Rocky Bank

"Rocky Bank"

- enthusiastically doing his best.

About
Rocky Bank is a former non-magic using slave of the magic nation of Zeth and the self-appointed servant of the warrior Rance.

Born and raised as a slave, Rocky spent the majority of his life being sold from master to master. These owners varied wildly in terms of their treatment of Rocky, with one being kind enough to teach him how to read, a rare skill for the average slave to possess, while others were outright abusive towards him. At some point, Rocky was sold by his then current master to Zeth's secretary of education Radon Alphorne, where he was immediately pitted alongside dozens of other slaves to fight to the death in his arena. Rocky became the underling of Gian, the most powerful slave fighting in the arena, and continued to work under him as an errand boy for some time.

During the events of Rance VI, Rocky, after making one too many mistakes while serving him, was captured by Gian and his men to be executed. He was miraculously saved by Rance, who had recently been thrown into the slave arena by Radon Alphorne and was looking for a means of escaping when he happened upon Gian and his men about to execute him. Rance effortlessly killed Gian after he attempted to recruit him as an underling, unwittingly saving Rocky in the process. Not long after, Rocky began serving Suneo, another influential slave within the arena, where he continued to be abused due to his clumsiness. Suneo made an attempt to enter into a partnership with Rance, who had quickly made a name for himself as an incredible fighter, but was immediately killed by the brutal warrior. After being saved by him twice, Rocky determined that Rance was the person fated to be his master and begged him to allow him to act as his servant. As Rance hadn't intentionally tried to save Rocky on either occasion, he was somewhat confused by his proposal, but decided that Rocky would be fairly useful as a human shield and agreed to allow him to follow him around, deciding that he could simply kill him if he ever became too big of a nuisance.

Rocky continued to fight alongside Rance in the arena for some time until the duo was rescued by Abert Safety, who was scouting for potential recruits for Ice Flame. Abert became impressed by Rance's strength and offered him freedom from the arena as well as a beautiful woman to sleep with if he agreed to join Ice Flame. Unwilling to be separated from Rance, Rocky asked Abert if he could also become a member of Ice Flame, which Abert languidly agreed to. After the three successfully escaped from Radon's arena, both Rocky and Rance officially became members of Ice Flame. Not long after, Rance slaughtered the entirety of the White Corps, the division he was assigned to, after getting into an argument with his commanding officer. Recognizing his strength, Ice Flame's leader Urza Planeis created a new division of the organization for Rance to command known as the Green Corps, which Rocky was placed into.

Throughout Rance's adventure in Zeth, Rocky continued to loyally follow him to the best of his abilities, being the only member of the original Green Corps to remain a part of Rance's core team from beginning to end. Following the successful eradication of the Monster army that had invaded Zeth after the nation's national defense system the Maginot Line had been deactivated, Rocky initially intended to continue following Rance as his servant, but was unable to as Rance, along with Sill Plain and Copandon Dott, had escaped from the country during the ensuing confusion. Instead, Rocky remained a part of Ice Flame, where he assisted in rebuilding Zeth while also spending most of his free time playing with the children of Kimchi Drive's orphanage.

Rocky makes a small offscreen appearance during the events of Sengoku Rance, where he briefly has a conversation with Urza over a magic phone. Unused to advanced magic technology, Rocky is too amazed by the phone itself to speak to Urza for very long, but mentions that he is doing his best to help Kimchi with the orphanage.

Rocky appears again during the events of Rance Quest, where, after searching for him to no avail for several months, he is successfully reunited with Rance, who he intends to work for full time now that Zeth has become more stable. While Rance had initially completely forgotten who he was, he begrudgingly allows Rocky to continue following him. Despite this, Rance refuses to allow Rocky to live with him inside of Rance Castle, forcing Rocky to camp out on the outskirts of the area in hopes that Rance will someday allow him to enter the castle.

Personality and Appearance
Rocky is a very short man with a stocky and muscular build, fairly long and curly brown hair, and a very craggy face that is almost always in an upbeat smile. In a fairly disturbing contrast to his weathered appearance, he is actually very young, being only 14 years old during the events of Rance VI. His poor appearance relative to his age can likely be attributed to the harsh life he was forced to live as a slave within Zeth, causing him to look much older than he really is. Beyond his physical features, Rocky wears old, sturdy-looking light brown armor with a lightning bolt-shaped symbol on it at all times. Despite living a life of constant struggle, Rocky is an eternally optimistic person. Countless hardships have forced him to always look towards the positive side of things, allowing him to shrug off incredibly torturous misfortunes with a smile on his face and to become reduced to tears of joy at even the smallest good thing happening to him. He does not know how to live outside of serving others, and actively seeks out a master to serve when he is without one. As a result of this, he is extraordinarily kind, friendly and humble to everyone he meets regardless of how poorly they treat him, and becomes flustered and shy when praised.

Like most second class Zeth citizens, Rocky is a devout AL-ist, donating any extra money he has to his local Church as well as praying for mercy whenever he or someone else is going through extreme amounts of suffering. He expresses surprise when he learns that Rance does not practice AL-ism, but does not judge him, showing that he is considerably more open to outside worldviews when compared to other dedicated members of the religion.

Rocky has been devoted to serving under Rance after his life was saved by him twice. Rocky believes Rance to be the fated master who he was born to loyally serve under. Rocky expresses constant admiration towards Rance, and mentions several times that he has never been happier than when he is serving him. In sharp contrast to Rocky's reverence, however, Rance treats Rocky incredibly poorly, constantly insulting him, physically beating him and even making numerous attempts at killing him simply out of boredom or even annoyance. Despite this, Rance does seem to acknowledge that Rocky has a small amount of value as a lackey due to his ability to take attacks meant for him as well as handle menial labor, allowing him to serve under him despite his usual disgust towards working with men. As he has endured abusive and life-threatening treatment under previous masters, Rocky is exceptionally tolerant to Rance's generally poor treatment of him, much more so than the average person, allowing him to instantly recover from even his cruelest actions.

He has a strong friendship with Kaloria Cricket, who is around his age and has had a similarly rough life prior to meeting Rance. The two seem to spend the most time with each other out of all of the members of Ice Flame, and continued to work closely following the collapse of Zeth by helping Kimchi run her orphanage. From the instant he saw her, Rocky has been smitten with Kimchi Drive, the gentle owner of the orphanage located in the Ice Flame headquarters. Rocky finds Kimchi's kindness towards the children that she cares for incredibly moving, and is equally enchanted by her considerable beauty, to the point of becoming tongue-tied simply from being around her. Despite this, Rocky has agreed to bury these feelings within himself out of loyalty towards Rance, who told him to stay away from Kimchi at all costs. Nonetheless, the two remain close as Rocky constantly assists Kimchi around the orphanage, causing her to greatly appreciate him.

He gets along extremely well with the children of Kimchi's orphanage, whose experiences remind him of his own. The children admire him as a surrogate older brother, and treat him with a level of respect that is comparable to their treatment of Kimchi herself. Notably, he is the only man besides Rance who Afra Ray is comfortable being around, and while it required a large amount of work on Rance's part to earn Afra's trust, Rocky succeeded in gaining it almost instantly, further showcasing his skill with children.

Abilities
Rocky is statistically an unimpressive fighter. He possesses a Level Cap of 19 which, while sufficient enough to allow him some capability in combat, is far too low for him to truly stand as a fighter. His low strength is noted by Rance, who expresses surprise at his weakness, to the point of describing him as "completely worthless". Despite this, he possesses an above average amount of resilience that allows him to survive attacks that could kill most people, including falling from a cliff several miles in the air, making him fairly effective as a guard.

In combat, Rocky relies on an axe to battle his opponents, which he wields with a considerable amount of skill. His most iconic technique is known as "Boomerang Axe", wherein he throws his axe in a spinning arc, allowing him to hit distant opponents. Despite his talent, his small size results in his attacks being substantially weaker than they otherwise could be, making him generally hopeless offensively.

Rocky's true talent lies in his obscene determination. A survivalist above all else, Rocky's will to do his absolute best at all times has allowed him to accomplish things that a person of his ability should have no way of doing. His boundless desire to get stronger in order to better help his allies has earned him the favor of the Level God Star Lord, who periodically visits Rocky whenever he begins to lose faith in himself in order to inspire him to continue doing his best. Star Lord's visits always result in Rocky's level cap increasing by a substantial amount, an incredibly rare occurrence for a Human, resulting in him ending his adventures with a level cap as high as 59, giving him much greater potential than the vast majority of humanity and allowing him to continue to effectively fight alongside his more talented allies.

Trivia

 * During the opening sequence of Rance 5D, the name "Rocky" can be seen in Rance's party in the sole screenshot of the scrapped game Rance 5A. As the character is not participating in the battle and thus not visible in the screenshot, however, it is unknown if it was intended to be an early version of Rocky himself or simply an entirely different character with the same name.
 * In earlier drafts of Rance VI, Rocky was intended to become a girl after receiving his final level cap upgrade from Star Lord, who would karate chop his head in half to reveal a cute girl inside of it. Concept artwork exists of Rance inspecting the now female Rocky's crotch, suggesting that Rance was initially going to be capable of sleeping with him.
 * Concept artwork exists of him in the Rance IX Guide Book, suggesting that he was at some point intended to either serve as a party member or at the very least appear in the game.
 * Rocky came in 3rd place in the males category as well as 18th place in the most pitiably cute character category of the Rance Quest:Popularity Poll, making him a popular character with the fanbase.
 * His name is likely a pun on a riverbank, the sloping center of a body of water that is frequently lined with rocks.
 * He is to date the only male slave that Rance has had in the series.