Doss

"Doss"

- introducing himself.

About
Doss is the twin brother of Wass and one half of an infamous bandit duo that became active in the Free Cities Alliance during the RA Era.

The sons of a woman who had been captured by a group of bandits as a sex slave, Doss and Wass lost their mother at an early age and were abandoned on the streets of a shantytown. Forced to fend for themselves, the brothers resorted to crime for survival, and committed offenses both large and small for the sake of being able to continue living. The two gained considerable notoriety among bandit circles as they grew older, with their imposing strength and stature making them highly sought after as subordinates. This fame did not earn them further respect or companionship, however, as the people around them merely viewed them as disposable tools to assist in advancing their own selfish goals. Having spent almost their entire lives with only each other to rely on, the brothers quietly resigned themselves to this empty and pitiless existence and diligently followed whatever orders were given to them.

In the year RA0015, Doss and Wass were betrayed by their comrades and framed for committing treasonous acts against their bandit group. As punishment, the pair were sentenced to a sky burial, a traditional form of execution used by bandits in which a person's body is chained to a rock and left to be gradually eaten alive by carrion birds. Despite their innocence, the brothers made no attempt at objecting their guilt and passively braced themselves for death.

During the events of Rance X: Part 2, Doss and Wass were encountered by El Mofus, a fledgling adventurer who had left their home just days before on a quest to defeat the Demon King Rance. While El showed interest in the brothers' condition, they were advised to ignore them by their traveling companion Nagata-kun, who was wary of getting involved with bandits. As the two began leaving, Doss weakly called out to them for help, seemingly entirely on impulse. His cry reached El's ears, causing them to stop and contemplate whether to assist the two bandits.

If El chooses to free Doss and Wass from the rock they are chained to, the two are overcome by gratitude at being shown compassion by another but are unable to articulate their feelings due to their poor communicative abilities. Their silence irritates the suspicious Nagata-kun, who reveals El's status as a child of the Demon King on a quest to defeat their father in an effort to intimidate them. This information inspires the brothers to repay El's kindness by accompanying them on their journey, lending their strength to the young adventurer as a means of expressing their profound debt to them.

After pledging their loyalty to El, Doss and Wass begin to silently follow behind them at all times. Though their presence at first frightens Nagata-kun, who remains suspicious of their true intentions, they quickly prove themselves to be invaluable allies by carrying the party's luggage and coming to El's aid whenever they are in danger. As the adventure continues, the group travels all across The Continent recruiting the aid of El's siblings in preparation for the battle against the Demon King. Though they rarely participate in the increasingly lively conversations held by the rest of the party as it grows in size, Doss and Wass nonetheless become a valued part of the group as dependable bodyguards that will always put their lives on the line for the sake of their companions.

The party's travels eventually led it to Rising Dragon Mountain, the site of Demon King Rance's residence of Amazing Castle. After numerous grueling battles, they eventually reached the Demon King's lair and confronted him in battle, only to be faced with the cruel reality needed to defeat him. With all other options exhausted, the mages Shizuka Masou and Nagi su Ragarl chose to offer their wounded bodies to Rance to buy their companions time to escape.

Upon escaping from the mountain, the party was transported to Rance Castle, the former headquarters of humanity during the 2nd Dark Lord War, to regroup. While the exhausted group at first planned to abandon its efforts to subdue Rance, their spirits were soon reinvigorated by El, who resolved to defeat their father no matter what. To assist them in gathering the strength needed to defeat the Demon King, several of the Continent's most legendary heroes are called to train the party, in the process significantly improving their abilities. After completing the training, the party is given a final test by the famed adventurer Arms Arc to search the world for the numerous powerful weapons and armor she had hidden throughout it, dividing them up into groups of two to three using a special item that matches a person to those they are most fond of to complete the task more quickly.

If Doss and Wass are recognized as El's "Best Friends" during this event, they will accompany them on their portion of the treasure hunt. The trio travels to Hanny in the Sky, a skybound settlement that serves as a paradise for all Haniwa. There, they will meet the Hanny King, fight either the Dark Lord Masuzoe or Kawazoe, and find the rare items that were hidden by Arms. If Doss and Wass are not El's "Best Friends", they will instead be partnered with each other and the full extent of their portion of the adventure will not be shown.

After completing the treasure hunt, the El Party regathers in Rance Castle stronger than ever and prepares for its second attempt at facing the Demon King. On the eve of the final battle, Reset Kalar, the oldest of El's sisters, proposes that the party takes a relaxing trip to a hot spring before returning to Rising Dragon Mountain. If Doss and Wass are El's "Best Friends" during the hot spring trip, they will approach them during the night after the rest of the party has gone to bed for a final heart to heart. Confiding in El for the first time since their journey began, the brothers reveal their past and proclaim the great happiness they have felt by traveling with them, the first person to ever treat them with warmth. El responds by asking the two to stay be their side after the adventure had finished, which they react to with surprise. After a moment of contemplation, the twins agree to remain with El even after repaying their debt, declaring the time they spent with them to have been the happiest of their lives.

The next morning, the El Party resumed its mission to defeat the Demon King, fighting through waves of his Monster servants once more to reach his whereabouts. While their improved equipment and abilities allowed them to fight more formidably against the Demon King, however, they were still incapable of matching him until his concentration was momentarily shaken by the sight of his frozen slave Sill Plain during the battle, creating a window of opportunity for Reset to slap him and restore his sanity through the power of her Hand of Klausen.

After freeing Rance's mind, the party took part in one final battle against the corrupted entity known as the Blood Memories, which manifested after the unexpected appearance of the Great Beast Quelplan in the Demon King's domain and its even more unexpected absorption of the Demon King's blood after it consumed Rance's body. During the battle, the Blood Memories took the form of every Demon King in history, forcing the party to face eight of the strongest beings to ever walk the Continent. After a long and climactic confrontation, the group managed to come out victorious, destroying the sinful existence and erasing the Demon King System for good.

Some time after the defeat of the Blood Memories, the El Party disbands, now having completed its mission. If Doss and Wass are recognized as El's "Best Friends", they will accompany them back to their home of Tridashita village with the intention of accompanying them on further adventures. After arriving at the village, Doss and Wass rent a room at a local inn, providing El with the time to reunite with their mother Crook Mofus. If Doss and Wass are not recognized as El's "Best Friends", they will instead depart from the party alongside Nagata-kun and Rocky Bank upon reaching the Free Cities Alliance, where they will thank El for a final time for all that they had done before making their exit.

If El chooses not to assist Doss and Wass during their first encounter, the brothers will remain chained to a rock seemingly condemned to death, and are never seen or heard from again.

Personality and Appearance
Doss is a very large man with a muscular build and a hard-lined, intimidating face that lacks eyebrows. Compared to his twin brother Wass, he possesses light brown skin and blonde hair styled into a small mohawk, and has a slightly shorter, stockier physique and broader, less focused-looking features. Doss' clothing consists of a leather shoulder guard worn on his right arm, an iron chain worn on his left, iron wrist guards, and cloth wrappings tied around his lower torso. He does not cover the top half of his body, exposing an intricate tribal tattoo along his pectorals that extends to the left side of his face, arm, and abdomen.

Like his brother, Doss is a silent and reticent man who prefers to express his feelings through actions rather than words. He has very little agency of his own, having been brought up in a trade that enforced the notion that he was an expendable object into his mind, and almost never interjects with his own opinions during conversation. His ability to communicate verbally has suffered in turn, causing him to speak in a simplistic manner and make drawn out pauses between his words. Beneath this inarticulate surface beats a compassionate heart with an endless capacity for loyalty, as he will unhesitatingly devote his entire being toward repaying the gratitude of those that treat him and his twin with kindness. This loyalty is displayed both on the battlefield, where he will valiantly intercept enemy attacks with his own body to protect his allies, and off, where he will gently carry the bodies of his sleeping companions to allow them time to rest during a long journey.

The sole friend that Doss has had throughout much of his life is his twin brother Wass, who he shares a very close bond with. The two have had to look out for each other with the understanding that no one else would since early childhood, and as such are able to understand the other's thoughts and feelings without needing to exchange words. While neither brother speaks very often, Doss is the less talkative one overall and seems to have a more limited vocabulary than Wass, leading him to allow his twin to speak on his behalf on most occasions. Despite this, Doss also appears to be the more emotionally dominant half of the duo, and is generally the one to voice their feelings during moments of great personal importance, such as when calling out to El for help during their first meeting or when offering a sincere thanks to El for all that they had done for them. This relative impulsiveness extends to his sense of self-preservation, as he has made it his personal vow to sacrifice his life to protect his teammates should they ever find themselves in a situation where escape is not an option.

Doss and Wass develop a deep and immediate devotion to El Mofus if the latter chooses to save them from their execution during their first encounter. As the brothers had lived their lives prior to meeting El believing that the world viewed them as being unworthy care or affection, the simple act of consideration that El displayed by freeing them from their prison fills them with a sense of warmth that neither had ever experienced before. To repay El's generosity, the two pledge their lives to serving them and accompany them on their journey to defeat the Demon King. Though Doss and Wass are steadily outpaced by El and their siblings in terms of strength and fighting ability as their adventure progresses, they remain vigilant about ensuring the rest of the party's safety at all times, even jumping in the way of the Great Beast Quelplan to protect them from being harmed. Over time, the feeling of indebtedness that the brothers have toward El grows into one of friendship as they are able to live with a sense of purpose and belonging for the first time ever, a sentiment that they profess to El at the end of their travels together. If allowed to continue being with El even after fulfilling their debt, the brothers are momentarily taken aback by emotion before happily agreeing to spend time with them as friends rather than servants.

Abilities
A powerful warrior who tempered his skills across a lifetime living as a bandit, Doss is an exceptional individual with a great deal of innate talent. He has a naturally large and well-built body that makes him excel at both giving and receiving damage, making him well-suited for battle. By the time of his first meeting with El Mofus, he had reached the very high Level of 53, which he is capable of increasing to a final value of 57 after being recruited by them. While such a Level Cap would ordinarily place Doss among the top percentile of Human combatants on the Continent, he is largely overshadowed as a specimen by Rance's Children, who possess no level caps as a genetic trait and are thus theoretically able to grow infinitely stronger. Doss himself admits this late into the party's adventure to defeat the Demon King, where he confesses to not be useful for much more than carrying luggage by that point in the journey.

In combat, Doss utilizes a large club to clobber his enemies. His fighting style is far more offensively oriented when compared to his brother's, relying on striking at his foes either several times consecutively or by concentrating all of his strength to deliver a single devastating blow. Contrary to his aggressive approach to fighting, he possesses the Guard Lv1 Skill Level, granting him an exceptional amount of potential for defending others. While Doss displays this defensive prowess many times as an ally, utilizing his large body to protect his comrades, he does not have any usable skills in gameplay that reflect it.

Trivia

 * Doss' name is derived from DOS, the acronym used to refer to the Microsoft Disk Operating System. MS-DOS and its workalikes served as the operating system for the majority of Alicesoft's early game titles, including the first four games in the Rance Series. Doss being the less erudite between himself and his brother is likely in reference to the Disk Operating System being a lower-powered and more primitive OS than the Windows Operating Systems that succeeded it.
 * Doss' character card in Rance X is affiliated with the Leazas faction. This is assumed to be solely for gameplay purposes, as the character is not suggested to be affiliated with the country in any other context.