Xantho Ricionzo

"To judge strength is to test trust. Once we open our eyes to the limit, ask yourselves: Are we the real monsters?"

- Xantho Ricionzo

Xantho Ricionzo is the leader of Team XANE and the main protagonist of the upcoming fan-fiction novella, ''Team XANE: Clear Colors. ''His ace weapons are Dual-Mechanized Cane-Gunners (DMCG) known as Immitisoul and Asperage.

Appearance
Xantho is a young man with pale skin of papaya whip complexion, maize-colored eyes, and phthalo green hair with several white strands that are hereditary.

He primarily wears a monochromatic hunter green Barong Tagalog, a type of traditional Filipino clothing. Embroidered behind it is his emblem: a brow-like feather covering half a circle, forming some sort of glare. Under the clothing his white shirt, and a pair of vambraces and rerebraces for his arms for protection. He also wears a pair of black slacks, each leg covering his weapons from underneath: Immitisoul on the left leg and Asperage on the right.

He always has eyebags due to lack of sleep and is occasionally seen without them.

The only accessories he wears are his silver watch on his left wrist and a yellow scarf around his neck, which conceals a mole.

Personality
Xantho is mostly serious and austere, yet coolheaded and polite. As an introvert, he finds tranquility in solitude and silence, but keeps in touch with his best friend Mavin Emmerich and his sister Amara. In his free time when alone, he writes stories and reads books, or sometimes sing when feeling emotional. However, Xantho comes out of hiding when he sees or hears strong Huntsmen and Huntresses, making no hesitation to challenge them to prove both his and their worth, as he additionally says his opening remarks before battle: “Apologies, but I must judge thee.” Despite this, Xantho seem to have no intentions of bragging and just evaluates his opponent’s performance while fighting, although this often came off as mockery or sarcasm to them, and him being called out as "prideful".

He strives to train hard as a future Huntsman, but is involuntarily more sided as an intellectual. Xantho always carries with him a different book every now and then as he read them. His thirst for knowledge based on his curiosity leads him to sleepless nights (and weird antics), resulting in his usual eye bags. He is quite irritable with people who do not take things seriously or study well, like how he nags Amara to read books. During a fight, Xantho catalogues everything about his opponents from weapons they used to skills they possess, all in which he used to his advantage, then jots down what he learns from them afterwards.

Despite Xantho’s negative nature, it is merely a façade to cover his sensitive side as he often views this as “weakness”, unless he is with someone whom he can trust. An example of his warm side is his duty as Amara’s big brother, being overly protective of her to the extent he keeps tabs of her movements.

Related to his love for animals, Xantho admires the Faunus. And, to the majority of the people around him in surprise, he is compassionate towards the creatures of Grimm. If unable to stop a dispute between Grimm and their opponents, Xantho usually stops this using Dust—mostly ice Dust. Despite his intolerance towards killing the Grimm, he gives a number of chances towards anyone who killed one, though out of self-defense isn’t counted. When it becomes mindless slaying or out of pleasure, he shows no mercy to the perpetrators. Moreover, he expresses grief whenever he must absolutely and necessarily kill a Grimm.

Even if Xantho mellows down into a more positive person, he still keeps some of his negative traits for he believes they are still helpful. Despite his serious demeanor, he does not lack eccentricity since childhood. He is described as a hopeless romantic sometimes, and seems to fluster whenever he meets a girl whom he can relate in terms of likes and character, although he mostly admires those with "good hearts". However, he tends to hide this all the time.

History
When Xantho was 11, his sister Amara decided to stay with their relatives in Vacuo along with the family heirloom—the Wing Adarna—with her. Thus, he was left alone without a friend, and temporarily with jealousy due to her having the heirloom in which he believed was supposed to be rightfully his. Without her, Xantho was exposed to bullies in school because of his "weirdness". Fortunately, he met Mavin Emmerich, a new classmate hailed from Mistral. Together, they became best friends as they can relate in terms of “weird”. Despite having a new friend, Xantho was still bullied, therefore concluding to himself that he needed to be stronger and smarter. This led to him studying and topping his classes, but still felt weak.

One night, Xantho and Mavin were biking peacefully when a dog barked at them from a distance, then gave chase. The two biked desperately as their wheels smoked. Xantho’s feet was nearly bitten in the process but kicked the dog away while peddling. When they lost the dog, Xantho developed a phobia for dogs.

Xantho and Mavin and the rest of their class were taken to Signal Academy for a field trip. There, the two witnessed how students were trained for combat and forged their own weapons. They were also given the chance to watch a match between two Huntsmen who were teachers in the school. After watching the fight, Xantho was motivated to become a Huntsman, as he saw this as a way of towering against his weaknesses.

[To be updated]

Abilities and Powers
Xantho’s main offensive play is his kick-based fighting abilities during close combat, like Karate and Tae-Kwon-Do. He executes breakdance-like power movements often to recover footing. Additionally, he uses soccer moves to counter anything considered a projectile item. Despite having an array of kicking techniques, his defensiveness is more impressive, most probably using this to either wear down his opponents or analyze their fighting prowess. Xantho not only uses his arms to defend but also his large hands in number of ways, such as stopping his opponent’s attacks to retaliate and pushing them away by the chest to open up options while temporarily distanced. His favorite move is the front leg axe kick he personally calls the "Gavel".

Weapons
Strapped around both his legs from left to right under his slacks are his two weapons: Immitisoul and Asperage (simply shortened as Imas or Asim), invented by Xantho’s best friend, Mavin. They are rectangular in shape that lengthens from his foot to his knee. Both are positioned specifically—Immitisoul is on the left side of the left leg and Asperage is on the right side of the right leg. Each are attached with special synthetic "canes" that serve as the weapons’ activation for firing, and holding Xantho’s rounds of “Calibullets” and Dust.

Imas is defaulted to use Calibullets and are fired similarly as Yang Xiao Long’s Ember Celica. However, Xantho can control his Aura to send signals to his two weapons to use a variety of Dust, each cane having long rotary chambers that contain limited amount of "Dust bullets", much like Weiss Schnee's Myrtenaster. These Dust bullets are utilized in two ways: 1) Xantho can launch them with kicks, then they slowly lit and explode on contact; 2) and ready them for an enhanced kick. He can also use the Dust to stomp the ground and create a column of fire or freeze the floor, at the cost of how many capsules used.

Whether Imas runs out of ammo or not, Xantho can optionally resort to ejecting the synthetic canes (often by kicking his legs out), both extend themselves (27" in length, 3/4" in diameter and rounded in both ends), and fight with them. If the canes still contain any bullets especially Dust, Xantho can still use his aura to use what type.

Semblance
Ever since his very first encounter with a Grimm, Xantho possesses the Semblance called “Grimm Whisperer”. With this, he can calm any Grimm either looking them in the eyes or shouting a stop-like command (i.e. "Halt!" or "Hold it!"). Moreover, he can communicate and read the thoughts of these monsters, and ask for their assistance, although he always tells them to flee afterwards. This ability is fueled by the positivity he held in his Aura. However, such enigmatic Semblance has its fair share of drawbacks.

First and utmost, Xantho’s Semblance will fail if the Grimm senses any negativity within him, such as killing tendencies or depression, or when a source of negativity nearby is too great. Moreover, this Semblance is less likely used whenever Xantho is in any non-Grimm areas. Xantho can also stop a group of Grimm, but a massive number would unfortunately overwhelm him. If he succeeds otherwise, this results to greater fatigue, or most probably faint.

Weaknesses
Despite having a calm composure, even the most coolheaded ones can have limits. In this case, Xantho's weaknesses are psychological. Bringing up the worst parts of Xantho’s past instantly snaps him to anger. Continuously mocking that piece of past until he goes into a blinding fury loses his way of focus and thinking, including in battle. At this rate, he is more vulnerable to critical hits. However, one must be cautious against a furious Xantho. Once he reaches his emotional limit, he breaks down into tears, followed by extreme fatigue that prevents him from further fighting, and exposing himself to easy defeat. Likewise, deaths of Grimm at a huge number put him at a great disadvantage.

Trivia

 * Xantho alludes to the Philippine national hero, José Rizal.
 * While his first name is from the Greek word xanthos (ξανθος) literally meaning "yellow", Xantho's surname is a portmanteau of the Spanish words ricial and name alonzo. Ricial means "green fields", which connects to how Xantho loves nature, including green fields. Alonzo means "eager for battle" and German for "ready for a fight", which shows his attitude of battling worthy opponents. The Spanish word and name are both related to Rizal's full name—José Protasio Rizal Mercado y Alonso Realonda.
 * The Xantho Trailer displayed references related to José Rizal. One notably is how Xantho was about to get killed by Cochach's men as a firing squad, which is similar to how the national hero was executed by the Spaniards. Xantho saying "Touch me not" is translated in Latin as "Noli me tangere", the name of one of Rizal's famous novels. Finally, Xantho shouting "It is unfinished!" was a reference to Rizal's last words before his execution, except it was the opposite—"It is finished!
 * Xantho possesses qualities that reflect that of Rizal's, such as being an animal lover, actor, bookworm, historian, phythophiliac, poet, peacemaker (between Grimm and humans) and novelist.
 * His surname was originally "Ricial", until I found out someone's OC already took it. It is unknown whether the creator would continue on her OC. If not, it is fine. Xantho's surname is already meaningful enough.
 * When Xantho uses his canes in combat, he uses the Arnis (or Eskrima or Kali), a martial art and national sport of the Philippines. The weapons he use is similar to the baston, the primary tool for arnis. Their length and diameter are shaped typically to how the baston are made with rattan, a common material used to make them.