(no subject)
[series]: Angel Sanctuary
[character]: Kurai
[character history / background]:
Kurai is the 14th (and now last) princess of the Royal Gehennan family. Growing up, she was rather infamous in the court because of her rowdy behaviour. Her father ended up exiling her, and as Kurai thought, it was because he was unable to tame her. So, she was sent to the third layer of Hell, Anagura. Of course, as she would later learn, she had always been the intended heir and she had been exiled to keep her safe. When she returned to Gehenna, she was startled to see a wasteland of bodies. The angels had broken the peace treaty and conquered the weakened Gehenna.
Wandering, Kurai ended up coming across a fellow demon that was alive. Yet, as she went to help him, the head ended up rolling into her lap. Angels. They had killed the boy and went to go have their way with Kurai, and that was when Kurai first met Alexiel. Saving her from that fate, Kurai came to look up to her and even 'love' her. From Alexiel, she learned how to use a sword and magic. During that time, she also found another relative, Arakune.
Alexiel was rebelling against God and she joined with her. Then, one day, Alexiel fell. In turn, Kurai and her fellow demons slept for centuries to store their power and to gather more comrades. They were waiting, always waiting.
At the start of the manga, Kurai had recently stolen the Angel’s Crystal (Alexiel's body) as she searched for her soul. Thinking that she had finally found her, Kurai was shocked to realize that it was Setsuna, and that Setsuna was a male. Initially hating Setsuna for being male and being human, Kurai ended up becoming his ally and helping him along his journey (also hindering him as she sometimes got into trouble...)
Wikia
[character abilities]:
As far as abilities go, Kurai is the Dragonmaster. She has a dragonstone earring that her father had passed down to her. It is a treasure that seals the three Dragon Gods: Jade, Amber and Agat. She can contact and speak with them. Also, she has the ability to call out mystical dragons. When the Angels didn't have the elements of water and wind, Kurai stated that she could call them out to complete the elements. She has the skill to control them, thanks in part to training with Hatter every day while she was with the demon, meaning she can ride them and talk to them.
Also, she states, "I frantically strived in magic and swordsmanship" meaning that she has skills in both of those areas. She has been shown to blast astral energy from her hands, especially when Hatter is bothering her. Being a demon, she also has a set of wings. They are not white and feathered like those of an angel, but instead leathery like a bat and multi-coloured; blues, greens, purples.
[character personality]:
Although Kurai might be lacking in stature, by no means is she lacking in personality. In many ways, she is more like a boy than a girl. In fact, not only does she refer to herself as a 'Prince', when people first meet her they tend to think that she is a boy. She fit in easily enough at the boy’s school, even trying to call out some guy who ended up being much bigger than she was. This is not only because of her clothing, but because she also refers to herself with masculine pronouns (in the Japanese). Kurai will also speak rather rudely, especially to people she doesn't like, whether or not she has cause too. Not really the trait that a princess should have, but Kurai isn't really a typical princess.
She is competitive, brash, outgoing and when she puts her mind to something, she will continue on that path for no matter how long. Sometimes the path she chooses is the correct one, but sometimes it just gets her into trouble. She is quite proud of her demon heritage and wishes to rebuild her kingdom. She can be violent when she needs to be, stomping harshly on people's toes or kicking them. She is easily prone to bouts of anger and will just as quickly threaten someone with loud words. She is someone who can easily be bored and doesn’t find any happiness in just sitting around and doing nothing, even if things are presented to her.
Kurai can also be very stubborn. In the beginning, she couldn't accept Setsuna as himself and instead simply wanted Alexiel back. To Kurai, Alexiel was the perfect woman. Whereas other angels had tried to have their way with Kurai, Alexiel had stepped in and saved her. Because of this, even though she was an angel, Kurai strongly admired the other woman and put her up on a pedestal. She guarded her body while she searched. For Kurai, pleasing Alexiel was always the number one thing and she wanted to become stronger. That way she could marry Alexiel so she wouldn't need a man to protect her.
While Kurai can be quite childish, she is also considered to be quite pure. The Mad Hatter often makes note of this and one of the reasons that the Dragons ended up choosing her as their master was because of this pure heart. Even though she is quite old, she is still fairly naive about how the world works. She is headstrong but she is also fragile and too trusting. At times Kurai does put her faith in the wrong people and in turn gets burned because of it. She is quick to trust people, hence why both Mad Hatter and Arachne are able to use her. She isn't one to often question truths. She accepts Hatter's proposition at face value, assuming that Hatter would keep the bargain.
Seeing a large quantity of blood or people being hurt brings back memories of the past to her. She sees the slaughter in Gehenna in such cases and is reminded of all that has happened. Kurai wants to be a strong leader for her people so that she will never have to live through that again and so that her people will never have to live through that again. She vows to become a better queen just for that reason. She is very loyal to her subjects and also to those who earn her trust. She is quite good at understanding the loneliness and the pain of losing someone and tries to comfort people.
Even though she can be quite loud, there is also a kind side to Kurai as well. Such is the case of Prince Abaddon. It is said that any who look upon him would die instantly. Kurai happens not too because of the earring she had taken from Setsuna. Seeing the loneliness that he suffers by being chained down and unable to fly in the sky, Kurai brings the birds down for him so that he could have some friends. She is the type of person who grows on people. Yet, she is also a crybaby and tends to fret and worry about people. Even when she is crying, she can still scream and be noisy with the best of them. While she initially denied her heart, she learned that she shouldn't, that no matter what she should listen to it and not lie to herself.
Kurai is often called pure, but to her, she isn't. She realizes as time progresses that a lot of the things she does is selfish, and she doesn't wish to be selfish anymore. She believes that she's not pure or innocent. She can be jealous and even has her darker moments. When Sara is attacked near the beginning of the series, for a moment Kurai wonders what if? What if Sara were to die there? If she were gone, wouldn't Setsuna then love her? Yet, she doesn't act on that, which is something. She even reprimands herself, asking herself what was she thinking?
She does envy Sara though. She was jealous of her and wanted to capture Setsuna's heart. She is just an ordinary girl despite everything else, and is just as fragile as one and just as sly. When she realizes this though, she doesn't wallow in it. Instead, she wants to truly become stronger so that she can protect the happiness of those that she loves. She pledges to herself that she won't lose her way anymore and that she won't allow anyone else to spill his or her blood for her again.
In the beginning, she only looked at things her way. She didn't stop to question why people did what they did. She was also hypocritical. She asked Hatter that even though Hatter knew that Lucifer 'didn't love you, so why did you fall for him?' Yet, Kurai isn't one to talk, as when she tells Setsuna that she loves him, she takes it back and makes a joke out of it. She might not always be understood, but she means well. She can be dense as well as self-sacrificing, wanting to be strong enough to protect people. She thinks that marrying is no big deal so long as she can help Setsuna. She wants Setsuna to always be laughing like he was. She doesn’t want to be left behind or not have those she cares about not come back.
Overall, she is a handful, but she learns, adapts and grows as she goes along. She realizes that she needs to be more aware of people and events. In the end, she takes the steps towards becoming a better queen for her people and her country.
[point in timeline you're picking your character from]: Post Manga
[journal post]:
What... What the heck is going on? [Muttering.] Not Gehenna and where the heck am I? Come on! This isn't funny!
[Oh, and before she forgets…]
Where the hell did my dragon go?! Don't think I'll let you get away with that! You- you stupid asshole!
[Fuming, annoyed. She will deal with that later, but now? Now she needs answers.]
Alright. Listen. You. Ya, you. Whoever is behind this? I don't have time for this stuff! I've got important things to be doing and I'm not going to let you stand in my way! Noise is waiting for me and so is my kingdom. So gimme some damn answers now!
[third person / log sample]:
She'd kissed him.
Had someone told Kurai when she first met him that she would have grabbed him by the ears, planted a kiss on his lips and then shoved him from her dragon, the only part she would have believed was the dragon pushing part. After all, he was a human, and male to boot. Add to that the fact that he was Alexiel-sama's incarnation... Well, that had disaster written all over it.
Yet, from that initial meeting, she had grown. She knew that and not only physically but mentally too. Kurai had told Setsuna that she was going to find a way to restore her kingdom. She was going to be a strong Queen, a Queen that all her people deserved, both those living and those who had perished along the way. While she had been a ruler before his arrival, she hadn't been all that mature. She'd been a young brat who had wanted really only one thing, and that was to have Alexiel-sama back.
Oh, but how she had grown. She'd loved the angel but she knew now that it was as Setsuna had pointed out. It hadn't been real love. It had been that immature love of a youth, for Alexiel had been the one to save her and take her under her wing. She'd taught her so much and given her a new life. It was the memory of that that Kurai had been trapped in. No more. There were many things that Kurai now understood. While she still might have her selfish moments, she knew that things weren't always about her. Alexiel would sleep and when she was ready, she would awaken. Kurai wouldn't force that on her. She would wait, if somewhat impatiently, until the day that Alexiel decided to wake up.
Then there was love... She still loved Setsuna, even knowing that he would never return those feelings towards her. He had Sara. Once she might have denied them though, but now she embraced those feelings. They were a part of who she was, and even if he didn't love her in the romantic sense, she wasn't going to deny those emotions. It was funny thinking about how much she had learned from him. She would have been more than happy to sacrifice herself if it had meant saving everyone else, but not for Setsuna. She remembered asking him which he would choose; him being happy or someone important being happy. It had been a one or the other situation, yet he had chosen everyone... Kurai had learned not to lie to her heart again. She also learned that she really did want to become stronger and that she did need to be more aware of her position.
It really was strange thinking about everything. The route that she had taken since stealing the Angel’s Crystal and finding Setsuna had taken her down a long path. Once, things had been so black and white. There were Angels. There were Demons. There were Humans. She hadn’t liked Angels too much, but who could have blamed her… Coming back to Gehenna to see all those she knew slaughtered. She could still remember that, the bodies piled upon the ground and the stench of blood saturated in the air. If it had not been for Alexiel, she likely would never have seen the other side of any Angel, let alone lived to the age she was. Humans too had surprised her. She had hated them, hated them deeply. They didn’t care that what they did also hurt her kingdom. Why would they? They were selfish creatures. God, angels and humans would finally be breathing their last breath was what she had thought. And demons… Those that she had trusted had in turn betrayed her while it had been Setsuna, a human, which had saved her.
And the end? The end was perhaps the strangest of all. Kurai never would have guessed that Rosiel would do as he did. Rosiel, whom her people proclaimed their hatred for, had given Setsuna his wings… It was as if the world had been turned upside down and on is head with that one simple seeming gesture.
Her fingers brushed against her lips as she glanced back at Setsuna one last time. Kurai didn’t know how long it would be before she saw him again. It could be many years, and likely would. She knew that she had a lot of work ahead of her. Rebuilding her kingdom wouldn’t come overnight. She knew she still had a lot of learning to do and still needed to grow. Yet, just because this was a bump in her path though it didn’t mean she was going to give up. She would be worthy of her title. With a determined look on her face, Kurai knew that this was the correct choice.
[character]: Kurai
[character history / background]:
Kurai is the 14th (and now last) princess of the Royal Gehennan family. Growing up, she was rather infamous in the court because of her rowdy behaviour. Her father ended up exiling her, and as Kurai thought, it was because he was unable to tame her. So, she was sent to the third layer of Hell, Anagura. Of course, as she would later learn, she had always been the intended heir and she had been exiled to keep her safe. When she returned to Gehenna, she was startled to see a wasteland of bodies. The angels had broken the peace treaty and conquered the weakened Gehenna.
Wandering, Kurai ended up coming across a fellow demon that was alive. Yet, as she went to help him, the head ended up rolling into her lap. Angels. They had killed the boy and went to go have their way with Kurai, and that was when Kurai first met Alexiel. Saving her from that fate, Kurai came to look up to her and even 'love' her. From Alexiel, she learned how to use a sword and magic. During that time, she also found another relative, Arakune.
Alexiel was rebelling against God and she joined with her. Then, one day, Alexiel fell. In turn, Kurai and her fellow demons slept for centuries to store their power and to gather more comrades. They were waiting, always waiting.
At the start of the manga, Kurai had recently stolen the Angel’s Crystal (Alexiel's body) as she searched for her soul. Thinking that she had finally found her, Kurai was shocked to realize that it was Setsuna, and that Setsuna was a male. Initially hating Setsuna for being male and being human, Kurai ended up becoming his ally and helping him along his journey (also hindering him as she sometimes got into trouble...)
Wikia
[character abilities]:
As far as abilities go, Kurai is the Dragonmaster. She has a dragonstone earring that her father had passed down to her. It is a treasure that seals the three Dragon Gods: Jade, Amber and Agat. She can contact and speak with them. Also, she has the ability to call out mystical dragons. When the Angels didn't have the elements of water and wind, Kurai stated that she could call them out to complete the elements. She has the skill to control them, thanks in part to training with Hatter every day while she was with the demon, meaning she can ride them and talk to them.
Also, she states, "I frantically strived in magic and swordsmanship" meaning that she has skills in both of those areas. She has been shown to blast astral energy from her hands, especially when Hatter is bothering her. Being a demon, she also has a set of wings. They are not white and feathered like those of an angel, but instead leathery like a bat and multi-coloured; blues, greens, purples.
[character personality]:
Although Kurai might be lacking in stature, by no means is she lacking in personality. In many ways, she is more like a boy than a girl. In fact, not only does she refer to herself as a 'Prince', when people first meet her they tend to think that she is a boy. She fit in easily enough at the boy’s school, even trying to call out some guy who ended up being much bigger than she was. This is not only because of her clothing, but because she also refers to herself with masculine pronouns (in the Japanese). Kurai will also speak rather rudely, especially to people she doesn't like, whether or not she has cause too. Not really the trait that a princess should have, but Kurai isn't really a typical princess.
She is competitive, brash, outgoing and when she puts her mind to something, she will continue on that path for no matter how long. Sometimes the path she chooses is the correct one, but sometimes it just gets her into trouble. She is quite proud of her demon heritage and wishes to rebuild her kingdom. She can be violent when she needs to be, stomping harshly on people's toes or kicking them. She is easily prone to bouts of anger and will just as quickly threaten someone with loud words. She is someone who can easily be bored and doesn’t find any happiness in just sitting around and doing nothing, even if things are presented to her.
Kurai can also be very stubborn. In the beginning, she couldn't accept Setsuna as himself and instead simply wanted Alexiel back. To Kurai, Alexiel was the perfect woman. Whereas other angels had tried to have their way with Kurai, Alexiel had stepped in and saved her. Because of this, even though she was an angel, Kurai strongly admired the other woman and put her up on a pedestal. She guarded her body while she searched. For Kurai, pleasing Alexiel was always the number one thing and she wanted to become stronger. That way she could marry Alexiel so she wouldn't need a man to protect her.
While Kurai can be quite childish, she is also considered to be quite pure. The Mad Hatter often makes note of this and one of the reasons that the Dragons ended up choosing her as their master was because of this pure heart. Even though she is quite old, she is still fairly naive about how the world works. She is headstrong but she is also fragile and too trusting. At times Kurai does put her faith in the wrong people and in turn gets burned because of it. She is quick to trust people, hence why both Mad Hatter and Arachne are able to use her. She isn't one to often question truths. She accepts Hatter's proposition at face value, assuming that Hatter would keep the bargain.
Seeing a large quantity of blood or people being hurt brings back memories of the past to her. She sees the slaughter in Gehenna in such cases and is reminded of all that has happened. Kurai wants to be a strong leader for her people so that she will never have to live through that again and so that her people will never have to live through that again. She vows to become a better queen just for that reason. She is very loyal to her subjects and also to those who earn her trust. She is quite good at understanding the loneliness and the pain of losing someone and tries to comfort people.
Even though she can be quite loud, there is also a kind side to Kurai as well. Such is the case of Prince Abaddon. It is said that any who look upon him would die instantly. Kurai happens not too because of the earring she had taken from Setsuna. Seeing the loneliness that he suffers by being chained down and unable to fly in the sky, Kurai brings the birds down for him so that he could have some friends. She is the type of person who grows on people. Yet, she is also a crybaby and tends to fret and worry about people. Even when she is crying, she can still scream and be noisy with the best of them. While she initially denied her heart, she learned that she shouldn't, that no matter what she should listen to it and not lie to herself.
Kurai is often called pure, but to her, she isn't. She realizes as time progresses that a lot of the things she does is selfish, and she doesn't wish to be selfish anymore. She believes that she's not pure or innocent. She can be jealous and even has her darker moments. When Sara is attacked near the beginning of the series, for a moment Kurai wonders what if? What if Sara were to die there? If she were gone, wouldn't Setsuna then love her? Yet, she doesn't act on that, which is something. She even reprimands herself, asking herself what was she thinking?
She does envy Sara though. She was jealous of her and wanted to capture Setsuna's heart. She is just an ordinary girl despite everything else, and is just as fragile as one and just as sly. When she realizes this though, she doesn't wallow in it. Instead, she wants to truly become stronger so that she can protect the happiness of those that she loves. She pledges to herself that she won't lose her way anymore and that she won't allow anyone else to spill his or her blood for her again.
In the beginning, she only looked at things her way. She didn't stop to question why people did what they did. She was also hypocritical. She asked Hatter that even though Hatter knew that Lucifer 'didn't love you, so why did you fall for him?' Yet, Kurai isn't one to talk, as when she tells Setsuna that she loves him, she takes it back and makes a joke out of it. She might not always be understood, but she means well. She can be dense as well as self-sacrificing, wanting to be strong enough to protect people. She thinks that marrying is no big deal so long as she can help Setsuna. She wants Setsuna to always be laughing like he was. She doesn’t want to be left behind or not have those she cares about not come back.
Overall, she is a handful, but she learns, adapts and grows as she goes along. She realizes that she needs to be more aware of people and events. In the end, she takes the steps towards becoming a better queen for her people and her country.
[point in timeline you're picking your character from]: Post Manga
[journal post]:
What... What the heck is going on? [Muttering.] Not Gehenna and where the heck am I? Come on! This isn't funny!
[Oh, and before she forgets…]
Where the hell did my dragon go?! Don't think I'll let you get away with that! You- you stupid asshole!
[Fuming, annoyed. She will deal with that later, but now? Now she needs answers.]
Alright. Listen. You. Ya, you. Whoever is behind this? I don't have time for this stuff! I've got important things to be doing and I'm not going to let you stand in my way! Noise is waiting for me and so is my kingdom. So gimme some damn answers now!
[third person / log sample]:
She'd kissed him.
Had someone told Kurai when she first met him that she would have grabbed him by the ears, planted a kiss on his lips and then shoved him from her dragon, the only part she would have believed was the dragon pushing part. After all, he was a human, and male to boot. Add to that the fact that he was Alexiel-sama's incarnation... Well, that had disaster written all over it.
Yet, from that initial meeting, she had grown. She knew that and not only physically but mentally too. Kurai had told Setsuna that she was going to find a way to restore her kingdom. She was going to be a strong Queen, a Queen that all her people deserved, both those living and those who had perished along the way. While she had been a ruler before his arrival, she hadn't been all that mature. She'd been a young brat who had wanted really only one thing, and that was to have Alexiel-sama back.
Oh, but how she had grown. She'd loved the angel but she knew now that it was as Setsuna had pointed out. It hadn't been real love. It had been that immature love of a youth, for Alexiel had been the one to save her and take her under her wing. She'd taught her so much and given her a new life. It was the memory of that that Kurai had been trapped in. No more. There were many things that Kurai now understood. While she still might have her selfish moments, she knew that things weren't always about her. Alexiel would sleep and when she was ready, she would awaken. Kurai wouldn't force that on her. She would wait, if somewhat impatiently, until the day that Alexiel decided to wake up.
Then there was love... She still loved Setsuna, even knowing that he would never return those feelings towards her. He had Sara. Once she might have denied them though, but now she embraced those feelings. They were a part of who she was, and even if he didn't love her in the romantic sense, she wasn't going to deny those emotions. It was funny thinking about how much she had learned from him. She would have been more than happy to sacrifice herself if it had meant saving everyone else, but not for Setsuna. She remembered asking him which he would choose; him being happy or someone important being happy. It had been a one or the other situation, yet he had chosen everyone... Kurai had learned not to lie to her heart again. She also learned that she really did want to become stronger and that she did need to be more aware of her position.
It really was strange thinking about everything. The route that she had taken since stealing the Angel’s Crystal and finding Setsuna had taken her down a long path. Once, things had been so black and white. There were Angels. There were Demons. There were Humans. She hadn’t liked Angels too much, but who could have blamed her… Coming back to Gehenna to see all those she knew slaughtered. She could still remember that, the bodies piled upon the ground and the stench of blood saturated in the air. If it had not been for Alexiel, she likely would never have seen the other side of any Angel, let alone lived to the age she was. Humans too had surprised her. She had hated them, hated them deeply. They didn’t care that what they did also hurt her kingdom. Why would they? They were selfish creatures. God, angels and humans would finally be breathing their last breath was what she had thought. And demons… Those that she had trusted had in turn betrayed her while it had been Setsuna, a human, which had saved her.
And the end? The end was perhaps the strangest of all. Kurai never would have guessed that Rosiel would do as he did. Rosiel, whom her people proclaimed their hatred for, had given Setsuna his wings… It was as if the world had been turned upside down and on is head with that one simple seeming gesture.
Her fingers brushed against her lips as she glanced back at Setsuna one last time. Kurai didn’t know how long it would be before she saw him again. It could be many years, and likely would. She knew that she had a lot of work ahead of her. Rebuilding her kingdom wouldn’t come overnight. She knew she still had a lot of learning to do and still needed to grow. Yet, just because this was a bump in her path though it didn’t mean she was going to give up. She would be worthy of her title. With a determined look on her face, Kurai knew that this was the correct choice.