Stephen Yen

Stephen Yen
A.K.A.	Zhen Jian-Hui
Age	23
Voice Actor	Kouichi Yamadera
Relatives	Chan Lianjie(Brother) Bruce Yuen (Brother) Chow Chiu-Wai (Brother)
Series	Read or Die
Player	Friend/Xach

Name: Stephen Yen (Zhen Jian-Hui)
Age: 23 (apparent)
Sex: Male
Birthday: February 14th
Birth Year: 2004
Place of Birth: Kowloon City, Hong Kong, China (?)
Parents: Unknown (Clone of Donny Nakajima and Maggie Mui)
Nationality: Chinese
Speciality: Papermastery
Hobbies: Reading, drawing, music and writing
Likes: Poetry, music of all kinds, theater
Dislikes: Abrasive personalities
Favorite Food: Lazhou-styled beef lamian
Least Favorite Food: Anything spongy
Favorite Music: American Jazz
Favorite Sport: Soccer
Most Valuable Possession: Several first-print copies of rare books.
Level of Education: College Graduate
Seiyuu/Voice Actor: Kouichi Yamadera

Physical Stats

• Height: 6'3"
• Weight: 169 lbs.
• Eyes: Blue
• Hair: Black
• Special: Thick-rimmed glasses

Appearance

Tall and lanky is the best way to describe him. He tries his best to stay as inconspicuous as he possibly can. His idea of dressing up is usually dressing in his favorite outfit, which consists of a black "Kelty"-styled Mackintosh coat with a light pink scarf neatly tucked and wrapped around his neck, a black Newsboy cap, white dress shirt along with a pair of sharply creased white slacks and a pair of black loafers. Other than that, he usually dresses in solid colored t-shirts, khakis and slippers or sandals.

Personality

Though he comes off as meek and milquetoast, he uses this obfuscating behavior to make himself seem normal and unassuming. He tries very hard to not draw attention to himself in most situations. He's generally nice to any and everybody and would much rather be 'friends' than waste energy on disagreements. He does have a short fuse when it comes to useless grandstanding and ignorance.

Background

Raised at the Morrison protestant orphanage in Hong Kong, Jian-hui's childhood was spent studying and working at various events. Though he wasn't a child genius in any means, he had a knack of figuring out some of the more challenging puzzles and problems given to him by his teachers and caretakers. At the age of 10, he was sent from Kowloon City, along with three other students named Chan Lianje, Bruce Yuen and Chow Chiu-Wai, to the Sichuan Province for 'extensive training.'

The four children, who ranged from 10 to 14 (Jian-hui being the youngest), were scouted by the orphange for usage by the Dokusensha, an ancient Chinese organization that's been in a centuries-old conflict with the British Library. The Dokusensha or the "Immortal Reader's Society" was a group founded back in the first dynasty of China. It was assigned the task of gathering information and important written knowledge from all over China and Asia.

As time went on, the Dokusensha's power grew and it became a shadow organization that controlled a vast majority of the media and literary knowledge flow in the Eastern Hemisphere. The only true rival of the Dokusensha in the bibliophilical cold war is the British Library, who employs the usage of specially trained individuals known as Papermasters to protect their properties from any wayward spies or agents.

The Dokusensha ended its cold war against the British Library in the late 1990s and broke into a British Library research facility, stealing several DNA samples of history's greatest minds. They cloned these individuals, but underestimated their genius and lost control of them. The clones escaped and the life-threatening but well-contained Ijin Conflict of the early 2000s began. The British Library's chief Papermaster dispatched of the Ijin and out of the Dokusensha's folly came some prosperity. From their observations of The Paper, they were finally able to duplicate the paper manipulating abilities that she and the other Papermasters inherited.

The first test subjects used, those being Sonny Wong, Anita King, Maggie Mui and Michelle Cheung, were successes, but were all lost to the Dokusensha during its conflict with the British Library in the late 2000s. After a nearly crippling setback, the Dokusensha were now ready to begin their training of second generation Papermasters and the four children from the Morrison Orphanage were their top choices.

The children were mentally conditioned and rigorously trained physically and through VR to be efficient agents and for several years they only knew of four things: Papermastery training, assassination training, stealth training and survival training. The children's memories were manipulated to give them a common backstory, those of four kids surviving together on the streets of Hong Kong. They perceived each other as 'brothers' and were taught that the Dokusensha found them and educated them. As repayment, the boys were forever indebted to the organization and to Grandmother, its leader.

This conditioning allowed the organization to instill undying dedication to the Dokusensha in their minds. As the now young men trained, their abilities began to manifest themselves, given each of their papermastery techniques their own style. Jian-hui's forte was creating several different kinds of piercing constructs with his paper, much like the Dokusensha's late papermaster, Sonny Wong. At the age of seventeen, Jia-hui, now completely reconditioned and renamed to Stephen (to fit in English-speaking locales better), was assigned to his first job as an agent of the Dokusensha, which was to dispatch of a child prodigy that was a prime 'potential' candidate of the British Library. Without hesitation, he departed and relocated to Japan to complete his task.

Stephen - Age 16

Though he regretted his actions, he completed his first job without fail. He had proven himself to be quite useful to the organization and was immediately assigned to another job in southern Japan. For three years Stephen found himself assassinating various agents and potentials of the British Library. The other three that were trained with him had also become successful agents and were deemed to be the first papermastery team of the Dokusensha, dubbed the Four Heavenly Kings of Paper jokingly by their peers. Stephen, considered to be the least skilled of the team, was mostly assigned to do work in Japan while Lianje, Bruce and Chiu-wai were sent to the Americas and even Britain itself to do work as agents. Stephen was thankful that he didn't have to deal with the dangers of the British Library's homeland himself.

During the time between missions, Stephen began to have doubts of his position and the effects of his actions against the British Library. Though he was still fiercely loyal to his country and the organization, he was starting to enjoy his job as a bookstore manager for one of their stores in Jinbo-cho more than the life of assassination and espionage. In his downtime, he found his mind wandering, wondering about the circumstances in which he and the other three brothers came together. He wasn't one to bet everything on fate and decided to try to find out his background, along with his the backgrounds of his brothers.

It took him nearly three years to uncover the Special Education Approach training that he and his brothers were subjected to. The information he found didn't surprise him in the least, but their origins did. The Morrison Orphanage, the place from which he and his brothers were first united and the place he no longer had memories of, was merely another front of the Dokusensha. The Morrison Orphanage itself was a testing ground of several clones made from the DNA of previous Papermasters. Lianje and Bruce were genetically related in a sense, as they were clones of Sonny Wong and Chiu-Wai was cloned from Ridley Wang, the British Library's errant Papermaster that betrayed his organization and defected to the Dokusensha, only to sacrifice himself to save Yomiko. Stephen himself was a clone of Donny Nakajima, the eighteenth agent of the British Library to hold the title 'The Paper.'

The fact that he and his brothers were clones came as no surprise to him. In fact, he was more relieved to find this information out instead of wondering about his imaginary parents. But shortly after discovering his dossier, the number of missions he was assigned to began to dwindle and he was no longer mentioned in the sweeping tales of the Four Heavenly Kings of Paper. In time, a new young papermaster rose and 'replaced' him as the fourth member. Like the three sisters before him, he had been gently pushed aside and left to his own devices, albeit on a short leash. The occasional mission trickled down to him, but he was mostly the caretaker of the Dokusensha bookstore now. With his newfound 'freedom' and time, he began to take tutoring jobs and taking piano lessons. He finally felt at ease, at least for the time being.

Skills and Merits

Common Sense (1)

Eidetic Memory (2)

Concentration (1)

Occult Library (2)

Local Ties (3)

Martial Arts - Good: Stephen knows Hung Gar and a Dokusensha-taught version of Dim Mak.

Driving - Very Good

Piano (and pianee) playing - Amazing

Acting - Excellent

Special Abilities

Languages: Stephen speaks English (British English with Received Pronunciation), Cantonese, Mandarin and Japanese fluently. He also knows some French and Spanish.

Speed-reading: Stephen also has the ability to speed-read.

Stealth: Excellent - Generally sneakiness and concealment.

Lack of Presence: Amazing - Stephen is able to stay in one location and position for up to three days without movement. In general, his general 'presence' is diminished.

Assassination: Excellent - Using papermastery and a style of Dim Mak, Stephen's proficiency to quickly dispatch of an unsuspecting victim is ruthlessly efficient. However, since this will never be used in play and is mostly here for the application's sake, I don't feel compelled to go into it any more.

Powers

Paper Manipulation: Telekinetic control over paper and paper products. A Papermaster can change the property of a piece of paper, giving it the sharpness of a knife or the rigidity of a sheet of aluminum. Paper manipulation also requires immense concentration to use. If a paper user's mind falters or he has any doubt in his abilities, he will be unable to accomplish more advanced feats. If a paper user is knocked unconscious, the paper under his control is released and returns to its normal properties.

Stephen's paper manipulation is mainly weapon based. He can, however, create extra appendages with his paper. He can construct the following (granted he has enough paper):

Paper Katana: A simple single edged paper sword. Its durability is as strong as a real katana.

Paper Clothing: Clothing made from various forms of colored paper. It looks and feels like actual clothing, too.

Absolute Paper (A.P.) Field: A small barrier of paper used for blocking anything from physical attacks to small-caliber handgun bullets.

Paper Drill: Creates a drill bit made out of paper. This drill can be used as a weapon or as a means of digging. Larger drill bits also requires vast amounts of paper to be used and an incredible amount of concentration to keep its cohesion.

Paper Doppelganger: A simple shaped figurine made of paper that's used to help with menial tasks and distract a foe if necessary.

Larger Paper Drills - See above.

Paper Appendage - Creates an oversized paper appendage over Stephen's existing limbs, meaning a larger hand and arm or larger foot. The properties of these appendages can be rigid and sharp as metal or as hard as rock. Due to the amount of paper needed to wield it, it's a technique of last defense and used only when necessary.

Unique Items

Several copies of rare first print books

Glasses: Normal Wayfarer-styled glasses

Weaknesses and Flaws

Dark Secret (1)
Ulterior Motive (2)
Twisted Upbringing (1)

Papermastery has a few overwhelming weaknesses, those being water, fire and sound. Though a papermaster can 'slow' the burning of his paper, it will still burn until there's nothing left. Also, if a papermaster's paper is too wet, it's no longer useable. Sound techniques can also make papermastery lose its cohesion.

Stephen is also human. While papermasters tend to be only slightly tougher than a normal human (maybe only tougher by anime standards), they're still suspectible to all the dangers of a normal human being.