Oh my god...

Ooooh, interesting idea, I’d never considered that! Thinking about it now, I’m kinda going back and forth over whether he would wind up with it. I mean, he’s definitely done a lot of bad things/’commit sins’ that he doesn’t especially regret, but the Lockdown does kind of force him to re-examine himself and how he treats people. I don’t know if he’d qualify as ‘irredeemable’. (Plus I don’t know if they’d want to risk Naoya’s loyalty over it - the angels are corrupt and horrible, but not stupid.)

But assuming that Loki did wind up with the Brand... well, to start, if Naoya goes Law route, it’s after the angels have spent a week targeting his worst insecurities. Convinced him that not only is he a horrible murderer who did actually deserve every bad thing that ever happened to him, but also this is his one chance to save Abel, who’s been corrupted and turned to a self-destructive path and needs to be led back to good. So even though his gut reaction to seeing Loki with the Brand and being told it’s either execute him or let the angels do it would absolutely be ‘FUCK NO’, he’s already been made to think his sense of morality is warped and he can’t be trusted to do the right thing on his own. He won’t kill Loki, but he can’t convince the angels to spare him either if he’s already doubting himself. His hesitance shows. And probably hurts more than Loki expects.

That’s one of those things I deliberately decided not to address for the sake of not giving myself a headache, ha ha~

It’s probably best to think of it like this - in the original games, there’s Loki the character who has a human form and can act against you, but there’s also the Loki who can be a demon you summon for your team. The summon!Loki and character!Loki have the same demon form, but the former of course, has no influence on the actual story or what the latter does. You can even have the summon on your team while fighting him.

Naoya’s sprites from here.

For jormelkaze, short haired Naoya sprite sheet edit!