Teseo "The Serial Experiment"

Teseo
Personal Information
Age	14
Height	165cm (5'5")
Origin	Korea
Status	Deceased
Classification	Adept
Septima	Hack the Planet
Affiliation	Eden
Appearances
Debut	Azure Striker Gunvolt 2
Games	Azure Striker Gunvolt 2 Mighty Gunvolt Burst
IRL
Voice Actor	Tomonori Ishihara
Created by	Inti Creates
Subpage

“O HAI NICE 2 MEET U BEEP-BOOP BOY. I'M TESEO, 1337 H4XOR EXTRAORDINAIRE! SPECIALIST IN MAKING YOU HAVE A BAD TIME!”
—Teseo , Mighty Gunvolt Burst

Teseo, "The Serial Experiment" also known in Japan as "Serial Experiment", Teseo (境界線上の電脳王 (シリアルエクスペリメント) テセオ, shiriaru exusuperimento Teseo; "Serial Experiment" translating to "The Boundary Lines' Cyber-King") is a member of Eden's The Seven and one of the antagonists of Azure Striker Gunvolt 2.

Teseo was formerly a contributor at a website that uploaded foreign movies, but joined Eden when the website was shut down, taking a fascination in their transmission equipment.

An eccentric person with a bizarre obsession with the internet, Teseo uses a lot of internet slang in his speech, a trait that tends to annoy everyone around him even when he doesn't intend to.

He has an affinity for the Hack the Planet Septima, which allows to take physical matter and turn it into computer data and vise versa.

Description

English Description

His “Hack the Planet” Septima allows him to take physical material and transform it into computer data, and conversely, take data and manifest it in the real world.

He was a former contributor at a website for uploading foreign movies, and once things went south for his beloved website he became fascinated by Eden’s transmission equipment and decided to join up with them.

He uses a lot of internet slang in his everyday speech, and irritates everyone around him every time he opens his mouth… he by no means does this intentionally.

Japanese Description

He’s a psychic with the “World Hack” ability that allows him to turn matter into data and, inversely, make data entities manifest themselves in reality. He used to be an uploader on an overseas video upload site, but his favorite site’s business worsened and it shut down.

As a result, he was attracted to Eden’s communication equipment and joined their activities.

He always uses a lot of net slang, and when he talks, his behavior makes his opponents get irritated at him, even though he doesn't intend to annoy them.

Appearance

Teseo is a young teenager with pale green hair, a thin ponytail and darker green eyes, with his bangs swept over his right eye. He wears a green zip-up jumper under a white coat, both of which have the sleeves rolled up, blue jeans, also rolled up, and black boots.

In his grimoired form, Teseo gains dark green hair with a long, thorny ponytail that ends in a drill-like spike, and black eyes with green irises with no pupils. He is covered in black and green armour, with particular emphasis on his lower body. His knees, feet, and elbows have dark green spikes. Teseo also wears a black crown that is lined with thorns.  

He is usually seen with multiple floating objects that resemble drawing pins, known as "Spinning Bits", the two largest of which serve as data terminals. 

Personality

Teseo is, at his core, an immature and provocative teenager. He's extremely eccentric and always shown to be in a good mood, always snarky and grinning whilst bantering with others. Teseo also seems to enjoy getting people angry, trying to get under Gunvolt's skin by mentioning Asimov.

He is also obsessed with internet culture, speaking in an near-unintelligble internet slang, references outdated memes and even uses hashtags in his words, the sum of which makes his behaviour akin to that of an internet troll. This manner of conduct, which most people assume is mocking, more often than not infuriates everyone Teseo is talking to. However, Teseo, in reality, is actually trying to cheer people up by entertaining them, albeit extremely poorly.

Teseo is also rather arrogant, taking great pride in his hacking skills and scoffing at the mere thought of someone better at him at it. At one point, he flat out declares himself a God. In fact, the only times where his net troll persona breaks down and he shows any genuine worry, horror, or shock is when someone beats him at something. In Armed Blue Gunvolt, when Merak beats him by sending him a virus, Teseo is left lost for words, and hurriedly claims credit for QUILL's attack. When he is beaten by Copen, he falls completely into utter despair, screaming in disbelief over his loss.

Plot

• Background
• Games
• Drama CDs

Originally from Korea, Teseo uploaded prank videos on a famous video site, resulting in a very loyal fanbase. However, as a result of increasing tension surrounding Adepts, the website was shut down.

With nothing to do, Teseo scanned the internet and stumbled upon Eden, which was improving its equipment to spy on the Sumeragi Group. He then decided to join as a system engineer for the fun of it. His contributions greatly improved Eden's technology, and he eventually became one of Eden's "bishops".

Before Eden's invasion of Japan, Teseo apparently played multiple pranks on the Sumeragi Group.

Azure Striker Gunvolt 2

Prologue

In the prologue, Teseo takes part in the kidnapping of Mytyl and the attack on the Sumeragi ship Seraph by attempting to drive it into a building. He gleefully observes Gunvolt with Tenjian as he makes his way though the ship, and later uses a Sumeragi weapon called the Plasma Legion to stop him from reaching the control room.

When GV does, Teseo uses his Septima to block him, so Gunvolt, using the Muse's power, with some unwitting help from Copen, pushes the ship away from it's target. Teseo later teleports Tenjian in to deal with Gunvolt and Copen, and retrieves him when he retrieves the mirror shards.

Gunvolt's Story

Data Facility (Virtuality)

Some time after the prologue, Teseo launches an attack on a large Sumeragi data facility and completely takes it over. Using his "Hack the Planet" Septima, he turns the building into a literal cyberspace. This catches the attention of Gunvolt and Xiao Wu, and the former goes to investigate.

Soon after Gunvolt arrives, Teseo hacks into his comlink, and from that point onwards proceeds to annoy everyone present with his never-ending slew of jeers and net slang. At one point, he asks Gunvolt if he and Quinn are friends or "friends" friends, and then asks for pictures. Later, he questions Gunvolt about Asimov, and asked if he really killed him.

Eventually, Gunvolt reaches Teseo and demands that he return his mirror shard. Teseo mockingly considers it, before using his grimoire to transform and attack Gunvolt. During the fight, he informs Gunvolt that he uploaded videos of Sumeragi's human experiments, turning the public against Sumeragi and turning Teseo into a hero, having started "#pulltheplug". He then reveals that he's livestreaming the entire fight, and that everyone wants Gunvolt dead. GV insists that a few followers ain't the world, but Teseo claims that internet IS the world. Gunvolt ignores him, and eventually Teseo is beaten and killed, with his mirror shard stolen.

The Garden 3 (Saviour)

At some point, a copy of Teseo, along with the rest of The Seven, is created by Zonda using her Mirror Septima. He, along with Tenjian, Gibril and Milas, await Gunvolt as he attempts to reach Zonda. When Gunvolt reaches Teseo, the latter calls him a stalker for coming to his house, and warns him that "Teseo 2.0" runs on much better "hardware". However, Teseo is beaten again, and Gunvolt moves on to Zonda.

Copen's Story

The Sewers (Forfeit)

After Copen defeats four members of The Seven, Teseo and fellow bishop Gibril kidnap Mytyl from her house and flee to the sewers. Furious, Copen tracks them down and demands that Mytyl be given to him. Teseo jokingly calls him "That Dude Who's In Love With His Sister", before joyfully informing him that he teleported her to the Garden, prompting Gibril to yell at him to shut up. Teseo pouts and calls her "tsundere", before leaving for her to deal with Copen.

The Garden 2 (Inferno)

As the last living member of The Seven, Teseo is sent to stop Copen, who has tracked down and broken into the Garden. When the Copen reaches him, he refers to Teseo as "you" (kisama, an extremely rude second-person pronoun in Japanese), to which Teseo responds that he has a name, proceeding to give a mini-speech about manners, much to Copen's chagrin. Teseo goes on to moan about humanity and how he can't live either with or without them, then immediately gets over it and attacks him.

During the fight, Teseo belittles Copen for coming in and destroying the Garden like a "primitive". Copen calls him a kidnapper in response, and Teseo asks him if he doesn't NOT think about his sister all the time. At that point, he notices Lola, and begs Copen for her A.I details, to which Copen threatens him, and swears not to even give him time to speak with God. Teseo then tells him that he doesn't pray to a God because he IS one. Disgusted, Copen finally lands a finishing blow.

Shocked and horrified that he's been beaten, Teseo, in a moment of disbelief and hatred, uses the last of his power to activate "it", before he dies. Copen then takes his mirror shard and moves on.

The Garden 3 (Saviour)

Zonda later summons an illusion of The Seven to aid her in her battle against Copen, Teseo among them.

Armed Blue Gunvolt

Track 2 - The Three

Teseo appears with Gibril preparing for the attack on Japan and, more specifically, the Sumeragi Group. Tenjian then arrives to make sure the two are ready, and they have a brief discussion on the nature of humanity, before moving to execute the plan.

Track 4 - Indolence, Memes and Meta

While Gibril duels with Sumeragi officer Jota, Teseo makes his way to the UTU Media Tower, but first dropping by the Subaquatic Base where Merak is overseeing the situation. Teseo proudly announces his arrival, and explains his septimal power after a surprised reaction from Merak. Merak, while at first laughing him off, finds Teseo already breaking through the server's security, then says that he's "more competent than he thought". Teseo remarks that Merak had better hurry before he breaks through all their security, to which Merak concurs, before stepping through a wormhole straight to the server room.

After thinking he had gotten away, Merak just briefly relaxes before Teseo himself teleports to where Merak is. Teseo excitedly asks Merak what he did, to which the latter responds that the former isn't the only one with Septimal powers. Merak remarks that he's in a hurry, but before he can leave, Teseo locks him in and tells him that "Super Teseo Time" is about to begin. He then summons the angel Ekoro from the game Gun Gal to deal with him, briefly and mildly impressing Merak, before he simply warps her away with his Wormhole Septima. Teseo reacts with violent shock, meanwhile Merak admits that if he keeps using his wormholes, that he won't hold up for much longer.

Track 6 - NO U

Teseo gets to the server room in the tower before Merak does. Merak comes to a stop, fooling Teseo into believing he has won, then relieves at the fact that he doesn't have to chase him around anymore. Merak tells Teseo that he came to "warn" him, by telling him that he had backtracked his IP Address and sent him a virus. Teseo laughs this off, calling Merak out on his bluff, before reluctantly checking and finding it to be true. Merak mocks him by saying that he had plenty of time to make a virus, since after all, he's a genius, and that his viruses are exceptionally nasty, telling Teseo that it might even spread to the rest of Eden's network if he doesn't take care of it. Fortunately for Teseo, QUILL chooses that moment to launch a cyber-attack by using a tangible trap. Teseo, in a ditch effort to save face, hurriedly claims credit for the attack, then quickly leaves before Merak can say any more; although the latter had already figured out that the trap wasn't Teseo's doing, as it wasn't the same as his previous modelling.

Paradise's Frantic Song

Teseo, alongside Ghauri and Milas, is mentioned to be on a mission during the events of the drama CD, and is thus absent from it's events. However, Zonda does mention that Teseo helped her come up with her plan to convert a young Adept found abandoned.

He provided the name for the plan, some resources and as well as the Lumen outfit Gibril gets to wear. He also makes an online album about Gibril wearing the outfit, to Gibril's dismay.

Lazy Kingdom

While Teseo makes no physical appearance in the drama CD, he is mentioned by Merak when he suspects that Teseo used his Septima to allow Elise's game avatar to use her Septima in the September Record game, commenting that "his hacking skills have improved".

Other Appearances

Mighty Gunvolt Burst

Teseo serves as the main antagonist of Mighty Gunvolt Burst. Using his Septima to take control of Professor White's VR training program, he traps Gunvolt and Beck within the digital world and uses digital copies of them to pit the heroes against the other Mighty Numbers and each other in hopes of streaming it live for views.

Teseo's plot is foiled when Gunvolt and Beck see through the ruse and team up, forcing the G7 member to face them himself using a giant robot modeled after himself. After an intense battle, Gunvolt and Beck managed to defeat Teseo, but the Serial Experiment escapes and decides to have the last laugh by resetting the VR training program to its factory settings, hoping to kill them both. However, thanks to Joule's Septima, Gunvolt and Beck manage to escape safely.

Teseo has two pixel stickers to collect as well; himself and his giant robot copy.

Powers and Abilities

As a human attuned to the Septimal stage of the Lifewave and a member of The Seven, Teseo is a powerful Adept who possess the Hack the Planet Septima, which, true to its name, allows him to manipulate computer data by turning computer data into physical matter and vice versa. In essence, this power gives him the ability to rewrite reality itself, potentially making Teseo one of the most powerful Adepts in the series.

The Septima is thought to belong to the same group as The Muse and Azure Thunderclap. By using this Septima, Teseo has access to a wide range of abilities, from turning areas into a physical cyberspace, to bringing even the most absurd fictional things, like Ekoro, into existence.

By turning himself and other people into data, he can teleport himself and others anywhere in the world he wants. Teseo can also pull off multiple hacking techniques with incredible ease, like hacking into a Sumeragi ships controls and controlling technology like Asroc and Gunvolt, but on a more powerful scale.

When he gains the power of The Muse, Teseo's power increases to the point where he can turn an entire building into a physical cyberspace, and can completely override the laws of physics themselves by doing things like linking the ceiling and floor.

In his Grimoired form, Teseo is able to levitate and fights with weapons called Spinning Bits, drones that resemble the spinning wheel of a sewing machine.

In battle, Teseo fights by using the two large shoulder Bits as computer terminals to direct the smaller bits to fight for him. He can toss his large shoulder Bits at enemies like a boomerang. He can use the Bits to utilize computer data for various offensive purposes like generating various enemies and objects such as Missiles and copies of Joule that drain Gunvolt's health on contact, firing massive torrents of data called Bug Death Lasers, and even switch his location with another to disorient opponents.

A specialty of his seems to be bombs, as he can create bombs with multiple different properties like firing lasers, draining his enemies heath, as well as the more traditional explosives, as seen in his Impregnable Fortress Special Skill.

Skills

EM Transfer

EMトランスファー

Teseo’s Septima materializes all kinds of weak foes, bombs, and the likes. Pay special attention to his “Curse Script”: It’ll drain GV’s health as time passes.

• Teseo will not create Curse Scripts if you play as Copen.
• Curse Scripts only last for a few seconds, and disappear immediately when Teseo initiates Bug Death Laser.
• Teseo's EM Transfer has only been observed to spawn Wheel Drones. He cannot spawn any other foe with this attack.
• The bombs made explode in a cross-shape, and can be destroyed.

Bug Death Laser

バグデスレーザー

Teseo teleports to the center of the arena and fires two lasers that rotate clockwise or counterclockwise. He also spawns 3-4 platforms in the air, which must be navigated to avoid the lasers.

Code Matrix

コードマトリクス

Missile attacks are generated by a spinning wheel bit. Then the wheels themselves fly across the battlefield. The missiles can be blocked via Flashfield, the bits cannot.

• 2nd phase onward, Teseo can toss his shoulder bits like boomerangs down his row during this attack.

Grid Raid

グリッドレイド

Teseo locks on to Gunvolt with a targeting reticule before rushing him with explosive data packets. A few seconds later, he and Teseo swap places.

• The packets can be blocked by Flashfield.
• Once the switch is made, the bits Teseo used to teleport will converge on you, dealing damage if you don't get out of the way.
• If Gunvolt and Teseo swap whilst the latter has been tagged, the tags will pass on to GV. If you use the Flashfield, Gunvolt will shock himself and take damage.
• Fun fact: holding off the packets until Teseo makes the switch will cause him to hit himself with the packets.

Circuit Rain

サーキットレイン

A data rain that pours from spinning wheel bits to attack. The pattern is always left, right, then both at once.

Impregnable Fortress

Impregnable Fortress

インプレグナブルフォートレス

"Let a voice cry out: /All Hail He Who Weaves The Code! /For his realm is sealed. Impregnable Fortress!"

Teseo's special move. He summons dozens of his spinning bits and makes a circle with them, with a small gap that allows the player to get in the circle. He then proceeds to spin the circle while dropping bombs inside. He will create four platforms on the sides of the arena, and fire multiple simultaneous Bug Death Lasers outward as he shrinks the circle.

He opens up the circle as he stops the lasers, but ends the attack with one more volley of bombs inward. Just keep your Flashfield up while inside the circle and you should be fine.

Quotes

• Azure Striker Gunvolt 2
• Mighty Gunvolt Burst

"GUNVOLTTTTTTT LOL! SORRY FOR HACKING INTO YOUR COMMS DUDE. #NOTSORRY"
—Teseo , hacking Gunvolt's commlink

"THEY lOOK ALMOST AS DUMB AS THE REAL THING DON'T THEY? ...PLZ RESPOND."
—Teseo , on his Muse copys.

"LET MY SONG B UR WINGZ GV!!!11 I LUV U GV! U R SO GRIMDARK! DAT PONY TAIL THO. WOW."
—Teseo , mocking Joule.

"I EXPOSED SUMERAGI PPL SO EVERYONE WILL THINK I'M RAD. THEN WHEN YOU ATTACK ME, PPL WILL THINK YOU'RE BAD! #GHAURI. FYI I'M STREAMING THIS. SAY HI. EVERYONE HATES YOU."
—Teseo , explaining his plan.

"HEY lOOK IT'S THAT DUDE WHO'S IN LOVE WITH HIS SISTER! SRY! ALREADY USED MY SEPTIMA "HACK THE PLANET" WEEKS AGO. THAT'S HOW WE SHIPPED HER OFF TO THE GARDEN! ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ "
—Teseo , teasing Copen.

"LOL WHY YOU MAD THO? AND ACTUALLY I DON'T PRAY TO A GOD BECAUSE I AM ONE."
—Teseo , boasting about his power

"I lost...? I... lost. Even with... the power to... rewrite reality itself...? Does not compute... there's no way... Hack The Planet... I won't... let it end... I used the last of my power... to put "it" into motion... But... it..."
—Teseo , in his dying moments.

"OOOK BOYZ, IT'S TIME TO STOP! LOLZ THX 4 ROUGHING EACH OTHER UP THO! I HAD A FRONT ROW SEAT FOR THE WHOLE BOUT! #VIPSECTION HAHAHAHAHA"
—Teseo , revealing himself

"GOT TONS OF NEW VIDZ TO UPLOAD NOW! AIN'T GOT TIME FOR YOU JOKERS. THESE ARE GONNA BE EPIC!"
—Teseo , mocking Gunvolt and Beck

"OH IT'S GV AND HIS TINY GF! WELCOME TO DIE! LOLZ. UR ON MR. TESEO'S WILD RIDE NOW KIDS HAHAHA"
—Teseo , greeting Gunvolt and Joule

"Y U NO LIKE ZA WARUDO HERE? HAHAHA OH! BUT THIS IDEA I HAVE DOH! HOW ABOUT DOING BATTLE AGAINST "YOU"?! KTHXBAI"
—Teseo , summoning Fake GV

"OH WOW YOU BEAT MY COPY-PASTE MONSTER! YER A WIZARD GV! THAT THING WAS TOTAL WEAKSAUCE THO HAHAHAHA"
—Teseo , after Fake GV's destruction

"BOOM! HERE COME THE COMMENTS! AWWWWWWWW YEAAAAAAAAAAAAA! TESEO PRESENTS THE HOTTEST NEW LET'S PLAY ON THE INTERNET! BEATING U LIVE IS GONNA BE LIT, FAM! HAHAHAHA"
—Teseo , starting his live stream

"YOU CELEBRATE TOO SOON, AND THAT'S NOOOOO GOOD... YA SEE, I DIDN'T LIKE HOW THINGS WERE GOING HERE SO I FIXED IT... BASICALLY, I JUST RESTORED THIS WORLD TO ITS FACTORY SETTINGS LOLZ. A WINNER IS TESEO. SMELL YA LATER, LOSERS! LOOOOL HAHAHAHA
—Teseo , after his defeat

Designer Comments

When working on his design, Teseo had no “personality setting” yet. Afterwards, I checked the submitted scenario and I felt that his design and personality had rather diverged. When I drew (new) illustrations I added factors like jagged teeth and a facial expression as if he mocked others. This allowed me to balance things.

(Hatakeyama Yoshitaka)

It needn’t be said, but… His motif is the thorn princess. But since the princess is sleeping then she can’t move at all… So in Teseo’s case I made the thorns look after cords and decided to proceed (designing) him as a boss carrying something big. After giving it some though like Merak and Stratos in the prequel, I submitted a draft I was given but, in the end, I settled down in a design with a spinning wheel, which felt like the thorn princess. When I came up with a draft in which he carried a bed, I thought that I might be a genius… But that wasn’t the case…

(Araki Munehiro)

Trivia

• The members of Eden are based off classical fairy tales and represent the pieces on a chess board. Teseo is based off Sleeping Beauty, and represents one of two bishops, the other being Gibril.
• Teseo is named after the TESEO variant of the Otomat missile, as the members of The Seven are named after missiles.
  • Milas is also named after a variant of the Otomat missile, though only in the English version.
• Teseo's dialogue is generally stylized in all caps (EXAMPLE).
• Teseo makes reference to multiple 2000's and 2010's memes, including those from (but not limited to) Harry Potter and JoJo's Bizarre Adventure.
• At the end of the Lazy Kingdom, though he is not explicitly named, it is heavily implied that Teseo was the one who allowed Elise to manifest her Septima within the MMORPG that she and Merak were playing on by using his Septimal power, Hack the Planet. Merak also comments that Teseo's hacking skills "have improved" after finding an email from him to Elise, suggesting that this takes place some time after the events of the Armed Blue Gunvolt drama CD.
• According to his Dengeki Nintendo profile, Teseo claims to be good friends with Asroc, something the latter strongly denies.
  • Concept art revealed the two also were meant to have very similar outfits.
• Teseo's "Hack the Planet" septima is a reference to the 1995 movie "Hackers", which features an unlicensed hacker TV show of the same name.
• Teseo's title of "The Serial Experiment" is a reference to this 1998 avant-garde anime series "Serial Experiment Lain", in which the titular protagonist also has computer data/internet related powers.
• Teseo's text that flies across the screen in Mighty Gunvolt Burst is a reference to Nico Nico video texts that fly by the screen.
• Teseo has a special laughing animation and audio that is only used if the player is killed, or is injured by his Grid Raid position swapping.

References

Japanese tweet regarding Teseo #1

Japanese tweet regarding Teseo #2

Japanese Version

“[Sad News] We must inform you of the end of Gunvolt… lol”
—Teseo, Japanese Quote ◆“The Boundary Lines’ Cyber King (Serial Experiment)” Teseo

See Also

Teseo "The Serial Experiment"/Gallery

Eden
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