Aya, Blade of Homura

Having learned the ways of the samurai from her ex-clan, leaving their blasphemous code and corrupted philosophy behind, Aya has seen much warfare and bloodshed in her time. However, instead of letting the influence of her dark past control her conscience and drive her into a path of vengeance and pain, she met a spark of hope that would change the course of her life forever. This spark would ignite her soul with furious passion and flaming justice.

Backstory. Aya was born into the head family of a powerful samurai clan. Her father was the clan leader and her mother was his consort. All of her siblings were men and were taken from their childhood at an early age to be trained into the clan's ranks while she was kept in the house where her strict mother would force her to learn the ways of a proper housewife. Aya didn't have a choice in what the rest of her life was going to be like, and she never had a chance to experience anything that wasn't taught or shown to her. Another perfectly bred woman who could cook, clean, and heed her husband's every beck and call. That's how it would have stayed, but one day, Aya found herself staring out the window while doing chores at the Samurai of the clan. Training, practicing martial arts, meditating. She stood there like a mannequin for what seemed like hours, as she fell in love—in love with the concept of the samurai.

From that night, she began watching the samurai train each day after her chores. She began reading tomes and manuals about samurai, their code, their academic arts, their martial virtues, and their disciplined nature. She stole a training katana from the barracks and began practicing their combat styles. She started to open her mind to all the things she had been missing out on for most of her life such as exercise, intellectual study, and magic. It took only a few months for her to realize that she no longer wanted to be the helpless servant princess with no choice in her life, she wanted to be a gallant, independent woman; she wanted to be a samurai not just in martial prowess but in personal principles as well.

Finding this calling in her heart, she snuck out of the house at night to go see her father and tell him her desire. There were a few female samurai in their ranks, so she knew it wasn't impossible. She would demand it if need be. However, when she got to her father's door, she heard multiple voices inside. Her father was discussing with his generals about a successful village ransacking and burning, making the surviving prisoners into slaves, and what town to hit next. Aya couldn't believe what she was hearing. After the voices began closing the meeting, she ducked into the alleyway and hid. As the doors swung open, she saw her father and his high-ranking generals dragging out body bags that were still writing, sacks of treasure, and weapons of war covered with crimson blood. After they left, Aya snuck into the war room and was horrified at what she found. The art had been replaced with war maps with large Xs over certain towns and circles around others. The books were replaced with stolen treasures. The beautiful ornate weapons were replaced with brutal torture devices. Most significantly, the banner that hung above the meeting room that once read "No retreat. No surrender," was replaced with "Kill, steal, survive."

Horrified and shocked at what had become of her once noble clan, Aya became frightened, confused, and disturbed all at the same time. She didn't know how to feel about this wicked transformation, but her petrified stance got her caught by her father who had returned when he heard her gasp. When Aya asked why he had done this, he simply said that it was easier to be cruel and survive than it was to be noble and starving. To which Aya replied that she no longer had any love or respect for her clan or her father. "You don't have a choice. You will continue this bloodline and this legacy," Aya's father told her. "You're wrong, I was given the choice the moment I took fate into my own hands. And my fate is no longer in your bloodline, for it is no longer my legacy," said Aya in response. "Then die, since you have no more worth to this clan" Aya's father seethed and proceeded to attack his own daughter. Unfortunately for him, he was getting older and weaker, and Aya had recently become a disciplined martial artist, so the fight was over before it started with Aya choke holding her father. However, when she looked into his pleading eyes, she knew she didn't have the heart to finish the deed, so she got off of him and ran—ran as fast and as far as she could, never looking back. And she ran with tears, knowing the only family and home she ever knew would never welcome her back.

Resparked. After a few months of being a runaway hopping from town to town, working odd jobs, practicing her martial arts, and studying her discipline, what Aya wanted most of all was a new place to call home—somewhere she could be safe and wanted. Luckily for her, fate had placed her destiny on a path of greatness, for when she arrived in a new town, she was immediately met by a monk in a red gi uniform. He asked if she was Aya, and she hesitantly affirmed this assumption. The monk then led her to his monastery where she was welcomed and greeted with open arms. The monk introduced himself as one of Aya's brothers who escaped the clan at an early age after discovering the clan's new atrocities. Aya told him her story, how she was looking for a place to belong and how she wanted to be a true samurai. Her brother took her up on this aspiration and worked with her to train her in all that he knew in the ways of the samurai.

Over the next few years, Aya had become an expert at martial arts, a studious academic, and a chivalrous lady. She was also taught about the ways of harnessing one's own spiritual energy known as ki and using it to become more spiritually balanced and whole. Additionally, she grew to put faith in The Light and work in its principles of harmony, peace, and prosperity. The monks also made her inducted her as a samurai of Homura, the Ancient Elemental of fire, and she took his principles to heart in her life. Aya had become her own person like she had always wanted; she was happy.

Aya, as she became a powerful warrior, was inquired to join the town guard, to which she happily accepted. However, as she worked in the guard, she realized that she was still passive in her personality, as she couldn't fight head on with bandits and monsters that attacked the town. She would always fight from the back, and when she was faced with direct confrontation, she would always be too scared or hesitant to fight back, having to be saved by her allies. Her brother realized this weakness of hers, and decided to train her in the way of using the same passion that called her to become who she became into fuel to fight for other's to have the same passions. He wanted her her to igniting a frenzied flame inside of her to use in times of conflict to burn down obstacles to herself and others.

While Aya got better at using this spiritual technique, she wasn't able to put into practice until one fateful day, when their past came to catch up to both Aya and her brother. Apparently, their father and their clan had discovered where they resided and had come with a battalion to burn their peace down along with their town. In the battle against the clan, Aya was once again fighting with her archery skills when suddenly she heard someone call her name. She was needed back at the monastery to defend it. It was being targeted. She rushed back to the monastery, fighting her way through liens of enemies until she made her way to the central hall. What she saw there would haunt her nightmares forever. She her father kicking her brother off of his blade. As he reached out to her in his last breath, he said, "Look to The Light. Follow your conscious. Light your heart aflame." He smiled a loving smile to his sister before falling to the floor. Aya crumbled to the floor, seemingly defeated, as her father slowly began to walk towards her, mockingly telling her to stand and fight him. As he reached her, he raised his sword above her head to finish her as well, but something had awoken in Aya's heart.

She was angry, but it wasn't anger that forced her to grasp her blade, it was his words. She finally found the fuel that she needed to ingite her soul; a new passion: the desire to be flaming shield of protection for others. As she grasped her blade, she heard in her head a voice that she somehow knew was Homura talking to her directly, "You have found your fire. Now I can ask you: do you wish to be my chosen warrior to enact the justice of The Light?" Without hesitating, she simply responded with, "Yes." She heard again, "Do you vow to hone yourself as a sword of principle and a shield of life? An impassioned flame of virtue?" "Yes," Aya responded. "Very well, I ratify you as my blade. Let the flame of your soul conflagrate into an inferno of purity!" Aya grabbed grasped her blade, her body and katana being encompassed by magical flame, as she stabbed through her father with lightning speed, her eyes blazing with intensity, "I am Aya, Blade of Homura. And you are in my way of my fire," she whispered into her father's ear, as she pushed his body of her sword.

From that moment on, Aya, Blade of Homura, worked in honor of The Light and with the guidance of The Blazing Passion to protect others from harm, and purge the world of evil with her impassioned flame.