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ASUKA R. KREUTZ

Introduction

This is my page dedicated to Asuka R. Kreutz aka That Man from Guilty Gear! I, uh, ended up getting a little out of hand with this, but I consider this page my love letter to him.

Asuka is the main antagonist of Guilty Gear, though he's not actually that bad a guy... if you ignore the war crimes, anyway.

Official profile

For the longest time Asuka didn't actually have an official profile due to him not actually being playable and confined to the lore only, but after finally being added to the game for the series' 25th anniversary we have something!!

Character bio:

PRAYING FOR THE ACCUMULATION OF GOODWILL
MASTER OF SORCERY

He stands at the pinnacle even among the company of generally highly capable magic wielders. He is both a scientist and also unparalleled in his mastery of magic – what one would call a genius.

Although he is generally polite and humble, he often finds even his carefully considered statements can result in discord.

In contrast to his intellectual capabilities, he severely lacks in stamina, with the slightest exercise tiring him out.

Any physically straining tasks are handled by custom-made bits of his.

Asuka continues to transmit “clear numbers” from space, in the hopes of bringing peace to Earth.

Profile:

Height: 5'5 (167 cm) Weight: 128 lbs (58 kg) Blood Type: Currently AB (for the 5th time)
Birth Date: November 10
Hobbies: Making buckwheat noodles in a Rube Goldberg machine, bonsai (specialising in succulents)
Values: Sol, Aria
Dislikes: Chaos
Affiliation: None
Weapon: Magic

Themes:

"The Man" from Guilty Gear 2: Overture
"The Gravity" from Guilty Gear Strive

Pre-Strive story overview this post:

He worked as a researcher on the Gear Project with Sol and Aria, and was a close friend to them.
Seeking extra time to find a method to cure Aria of her deadly illness and for her to live together with Sol once she’s been cured, he transplanted them both with Gear cells. After some time, the military began intervening with his research.
Wanting to avoid Gears being used by the military, Asuka developed the ultimate Gear “Justice,” who could command all other Gears, with Aria as the body.
However, Justice went berserk due to interference by the Universal Will, which sought to destroy humanity.
Thus began the Crusades. Asuka became known as the Gear Maker, and was labeled the devil responsible for the misery that followed.
He concealed his face and real name for a long time, but he showed himself after defeating the Universal Will with everyone.
He then surrendered himself to the United States, attracting attention from all over the world.

"Wow Nyar, tell me more!"

That's just what I wanted to hear, babygirl. Let's get into the story:

Story

(NOTE: I'm gonna write this assuming you have at least some knowledge of Guilty Gear lore)

While Guilty Gear takes place in the 2180s, Asuka actually originates back to our era -- it's not stated what year he was born, but it is known that in at least 2014-2016 he was working on the "Gear Project" alongside his best friends and colleagues, Frederick Bulsara and Aria Hale. Asuka is the lead on the project, and the aim is to essentially create a magical cure for human illness, in the form of something known as "Gear cells."

Near the completion of the research, Asuka decides to turn over his research to the state with the terms that it will 1) further peace in the world, 2) everyone involved in the research must have their physical and financial well-being guaranteed, 3) current staff will keep their jobs and receive a budget increase, and 4) these terms must become publicly known as a protection. Guess how this turns out.

Things go awry, and it becomes known that Aria has a terminal illness herself threatening to take her life. Against her wishes Asuka decides on the genius idea to cryofreeze her until a cure can be found, and he imbues Frederick with Gear cells in order to artificially prolong his life long enough to see that day. As per the events of Guilty Gear Begin, a hostile military takeover of the project is done, and despite his prior requests for his work to be used for world peace, he decides to stick with the project til the end as it becomes used for weapons research. Asuka betrays Frederick, and later uses Aria as a base for Justice, the first complete commander Gear.

In 2074*, a deployment of Justice is done, and when the Universal Will threatens to manifest over Japan, Asuka issues the command to forcefully have Justice vaporise the country, reducing it into a gigantic crater for the rest of the series. This unsurprisingly causes irreparable trauma to Aria, and Justice goes bazonkers as a result, leading into the devastating 100 year war known as the Crusades.

* (A flashback in Sign chapter 4 lists the year as 2074, but an exposition dump in chapter 6 lists the year as 2073)

A lot of Asuka's backstory is left vague aside from this, really the only other things that are known are that he was once a student of The Original, hence his magical talent.

After this, Asuka becomes known as a war criminal and just kinda fucks off, abandoning his own sense of identity and just becomes a mysterious figure known as "That Man" or "the Gear Maker" who observes the world and occasionally influences events with the help of his servants: I-No, Raven, and later Jack-O' as well.

FUTURE ME REVISE LATER PLEASE

To add: brief overview of GG Overture story, idk if it's worth touching on Xrd. That shit is FREE

Personality

Asuka's an interesting character -- he has the build-up of being this evil scientist and fabled mage who destroyed the world, yet any other character who meets him realises, "hey, this guy's actually not that bad" and feels he doesn't live up to the reputation of world's most heinous war criminal.

Despite his menacing reputation, Asuka's actually quite polite and calm. His ultimate desire for the world is peace for everyone, and he has messianic disposition as a result. He considers the destruction of Japan a necessary evil, and the Crusades an unfortunate byproduct of his actions -- when asked about the Crusades in Strive, he regards himself as a "bystander" as opposed to having a direct connection to it. However, when Axl asks in Xrd if Asuka was responsible for the Crusades, he does say yes.

Asuka considers himself a saviour to those around him, from his friends to his servants, and believes he knows what's best for them. He goes against Aria's wishes because he believes he has the best solution, despite desecrating her memory and traumatising her past the point of no return. He admits to feeling he's failed I-No when she decides to walk her own path in Strive, and even once the story's over he still believes that he needs to protect humanity and do his best for world peace.

However, he's actually very awkward and unsociable, and he himself admits to being a pushover who just does what everyone else wants and not deciding anything for himself. He has problems with communication and conveying his feelings, which he acknowledges, and overall he's very self-conscious of his faults -- later to the point of self-deprecation, referring to himself as a "pathetic, ineffectual nerd" and believing himself to be unlikeable. Hell, his whole arcade mode is based around his own damn clone telling him to grow a pair and better himself.

The core motivation for everything he does is actually the sake of his friends over the sake of the world. It's even stated on his profile that what matters the most to him are Frederick and Aria, despite their complicated histories and Asuka acknowledging that he's ruined their lives. In this regard he has a strange, almost obsessive one-sided relationship with Frederick, where he states that he's fine with being hated as long as they can still have a connection.

Overall he's a funny little guy, I always call him my little "autism king" bc really... HE IS. He has a fixation on math and numbers, and he believes that by sharing his numbers with the world (statistics acquired through the Tome of Origin) it will bring about world peace... somehow. If anything he's very misguided, even if he has some good ideas.

So, what's the deal with Asuka R♯?

I'm SO glad you asked. Strive actually did something interesting when they made him playable -- the "main" Asuka for the DLC is R#, who isn't actually the original Asuka, but rather a clone made by him for unspecified "selfish reasons."

This is R#, with the red colour scheme:

And this is actual Asuka, now with a blue colour scheme:

R# isn't actually a 1:1 clone of the original Asuka as he was "accidentally" given a modified personality, making him more of a distinctive character. However, this isn't really explicit unless you go through the arcade mode.

In comparison to the original Asuka, more confident, open with his emotions, and overall he seems to be more reflective of what Asuka wishes he could be. He openly states that he likes himself and wishes to exist, which is in direct contrast to how self-deprecating Asuka acts post-Strive.

For simplicity's sake I'll treat R# as an extension of the original Asuka, but at the same I time I really do consider him a seperate character and he deserves his own page at some point...

Side notes regarding the colours thing, bc it's something people doubt for whatever reason:

  1. In the trailer it introduces the blue colour scheme as Kreutz and red as R#

  2. Asuka's arcade mode locks you into using Kreutz as colour 2

Asuka's charcter page for Strive Asuka's character introduction in Japanese Asuka's character introduction in English Asuka's page on Dustloop
"Isotope and Isolation" from the Overture Material Collection, translated by Sol Radguy
Guilty Gear Begin translation by Sol Radguy

Game theories and headcanons

Ah... this is my specialty. I could go on forever about these.

Asuka is GAY AS FUCK

FACT that I learned from Daisuke Ishiwatari himself: Asuka is BIG GAY HOMOSEXUAL GAY

Asuka: Still, I'm delighted. Just as I thought, you're only thinking of me. Asuka: I thought that if he hated me... Frederick and I could keep our connection.

He is INCOMPREHENSIBLY gay for Frederick, and the one thing Strive did right was make it so blatantly obvious that even complete normies who've seen the Strive story mode joke about it. Asuka devoted his whole life to bringing back Aria because he wanted Frederick to be happy.

Also… have you seen the one Rev2 after story with Raven…? Man…

Asuka and R#

I have so much to say on R# that I ended up making a second page just for him. :3

See here: [[Asuka R. Sharp]]

Gear Project era

Gearpro era has been touched on a decent amount in canon, but we still don’t have many details tbh.

From what we know:

I’d like to present my little diagram that I made after they showed the GG World preview for Strive and I got mad that they wrote that Asuka was just “colleagues” with Frederick and Aria — THEY WERE HIS BEST FRIENDS!! HE RUINED THE ENTIRE WORLD FOR THEM!!! FUCKKKK

Asuka and the Original

The Tome of Origin and Asuka’s intentions

This is less vague now that he has his arcade story,

So, why do you like him?

Because I wanna have raw, visceral sex with him. Next question please!

Jokes aside (though I do mean that), not to seem like a cringe lord, but he really is my everything. He's weirdly relatable, he's cute as hell, intriguing as a character, and, uh, he has a very high amount of very sexual-sounding voicelines for whatever reason (like for real, go listen to his Overture and Strive files). Not to be gay but I love him wholeheartedly, he motivates me and gives me something to be passionate about.

I've been an Asuka truther since a friend got me into Xrd, and hilariously I've actually made some extremely valuable personal connections with others due to this (if you're reading this, you know who you are). Usually I don't get involved with fandoms, but I definitely don't regret taking a chance here.

And some final fun facts:

And... that's all I've got for you

Well, not really. I'm actually an avid fic writer, and if you care for some reason, feel free to browse through my works (though a lot of it is drafts I could never bring myself to finish).

So, here’s some personal favourite fics of mine:

Special thanks: