“I’m not just for show.”
-Kawaguchi Umeko
Name: 川口 梅子 (Kawaguchi Umeko)
Race: Human
Gender: Female
Age: 18
Nationality: Atlesian Origin, Vacuuan Affiliation
Team: TSUN (Tsunami)
Designation: Huntress
Appearance: Standing slightly taller than average, albeit not by much, Umeko clearly cares about her appearance. Her clothes are, without exception, kept immaculately clean and worn in specific combinations planned out long in advance. She wears them quite well, too; Umeko is unquestionably a striking individual. She's built like a fighter, with a solid stance and toned limbs, but her choice of style usually makes her seem much more lithe than she is. Her brown hair is straight and shoulder length, worn differently depending on what she thinks will look best. Umeko is almost always grinning a wide, amiable grin like she wants the entire world to be her friend and invites them to be so. The deep blue eyes set above that grin are highly expressive, and very much the gateway to whatever Umeko is thinking.
Her clothes tend towards the blue end of the spectrum, but their style is incredibly variable. On a daily basis, when attending classes, she generally wears something close to the traditional Atlesian student uniform, in spite of her actual affiliation. She bends this habit for formal events, during which she does don the official Shade uniform. Casually, on the other hand, her wardrobe is nearly infinite; clothes for every occasion, every type of weather, and every temperature. Light jackets are quite common, as is the occasional sweater. Most casual settings will see her in jeans, but the odd semi-formal will prompt the use of a skirt. Wherever she goes, Umeko wants to be the best dressed in the room.
She does have an outfit that could be considered something of a signature, however. A pair of dark blue jeans paired with classy (but intentionally durable) shoes paired with a deep blue top. Over that she adds a waist-length white jacket, with the emblem of Shade stitched in black over what appear to be devil horns on either shoulder. She's never seen, regardless of her attire, without her headband and rarely without her white messenger bag,
Personality: Umeko is friendly, oblivious, and a little too eager to show off. She thrives on being the center of attention, having the most friends, and standing in the shining spotlight. At least that's the disposition she likes to show to the world. The truth is much, much more layered. The hordes of acquaintances and casual friends are kept at arms length, prevented from seeing past the veneer they're supposed to see. Beneath the mask is a much more contemplative young woman, someone much more sensible than her almost arrogant public persona implies. Umeko realized, quite a long time ago, that her peers (and elders) tended to underestimate her due to her bubbly nature and fashion-oriented interests. So why not use that to her advantage?
The real Kawaguchi Umeko is highly driven, and paradoxically, infinitely more willing to criticize someone the more she cares about them. Such criticisms, truth be told, are often emphatic, occasionally angry, and very impassioned. But on the other side of the same coin, those she cares about can be subject to displays of loyalty or affection that would seldom be extended to one of her superficial 'friends'. The truest sign of her friendship is being permitted to see underneath the public facade.
Fighting Style: Despite the attitude she projects, Umeko is a devastating all-range fighter. Lacking in raw power, she instead focuses on technique and battlefield control. The White Devil's forms give her both offensive and defensive capabilities at all ranges, and her Semblance gives her the ability to alter her environment a little as needed. Her
preference, most of the time, is to act as a mid-to-close range combatant. Her rifle, and its sword form, give her the precision she needs to land dangerously precise strikes while her shield ensures she can take hits just as well as give them. But given the nature of her team, she is not the only (or necessarily the best) suited for this role. When the situation requires she transitions smoothly into acting as mid-to-long range fire support, using her remote shield bits to harass the enemy from any angle, and her rifle to hit where it hurts. Her Semblance is no slouch in this role, either, as it allows her to redirect shrapnel and detritus in creative ways.
Simply put, Umeko will adapt to any scenario one attempts to force her in as best she can. And much of the time, that is quite well. After a bout with her in the arena, few ever quite buy into her seemingly oblivious nature ever again.
Weapons/Equipment: Remnant Expansion (Prototype) #78 Unit 2 Grimm-Use Non-Demanding Armament Machine ver. White Devil: The White Devil started life as a project for the Atlesian military. Atlas has long believed in recruiting their Hunters into service as Atlesian Specialists, but the common Atlesian soldier has never been able to go toe-to-toe with the foes that Hunters handled. They had to rely on strength of numbers, not individual capabilities. The Grimm-Use series was intended to permit the common soldier the adaptability to handle as many foes as a Hunter, if not with quite as much skill. In fact that was the purpose; a set of equipment that could be used for maximum effect, with minimum skill. The project showed promise, but ultimately was a casualty of Atlas’ changing goals. They no longer wanted to increase a soldier’s effectiveness, they wanted to take the soldier off the battlefield entirely.
So Sunrise Industries, the contractor for its development, mothballed the project. The five units that had been produced were put into storage and forgotten. Sunrise Industries itself, unable to keep up with the changing mindset, declared bankruptcy a few short years later and its assets were liquidated. The five prototypes were sent to auction, while the Atlesian military’s active contracts were subsumed by other contractors. And that was when they fell into Umeko’s hands.
The White Devil consists of two primary parts; a handheld semiautomatic railgun rifle, and a large quadrilateral shield. The railgun operates by using lightning Dust to generate the magnetic field necessary to launch a projectile along two rails at exceptionally high velocities, making the weapon highly destructive to compensate for its low rate of fire. Using a trigger mechanism in the handle the railgun converts to a long, slim sword. This sword uses the same lightning Dust to superheat the blade’s edge, drastically increasing its penetrating power.
The shield, in its base configuration, is just that; a shield. It secures itself parallel Umeko’s forearm, with a handle gripped in her left hand, and can be easily used to defend against attacks. Its secondary uses, on the other hand, are much less obvious. The handle is connected to the rest of the shield by two long cords, and the handle contains a small motor to retract or release those cables with the press of a button. The shield itself splits in half, both halves folding to create a rail-based firing aperture similar to that of her rifle. These halves fire a laser based on technology being developed for a separate Atlesian project. In this form the halves of the shield use Gravity Dust to become weightless. Like the cables that connect them to their handle, the firing mechanisms are controlled by an adjacent button.
Both halves of the White Devil have storage forms for noncombat situations. The rifle folds to stow away inside the shield, which uses the seams for its transformation to become a rigid messenger bag.
The final piece of Umeko’s equipment, developed independently of the rest,is a visor and earpiece that contains the functionality of a Scroll while providing eye protection from both shrapnel and blinding light. Outside of combat the device looks very much like an unusual headband. Upon activation it flips down and the v-shaped antennae deploy above her forehead.
Semblance: Center of Attention: Umeko can control the relative gravitational attractions generated by an object. All objects, however small, exert some degree of gravitational pull on all the other objects around them. Umeko can affect the intensity of these pulls, allowing her to manipulate the gravity generated. Most commonly this is used to cause objects to fall into a stable orbit around her, or another object, mistakenly leading many to believe she controls the orbit of objects. The reality is much more nuanced in its potential applications.
History: In Atlas, name and standing is everything. The Schnees are but the most well-known example. What matters is what you have, who you know, and how you got there. If you weren't born with a silver spoon in your mouth you'll spend your entire life kicking and punching to claim one. Everyone knows the names of each industry's titans, but few will remember the small families you meet on the street. In that way, Kawaguchi Umeko is of little note. A deep search of her history will find a modest career in modeling for different magazines, fashion in particular, and her transcripts from Atlas' academy for young hunters and huntresses. A deeper search will find little more about the Kawaguchi family. Simply another foot note in Atlesian history.
Unless one happened to find her birth certificate, and discover that she was born Umeko Huntian, not Kawaguchi. Unlike Kawaguchi, the name 'Huntian' is known to many. The Huntians have been joined at the hip with Atlas' military-industrial complex for generations, supporting, funding, or running dozens of different weapon manufacturers over the years. They made themselves rich off of Atlas' military generations ago, and kept the family interests in good shape through every highpoint and recession since. After all, with the Grimm out there, there'll always be a need for weapons. The Huntians rubbed shoulders with the elite, and were quite content to stay within their echelon. Until, that is, one of the family's minor heirs fell in love with a young worker at the head office.
Robert Huntian's, in his family's eyes, ill-planned love resulted in Umeko's birth. Though he had every intention of sticking with the family he had created, the mastermind of the Huntian empire were less than pleased by the idea. Robert eventually succumbed to the pressures of his more business-minded relations, and returned to the family's good graces. He made sure Umeko and her mother were very well cared for, with as much money as they needed to live comfortably. A share of this money, every month, went into an account in Umeko's name for her to use when she was old enough. Umeko herself grew up attending the kingdom's best academies, with few illusions over the circumstances of her birth. Even fewer about her standing compared to her peers.
Some combination of these truths lead her, at the age of eleven, to discard the Huntian name. From that point on every document was handled using her mother's name, and Umeko Huntian vanished from the paper trails of the Atlesian government. When one of the Huntian empire's investments, Sunrise Industries, went belly-up a year later she found herself drawn towards the liquidation auction and from there to her calling.
While the next generation of Huntians were groomed for business, Umeko entered into Atlas' school for hunters. Her own funds, carefully tucked away until she was old enough, were in good standing when she became a teenager. They were soon supplemented by work done on the side, showcasing fashion and gear in magazines geared towards hunters and huntresses, and invested carefully according to advice and careful consideration. When Kawaguchi Umeko entered Atlas' answer to Signal, no one knew who she was. By the time she left she had made herself known as a highly capable fighter, and a charismatic individual.
It was her success that lead her to leave Atlas. It is no secret, in any of the kingdoms, that the Atlesian specialists were usually recruited from the best of Atlas' training facilities. If she carried on into the next school, she might face the same recruitment efforts. So she packed her bags, gathered what resources were hers, and moved to Vacuo to attend Shade.
Relations with other characters: N/A
Extra: My semblance... Probably something to do with tech, honestly
Ghosthands
Plank Sinatra
UltimoScorp
The World
