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Suzume
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Account Name: Aoi Akemi
Basic Character Information "Ugh, I'm too young for this shit..."
Name: Suzume Nickname: 'Dragon Warrior' Age: 22 Gender: Female Race: Human Affiliation: Bounty Hunter Threat: 30 Achievements: - Landed a single cut on the greatest swordsman she is aware of, Salvatore 'Red Blade' Stark, worth over 300,000,000 beli, with only two and a half years of training.
- Spent 2 years enlisted in the Marines. Left after service.
- Arrested numerous bounties on a civil island for a year after getting her bounty hunting license.
- Fully responsible for the arrest of 'Polygon' Pol Grigory, a devil fruit using pirate worth 30,000,000 right out of the blues.
Profession:
Primary -- Doctor A Doctor, on a ship or otherwise, gains large medical knowledge. Suturing and cleaning wounds, making bandages out of various materials and preparing drugs, is all part of a Doctor's job. Doctors are the only ones capable of healing serious injuries on the crew. Doctors have the ability to create drugs and toxins that can buff allies or debuff enemies.
Secondary -- Weapon Specialist A much more general fighter-type profession, a Weapon Specialist is someone who has to a large or small degree devoted his/her life to the mastery of a single weapon or weapon type, such as Swords, Axes or Whips. This profession applies generally to melee weapons.
Jack of all Trades -- Inventor An Inventor is a man or woman with knowledge in how various mechanical devices work. They have good insight in how blueprints work, and can upgrade weapons, build gadgets and battle engines if they have enough materials.
Jack of all Trades -- Merchant Merchants are fairly charismatic people who are skilled in both bargaining and selling things to others. Their expertise means that they are very knowledgeable of the economy, and deal with all manner of merchandise. Additionally, they they tend to be well-connected in trading circles. Position: Bounty Hunter -- Doctor
Physical Appearance "Stare too much longer and you won't have eyes to stare with." Height: 5'5" Weight: 134 Hair: Purple, tied up and hidden away by her hat, two tails falling past her ears, wavy bangs when visible. Very long when down, roughly butt-length Eyes: Purple, missing right eye Clothing/Accessories: Suzume's primary and iconic set of attire is a yellow turtle neck under a black vest with white buttons, further under a dark purple longcoat. This is paired with a totally mismatched pair of short shorts, with a belt that she has a sword hanging upon her right hip with. The belt is designed to look loose when fastened, giving onlookers a sense of comfort.
On her head, she wears a cabbie hat, black in color with a white bill, turned towards her right and tipped forward . She wears a black eyepatch over her right eye socket, and a pair of glasses, which she needs for seeing fine details like individual letters, but can take off during fights without hindering herself any. She also wears a white scarf loosely, around her neck, only selling further the mismatch that is her outfit. She wears shoes when necessary, but prefers not to in most situations, defaulting to boots in deserts and snowy wastelands. General Appearance: By the look of her, Suzume is not what one would expect to see in a primary combatant, and especially not one who hunts down pirates for their bounties. She is petite with a small frame, lacking overall apparent intimidation factor. Despite this her proportions are still in a relative hourglass. Her skin tone is light with a lack of ability to either tan or burn. She has a single purple eye in her left socket, along with hair of a matching color, which when left down will extend to her hindquarters.
Normally she will keep her hair tied up in a massive bun so that she can hide it beneath her incredibly fashionable cabbie hat, leaving twin tails dangling from just in front of her ears, as well as the left half of her bangs, which appear quite wavy. Asides this, her body is covered in scarred-over injuries that she attained throughout her training, some pretty mild, others rather brutal. Her dense upper body attire is what hides most of these.
Suzume
The Character "Hey did you know that you have the right to remain silent, even when I'm not arresting you?" Personality: Out and right, she doesn't seem to come off as a 'pleasant' person to be around. She has an air of professionalism about her that makes for a great work partner, but more-or-less she isn't one for socialising. People have a tendency to not be able to hang out with her because she is very cold, doesn't say much, and what she does say stings a little bit. This is the persona that she masqerades about wearing all the time, because it's easier to be a cold pessimistic bitch than it is to be a sad sack who hates life.
Suzume has a pessimistic world view, and is outright sarcastic most of the time. Her cold demeanor may be offset by a decently humorous person, especially someone who shares her interest in satire and sarcasm. The best way into her heart is through her funny bone, that is to say. Though don't expect to be making many mutual friends, the most she'll do is hold back crippling insults to their personality. No, not all the insults, just the ones that make them try and hit her.
The cold bitch is rude, this is for certain. As one of her defining features, she is not only very receptive to anger, she is very violent as well. She gets a lightly sick pleasure out of beating people into the ground, this goes especially for people who deserve it, such as pirates, jackasses at the bar. She is a bit of an alcoholic, easily spotted by the first place she ever wants to go when she lands on any shore is to the tavern, and when she finds it, she gets outright plastered.
As a doctor, she is quite... mean. She learned how to treat many injuries early in life, and has a great amount of field experience with actual injuries, especially on her own body. But because of her experience with injuries, she doesn't have the mercy of more traditional doctors. When someone is groaning about pain she simply tells them to shut up or treat their own injuries. When she knows something she's about to do will hurt, she hands them a chunk of wood to bite down on. Suzume basically hates people who get themselves injured for stupid reasons, but more so, she hates people who would injure themselves for any reason.
Suzume can be nice... sorta... when she's drunk. It's not a traditional nice, but for people who know her, she's like a whole different person. She's willing to talk about her life, other people's life, personal stuff, and is far more personable, though that isn't saying much. She's still a sarcastic, satirical bitch, but she's not 'cold' when drunk. Not 'warm' either; closer to 'lukewarm'.
The cold bitch has an absolute hatred of pirates, having well over enough experience with them to outright attack pirates if they so much as breathe in her general direction. Moreover there is a certain man that she wishes to see dead one day, and her goal in life is to strike the blow that ends that man's life. This man is a pirate, and is the sole reason she decided to be a bounty hunter instead of a marine.
That said, she is a far more polite person in general when a well-known marine confronts her. She doesn't understand why she respects them so much without wanting to be one of them, beyond the simple fact that the marine training and professional regimen would just get in the way of her goals. Suzume finds marines nothing less than the utmost of respectable people. On a totally different note, she finds corrupt marines are even lower than pirate scum. Beneath that is any shichibukai, since they are a pirate that uses the government to get away with any crimes they perform. And beneath all that is the one she hates the most.
What exists as possibly her only redeeming quality, is her absolute respect for the law. The law is able to be used against her by pirates that she is hunting, such as running across a street where the light will hold her up, given that ever becomes a thing. She's the kind of person to turn herself in for jaywalking if that were a law she was aware of. Furthermore, she makes it a point to immediately find and study every law present in a new town. If she's been somewhere before, it's likely she knows even the most remote and stupid law. That said, she is prone to turning people in for the dumbest shit. After all, a person who breaks the law is no better than a pirate.
Possibly deducting from this is her sheer focus on vengeance. Whenever she is spited or wronged, she is very focused on revenge. This is also included on when she is bested in combat, or even a chess match. Her angry mannerism of getting even with people is how she tries to get stronger, smarter, in general better than she was before. Where others focus on a goal, and relentlessly follow it, she has a main goal, and winds up setting other goals because people at any point got in her way, or made her feel inadequate, or even just proved they were better than specifically her.
Love for her is not like love for other people. She doesn't treat anyone she 'like likes' any differently. She doesn't expect anyone to notice the difference, because there is none. Suzume is a bitch out and right, she knows it. She keeps her emotions bottled up and doesn't share anything nice. Her mind is as tightly locked as any safe. The most a person can tell is that she won't kill them.
Hometown: Kuroshima, Grand Line History: "Long story short: Someone lost a bet, now pirates die."
Chapter 0 -- Kuroshima Kuroshima is an island located in the Florian Triangle which rarely recieves visitors due to a number of reasons. First is the horrendous location, since the Florian Triangle is a foggy mystery thought to be haunted, most ships passing through will spend as little time as is necessary to get through it. The second reason, probably the most hard to deny is the pigmentation of the entire island. Due to an interestingly high carbon content in the soil, and a mutation of pigment in the leaves, the island takes on a dark grey appearance even in the incredibly rare instance of sunlight. This is caused by the leaves needing to absorb all colors of light for any hope of survival, and the high carbon content in the soil transfers into the wood of the trees giving it a dark appearance. Otherwise nothing that grows here is actually any different from the same stuff that grows elsewhere.
Kuroshima was founded some two hundred years ago, when a ship crashed into it marooning numerous ex-citizens of Wano country on the island. These citizens had left the New World in search of the famed 'Paradise' they'd heard of, so when they crashed on the island, they found that despite the dreary scenery, the land was quite liveable. After a decade or so, they'd established an actual small society on the island, and named it 'Kuroshima', meaning 'Black Island', as an easily memorable name for a land where everything was black. Citizens on the island basically took after Wano Country lifestyle, and the island is the best hint of Wano Country culture a person can get without meeting someone directly from there.
Chapter 1 -- A Prodigy is Born Then, 22 years ago, Suzume was born. Kuroshima was a place where people strived to make the best of themselves to bring honor to their family, and Suzume was born into a prosperous family of doctors, amongst the most honorable people on the island. From a young age, she was taught the ins and outs of medicine, mostly first aid and stuff that plagued the Grand Line and especially the creepy stuff that you could get in the Florian Triangle. Since most of the scariest diseases and infections were native to the land, the young medical prodigy was jaded to the worst of the worst before she was 10, especially since Kuroshima was a rather small place. Not many doctors, that is to say, and her parents ran the clinic in-home.
Suzume was prodigious, learning how to fix brutal injuries sustained from blacksmithing accidents and attacks from ravenous giant fish, all before she was old enough for her parents to trust her with a scalpel. The overall need for her to be there was very low, however, since her family was known for pumping out prodigious medical progenies since before Kuroshima itself. As soon as her parents pumped out a baby brother when she was 13, she was ignored and her brother began being the favored child. A combination of metaphorical shellshock and stupid hormones caused her to sneak off in a ship with a bunch of grown-ass men who wanted to sell stuff in the nearby Sabaody Archipelago.
This was a smooth trip for the most part and she spent a good amount of time, roughly a few months with these merchant fellows, who were actually pretty great guys. Suzume found that she could trust them as friends, and figured that she could make her living as a doctor in a crew of merchants. One of said merchants was a particularly nice fellow, who saw something of a daughter in the medical prodigy. Because he was so nice, and because the weapon wasn't selling, due to a lack of users of such a weapon, he gave her a sword, rumored to be cursed due to being forged in the Florian Triangle. He figured since she was forged in the Florian Triangle as well, she'd be more cursed than the sword, and it would obey her. He even showed her how to handle a blade without cutting herself, something of a swordsman himself.
The trip back home was where tragedy struck and changed her life forever.
Chapter 2 -- The Night The Sky Rained Blood The merry crew of mercantile professionals had their journey cut short, as a man with a sword tore their ship in twain. With a flick of the wrist with this sword in hand, the man sent waves rippling through the air that made the ship become rent asunder. This man was quite possibly the greatest swordsman in the world, and he was pirate, after the merchants' treasure. Suzume watched this man cut his way through men, sometimes three at a time with a single stroke. The only one who wasn't actively resisting the man's attempts to raid the ship was the one who gave her the cursed sword, who was trying to comfort Suzume by averting her gaze.
The merciless swordsman saw that the man was a swordsman, as well as deeply cared for this little girl he knew for a few months, and demanded a duel. The man refused to fight, but the swordsman would then get Suzume involved in it, saying that the winner controlled the fate of the girl. When the merchant swordsman declared that it was wrong to control someone else's fate, the pirate would only laugh, claiming that controlling her fate only meant that she went with the winner to safety. The medical prodigy herself, of course had no say in the fight that was doomed to result.
The merchant fought with the skill one would expect from a swordsman in the Grand Line who made frequent trips in and out of the Florian Triangle. Unfortunately, the man was simply unable to fight on par with the pirate, who was something close to godly. Suzume was even worried he may have had a Devil Fruit power, due to the sheer impossibility of his sword skills. The merchant was a kind enough man to receive the blow that would kill him with honor, while kneeling down and smiling at Suzume, telling her "It was a win-win. You live no matter what." Then he was beheaded, and this absolutely crushed the young girl, not even 14 yet. Possibly her deepest regret was not remembering that man's name, despite his smiling decapitated head being permanently branded into her nightmares.
Chapter 3 -- Hatred and the Lessons Thereof Thereafter, the pirate told her to gather her things, and meet him in a couple of minutes, while he took that time to loot the hell out of the merchant ship. She hid her cursed sword in her medical supply bag, so that she merely looked like a doctor. The pirate would then take her onto his ship, and they for an oddly long time they just stayed on opposite sides of the ship, as if deciding what the hell to do. At the same time the pirate discovered her cursed blade in the bottom of the medical bag and decided to tell her his name and take her on as a pupil, she'd decided that she was going to do everything in her power to kill this man.
"I am Salvator Stark. I am a wanted man, worth well over 300,000,000 beli. I am nothing less than the greatest swordsman in the world. Since I control your fate, girl, I deem that you shall become the one to take my mantle from me," spoke the pirate. For the first time in a few months, after a clearing her throat, the girl would speak up, "That suits me just fine... Because I've decided that I'm going to kill you. The mantle of greatest swordsman will just sweeten the prize. My name is Suzume, I'm not wanted for any crimes, I've swung a sword a number of times I can count on my hands, but I will be the one to kill you. So if you want to train your death, I'll be your student, and with the cursed black blade that my friend gifted me before you removed his head before my very eyes..." "That's enough, girl. I can only handle so much anticipation." "But..." "I said enough. I am your master, so you must listen to me."
As one would imagine, their relationship at that point was so close you could only imagine how deeply the knives were plunged into one another's backs. Their relationship was one of pure hatred, so intense it was almost like friendship. They would pay eachother compliments that the other knew was just a bunch of bullshit. And that was just the social aspect of their relationship. Very frequently would Suzume 'accidentally' bump her master overboard while he was staring out into the blue seas, and so often did Stark 'accidentally' forget to feed her. Between swordplay lessons and their viscous food-fights which left both of them needing to repair the ship, despite the damage to the ship being Starks fault, they didn't have enough time to savor their loathing of one another.
Then one day, the ship would land on a new island. Some place that looked like it didn't have much to it asides being a massive graveyard of rusty weapons with large eroded castles in the distance. "This island is where two of the greatest swordsmen to ever grace the world with their talent trained..." "You mean Kuraigana Island?" "...Y-yeah. How'd you know?" "If I can still remember how to treat a Hangman Fungal Infection that I've only seen one other time back when I was 7 years old... What makes you think I wouldn't remember each and every stupid thing you ramble on about in your 'swordsmanship history' lessons?" "You make a point." "How haven't I killed you yet?"
Before they could really continue their classical banter, they were surrounded by vicious Humandrills, armed and ready to fight with the only non-rusted weapons for what seemed like miles. "You mentions something about monkeys. Are these heavily armed monkeys those monkeys?" "Yep. I recommend you leave them to me." As much as she hated to admit it, Stark was a superior swordsman to her by every stretch of the imagination, and if he had a professional opinion about the skill of something, she'd learned to accept it before she got herself almost killed.
After carving a path through the ferocious Humandrills, they took refuge in an eroded castle in the even more eroded ruins of what appeared to be a town. With nothing but a large amount of medical supplies, a good supply of food, and their blades, Stark revealed his master plan. "In all of my career of being a swordsman, very few people have been able to bypass my defenses. Those who boast the ability to cleave through steel even to this day have failed to chip my mighty saber, Taka. All those who make it through my guard and landed their blade on me have left their mark, you could say I scar easily. Those who have left their mark were incredibly good swordsmen, blessed with more talent, skill, and luck than the hundreds preceding them combined. I've decided that here on this island, I am going to let you come at me at any time, and attack me until you've landed a cut or are dead. I will do you the service of not holding back, but if you die, it's your fault. Regardless of the result, when this is over, you're free to go."
Suzume was caught off guard, certainly she'd tried many times to kill him, pushing him into the sea, attacking him in his sleep, but each time she'd not been able to make a scratch on him. Now she had to lower herself to the pathetic goal of just landing a cut? This was bullshit! "You can't be serious! I told you, I'm going to kill you! You can't just do this, I'm nowhere near strong enough yet!" "If I were to be killed just because I trained you to specifically be able to kill me, you would have the mantle for a few months tops, and then someone completely unworthy would take it from you with a style of swordsmanship you are utterly unfamiliar with. I'm letting you go so that you can gain true power and then come to kill me. I want you to earn a title and have it hold true for as long as you live. A petty overspecialized swordsman will not do at all."
Chapter 4 -- Training To and From Hell Obviously the first thing that popped into her mind was to immediate break down and attack, sick of her master's stupid face. The man parried her with such ease, such delicate precision using his blade that she stumbled off to the side and hit the ground scraping her knee. "Tut. I thought I taught you better than to overextend yourself with a stab," Stark taunted. "Shut up, that was just a warm up!" Suzume shouted in anger.
Letting hate take over, she unleashed as much fury as she could, striking with enormous speed. The pirate lord of swordsmanship would effortlessly parry her attacks, almost like he could see each and every thing that she did or intended to do. Within a few minutes she was tired out and panting, her stance weak from exhaustion. "Why aren't you cutting me? I thought you said you wouldn't hold back. You weren't this nice to the merchants!" she would taunt, almost like a roar of desperation. "I never said that the training had started, in fact, I never finished telling you my master plan, you kinda just... started screaming and attacked me," he would say, his face almost resigning.
Defeated, Suzume dropped her sword and fell to her knees.
Stark continued, "Until you land a cut on me, I'm going to keep helping you grow. I will not attack you first, and if you require, we can keep on training here until Humandrills are extinct. Until you cut me, I will not leave this island." Suzume would stare at her sword upon the ground... "Alright."
At that point Suzume's resolve was redoubled. Lessons in swordplay on the island involved sparring with tamed Humandrills, which Stark captured from occasional raids on the castle. The student of swordsmanship spent a good portion of the following two years in a constant fluctuating state of training with humandrills and getting scars from her attempts on her master's life. Gallons of monkey blood was spilled in the name of her goal, and paired with the hellish basic training which involved lifting, throwing, and cleaving large rocks, Suzume was shaping up to be a prodigious swordsman as well.
As a totally-out-of-left-field side note, Stark captured and trained a few humandrills to take his boat out to a nearby port city and resupply them with food every month or so. These humandrills do it mostly out of reflex to this day, and are considered regular customers.
Chapter 5 -- New Hope In two years of training with frequent attempts on her master's life, each attempt failing and causing her to need to treat her own wounds as she was the only doctor available within 5 days travel of the island, Suzume had tallied herself up a great deal of scars on her body. Some big, some small, some outright vicious and others looking like slaps on the wrist in comparison, the girl who was once a simple doctor was a piece of modern art. She was uncertain how she'd pulled through with a good many of the wounds as Stark was merciless against her when she tried his life. She couldn't count how many times she'd narrowly avoided losing her head.
Nonetheless, by anyone else's standards she was a monster in her own right. She was able to dispatch humandrills basically on reflex, each new fighting style she tore through only made her more anxious to slay her teacher. At that point she was quite proficient with the art of slicing with the air itself, and could cleave stone in the ruins almost on accident. The only thing she was certain of, however, is that each time she tried to kill her master, their fights got more intense, and she lasted longer. By her calculations she could land the cut if she played her cards right, but cards were always in Stark's favor.
Then it hit her, the true trick to swordplay was not to learn her master's style. Certainly, the man had a good style of combat, which was without doubt superior to that of other swordsman. But Stark knew how own style worked inside and out, and anything that he'd taught Suzume, he had mastered and put into practice years before he'd even met the unfortunate girl. Suzume, age 16, had to develop a style of swordplay all her own from the scraps her teacher had thrown her all these years. If she could do this before the next time she tried to kill him, she might have been able to pull it off.
It was haphazard, but she managed to piece together a new way to combat foes with a sword in the span of a month. Stark knew she was up to something when it took her so long to make an attempt on his life, and this excited him greatly. Upon their next fight, Stark would laugh, "I was starting to miss the attention. You ready to die?" "I was about to ask you the same thing, you damned murderer," Suzume would retort, "A quick question before you die, how does it feel knowing that you've groomed the harbinger of your demise?" Stark would grin with this nigh-demonic look in his eye, "I don't know, I'll tell you when I've successfully done it!"
With that, she pulled out her sword, and held it as usual, pointing it towards the target of her particular loathing. Her eyes were full of confidence: a new sort, unlike the usual overconfidence that Stark had smashed time and time again. What kind of attack would she reveal this time?
Chapter 6 -- Hope and Melancholy The battle of blades started out like any other. Despite claiming that he was not holding back, Stark refused to set the pace of the battle and thereby left Suzume to attack at her own pace, making the fight quite unfair to begin with. Since the student was a masterful swordsman without question, she learned to hide her preferred combat rhythm by rapidly alternating between deliberate attacks and furious speeds, making Stark need to take the reins if he wanted to establish anything near a flow of battle. This was how the fights were all the time, at least ever since the girl who was once a medical practitioner got good.
Blade to saber, Suzume clashed her cursed blade against the pressing offense in order to force a neutral ground. Backing off both, the student and the master looked deadly serious, despite relaxed positions. From experience, they both saw no openings in one-anothers' stances, it was only a matter of time before one would be forced. The hateful teenager would retain the confidence she had earlier, showing a sign of obvious improvement, since normally by this point she would be tired. Almost a full half-hour of heated blade on blade combat would do that.
Suddenly, the girl took a deep breath and relaxed even more raising her blade up slowly, deliberately; zero openings present the entire time. A second deep breath followed, she seemed to be focusing a great deal. It was time for the reveal of her new art, she charged in, and with a great deal of force she would work her whole upper body into a horizontal slicing motion, swinging her blade with a full arc. This was something she'd learned to completely avoid altogether, for the very reason that followed up, Stark simple ducked the slash. As a blade of air shot into the distance and cut through stone, she would be left wide open. A slightly disappointed 'tut' emitting from the pirate was immediately followed by him swinging for a massive blow to the girl with his mighty cavalry saber.
Yet from the corner of his eye he caught a glimpse of something, and immediately shifted from a slash to a reverse grip on his sword so that he could block an incoming swing from a totally different position and angle. It was a clever move, but not enough, yet almost as soon as he relaxed he felt a blade narrowly whiz past his chest. Stark was shocked, Suzume almost landed a cut on him using just one technique she created while he wasn't watching. It was pure luck that she didn't.
"Interesting move," spoke the master to the pupil, watching her take several steps back and the images of her that he'd reacted to seem to blow away like smoke, "What do you call it?" Suzume smirked, huffing a bit, "I like to call it 'Zanzou', personally. But since I made it specifically to deal with you, would you like to name it?" The master chuckled a bit, not taking his eyes off of her for an instant, "Nah. I like that name... Beheading Emperor," he would say thoughfully. "Er... No, you're thinking 'Zan-ou' which uses a different form of 'zan' and 'ou' instead of 'zou'. I'm using the form of 'Zan' meaning 'leftover' and 'Zou' which can mean 'image' or 'shape'. You know... 'Zanzou'." "Did you just give me a grammar lesson in the middle of a battle?" "Well, I figure you should understand the name." "You are just full of confidence today, aren't you?"
Taking another moment to relax and breathe, the pupil would dash back in, swinging diagonally. Stark parried the attack aside, and swiped at her, only blowing away an afterimage, and had to continue the blade's path to block another slash from the other side. "Not good enough, the last attack is from the middle!" he would say aiming a stab for the middle. Suddenly he'd realize that another attack was coming in from the right side, so he would adjust his blade's trajectory, and slash upwards. This time, he managed to hit his mark, but he felt a sudden cold, yet hot kind of pain.
Suzume would let out a sharp cry and fall onto her rear, her blade dropping to the ground as she brought both hands to her face. Meanwhile Stark would raise his hand up to his shoulder and pat the spot that hurt. Sure enough... Blood. A smile stretched across his face, as he would turn to look at his pupil, though his smile soon became a frown upon noticing her situation. "You alright? You don't usually scream like that when I cut you, even when you should have been dead," spoke the pirate, monotone and curious.
He knelt down to pull her hands away from her face, and let out something of a huff when he discovered what he'd done... A slash went up across her cheek and cut her eye in half. It wasn't a pretty sight, that was for certain, though it was certainly not the first time he'd seen it. "Tssssss. Ouch, that's probably going to hinder your goal of killing me a good amount. Fortunately for you, however, you landed the cut, which means I'm done training you and you can go out on your own," he would say in a totally unsympathetic tone, basically placing the blame on her for getting hit. Salvatore Stark then walked away, leaving Suzume with all the stuff that was in the castle to herself.
She had successfully landed a solid cut on the man who she was certain was the greatest swordsman in the world. But Suzume wasn't happy... why? Was it because of the fact that even in her greatest victory, the object of all of her hatred can still lord his superiority over her? Was it because her swordsmanship wasn't good enough? Perhaps it was because she knew that the bastard, even when he finally released her, was going to be the object of her hate. Even in victory, when she finally had the hope of achieving her goal, the man she hated so very much was able to take something else precious from her.
Chapter 7 -- A New Day After having to go through the procedures to not get a lethal infection in her no-longer-functional right eye, on her own, with no anesthetic on hand (though she had a medical paralytic to keep it from closing), she would spend a bit of time relaxing for a change. She had no means off of the island, so she sat in wait on the beach most of the time, looking for a ship she could hitch a ride on. Something like a month later, she was rescued by a marine vessel.
Marines, people that she could really get behind. The kind of folks that she grew up knowing that she could respect and trust, because they were protectors of the people. The majority of the issues that she had were the gratuitous number of scars that she had accumulated while on Kuraigana Island, and the dried blood on her black sword. She claimed that both were courtesy of the Humandrills native to the island. She'd only been stranded for a short while and was lucky to be alive, and all that she wanted to do was go home to Kuroshima.
When she got back to her home on Kuroshima, her parents were less excited to see her again than they should have been, especially considering all she'd been through, but then again, she didn't want to tell anyone about the kind of shit she'd been through. Thereby came the big issue, she wasn't the little girl they remembered her being. She was practically full grown, and had so much hate still. While her parents didn't appear to mind too much, she could tell that her new self was scaring them. She didn't want to bring her family shame, so within a month of returning, she set off once more.
She wound up in Sabaody Archipelago once again, and opened up a home clinic there. It was a sound venture, profits rolled in as they should, albeit her negative personality made it so that she rarely if ever got a returning patient. Suzume spent a few more years working as a doctor, trying to let her hatred subside, trying to forget the horrible things that happened to her. But she couldn't.
Every night she saw the smiling head of her friend, the grinning face of the pirate bastard. She remembered to cold sensation of being cut, the warm sensation of blood oozing from her open wound. She relived her own hell night after night, recurring over and over ad-nauseum. She couldn't live the normal life she seeked when she was a kid. Suzume needed her vengeance or she'd never be able to sleep soundly at night again.
Chapter 8 -- The Devil's Worst Nightmare Within a month of turning 18 she found herself joining the marines in hopes of attaining the power she needed to kill the object of her hatred. The issue was that the marines didn't train her anywhere near as hard as Stark trained her back on Kuraigana. Nonetheless, she figured that a good many people who achieve high ranks pulled it off through experience and actions, so of course basic training would be a piece of cake. She was placed under the command of Commander Jinseng 'Dragon Tamer' Chea, a female marine of high rank.
The captain was quite a techy person, always fiddling with gadgets and making things to bring down pirates with. A good majority of the funding she was given was spent on building weaponry for the purposes of combating the pirate threat, although, as a side-effect a good majority of the stuff she made was basically only able to be understood by her. She was therefore a field and patrol unit first and foremost, while also being an honorary member of the science division, a quaint title.
Jinseng and Suzume's relationship was quite relaxing, if you'll excuse the pun, Suzume could see a friend in a fellow compatriot against piracy and all its facets. Suzume, being a freaking genius, was able to comprehend a good majority of Jinseng's stuff, and thereby she started to learn the art of 'inventing', a strange and foreign art which yielded results akin to mythical stories of yore. The captain's not-so-secret weapon was her flamethrower, built of her own design, which was crafted from a powerful scientifically created metal known as 'Veganium', and had capably eaten a devil fruit, specifically the Dino Dino no Mi Model: Quetzelcoatlus.
The apparent result is the reason why Jinseng was known as 'Dragon Tamer', she had successfully wound up creating a fire-breathing carnivorous flying reptile. While the logistics of how Veganium actually worked were utterly lost on Suzume, the function formed by the pair was not, and the marine was impressed, especially on the numerous times she'd seen it in action. While Suzume and Jinseng were the only noteable members of the division, they'd taken down a good many pirates back in the day.
But a year and a half in, Jinseng was struck down by a pirate during a high-octane pirate-versus-marine bout, involving multiple battleships on both sides. While Suzume was quite used to being outnumbered, outclassed, or both, Jinseng had proven time and time again that she hardly needed to lift a finger most of the time, so when the battle was too much for a single fire breathing dragon to hold foes off with, she was overwhelmed. Suzume's only real friend on the crew was yet again killed right before her eyes, shot down like nothing. The only difference was that the girl who was once a medical prodigy could have done something about it if she was paying attention!
Sadly the only thing she could do was request that the flamethrower be given to her instead of sent back for experimentation. When asked why, Suzume claimed that she'd taken a liking to Chompers, the nickname she'd designated the critter. They'd unofficially accepted her request, and then Suzume was allowed to have a desk job for a while, since her friend being killed in such a conflict was traumatizing. Beyond pushing papers and taking calls over the den den mushi, she spent the last half of her second year of service working out paperwork to keep Chompers officially outside of the force, using the military animal laws, claiming they were inseperable, which they had become over that time.
Side note: This half of a year doing marine desk work was where she picked up a pair of reading glasses, which she wears to this day so that she can read stuff when she needs to. This is why she wears both glasses and an eyepatch.
Chapter 9 -- A License to Kill At the end of her first two years, she was not drafted into two more years, and didn't extend her service because she felt that the marines desk job was holding her back. At age 20, with two years of military experience under her belt, she moved on to a more direct approach to her goal. With a fueled hatred of pirates that had been burning for half a year, she had decided to immediately attain a Bounty Hunting License.
She moved over to the nearest island from where she'd been posted in the marines and seemed to settle down for a bit. She took care of some wanted men who'd come in and try to start trouble. This was to get used to the system that was in place, turning in pirates and receiving money was a bit more of a complex procedure than she'd anticipated. After a year of being a town's best security, she'd make her return to the sea scene with a brutal and sudden turning in of a 30,000,000 beri bounty head.
Someone thought they could mozy on into the grand line and be big news because of their high bounty coming out of the blues, and she immediately put them in their place. Turning in the bounty of 'Polygon' Pol Grigory, a man with devil fruit powers that let him break down into cubes and shape himself like building blocks, Suzume enterred the bounty hunting scene with a strong start, and since then has not stopped hunting pirates like some kind of madwoman, earning the title of 'Dragon Warrior' for herself, denotive of her unstoppable fury, the dragon whom she is associated with (Chompers), and her skill in combat.
Hunting down pirates, she aims towards the prize at the top of the mountain: 'Red Blade' Stark, the man who ruined her life, and then led her down the path of self-destruction.
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Abilities and Possessions "Try not to struggle too much; there's a 30% markdown on your price if I turn you in dead." Combat: One part shaolin monk, one part battousai, and one part berserker, Suzume's skill with a blade is in the upper echelon in the world. In combat, she is relentless in her assault, utilizing her sword in any way she can to cause her foe harm, but at the same time, relies almost entirely on absolute coordination and clever use of feints in order to force openings for the final blow. Further, she is fully aware of the power behind a battoujutsu draw-slash, occasionally taking the time to sheathe her sword for the extra 'oomph' she needs to put a particularly nasty foe down. Having learned from someone she can only assume is the greatest swordsman in the world, her style of swordplay is actually insanely well-rounded. She is as skilled at blocking bullets as she is with air cutting, and her familiarity with her sword is unrealistic in the simplest way of explaining it.
Her most skilled application of swordplay is utilized in her personal use of her fighting spirit as a weapon in combat, a method she calls 'qi'. By channeling this fighting spirit with calmness and relaxation, she performs superhuman feats of skill with a sword. This is not necessarily easy for her to do, of course, since her fighting spirit is born from unbridled hatred. It usually requires her to take a few deep breaths and deliberately relax herself, which can leave her open. Nonetheless, the payoff of channeling her qi is quite great, allowing her to up the ante when she's getting outclassed.
While not too infrequent, she is also willing to make use of her Veganium Flamethrower, Chompers. Chompers himself is a flamethrower who ate the Dino Dino no Mi Model: Quetzalcoatlus, and is often confused for a dragon due to the fact that this combination effectively allows him to breathe clouds of fire from his mouth. Chompers, being a flying reptile, prefers to stay aerial in combat, and carpet bomb foes with fire. In odd cases, such as when facing a fireproof foe, or running out of fuel, he can resort to basic attacks, biting and tearing with his predatorial teeth and claws. As a carinivorous zoan, his basic instincts are to hunt and kill, though he's been tamed and is more or less as gentle as a kitten when not ordered to attack.
When disarmed entirely, she is still a medical prodigy and knows a great many things that she shouldn't do to someone if she wants them to be alive. Like a cornered rat, she is quite possibly more vicious without a sword than she is with one. While unarmed, she can't pull off things involving qi, since the sword is a major conduit and a focus point, but she is still capable of striking foes in locations that they'd otherwise prefer to remain intact. She's unafraid to abuse an opponent's weak points, because when she's fighting without a sword, it's not about the hunt anymore, it's about surviving until she can get her sword again.
Defensively, she is highly proficient at long strings of parry-counterattacks, as well as complete dodging attacks when she needs to. She is not afraid of injury, which is why it's hard to keep her on the defensive for very long, since she is willing to add a scar to her collection to win a fight. She hammers on the offensive the moment her counterattacks get a defensive response, and doesn't let up until she can no longer see an opening. Once she is done attacking, she jumps back and readies the defensive once more, generally cycling as such. Weaponry:
Akisame -- The Cursed Black Jian A blade crafted from a legendary black metal in the Florian Triangle, deemed to be cursed by sword fanatics everywhere, due to the haunted nature of its origins. Its blade is oddly hefty due to the material in which it is forged from, making it a tad more difficult to work with, though the payoff is that it allegedly cuts better. The difference is negligible if not entirely in the head of those who swing it. The blade of this sword is double-edged, and extends 31 inches from the handle, with the handle being a solid 10 inches as well, designed ergonomically so that it sits well in the hand without causing much chafing from use and wrapped with red and white fabric. It is straight, with no curvature in its design, and jet black. The hand-guard is small and circular with red jewels imbedded around the rim, while the pommel has sky blue jewels imbedded. The sheathe is black, made of laquered wood, with elegant silver-colored trimming on the base and tip, as well as the middle. Along with this trimming is imbedded yet more sky-blue jewels. Very fashionable, yet oddly inseperable, these jewels never seem to require even basic maintainance. Appearance
Chompers - The Portable Dragon An elegantly designed piece of modern weaponry, born from the battle-ready mind of marine combat scientists. It took a LOT of paperwork to get the marines to let her keep him, but thanks to hard work pushing papers, Suzume has managed to attain a unique and powerful companion. Why so powerful, one might ask? Why it's simple really, Chompers is a new age flamethrower made entirely out of Veganium. This miracle of scientific experimentation allows people to let a weapon house a devil fruit, most noteably zoan types, allowing people to be armed with sentient and loyal animal companions capable of combat both with natural weaponry, and that of their base form. In this particular circumstance, Marine scientists got their hands on the ancient zoan, Dino Dino no Mi, Model: Quetzelcoatlus. That's right, reader, you are looking at a state-of-the-art portable dragon. Well... at least as close to it as you can get. Massive flying lizard that can breathe fire. In it's base form, as a flamethrower, it has a dual grip, one grip reversed (pointing upwards) with a thumb-button for unleashing hell, with the other on the left side of the device. The fuel canister sits behind an acceleration gas canister (full of pressurized air) which forces the gas out in a powerful steam, allowing less fuel to go further. This is, of course, ignited via a pilot light at the front point, and viola~ a portable firearm, literally! And all that placed in the compact size roughly equivalent to an RPG launcher. Of course, in its zoan form, it takes on the shape of a massive flying lizard, scales brown in coloration, with an oblong beak-like muzzle, full of razor-sharp teeth. It's roughly 30 feet (10 meters) tall from toe to tip of the beak, and has a 52 foot (15 meter) wingspan! As astounding as that is, it doesn't affect the efficiency of the flamethrower part of it. Altogether it only has enough for 4 uses per reload, requiring a refill in the main fuel canister, though the pressurized air canister is good for at least 20 reloads. At the norm each stream of fire is roughly equivalent to a rank 8 flamethrower technique, having an 8 meter cone-shaped stream on the norm, though she can load in more powerful fuel for more powerful effect, for techniques. Appearance - Flamethrower Appearance - Quetzelcoatlus Items: Beli: 31,900,000 SD Earned: 167 Stat Points: 32 + 150 + (17*(2/3) = 11.33--) = 193 Advancement Points: 0 SD Remaining: 0 Stats:
- Used for Stats: 148
- Used for Fortune: 45
- Strength: 48
- Speed: 49
- Stamina: 25
- Accuracy: 26
- Fortune: 64 (37+27)
Traits: Jack of All Trades (1 Professional Trait) – The character is able to master multiple skills, and has become adept at a number of things. This character gains two additional secondary professions. Technically Adept (1 Professional Trait) - Increases total technique points by 40% of your fortune score. Technical Mastery (1 Professional Trait) - Increases total technique points by 100% of your fortune score, but does not stack with Technically Adept (this benefit overrides the previous benefit). Requires Technically Adept and 100 SD earned.
Advanced Sword Mastery (2 General Traits) - Requires 100 SD earned. This replaces Sword Mastery if the character already possesses the trait. The character has attained supreme mastery in the way of the sword. All techniques using a sword are always treated as being four ranks higher for purposes of calculating their technique rank benchmark, though their actual rank is not changed. Additionally, all techniques which gain this benefit have their focus cost reduced by half. Tough Bargainer (1 General Trait) – Ever the successful businessman, merchants know how to extract money from people and to keep as much as they can from leaving their pocket. Thus, they will always earn 20% more Beli in their Storylines. Beast Handler (1 General Trait) - Characters with this trait have a natural affinity for getting along with animals. Wild animals tend to behave either neutrally or friendly towards the character, unless they are very strongly aggressive. These animals, with proper approach and care, may be made to be merely distrustful and may sometimes refrain from attacking. The user also gains one NPC pet, who may possess humanlike intelligence, behaves as a crew NPC and is controlled by the player of the main character. 'Tis But A Scratch! (1 General Trait) - Weapon specialists are often used to fighting against other weapon specialists in close combat. Thus their chances of being injured by such weapons increase drastically compared to others. These particular characters are used to fighting so much under those conditions that they can actually ignore the effects of pain much better than their sissy counterparts and fight on. Skill in Upgrades (1 General Trait) – These fellows are amazing at what they do, such that they can do it for a much lower cost. All technological upgrades that they make to weapons get a 20% discount. This discount applies only to the inventor themselves, and not weapons made for others.
- Devil Fruit
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Devil Fruit Name: Nope Devil Fruit Type: Nu-uh Devil Fruit Ability: Nada
Techniques "Alright, looks like today's the day bitches die." Regular Technique Points: 224 Used Regular Technique Points: 146 Special Technique Points: 0 Used Special Technique Points: 0
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| * - Denotes a benchmark benefit from Advanced Sword Mastery | Zanzou (Afterimage) (28*) Type: Supplementary Range: Self Stats: N/A Description: Taking a deep breath, Suzume channels her hatred with relaxed, deliberant calmness. This causes her motions to appear slightly blurry, as if her outline is slower than her body, leaving motion blurs. Using her fighting spirit, or as she likes to call it, 'Qi', for a single post, she can cause each of her sword attacks to appear visibly quicker, though not actually any faster. This is done by leaving behind an afterimage in the wake of her attack, regardless of actually hitting, as she performs another attack. These afterimages cannot impede or harm the foe in any way, and are merely distractions left as she quickly repositions herself after each attack in order to strike from an 'unexpected' angle. The afterimages are immediately dispelled into thin air whenever they are attacked, or when Suzume ceases the offensive in order to back off or block. After each time this is used each thread there is a slightly longer cooldown, one post after one use, two after two, and on like that. After 5 uses she requires rest, and after 6 uses in a single thread, she'll be completely unable to move.
When in use, offensive techniques have the prefix-adjective "Taishoku no" ('Fading') tacked onto their name, as the afterimage visibly fades away.
| Kawasu (Parry) (28*) Type: Defensive Range: Self Stats: -- Description: Suzume rapidly angles her sword in such a way as to cause bullet-speed projectiles to land on the blade, and then redirect off of it in some random direction. This can be done with non-ranked shooting attacks, ranked single shots of rank 32 and less, and gatling gun techniques of less than rank 28. Obviously, she must see the attack coming, and it must at some point be in her sword's range. in order to parry it.
| Kotoken (Flying Sword) (14*) Type: Offensive Range: Short Stats: -- Description: With a flick of her wrist, she swings her sword with enough skill to send out a cutting shockwave, extending her usual cutting range a good deal. This shockwave cuts like a normal sword swing.
| Kotoken: Ishi no Uta (Flying Sword: Stone Song) (16* (14+2)) Type: Offensive Range: Short Stats: -- Description: Branched from Kotoken. With a flick of the wrist, she swings her sword with enough skill to send out a cutting shockwave, extending her usual cutting range a good deal. This shockwave can go through untiered materials like stone with no impedement.
| Kotoken: Tetsu no Uta (Flying Sword: Iron Song) (20* (16+4)) Type: Offensive Range: Short Stats: -- Description: Branched from Kotoken: Ishi no Uta. Gripping her sword firmly, she whips the blade with deliberate force, and unleashes a cutting shockwave extending her usual cutting range a good deal. This shockwave is capable of sawing through tier 1 materials like iron within its effective range.
| Kotoken: Hagane no Uta (Flying Sword: Steel Song) (28* (20+8)) Type: Offensive Range: Short Stats: -- Description: Branched from Kotoken: Tetsu no Uta. Gripping her sword firmly, she whips the blade with deliberate force, and unleashes a cutting shockwave extending her usual cutting range a good deal. This shockwave is white in color, and is capable of sawing through tier 2 materials like steel within its effective range. Has a pleasant whistle as it soars through the air.
| Harinezumi (Porcupine) (4*) Type: Offensive Range: Melee Stats: -- Description: Reeling in her sword so that the handle is close to her chest while the blade's tip points directly at her foe, she proceeds to unleash a great many strikes at the general direction of 'forward' appearing to make a cone of furious stabbing attacks.
| Momiau (Shove) (4*) Type: Offensive Range: Melee Stats: -- Description: A thrusting attack which actually doesn't intend to do much damage, but instead merely causes the foe to topple onto their rear or back by lightly shoving their upper body backwards with the tip of her sword, disbalancing them.
| Taihou (Cannon) (6* (4+2)) Type: Offensive Range: Melee Stats: -- Description: Branched from Momiau. A more potent thrusting attack, which aims to knock foes backwards and onto the ground with roughly the same sword-tip thrust. Good for gaining distance when she needs it.
| Senkou (Flash) (4*) Type: Offensive Range: Melee Stats: -- Description: An iai drawing-attack, which starts from a sheathed position at the hip, and slices diagonally upwards from there, using the momentum of the draw to deal damage. This momentum also knocks a foe upwards towards the sky.
| Hirameku (Flicker) (10* (4+6)) Type: Offensive Range: Melee Stats: -- Description: Branched from Senkou. An iai drawing-attack which starts from a sheathed position at the hip and slices diagonally upwards from there. This attack is performed with high speed, appearing blurry.
| Toppi (Offbeat) (24* (10+14)) Type: Offensive Range: Melee Stats: -- Description: Branched from Hirameku. A slash which can be performed in the iai mannerism or with sword already out. Requiring that she channel her qi calmly and deliberately, this slash is performed at ludicrous speeds, such that an observer of such an attack would not normally be able to perceive the fact that it even happened. When performed, Suzume appears to simply walk past her foe without attacking, though blade is out now even if it weren't an instant ago. She then sheathes the blade, and upon it clicking into place, the attack finally kicks in, her foe being cut.
| Suzume Panchi (Suzume Punch) (4) Type: Offensive Range: Melee Stats: -- Description: A punching attack in which Suzume smites her foe with the mighty force of her sheer physical might! ....Alright, she just punches them really hard in the face.
| Dragonbreath Canister (14) Type: Offensive Invention Range: Short Stats: -- Description: A canister full of more effective fuel for her flamethrower. When fired from the flamethrower, it has an extended cone, now reaching a slightly extended (though still short) range with its flames and hits with more intensity, causing flammable materials to catch fire within its cone. This canister can fired 4 times in a thread, and is refilled between threads.
| Hellfire Canister (28 (14+14)) Type: Offensive Invention Range: Medium Stats: -- Description: Branched from Dragonbreath Canister. Improving upon the previous formula, Suzume's figured out how to make a petrolium-based fluid which burns with sufficient intensity so as to melt through iron quickly. This fuel, when fired from the flamethrower, it can reach a whopping medium range with its flames, causing anything even remotely flammable caught in this cone of hot death to be set ablaze the instant it makes contact. This canister can be fired 4 times in a thread, and is refilled between threads.
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Development History "I hate math." Gains/Losses: Amity's Stuff Aoi's Stuff Scoop From Fortunata Hendrix +98 SP Stuff From Fortunata Scoop from Luna AkemiSell back all iron katanas and case for 1,600,000 beli What Luna Did Cyborgs Music and Mayhem+13 SD + 3,000,000 beli A Few Pieces Short of a Masterpiece+23 SD + 5,750,000 beli July Contest+2 SD Interlocking the New Pieces+18 SD + 4,450,000 beli Finishing the Puzzle+23 SD +5,550,000 beli Another Piece Joins the Bunch+6 SD + 1,250,000 beli Janurary Contest - +3 SD A New And Puzzling Sea +4 SD, +2,000,000 beli Fortunata's IC Doings, Gains, and Such Maginificent Bastards (Incomplete)+6 SD, +1,450,000 beli The New Luna's Doings (None Yet) Here -7,000,000 beli, +1 Seaking Bone Katana Saint Paddy's... Patty's Day Bash - +2 SD and a bottle of hardcore dizzy-water. The Book's Cover - +13 SD, + 3,200,000 beli Judgement Failed - +2 SD, +450,000 beli Edit Log:
Spoiler: click to toggle 8/3/2015: Added gains from Rust Around the Edges.
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