Ran

Ran
Created by	Azulookami
Designed by	CursedMarked
Species	Canine
Gender	Male
Occupation	Captain of the Guards
Desires	Domination Pup Play Musk

Ran is the Captain of the Guards in the visual novel GameOver. A true commander in body and spirit, he will not allow any backtalk or disobedience. He keeps an iron grip over the guards and maintains order in the Barracks and the town as a whole. He has one Bad End to discover.

Questlines

Getting The Captain's Approval

Upon first encountering you, Ran seeks to kick you out as an unknown townsfolk bothering the guards. But he quickly recognizes you, seemingly by your scent, as the new traveler from outside who has been getting particularly close to Garius. He demands you explain how you go through the forest, threatening incarceration if you fail to be forthright. You don't have much to say, but it's enough to prove that you aren't the other traveler who arrived under suspicious circumstances. He decides he can make use of you and says you're not allowed to leave town and, as of this moment, you count as a recruit in training.

Not one for unproductive chatting, Ran currently has no conversational scenes, but does have specific commands he'll allow after requirements with other characters are met. Your interactions with him while patrolling are somewhat flirtatious, especially if musk is unlocked as a trait. After meeting Iron and have patrolled at least once with Ran, you can get permission from him to train with the guards. Similarly, after you've lost to Iron in a fight, you can speak with Ran about the stallion's weird obsession with you. The Captain mentions that this has happened with a few people before, where Iron determined that they had some ability they weren't utilizing, and he tells you that you should become stronger to stay safe from Iron's attentions. He suggests getting some gym time in and learn how to grapple from Vic. Beating Iron will impress Ran enough for him to allow you to patrol with all the guards, with you having shown that you have the intellect to deal with problems.

Getting The Captain's Trust

If you go to patrol with Ran while having high lust and musk is unlocked, Ran will help you with your predicament, but threatens to give you training if you don't shape up. Repeating this scene several times will result in him following through with his warning and give you your first pup training in order to control your urges. After this point, further disobedience of having high lust will just repeat the prior training scene and regular patrols will be replaced with patrols as Ran's pup. Be careful of your own well being however or you will end up becoming his permanent pup recruit.

Proving yourself by helping out the investigations of others, including Crux and Kubas, and having been made a pup to prove your loyalty in an alternate timeline will impress Ran enough to have him choose to let you help him directly with investigations. He also gives you some background on the fighting in the northern forest and how it used to be in the southern forest and the town was used as a base for the demon cultists. Getting your agreement of silence, he explains that a major demon summoning was done by the cultists previously to grant themselves power and it was with the help of the mercenary troop that they were thwarted. A second attempt resulted in the town being caught up in the skirmish and being mostly destroyed. The rebuilding had only been accomplished recently and, yet again, the cultists have started up their efforts, hence the fighting in the north. Though it is unknown from where the cultists are basing their activities this time, which is precisely what Ran wants you to investigate. Before that though, he brings up his knowledge on the memories that he, Iron, and Kubas have of you for things that never happened. There is someone in town who might be able to help you figure out more on how this power works, but to meet him you first have to get closer to Mayor Sep. Furthermore, you have to gain Azlos' trust before he will also agree to take you to meet the person in question. Raising questions and confusion, Ran tells you that while he doesn't know exactly what's going on with you, you're not the first person to come to the town with such strange memory effects and also walked through the forest barrier unscathed.

Getting The Captain's Support

After having met Diakor and being told by him that Ran wants to speak with you, and having progressed Kubas' investigation enough to have informed him about nagas and their abilities, Ran will want your report from the Sovereign. If you have advanced your relationship with the dragon enough to have gone inside of him and become more his vessel, he'll speak directly to Ran with your body, otherwise he'll just tell you what to say. The Captain decides you are useful to take with the guards on patrol now and in their efforts to deal with the enemies powering the forest illusion barrier. He also plans on personally training you further, though in private, which Diakor mocks as useless keeping up of appearances and if he was the one training you, he's do it whenever and wherever he wanted. Though he notes that he should be careful in how he works through you, as his mark would much more alert those enemies around than the minor ones from demons you currently possess. His blessing, however, is outside of your personal control and can only be activated by the dragon himself through you.

Future interactions with Ran and other events require a closer connection with Diakor. When next patrolling with Ran, he will have you and your Sovereign inspect some tracks outside the south gate. Diakor confirms them as related to the nagas and suggests discussing with the centaurs what they've seen. If you are given a scroll, he will also be able to have you chart out the area. He is able to confirm that a male naga, seemingly without a female Seer, has been going through the area. You will be assigned to take care of the matter, though the taming of the naga wouldn't work out well if Diakor did it himself. So Shlar will need to be involved too.

Another patrol will have Diakor notice that some being around the town is trying to stay in slumber. He questions Ran on the details of the mysterious other person that arrived the same night you did and, while the details are different than what he expected, he claims to have an idea on whom the being is. He explains that it isn't a person, but a spirit of metal and the forge that likely came from the nearby cave. This doesn't mean it'll hang around the Blacksmith's though and instead will be waiting for the town to grow before revealing itself. Azlos can uncover him, but only under the right conditions, since doing so incorrectly could cause the spirit to go wild with flame and burn the town down. Diakor notes that the arrival of this spirit means the specialization of the town and what it will produce has been made and Ran approves.

A patrol of the North Gate has Diakor notice that your body has started to naturally incorporate some of his powers and that the proximity of the hidden forest glade and its affinity with your favored element, darkness, might be amplifying your abilities. You could likely gain more power yourself if you stayed there, but you wouldn't be able to leave again unless the glade's area of influence grew. It has only been halted now due to the involvement of the forest barrier. He informs Ran of all of this and says only those of a particular capability will be able to go to the glade. Either someone who has the high level magic of dispelling falsehoods, such as Jar, or one who would be invited by nature to enter, such as Shlar. Harold might be able to enter if he focused all of his magic onto that purpose, but his current focus is not amenable to that outcome. Ran decides to get Shlar to help Garius' goals within the glade, as the man-made location is the last gift from the previous alchemist and clearly something helpful in the town's defense was left there on purpose.