Profile

Appearance: Probably the biggest change is that Niou has learned a few tips and tricks from hair and makeup artists over the years; he looks more put together on a day to day basis, more photo-ready should anyone care to snap his picture. Despite what many believe, his ash blonde hair and bright blue eyes are naturally like that thanks to a melanin deficiency that runs in the family. He’s become somewhat well known for the rat tail hairstyle, though these days his hair is properly grown out to be longer - he simply styles it that way now. He oh-so-lovingly refers to it as “rattie.”

His eyeliner game is strong for it accentuates his pretty eyes and he is never without a spark of mischief that makes you wonder if you ever truly know what he’s thinking.

Personality: To tie down Niou is like herding cats. He’s mercurial and mischievous, and despite how many try to prove this wrong, he’s very particular with who he allows near his heart. As a result, there are very few people in the world who truly get to see Niou for who he really is, and really this suits him just fine. Those who are important know who they are.

He is very much about smoke and mirrors - never letting people know his true intentions or motivations. He enjoys watching the little cogs turn in people’s minds as they try to understand, and he does everything in such a disjointed manner that even the most intelligent of minds would become dizzy.

Biography: “The South” was about as specific as Niou would ever get about his hometown. People thought he said that to be mysterious or to keep an epic secret or simply because he was a pain in the ass. In reality, while yes it was all those things too, it was actually because he bounced between Kyushu and Shikoku as a kid. But, it did give him the excuse to fuck around with the dialects he spoke and the bemusement he received was entertaining as shit - misdirection, after all, was his forte.

It was his genius-like mathematical brain (and most certainly not the fantastic test scores) that got him into Rikkai, but he quickly made a name of himself as one of the star tennis players. School was never really a priority of him, passing certain subjects with ease and putting exactly zero effort into others, but just like the others of his year, tennis was his life. Ultimately, fourteen was a life altering year. His memories are a mixed bag, everything from euphoria to feeling like shit on the bottom of a shoe, and he never did quite recover emotionally from going through the experience with Yukimura. Somehow he was at the top of his tennis game, but he also neglected taking care of himself, never went home, and survived off barely nothing but convenience store bentou. Despite this, the growth he experienced far outweighed the shit, and ultimately in the end it was for the best even if the habit of wandering around like a stray cat never truly ebbed.

Since he didn’t have to bother with exams, he entered Rikkai’s University without any real direction for his studies. He joined a theatre class for shits and giggles because it would be an easy way to get some credits. When the class was approached about performing something for the school’s culture festival, while his classmates began excitedly preparing for all they could do, Niou decided to break off and do something on his own. Somehow, the school agreed - probably because they didn’t really know how else to respond.

He personally choreographed and wrote the song that he performed in front of the entire school, poking fun at a tennis match from that life altering third year paved way to the rest of his high performance tennis career. The crowd loved it - so much that he made a bit of a name for himself, and had the theatre department clambering to find a way they could incorporate his abilities into more school performances.

Not long after his second term at school had concluded, he was approached by a representative of Bang!Entertainment, who was very interested in seeing more. In a series of interesting encounters, interviews, and contracts, he found himself swept up in the entertainment industry. All the reasons why it was a terrible idea - he couldn’t sing, he had a terrible personality, his posture was terrible, amongst others - also became the reason people came to love it. Even so, nobody’s still quite sure what to call him - an idol, model (he’s game to do basically just about anything), an actor - other than by his stage name, “NI-OH.”

When the demands on him for work became a bit much, he fell just short of dropping out of school, switching to studies very part time so he could focus more seriously on what other possibilities he could explore to effectively paste his face across all of Tokyo.