Name: Kuwa KuAge: 20
Birthday: December 1
Gender: Male
Species: Yokai (Tengu)
Category: Student
Class: Middle School
Grade: 8 (Remedial)
Appearance Description: one | two | three Kuwa is a lean, willowy fellow, standing at about 5’5” and thinly built. He’s smooth-skinned all over with skinny legs, bony knees, and very soft, papery hands. He weighs very little and has sort of a delicate bone structure. But we’re overlooking the obvious-- like all kotengu of his realm, Kuwa’s facial features are unmistakably avian. The species is indeterminate-- he has a narrow, glossy black-feathered head that seems mostly crow-like and then a blotchy yellow beak, hooked at the tip like a black kite. His round, beady eyes seem raptor-like as well, currently yellow but turning to red as he reaches full maturity. The feathers of his neck taper off sharply in a way that seems unnatural as if in mid-molt, exposing stubbly pink gooseflesh in patches around his throat and shoulders. They resume as normal over the rest of his torso and eventually taper off just above the knees and elbows, where they become softer and sable-brown.
Most of this, fortunately, is never seen since at the Academy he wears the normal school uniform rather than his kind’s traditional monk robes. He still dislikes long pants and prefers above-the-knee jogging shorts with over-sized jackets and sandals. He collects talismans and good-luck charms (most of which are fake) and has most of them strung around his patchy neck at all times. It’s worth noting that Kuwa was issued the standard human charm upon entering the academy but never seems to actually wear it the way he's supposed to. If he ever uses it, he appears as a slender young man of east asian descent with spiky black hair, a vacant, wall-eyed stare, and an unreasonably long nose.
Personality Description:
Kuwa is a keen learner, explorer, and agent of self-expression. He’s fairly artistic and can often be found writing, painting, or drawing on his own. Despite this seemingly passive lifestyle at the Academy, Kuwa’s active side is what has historically defined him. He has always acted on whim and impulse,which (fortunately for humanity) has always been fundamentally rooted in “good.” If he sees someone in trouble, something unjust, something dangerous, he can’t help but recklessly burst straight into the middle of it and interfere. He used to be quite athletic due to extensive martial training, but much of that was lost during his years of captivity. He’s on the school track team and seems to get most of his energy out by running, which he practices every day. His core values are charity and honor, and he holds himself in high regard despite his past misdeeds.
Even if a school of people who are all “different,” Kuwa feels like an outsider. He tries to avoid drawing a lot of attention to himself, but he’s not really “normal” enough to do a good job at it. Instead, he tends to come off as shy or awkward. He’s uncomfortable speaking, aware he’s not very good at it or that humans tend to be startled by him, so he spends most of his time listening attentively instead. He’s a wallflower and a passive observer more than an active participant in most events.
Kuwa likes people, but he doesn’t feel any real loyalty towards them. Even with those he shares genuine bonds of camaraderie or friendship with, he feels zero issue walking away when his whims change and is puzzled later when they react negatively. He feels emotion normally, but has difficulty showing it or expressing it to other people. Despite being a bit of a daydreamer, it’s very clear when Kuwa is excited--he’s an energetic person and makes lots of rapid movements and gestures when he’s invested in a topic. He seems to have a fascination with often mundane human things and can be rather innocent and naive in this regard. He seems to put high value in even cheap jewelry and talismans, perhaps due to spending so much time in a human temple. Remember he was placed at an eighth grade education level due to having such major gaps in his education.
It wouldn’t be wrong to say Kuwa is a little simpleminded-- it’s like his head is just somewhere else. Like many of his kind, he is easily tricked and distracted. He seems to have no concept of consequences for his actions and believes strongly in fate instead. When times are hard, his mantra is “sometimes bad things happen to good people”, a phrase he uses to remind himself that misfortune occurs at random, not necessarily as the result of a linear outcome.
- Positive: Curious, Driven, Artistic, Honorable, Energetic, Impulsive
- Negative: Gullible, Reckless, Disloyal, Shy, Awkward, Superstitious
Active Abilities:
Wind Fans (item)
- Tengu have some power over the element of air, and these fans traditionally help channel their abilities. They require some skill to wield, but can seriously impact air currents and call down hurricane-force winds in the hands of a master. Only a tengu can effectively use these items, as the ritual to invoke them properly requires a precise series of dance-like steps and acrobatics that require one to walk on air itself. In a normal person’s hands, they serve to create or channel short, pressurized bursts of air (like an air bazooka) or to stir up a simple breeze/light wind. Kuwa possesses only apprentice-level wind fans and could really only create the equivalent of a small galestorm with the correct movements.
- He might not have wings, but Kuwa sometimes seems to defy physics through sheer acrobatic ability. For short bursts he can run on air or otherwise propel himself off seemingly nothing, as if springing off a wall or leaping unusually high. The air is a tengu’s element, and Kuwa can certainly use it to his advantage. While these feats of acrobatics are certainly supernatural, they are not outright impossible. He cannot fly, float, or otherwise completely defy gravity. Imagine that at any time you could reach for a very fragile handhold or foothold, or were otherwise unnaturally supported by threads about to break. Like walking on thin ice, you can cross water, but your time is limited by your dexterity.
- A more refined aspect of his general good luck aura, Kuwa can break the bonds of harmful magics, compulsions, and minor curses. This is obviously highly dependent on the type of jinx, which has to have originated from an outside source. Attempting to ‘eat’ self-generated magics inherent to a person’s nature will cause them physical pain. Many major curses tend to regenerate almost immediately, but Kuwa can at least temporarily suppress its negative effects. Because of this, kotengu are able to approximately ‘scent’ out active magics, though they usually need to be in close proximity of the jinx. While he can also technically eat beneficial magics, harmful magic powers up his own lucky aura. Note that he must be in touching distance to ‘eat’ and that the process is quite unnerving. Without jinxes to snack on, he’ll settle for raw meat.
Passive Abilities:
Identity Thief
- Befitting their reputation as tricksters, outside of their Hells tengu speak only by mimicking the voices of others. After hearing only a few sentences, a skilled tengu can memorize that person’s voice down to the exact detail and replicate it in its entirety. When communicating in the real world, a tengu actually has no choice but to do this in order to speak human (and not demonic, for instance) language. The effect can be quite unnerving. Jackdaw-like, Kuwa often switches tone or voice in the middle of a sentence or just for a single phrase he’s using from memory. He can also mimic other sounds that he tends to mix in with his words, like jingling coins or the sound of rushing water. It’s honestly weird, but since he is still speaking “English” to begin with, his human translator can’t affect it.
- Somewhat linked to the previous ability, tengu speak and understand all sentient languages of the human and monster worlds. This is of course unnecessary due to human language translators at the Academy, but even outside the school or without a magical item Kuwa will understand and be able to communicate with them. Moreover, this is not just a vocal ability. Kuwa can inherently read, write, and copy exactly any text in any language. He’s better at writing than speaking, so his handwriting is (fortunately) consistent, unlike his spoken words. He does not understand animals or non-sentient beings.
- Kuwa’s kind are infamous for bringing either good or bad luck to the people around them. The daitengu of his Hell was known for bringing great disaster to the mortal world, through which she reaped great power and fortune for herself. Kuwa has a simpler gift: he’s lucky. This ability heavily relies on the balance between good and bad luck to function-- due to years of personal bad luck, Kuwa himself has been granted by the powers that be an indefinite supply of so-called “good luck.” Once this “luck debt” finally runs out, a new tragedy will occur to reset the cycle. This Aura of Fortune mostly affects him personally to ward off or redirect misfortune. However, those directly interacting with him or in close proximity might be caught up in the blessings of chance assuming it continues to further Kuwa’s best interests. It’s a subtle power, but effective.
Weaknesses: N/A
Common Magical Items:
Human Shape Charm (Note: not worn, kept in pocket)
- While wearing this charm, the character appears human. They lose access to any abilities they had as a result of any non-human physical characteristics of their original body. For example, a character who uses wings to fly will be unable to fly while using a human shape charm. Characters wearing this charm always have a single set human form, which resembles their non-human form.
Tengu are all different, but Kuwa was unusually rash. The tengu Hells-- as we would think of them, in a demon-sense-- are misty, forested realms beneath and within the mountains. They are worlds left over from ancient history. Throughout his upbringing, Kuwa wanted to know more-- he wanted to see the human realm for himself. Of all her underlings the Daitengu, Taeru Ti, trained, she was particularly fond of Kuwa. There was something more to him than the other kotengu. If he worked hard, she claimed, he would someday soon be ready to leave the yokai realm. But Kuwa’s curiosity could not be sated by mere “someday”. Despite being a mere child, a teenager, he did the unthinkable: he took the daitengu’s mask.
The mask is the key to a daitengu’s power, for it is this item which allows them to shape-shift into a human form. Disguised as a human, Kuwa went to the human world on his own. He was fascinated by his first encounter and wandered into a village, deciding to snoop around one of the temples. While in most places it would have been unthinkable to believe in such a supernatural visit, the rural village he had entered was a superstitious one with many generations of stories to fall back on. There had been legends of tengu stealing away the women, the priests, and the children over the years, and the head priest of the shrine spared no risk or mercy. He tricked Kuwa, and sealed the yokai away in the basement of the shrine.
Still, he did not die. The priest was not that cruel. He was fed. He was talked to. For the first year, the head priest was the only voice he heard, and to this day it is still the only voice he knows well enough to mimic completely by memory. Over time the rest of the temple also began to show him pity and sometimes even kindness. They even gave him paper and paintbrush, calligraphy, scrolls, books, items to draw with. The monks feared him, but also took care of him. He became somewhat of a pet or a mascot, in a way. A spectacle, a local hush-hush, a secret the village took pride in. Their prisoner was a good-luck charm, practically a symbol of bounty for its people--for how could bad luck fall upon them when they knew they had it contained? And so Kuwa survived--barely. He spent three years in the dark cell, lost to both worlds.
At long last, word got out. Slowly mysterious rumors of the tengu being kept prisoner beneath the village shrine got out to other provinces. Most people dismissed it as a tall tale, a gimmick to draw tourists to the remote shrine, but the scouts of Starlight Academy were eventually alerted as well. People finally came to free him and undo the crime committed, unlocking the thick metal collar which he’d worn around his neck all this time. However, before he was freed, one of the scouts demanded a price. He was told that they would leave him here, never to be saved, unless he traded them the unthinkable: the daitengu’s mask. Kuwa felt that he had no choice, and so he surrendered the object in exchange for his freedom.
It was only later once he’d already been flown to Manta Carlos and begun his school life that he found out he’d been tricked, and the mysterious scout who’d taken the mask could not be found. The other scouts who'd helped rescue him claimed to have no memory of such a person. Kuwa had been willing to accept a life of exile, learning human ways and struggling to adjust to this modern-day society he’d been so blind to before, but now that he knew it had been stolen he had to find the thief. The shame of the so-called scout’s treachery was unbearable. He had to get it back. And then maybe he could return, and all would be forgiven. He just needed the mask.
Resources: Scholarship money (education-related only)

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