Posts
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27
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Arcana
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XIII. DEATH
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EXP
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2000
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Tag
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@kei
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OOC Name
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Cedar
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MURAMOTO, Kei - Posted Apr 19, 2018 21:10:46 GMT -7
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Basics Full Name: Katherine Muramoto Nickname(s): Kei - It's the name she's gone by all her life, even before moving to Japan. She absolutely hates her first name, and does her best to make sure nobody ever learns that it is what it is. Age, D.O.B.: 15, July 18, 2004 Gender: Female Category: Persona User Arcana: Death Grade/Career: 1st Year at Mishiro High Ethnicity: Japanese-Canadian Family:- Alexander Grey - Estranged father, age 48
- Eri Muramoto - Mother, age 46
- Name Unknown - Half-sibling, age 20 - 25
- Nolan Muramoto - Brother, age 12
Appearance Standing at 5'10", Kei towers over friends and family alike. She's thin, but certainly not scrawny; there's some faint muscle definition in her arms and legs, though she's a hell of a lot stronger than she looks thanks to regular, strenuous exercise. Despite the time she spends outside, Kei's skin is pale, and tends to burn more than she tans. Her eyes are a cool grey colour, and she keeps her long black hair tied back in a ponytail for convenience's sake. When it comes to clothing, Kei dresses pretty plainly, leaning toward clothes that are somewhere between baggy and tight. She prefers shorts to pants, and pants to skirts, and skirts to dresses... Though you could still probably get her into a dress anyway. Most of her clothes are older, evident by faded colours and dated designs, but they're still in good condition/hole-free.
Personality Likes: Music, playing the guitar, cooking, free running, sports, teriyaki, tiramisu, rodents, exploring the city, gaming, competition, horror movies/horror-themed games/horror-themed anything, roller coasters.
Dislikes: Sitting still or moving slowly, playing the guitar (it's complicated okay), silence, cats, singing (around people; if she's alone, Kei will belt it out), spicy food, being alone for extended periods of time.
Hobbies: Playing the guitar, track and field, free running, avoiding school work, exploring, gaming.
Goals: Kei's focused more on the "now" than anything else at the moment, and hasn't bothered to come up with any goals that are more concrete than "don't flunk out of school."
Kei is a highly emotional, highly expressive person, which makes her one of the easiest people to read. She tries not to be, tries to keep everything tucked away and out of sight, but she's absolute garbage at it. She's a terrible liar because of this, and it also makes her a bad candidate for secret-keeping. Kei will never tell a secret that she's not meant to share, but it's still easy to get truth out of her. All it takes is a few well-aimed questions, which Kei doesn't even have to answer -- not when the answer's already written in her expression.
She's a sweet kid, though. She does her best to be cheerful and optimistic, and though she slips here and there, she's always quick to bounce back. ...Which isn't as great as a trait as it may seem. When Kei jumps from a negative emotion to a positive one, it's almost always a forced transition -- one that brushes the negative emotion aside, where it gets a chance to fester and grow into something worse. But Kei is so determined to be happy, to be okay, that she refuses to deal with any of it... At least, not until she can't ignore it anymore. Not until that mess of negativity has been twisted into something awful that comes pouring out of her months after all those issues should have been dealt with.
When it comes to meeting new people, Kei is usually the first one to approach. She's a friendly kid, and definitely a talker -- she'll chat your ears off if you let her, and she'll probably shove her foot in her mouth a few times too. Kei, sweet as she is, isn't the most socially-adept person. She hasn't got a solid grasp on what's okay -- and not okay -- in a general conversation, and it shows through a fair bit. She's at least aware of this, though, and will often let others lead the conversation until she's more comfortable with them, and has a better grasp of who they are. In spite of how confident she tends to come across, Kei is actually pretty nervous around new people! It doesn't make her any less friendly, but she's just a touch more quiet than she usually is. ...And a touch more fidgety too.
Her nervous habits crop up in other situations, too, to varying degrees. The more stress she's under, the more she moves, though whether she's loud or quiet tends to depend on the scenario. She'll yell and cuss in Prisons, but stressful social settings will see her subdued and almost silent. When it comes to the latter, it's not unusual to see her duck out when possible. If a situation doesn't involve constant, strenuous movement (like Prisons), she has a very hard time staying there for long. She generates nervous energy faster than she can typically dispel it, and if things become too much she runs the risk of breaking down. ...Or shutting down. Either or works.
When it comes to confrontation, Kei is the type to immediately back out and just take whatever's coming to her. Under most circumstances, she will do absolutely nothing to defend herself, even if she's about to get pummeled. Kei's of the mindset that she has no right to defend herself; she tormented other people for so long that it's only fair for them to get back at her. ...Even if they're not the people she tormented. It's the principle of the thing. Now, if one of her friends gets involved in an altercation, it becomes a different story. Where Kei won't lift a finger to help herself, she will fight tooth and nail to defend the people close to her. Bullies beware, because damn, can Kei throw a punch.
History Kei was born in the city of Toronto to Eri Muramoto and Alexander Grey. The family lived in a quaint little townhouse near the city outskirts -- a home that seemed to get smaller when Nolan was born some four years later. But things were still alright; there was always food on the table, always a roof over their heads and clothes on their backs, and sometimes there'd be enough money for something a little extra, too. They would have been better off if Eri worked, but she preferred to stay home with her children -- especially when Kei and Nolan were young.
Kei had issues with school from the get-go. Though she was great with play-based learning (a la Kindergarten and some of the earlier grades), she struggled to keep focused during even the shortest of lectures. She also didn't do well when it came to sitting down to do the work; she was easily distracted, and frequently left her seat to wander about the classroom and see what everyone else was up to. Because, as far as Kei was concerned, everyone was her friend and wanted to talk to her! In reality, most of her classmates couldn't stand her -- and they weren't subtle about it either. But Kei, who had approximately zero social skills, thought they were all just joking because that was what friends did. This went on for a couple of years before her classmates snapped. One kid in particular stepped forward to lay it out for Kei -- that she was weird and loud, too tall and too clumsy and god, why couldn't she take a hint?
Kei was devastated, but the worst was yet to come.
The outburst seemed to give the other kids the courage they needed to be more upfront about their bullying. Not only did they verbally berate her, but they messed with her things, too; her books were stolen, lunches thrown out, shoes filled with tacks -- everyday there was some new torment awaiting her. Kei's teachers were of no help; they couldn't do anything unless they caught someone in the act, and most of the kids were smart enough to avoid that. Eri was furious by their inaction, and called the school a number of times... But until one of them turned around and punched Kei, there was apparently little the school could do.
It never got to that point, though; mostly because it ended up being Kei doing the punching. After a year and a half of constant bullying, she finally turned around and beat the ever-loving shit out of a few kids who'd been tormenting her. One boy even suffered a broken nose.
Kei was suspended and sent home within the hour. The kids she pummeled, though, got off scot-free. Kei didn't think it fair -- those kids had tormented her for almost two years. Why weren't they being punished too? Why hadn't all of the bullies been punished? They'd made her life miserable, and just gotten a slap on the wrist for it. But when she tried to fight back, when she tried to make them stop -- because nobody else was doing a damn thing to end it -- she got suspended! The nerve!
To make matters worse, her parents had decided to punish her too. It had been Alexander's idea, but Eri, who'd been the one at home, was the one who sent Kei to her room to think on what she'd done, and why it was wrong. And Kei did exactly that, except she never found the guilt everyone seemed to expect her to find. She only found more anger, which would fester and grow during her suspension.
This did not make going back to school easy. Kei's classmates were done with her now, afraid of what she'd do to them... And rightfully so, because Kei sure as hell wasn't done with them. If the school wasn't going to suspend her bullies, she'd make them suffer herself.
Kei got suspended several more times in the following years. Her purpose was twisted, too; at some point she stopped picking exclusively on the people who tormented her, and just bullied anyone who happened to piss her off.
...Which was a lot of people.
Her grades also dropped, and her relationship with her parents quickly deteriorated. Kei had stopped respecting her parents after they'd grounded her after her first suspension; she sure as hell wasn't going to start listening to them now. The three of them fought constantly because of this. When Kei got sent off to middle school, things continued to get worse. She fell in with the rougher crowd, thinking she'd finally found a place to really belong.
Except, she hadn't. Because as angry as Kei was, as much as she was willing to punch people and steal their lunch money, she was nothing compared to the people she'd tried to make friends with. There was still a bit of a goody-two shoes in her -- just enough to make her extremely uncomfortable when her buddies started partaking in less-than-legal activities. It scared Kei, and she tried to back out, put some distance between her and them, but it was easier said than done. She started staying home to avoid them, pretending to leave the house in the morning only to double back and sneak in through her bedroom window. She was starting to really regret some (most) of her past actions, and the path she'd decided to take in life.
During this tumultuous time, Kei also figured out that she liked girls... A lot. She wasn't sure how to feel about this, nor was she sure how her parents would feel about it. Homosexuality had never been a topic of discussion in the house, and Kei... wasn't optimistic about either parent being accepting. And that was scary.
Everything was scary. Kei had no one to go to for help, which just made things that much worse. She tried to ignore her feelings as best as she could, don some sort of mask of false confidence. It worked for maybe a month, before everything came pouring out. It happened over dinner -- another conversation had turned into a fight about Kei's behaviour, at which point Kei just decided "to hell with it" and came out to her parents just to spite them, just to piss them off even more. Eri snapped back with a "you're too young to know that", to which Kei responded with a hearty "fuck you" and stormed off to her room.
A typical dinner at the Muramoto household, all in all.
Except, Eri suspected there was something a bit more to Kei's outburst this time. Usually she just yelled, and didn't say silly things like "well I'm G A Y" to get a rise out of everyone. So after dinner, Eri told Alexander to go check on Kei, and he found her bawling her eyes out. He sat down beside her, gave her a pat on the back, and that was enough to make Kei tell him every. Single. Detail. Of what she'd been feeling over the past few years.
Alexander had no idea what to do with this information, so he took it to Eri and let her make all the decisions. Eri mulled it over, and decided it was time to pull Kei out of the public school system. It had been something she'd thought of doing way back when Kei was in grade three, and quite frankly, she regretted not doing it then. Maybe then this whole thing could have been avoided, and that rough patch in Kei's life would've been only a year long, instead of four. But the past was the past. The only thing to focus on was helping Kei now.
So they pulled her out of public school and set about homeschooling her. Things started to look up after that. Kei was released from the hold her so-called friends had on her, and she also didn't have to worry about her reputation as a bully. She mellowed out a lot, and though she was a long way from the cheery, upbeat kid she used to be, she wasn't aggressive anymore either. She was just... Quiet. Quiet, reserved, and a little more withdrawn than healthy. Eri did what she could to try and pull Kei out of her shell, but Kei wasn't having it -- she was still wary around her mother, after the "you're too young to be gay" comment. So Eri pushed Alexander to do something in her stead. On a whim, he decided it might be fun to try and learn how to play the guitar with Kei. Kei was a little reluctant at first, but still went along with it anyway. And it was a good thing she did. After a brief adjustment period, Kei really started to enjoy playing. Those practice sessions gave her something to look forward to, something to be happy about, and her mood improved immensely. She felt like she was bonding with her dad, too, which was definitely an added bonus.
Now the only thing left to do was find a way to get Kei out of the house from time to time. Eri enrolled her in a free running camp over the summer, and Kei absolutely loved it. Eri, thrilled that they found another hobby for Kei, was quick to push her to keep pursuing free running. She got Kei into classes that ran a few times a week, and gladly drove her to open gym sessions too. As time went on, Kei became more and more confident, and more cheerful too. She started making friends at her classes, and for the first time in a long time, everything seemed like it was going to be okay.
And then Alexander had to go and ruin it all. Eri caught him with another woman, and a horrible fight ensued. Alexander had no interest in fixing what he believed to be wrong with his marriage, and Eri respected herself too much to try and stay with him anyway. She filed for a divorce, and when she requested full custody of the children, Alexander didn't make any move to fight her on it. He did argue the amount he had to pay in child support, though, complaining that the bar was set too high. He lost that battle pretty quickly. Learning this was devastating to both Kei and Nolan, who had only known their father as a loving -- if not sometimes distant -- man. Eri tried to minimize the damage, but there was little she could do.
Eri was at a loss for what to do. She was now an unemployed single mother with two very emotionally-compromised children to support... And, really, she wasn't doing well either. For the first time in a long time (twenty years, give or take), Eri reached out to her family. Most ignored her, giving her the cold-shoulder she'd given them all those years ago. But one cousin was kind enough to offer Eri and her family an apartment, and a job. The catch? It was in Sanyo City, Japan. While this might have seemed like a ridiculous reason to move, to Eri it made sense. It was a guarantee of employment and housing, which she couldn't get in Canada. Without Alexander's paycheque, they didn't have the money to stay where they were -- or even in Toronto, for that matter. And Eri hadn't held a job in over sixteen years, which would make finding one damn near impossible... At least, one that would pay the bills, anyway.
Of course, she wasn't going to drag her children to a foreign country with no warning. She sat them down and laid out their options, giving Nolan and Kei a chance to veto the move to Japan. Neither one of them did, though, and come Spring the Muramoto family was settling into their new home, thousands of miles away from all that Kei and Nolan had ever known.
Equipment
Notes- Kei has an older half-sibling that she knows nothing about. The child was a product of Eri's university relationship with another classmate -- she wanted to give the baby up, but was manipulated by her mother into keeping it. Eri's relationship with the child's father ended shortly after it was born, and her relationship with her own father deteriorated. With Eri at school, the baby was looked after mostly by Eri's mother. When the child was three, the father came back, having decided that he actually did want to play a role in the kid's life. Eri's mother didn't want to let him in, however, and once again manipulated Eri in order to keep the father away. An ugly court battle ensued, and Eri lost custody of her child. The father, scared of what Eri's mother might do to get the infant back, barred Eri from visiting the child. Grief-stricken and furious with her mother, Eri moved out of the family home immediately after finishing her schooling. But where most would move a few towns over, Eri decided to move a few countries over, and went to live with a distant cousin in Vancouver, Canada. She later moved to Toronto.
Kei (and Nolan) know none of this. They were told that their maternal grandparents died some time before Kei was born, and that Eri didn't have any remaining family in Japan, which was why they never visited/called/wrote. - Kei owns two pet rats -- Sage and Basil -- that are spoiled rotten. Her brother and mother hate them, but Kei thinks they're the cutest things in the world.
- While she's never been great with school, Kei's actually capable of doing well. The reason she struggles so much is less that she's stupid (which she firmly believes), and more because she missed out on so many classes between grades three and seven. She didn't get a chance to build any kind of basic skills or foundational knowledge, which makes the advanced topics pretty tricky.
- Alexander was just as iffy about Kei being gay as Eri was. But where he said nothing, hoping Kei would come to forget it all if no one brought it up, Eri voiced her concerns. The issue hasn't been raised since, but Eri has actually come to terms with it.
- There are a lot of situations like the above, where Kei thinks her father was more supportive than Eri ever will be, when the reverse is in fact true. The issue lies in how they dealt with problems. Where Eri prefers to tackle issues head-on through action and words, Alexander would rather sit there and let things play out, seeing how the issue resolved itself without intervention. Due to this, Eri was the one who usually dealt with teachers, the school, etc. when Kei was in trouble, while Alexander sat on his ass until his wife told him to do something. Unfortunately, Kei still thought him the "better" parent.
- Nolan and Kei aren't close, but they don't fight a lot either. Nolan is extremely independent, mostly as a result of Eri and Alexander spending so much time/energy on Kei. He pretends he doesn't care, but he does hold this against his family a little bit.
- Despite never having lived in Japan until now, Kei speaks Japanese pretty well -- Eri started teaching the language to her and Nolan when they were little. She's still got a noticeable accent, though, and her writing is almost illegible. ...Which, to be fair, holds true when Kei writes in English too.
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Posts
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27
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Arcana
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XIII. DEATH
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EXP
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2000
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Tag
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@kei
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OOC Name
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Cedar
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MURAMOTO, Kei - Posted Apr 19, 2018 21:14:28 GMT -7
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Persona Name: Hel Arcana: Death
Resists: Ice Weaknesses: Light
Skills: Description The daughter of Loki and the giantess Angrboda, Hel is the Norse goddess of the underworld (also called Hel). She appears as a tall, pale woman, though in some places her flesh is rotten and blackened, and even peeling away to reveal bone underneath. Her hair, white as snow, falls past her waist, where ice begins to encase her body. Her eyes are as white as her hair, and bear no pupils. Overall she's a gruesome, frightening sight to behold.
Kei's mask covers her jaw. It begins above her ears and loops around them before travelling down her face, following the curve of her cheekbones and jawline perfectly. The mask stops sloping down when it reaches the corners of her mouth, straightening out and covering her lower lip. A pair of symmetrical lines run down both sides of the mask, stopping just where her chin starts. The lines start off as a pale blue, but the colour fades to white the closer they get to Kei's chin.
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