodey Boy. Coli: Portal DPS: Melee #2 build If he doesn't work out in the team, I'll replace him with Oyaji and see what happens from there.

Bakugou came from the Blacksand Annex. He has an explosive temper and an increasingly difficult time processing emotions other than anger due to his inferiority superiority complex. Being told he was amazing for his fighting prowess and that he had to be the best by his mother, who left for the eternal war, left a lasting impact on him. It is his constant mission to prove himself superior to everyone so that no one will look down on him. Even general kindness and concern from others earns them an explosive response because he struggles to understand something other than violence.

When he first arrived at Haven's borders, he was fresh out of the latest in a series of fights he had gotten into on his way out of the Ashfall Waste and across the Windswept Plateau. Rosette had happened to spot him all scuffed and scraped, and she invited him to help himself to their resources before he went on his way again. He would have refused on principle, scoffing at the idea that he would need any help, but somehow he found himself unable to argue with her. Oh, he had tried to, but the way she talked gave him no room for it.

So, he wound up sitting in her tea room eating his fill in preparation for another long journey interspersed with fights on his quest to locate and defeat the strongest dragon in all of Sornieth. He had fully intended to leave and never look back... and he would have if Rosette hadn't so casually mentioned that Haven had warriors with scars and tales of glory to prove it.

"Well, now you have to tell me what they're like!" he insisted. A place called Haven, of all things, having strong warriors seemed too good to be true.

But she just smiled and said, "Oh, I imagine they'll be back from their hunt soon enough to tell you all about it, don't you worry~ Unless you're in too much a hurry..." And there she knew she had him caught, curiosity piqued for the rest of the evening so that by the time he actually got to meet them he felt too committed to leave.

He found himself particularly in awe of Solat and he holds her in high respect, trusting her judgement usually without question.

Kaminari really likes him for some reason and insists on hanging around him or involving him in activities. Something about his sunshiny personality and utter hopelessness opens up Bakugou's softer side on occasion.

Iida, on the other hand, seems to have utter faith in his ability to grow as an individual and is constantly trying to keep him in line "for his own good"... Bakugou doesn't know what that's supposed to mean, but it sounds like a complicated emotion and the only way he knows how to respond to that is with displays of dominance to assert control. Iida remains unimpressed but firm. Eventually, Bakugou had to concede that maybe there are others who actually just care about him for some reason and their interactions become something closer to friendly bickering.


Back in the pits of the Blacksand Annex, Bakugou had quickly discovered that his hands were too aggressive and impatient for the delicate work of a blacksmith. He couldn't shape or forge clay without destroying it and metalwork required far too much precision. It should be strange how in the raging fires of his birthplace his destruction was a hindrance, but in the tranquility of the Zephyr Steppes it would become one of his greater assets. One moment he was angrily making craters in the ground to blow off steam, and the next he was being yelled at to put that energy to good use and actually help the clan architect with renovations. Over time, he learned how to be precise and delicate in this too, and he takes pride in his work.

In fact, he takes so much pride in it that anyone else messing with it will quickly find themself on the receiving end of a rather explosive backlash.

A prime example is the short-lived adventure of Sabori's "chicken excavation squad" that she'd had the nerve to ride into his territory, claiming that she was going to "revolutionize excavation for maximum gains." And that sounded like a challenge to him, so he simply threatened to explode her chickens and her boat to show her how she would like having her job messed with. Unfortunately, he hadn't realized that the so-called "pirates" were using a dragon for a boat until Maris sought him out for a confrontation. He had been about two seconds away from starting a fight with her, but Zuzu apparently hadn't approved of his threats on the lives of chickens and ratted him out to Rosette.

Bakugou won't admit it out loud, but he does not like to disappoint Rosette. Once she managed to coax a simple explanation out of him, he and Maris came to a mutual agreement. Bakugou will not threaten the "boat" and Maris will keep Sabori away from the excavation grounds. From then on, Sabori took the hint and reluctantly had to retire her chicken excavation squad, which has been in Sylph's care ever since. If he had to guess, he'd suppose that's most likely the reason Gravel was ever returned to Moss in the first place, not that Bakugou cared about any of that. Threatening the chickens was "bad", but threatening Maris (and her Charges) had been worse and Bakugou would never make that mistake again, so the less he had to think about it the better.

Another part of Bakugou's job is repairing damage done to the clan territory. A decent amount of that damage is naturally due to his own explosions or BangBang getting a bit too trigger happy with the pirates' cannon, but another large contributor is Haven's allied clan out in the Viridian Labyrinth known as the Glade.

The first time it really became a problem was when Garna was sent to Haven in a catapulted seed pod, leaving a crater in its wake. As he stared down into the hole, he cursed the Glade's catapult engineers for giving him more work to do. He would have to be the one to fill it, not them, so what gave them the right? Admittedly, he had exploded the hole out of anger, making it bigger in the process, but releasing that pent-up aggression had felt good and that would have been enough had that been the Glade's only offense.

Unfortunately, it wasn't only the menaces with the catapult who liked to test his patience. Aakesh had also made a name for himself in Bakugou's book of rivals. Every time the overgrown Imperial would land in Haven, he would slam down onto the ground, absorbing the shock himself but leaving behind craters the size of his feet where he stood.

Bakugou had no idea why the rest of Haven seemed to almost revere the guy as though he were some benevolent deity of lightning looking out for them. Lightning was a freaking omen of destruction of a nature that Bakugou did not approve. Above everyone else's wistful sentimentality, he would be spewing strings of curses into the sky every time so much as a crack of thunder broke out. "YOU BETTER NOT BE LANDING HERE AFTER I JUST CLEANED UP YOUR LAST MESS!"

And Aakesh took that personally, going out of his way to land in front of Bakugou every time he was so much as passing overhead just to say hello?! and fly off again like Bakugou didn't know exactly what he was doing. That's it! He was going to fight the lightning itself, screaming and cursing and spitting, if he had to! He would threaten to explode Aakesh's house to see how he liked it if he even cared to know where it was, but Kaminari kept holding him back with naive platitudes like "He just came by to say hi! See? He's a friend! You don't have to yell at him!"

After enough of his grumbling about it, Iida inevitably pointed out that Aakesh's house was somewhere in the Behemoth and Rosette would take personal issue with it if he ever went near it with ill intentions. The thought of Rosette being genuinely angry with him was enough to deflate his anger and leave him feeling only mildly grumpy. Whatever. Aakesh wasn't even worth expending energy to explode anyway.

Xanthias, on the other hand...

Bakugou had been in the process of collecting materials to fix another one of the demon of the sky's personal attacks, only to return to more dragons in his hole! The Glade's disrespect for his job had gone too far and he was finally going to show someone his wrath - or he would have if Iida and Kaminari hadn't held him back and dragged him away until Haven's unexpected guests finally flew away. But he swore that the next time he saw Xanthias or Nilaratan anywhere near dirt that was under his jurisdiction, he would show no mercy.

So, during their next visit when he caught AmRealFae wandering over to his construction site, he was already on edge. "If anything other than rock or dirt so much as touches this hole, I'll turn it into shrapnel. Got it, pipsqueak?"

The invisible Fae thing paused just long enough to stare directly at him before sticking a single purple toe in the hole, completely disregarding every basic safety rule Bakugou had ever established for the workplace environment - especially for invisible entities that were more at risk of finding themselves in the wrong place than visible ones. Construction zones are not a joke!

Bakugou could feel the smug expression on the creature's stupid disguised face - a taunt - knowing full well that the likely nearby minders would immediately come to his aid if he so much as squeaked.

"I'll do you a favor and not blow you up," Bakugou decided, "but anything you put in this hole will be buried there."

To make his point very clear, he began to sprinkle some dirt on the offending toe and, in the creature's scramble to shake it off, the weird-looking plushie he'd been carrying fell from his grasp... and slid further into the hole. A short, panicked squeak of horror escaped the creature as Bakugou grinned, sharp teeth on full display as he menacingly held the first bag of dirt over the beloved toy, tipping it excruciatingly slowly. Bakugou had him exactly where he wanted him! After this, the small menace wouldn't dare mess with him again!

But just as the first specks of dirt touched the fabric, a cacophony of the saddest cries and squeaks Bakugou had ever heard erupted from the Fae masque, pleading for mercy.

Bakugou wanted to be mean, he really did, but there was something so pathetic about the trembling creature who had just moments before been so infuriatingly smug that stopped him. To this day, he still swears he only stopped pouring the dirt because the sound was annoying and he didn't want a headache that day. That's the only reason! Not because he started to feel bad, or because Rosette would have been mad at him if she'd found out, or because he started getting the crazy feeling that he could tell there was a heart-breaking look of distress on AmRealFae's invisible face. The noise just wasn't worth it, that's all. (It only bothers him a little bit that, no matter how convincing he thought his argument was, no one who learned of what happened next would believe him.)

So, he dropped the bag of dirt and retrieved the plushie for the distraught Fae, dusting it off while begrudgingly mumbling about how next time he wouldn't bother to clean it before handing it back.

Unfortunately, this only seemed to encourage AmRealFae to come back to his construction site and watch him work. At least he had clearly learned to stay out of the way of explosions when Bakugou told him to... if only his understanding of "out of the way" wasn't to sit on Bakugou's head. But there were worse places AmRealFae could have chosen to perch and it didn't interfere with his work, so Bakugou allowed it and eventually decided that as long as this creature was here he was going to learn the job. And that is how AmRealFae became Bakugou's apprentice.

The next time Nilaratan happened to stop by to collect his charge and caught Bakugou enthusiastically handing AmRealFae rocks to practice throwing in place of explosives, the fancy Skydancer evidently decided that this was a Xanthias problem even before Bakugou could indignantly yell about how he runs a safe operation.


Admittedly, Bakugou had expected more of a fight. In fact, every time he engaged in a confrontation he was sure would result in one, he was repeatedly and consistently shocked when most dragons refused to even humor the idea. He had long since made it a rule (technically ever since the chicken excavation squad incident) that, if anyone messed with his work for any reason without permission, it would be settled with a fight... and yet... All he got were a bunch of wusses with their healthy communication skills and passive-aggressive craters.

Cue Blizz PURPOSEFULLY hopping into the construction site when she's SO DONE with politics and all of Arseni's good at diplomacy-ness because she is READY TO TUSSLE NOW!

Arseni and Rosette catching wind of it and being like "oh no, the children are fighting" D:
Rosette has pretty much adopted Bakugou against his will and Arseni's framing Blizz's drawings on his office wall
so it's just like
oh, your kid is fighting my kid
why are they fighting? are they upset?
but no
they are just having fun

the first time Blizz would jump in like
LOOK
YOU ROTTING KNOW THAT THESE PEOPLE DON'T APPRECIATE A GOOD FIGHT
I NEED A GOOD FIGHT
LET'S ROTTING GO
so it's less of "oh no diplomatic faux pas/children are fighting" and more like "children are fighting but they agreed on fighting terms"

Bakugou has not forgotten his quest to locate and defeat the strongest dragon in all of Sornieth
although he has put it on hold for Reasons, so he is always down for a fight and he would appreciate the straightforwardness about what she wants.