Post by XIAO-LIN on Aug 7, 2011 17:15:25 GMT -5
"just because you breathe doesn't make you alive."
Personal[/u]
Full Name: xiao-lin
Gender: female
Age: twenty-four
Element: air
Alignment: no affiliation
Location: Hama's Village (official name not given)
Appearance: Being a nomad by choice and therefore never settling anywhere for too long, Xiao-lin doesn’t bring a grand amount of baggage and anything in her possession serves a purpose, immediate or otherwise. Though one might find it rather strange that an air bender dresses so much alike anyone found in the fire nation. In truth it is mostly a disguise and allows her to move relatively unnoticed for what she truly is, allowing that the arrows on the back of her hands remain covered when in public places. She doesn’t like to advertise her presence much less where her heritage lies and often bears the Fire Nation crest. Her usual attire is modified Cheongsam. Unlike the traditionally seen Cheongsam, the red silk outfit has had the waist section completely removed making it a two-piece outfit. The shirt has no sleeves and bears her midriff; the yellow stitching and knots to tie it are located down the center opposed to across the shoulder as they normally are. With golden trimming and the black symbol of fire etched to its back. She also wears a set of goggles on her head to use when she is riding. Her arms are partially exposed but are covered by black arm coverings and a pair of gloves for good measure, hiding her blue arrows. The lower half remains dress-like, slit down the sides to bear her long legs, which she occasionally covers with pants. Knee-length black stockings, high boots that hide a hidden blade in the toe of each and a long black scarf complete her look. As for her physical traits it would be difficult for anyone to know her origins if they looked past her attire. Her hair is a cerise color, not quite pink yet not deep enough to be considered crimson or scarlet. Typically she wears it in two short buns on either side of her head with hair falling loose from them. Other times she neatens the style so that it looks deceptively short. Large blue eyes and pale skinned, modest height with an athletic build and nimble. The only traces left from where she comes from are the blue arrow tattoos that are well hidden from sight. Hair has grown over the one on her head and her gloves and arm guards cover the ones on her arms and hands.
Personality: Xiao-lin is an enigma even amongst her own, an individual who denies all that is commonplace about what is known of the Air Nomads and is flagrantly defiant of what a lifestyle dependent on others. Her lifestyle has not permitted her to be soft or to find solace in others; too many times she has learned that things such as kindness and loyalty, while present in the world – are completely unreliable and idealistic. It has become the girl’s standard of living to be a cut-throat; back-stabbing opportunist who thrives on the chaos of the nations and does not seek to remedy the hardship, feeling that it is not her role to make the world a better place to live in.
The young Air-bender is pessimist, immediately expecting the worst possible outcome from any given scenario. It has become a conditions response that she does not expect goodness from everyone, especially from those who exist in her circle of contacts. She operates under two modes of expression, irritated and indifference, they are the norms and her expressions rarely stray from them. By default, she has never really been a child to openly express herself and now in her adulthood, suppressing her emotions have become too troublesome and she completely ignores her own feelings in favor of what she wishes to accomplish. Morals and virtues are nothing but hindrances for her, the concepts of right and wrong ignored because the nothing is so well defined as that. However, in a state of living contradiction she isn’t wholly unfeeling and black hearted and shows surprising care and occasional streaks of philanthropy when it suits her. Though, not without spouting some heavy-handed criticism first.
In terms of her interactions with others she tries to remain professional when addressing clients. As a bounty huntress she typically answers to no order but her own but if she is approached for a job she rarely turns down an opportunity. Towards others she generally doesn’t have too much of an issue coping with common folk, but don’t expect her to be much for company seeing as she has her own emotional blocks up to keep most everyone at arms length. She hates to be depended on or seen as a friend because it is never entirely clear when someone may become an enemy. Likewise equally hard to determine when someone will become an ally. So in lieu of that, Xiao-lin prefers a stance of neutrality, neither like or dislike. But it isn’t hard to rub her the wrong way. She cannot stand lazy people or those who expect good-fortune to simply fall into their laps. Having grown up a poor farmer’s child she knows the hardships that come with working to support oneself. So nobleman or anyone with enough money to sustain their way of life and living with excessive opulence, grate on her nerves immensely.
While she is not exactly the best example of etiquette and poise, Xiao-Lin will not stand for discourtesy toward herself or others who do not deserve it. Bullies or those who use force when it isn’t necessary are not people she enjoys being around and will distance herself if she can. But make no mistake she will not jump in and help of her own accord, sometimes even when asked for help she won’t do anything but again, it all depends on circumstance.
The only times where she seems to not be on her guard is when she’s eating – she has an almost obsessive compulsion to eat anything she hasn’t tried on sight and possibly spends most of her money on food. It is only when she is eating that she seems to forget that she’s supposed to be a cool, bad-ass bounty hunter and reverts to an almost child-like demeanor. Of course, once she realizes her error she becomes flustered and shy and immediately starts looking for ways to leave the situation.
Otherwise she is apathetic to everything and lives in a world of absolutes and refuses to bend to the invariables that spring up.
Her only confidant is her Pygmy Puma, Kyurara who she picked up as a kitten in Ba Sing Se.
Hobbies: eating • saving money • brushing kyurara • staying up late at night • watching people • bounty hunting • calligraphy • traveling • making talismans
History: Xiao-Lin, in spite of being an Air Bender, has never visited any of the Air Nomad temples and had a rather unconventional form of training to master her abilities. Her family also was not quite typical either. Her father was a formerly a traveling healer who became a doctor in a small village on the outskirts of the Earth Kingdom. Her mother had been a Ba Sing Se noblewoman who had made the choice to move from her home to live on a small plot of farmland and raise his family.
They were newcomers to the village and while the society was warm and inviting there was a little fear and anxiety of the presence of the wandering Air bender in spite of his good deeds. It wasn’t understood why but spirits were often attracted to him and while he did have talismans to ward off those of mischief, there was little preventing them from growing familiar with the town. So the people were often terrorized by moving or missing objects, small pranks that were not immediately harmful.
When Xiao was born those little pranks began to worsen and with viable reason either. Many began to associate her birth with the problem and while no one openly shunned her they were wary of her nonetheless. It was only after a rockslide took the lives of a father and son returning from selling their wares in a larger city, that some began to actively let their dislike of her known. She was only three years old when adults began to express their hatred of her, blaming her for things outside her ability to control. Her father did his best to create talismans to help the townsfolk and because of his efforts the spiritual activity did abate. But the spirits were not to blame for the raiders who fell upon the town.
The raiders who came were intent on looting the village and in their endeavor burned the tiny settlement to the ground, slaying people who were unfortunate enough to be in their way – her mother among them. Father and daughter were left with the survivors who, caught in their distress, blamed them for their misfortunes and burned their home. Chased from the village and with no choice but to leave, the grieving family took their chances on the wilds and soon was confronted by bandits who immediately overwhelmed them.
Her father was killed in front of her and the event traumatized her to the point of repressing all of her memories. The leader, though having no use for a female child, took her and began to raise her for his own purposes. An Air bending child was a rarity and thinking of what her powers could do if honed was endless. So he took care of her, rearing her like his own and Xiao never protested for in repressing her memories she completely forgot that the man who wanted to be called ‘father’ was the one to murder her own.
She became a bandit, killing and pillaging as was instructed, honing her abilities to be of use to her Father. However one evening while away from camp she encountered a spirit who, unbeknownst to her, was her mother. One meeting was all it took for her repressed memories to begin to filter into the gaps that she had tried to ignore and within months she began to realize the deception. In a fit of rage she used the trust she had gained from them to slay her father’s killer before fleeing to the Earth Kingdom from within the Fire Nation where they had traveled.
From then on she took up bounty hunting and known as 'The Red Lion'.
Bending Art[/u]
Blades of the North[/blockquote][/size]
Difficulty: Advanced
Description: An offensive tactic with many variations. By warping the air the bender focuses on hyper condensing wind and funneling it through the hands. The pressurized air is then mentally formed into a blade, disk or other weapon. Because of the constant pressure the air is capable of ripping through objects with the same force of a blade.
Limit: Restricted to Airbenders
