Killua Zoldyck

Player Information

Name/Alias: Marvel
Player Journal: tinyangryblonds
Contact: blondandflannel | AIM: crownedcaduceus
Timezone: EST
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In-Game/Processing: N/A

Character Information

Name/Alias: Killua Zoldyck
Fandom: Hunter x Hunter
Canonpoint: After parting with Gon at the World Tree (his last appearance in canon).
Gender: Male
Age: 14. It's a little ambiguous in canon, but we know that 1) Killua is 12 at the time of the 287th Hunter Exam, and his birthday is in July, 2) the Hunter Exam takes place every year in January, and 3) his last appearance in canon is very shortly before the 289th Hunter Exam. Thus, two years have passed, and it is late in the year, so he would have turned 14 that past summer.

Physical Description: Killua is short and deceptively slender, with pale skin, messy white hair, and eyes (often described as "sharp" or "slanted" in canon) that range from bright blue to icy blue depending on lighting. His canon height is 5'2", but it's unclear exactly when in canon that describes, as he and Gon both grow over time. At this late canon point, though, it's probably safe to assume that he's somewhere between 5'2" and 5'4".

Image - Killua at the start of the series, age 12
Image - Killua in NGL, age 14
Image - Killua (right) just before parting with Gon, age 14

Killua changes outfits at least six times per arc. (Note: this may be a slight exaggeration. But seriously, he's fucking vain.) His taste seems to include dressing like he shops at Hot Topic.

I say he is deceptively slender because he tends to wear loose-fitting clothes and/or layers that obscure his body shape; when in peak physical form, he is actually scarily muscular, even though he doesn't look it to the average observer.

History: His entry on the HxH wiki can be found here. The background/plot sections are pretty complete, and decently reliable when it comes to the basic sequence of events.

Personality:

Killua is the third son of the Zoldyck family of elite assassins--and, according to his grandfather, the most naturally talented of them all, which is not a low bar. From a young age, he's been treated as the upcoming heir to his family's legacy. If this sounds like a good thing, it's not: most of his childhood consisted of intense and often brutal training, up to and including explicit torture to teach him resistance to pain as well as ensure his obedience to the family. Their goal was to turn him into the ultimate assassin: emotionless, cold, and ruthless.

Unfortunately, things didn't quite work as planned.

On the outside, it might seem as though their plan was successful, at least at the start: Killua is calculating, ruthless, and has no problem killing people to achieve his goals. In the beginning, he doesn't bother with most people, seeming to consider them wastes of time (though good for a laugh, if he can mess with them). During the Zoldyck Family arc, he barely even remembers Leorio and Kurapika's names, though he spent most of the Hunter Exam with them. He's also an arrogant jerk, regularly lording it over others how much more talented he is than a "normal" person

The inside, though, tells a very different story. Killua doesn't, truly, want to be an assassin at all--and, after turning twelve, he got up the guts to tell his family as much, resulting in a fight in which he stabbed his mother in the face and his brother in the side before fleeing home. What he really wants is to have friends and, in his own words, "to live a normal life." Due to this trait, his family considers him "mentally weak"--defective, even--and they've been trying to beat it out of him (literally and figuratively) for years, seeing it as a necessary step to unlocking his full potential. The fact that this never worked is a testament to just how deep his true emotions run. By the time he was twelve, he'd killed hundreds of people, maybe even more--and he was sick of it.

Meeting Gon was a major turning point in his life. Killua thinks of himself as essentially terrible, another side-effect of his upbringing: Illumi outright tells him that not only does he not need friends, someone "like him" (a killer) doesn't deserve them. Meanwhile, to Killua, Gon is like the incarnation of light (something Killua literally says in his mental narration)--and despite this, Gon likes him. Not only that, but the darkest parts of Killua don't phase Gon in the slightest; Killua rips out a man's heart in front of him and an hour later they're fooling around as normal. As an assassin, Killua was trained to be analyze people, to know a target better than they know themselves so he could accurate predict their movements. And yet Gon is totally unpredictable. It's, self-admittedly, Killua's favorite thing about him.

Additionally, Killua sees Gon (accurately) as a person who is full of wants: to become a Hunter, to find his father, to have adventures; the list goes on. Meanwhile, his own family, especially Illumi, would have him believe that he is incapable of truly wanting anything, insisting that he can only feel pleasure when people die. Though he knows he doesn't like killing people (most of the time), Killua even admits that the part about not wanting anything is mostly true. While he can think of several things he doesn't want to do (going back home and/or inheriting the family business topping the list), there's not a whole lot that he actively wants to do, either.

After meeting Gon, Killua finally has at least one thing that he wants: to stay by his best friend's side. Not that he'll readily admit this; he's tsundere mostly as a coping mechanism, as he's used to anything he admits to liking or wanting being immediately snatched away from him (note: the way Illumi threatened to kill Gon). Still, the levels of loyalty and devotion he feels toward Gon are, frankly, so intense as to be horribly unhealthy--something Killua himself even realizes, late in the series. He puts Gon on a pedestal: Gon is light, and Killua is darkness, and for a terrible person like himself to even be allowed in Gon's presence is something he cherishes.

Killua has some self-esteem issues, is basically what I'm getting at here.

If there is any emotion that rules Killua, it is fear. He was trained from a young age to never fight anyone stronger than him, which, once internalized, led to a tendency to avoid challenges and freeze up in the face of real threats. It also probably contributed to his incredibly advanced analytic and strategical skills: he is able to analyze the threat level of a given situation in seconds, and when working with Gon, he often takes the role of the strategist--not because Gon can't, but because Killua is the one who excels in analyzing both the short-term and the long-term consequences of a given action.

When Killua has a choice, he will always choose flight over fight unless he is 100% sure he can win. In later canon, this causes a major internal conflict for him, as his teacher warns him that if he doesn't learn to conquer his fear, he will one day abandon Gon to die--which is something he would never forgive himself for. Eventually, while fighting (and getting his ass kicked by) a Chimera Ant in order to protect Gon, he is able to overcome his fear long enough to realize that he's being controlled by one of Illumi's mind-control needles, which he promptly rips out of his forehead. After that, his anxieties are much less pronounced, and his confidence continues to grow.

Over time, starting at the beginning of canon, Killua slowly learns from Gon how to let the long-buried parts of himself show through. Together, they're playful and adventurous, competitive yet supportive, always pushing each other to be the best that they can be. Alongside Gon, Killua slowly begins making more friends, protecting those who are weaker, and selflessly helping others with their problems (see: Zushi in Heavens Arena, Kurapika in Yorknew, Ikalgo in the Chimera Ant arc... the list goes on). He begins to avoid killing, saving it for situations where there are no other options, even when it's inconvenient. If asked, he'd probably credit Gon with teaching him right from wrong, but in reality, it's more that Gon brought out the impulses that had always been there, just below the surface. After all, when Illumi causes him to have a breakdown at the end of the Hunter Exam, long before Gon has had much of a chance to work his magic, the person he snaps and kills is Bodoro--who was about to fight and possibly injure the less experienced Leorio, one of Gon's friends who had been kind to Killua.

By the time of the Chimera Ant arc, Killua is, at times, far more concerned with morality than Gon. It's Killua who comes up with the idea of trying to save the humans who are soon to undergo the selection process, and it's Killua who goes out of his way to help Ikalgo during their infiltration of the King's palace, becoming distracted from his own mission despite warning others against doing the same. And, again, it's Killua who tries to stop Gon from killing Pitou while she's trying to heal an innocent girl.

And unfortunately that's where everything starts to go to shit.

Gon accuses Killua of "having it easy" because their mission "means nothing to him," essentially echoing his family's words and reinforcing the idea that Killua is incapable of caring about anything. Killua's smart, and he knows Gon well enough to know, at least intellectually, that Gon's words were spoken out of anger and probably don't represent how Gon really feels. But Gon's opinion of him means more to him than anyone else's, and his words leave Killua badly shaken. Almost as badly shaken as the fact that the next time Killua sees him, Gon blows himself up.

Though Gon is healed fully from his would-otherwise-be-fatal injuries by a deus ex machina in the form of Killua's sister, their friendship is badly fractured. After two years together, Killua has become painfully aware of the problems in their friendship, and he has taken on a new responsibility: protecting his sister from the rest of their family. And so, the two part ways.

For this reason, a post-Chairman Election arc Killua is on unsteady ground. After relying on Gon for so long (and being relied on in turn), he's going out into the world as an independent person for the first time, trusting himself in a way he never could before. In many ways, he's still fundamentally flawed: rude, abrasive, possessive, moody, emotionally stunted... and that's just highlights. But he's also kind, loyal, and an overall positive force in the universe. Most importantly, he's learning, finding new confidence, and figuring out how to be himself--with or without Gon.

Until he ends up here, that is.

Abilities: People are capable of reaching physical levels in the Hunter x Hunter world that would be beyond impossible in ours, and even with that taken into account, Killua is exceptional. His abilities fall into three categories: basic abilities, assassin abilities, and Nen abilities. The word "Nen" refers to the manipulation of one's aura, and is essentially a blend of physical prowess and magical powers.

I apologize in advance for the length of this... While some of it may sound excessive, keep in mind that these kinds of abilities are relatively common in his universe, and many of the characters from his canon could still easily overpower him.

Basic Abilities

Enhanced Physical Capabilities: Learning Nen enhances one physically, but even before that, it's definitely safe to say that Killua has supernatural levels of strength (he is capable of moving 64 tons by the end of canon). He is also extremely fast, with very quick reflexes that allow him to grab fast-moving objects with ease. His coordination and balance allow him to stand up straight on the back of a galloping horse with absolutely no difficulty whatsoever, and he executes mid-air flips and turns in combat like it's nothing. He can run for hours without getting tired, can heal from serious injuries in just a few days, and is just generally difficult to put out of action.

Perception: Having been trained in tracking, surveillance, and other such skills... let's just say if he was a DnD character his spot/listen skills would be in the near-deity levels. It's basically impossible to escape his notice without using Nen.

Pain Resistance: During his upbringing, Killua was trained to be resistant to pain via regular torture. In canon, he is shown to endure hours of whipping without reacting in the slightest, even falling asleep at one point. It in canonly stated that he still feels the pain, he just has no particular need to react to it.

Electricity Resistance: Another effect of the torture-slash-training of his childhood: during the Heavens Arena arc, Killua is shown to be able to bear exposure to a current of one million volts. Once again, he still feels the pain, but he suffers no other symptoms from the shock: though there is a moment in which he pauses, presumably steeling himself, he doesn't even lose his footing, and subsequently defeats his opponent with ease. Later, he develops a Nen technique in which he converts his own aura into electricity, and he is able to essentially "charge himself up" in a pinch by grabbing onto the live wires inside a wall socket.

Poison Resistance: Killua has been trained (presumably via exposure) to be immune to most types of poison.

Yo-yos: Killua has special combat yo-yos. Yes, seriously. Don't laugh. They are specially made to be extremely heavy (50kg, or over 100 pounds) and effective long-range weapons.

Assassination Abilities

Claws: Killua can manipulate the anatomy of his hands, strengthening the muscles and elongating his fingernails into claws that are sharper than knives (he is able to decapitate someone or cut through their chest to rip out their heart with relative ease).

Stealth: As an assassin, Killua was heavily trained in stealth, stalking, and infiltration. In canon, even those with supernaturally good hearing are barely able to hear his footsteps, and it is very hard for targets to detect him.

Rhythm Echo: This is an assassination ability that involves walking in a certain rhythm, causing illusory copies of oneself to appear.

Nen Abilities

Basic Nen abilities include: moving one's aura around to guard against or enhance your own attacks, taking less or dealing more damage in the process; concealing one's presence by entering a state in which your aura is suppressed; and pooling aura around one's eyes, allowing you to see others' Nen or residual Nen on objects.

Additionally, Killua is a transmuter, which means he changes the properties of his aura to resemble something else: in his case, electricity. His uses this ability in various ways: to enhance his speed and reflexes, to shock opponents by touching them (or conducting electricity toward them through something else), and to shoot lightning bolts.

Samples

Dialogue: His thread with Gon on the Test Drive Meme.
Exposition/Introspection: Alluka’s breaths had evened out into the relaxed rhythm of sleep, but Killua was wide awake and staring at the ceiling of their dark hotel room. Arms crossed behind his head, he would have looked perfectly relaxed to an unfamiliar onlooker, but there was a lump in his throat that wouldn’t go away no matter how many times he swallowed around it.

Gon would have finished climbing the World Tree by now, he was sure. Lack of Nen wouldn’t stop him—wouldn’t even slow him down. Killua had seen him brave far more difficult challenges during the Hunter Exam, and that was two years ago, now; comparatively, they'd just been a couple of bratty kids with more attitude than brains. Killua grinned, but it faded quickly. Now, they were... something else. Barely teenagers, yet so much closer to adulthood than before.

Anyway, Gon losing his Nen would only put a damper on his fighting ability, not on anything else. He was just that kind of person.

Maybe… Killua thought of that night in the King’s palace, Gon’s aura leaking dark and angry from his twisted form, consumed with a rage that Killua couldn’t calm, a need for revenge that Killua couldn’t help him satiate. Maybe it was for the best.

Killua rolled over to face the wall. Years ago, having a huge hotel bed all to himself would’ve meant spreading his limbs out to all four corners, surrounding himself with candy wrappers and empty bags of junk food as he worked his way through the late night TV channels, and eventually passing out and drooling all over a pillow for fourteen uninterrupted hours

Now, it just felt empty. He and Gon had gotten used to sharing; it was cheaper, for one thing, and anyway, they were both boys, so it wasn’t weird. The lack of that familiar weight on the other side, balancing out his own, kept waking him up in the middle of the night. His eyes would snap open, searching the room for Gon’s profile, until he noticed the other bed with Alluka’s long hair spread out over the pillows. Then, he'd remember.

It made his chest feel tight every time, but he told himself he was getting used to it. He knew he could’ve asked Alluka, since they were siblings, but… no. They were getting too old for that, and Alluka was a girl; she needed her own bed.

Would Gon tell Ging about him, Killua wondered? It had only been a few months ago that he’d said it: that the first thing he’d do after meeting Ging would be to introduce him to Killua. Killua still flushed at the thought; Gon never thought about how things like that sounded.

They would always be friends. That’s what they’d promised. But things were different now, and if Killua had to guess… Gon probably wouldn’t mention him. He was meeting his father for the first time, after all; it wasn’t like they didn’t have plenty of other things to talk about. It was selfish for Killua to expect anything else. Stupid, even.

He rolled over in the other direction, smiling at Alluka’s sleeping face. His first priority was protecting her now, anyway. Even if he’d wanted to—even if Killua had wanted him to—Gon couldn’t have come with them. Not without his Nen. Killua couldn’t protect them both.

So much easier, to pretend that was the reason for their separation. To pretend that they'd never stood in that round, dark, desolate room, with Killua's eyes locked on the back of Gon's head as Gon refused to face him, speaking in a voice so cold that Killua's tears froze before they could fall.

When Killua closed his eyes, he could still feel the force of the explosion.