Nolan Hyker

"Salt actually tastes very good to me. It's almost like eating medium-rare steak cooked on a low fire, except it's not, it's better! Whether it's salt from a salt shaker, a salt block, from the ocean, I will eat it! Most people think it's gross, and only use it for seasoning, but I've become, like, addicted to it. And I blame my mother, but oh well, who can blame me though."

- Nolan admiring his love for salt.

"And no, I'm not possessed or weird."

- Nolan

Nolan Hyker (ノーランハイカー Nōran Haikā) also know as The Salt Dragon (塩竜 Shio Ryū), is a Mage and a dragon slayer who was raised by Shio Shio (塩女王 Shio Joō lit. The Salt Queen), the one to also teach him Salt Dragon Slayer Magic. He was originally from Rose Village before uncertain events to which he left in order to avoid. Fourteen years later, he returned to a rebuilt Rose Village and joined the Sky Petal guild. From there he met Rhysand and Tsume Konokori on a job, convincing them both to join. In the end, all three ended up being a part of Sky Petal, jokingly calling their team, Triple Guy Team and it stuck.

They stuck together as a team for three years before Nolan suffered defeat at the hands of Amirah, a fellow dragon slayer and friend he had met during his travels. Vowing to get stronger, Nolan left his guild for a year to train and get stronger. When he returned, he and Amirah fought again, to which she commented that he could keep in par with her, and to keep training. Nolan decided against returning to his old guild, as he begun looking for a new start and decided to join the guild Koma Inu.

Appearance
Nolan is a lean, muscular young man of a height of 5'10" with a slightly golden skin tone, bluish-grey eyes, golden hair, some of which are spiky strands that jut upwards a little in the back, and with a long fringe down the left side of his face. Nolan has abnormal sharp canines and has also attained a scar from his second fight with Amirah, this one being a jagged blemish vertically on the left side of his collarbone. Nolan's previous guild mark was golden and located on his left bicep. His current one is now white and located in the same spot.

Nolan's outfit consists of a red and black striped shirt with a low v-shaped neckline with a gold trim, exposing a little bit of his upper chest and neck. Over that, Nolan wears a black, silver trimmed, high open-collared overcoat. Four silver buttons in the shape of a square are on the right side of his coat with a diamond and circle symbol on the left side, inscribed with some words around the inside of the circle. Two more silver circles rest on the collar of his jacket, the collar seeming to have three different folds. Nolan also wears a loose leather necklace with a single white feather pendant, seemingly a gift from his adoptive mother, Shio. He wears a pair of simple, loose, dark pants tucked inside laced boots.

After his year of training, Nolan is seen wearing bandages that cover his entire torso and chest with a white toga-like garb, that has a black draconian pattern that covers on-half of his body while the other half is exposed and wrapped in bandages. A light-colored sash is also tied around the upper part of the garb that streaks to the hip to go with one around his waist as well. On his left arm, he has an intricate tattoo from his shoulder to his wrist, although it's partially hidden by the bandages on his wrists. His hair is also lengthier and more spikier (although the spikes are mostly flattened downwards) reaching down to his shoulders. Over this, he also dons a white cloak.

However, after a couple of more months, right before he joins Koma Inu to get a new start, he gets a haircut back to his original style and discards the outfit in favor of his old one. Although he still wears the cloak from time to time, and keeps the bandages on both wrists, despite the tattoo being on one arm, and the rest of it still being visible. He also now sports a new scar; a jagged one on his opposite arm, stretching from his forearm and curving under his arm and stopping with the tip of it on top of his wrist.

Personality
Nolan is a very sharp individual. While he mostly goofs around and tends to not take most things seriously, Nolan is very observant and keen to predicting outcomes and solving puzzles. When he is often thinking hard about something, he comes off as aloof, which isn't the case at all. Nolan is a very friendly and accepting person, although he does hold his standards about who he interacts with. He's able to notice the difference between very well, and can mark the slightest changes in somebody or something, due to him being very perceptive.

Nolan tends to be very sociable and carefree when it comes to most everyday things, but he does take his responsibilities and the welfare of others seriously. Which leads to Nolan being optimistic most of the time, although he does tend to contemplate a lot. While he is very imaginative and loves to share his new ideas with others, he often likes to keep some thoughts to himself and is working on keeping a level head in high emotion running situations, as he tends to get upset in unnerving situations. But while he's not a stay-still kind of guy, Nolan is patient and tolerant of most things. Although Nolan can be very flighty and changeable, which is why he struggles with following tasks all the way through, and he can be chronically late or forgetful.

With things he holds a strong opinion in, he can be very steadfast, making him a steady and faithful friend and consistent with what he does, although if it's in his favor, he doesn't mind switching things up a bit for a bit of fun. Nolan is a curious one and he often gains interest when someone is excited by their own interst. He keep an open mind in order to experience everything. He can also be often clumsy. Nolan loves to spot patterns, going hand in hand with his observation skills. It makes it ironic that Nolan's words should always be taken with a grain of salt – but not because he is dishonest, Nolan tends to share thoughts that are not fully developed. This can often make him seem quite pensive, but Nolan is really quite relaxed and friendly with people he knows, and is always up for learning about other people and what they know.

While Nolan does like his space from time to time, he has stated before that he doesn't prefer it and would much rather be in the mix of a large group or scene. Which may be one of the reasons that Nolan gets distracted often. Due to his imaginative spirit, Nolan often times employs new and creative ways to use his magic, especially when against other opponents.

Salt Dragon Slayer Magic

 * Salt Dragon Slayer Magic (塩の滅竜魔法, Shio no Metsuryū Mahō): is a type of Dragon Slayer Magic, Caster Magic, and Lost Magic that allows its user to transform the physiology of their body, and gain the various characteristics, typical of a Salt Dragon. They also have an extreme weakness to water magic, but are resistant to fire and shadow magic. Consequently, this Magic allows the user to both produce and control salt from any part of their body, which can be used in both close and ranged combat to a great extent. A trait the Salt dragon slayer magic allows its user to do is consume salt to replenish their health or magic. However, they strictly can not eat their own magic. The generated salt can be manipulated in a wide variety of ways, their “type” can be changed at will, and they can even be given a material consistency. Such salt seems to have a “sharp” effect to it, seemingly causing bludgeoning damage while either blasting into people's eyes, mouths, and being able to form dagger and the like with the salt. Salt produced by this type of Magic provides much more damage if than standard salt if someone else some how ingests it, or gets it in their eyes. In addition, the user can consume external sources of salt to restore their body to a healthy state and regain their reserves of strength, something that also makes them immune to most types of salt, due to their capability of nullifying salt-based attacks by sucking them in and eating them; the consumed salt also seems to possess a different “taste” according to its “quality”.

Dragon Force

 * Dragon Force (竜の力 Ryū no chikara): greatly increases the damage done by standard Dragon Slayer spells, and grants Nolan access to more advanced, powerful attacks. It also drastically enhances his physical prowess, making him far stronger, more resistant to damage, and faster, and considerably boosts his overall Magic Power, which becomes visible, sometimes taking the appearance of a Dragon. When exuded at its fullest, said Magic Power takes on a violent corporeality, likely as a result of the immense amount of Magic power employed when Nolan entered this state through the use of Rhysand's Ether Salt, his salt magic gained the ability to burn off offending Magic, even that of cell eating magic like Necrosis. Those who have been taught their Magic by a real Dragon, certain conditions must be met in order to enter Dragon Force: the only one known so far would be to eat substances with powerful Magical properties, preferably those somehow related to the element they can control and consume; while other, unrelated substances can be eaten as well, these have been described as being similar to "poison" for the user, causing heavy after effects, such as pain on activation and extreme exhaustion after use. After Nolan returned from his year of training, he has been able to freely enter this form on will.

Salt Wind Dragon Mode

 * Salt Wind Dragon Mode (モード塩風竜 Mōdo Taiyō Kazeryū): After successfully eating wind or air, Nolan will enter Salt Wind Dragon Mode. In this form, the salt and wind will fuse and Nolan's attacks will possess the properties and destructive ability of both elements. And even more so since the wind is capable of blasting and controlling lots of amounts of salt while blasting targets at hurricane like speeds.

Supportive Slayer Magic

 * Salt Drive (塩・ドライブ Shio Doraibu): This move is used with caution as it takes a huge amount of magical energy in order to enhance the user's offensive attacks. It's where the user's magical energy is fused with their bloodstream and the adrenaline they're experiencing during combat. This in turn reacts with their own body and magical energy, increasing the Strength, Speed, and potential they possesses tenfold. Users enter a state of enhanced awareness and peak physical ability. While in this state, a Salt Dragon Slayer demonstrates heightened reflexes as it amplifies their salt dragon slayer magic without exhausting themselves. Visually, this causes a large amount of white energy to emit from all parts of their body.

Physical Attributes
Tremendous Strength: Nolan possess far greater strength than that of any human due to his dragon slayer training. Raw power like his is what enables Nolan to lift up and even throw things five times his size, impacting his targets with even more power. Nolan is able to incorporate such strength into his magic and deal deadly attacks to the point of bone breaking and sending people flying back a good distance. It has been shown that Nolan is capable of leveling small hills when he fights, such as once when he threw an opponent clear through a hill and out the other side. Nolan is able to punch through boulders and even steal with his magic just enhancing his abilities. Without his magic, Nolan is just as strong and can cause small fissures in the ground after impacting an opponent hard enough or throwing them to the ground with just as much ferocity. Nolan has been able to perform a number of physical feats that should be near impossible, among which are freely swinging around the trunk of a palm tree he personally broke, bare-handed, as a makeshift weapon, doing the same with a large boulder, shattering three houses straight as he used it as a bowling ball, and stopping a gargantuan beast's foot, which was going to crush him and his team members, all by himself, subsequently throwing the robotic like beast off balance by rapidly pushing it away. Furthermore, Nolan was capable of battling Amirah Radial the second time and being able to go on par with her, despite the former having hundreds of years of training, though even she didn't know it at the time.

Enhanced Smell: Nolan has a keen sense of smell, as with all dragon slayers, his is said to outrank that of even the most proficient hunting dogs. Not only is he a natural at detecting scents and finding things over a long distance, but Nolan has also been able to distinguish smells most would find all muddled together. He once was able track down four different people by approaching the cart they had been kidnapped in, scenting the whole thing, and then being able to detect four complete different pathways that they had gone down. But having perks like these also means that his nose is extremely sensitive, especially to bad smells such as when Rhysand hung his sweaty sock directly above Nolan while he was sleeping, he woke up in the span of second and proceeded to wash out his nose. After that, he refused to sleep in his room and opted for a tree instead while Rhysand called him dramatic. Later on, he claimed to still have the smell in his nose three days later.

Enhanced Hearing: Nolan has proven to have exceptionally good hearing, such as when he was able to hear a low conversation from the top seats in a game stadium, instantly becoming aware of how the game makers planned to unleash a non-domesticated taurin bull to kill the world champion bull rider. He immeadiately took action and released the bull on the game makers instead, replacing the bull with an actual one, preventing the champion's death in the process. Nolan has also proven himself to be able to hear through several buildings as he did when he eavesdropped on a mafia meeting from five buildings away.

Incredible Speed and Reflexes: No matter the opponent that Nolan is pitied against, he has extremely fast reflexes to keep him from death's clutches. He can put on quick bursts of speed to fly over short distances, doge close-range bullets and attacks, and he can shoot fast over long distances as well. And due to his strenuous training and his expertise in hand-to-hand combat, he is very strong in his punches and kicks. Because his kicks are so strong, his legs are as well, which further enhance his speed and swiftness. This allows his agility to be on par with that of three experienced speed magic users at once and still be able to outmatch them. Nolan's agility allows him to make fast and swift maneuvers, switching directions in the span of a second while running at high speed that would normally make anyone else undoubtedly slip or lose traction. Lots of times, he dashes out of the way of oncoming attacks, and with his speed, he can deliver multiple fast jabs and punches, which makes it super effective against a larger and slower enemy. Nolan's reflexes are greatly heightened, such as when he was able to feel the crackle in the air from a bullet and immediately dodge it without a second thought. Such reflexes make some people compare him to a monster since the way he dodges most things is considered inhumanly possible. Nolan has even had a dagger thrown at his back, to which he could feel the whiz of it cutting through the air, lean sideways, and catch it by the hilt. It was also shown when he and Takato were out searching for a missing girl and five people jumped out of a tree above, Nolan being able to quickly react within a moments notice and knock out three with just his hand while they were still falling out of the tree.

Immense Durability: Nolan has proven himself to be incredibly durable. He has managed to take continual, deadly assaults from foes and continue fighting. Such impressive resistance was first shown during his battle with Amirah, in which he received wounds from his opponent's immensely strong, hot, solar dragon magic, and kept fighting on, nonetheless, eventually ending up a tie. Also, during his fight with Silver, Nolan displayed a natural resistance against the Palingenesis' member's cell-breaking magic, described as lethal and immediately destructive. A true testament to his durability was shown when he blocked one of Amirah's strongest Solar Dusk attacks, Wing Flare, with two hands, not moving an inch, and emerged completely unscathed from the enormous explosion that followed the impact. Nolan has also shown little to no weariness despite using extremely powerful spells. After his year of training, Nolan was thrown through two buildings, but was still able to stand up with minor scratches and continue on fighting as if he was knocked to the ground backwards. He has also been able to withstand multiple large blasts and keeping consciousness through his sheer stubbornness.

Ways-Of-Combat
Master Hand-to-Hand Combatant: Nolan is an extremely proficient unarmed fighter, often using just his fists without heavily relying on his magic in order to defeat opponents. Even with employing his magic into his master combat strength, it deals great effects of massive damage, combined with his superior strength. Such skill is paired with amazing physical prowess: aside from his strength, Nolan has displayed high degrees of speed, agility and reflexes, enough for him to match melee-specialists of Mirajane's caliber in battle. He was once able to take a salt blast with just his bare hands and completely spin it around to directly attack his opponent instead of absorbing the attack like he could have. And not just salt, but he has been known to do this to other attacks as well, with just his bare hands. Nolan has a much more freestyle type of fighting but will try and aim for the vital points with heavy punches and kicks that he knows'll deal a lot of damage if not incapacitate his opponent.

Magical Abilities
Immense Magical Power: Nolan had already demonstrated time and time again his superior abilities when it comes to magical power. Especially as a dragon slayer, Nolan possess a far-more than normal amount of magical power, shown by the impressive hold he has naturally over the exterior of his magic, able to exert his auras to extreme means that lets everyone know and see the intensity of his magic, as well as be able to dull it down (contain it) enough to hold it in and keep people from noticing how much magic power he actually has. Nolan has actually proved such a fear several times when he's taken jobs with his old team and had to be stuck with collecting info. When Nolan's aura is released, the magical energy itself is a dazzling white, streaming in a large wave off of Nolan's body the more intensely he focuses his magic. Sometimes, when deeply, emotionally, upset, Nolan's aura takes the image of the Queen Salt Dragon which surrounds him, striking fear into his opponents hearts as they gaze upon the Salt Queen's glowing orange eyes. If Nolan focuses and concentrates hard enough, he is able to extend a partial bit of his magic in order to essentially give someone else a power-up boost, much akin to like an energy drink of sorts. It allowed Rhysand, who had depleted all of his magic energy while he was up against one hundred dark guild members. Rhysand was able to absorb only a little bit of Nolan's magic which was enough and enabled him to beat out the rest of the guild. However, this process is very taxing on Nolan's body, it just goes to show how much magic power he has and can still use. Also, due to Nolan's extensive training during his year off, Nolan has also managed to unlock his second origin, increasing his magic power by tenfold. With this new core unlocked, Nolan has come close to, but hasn't actually reached his limit yet with a worthy enough opponent.