Yuki Montgomery (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
sunnydaymonic) wrote2035-12-19 04:00 pm
sunnydaymonic) wrote2035-12-19 04:00 pm
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[OOC] Background Information
YUKI MONTGOMERY
You can't change the entire world alone and trying just leads to resenting yourself for trying so hard when no one wants to change.
stats
basics
Mid-20s medical student preparing for residency who ran away from Japan after finding out that his father's family, the Miyamimoto had been hiding the fact they were actually descendants of Taiyotori, a sun demon. Yuki grew up being called "snowman" by other kids for his white hair and purple eyes and having the ability to heal people, see auras/souls/spirits, AND at times accidentally have issues with solar energy. He thought all of this was part of his family being mages, but no it was due to the fact of his demonic heritage.
Taiyotori used hosts to maintain its presence on Earth as without a host they didn't have an anchor to control their magic physically. The Miyamimotos were a family of warriors that gained power through their hosting of Taiyotori. But the tides changed against demons and more and more were coming through that broke the treaties and killed people (still not the majority, but enough to cause serious trouble), starting wars with humans. The Gates were strengthened, many demons and Mystland beings were pushed back to the other side of the Gates and the Mystlands closed off once more. The Miyamimotos eventually hid their true lineage as half-bloods but every so often the gifts and genetics of the demons would be stronger in certain offspring.
Yuki is kidnapped, tortured and forced into death matches by a group attempting to use half-bloods to summon their demon relatives to force them into bondage and it is through this that the truth is slowly pushed to the surface. He confronts his grandfather and finds out the truth about their family, only to be so rejected by him that he and his parents end up leaving Japan and going to the states, where Yuki changes his last name and tries to restart his life on his way into college. But all through this, a Voice has been calling out to him that he's been ignoring for 8 years now.
He's tired, overworked, suppressing a lot of trauma, but also very caring and wants to heal people using science, not magic--even though he's a very powerful healer. He is attracted to guys, but has never actually been romantically attracted to anyone so far in his life and is pretty awkward around people in general, but tries to be friendly in his own way.
setting
Yuki is from a verse I call Runes & Myst, which was an original verse I created to retrofit my other OC, Sarona Gayle.
Earth is similar to our own, only magic has always existed in this world and technology is much more advanced than it is in our world today, thanks in part to magic helping to further technology and vice versa. It looks like our world in a lot of ways, but in some ways the world could look Very Different. Some people are more aware of magic than others depending on where they live and the influence of magic in the culture/region. Organizations exist that cultivate this magic, although in various ways (some in more secretive ways than others but all fairly out of the public eye).
Magic is fairly acknowledged in Japan, but only certain forms of magic are seen as acceptable. Anything potentially linked to the Mystlands is viewed in a very negative light due to a history of Japan was a focal point of cracks in the Gates and hightened Greying and Myst-conflict. Still secret organizations exist as not everyone wants others to know what they are doing or why and many prefer to keep their traditions and secrets a secret. It's in very poor taste to ask someone about their magical history or traditions without being invited to.
Magic in the US is a lot less acknowledged than in places such as many European or Asian countries, but the secret organizations are prominent in their own ways, just for different reasons that “legitimize” them more to the unknowing public. It is always so easy for people to ignore things they don’t want to think are real with the right circumstances telling them to look the other way.
It’s the year 2051 and things such as basic Mobile Armor (what some might call Mecha thanks to Japan’s influence) and Advanced Industrial Mobilized suits (AIMs) exist. Mobile Armors/Mecha are treated much like one would tanks, submarines, fighter jets and other militarized weaponry, created for one person to “pilot” by themselves instead of a group of people. AIMs are essentially high-tech construction machinery. They could be fitted with weaponry, but their primary purpose is construction, research, emergency services, and the like.
There are different forms of magic that people can have an affinity toward and different names for those people. There is being a Mage (standard English term) which involves casting spells using verbal magic with an assisting conduit (such as a wand, staff, amulet, your own body, etc). There are Runists, who use written spells with scripts of specialized and/or ancient languages, sometimes called rune mages, but they are not exactly the same. One could be both a mage and a runist mixing the two together. Then there are Elementals, who are compatible with magic based in nature and natural forces. Next are the Engineers, who are those who study magic and how to meld it with modern technology. An informal word for them is Techa. Like with mages and runists, Engineers aren’t necessarily One Thing and can be a mix of the other areas of magic. One could be an Engineer who studies Runes and how to use them to power Mecha and AIMs, or who builds specialized conduits for Mages.
And there is Magic from beyond The Gates. The Gates is the name for the barrier that exists between the human world and the Mystlands. The Mystlands is a world made almost entirely of magic and where non-human magical beings originate from. The magic of the Mystlands is not like that of Earth and can cause conflict, but it vast and diverse a world as the Earth itself and many different peoples and creatures live there (including some humans). Demons, Angels, Lycans, Animal-people, Fae…all of these people exist in the Mystlands within their own regions and/or kingdoms. Many areas of the Mystlands are deadly to humans who travel there without proper protections or can cause their minds/souls/bodies/magic to be corrupted, which is known as Greying, because of the influence of The Myst.
To prevent the effects of Greying influencing the Earth itself, thousands of years ago, The Gates were put in place after a powerful war between different factions of humans and Mystlanders. They provide a buffer between the two worlds. But as years have gone on, the Gates had been worn down and stretched thin, causing tears and breaks to occur in the walls, which can lead to beings passing through from either side into the other. Humans can accidentally get lost in the Mystlands or demons and other creatures can come forth and affect the world. For example, Werewolves and other Were people exist because beings called Lycans found their way out of the Mystlands and into our world, attacking and infecting those people until they were, too, changed. After a thousand or so years, these people created clans and factions of their own in the human world, disconnected from the Lycans of the Mystlands, but the longest lived of them know where the Change first originated. Some Mystlanders have the power to travel back and forth through the Gates at will and use that to gain a strong influence on Earth.
Then there are the Psychics, people born with unique abilities that exist outside of the typical Laws and Rules of Magic. Seers, Telepaths, Shapeshifters, Unique Family Bloodlines abilities (such as body-mass manipulation), etc. It is believed that Psychics evolved from the influence of Magic and Myst on each other, but it doesn’t have the aura/signature of either. Psychics have existed for thousands of years. They were rarer in the past but have become more and more common in the couple hundred or so years. Thus, the question of their existence and how their abilities work and manifest so randomly (or hereditarily) has become more prominent.
Many young people who grow up within these communities are trained within their specific community. Mages taught and trained by Mages (usually within their own clans), Runists by Runists, Weres by Weres, etc. But this is not always the case. Hunter Guilds exist that recruit from all over the spectrum of people to fight against the “darker” forces at work. They are fairly diverse in accepting even beings of the Mystlands into their ranks if they can prove themselves. And there are some private academies that exist to allow these children to interact outside of their bubbles and gain a wider awareness of the world at large. Aurora Academy is one of these such private institutions, but others exist throughout Asia, Europe, Africa, and even South America.
magic system
On this Earth there are currently three forms of Magic. There is Earth Magic which is broken down into two categories, Nature Magic and Soul Magic, there is Myst Magic, and then there is Psychic Magic.
Nature Magic is magic that inherent in the Earth itself and the ecosystems that exist on it. Everything on the Earth can be used for magic if done properly, but some materials and tools have stronger magical signatures. Soul Magic is magic inherent to anything that has a soul. It's an offshoot of Nature magic, but has evolved over the millennia into something unique but similar.
Myst Magic is magical energy that comes from the Mystlands, and can be broken down into its own categories, usually by what aspect of the Myst has influenced it. It is extremely varied and works in opposite to Earth Magic without proper care and manipulation. Myst energy can even corrupt and corrode Earth Magical signatures, something called the Greying. Earth Magic can build defenses against Greying, but the less magic someone or something has, the more vulnerable they are to the corrosive and corrupting potential of Myst Magic.
Psychic Magic on the other hand seems to be inbetween the two. It is believed that Psychic Magic (which is naturally more resistent to the Greying) is a mix between earth and myst magic, but no one has proof of it. Still, Psychics have existed for thousands and thousands of years, just not in great numbers. But in the last hundred years or so more Psychics are being born. Psychics can travel through the Mystlands without needing extra protections, but also have a weaker defense against Soul Magic than they do against Myst Magic. It does combine in a more complimentary way with Earth magic than Myst Magic though.
history
MYSTFUL LEGACIES
Hundreds of years ago, yet still thousands of years after the first of the Gate Wars when the Gates were first put into place, cracks and other "gaps" in the Gates were becoming more common. But at first this was seen as perhaps not such a bad thing. Those who came through the cracks were beings fleeing violence and wars in the Mystlands, refugees and peaceful creatures hoping to wait out whatever upheavals were occuring on Earth. Many of them kept to themselves in secret locations where the lines between Earth and Myst were the most blurred, away from humans. Those that interacted with humans tended to be benign, with some exceptions that mages, priests, and the like would deal with swiftly. There was an understanding of "keep to yours and we'll keep to ours."
Japan was a place with a lot of crossover and some Mystlanders were even welcome there, as treaties and alliances were a boon to the people. That is where Taiyotori comes in. Taiyotori was the offspring of one of the great demon kings of the Mystlands, who had decided to split his own soul into 10 parts, 9 "children" to anchor and provide him strength, as all the power they gained, half that would be given to him, the one part representing the core of the soul. And gain strength his children did, become warlords in their own right across the region, but all of them still loyal to their father.
When the Demon King Garuda had conquered over a fourth of the Mystlands, he calmed down his campaigns, a tenuous peace settling in his lands, despite the oppressive control he kept. He allowed his offspring personal time for the first time since he had created them. Taiyotori found out one of their "siblings" had visited Earth during this time and was curious enough to do the same, but what they found was they had no corporeal body on Earth. This was something that had never been a problem before because they wore specialized armor to hold their forms in the Mystlands and could control it easily, but the armor was extremely conspicuous and thus was encouraged to leave it.
Taiyotori remained formless for years on Earth, watching humans, curious about them, and also somewhat judgmental at how messy their wars were. It was insulting, to be a warlord with the power they had and to see how humans just kept going back and forth in such a haphazard stalemate. That was until they met Hitosei Miyamimoto. Hitosei was a warrior with a hidden store of magic that they could sense was yet untapped. He was strong as a warrior, but from a family of no little-to-no magic potential, so Hitosei's bright aura stood out, even if it was clearly dormant, untouched, almost as if magic had skipped whole generations only to be locked inside one person. They spoke to Hitosei in his dreams, getting to know him, learning about his goals, motivations, and felt like they understood each other. Of course, Hitosei thought all of these conversations were just dreams. To him, Taiyotori wa a person he dreamt of that helped guide him and he felt a deep connection to only to forget their face every dawn. He could not see Taiyotori when awake because of his magic being so dormant.
Until Taiyotori woke it up, just because they could, and wanted to see what would come of it. Because they felt that level of potential being untouched was wrong when they had come to respect Hitosei. But they didn't expect that the powerful magic they had awakened was Empathy and Sight and the overload almost drove Hitosei to madness. They hadn't expected this reaction, hadn't realized exactly what that level of power would do to a human mind. And so to protect Hitosei's mind, Taiyotori bonded with him, shielding him from the strength of his power, but also confirming to him that Taiyotori did indeed exist, not just as a figure of his dreams, but a demon who had been watching over him for some time.
At first Hitosei was horrified, angered, and betrayed, but with the empathy he could now feel, he could also sense Taiyotori's feelings, and know intimately exactly why they had done what they did and how they had thought they were doing right by him. And in return, Taiyotori gained empathy in a way they never had before. Before they could only sense the feelings of their siblings. Other beings outside of their bond were curiosities or worthy opponents/allies at best or worthless and unimportant at worst. They didn't understand the feelings of others, couldn't relate to them in that way. Until now. It opened up an understanding they had never felt before, but also twisted feelings of confusion, doubt, and even shame. Shame because it took feeling how others felt to care that their lives should matter in any way. They didn't know what to do with all of these feelings, and in a twist had managed to overwhelm themselves. The bond between Hitosei and Taiyotori remained even after Taiyotori left his body, but it was much weaker, just enough to provide Hitosei some protection as he learned to control his new abilities.
Then came the battle where Hitosei's side was being decimated, overwhelmed by the sheer numbers of the allied forces against them and Taiyotori offered help, offered that should Hitosei allow them to permanently bond, tying them together with Hitosei as his host on Earth, they could become one and gain the power to beat their opponents back. Hitosei accepted the bond, welcomed him as his host and turned the tide of the battle. Now he not only had the magic Taiyotori had awakened in him, but also the power of the demon warlord themselves.
He married, had children (all who bore the touch of Taiyotori's influence, whether through eyes or hair or an undeniable glow to them), and continued to gain acclaim and esteem as a powerful warrior, blessed by power and skill and wisdom surprising for someone so young. It gave his clan power and status and he was ever grateful to Taiyotori, but the more the years went on, the more they began to blend into each other, and Taiyotori became happy, content with this life to be one with Hitosei and never part from him. Until one of his siblings, Arashimaru, found them. He warned Taiyotori that if he stayed with Hitosei for too long, when he died, they would also die. That they could not lose themselves in their host. For some time, Taiyotori wondered if maybe they wouldn't mind that. Having lived as one with Hitosei, having loved as one with Hitosei, to then grow old and die with Hitosei. He had all of Hitosei's memories and Hitosei had all of Taiyotori's. They were one being of two minds merging more and more into one.
Hitosei, on the other hand, refused to allow this to happen. He insisted that Taiyotori break the bond before he died. Because when Hitosei was dead, it would be Taiyotori who would continue to watch over their clan, the growing family they had made. If they parted, Taiyotori could choose to bond with one of their children instead. Arashimaru told them that he needed to accept that their time was always going to be limited on Earth as it was. Garuda would call them back eventually. This was all true, but somehow, in the years of living with Hitosei, Taiyotori had almost forgotten, had let their life from before meeting Hitosei slip away. As if it was the life of someone else.
Separating from Hitosei felt like cutting off a limb, but they did it. They did it and immediately sought out their only daughter, Hoshihana, offering her the bond (and seeking comfort). Hoshihana was the most magically attuned of their children, had always known about Taiyotori from the time she was old enough to understand what she was seeing when she looked at her father. She had spoken to Taiyotori and connected to them in a way her brothers (powerful in their own right from the blessings of Taiyotori's bonded parentage) had not been as interested to. She called Taiyotori her third parent, her soul parent.
She became Taiyotori's host and there was some jealousy from her three brothers, that she had been chosen for Taiyotori's blessing in that way, but she never tried to take over as head of the clan, leaving that to her oldest brother. But even while he was the head of the clan, people knew that she was the core of it, because she was the host. For generations this would continue, with the Miyamimoto clan being strong and powerful, with Taiyotori choosing a host from each generation. But the bond never lasted as long or was as deep as what they had with Hitosei. He could not love their children the same way they loved Hitosei. Instead they maintained more of a parental role, a mentor who would advise and guide and gift them their power. The Miyamimoto clan became very well known as an elemental mage clan, blessed by the sun itself, who used their power to maintain peace. There were even times when Taiyotori had to face their own siblings because they too would periodically take hosts or favor a clan. But overall these generations were times of bounty, even through the times of war. Things were good for the Miyamimoto clan and though Taiyotori still felt the loss of Hitosei, they were content to see how their family had grown.
Then another major war broke out in the Mystlands and the damage caused not only wrecked many kingdoms there, but also the Gates. Mystland creatures were spilling through more and more and they were not the same as the ones that had done so before. The Mystlanders that came now were more like invaders instead of visitors or refugees. Wreaking havoc, murder, stealing souls and causing mass destruction. The view that humans had of demons and other Mystland creatures was changing, rapidly, and not for the better. Taiyotori and their siblings came to a bitter understanding--they had to fight and close the gates. But not all of his siblings agreed. Some were on the side of the invading forces--because the Demon King Garuda was leading it. They refused to go against their father. But five, including Taiyotori, had come to care deeply for humans and Earth.
With their hosts, they fought and used their magic to help seal the cracks in the Gates across Japan, but in the final moments they also knew they couldn't stay any longer. Humans were no longer as welcoming to Mystlanders, fearful and distrusting. Taiyotori could see it in how the Miyamimoto were treated, even while fighting on the side of humans. Because Taiyotori's influence was hard to deny, even if they hid it with claims of being elementals and mages. These were not exactly lies, as many of the Miyamimoto progeny had gain their abilities from either Hitosei's awakening, Taiyotori, or both.
Their current host, Hikaruhito, was a kind and passionate man who reminded them of Hoshihana in how deeply attuned to magic he was. Not Hitosei, but no one could ever compare to Hitosei to them. Still, they liked Hikaruhito and were sad to leave them. But it had to be done and they closed the Gate behind them, making sure nothing else could get through it at this time. Of course as time went on and more magic was used, the Gates would weaken again, but it was what they could do for now.
But as time went on back on Earth, the Miyamimoto clan had to protect themselves from new persecutions due to the rumors that they were demons themselves (not entirely wrong). So within a few generations the truth about Taiyotori was suppressed altogether, hidden as if they were ashamed. Times would change, magic would become accepted again in Japan, but Mystlanders, especially demons, are still hated by society at large. And the Miyamimoto clan tried to breed out all of the physical signs of Taiyotori's influence and rewrite their history to have more mundane origins for their powerful elemental abilities.
Until Yusei Miyamimoto is born.
CHILDHOOD
Yusei was born during a rather scandalous time for his clan. His father, Seito, had gone to the US for university to avoid the fact his parents were getting a divorce (LE GASP) and fell in love with Nadia Montgomery. It was a whirlwind romance of two minds just connecting and two auras that were very compatible to the point that they could even share magic with each other. Seito didn't have a lot of magical skill but he was very good at reading people's souls/auras and it led him to Nadia, who had a very strong magical aura that seemed to call to his.
They were in love and knew they wanted to be together and married before the end of college, only to go to Japan and face the contention of what his family would do. His grandfather, who Seito had always been close to, informed him he was disappointed by his impatience, but other than that, seemed to accept that Nadia was going to be a part of the family. Not all of his family was as accepting, but as his grandfather was still head of the clan, no one was going to be outwardly disrespectful to their faces.
So they stayed in Japan, followed the formal marriage traditions of the clan, and within a few short years along came Yusei. Yusei who was dark as his mother but somehow had hair whiter than his great-grandfather's and eyes a shade of purple that no one else in the family had.
This of course just led to even more scandal and rumors, whispers that Seito had brought the Curse back upon the family, the one they had spent generations weeding out, purifying themselves from. Seito, of course after being one of the youngest members in the family at the time, hadn't believed in the supposed "Curse" and thought that it was just some tale parents used to scare he and his cousins into behaving. But then he saw his own son and wondered.
Yusei wasn't a "normal" child by some standards. His white hair and purple eyes weren't typical for either side of his family, and he suffered from bouts of hyperactivity and fatigued illness throughout the year that his family didn't quite understand until his great-grandfather insisted that his elemental bonds were awakened even at such a young age and his family took protective measures for him. He's sickly and more prone to illness during the winter when there is less sun, but is a lot more active and energized during sunny days and summer months. He spent one winter, when he was four, sick with pneumonia and he didn't know it, but his parents would sit over him at night as he slept, pumping him full of their own energy to help him make it through until he got better. It was a very traumatic time for them all, but the weeks spent in the hospital probably did have some influence over him wanting to be a doctor because the staff were extremely kind and protective of him. By the time he had left the hospital, he'd almost forgotten he didn't live there, but he loved the people and some of them are still friends with his parents to this day.
Then there was his soul-sensory abilities, which also were active at a young age. He could see souls, whether dead spirits, or the projections of the souls of living people around him and it was very overwhelming. He didn't have the means to express this until he was three years old and it was then that a Blinding Spell was put on him. It kept him from seeing souls and projections without him actively seeking them out most of the time, but the spell would need to be redone yearly so it lasted and sometimes the strength or darkness of another person's soul was enough to break through the spell anyway.
This left him feeling disconnected from his family, no matter how much he loved them, because the adults treated him with contempt and suspicion and their children would follow suit and he didn't really understand except that he didn't look like them. His great-grandfather was loving and kind, if a bit stern, but he died when Yuki was five and the passive aggressive behavior become a lot more openly antagonistic--at least when his parents weren't around. Because his mother never put up with any of this and would put people in their place and didn't care what they thought about her in the process.
Yusei was raised mostly normal, although his parents didn't let him out of the house much as a baby or young child without them, not until he was old enough that he had to go to school (mainly because they worried he might get ill or the Blinding Spell might fail and he would be overwhelmed without them there to help him). Then he got bullied and called a "yukidaruma" or "snowman" by some children and the name stuck. As he got older the teasing and bullying continued, but he managed to make it work for him, turning "Yukidurama" into "Yuki" and making friends with some children who had once been stand-offish around him and finding others who would accept him. His parents loved him, his great-grandfather accepted him and was even kind and gentle until his death, so things weren't easy but he never gave up. He was smart, dutiful to his family, trained as a mage just as they expected, and only wanted to make them proud, when he knew so many (especially his grandfather) had never seemed happy or proud of him in anyway. He was always lacking to them.
Visiting his mother's family in the States was always such a strange occurrence in that his mother's family was much smaller than his father's and a lot less judgmental. Not perfect since magic was a lot more hidden where they lived in the US, but he could hide his hair and eyes by claiming albinism or hair dye and many people seemed to accept it (except those who wondered why he seemed even happier under the sun instead of repelled by it, but they let it go). His cousin Lanette was a great friend to him in the States and they talked all the time on the phone despite international fees when he was back home. So he did have a support system, albeit a small one. It was enough for him, and he would keep trying to prove himself to his father's family because their opinions mattered a lot more to him than he would ever admit.
He excelled at elemental magic, not only being able to use a nonverbal magic by the time he was 14, but also being able to draw more power by spending extra time in the sun. He'd had to replace his crystal multiple times over the years because of overwhelming his conduit, but eventually he was gift a special crystal by his father that his great-grandfather had wanted saved for him until he was 12. A special sphere crystal he kept on a necklace and could use to direct all of his magic without fear of Rebound Magic (excess magic expelled during spells when a proper conduit isn't used that can come back on the user. Some people have the expert magical control to not cause Rebound Magic, but it takes years and years of training or highly natural skill).
CONSEQUENCES & TRUTHS
By the time he was 17, Yuki accepted he was seen as different by other people and even by his family. He still had his parents, and some friends who trusted, so life could have been much worse. Then someone he thought was one of his closest friends, a teen named Hiro who he had met as a freshman in high school, betrayed him. In truth, Hiro, was raised as part of the Stark Order, a group seeking out half-blood humans to experiment on and use as slaves, who recently had begun attempting to use their blood-bonds to summon demons from the Mystlands into chained contracts (making them all but slaves to whoever summoned them).
Yuki didn't understand much of this, because he didn't even have demon blood, so he wasn't sure why these people had taken him in the first place and he tried to explain this, but it never mattered. They laughed with each other his face, as if they understood something he never would. The experiments were weeks of torture and pain and his mind being turned against itself as he was drugged, shocked, pieces of flesh and bone (and more) taken, and then forced by magically enhanced tech attached to their spines to fight some of the other captives to survive in hopes that them killing each other would unlock the final summoning. With their specialized technology, the could control their prisoners, even forcing them out on missions with other Order members when they aren't experimenting on them. They are useful tools, he heard someone once say, but it's like using a revolver when you could have a grenade launcher.
He managed to last over a month with them, and even built some tentative bonds with some of the othe teens he'd been imprisoned with. He could feel as each one died, their souls leaving. And so he fought, but had just enough control still in himself that he never killed and his body would heal from many of the injuries--scars left that seemed much older than they were. It made the Order very angry that he wouldn't follow through with the final kill, and would just torture him some more since they knew he could take it, considering how much they kept testing out his healing capabilities and even stuck him under a sun lamp (something that always accelerated Yuki's healing. The fact they knew this meant that Hiro really had told them everything Yuki had ever confided in him.) So they just tortured him and experimented on him more, even taking organs from his body to see if his healing could replace them...and it could. They never tried to remove his heart, because it was too risky.
But something had happened when in his last fight, he finally did it. He killed his opponent by calling down lighting out of nowhere and electrocuting them in his arms, feeling as their brain died and soul's connection to their body broke. He was finally able to break through completely, pushing back against the mind-control technology forcing them to fight, horrified by what he did, as he could see the other person was dead, soul gone, and suddenly there was a change. Golden light blinding everyone around them as Yuki began pushing his own soul magic back into their body, trying to find the link to their soul before it was gone forever. He found it, but he found another link as well, something old and distant and very, very warm. Yuki grabbed both, not sure why it was there and then pulled, drawing them back into himself to hoping to hold the young man's soul as his body healed.
And that is when the runed seals carved and traced in blood all around the began to glow. The summoning was activating, Yuki felt something pulling back at him, that link he had grabbed resonating as something trued to reach him and if he listened he could maybe hear someone trying to call out to him. The voice was becoming more and more audible and Yuki felt the link he'd been holding, that it was pulling them closer together in some way.
Then he was rescued by a hunters group who disrupted the ritual. They destroyed the summoning seal and rushed in to help. Destroying the seals was a shock that caused Yuki to let go of the soul bond he'd been clinging to, which allowed the soul he'd been holding to return to the body that was entirely healed. He had managed to bring the other boy back from death, but all of this took a huge toll on him and he collapsed. Thankfully, the hunters were able to save everyone who was still there, although most of the Stark Order cultists who were there managed to escape in the chaos.
Yuki woke up days later, having been returned to his family and cared for by them. He'd been left in the sun house, a meditation space adjacent to the main house with a special roof to allow the sun to shine into it at all times of the day, plants growing in various spots in the room, and special solar lamps for them during the night and colder months. Thankfully it was the summer. He awoke to find that he had electrical burns up and down his arms that had taken days to heal due to how diminished and weakened his magic was. He took a couple more days to recover and it left him a lot of time to think.
The summoning had almost worked. He had thought they had taken him mistakenly, but there had been a soulbond he felt, he had touched it and pulled on it, and someone else had pulled back on the otherside. The summoning had only intended to work on demons. Demons who were the blood-relatives of the humans sacrificed in the ritual. It could only mean one thing, and suddenly much of Yuki's childhood, the treatment of his father's family, the whispers of a "Curse"...it all made a lot more sense. He didn't want it to, but it did.
Then he started hearing The Voice. It came through in a dream and he ignored it, thinking it was a nightmare-induced reaction to everything he'd been through. Even though the Voice continued to call out to him. It was so familiar and yet so repelling. Something about it called to him and disturbed him at the same time. He tried to ignore the voice and recover, spent months trying to pick his life back up and act like he was fine, that he wasn't crumbling inside out and getting only 2-3 hours a sleep at a time. His parents were concerned, but his grandfather told him that a Miyamimoto could rise above such trials and stay true and that is what he was trying to do. His mom asked him if he wanted to visit her family in the States, take a vacation, but with entrace exams coming up and him already behind, he refused. He needed to handle this on his own.
Then he was looking through old scrolls for some healing magic advice. It seems one of the scrolls wasn't about healing but instead about Taiyotori and had been hidden in the healing scrolls when the others had all been destroyed. It broke him. Because the truth he had known and tried to ignore was right there laid out for him. He confronted his father, and then his grandfather who had always been distant toward him and the truth came out about Taiyotori. That they had been trying to erase the shame of Taiyotori from their blood for generations but he brought it back all over again. That Seito's one rebellious act of marrying some foreigner had brought back the Curse of demonblood they had thought they had been free from because their union couldn't have been pure. This was also the point where Seito almost punched his own father in the face, but Yuki held him back, the anger and confusion having drained out of him into misery and resignation.
NEW NAME, NEW YOU
He understood now that nothing he did would change things. That trying wasn't worth it. Nadia put her foot down and got her son out of there. They went to the States and Yuki tried not to feel like he was running away. The Montgomerys helped them until they got on their feet and he is still trying to sort himself out and even helped him officially change his name on his legal documents to Yuki Montgomery. His mother started her own life over and waited to see if Seito would follow. Telling his dad had been the hardest thing he had ever done because he was prepared for his father to not forgive him for giving up the Miyamimoto name, but it only led to his father showing up in the States a few weeks later (he'd had to wait to make sure his passport was approved, as he didn't have citizenship as Nadia and Yuki did), telling him that if he had to change his own name to prove how much he loved his son and wife, he would do so.
And so Yuki's life went on, working through the trauma of what happened with the Stark Order, his family's abject rejection and condemnation of his existence, and the guilt he felt that he had made his parents give up the lives they had in Japan for him. And then there was the Voice. Because the Voice was never gone for long. So he went to college, then to medical school and is doing everything he can to put that entire part of his life behind him. He's 25 and doing his best. He barely sleeps, but a few hours of sun each day help get him through and he tries not to think too hard about the reasons for that. If he doesn't bring it up, no one else is going to.
personality
Yuki is a quiet person who can be a bit intense because he often won't look people in the eye, but when he does, he stares and stares and doesn't realize just how much staring he's doing. He's very socially awkward, but also adaptable. He rolls with whatever happens, used to people judging him, thinking he's strange, and telling himself to push past all of that. His entire life has been him pushing down negative feelings and meditating to work through his anger and hurt because no one was going to fix these things for him so the only thing he could do was change how he felt and how he reacted to the unfair circumstances.
Because he grew up dealing with illness, he spent a lot of time around hospitals (he is the strongest healer in his family, so of course they couldn't do much for him most of the time when it comes to illness rather than injuries), and came to really respect doctors, nurses, and the entire hospital staff. He wanted to help people out the same way and that's why he's so dedicated to becoming a doctor, even though it's an extremely stressful job. He's good at dealing with stress...mostly. He might not sleep much, and thus looks like he has perpetual baggy eye all the time, but he can manage everything else.
Yuki is also someone who is very afraid to trust. He trusts his close family and his mother's side of the family (the Montgomerys), but he doesn't try to make friends. Not after Hiro betrayed him for the cult he was raised in, not after everything he went through. He also is very cautious, a bit paranoid, never walks into dark areas, keeps a flashlight with him when he has to walk to his car from the hospital at night and has trouble with people touching him without his person. He also has anxiety about scalpels but has managed to mitigate it because he refuses to allow what happened to him to hold him back from the dream he's had since he was a kid. He wants to be a doctor, he is going to be a doctor, no matter what mental hang-ups he might have.
And beneath all of this is someone who is still hiding how much he hates himself and blames himself for everything wrong. It was the fact he was so obviously a halfblood that led to his extended family to treat him the way they did. His parents had to give up their lives in Japan to stand by him. He ran away instead of standing up to his family and sees himself as a coward for it, but also doesn't believe forcing them to accept him would ever happen. He knows these feelings are irrational, could even mention all the ways these intrusive thoughts are false, but it doesn't stop them. So he keeps them locked down tight, not even mentioning them to the few close confidantes he has. He tells himself he should just get over it and move on, and tells himself he HAS moved on, but those thoughts and feelings are always there.
He also refuses to use magic unless necessary, because each time he has, the Voice seemed to get a bit louder, more prominent. It already has taken over his sleep and given him the craziest kind of dreams. He also refuses to acknowledge that the Voice is likely Taiyotori themselves, because doing so might be a gateway to acknowledging them and opening contact. He very, very, very much does not want that. He has shoved all of the issues with his halfblood status into the back of his mind and thinks ignoring it is the best way to not have to deal with it. He still maintains the Blinding Spell to help tone down his soul-sensory, but that's about it. Living in the States, in a region where magic is less common does help since he doesn't have the urge to give in. As obvious, Yuki is not someone who is good at using healthy coping mechanisms.
Sometimes Yuki can come across a bit like an asshole. He is blunt and honest (mostly) and doesn't mind telling people things they may not want to hear. He has learned that doing this often can get him into trouble, so he has toned it down a lot since he was a child. He's also someone with a bit of a temper, but keeps it locked down so that when he does get angry it's a bit explosive (in more ways than one). It takes a lot for him to get to that point, but he can be a bit short with people and doesn't really enjoy dealing with idiots.
miscellaneous
- As "yukidurama" was a nickname he could never run away from, getting people to start calling him "Yuki" was really the best way for him to reclaim it for himself.
- As a very young child Yuki would get sickly during times when it was especially cloudy for an extended period of time and would catch illnesses very easily in the darker winter months.
- Yuki's closest friends were his cousin Lanette and his friend Rinku, who also happened to be the person Yuki tested much of his first-aid skills on as a teen because Rinku was into a lot of sports while getting into a lot of fights with assholes who picked on Yuki in junior high.
- Yuki is very skilled as an elemental mage, but ever since he found out the truth, he's avoided all using any kind of magic.
- Yuki keeps one of his eyes half-covered because it seemed to help calm some people to not look him in the eyes directly that way (but he also doesn't tend to look people in the eyes himself for this reason unless he's being intentionally intimidating).
- Yuki has a part-time job working weekends at a pet supply and grooming store. He works 12-hour shifts, allowing many of his coworkers to get a day off on the weekend. They like him even if he is very hard to get close to.
- The Montgomerys are generally well known in their community as powerful intuitive people who are very good "Guides," people to ask for spiritual advice. They are typically spiritual and earth-based in their magic.
- Giving up magic meant Yuki no longer could use magic to fix most things that broke and his Uncle Nate taught him basic tinkering, as he's a mechanic and a repair man.
- Yuki gets cold very easily in the winter when the sun hasn't been out and will bundle up with multiple shirts, gloves, etc. He plans to move to southern California after medical school because of this.
- Yuki does not like small enclosed spaces (borderline claustrophobia).
- Due to what happened while held by the Stark Order, Yuki is aware he doesn't need the crystal to channel his magic as he always assumed. It was part of what made him finally start reconsidering everything he'd been told about where his abilities come from. He still kept the crystal as it was a gift from his great-grandfather and has other uses (such as the prism sword).
- If asked, Yuki will say he's sworn off all magic. The fact he still uses the Blinding Spell on himself doesn't change that. He just justifies it as his way of shutting down his own natural magical reactions to ensure privacy of others (which it what it does).
abilities
ELEMENTAL: Yuki is a skilled light mage who can use solar and electrical kinetic energy to power his spells. He used a crystal he once carried always on his person but now keeps hidden in a drawer at home, but knows he probably doesn't need it. He was skilled enough to use nonverbal spells at the age of 17, which is when he gave up magic.
PRISM SWORD: The conduit crystal Yuki can use to channel his magic for his spells has a mass displacement capability. It is capable of shifting into a sword (a larger/broader katana) that is extremely sharp and nigh unbreakable when his energy is channeled through it. It reflects light like a prism due to being crystal-based and allows him to funnel greater energy through it and stronger spells.
SPIRITUAL SENSORY: Yuki can see other people's souls as an aura's projection around their bodies. The view of their souls gives him insight into who they are as a person, or even what their surface emotions are when in close contact, but because of the overstimulation from this, he uses a Blinding Spell to block this ability. Sometimes someone's soul is strong enough to override it, but usually this is enough to protect him.
MARTIAL ARTS: 14 years of martial arts training along with his mage training (and sword training) as he grew up.
LANGUAGES: Yuki speaks Japanese, English, and Spanish.
DEMONIC HERITAGE: Yuki's demonic heritage is very strong in him, which is why his abilities are naturally stronger than typical light mages. The sun itself is his power source, and he used his crystal to focus it (not knowing that he didn't need it the way his family had taught him he did). He is always stronger and healthier in the sunnier months, especially summer, and his demonic heritage is also why he can use solar energy to heal others through touch alone. He heals very quickly and can even heal from extremely serious wounds with strong sunlight as a booster. This ability does not work if he's been cut off from the sun for an extended period of time. With enough focus and energy he can even heal lethal wounds or bring someone from the brink of death. This heritage also gives him a spiritual bond to Taiyotori and he would be the natural host for them if they were to ever come back to Earth. This is why he hears their voice calling out to him.