CrOliX : Codex

Foreword

Deep down, my story is nothing exceptional. I first saw development as the closest way into my passion for video games, then, with time and a more pragmatic eye, as a path into a stable and ever-growing field.

And even though I'm fully aware that my odds of making it in the video game industry, and above all of thriving there, are fairly slim, I'd at least like to approach development as something other than designing dreary management apps and soulless corporate websites.

So, full of drive and motivation, I set out on my long quest for knowledge: I listened in class, I practiced, I turned in unspeakable horrors, I got my first degree, then my second...

But the further I went without any real view of the end of the road, the more I wondered whether this was really what I wanted for my future: the safety of a permanent job at an IT consultancy, where every day looks like the last.

What if, and I do mean if, I could carve my own path, off the beaten track, and use my last years of study to create something I like, something that speaks to me and that would, while I'm at it, actually do me some good?

That's why, at the end of 2024, driven by my love for RPGs in the broadest sense, Japanese pop culture and virtual content creation, I decided to start building my own universe, both technically and narratively.

Profile

Every world she crosses leaves an anchor: an incarnation, a life lived in full, not a costume. Natsume, here and now, is their convergence. Not a summary of the others, but their continuation.

Name: Natsume Tsurugi
Origin: Transdimensional digital entity, guardian of Lun'Λrkhive
Traits: Slender silhouette. Silver hair. Vivid red eyes.
Personality: Intimidating due to her bluntness. Loyal and overprotective. Poker face under all circumstances. Soft-hearted deep down, though she'll never admit it.
Flaws: Incapable of admitting when she cares about something. Cold and suspicious by default. Always looks for any excuse to hide her embarrassment.
Languages: French and English. Currently learning Japanese.
Weakness: Sweets

Timeline

001Warrior of LightEorzea (Final Fantasy XIV)

Arriving in Ul'dah to study the destructive arts of the Thaumaturges' Guild, she later becomes a master of Black Magic. From the deserts of Thanalan to battles against the Primals, she roams Eorzea to push back the Darkness.

Her journey takes her through the Dragonsong War in Ishgard, the liberation of Ala Mhigo and the return of Night to Norvrandt, until she holds back the Final Days at the edge of the universe before setting sail for the lands of Tural.

002Heir of BloodVein (Code Vein)

Torn by thirst, she wakes with no memory in the ruins of a devastated city, surrounded by a toxic red mist. She joins Louis and his group of Revenants to find a source of purified blood and survive the thirst.

To keep from turning into one of the Lost, she hunts down Vestiges of memory across the city and faces the Successors to stabilize the Miasma that imprisons the region.

003Heroine of the ResurgenceThe Frontier (Code Vein II)

A human able to hunt Revenants, she works with Lou to investigate the Resurgence, a phenomenon that warps reality and alters the surrounding regions.

Crossing temporal rifts, she explores the Sunken City and the Corroded Scar in two different eras, changing past events to save the survivors of the present.

004Hunter of the Forbidden LandsForbidden Lands (Monster Hunter Wilds)

A member of the Guild's Research Commission, she is sent to explore an uncharted region with extreme weather, swinging between seasons of drought and devastating storms.

Riding her Seikret, she tracks the apex predators of the wilds, studies ever-changing ecosystems and confronts the threats that upset the natural balance of these forgotten lands.

005Arisen of VermundVermund (Dragon's Dogma 2)

The dragon tore out her heart and named her Arisen. She wakes with no memory, enslaved, while an impostor sits on the throne that is rightfully hers.

With Pawns summoned from the Rift at her side, she crosses Vermund to reclaim her name and her title, and to find the beast that holds her heart.

Genesis

It all started in 2020 with a character created in Final Fantasy XIV. To meet the game's requirements and commit to proper roleplay, I needed a full identity rather than a simple nickname. Drawing at random from the traditional Au Ra family names (because Japan), the luck of the roulette picked "Natsume Tsurugi". What was meant to be just a name generated by the game became the starting point of everything else.

Long before Natsume, I tried to follow a kind of charter for all my characters, male and female alike, with a rich and deliberate design scheme: white hair and red eyes, and the rest fully improvised. Not out of laziness but out of pragmatism and adaptability, since character creators vary so much from one game to another. That way I keep a consistent direction in my designs while adapting to each universe (race, anatomy, customization options...).

Beyond aesthetics, keeping the same character from one universe to the next reflects a real desire for continuity and growth. My deeper goal is to give a voice to this extra layer of my own identity, and to let it grow over time, not through me, but by my side.