Name: Nozomi
Age: 33
Gender: Female
Height: 5'4”
Build: Athletic
Hair: Black
Eyes: Red
Complexion: Ghostly and Pale
Marital Status: Single, but in a secret committed relationship
Image: Just pretend she actually keeps her hair cut short
Appearance: Nozomi stands at average height with an athletic, toned and scarred body that has seen years of hard labor. Her skin is a ghostly, almost sickly pale and she rarely ventures out into the light of day without wide-brimmed hat to shield her blood-red eyes from the ravages of Lady Amaterasu's rays. Despite the callouses of her hands and every sign and indication that she spends ample time that she can get away with under the sun, her skin remains so white that veins are visible along the edges of her garments and occasional freckling can be seen more prominently. Her lips are paler than usual, and though her short-cropped hair darkened from her childhood, her countenance does make some feel nervous around her because of those bright red eyes.
She can be a roiling thunderhead at times, rumbling with energy that is not pent up well. She never looks comfortable when sitting unless it is in meditation, her body clearly preferring to be in the midst of physical activity. When in a situation she is permitted to carry weapons, she can be seen with two ever-present wooden tonfa, weathered and well used from countless old stains in the wood grain, and in battle she dresses in peasant armor and carries a bow as well. Otherwise, she dresses in simple kimono and monastic robes of a dark hue. Normally, her calloused hands are wrapped, ready for both Jiujutsu and picking up a hammer and nails or a farmer's rake. Whatever is needed. The only piece of jewelry she wears is an old, faded jade bracelet of Nezumi make that has seen better days.
Personality:
"An acquired Taste," some would say. You could drag the Hikaru out of the mountains, but you would never drag the mountain out of the Hikaru. Though it has been 16 years since Nozomi would refer to herself as a tribeswoman, she is still a rough around the edges woman with a tongue that would make a courtier blush in shock... when she thinks he can get away with it. Nozomi is a long way away from the barely-aged woman who entered the very edges of hell seeking the kami Hisomu, fantasizing about becoming a great killer in the ranks of the Bayushi. She has been forced, through countless visits to the Imperial Court, the Stag and Spider lands and her travels with Shinsei to learn to 'behave herself' in public. What this means is that, you can often tell that she wants to call you an ox-brained jackass of a man, she usually won't.
Her sense of humor has not improved with years. She could laugh at the executioner's block. She is a controlled, at times brooding woman who is open with those who she chooses to be, but usually more than a little stand-offish. She enjoys regailing people with colorful tales of others' heroism, but prefers not to focus on her own story that much. Though she is a meditative and reflective woman like many in the monastic order of heroes, she favors a life filled with labor and simple pleasures to one of constant study or politicing. Nozomi has never sought any level of status. As social castes stratify, she has been heard to grumble her dissent to the changes in the empire, but bows as quickly as any peasant to her betters. Within the Order, she is known to clear that she does not consider herself a 'leader' and all of them equals.
Accompanied by: Her daughter Mayumi (Again, the image is sort of perfect, but assume appropriate kimono rather than leathers)
Mayumi, age 14, is a girl nearing her coming of age. When Nozomi has been seen, she is almost always accompanied in her travels by her daughter. Though far from attached at the hip, Nozomi can be a touch on the protective side where her daughter is concerned. The girl is willful, and well aware that as she is not 'quite' considered an adult that there is a shred of latitude that she will enjoy as long as she must suffer not going through her coming of age. She is her mother's daughter to the core, stubborn, gruff, at times as outspoken as she thinks she can get away with, and impish. She idolizes the ground that the hero of the Spider, Hisomu Matsu, walks on and carries around a bisento as her preferred weapon of choice where she is allowed to do so.
However, as much as she reflects her mother, there is a different quality to the girl to that of Nozomi. She has a bit of an almost insufferable know-it-all edge, the girl having drank up countless scrolls of lore in her time within Dragon Lands. And where her physical traits differ from her ghostly mother, Mayumi looks very little like her father, not that anyone ever really remembered Taka well...
Hooks:
- She's a regular traveling companion with Shinsei. Even if she always gives him plenty of space, maybe your character ran into her at times like that?
(Some say she's too close to Shinsei, but they never say so to his face or where the kami can hear.)
- Did you travel down to the Shadowlands to rescue Hisomu? She's always up for catching up and sharing old tales with familiar faces. She still has an awful sense of humor and a laugh like a snickering hyena.
(Stories of Phi are fairly hard to come by. She doesn't sing her praises, and seems content for Nanzi's accounts to be light on details of her exploits.)
- Who's not keen on this whole caste system thing that's coming up? Nozomi's a receptive ear, but she seems unwilling to act out.
- Are you a Scorpion? They say she's never been back to Scorpion lands, not even her old Hikaru stomping grounds in the last 15 years and skirts well wide through Unicorn ones. She's never even BEEN to the Beiden Pass since the rescue of Hisomu. Why? Something to hide?
(Rumor has it she actively dislikes the Scorpion Clan, though she's never been seen saying anything ill of them, and still supposedly corresponds with a Bayushi Umeno regularly.)
(
Player Note: If you are Scorpion in a scene with her, she will almost certainly at some point roll Perception-Lore: The Lying Darkness during the conversation, looking for signs of the Lying Darkness in your character. She does this for literally ALL scorpion but Shosuro. She just ... assumes with her.)
- Are you a Crab, Dragon or Spider? She spends a lot of time in your lands, and her presence is frequent enough to be memorable. She usually keeps to the peasants, but they say she used to come train alongside Hisomu Matsu from time to time.
- Are you a monk, or interested in monk-stuff? She was one of the founders of the Order of Heroes, though they say she doesn't hold any position in their ranks. Still, they say that the demonstration of power she gave Shiba a few years ago was very impressive, enough to help establish the Order.
(Some people think she avoids public life because of a child out of wedlock. Most, however, assume the refusal is a monk thing and that she prefers to honor the memory of Taochusu and Ch'Jack'Matt as the first great fallen heroes of the empire.)
-That kid of her's age. She would have had to be born in the shadowlands trip or close to it. They say she's a caravan guard's kid and that Nozomi used to be promiscuous in a former life.
(It's hard to find any other rumor than this. A favorite among courtiers to remind that one of the Order's founders has a bastard child. What's odd is how both women seem to simply tolerate the rumor, since they're peasants and at the end of the day who cares whose father a peasant's was?)