Gensoukyou:Reimu Hakurei

The Hakurei Clan
 The Hakurei clan has, since the very beginning of it’s founding, been a clan well known for its devotion to the Shinto religion. They had a shrine that wasn’t necessarily large, but it was fairly well known. Many would visit for mostly small things, leaving donations as thanks for their services. However, their resident god was one of youkai extermination, and the greater half of the requests they received were ones that had to do with getting rid of a troublesome youkai. The members of the Hakurei family who showed high aptitude for channeling spiritual energy trained for a great portion of their lives in the arts of sealing and youkai extermination in order to deal with the growing threat. It was dangerous work, however, so many of those that did undergo this training were not expected to live very long. Those that did survive often became very powerful, it seemed that power in the Hakurei bloodline was great, and that power was passed down the generations. Due to the Hakurei clan’s prowess, they became well known in several parts of Japan. One day, they were informed that there was an area with an exceptionally high concentration of powerful youkai, and they were asked to help deal with the problem. They readily agreed and began work on getting another shrine built in the new location in the hopes that they could defeat every youkai there with the help of their god. It seemed that many other humans were arriving there as well, each one holding a fair amount of spiritual, or sometimes magical power, each wishing to help in the extermination effort. The members of the new shrine welcomed the support, as they had not yet gotten set up. A village had already been established by the others, so the shrine was set up a fair distance away, but still close enough to aid the village and vice versa. The task that these people had set out to accomplish was difficult, however, and they felt that their numbers were dwindling, despite the Hakurei clan’s support. There came a point where there was only one Hakurei miko left, as the others had died off. Things seemed grim. However, a youkai appeared to the miko in the middle of the night, sending the last shrine maiden into a panic as she readied to defend herself, much to the amusement of the youkai who had appeared. She explained that she had not come to fight, however, merely that she wanted to talk. The miko was suspicious, but agreed to hear her out. This youkai introduced herself as Yukari Yakumo and explained that she was going to seal away the entire area inside of a giant border. She had heard about the Hakurei clan’s skill in sealing and borders and could use a bit of help maintaining the border once it was set up properly. Hesitantly, the remaining miko agreed to help, as doing so would prevent the youkai in the area from escaping and causing havoc elsewhere, it became known as “The Great Hakurei Border”. Yukari created the border with the human’s help, then linked the border to the Hakurei bloodline before vanishing for a great while. However, the miko’s work wasn’t done yet, there was still work to be done in the form of keeping the youkai at bay. As the sole miko of the shrine, however, it was difficult for her to continue, especially due to her increasing age.

The Shrine Maiden of Paradise
 A spark of hope came once the miko’s sister, a non-combatant member of the family, bore a child who appeared to possess a great amount of spiritual energy, probably greater than any Hakurei before her. The miko figured it might have something to do with the spell that Yukari had weaved into the family line, but it didn’t seem too important at the time. When the child, Reimu, was still young, the miko began her training. Reimu was hot headed and defiant, so training was slow, but the girl’s power was great despite that fact. Before Reimu’s training could be completed properly, her aunt was killed in battle by an exceptionally powerful youkai. Reimu, being fairly young at this time, didn’t really understand quite what was going on at the time. With no one to protect the shrine, youkai soon found their way to it and began to slaughter the members of the Hakurei clan that were not skilled at youkai extermination. However, before these youkai could touch Reimu, each of them seemed to have been vaporized instantly in a flash of light. Behind where the youkai had been stood that youkai from long ago, Yukari. Reimu didn’t know her, or what was going on, she was afraid. Yukari, who wasn’t about to let Gensoukyou’s border be so easily destroyed with the death of the last member of the Hakurei clan, extended a hand and offered calming words. After Reimu had gotten used to her presence, Yukari explained that she was going to have to look after her from now on, and that it was important for Reimu to continue her family’s traditions. It took a while, but she gradually warmed up to Yukari, coming to see her as a mentor of sorts. And it was true, Yukari taught her a great many things about how to use her power. When Reimu was about 15 years old or so, she was ready to properly begin her work as the Hakurei miko. Reimu went on many journeys in order to protect her home, taking her from places like Makai, to hell itself. The work of the Hakurei miko is never done, however taking up a large chunk of Reimu’s life. Still, she is obligated by a sense of family honor to carry out the task given to her.

Personality
Reimu is a very gruff, straightforward person. She is a little quick tempered, having grown somewhat irritated with the fact that something seems to go wrong in Gensoukyou every few weeks and wishes that things would stay fixed for once. Though, while she may seem like a somewhat angry person to those that she does not know well, she is actually rather laid back, preferring to spend her time relaxing at her shrine rather than going out and exterminating all the youkai. She believes heavily in the concept of balance and that both humans and youkai need to exist for Gensoukyou to prosper. As such, she treats everyone equally; human, youkai, strong, weak, it doesn’t matter to her. Most of the time, this is seen when she goes just as hard on someone like Cirno as she would on someone like Remilia, much to the dismay of the weaker youkai and fairies. However, Reimu is not cruel, and does not usually kill those that she defeats, as per spellcard rules. Instead, she just beats them until they either don’t get up to continue fighting, or run away. Either is fine with her as she would rather that the fight be finished as soon as possible. Sometimes, if she feels that the fight is dragging on far longer than it should, she seals whoever she may be fighting with a timed seal that wears off after just an hour or so, and by that time, Reimu has already moved on to deal with whatever she wanted to do at the time.

Power/Combat
Reimu is an extremely powerful individual, perhaps the most powerful of the humans in Gensoukyou. She tends to rely on a variety of typical miko forms of attack such as ofuda and ritual needles, both of which can be used for a variety of things depending on how they were prepared before hand, then invoking their power once Reimu is ready to use them. She also learned quite a bit from Yukari about how to control the power granted to her by her connection to the Hakurei Border. This power lets Reimu remove herself completely from Gensoukyou’s state of reality, but still be able to interact with it. Needless to say, this ability in itself makes Reimu extremely dangerous, as she cannot be touched while outside of reality.

Reimu has the ability to host various gods inside of her body in order to borrow some of their power. While she hasn't exactly mastered this, she is proficient enough to host the god that boosts her physical performance, allowing her to execute physical attacks that would probably be beyond the reach of a normal human. Finally, she has the ability to sense changes in auras around her and can even manifest certain auras to do various things. The use of this power is most notable in her spell card “Fantasy Seal”.

The Hakurei Orbs- The Hakurei orbs are the go-shintai of the Hakurei shrine, unbeknownst to Reimu. Since she does not know her god's name, she is unable to supply them with faith, causing the orbs to be much weaker than they would be normally. However, the orbs still retain the blessing of the Hakurei god, allowing for massive amounts of damage output in the form of spiritual-looking ofuda or needles.

Ofuda- As a shrine maiden, Reimu is skilled in the art of creating ofuda by creating a contract with a god on a slip of paper. Depending on the way she writes the ofuda, the effects can be very different. In the case of writing an ofuda to ask for the blessing of the Hakurei god, she simply writes her family name on it along with a short plea. It's amazing that this actually works, as one would generally have to know the name of a god before asking for their blessing.


 * Barrier Ofuda: This blessing creates a barrier that can block attacks as well as her target's paths of escape. Using more than one ofuda at a time strengthens the barrier.


 * Hakurei Homing Ofuda: An ofuda type that Reimu uses quite often, this type of ofuda tracks the energy released by magical beings, trying to home in on them before sealing away some of their power, at least temporarily.


 * Hakurei Sealing Ofuda "Youkai Buster": This type of ofuda works similarly to the homing ofuda, but trades the homing capability for more power. Getting hit with one of these will cause an explosion, sealing away both the opponent's magical power as well as draining their physical strength. Because youkai gain power from human fear, these ofuda block that energy from them, drastically weakening youkai hit by it until this effect wears off.


 * Scatter Ofuda: Another youkai damaging type of ofuda that splits into many smaller pieces before flying off. Each piece has a weaker sealing effect than a normal amulet, but there are many of them, so they are good for area suppression.

Persuasion Needles- These ritualistic needles can be infused with spiritual power in order to cause various effects on the target, their power stemming from forms of acupuncture. Since they are needles, they tend not to damage the target too much physically unless they hit in just the right place.


 * Mental effects: Taking hits from these needles has a strange effect on the mind of those that it hits; essentially, it causes them to lose the will to fight. The stronger the opponent's will, the more of these needles it will take.


 * Physical effects: These needles drain the physical strength from targets, often causing paralysis if they hit in the right places.


 * Spiritual effects: The spiritual charge of these needles disrupts the target's ability to use magic. If the target is powerful enough, more needles may be required to completely block off their power.

Yin-Yang Orbs- Similar in appearance to the Hakurei Orbs, these are created by condensing spiritual energy down into something about the size of a marble. Power can be poured into these orbs to make it grow and radiate a divine power that is damaging to youkai and those who use magic (e.g. Alice and Patchouli). Of her various trinkets, these are probably the most powerful aside from the Hakurei orbs themselves.

Spellcards
(To be written)

Major
- Yukari Yakumo: Yukari is the person that took over her training once her aunt died and one of Reimu’s first actual friends. Yukari is also the reason that Reimu doesn’t outright hate youkai, since Yukari demonstrated that not all youkai are “bad”. Still, Yukari tends to tease her which gets on Reimu’s nerves a little. - Marisa Kirisame: Reimu’s first human friend. They met while Reimu was trying to resolve an incident, though Reimu didn’t think much of her at first. However, Marisa started to show up more and more often and began to grow on Reimu a little. At least, enough for Reimu to tolerate her presence at the shrine instead of trying to drive her away. In general, she enjoys the magician’s presence, it’s nice to have a human around when most of one’s friends are youkai. -Suika Ibuki: Suika started hanging around the shrine after Reimu stopped her from causing an incident. This annoyed Reimu, but she couldn’t get rid of the oni due to her huge amount of power. Begrudgingly, Reimu allowed her to stay. But after time, Reimu softened towards her a little, probably after copious amounts of sake.

-Alice Margatroid: Reimu has never really minded Alice, but due to the increasing occurrence of their interaction, they may have become a little more used to each other. To be honest, even though the magician is a little irritable, she's useful to have around, it seems.

Minor
-The residents of Gensoukyou: Reimu has met just about every notable person in Gensoukyou, although she doesn’t necessarily remember all of them, especially the ones that she met when she was younger. Unless you talk to Reimu on a semi-regular basis, it’s probably safe to assume that she doesn’t remember you.