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Name: Azai Mana
Faction: Mercenary
Ethnicity: Japanese-German (75/25)
Age: 18
Gender: Female
Height: 5'9"
Weight: 120 lbs
Eye Color: Red
Hair Color: Silver-White

Appearance:
Image A Ho!
Image B Ho!

Mana is a fairly slender woman with inherently pale skin and crimson eyes. Her appearance is such that, were she in the west, she might be considered to be at the midway point between having a normal skin color and being albino. Her build is slight but athletic, prioritizing agility over power. She is suspiciously without scars, despite half her life being filled with curious activity.

Personality:
Mana is a generally cool, calm person, almost devoid of outward emotion and seeming cold. She has been like this since becoming an amnesiac, trained to never display a feeling or emotion that wasn't necessary to pull off a job. On a similar note, she is practiced in feigning alternative personalities, if one can get a job done better. Due to recent events, however, she has begun to feel a resurgence of emotions, and given the right stimulus, can display excess feelings. If provoked in just the right manner, she can ignite with ungodly rage. If pleased, she can be immensely happy and content. These are just a couple of examples.

Her personality in combat is much the same as her usual persona. She has been effectively desensitized to killing, and will eliminate any and every single perceived enemy in her path. Though she'll defend herself as necessary, she values her own life much less than others, throwing herself into battle without worry or concern, for if she dies, she dies. She would view it as a fitting punishment for someone who was made to abuse and butcher innocents for half of her life.

History:
Late in his life, Azai Sukemasa, grandfather to Azai Nagamasa, found companionship in a woman whose parentage included a German merchant. He did not mind that she was of foreign descent, for it was her caring and open personality that intrigued and attracted him. The details have since been lost in time, but the short story is that she was made willingly into his last concubine, and through her, he fathered a daughter in the year 1542. The child was named Mana, a word for affection and love. Unfortunately, Mana would only have a few short years with her father before he passed in 1546. His eldest son, Hisamasa, would inherit the clan, though prove to be an ineffectual ruler.

Despite the loss of her beloved father, Mana still had her mother, as well as her little nephew, Nagamasa. She would spend much of her time with the both of them, learning a great many things from her hybrid mother, and in turn passing them on to her growing nephew. It was always an odd concept for Mana to be an aunt when Nagamasa was only three years her junior, and she more often considered him her brother, but it did not matter, for as long as they were together, she was happy and content. This, unfortunately, would not remain the case.

In 1551, at nine years of age, it was proposed that Mana was sent to the Rokkaku in order to improve declining relations. Hisamasa had since become a vassal after losing domains to the Rokkaku, but things were expectedly sour between both administrations, so he had hoped to smooth things over by essentially sacrificing his little sister to their clan. Mana had no choice in the matter, and regardless of how much her mother fought, the questionable daimyo reminded her of her station as concubine to a deceased man; this was followed by an order for her mother to accompany Mana to her destination. Thus, with a tearful goodbye to young Nagamasa, Mana was shipped off to Rokkaku.

She never made it to the border. An organized posse of bandits raided the Azai convoy and took her and her mother by force, retreating into Ise, land of the Kitabatake. They were kept bound and blindfolded for the entire trip and only fed once per day, but left unharmed. Upon arrival to their destination, they were put before their leader, a man by the name of Momochi Yojimbo, who had been scorned by Hisamasa for running illegal operations in Omi and forced into exile. He stated that in order to take revenge against the daimyo, he kidnapped his sister and intended to use her for ransom, then lure the man in and slay him. While Mana's mother bore only so much love for Hisamasa, she railed on Yojimbo verbally for stooping low enough to use a child in his plans. This quickly led to Yojimbo ordering her to be silenced; one of his less intelligent men took this as a command to kill her, and hacked her head off. The sight sent Mana into a blind rage, and despite being but nine years old, she tackled the man to the ground and pounded at his throat until it gave way and was crushed, leading to his death. At that time, Yojimbo booted the little girl's head and knocked her out cold.

The trauma of seeing her mother slain before her very eyes, killing her assailant, and the blunt force trauma to her skull combined to render Mana an amnesiac. When she next came to, all she could remember was her name and naught else; her memory had been all but wiped, or suppressed in the wake of the aforementioned trauma, leaving her as a blank, hollow person. Yojimbo realized that both of his bargaining chips had been rendered useless, but seeing Mana's empty state gave him a different idea on how to make use of her. For the next eight years, he would train and have trained the girl in how to be an efficient fighter and killer. By seventeen years old, Mana had manifested into a cold, proficient enforcer of Yojimbo's will. Her personality was malleable, but her master made sure to keep anything from influencing her, so that she would remain subservient to him, and him alone.

On her seventeenth birthday, Yojimbo decided to reward Mana, giving her a day off to relax, and offered to grant any one wish of her choosing. Now, for most of her time under the vengeful criminal, Mana had acquired a curiosity, wondering why she could not remember anything beyond the time that she thought was when she met Yojimbo; all she had been told was that she'd been taken in off the streets of Ise, and even that seemed sketchy. So it was the question of her past that she asked her master. Fearing no repercussion from telling what was now his apparently loyal enforcer, Yojimbo fessed up, telling Mana of her lineage, and how he truly came to acquire her services. He even discussed her mother, and her unintentional death. Though she did not show it outwardly, for she had long since mastered concealing her true feelings, Mana was confused about what she heard. She calmly thanked her master and resumed her day off.

Reflecting on Yojimbo's testimony, and taking time to meditate on it, Mana found that she was remembering bits and pieces of her past. Fragments of memory lost to trauma. It was far from a complete recollection, but she knew in her heart that Yojimbo had not been lying. She was a daughter of Azai, being used as this man's tool to do what he wants, when he wants, and how he wanted it done. She had killed innocent, well-meaning people in his name. At this grand realization, an immense rage boiled in her chest, and flowed through her body. Just as Yojimbo yearned for revenge against Azai, Mana would have vengeance against him.

It took a few months to plot everything out, but she arranged a ploy to remove Yojimbo from this life. She paid one of his cohorts to tip him off about an Azai envoy - a traveler and his companions from Omi whom Mana also paid to act - passing into Ise, which invigorated Yojimbo, thinking he had a new opportunity to spit in Hisamasa's face, if not resume his path to revenge. He personally set up an ambush for the purported envoy, intending to take him and his guards down before he could reach the Kitabatake capital. Mana, in turn, bribed every single member of the ambush to follow her directive during that day instead of Yojimbo's, draining her personal coffers to do so. On the day of the ambush, when it was to be sprung, Mana commanded her comrades to turn on their master, bringing him down and letting the fake envoy leave scot-free.

The daughter of Sukemasa gave Momochi Yojimbo no quarter that day. Held down by his own thuggish employees, he was subject to a punishment over eight years overdue. Mana wiped him from the face of Japan, then immediately took over his little group of criminals and disbanded them all. She rooted through Yojimbo's belongings afterward and found something very interesting: eight-year-old scrolls, with seals, meant for Rokkaku eyes, detailing that Mana was for certain of Azai blood, and intended to be held as a hostage to foster better relations. Taking these things with the rest of her limited belongings, Mana departed Ise quietly.

Now, she resides just within the border of Omi. Reluctant to go home, and knowing that there was likely no feasible way to see the new lord of Azai, her own nephew, after all these years.

Stats

Strength: 11
Dexterity: 14
Constitution: 13 (18)
Wisdom: 13
Spirit: 12

Inventory:



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