MAKOTO YUUYA [NORMAL TYPE CASTLE GUARDIAN]

[Makoto Yuuya]

WRETCHES AND KINGS - - -

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PEN AND THE CONTRACT

B A S I C I N F O

★ NAME: Makoto Yuuya
★ NICKNAME: Also answers to Mako
★ GUARDIAN TYPE: Normal
★ STATUS Second
★ AGE: Nineteen
★ HEIGHT: 5’4”
★ WEIGHT: 119 lbs.
★ FACE CLAIM: Valshe from Nico Nico Singer
★ APPEARANCE:

At five-foot-four, the Castle Guardian of Normal types is one of the shorter members of the group, but she still manages to leave an impression on anyone who sees her. With a petite build devoid of major curves and an overall androgynous figure, Makoto likes to blur the line between feminine and masculine in her appearance, though whether she is successful in this depends on whoever she happens to be dealing with at any given moment. Her hair is naturally blonde although she has a habit of occasionally adding a streak of brighter color every now and then when the mood strikes, and keeps it cut to neck-length most of the time; if she allows it to get much longer, it starts to itch and annoy her. Her skin tone is a bit on the pale side, though she does spend quite a lot of time outside. It just so happens that she tends to burn far more often than tan, leaving her with a painful red rash that contrasts nicely with the color of her eyes.

Those eyes of hers have always been a bright, almost electric blue, and she wouldn’t have it any other way; she likes the bold color, and she likes to think they help her stand out in a crowd, however common blue eyes might be. The face surrounding them is easily the most obviously feminine of her features, though to be fair there are many guys running around Aether City with just faces just as girly. Her smile is bright and wide, glinting almost as brightly as the Arceus only knows how many studs and loops in her ears, the number of which seems to change daily depending on how many she feels like wearing and how often she adds a new one.

Makoto’s taste in clothing can be inconsistent, but she loves to wear darker colors - particularly reds, blues, and blacks, although she has also been known to wear white on occasion with some brighter tones. Many of her tee-shirts, dress shirts, vests, hoodies, and jackets are dark colors, though she has been known to wear lighter grays every now and again. Pants - and she almost always wears pants, never skirts - are likewise black, blue, or red, occasionally plaid, and usually held up with more metal-studded belts than necessary. Her footwear usually consists of black boots or sneakers, if she bothers to wear shoes at all; when lounging around her personal quarters, you are far more likely to see her wandering around barefoot than anything. Finally, she is a huge fan of collars and wears them so often that she feels uncomfortable without their familiar weight around her neck, and has several that she keeps to switch out for different situations although she sometimes exchanges these for ribbons or ties if a special occasion calls for something a little more elegant - though do not by any means think that she is going to act any differently just because she has to put on some fancy pants! Speaking of which, for all her emphasis on being "comfortable," she also likes to occasionally play the prince whenever her position as a guardian requires a higher level of sophisticated dress, and for all her usual rough-and-tumble appearance there is no doubt that she cleans up nicely.

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P E R S O N A L I T Y

★ POSITIVE:

• Cheerful - The world of competitive battling has a lot of ups and downs, especially when you are second in line to test ambitious young trainers. These can weigh heavy on a person, but Makoto manages to stay cheerful and upbeat, and encourages her fellow Guardians to do the same. Cheering them up on down days is something of a personal mission of hers.
  
• Optimistic - Tying in with the above, this is one trainer who always looks on the bright side of things; Aether City is depressing enough, so you have to emphasize the positive to stay sane, and that she does. That’s not to say she doesn’t have her down days - everyone does - but she tries not to let herself dwell on the negatives even when feeling bad.
  
• Self-reliant - While Makoto prefers company over being alone most of the time she is pretty self-sufficient thanks to her time spent training and she has no problem handling herself when the need arises.
  
• Level-headed, at least in battle - If a battle turns sour, don’t expect her to start cursing or freaking out, for while Makoto is definitely an energetic battler her excitement hides a calm mind that can make snap decisions despite the chaos around her. It’s one of the main reasons she made it this far.
  
• Confident - As a Castle Guardian, Makoto knows that she is a skilled trainer, and her self-confident nature doesn’t stop there; she keeps it with all her interactions, and there are only very specific conditions that can make her truly doubt herself.
  
• Graceful Loser - Just because she is confident and optimistic doesn’t mean that this trainer can’t take a loss; if that were true, then why be a Castle Guardian in the first place? She accepts her losses and wishes those who defeat her luck against her superiors - even if she still looks forward to rematches!
  
• Enthusiastic about Pokémon and training - For her, becoming a professional battler was a choice she made because she loved doing it and wanted to continue living that kind of life. She loves her Pokémon, and she loves the thrill of a good battle against a tough opponent almost as much. She’s even thinking about building a second team to take unofficial challenges so that she can have the occasional just-for-fun battle.
  
• Supportive - If any of her friends is in a crisis, you can bet she’ll be there to help as soon as she can - most likely riding Stantler-back. She also likes to give younger, more inexperienced trainers pointers, and finds it amusing when those friendly suggestions come back to bite her in the butt later.
  
• Persevering - Despite the attitude she has today, she had some more emotionally trying times when she was younger and it was through those trials that she learned to bit her lip, look to the positive, and keep on keeping on. She’s determined not to let anything break her, and she swears to Arceus that she’ll keep it that way. Although she admits that there is a point where you have to stop taking the shit the world throws at you and fight back.
  

★ NEGATIVE:

• Wary of gijinka, thanks to past bullying - During her middle and early highschool years, a certain gijinka classmate of hers enjoyed tormenting her with her psychic powers, and some of her early opponents didn’t play fair in battle, using their abilities to assist their Pokémon and bringing them out on top. There’s not a lot that can rile Makoto up, but cheaters and those who abuse their power sure do, and as a result she is often suspicious of gijinka at first, provided that she is aware of what they are. She’s likely to go harder on such opponents as well to ensure they don’t cheat her somehow.
  
• Teasing - It’s no secret that Makoto is a sucker for all things cute, and one of the things she thinks is cutest of all are flustered individuals. To that end, she enjoys going out of her way to make others feel uncomfortable, and sometimes she can cross the line from acceptable jabs to flat-out cruelty, though she never does so consciously.
  
• Unprofessional - Whether it involves clinging to her fellow Castle Guardians in front of challengers, catnapping when they show up to face her, or running around barefoot in nothing but a hoodie and her plaid boxers, there’s no question that this trainer does not always act with the dignity one would think someone of her position should have.
  
• Vain - Mako thinks she looks good and she takes a lot of pride in that - excusing such incidents as the one above, that is. She even makes sure to polish every one of her ear, lip, and tongue rings before she goes to bed at night to make sure they still gleam nicely the next time she wears them.
  
• Insensitive - Because Makoto has a difficult time understanding when she’s going to far, she can sometimes unintentionally upset others a great deal with what she considers “harmless” teasing. She never means to - unless dealing with someone who she thinks deserves to be taken down a few pegs - but these blunders are just an unfortunate side effect of dealing with someone who does not always “get” what’s going on.
  
• Rash - On the downside of her confidence, Makoto can bite off more than she can chew all too easily, and because she refuses to see any loss or close call as anything but a learning experience, she is a bit out of touch with just how much trouble her carefree don’t-wanna-wait attitude could get her into someday.
  
• Immature - If you act coldly to her or start ignoring her, she’s likely to burst into tears - fake ones, most of the time - and bemoan the fact that so-and-so is being so cold and mean to her. And if for some reason you should quarrel with her, she is more likely to get back at you with a practical joke than anything else, and she’s prone to sinking down to a childish level when dealing with kids. Or just other immature trainers.
  
• Wasteful - For someone who likes to depend on herself, Makoto has very little self-control when it comes to spending, especially when she sees a Pokémon she wants up for sale. Or TMs. Or even things like snacks and new piercings. Basically, she uses up her battle funds way too quickly, and it sometimes gets to the point where she shows up begging one of the Guardians for something to eat because she wasted all her money.
  
• Vicious if angered - It takes a lot to push Makoto’s buttons, but if you somehow manage to do it, she can be downright vicious in a fight. It does not matter that she’s a human, or that she normally frown at the thought of using her Pokémon on anyone who’s unarmed. If you set her off, her fury is explosive and unrelenting, and if she does not start taking shots at you it’s likely that her right-hand mon Zanta will and his claws are definitely not for show.
  

★ HABITS, QUIRKS:

• Has a habit of gnawing on things: namely straws, writing utensils, and the leftover sticks from lollipops. She used to bite her nails as well but she’s over that bad habit now...mostly.
  
• Enjoys confusing others, especially leaving them guessing about her gender, although she is rather bad at acting boyish when anything cute appears in front of her.
  
• Speaking of which, her definition of “cute” is a fairly broad one that ranges from certain Pokémon - including less conventionally adorable ones such as her Stantler - to her fellow Castle Guardians.
  
• Likes to scope out competition by wandering around the city and acting like a normal trainer. She absolutely loves the look of surprise on others’ faces when they realize that she is one of the Guardians they challenged!
  
• Relationships with her are rare and unlikely things, and while she'll occasionally tease others about their sex lives she is extremely uncomfortable with the thought of doing anything like that herself. Even now that she's more comfortable with her issues in identifying as one gender or the other, those feelings of being uncomfortable with her body continue to linger.
  
• Tying in to the above, her worst fear - aside from seeing anyone she cares about coming to harm - is being seen naked, which is one reason why she tries to plan things to that she showers in the Castle when no one else is around.
  
• Aside from walking, Virgil is her main mode of transportation. She likes to go charging around on him, as ridiculous as this looks. She thinks it’s badass.
  
• Although her parents raised her to be a vegetarian, Makoto does eat meat now when she has the chance - she feels somewhat bad about it, but if Pokémon eat other Pokémon then why should it be different if she has a steak every so often?
  

★ OVERALL PERSONALITY:

With a jumble of attributes that generally point toward a sunny disposition, it is hard to think of Mako as anything but upbeat, confident, and friendly - though, strangely, she's not too fond of physical contact with others. Touch her, and she may flinch; a habit acquired at some point in the recent past, and while there is no horror story behind the dislike, she still refuses to do more than give a friend a quick hug. She can smile and laugh with others, will tease and joke with the group, but after her first breakup took a turn for the heartrending, she refuses to be touchy-feely with others anymore lest she lead anyone on with her playing. Other than that, she's still the same goofball who joined the guardians in the first place, just slightly more subdued now.

Besides her discomfort with touching others now, Makoto has a bit of a dislike for her body - or, to be precise, that her body is biologically female when she considers herself an androgynous individual. Not necessarily a guy, not exactly a girl, but something in between; because of how difficult it is to explain this to others she simply allows them to decide whether they think of her as female or male based on their own judgement and observations. Unfortunately, that “messed-up” way of thinking was part of what lead a psychic-type gijinka to bully her during her school years: a time the young Castle Guardian does not enjoy thinking back to at all, but she can see no other real solution.

Speaking of which, if there is one group of people she is less likely to get along with than others, it would be gijinka. Now don’t get her wrong, she’s met some great trainers who just so happened to have Pokémon DNA in their veins, some of which who definitely appeared to get along better with their teammates than normal human beings. However, there were others that used their powers to cheat during their battles with her during her early days battling competitively, and some even pulled that kind of crap during tournaments! Just remembering it makes Makoto clench her fists in fury even now, and the incidents have infused her with what is unfortunately a lasting distrust of gijinka kind in general. And while she cannot speak for every gijinka she ever faced, she knows for a fact that some that abused their powers were legal - including her classmate - which in turn meant that they were using the very DNA that saved their lives to cheat others. It disgusts her to think that some people could be so downright disrespectful, and that such misuse of their powers insults the Pokémon the life-granting blood was taken from.

As you might guess both from her position as the normal-type Castle Guardian and from the above sentiment, Mako both loves and respects Pokémon. It is what her parents taught her first when she was young and, later, a lesson she re-learned on her own when there was no one else for her to trust. Her team is like family to her, especially after her parents vanished. Zanta is without a doubt the one closest to her, as he was her first, and she is rarely seen anywhere without the Zangoose accompanying her outside his Pokéball. She respects his strength - both on the battlefield and as a quiet listener and furry shoulder to lean on when feeling a bit down - and he respects her ability to keep her head clear in the midst of battle to direct him. She might love Kikka and Virgil as well, but Zanta will always have a special place in her heart, and she is one of the few beings she treats with the utmost respect.

Because she sure as hell does not give enough to her superiors.

It's not that she's rebellious or acting out; really, her lack of respect has more to do with her fun loving nature than anything else. She refuses to treat people who should be her friends as some kind of lordly, lofty superiors just because they rank higher on the challenge than her, and so talks to all of them like she would someone on her own level. Yes, she knows that four out of five of them are stronger than her, but that never crosses her mind - really, they’re a group of top-notch trainers for their brackets working together under the common goal to challenge up-and-coming trainers to improve themselves, so why shouldn't they act like a big family? The point is that being all formal and stuffy all the time is boring, not to mention stressful if you can't open up to anyone, and if you take yourself too seriously then there’s no way anyone’s going to have any fun in such a stale atmosphere. That should not be what the Castle Guardians are about, at least not in whatever strange version of reality she resides in. However, even if she might not act like it, she does respect the other Guardian’s battle skills and looks to them as something to aspire to, even if she might fall short along the way.

When it comes to her friends, she is fiercely protective of them, and seeing them wronged is one of the few things besides blatant cheating and Pokémon abuse that can send her into a rage. However, she herself is not immune to being the one who causes them problems; from an early age she has had a difficult time understanding boundaries and does not always know when her lighthearted teasing has crossed into dangerous territory, leading to misunderstanding that could potentially ruin friendships. She is making an effort to get better at avoiding, but it is hard to improve when you do not understand exactly where you are going wrong - that, or she just has a thick skull. To this end, she has a small notebook in her room that details what she knows is not okay to poke fun at around certain people, and often takes it with her so that she can scribble notes at any time...though truthfully she is just as likely to use it to jot down random things such as what kind of snacks she wants to eat or where to go train on any given day as she is to use it for its intended purpose.

Speaking of snacks, another thing to note about Mako is that while she can take care of herself when she’s on her own, when she has an allowance of sorts and is surrounded by others she tends to get a little, er, enthusiastic with her spending. Her room is often full of snack wrappers before cleaning days - it’s a good thing she spends so much time running around training with her Pokémon considering how much junk food she ingests - and what she doesn’t spend on expendable things she wastes on TMs, Pokémon, and new piercings. Really, as a Castle Guardian, she should be a bit more responsible with her funds, saving up for important things like Pokémon medicine instead of blowing it all on impulse buys. It’s no wonder that she sometimes resorts to raiding her co-workers fridges - or at least tries to!

Part of her spending issues likely stems from her natural tendency for doing before thinking - at least outside of the battlefield. Makoto is without a doubt an impulsive, rash individual, prone to forking up cash for whatever she wants and getting into battles she should probably stay out of outside of her position as a Guardian. She rules the 20-30 bracket for a reason: if she goes against anything higher, she’s just tempting fate, but she fails to realize how dangerous picking battles with the wrong people can be. Or how risky it is to go running around the City in search of Pokémon for her second team without worrying about any of the dangers that might befall her. Risking her safety after making a hasty decisions on where to go, who to battle, and what to chase after could easily get her in trouble someday.

In battle, however, it’s another story entirely. Something about the energy, about the rush of adrenaline when watching your trusted partner fighting with all its might against a tough opponent really clears her head, letting her think sharply and make snap decisions without being too rash about it. There, on the battlefield where she belongs, she can think quickly without overshooting herself and adapt as her opponent’s strategy changes. Moreover, battles give her even more confidence in her abilities as a trainer, and while she can accept a loss without throwing a fit she never goes into a battle thinking that she cannot win. Fighting-type shows up ready to rip her team apart? No big deal! A ghost-type thinks that it’s safe thanks to type immunities? Kikka, go chomp on it! No matter what the opponent she faces, she’ll try to find a way to strike back and fight to the bitter end, and if she falls in battle then that is all the more reason for her to rethink her strategies. According to her, everything is a learning experience and no battle can ever be truly lost so long as you and your Pokémon make it out alive. So while she might be immature, strange, and just plain silly outside of the battle ring, put a Pokéball in her hand and an enemy in front of her and you’ll see the attitude that really got her where she is today.

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H I S T O R Y

• The family Makoto Yuuya was born into was hardly what most people would think of as a normal one: her parents, young and sickeningly in love with the world as much as each other, were an odd pair to begin with. Preaching a message of respect for Pokémon, the environment, and other human beings, the two of them ran a small “alternative” Pokémon clinic that according to them “put your Pokémon’s health and wellness first and foremost without relying on machines,” creating a warmer, more natural atmosphere for their patients. The two of them took pride in the fact that they brewed their own medicines out of berries and herbs and used their own Pokémon - a pair of Audino - to treat their patients’ more serious injuries. Her father was a lifelong dreamer who had given up a promising career in more conventional Pokémon medicine to open up the small business with his soulmate, a very spiritual woman who practiced a way of life adhering to the idea of balance and nonviolence. They never married officially, but considered themselves bound together for life long before Makoto came into the picture and completed their three person, two Pokémon family.
  
  With parents like these, Makoto’s early childhood was filled with learning about Pokémon - what certain species liked, how to treat minor wounds, and most importantly to show them the proper amount of respect. The creator of the universe, Arceus, had bestowed them with such wonderful powers after all, so it was only right to love and revere them. The little girl quickly grew to be more comfortable around Pokémon than people other than her parents, and while by the time she was a toddler she would hide behind counters or her parent’s legs when customers came by, she could often be found in the mornings curled up with some of the overnight patients. That, coupled with the fact that her parents insisted on homeschooling her in their own way as opposed to sending her off to real classes when she was old enough, is likely part of why she has such a difficult time understanding humans to this very day.
  
  While she herself would not become a trainer for many years, her love of normal-types sprung up during this period of her early childhood, thanks in part to the Audino pair her parents kept as their medical staff. She was also quick to pick up another of her personal quirks - that is, her flat refusal to wear skirts and dresses. Even as a young child, the girl flat-out refused to wear “girl” clothes, and her open-minded parents never questioned the habit and chose instead to let her dress how she chose to. She just knew what she liked to wear and how she liked to act and went with it, turning into an energetic ball around the clinic and the basement home beneath it but reverting to a shy, quiet child whenever she had to venture outside or interact socially.
  
  Running an independent wellness center did have some drawbacks, however. For one thing, the money they earned from their cheap treatments and medicine sales was barely enough to keep their little family and business afloat. Many people still preferred the familiar, free service official Pokémon centers provided, and it was their handful of devoted like-minded customers that kept them going. They were most definitely on the lower end of the middle-class spectrum, not that Makoto knew any better at the time. They were who they were, and this was the only life she knew...at least until that familiar life came to a rather abrupt end when she was eleven.
  
  
• Living in Aether City - even the section of the middle-class district where Makoto’s family ran their center - could be a dangerous affair, no matter how much her parents tried to deny it. That is why her parents, along with several of their devoted customers and close friends, started making plans to explore the wilderness outside of the city in hopes of finding some place they could start a small settlement. Makoto’s mother was particularly adamant about moving ahead with the plan - she felt that with the rising tensions in the city, something was bound to burst soon, and she did not want their family and close friends caught up in the conflict. According to her personal beliefs, the world was a balance of good and evil, and whenever one outweighed the other a grand catastrophe of some kind was bound to happen to even things once more, and she was sure that such an event was sure to befall Aether during their lifetimes. Rather than wait for such a thing to happen, she and the rest of their tight-knit group decided to push forward with their efforts sooner rather than later and so one late spring day Makoto’s parents closed up the shop, intending to come back for their things once they found a suitable area to settle, left Makoto with one of their friends that hadn’t opted to go on the expedition and set out.
  
  At first, Makoto was excited about the possible move despite feeling a bit uncomfortable with staying with her parents’ friend. Over the years, her shyness had gradually lessened, but it was still odd sharing living space with someone who was not your family, but the older woman was quick to break her out of her shell using her Pokémon. She was primarily a grass trainer, as opposed to Makoto’s preferred normal-types, but they helped to encourage the youngster to be more open. Eventually, she was just as comfortable with the friend as she was with her own family, much to her current guardian’s relief. However, as what was supposed to have been a few weeks away from her parents trickled by into first one month then two, a feeling of dread started to hang over the household. It soon became clear that something had gone amiss with the expedition, and despite waiting anxiously for any word from her parents and the others on the team, Makoto and her trainer friend began to lose hope. After three months, the exploration team was officially named missing, and at nearly six months the authorities told the waiting pair that they had best prepare for the worst.
  
  It was a trying time for Makoto and she began to distance herself once more, all the while refusing to believe that her parents could be gone. Rather than standing by and letting her young friend sink into depression, Makoto’s caretaker got her something to help her cope with the difficult time: a young Zangoose, who she immediately and uncreatively named Zanta. The pair became inseparable almost immediately, and were soon running off to train at all hours of the day, and Makoto quickly seemed to forget her previous discomfort with being out in public with Zanta at her side. Over the next few months, she learned how to direct her partner in battle, and was soon enjoying it as much as any kid her age. She might have missed her her parents, yes, but she was starting to see now that even without them here life was still going on, and it was actually going pretty great all things considered. She had a partner she was growing to trust, a mentor that gave her a place to stay and introduced her to battling, and a new love for battles. However, the young trainer was about to learn that such a carefree lifestyle couldn’t last forever, because it wasn’t long before her father’s parents - a pair of grandparents she never met - got wind of the disappearances and did their misguided moral duty of coming to claim her.
  
  
• At first, Makoto refused to believe that the aging man and woman who showed up at her temporary home demanding that she go with them were her family at all. She knew that her mother had lost both of her parents shortly before Makoto was born to some kind of weird sickness: that was hardly a secret. But her father never breathed a word about his family, and all her mother had shared with her was that they had parted on bad terms. Now, those same people had walked into her life uninvited and insisted that she give up the home she had only just gotten used to in order to stay with her family. The young trainer fought against it, not wanting anything to change more in her life than it already had, but there was little her guardian could do to help her in this case. Like it or not, the Yuuyas were Makoto’s only known relatives and it was important to respect their wishes, despite how much their granddaughter would rather stay where she was. And so, with little warning or preparation, Makoto forced herself to grudgingly accept the situation and packed up what she had to leave for another new home.
  
  Much to her surprise, her grandparents were pretty well off, and while they definitely did not live in any of the exclusive communities in the upper-class district, they could afford to live comfortably on its outskirts. Her grandfather designed and improved medical machinery for a living and had hoped his son would follow in his footsteps before the latter fell head-over-heels for some nutcase of a girl and, influenced by her strange ideas, rejected the life his family had planned for him and ran off to live with her instead. The Yuuyas never even knew they had a grandchild until a friend of theirs who had, upon looking for the center they mentioned out of curiosity and only finding it closed, did some digging and revealed both the disappearances and the existence of their granddaughter to them. Now, despite their narrow-minded view, the older couple were by no means heartless and immediately set out to locate the girl, though the strange boyish child they found was nothing like what they had expected. Nor did they know what to do with such a child once they had received her into their home. Makoto was awkward around them, almost resentful sometimes, and spent more time in the room they provided for her playing with her Zangoose than anything else during the first few weeks with them. Even the presents her grandmother gave her - cute dresses and skirts in an attempt to make the girl look more feminine and presentable - did nothing to solidify their shaky family relationship.
  
  When Makoto admitted that she had never been to school, her grandparents were shocked - and then, happy, because they thought that sending her to a good school might help her adjust to living “like a normal person.” Within three weeks of moving in with them, Makoto was enrolled in a small, private middle school.
  
  
• If the Yuuyas thought a proper education would benefit and domesticate the preteen, they were wrong. The whole ordeal was entirely wrong for Makoto from day one, though her refusal to give in and say anything about it meant that no one was aware of just how awful it felt for her. First of all, there was the matter of the uniforms, which included sensible skirts and sweater-vests for girls that made Makoto’s skin crawl when she had to wear them. Then there was the curriculum, which never failed to make the girl’s head spin with how absolutely foreign it was from everything she knew. She had been homeschooled for most of her life, so she was hardly the uneducated wild-girl her grandparents thought she was , but she nonetheless felt completely out of place in a structured classroom where you had to sit all day and had no time to get up for breaks if you got antsy. She had also gone without any lessons since her parents left on their doomed expedition, so keeping up in her classes was extremely difficult for her. Still, she kept on trying, setting a goal to reach each time she took a test so that she could challenge herself to work her way back up. Achieving them meant she got to congratulate herself on a job well done, even if her grandparents still cast disapproving looks at her report cards. However, while she could find a silver lining with her studies, it was hard for even look-on-the-bright-side Makoto to come up with good things to focus on when it came to dealing with her classmates.
  
  The majority of her scholarly peers had been brought up in this educational system and one particular group of such individuals took the chance to sneer at just about anything Makoto did that was amusing or out of place to them. If they scored low on an exam, they made a show of talking about how bad their grades were before comforting themselves that at least they weren’t as low as a “certain someone’s.” Moreover, once they realized how uncomfortable she was with the uniform, they went out of their way to compliment her on how pretty she looked, which always riled her up to the point where she felt like storming out of the classroom just to get away from them. Fortunately, she was able to keep her head together through her first school year by focusing on what she could achieve, sending letters to her trainer friend, and playing around with Zanta. Once school was out for the summer, she threw herself into training whenever she had a chance to escape the house and the tutors her grandparents had arranged for her to try and remedy her academic shortcomings.
  
  It was around that time that she first started to consider battling for a profession and not just as a hobby after she had the chance to attend a tournament one day as a spectator. Seeing the way the trainers worked together to pull off stunning victories with their partners against tough opponents resonated with the youngster, and she began to think that if she and Zanta trained harder then ever they might actually have a chance in one of these competitions. However, when she actually tried to enter the next tournament that allowed entrance-level trainers to participate - it surprised her immensely when her grandparents actually agreed to pay the entrance fee - she promptly lost during the second round in a battle that barely lasted three minutes. The young trainer was forced to face the facts: Zanta might have been a strong fighter for his level, but he just wasn’t strong enough to take on full teams by himself yet. If she wanted to really pursue competitive battling seriously, then she was either going to have to buckle down and train even harder or start building a team that could back him up, because if her grandparents were hoping that one big loss would put an end to her silly dreams of being a trainer they definitely thought wrong. More than anything else, her loss motivated her to try harder, and to start thinking about what else she could add to her team in order to have a better shot the next time around. The rest of that break was spent in intense training, now determined to raise her partner’s strength to the point where her lack of other Pokémon would no longer matter.
  
  When school started up once more with it came another major change: one of her classmates - and the leader of the clique who had picked on her the previous year - had fallen sick over the summer with the virus and came back to school in the fall as a Gothorita gijinka. If her teasing before was bad, then what she could do with her newfound psychic powers was incredibly worse. No one’s secrets were safe now that the middle school’s gossip queen could read minds, and if she overheard though mental complaints that anyone was having a bad day, she spitefully went out of her way to make things worse. If she caught you thinking a bad thought about her, she would expose one of your innermost secrets to the entire class, and she especially liked pushing Makoto’s buttons about her gender identity issues, saying that she had to have some kind of brain damage or weird disease to think that she was anything other than what her body said it was. Naturally, the girl’s followers took up her teasing, and Makoto was never so tempted to set Zanta on someone as she was at that point in her life. She absolutely hated the way the girl used her psychic abilities - abilities that were a side effect of the blood transfusion that saved her life - on her and on others to make them feel like dirt. But while her life at school got worse, she now had something else to look forward to, much to her grandparent’s frustration: daily training. With her new goals in mind, she focused less on trying to do well in school and poured all of her pent-up resentment toward her classmate into her battles instead of clinging to the studies that were starting to mean less and less to her with each passing day.
  
  Life went on and with the passing years came both small triumphs and harsh challenges. The bullying at school grew worse as time went by, until she finally had enough of it soon after starting her second year of high school and snapped thanks to a particularly humiliating incident. Uncharacteristically furious and wanting to get out of the school at any cost, she flat out told her grandparents that if they didn’t allow her to transfer to another school where she wouldn’t have to deal with the assholes in her class anymore, she would stand up for herself with Zanta the next time she was picked on at the risk of getting kicked out. At first they thought it was some kind of joke, or perhaps just another crazy teenage fit, but after they were called in by her teachers for releasing her partner in the hallway and swearing that if anyone came near her again, she was going to let Zanta to cut them to pieces, they realized that she really wasn’t kidding. The resulting conference lead to a lot of yelling, mostly from her grandfather, who asked why she couldn’t act like a normal high schooler, and from Makoto, who retorted that she’d been keeping quiet and taking far more than most students could endure from her class without becoming a shut-in. But she was at the end of her rope. She was done taking this bullying just because she wanted to please her grandparents and if they wanted to be rid of her embarrassing attitude so badly, then she would be glad to get out of their lives and let them pretend that the last few awkward years had never happened. Instead of flatly kicking her out, however, they finally relented and allowed her to transfer to a much bigger, more anonymous public school in the middle-class district. However, to say that things improved between them after that would be a complete lie as the older couple took to throwing up their hands and ignoring their granddaughter now as opposed to trying to find ways to make her cooperate with them, and Makoto was certain that they were counting down the days until they could get her off their hands and never have to see her again. In her bitterness about their attitude - snubbing her when she tried to stick with their stupid education plans, damn it! - she took the freedom their cold shoulder granted her and ran with it.
  
  While that might sound like a rebellious statement, Makoto didn’t really “rebel” in the ways teenagers might normally do. Sure, she started collecting holes in her ears the way some people might collect stamps or coins at that point, but she never did anything really drastic. She still attended her new school - most of the time, anyway - but the biggest way she ever “acted out” was by throwing herself harder than ever into the competitive battle scene. With less stress from school bogging her down and more time to train, she quickly rose through the ranks in her preferred level bracket, first with Zanta and then with a Stantler she acquired from one of her new classmates in a trade for a Smeargle she caught on a whim but didn’t feel fit on her team. Next, she bought a Lilipup with some of the money she earned after she started taking some catch jobs for people who were either too busy or too worried about the dangers involved to go round up Pokémon themselves. It was hardly a consistent job and definitely one that didn’t earn her any respect points from her grandparents but the infrequent pay was good enough to pay to replace the Pokéballs she used up, provided her with a decent amount of spending money, and it gave her the opportunity to train her team while working. It was definitely a win-win situation in her eyes, even if she preferred battling with other trainers to taking on wild creatures any day.
  
  
• By the time she graduated high school, Makoto was still virtually a nobody in the eyes of her grandparents and most of their friends, but she was pretty well-known in the 20-30 divisions of ranked tournaments with her normal-typed team, having placed high in several larger tournaments in her last year of formal education. Surprising neither her grandparents or herself, the girl had barely graduated when she bid them a hasty farewell, packed up her things, and ran off to pursue her dream more fully. It wasn’t a stable life by any stretch of the imagination - her pay for her jobs was spotty and she often had to send large chunks of it to her old friend to keep it out of her hands so that she would still have enough to pay her entrance fees when larger tournaments came around - not to mention the rent on her apartment. Personality wise, however, she was now better off than ever: years spent building her confidence in the battle arena had bolstered it outside of the ring and now that she was living how she pleased she felt more comfortable just being herself without any worries of what others would think. Hell, why should she worry about their thoughts on her when she could kick their asses in a battle? Though, considering the clingy habits she shortly developed thereafter, she likely became a little too confident.
  
  Her real crowning triumph as a professional battler came when she managed to best all the other trainers in the 20-30 bracket in one of the largest city tournaments soon after turning nineteen; admittedly a bit older than some of the kids she competed against, but still young compared to several of her rivals. For her, it was an amazing feeling, standing there and knowing that she’d pulled it off. This was what she sent out to do with her life, and now she had official proof that she could battle with the best of them. Even so, it was in the aftermath of that tournament that she received an even higher honour: an invitation to join a group of exceptional trainers known as the Castle Guardians, representing the normal type and her preferred levels. She took it without a second thought, and has been throwing herself into her job ever since. It can be tough work, testing trainers like she does, but it’s definitely a more rewarding career than anything else she can think of.
  
  Lastly, and not as particularly noteworthy as the rest of her history, Makoto went through an ugly breakup with someone she considered close to her, but not close in the way they were supposed to be. Now she's still suffering through the aftershocks of ruining a friendship with dishonesty after swearing to live honestly, and so she's had a bit of a relapse and dropped her touching and clinging habits. So while she's seemingly back to normal in most ways, she is spending more time recently just wandering the city training, trying to take her mind off the pain she's caused.
  

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P O K E M O N

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★ POKEMON: Herdier
★ NICKNAME: Kikka
★ TYPE: Normal
★ GENDER: Female
★ LEVEL: 20
★ ABILITY: Intimidate
★ MOVE SET: Leer || Tackle || Odor Sleuth || Bite || Helping Hand || Take Down || Work Up

★ POKEMON: Stantler
★ NICKNAME: Virgil
★ TYPE: Normal
★ GENDER: Male
★ LEVEL: 25
★ ABILITY: Intimidate
★ MOVE SET: Tackle || Leer || Astonish || Hypnosis || Stomp || Sand-Attack || Take Down || Confuse Ray

★ POKEMON: Zangoose
★ NICKNAME: Zanta
★ TYPE: Normal
★ GENDER: Male
★ LEVEL: 30
★ ABILITY: Immunity
★ MOVE SET: Scratch || Leer || Quick Attack || Swords Dance || Fury Cutter || Slash || Pursuit || Embargo

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P L A Y E R I N F O

★ OOC NAME: Cori~
★ AGE: Twenty-one...supposedly.
★ OTHER CHARACTERS: Kouki Hidaka, Cornelius Clarent, and Haruhiko Hamazaki.

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★ template was made for wretches and kings, do not steal ★

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WE COME FOR YOU

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