Well, folks, this shouldn't be a long journal entry. It's just a small request I've wanted to post up here for a while now. Some of you may have noticed I've been drawing an androgynous character clad entirely in white for a while. This would be Maou, one of our more controversial characters (and our token Rinnegan user) in the Naruto Nouveau RPG.

The NN community has undergone several incarnations since the community's humble beginnings in Fall 2006. For a bit of backstory regarding the forum's changes, we started off with Suriko (our Shichidaime Hokage) as our forum administrator with a legion of sub-administrators (I was in charge of character/clan approval). The site was called Neo Naruto, taking place 50 years past the theoretical end of Naruto Shippuuden. By December 2007, one of our roleplay moderators started attacking our members and even deleted the website, just because he FELT like it. I was the one who restarted it before January 2008. By November 2008, almost everyone grew sick and tired of Hetsurin's crap and moved to an alternate site where I seized power...both as administrator and our Hachidaime Hokage (Yamanaka Sae).

The site (now approaching fifty-seven years past canon's theoretical end) tends to have much darker themes than Masashi Kishimoto's story, approaching more of a PG-13 to R rating. The lines between good and evil are artistically blurred (for example, our Hokage's nature approaches that of a dictator, while it's our Akatsuki leader who's the humanitarian!), even minor characters have a complex backstory, and (some) technology (such as internet-accessible computers, GPS, and cell phones) have caught up with the times. We have a broader demographic of active villages, a blend of filler and confirmed canon:

Konohagakure
Sunagakure
Iwagakure
Kumogakure
Kirigakure
Hoshigakure (in fact, the character I'm writing this mini-article about lives here)
Amegakure
Kusagakure
Kemurigakure
Yugakure
Takigakure
Otogakure
Yukigakure

Since power shifted from Suriko to me, our site's been more active and produced better writing. Not only this, but we've recently received our 50th member. I've been participating in invisionfree forum RPGs since 2000 (I still can't believe it's almost been a whole decade), but out of ALL the stories I've belonged to, Naruto Nouveau has been the most intriguing, captivating, and downright addictive.

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(WHERE YOU SHOULD PROBABLY START READING IF YOU DON'T WANT TO READ THE INTRODUCTION)

Okay, okay; I've made my pitch for Naruto Nouveau. While that's all well and good, that still doesn't answer the pitch question: Who is Maou?

Maou is a 25-year-old enigma on the forums, the Hoshikage's best friend. Hoshigakure has been trying (even before the Naruto filler) for a very long time to be acknowledged as the Sixth Great Nation, even lauding their leader as a Kage. For the first time ever, their Hoshikage, Naitsuusha Seta, actually IS on par with one of the Five Kages, and he's ambitious enough to demand changes be made. Seta is a coldblooded sociopath, but he shares a past with Maou and does a great job of hiding his heartlessness; none of the characters on the forum really know one way or the other if Seta genuinely cares for his sick friend, or if it's all an act, just to have the Rinnegan at his disposal.

Maou himself has lived one of the harshest recorded lives in the NN canon. He was kidnapped and trafficked as a child, and eventually sold to a malicious Sunagakure medic (I'm not going to go into detail here; just know that some of the things Hideo-isha did to this poor kid qualify as torture), but the worst of it came when the whole estate became infected with the plague. Only Maou survived. Not knowing how to get home, the little boy returned to his kidnapper and ended up in quarantine for a long, lonely twenty years. It was Seta who released him, Seta who gave Maou his life back...Seta who accepted Maou, flaws and all.

Despite all the maltreatment early in life, Maou's surprisingly naive and hopeful when it comes to new people in his life. He's got a sweet (and rather childlike) nature, and only gets defensive if somebody speaks ill of Seta or his token student, Kyoujin Sanosuke. The same will probably be true for his other students, once Murasaki Hariko and Kinjou Shizuka are completed characters.

If you're an NN member already, Maou's biography can be viewed here: [link]

If you're not a member, but you're curious, here's a small taste of what's involved in the story. Send me a note with your email address and I can send the entire history to you via Gmail. While this may not be his actual history (it's pretty long, seeing as he's 25 years old), I'm showing off his personality:

"When one hears of the Rinnegan, people tend to think of greatness, terror, and power. Maou may have the Kekkei Genkai, but don’t let this fool you. In reality, he’s very childlike, giving unconditional love to anyone who so much as gives him a smile. He’s got a strong desire for acceptance, bending over backwards (even to the point of harming himself) to please individuals he likes. There’s no greater case of this than there is with Naitsuusha Seta, the Hoshikage. Despite being a cold, conniving sociopath, Seta’s the closest thing to a friend Maou’s ever had. For that, everything Seta says goes. In fact, Maou can’t bring himself to EVER tell Seta no. Any sort of argument with Seta makes Maou fret that perhaps his friend doesn’t like him anymore...might even abandon him.

So, why is this twenty-five-year-old shinobi so emotionally stunted? He’s been horribly mistreated, isolated, and neglected during his short lifetime. He’s gone from being his mother’s precious child...to a loathed piece of property...to a forgotten treasure, locked away for twenty wretched years…to Seta’s patsy. Not only this, but that long quarantine left him in constant agony, trying to fight off the Maou plague, an illness that unfortunately shares a name with its victim. No, this isn’t how he got his name (that’s explained in his history), but it did leave its mark on his mind, as well as body.

As a plague survivor (a very rare phenomenon, considering only one out of every two hundred sick survive), Maou’s suffered severe tenketsu damage. His blood’s blackened and has difficulty clotting properly. Sometimes he sneezes, vomits, cries, and spits up black blood. Due to this, he keeps almost all of his body covered, since even his sweat or saliva can transfer the illness to another person. He's highly contagious and he knows it. His entire body aches with every motion, causing him to often whimper from the pain…or ask his caretaker to give him a good painkiller. This may also explain why he loves soft, cuddly things; they’re less likely to injure his delicate body.

At the same time, Maou actually suffers from a severe case of self-hatred, after hearing for so long that he’s nothing but a monster. His name, Maou, actually translates as devil. Watanabe Hideo, his former master, even branded the kanji for "oni", a kind of demon, above Maou’s left hip with a white-hot kunai, just to show that anything named for the Devil should be treated as the Devil. Maou put up with the abuse for so long that he feels he deserved it, that he’s rotten to the core. He doesn’t want to be, though, so he attempts to compensate by being the best person he can muster himself to be.

Naturally, he’s one of the sweetest, most congenial people you’d ever hope to meet. Sadly, it doesn’t matter how kind, loving, or generous he is; he always feels filthy inside…that maybe only Seta is capable of showing him anything remotely resembling love."

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(HERE IS THE PITCH, EVERYONE; AT LEAST READ THIS)

So, what's the request? Maou has his 26th birthday coming up on November 7th and he's already become pretty iconic for the website. I was wondering if I could convince some of you guys to do some artwork as well, maybe for a contest? I'd like for the contest to begin from Today to November 30th...giving everyone approximately one month for completion.

I'll be willing to sketch an OC or a pairing of the winner's choice as a prize.

How about it, guys? Artwork for Maou? Here's a few samples to help you get started:

[link]
[link]
[link]
[link]

I appreciate anyone who wishes to join the contest. I've never hosted one before. ^^