lity to command flies. He is covered in rot, so is always surrounded by tens of flies, and can summon more, with numbers going into the thousands. I'm talking clouds of flies. These flies can do many different things, though he mostly uses them as distractions or to attack, sending hundereds of flies at a time to bite and spread disease in an individual. Flies may also lay eggs in an individual's wounds, which can cause increased infection and hemmorhaging. Flies may burrow under the skin and eat a victim from the inside out, or just rip them up by entering and exiting through new points every time.

The rot covering the Aubrey has made his skin extremely thick, often likened to stone. Hits often bounce off of his skin, dealing little to no damage to him.

Besides these two things, the butcher's only tools are his own physical power and his work tools. These are, in no order:
One (1) cleaver. The cleaver is used for making cuts and dealing heavy slashing damage.
One (1) tenderizing mallet. The mallet is used for bashing. Primarily directed at the skull or any other vital areas where there is bone protecting organs.
One (1) meat hook (with chain). The hook is used as both a utility and as a weapon. As a utility, Aubrey can sling the hook at someone, goring them in any which way before pulling them towards him for followups. As a weapon, Aubrey can swing it by its chain and attempt to hit people.
One (1) chainsaw. The chainsaw is overkill. You should know by now what it's used for.

It's all work-related don't ask about the last one.

Anonymity is another important aspect surrounding Aubrey. It could be considered a strength, since it makes it harder to research his abilities.[/spoiler]

is heavy-handed, and his swings are always both full-power and telegraphed. He's also a large target, and isn't very keen on dodging, preferring to either block or just take the hit.

His flies and his own body are still fairly normal, and under a lot of pressure, damage, or the effects of the elements, they will crack and die. He's just a normal guy. Kind of.

Chainsaws require gas and are prone to start-up issues.

Blades tend to dull over time, so if Aubrey doesn't care for his tools, they become less effective.

All of his tools are normal items. None of them are exclusively weapons. They weren't designed to kill, and they weren't designed to hold up really well against other blades and stuff in combat.

Aubrey can get kind of mad sometimes, and he gets really out of hand when that happens. Reason goes out the window.[/spoiler]

He stands at around 6'3". He's pale-skinned, and is covered in lacerations coated in rot and pus, as if he had been dead for a few months and then came back. He most often wears a short sleeved red shirt, jeans, a stained (with a large variety of things, mostly blood and pus) butcher's apron, and a pig mask (made from a real pig's head, rather than latex or anything else). Underneath the mask, Aubrey has a patchy beard and greasy, neck-length black hair. His eyes are a greyish-green and he has a healed wound next to his left eye, right inbetween the nose and the eye, as well as a large, circular scar on his forehead, dead in the center. He often caries a duffel bag with his butchering equipment inside, and the bag itself is a deep maroon with a Soviet pin on the right strap.

In stick figure format, Aubrey is a greyish-brown stick figure with the mask and the apron still on. No further deviations.[/spoiler]

not even saying a word to people either during work hours or during the hours of slaughter. He can only speak Russian, and he doesn't take kindly to foreigners, primarily targeting them in what he calls "ingredient runs". He remains stoic even underneath his mask during his murders, as he does during the day while running his butchery. He is the Russian equivalent of a neo-Confederate, and is a very strong nationalist. Despite being a patriot, Aubrey still kills his own people, primarily if they do not share his views.

Aubrey is also very sadistic. He is known to use torture during many of his killings, only because it "makes the product taste fresher".[/spoiler]

een taught how to wield a blade. His father taught him the most prime area to make cuts, and in turn, Aubrey became one of the best butchers in Yakutsk. Yes, Aubrey was never taught how to fight. His father inspired him with stories of radical nationalists attempting to overthrow other countries, however, so Aubrey taught himself how to use his tools and upbringing to his advantage. He hypothesized that cutting through the flesh of non-conformists would be similar to cutting pig, and that tenderizing it would be just as much visceral fun. When he turned 20, he tested this theory by killing his leftist mother with only a cleaver and a tenderizing mallet. Aubrey tested one last theory, the most taboo of theories, and took a small piece of flesh and popped it in his mouth. It didn't necessarily taste like anything, but selling it amidst cuts of pork or sausage would be fairly easy, so he did just that, serving dead human along with dead pig.

Shortly after the incident, Aubrey's father finally realized what had happened, and attempted to kill his own son. Taking his most prized possession; a Tokarev pistol, Aubrey's father walked into the shop, drew his gun, and shot Aubrey in the forehead. Presumed dead, Aubrey's father took his son's body, laid it in the back of the store, and closed shop for good, leaving his son and the rest of the pork to rot away and be consumed by flies. However, things didn't work out so well for Aubrey's father. Somehow, by some miracle, Aubrey hadn't died. The bullet that had shot him hadn't even penetrated his skull, and it simply remained exposed, right in the center of his forehead. Once he came to (a few days later), he removed the bullet and swore revenge on his "backstabbing pig of a father". Aubrey eventually got his revenge, murdering his father in cold blood with his usual tools and ransacking his house for anything of value. Jewelry and other valuables were left behind in favor of his Krona: a Western-style chainsaw, which would be perfect for his new occupation.

5 years later, Aubrey reopened his butchery, but he had certainly changed. His skin was covered in rot, pus and ferment. Lacerations and bruising had left his exterior looking sickly pale, with yellow (from the rot and pus) and blue (from the bruises) mixed within. The oddest thing was that the flies that once hopped from pig to pig now rested all along Aubrey's body, and did not move as he did. They simply stayed put, much like a suit of bees that you'd see on like Fear Factor or something, except toned down a couple hundred thousand notches. Unknown to the public, they were no longer being served pig. Only the freshest cuts of human meat. After all, leftist meat is still pork, right?

After killing a Ukranian that dared enter his shop, Aubrey was sent to Ukraine for imprisonment. Shortly after, he escaped using a bit of pig fat and a dumbbell. Once Aubrey had escaped, he found himself moving away from his beloved country to a city called Sierra Pines. The city disgusted him, since it was a city full of people from all walks of life, and he vowed to clean it's disgusting interior, one victim at a time.

And now, here's something we hope you'll really like.[/spoiler]

partment, an old TV producing the low noise, the grey of the static lighting up the room around it. Tapestries of Russian flags littered the walls, as well as a bookshelf, filled with different novels and biographies. On the third shelf, in between a copy of War and Peace and a copy of Fathers and Sons, was The Communist Manifesto. Two copies of The Cherry Orchard stood next to each other, one in significantly worse shape than the other. Across from the shelf was a mattress with no frame, the sleeping form of Aubrey Zima hidden underneath the covers. The time was six in the morning, and just as the clock struck six, Aubrey's alarm went off. The overweight butcher picked himself up from off his bed, grimaced, and wiped his face with his own palm, rubbing his eyes a bit before moving to stand. Once up, he did what most people did in the morning: hit the showers, get dressed for work, grabbed his bag of tools and donned his pig mask. Stuff everyone does before heading to work. Aubrey exited his flat, stretching for a quick second before making his way to his car: a red VAZ-2108. He reached into his pocket, grabbing his keys and unlocking the driver-side door, tossing his tools on the passenger seat before stepping in himself. Once inside, he inserted the key into the ignition, twisted until the car roared to life, and pulled out of the lot. He looked down at his cupholder, grabbing his pocket journal with one hand and flipiing to the most recent page. "Сегодняшние жертвы: Элиас Гантенбейн и Ричард Аурум" (tl: Today's victims: Elias Gantenbein and Richard Aurum)

Aubrey went for the easier target first, pulling up in front of Richard Aurum's house: a small one-story with two windows on the front, one on the left side. Based on the architecture, the bedroom was most likely on that left side. Aubrey looked down at his book once more. No survivors. Aubrey grabbed his bag, pulling out his cleaver and mallet, both in one hand as he shut his car off, removed the key from the ignition, opened the driver side door and exited. He moved the mallet to his left hand, letting his dominant hand hold the more lethal of the two tools and strode up to the front door. Sparing literally every possible formality, Aubrey raised his foot and kicked at the handle, damaging the lock irreperably. Another well placed kick opened the door entirely, the door swinging open and slamming against the wall, leaving a hole in said wall. Aubrey entered, breathing heavily as he moved through the house, knocking down pictures and a vase on his way to the bedroom, where Midas most likely waited with a weapon drawn. Once at the door to the room Aubrey presumed to be Richard's bedroom, he delivered another hard kick in an attempt to knock down Midas if he was waiting in front of or behind the door. The door flew open and Aubrey was immediately struck in the shoulder with an arrow. Midas looked over at him, a slew of emotions in his eyes and voice as he spoke.

"Get out before I kill you."

Aubrey, of course, didn't understand what Midas had said at all, and stepped forward.

"Я слышу страх в твоем голосе. Я чувствую его в воздухе." (tl: I can hear the fear in your voice. I can feel it in the air.")

Aubrey lunged forward, attempting to slice at Midas, grazing him but not getting the clean cut he had hoped for. The arrow in his shoulder removed itself and stabbed into Aubrey again, or tried to, but simply hit him and bounced off as if he had thrown a rubber ball at him. Aubrey lunged again, slicing at Midas once more, catching him in the shoulder. His cleaver successfully embedded into his first victim, Aubrey sent his flies to do two things. First, retrieve the cleaver. Second, enter Midas' wound. The flies did just that, a large swarm latching onto and flying away with the large knife, then returning and crawling into Midas' exposed flesh. Screams of agony soon followed, Richard clawing at his skin frantically as the flies wriggled about inside, laying eggs and eating him from the inside out. Aubrey laughed harshly, then coughed a bit, merely watching as Midas crumpled to the ground, clawing at himself, inflicting wounds to himself in an attempt to get the flies out of his system to no avail. Aubrey walked forward, looming over Midas as he continued to cry out in agony.

"PLEASE STOP." The telekinetic begged, looking up at Aubrey as he watched.

Aubrey couldn't understand, but he obliged, swapping his mallet into his right hand, raising it high and slamming it into Richard's skull, hearing him cry out once more as his skull suffered serious blunt force trauma. Another swing crashed down, followed by a flurry of swings, Midas' head becoming more and more of a gorey, pulpy mess with each brutal, visceral hammer blow. Aubrey continued even after Midas was most likely dead, fragments of skull and chunks of red and grey matter flying across the room. Once the deed was done, Aubrey set to preapring Midas' body for transportation. Several cuts were made, Richard's body cut into many different pieces. Arms and legs were fragmented down into arm and forearm, as were the legs, and what was left of the head was simply discarded, the torso and everything else still intact. Aubrey left the room and rummaged abouth the kitchen before finding what he had been hoping to find a black contractor bag. He also managed to find Richard's cell phone, which he put in his pocket. Each piece was carelessly tossed into the bag, then the bag was tied and dragged out to Aubrey's car. The butcher popped the trunk, tossing the bag in, then closed it and got back in, driving to his next target's address.

One long, silent car trip later, and Aubrey found his next destination: Elias Gantenbein's apartment. Unfortunate as it was, Aubrey couldn't just barge into the main entrance of the complex. Instead, the butcher took to the fire escape, tossing his mallet up at the ladder, watching as it clanked down to the ground. He grabbed hold of a rung, pulling himself and his bag up one rung at a time, grunting with each hard pull. Once he was on the platform, Aubrey made his way up the stairs, looking into each window until he finally saw him. Aubrey's face scrunched up in anger as he looked upon the sight of Elias drinking a glass of whole milk while attempting to reach a dead man on his phone. Speaking of phones, Midas' was ringing in Aubrey's pocket. The pig butcher pulled it out and pressed the "answer" button, listening to Elias.

"Hey, I've been trying to call you all day! We've gotta train for our fight against that one guy tomorrow... god, what was his name again?"

"Обри." (tl: Aubrey.)

"Nah, that doesn't sound right. Speaking of not sounding right, you don't sound like yourself. You alright?"

Yeah, even though Aubrey couldn't understand him, he couldn't stand him anymore either. The phone left the butcher's hand, smashing through Elias' window, followed by the butcher himself. Elias reacted immediately, jumping back defensively, drawing his femur from his leg, shaping it into a sword. "You got to Midas first, huh? That sucks, but at I can get a cool revenge story now." He then drew his ribcage from his chest, shaping it into a buckler. He threw himself at Aubrey, buckler down, sword up, and Aubrey retaliated by grabbing Elias by the neck. Elias kicked at him, bashed his arm with his buckler

He reminds me of Roadhog from Overwatch. LOL

Moving onto the character itself, don't colour me all too impressed. I liked Elias for the fresh angle it was coming from, though I understand if you weren't too pleased with writing him.

That being said, expect to get bored of this one too rather soon. The written word doesn't lend itself too much to visceral displays of violence.

Don't have time for a full critique so if you want one you'll have to hit me up when I'm back.

Quote from Azarel CS.777

He reminds me of Roadhog from Overwatch. LOL

I assume the word "pig" in his name and the hook in his equipment?

Anyway, Aubrey looks like an... interesting character to say the least. His equipment's certainly interesting and his ability is pretty unique, but I do have some random questions regarding a few things. I haven't read the demo or story yet, so forgive me and just let me know if I can find the answers there.

First, what exactly is the rot attached to his body composed of? Is it meat, vegetables, trash, or possibly a combination of things?

Also, how do Aubrey and his flies fare against fire? I know you mentioned the elements in your weaknesses section, but is his armor easily combustible? Is he a bug paper's wet dream? Can he be "washed" of his defenses? Just wondering some specifics.

You stated that the flies closest to his body are fairly normal, but does that mean he can summon "special" flies or simply other species of flies. I only ask because there are some pretty nasty flies out there.

You said he's by no means slow, but I assume that means he has average to above average speed and agility?

...I think those are my only questions. Again, sorry if these are already answered in the thread. I'm still reading, but these crossed my mind as I was going over the abilities and such.

Quote from Vern

expect to get bored of this one too rather soon.

edit: wait no you missed just a few. the mallet is in both the first and the second game, it's what Martin uses to kill the second teenager on the first floor in midnight animal. the saw is Alex Davis/Swan 1's weapon. the flies are in reference to the flies buzzing about in the nightmare sequences in hotline 1.

moving on. aubrey is a character i've sort of written in the past. i love writing a killer, and i've written a few killers in the past, one being a nameless butcher that ran around in a cow mask killing people that bought his goods. that and HLM were my main inspirations going into this character. the demo itself is pretty bare-bones, but i plan on going deep into what makes aubrey tick with each fight. the angle i plan on going for is less tied to the visceral violence of aubrey's murders, but rather behind the killer's mask. more and more will come to light as i write him, and i hope to god i dont get bored of him any time soon.

onto Kamiroo Wolf's questions.

First, what exactly is the rot attached to his body composed of? Is it meat, vegetables, trash, or possibly a combination of things?

the rot on aubrey's body is his own decomposing flesh.

Also, how do Aubrey and his flies fare against fire? I know you mentioned the elements in your weaknesses section, but is his armor easily combustible? Is he a bug paper's wet dream? Can he be "washed" of his defenses? Just wondering some specifics.

aubrey burns at a slower rate compared to most humans, but most bugs, especially flies, do not fare well against fire, so yes. fire is a big counter.

bug paper wouldn't affect aubrey either, and he would generally try to make the flies avoid it as well.

aubrey's defense can't necessarily be "washed", per se, but it can be whittled down or abused.

You stated that the flies closest to his body are fairly normal, but does that mean he can summon "special" flies or simply other species of flies. I only ask because there are some pretty nasty flies out there.

the flies he summons are all "normal", but the things they do are things most flies don't do. burrowing into human flesh, attacking in swarms, etc.

You said he's by no means slow, but I assume that means he has average to above average speed and agility?

he has an average walk/run speed, but his swings are fairly heavy-handed. he doesn't really dodge much, but he will move around to protect himself and cover any openings.

thanks for giving me some questions and cnc

As a shift supervisor at a Panera Bread, where turning off a sink with your hand instead of paper towel is a critical violation during a food safety audit, the fact that this guy has his own store is incredibly amusing to me!

Always neat to see another villain!

Quote from Crank

As a shift supervisor at a Panera Bread, where turning of a sink with your hand instead of paper towel is a critical violation during a food safety audit, the fact that this guy has his own store is incredibly amusing to me!

Always neat to see another villain!

Thanks, Crank! Thanks for all the help in the discord, too.

Quote from Kamiroo Wolf

I assume the word "pig" in his name and the hook in his equipment?

Yes, and aso because his slow attacks. I just read his demo: It's terrifying.

This is the type of character I instinctively want to kill.

Well done!

Why so I think a battle between Aubrey and The Handyman will be interesting. VERY interesting.

I have more questions about his store:

How does it operate? If he only speaks Russian, are his choice cuts and menu in the language as well? Does he sell it personally? Like, does he operate his own cash register? If not, does his staff know about his practices? If it is just him, is there an online option? Or do you need to go there? Do they deliver? Does he deliver it? Can he communicate with English speaking customers? Or is that a requirement to buy from him

Thanks!

Quote from Crank

I have more questions about his store:

How does it operate? If he only speaks Russian, are his choice cuts and menu in the language as well? Does he sell it personally? Like, does he operate his own cash register? If not, does his staff know about his practices? If it is just him, is there an online option? Or do you need to go there? Do they deliver? Does he deliver it? Can he communicate with English speaking customers? Or is that a requirement to buy from him

Thanks!

Aubrey's store is self-run. He has no other staff, and he doesn't get many outside customers considering his reputation of being a "hyper-nationalist". All of his cuts on the board are in Russian. No other language is displayed anywhere. They do not deliver, and there is no online store. It's all very poor business practice, really. The foreign customers he does have usually come in with phone translators and have the prices jacked up on them, but none have denied that the meat he sells is delicious. They haven't found anything like it in grocery stores or supermarkets yet. He manages to make a profit because of this reputation, and despite him hating every second of it, he can relish in the fact that he has almost an entire neighborhood in Sierra Pines hooked on human flesh.

Concerning his own appearance, during work he wears a long sleeve shirt to cover his gross, rot-covered arms. Flies are common in butcheries as well, so they don't seem out of place to anyone. Lastly, all of his tools and hooks and everything both in the store and in his bag are kept surprisingly clean. The back area is hardly ever covered in dirt or grime. The front also has a Russian flag inside the store, and a radio playing all sorts of 20th century Russian music (avant-garde, "pop", jazz, even some older classical pieces) is on the counter next to the register. If anyone were to ask you what Aubrey is like, they'd just tell you that he's "some racist Russian butcher" or something of the like.

Going by the demo, human is advertised as pork?

Quote from Crank

Going by the demo, human is advertised as pork?

Yep! Aubrey sells cuts of pork, bacon, sausage, pulled pork, and just about anything else that is pork related. Except it's human.

Wait. Does he sell any actual pork?