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hiddenbygods
Jun. 8th, 2012 08:50 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
reconstructschaosMun
Name/Nickname: Bird
Age: 20
Dreamwidth Username:inkedfeathers
Contact: monstercharmant on plurk
Current Characters in Game: N/A
Do You Need A Invite Code?: ~~~~NOPE~~~~!
Character
Character Name: Victorique de Blois
Canon: GOSICK (anime)
Age: 15
Appearance: Beautiful and cute, like a life-sized bisque doll, but a bit eerie... also, only about five feet tall. ^^;
Canon Point: Episode 21: The Bells of Christmas Eve Toll at the Heels of Time
History: Victorique was born to the Marquis de Blois and his mistress Cordelia Gallo on December 25, 1910 in the Kingdom of Saubure. It is said that after the Marquis Albert de Blois discovered that Cordelia Gallo was suspected of murder and that that was the reason for her banishment from her home village of Grey Wolves, he broke off their relationship and kept the child hidden from the world.
The truth of the matter was that Albert de Blois had abducted Cordelia Gallo and forcibly impregnated her to produce an heir with the unique bloodline of the Grey Wolves which gave them their distinct appearance (small-bodied, pale, blonde, and green-eyed, similar in appearance to the green-eyed pale-furred wolves that surround their ancestral home) as well as super-human intelligence.
Cordelia's suspicion of murder was used as a pretext to cover up Albert's actions and gave him reason to send Cordelia away to an insane asylum (no better than a death sentence in that era) and confine their daughter to a cold and dark tower, just as he had done with her mother for the year leading up to Victorique's birth.
Victorique was raised without love and very little human contact, treated less like a daughter and more like a mine to be harvested, owing to her great intellect. Her older, legitimate brother Grevil de Blois is a police inspector, most likely due to his father's standing as an aristocrat and head of the royal Ministry of The Occult, but his intelligence is average at best. Victorique cracks his most difficult cases from the shadows, spoon-feeding him her deductions, and he takes all the credit and receives puff pieces in the papers.
When her mother came to visit her daughter for the first time, many years after her birth, she was horrified to see that Victorique lived in the same horrible conditions she herself had suffered under. The girl was thin and barely able to cry. She gifted Victorique with a pendant with her picture in it, as proof of their bond as mother and child. She promised that no matter where Victorique was, even if she could not cry out, as long as she had this with her, her mother would come to her rescue.
Years later, at the age of 14, Victorique was enrolled in the Saint Margeurite Academy, which was used as a secret armoury by the Kingdom of Saubure in the past. Once again, she was confined, not allowed to step foot outside of the campus without permission from either her father (who almost never gave it) or her older brother (who was somewhat more sympathetic). She skipped most of her classes, spending her days at the very top of the library's tower, eating sweets, reading multiple books, and further sharpening her mind even further.
The other students feared her and nicknamed her The Golden Fairy of the Library, after a popular spooky story about a fairy of infinite intelligence who would seemingly guide those who were lost, only to devour their souls as payment.
Due to her minimal contact with humans, she hid away whenever anyone else went up there, but she decided to stay out of some curiousity when the Japanese exchange student Kujou Kazuya climbed up the stairs.
An outcast much like herself, she took to befriending Kujou who had unfortunately received the nickname of the Black Reaper (based on the popular ghost story The Reaper Who Comes in Springtime) thanks to his unusual features of black hair and black eyes, in her own manner, although it began merely as a way to fend off boredom. She called him instead by the name Springtime Reaper and informed him that he was late... that he will come here again, at noon, tomorrow. That is what her Wellspring of Wisdom has told her. Kujou runs away in fear, claiming that a doll had told him his fortune.
After witnessing her elder brother taking credit for the induction Kujou watched her give him from her tower, in a very roundabout way (with Grevil pretending to speak to Kujou so he wouldn't have to face his sister), Kujou was infuriated. He decided that Victorique had the right to enjoy at least part of the reward, so Grevil de Blois invited him (and his sister by association) onto the yacht he was given as a gift for solving the mystery of the murder of Madame Roxanne. Victorique had rarely ventured into the outside world before meeting Kujou, so when her brother gave them permission to come board the yacht, Victorique started pointing at everything outside in excited wonder, enthralled by the simplest of sights, like newspaper stands and showed remarkable ignorance of everyday things (when Kujou called out to hire a carriage to their destination, Victorique wondered if this was sorcery or if the man was a servant of his).
Aboard the yacht, Victorique discovered an envelope addressed to Madame Roxanne, an invitation to the Miniature Garden Box Evening... and so they stumbled upon another mystery, aboard a ship built to be an exact replica of one with a bloody history that had sunk years ago.
Initially, Victorique treated Kujou more like a servant and a plaything, a source of amusement and relief from her boredom, rather than a friend but gradually grew to care deeply for him, even though she was still haughty and prideful. If she is Sherlock Holmes, he is her Watson. He collects clues to report back to her (she calls them "fragments of Chaos") and makes innocent observations that aid her in her inductions ("reconstruction of the fragments of Chaos"), with the help of her natural abilities ("her Wellspring of Wisdom").
Even when she was a safe distance away from Ned Baxter when he appeared to be dead on the replica Queen Berry (he was one of the guests there) and she realized he was faking his death and not to be trusted, she still pretended to be scared so that the unwitting Kujou would be forced to stand by her side... in order to keep him away from the potentially dangerous man, even though it hurt her precious pride.
One by one, passengers aboard the ship were killed by hidden traps, until one went mad and tried to kill the others, just like the Hares on the real Queen Berry.
Victorique later revealed Ned as as the "Hunting Dog" used to spur the children (the "Hares") aboard the real Queen Berry into suspecting one another of being his killer (he played dead then too, to rouse their suspicions) and prompted them to kill one another... and so, she solved one part of the mystery. Ned then decided to kill them to silence them, but Kujou led Victorique to the radio room so she could send a distress signal, while he fended off the much older man.
Victorique cried out, not wanting him to go out and fight him, forcing him to promise that they would go back together.
In the end, Kujou managed to win the fight against Ned and they were rescued. The authorities apprehended the one responsible for recreating the ship from years ago, who turned out to be one of the surviving Hares from the real Queen Berry; she was protecting Kujou and Victorique from Ned, because the only people she wanted to kill were the men responsible for the victimized childrens' deaths years ago. Victorique explained that she recognized her as the culprit because she lied to them on the ship, claiming to be a rich woman, despite walking shortly before stopping and turning, the habit of someone who had spent much of their days in small, cramped spaces, not large mansions. She also revealed that she had a gun hidden in her bag from the start.
When the culprit was taken away to be punished, she crossed paths with her friend, the maid responsible for the death of Madame Roxanne, and returned to her the pendant she gifted her with on the ship years ago.
Madame Roxanne was a fortune teller who set loose hares and had a hunting dog chase and devour them, basing her predictions on which hares survived... the children, all of different nationalities, were the hares. The ones who survived predicted the countries who would be victorious in the then-upcoming Great War. Madame Roxanne was meant to board the replica Queen Berry and attend Miniature Garden Box Evening to be killed by the culprit, because she was responsible for the childrens' deaths, but had already been murdered in the previous case.
In this manner, many of the mysteries Kujou and Victorique solved together were connected, relating to the Kingdom of Saubure's past, the Great War, and the upcoming war...
However, in a stark contrast to the way she solves cases for Kujou's sake without asking for payment now (apart from her usual pestering for either more mysteries or sweets), she demands things of Grevil. When she was still locked up in her tower and Grevil was desperate to prove the innocence of the girl he adored, citing love as his reason, Victorique could not understand the meaning of the word. He later tells her that an ordinary human being would have asked for him to stop loving her as payment, if they truly wished to see him suffer. But Victorique, a Grey Wolf, could not understand such a simple thing... so she demanded that he wear his hair in a ridiculous pompadour as payment, because pride was all she held dear.
Because she solves crimes for Kujou without asking for payment, Grevil is astonished and decides it's too invaluable a skill not to use him as a way to get Victorique to solve mysteries without asking for heavy prices.
She breaks down in tears when Grevil reminds her of that incident from her youth, claiming that she has changed... that she does understand love now, but he still thinks of her as a being incapable of love.
After Kujou read a classified ad in a newspaper calling all descendants of the Grey Wolves to celebrate the Summer Festival in their ancestral home, he decided to bring it up to Victorique as something that might stave off her boredom. He did not expect her to become so interested in it as to sneak away from the Academy the very same night to take a train there. When he followed her, it was revealed that her mother, Cordelia, had been banished fifteen years ago for murdering the previous Village Elder Theodore.
With his help, Victorique manages to solve the mystery and absolve Cordelia of her sin by revealing the real culprit.
While in the village, Kujou takes part in a ceremony where children ask the village elder questions and he responds with the answers conveyed to him by the spirits of their ancestors. The question he asked was whether or not he and Victorique would be together forever...
The elder delivered a prophecy: "you will not die together. Years from now, this world will be shaken by a strong gale. Your bodies are light. The gale will surely separate you both. But fear not! Your hearts will never be apart."
Victorique also asked the elder a question, although she lied to Kujou about the reason for her tears and claimed she only asked if she would grow taller. The truth was that they both asked the same question and received the same prophecy in answer.
After Victorique solves the mystery, the real culprit also goes mad and plans to burn down the entire village. Once again, Kujou protects Victorique, but falls off when the only bridge connecting the Village of Grey Wolves to the outside world is burned down and broken. Victorique holds onto his hand, trying to pull him up, even as he loses consciousness and she loses her mother's precious pendant in her struggle. He wakes up and reaffirms that now is not the time in which they will part and she pulls him up to safety. They return to the Academy together.
Victorique gains a romantic rival and a second friend (well... eventually) in Avril Bradley, an exchange student from England. They do not get along at first, because Avril was already developing feelings for Kujou when she meets her, so she decides to tease Victorique by calling her a monster and wolf-human hybrid. She later apologizes, but Victorique has settled on derisively nicknaming her the Farting Newt. Although Victorique is initially jealous of Avril for spending time with Kujou and even breaks down in tears after haughtily rejecting an offer to spend time with them together because she didn't expect Kujou to really leave her behind, she later realizes Kujou is not interested in being anything more than a friend to Avril.
Later, Victorique discovers an old book by a famed, masked alchemist known as Leviathan who served the previous king. The author arrogantly poses a challenge the reader, which Victorique takes very personally. She also hates the book for its tasteless design (a pop-up memoir? Really?) and when Kujou tells her about the rumours around school of an alchemist and the movie based on those rumours, she decides to solve the mystery, uncover his identity, and the secret behind his false alchemy.
She finds the lost gold that Leviathan hid, proves that his alchemy was a farce, and finds his final resting place, as well as revealing his true identity as an African man and the only survivor of the workers that had been brought over to the Kingdom years ago to transport the royal gold before being killed and thrown into a mass burial to forever keep the gold's location secret.
She claims she knew this much because she was the same as Leviathan, meant as a tool for the storm. He used his knowledge of the gold's location to create the illusion of creating gold from nothing, gain a high standing, and influence the kingdom's politics to protect his home country from further oppression. In addition, his book mentioned his encounter with Albert de Blois, shortly before Leviathan's own demise, where the former demanded an army of homonculi to prepare for the second storm. Leviathan's advice for the man who sought power was to reproduce with a woman of a rare and powerful bloodline... so Victorique learned of the reason behind her birth.
Her father decided she had been out and about too often lately, reprimanded her brother, and sent her away to a convent on Beelzebub's Skull, as bait for her mother and Brian Roscoe. With the help of Victorique's mother, Kujou travels to where Victorique is held and saves her.
Cordelia gives Kujou a ring to deliver to her daughter, telling him to pass it on to her (perhaps to replace the pendant she lost for Kujou's sake) and tell her that her that "maman still loves her adorable little girl, just as she always did." She also tells him to encourage her daughter to show her survival instinct.
Victorique's father had rigged the convent to flood, but Kujou manages to outrun the water and jump into the back of a train while carrying Victorique, promising to always protect her. Aboard the train, they become the unwilling participants in yet another bloody contest... the prize? The Box of Spirit. The Box of Spirit is a tradition of the Grey Wolves, carrying several items that serve as proof of a Grey Wolf's heritage. This particular Box of Spirit belongs to a man of high standing in Saubure and could tip the balance of power in the kingdom. Kujou and Victorique survive, secure the box, and return it to its rightful owner, Jupiter Roget, head of the Ministry of Science. This is interesting because the Grey Wolves are mystics and supernatural by nature, proving again that hypocrisy of the two Ministries. Victorique returns the box to him, but she returns it incompletely, keeping the one part of it that reveals his birthplace as her trump card for the second storm.
Later, Victorique's father takes her away from the Academy yet again. She tries to cut off ties with Kujou to keep him from getting involved, but Kujou is too stubborn. Her father, not understanding how she works, tries to force her to solve the mystery of the late Queen Coco Rose's death, while keeping her bound with ropes and surrounding her with candle lights and the strong scent of incense. She knows they're meant to sharpen her senses with them, but laughs at his methods, because even though he is the head of the Ministry of the Occult, his methods were still based on the same scientific principles that Leviathan's false alchemy did.
Kujou, with the help of Brian Roscoe (Cordelia Gallo's friend and fellow exile from the Village of Grey Wolves), gathered clues and broke into the place Victorique was bound, rescued her and gave her what she needed to solve the mystery.
Victorique used half-truths to close the case, suggesting that the real Queen Coco Rose, contrary to the popularly romanticized story, had not been in love with the king and instead loved the masked alchemist Leviathan. The reason the queen seemed like an entirely different person, cheerful and happy, when she was moved to the country side away from the palace was because she actually was a different person. A nearly identical double was hired to pose as the queen to hide the fact that he had killed the real Queen Coco Rose in a fit of anger when he found her with her newborn mullato child.
This was only part of the story, but Victorique kept the rest secret. On the carriage she rode back to the academy with Kujou, after closing the case, they met the real Coco Rose and her grown-up son.
The truth was that there was a third Coco Rose. Unbeknownst to the king, a trusted friend from Coco Rose's home country came to work as a maid in the palace and, because she resembled Coco Rose, switched places with the Queen just before the king entered and found her with the baby.
In short, the maid was killed by the king who believed her to be the queen, the double was hired to act as Coco Rose to cover up the queen's supposed death, and then the double was killed to hide the secret. The real Coco Rose lived a quiet, peasant's life with her son.
When they arrived at the academy, Kujou muses that since they were back at the academy, Victorique would likely be bored. She agrees that she would certainly be bored, but admits regretfully that boredom was better than putting Kujou in danger.
He smiles at her and they hold hands as they return to the quiet days of books.
AU History: N/A
Personality: Victorique is, at first glance, a contradictory, unsocial person. Her diminutive height and childlike features are at odds with her very mature voice, penchant for pipe tobacco, and her perpetually bored, unphased expression. She is often quiet, but prone to angry outbursts due to her impatience, cynical, oftentimes dramatic, and she is just as likely to be acid-tongued.
She looks much younger than the average fifteen year old thanks to her bloodline, physically closer to a ten year old, but behaves much older than she is. She is old-fashioned, even for her time period, both in her behaviour and her way of dress (it's the roaring twenties! Have a girl decked out in hand-me-downs from the Victorian era). Her manner of speaking is very refined and suitably old-fashioned, while simultaneously blunt and rude, particularly when she's annoyed.
Although her bloodline also makes her naturally inclined to developing great intellect, Victorique occasionally acts childish, calling Kujou names and kicking him when she's angry, rolling around the floor repetitively when she's bored, and pouting when she doesn't get to have her way. Sometimes, she throws tantrums or acts rashly, like when she reacted to Avril's name-calling and hair-pulling by lifting her desk over her head with the intent of throwing it on Avril. Victorique is also very fond of sweets, especially macaroons.
Like the stereotypical image of Sherlock Holmes, she has a habit of smoking a pipe, particularly when she is about to deliver her induction, usually prefaced by announcing that she will "reconstruct the fragments of Chaos with [her] Wellspring of Wisdom." She can be rather dramatic sometimes, which can make her harder to take seriously sometimes, such as when she predicts that Kujou will be the one who will fend off her boredom and that he will visit her again... it's probably a self-fulfilling prophecy, because she said to him, but it's also suggestive of the fact that Grey Wolves develop the ability to effectively predict the future to a certain extent as they grow older.
Her method of induction is similar to Sherlock Holmes as well. For example, when Kujou recounts the theft of a nun's plate that happened earlier that morning, when Avril was admiring a music box that suddenly exploded, scattering smoke, the nun shouted, and the crowd was distracted by the sudden flight of a flock of pigeons throug the smoke, Victorique decides that the case is a bore, because the only possible culprit is the nun herself. Proper nuns do not set spread-legged like men, this nun sat spread-legged, therefore, she was not only not a proper nun, but she was hiding the cage of pigeons under her skirt, as well as the plate. The music box was set to explode when someone tried to crank it, she opened the cage under her skirt to release the pigeons into the resulting smoke and used the distraction she created to slip the plate under her.
Due to her upbringing, she's not very sociable, preferring to hide whenever someone she doesn't know goes up to her part of the library. She prefers reading books by herself to attending class with her peers. She hides so often that she's become something of a myth at the academy and one thief even tries to convince Kujou that he's such a lonely, friendless person that he made her up and that the Golden Fairy has no existence outside of being a figment of his imagination.
When Victorique realized Kujou was in trouble, she overcame her fear in order to assault the thief by throwing books from the top of the staircase and keep her from harming Kujou.
Conversely, when her older brother's long time crush Jacqueline climbs up to the top of the library, Victorique sits stiffly, shivering and sweating with anticipation, singing to herself in a vain attempt to convince herself that just because Kujou isn't around, doesn't mean it has to be scary...
When Jacqueline spots her, Victorique does not move an inch, convincing the former that she's a life-sized bisque doll. When Jacqueline picks her up and hugs her, commenting that she's so warm, she'd almost swear she was alive, Victorique recovers from her momentary shock and informs her "although it is regrettable, I am indeed alive."
This is shown only subtly in the anime, as in the previous example of her meeting Jacqueline, but is shown in more detail in the original light novels: Victorique's way of thinking switches from a more structured and restrained "human" manner and a more feral way ruled by instinct. This accounts for her survival instinct and some of her stranger mannerisms, especially when she's provoked, like the way she bares her teeth, lashes out at others, or crawls into small and cramped places to hide.
As far as solving cases, stating her conclusions, and questioning witnesses and suspects, she is much more skilled at that, even though she is still blunt and has her strange moments (for example, when someone says something that she deems ridiculous or impossible, she tends to assume they're joking, and so offers a very stilted and bizzare polite laughter to humour them). She only seems to have a great deal of difficulty with connecting with people on a more personal level, although she's losing that fear of other people thanks to spending so much time with Kujou and Avril.
Victorique adores her mother, even though they were separated very shortly after she was born and did not see eachother again until about ten years had passed since then. Still, her relationship with her mother is the closest to a normal familial relationship she has.
Her relationship with her brother is strained, but far better than her relationship with her father. For most of the series, he never looks her in the eye or addresses her personally, using Kujou as a sort of medium to communicate with her. Although he also holds seems to hold a distaste for Cordelia Gallo and Grey Wolves in general, Grevil gives Victorique permission to leave with Kujou more often than his father would like. He even argues with his father when he thinks the latter has done too much to Victorique (namely, bidning her with ropes, overwhelming her senses by surrounding her with dim candle lights, rhythmic chiming of bells, and the strong scent of incense) in trying to force her to use her abilities.
Her relationship with Kujou develops from that of a master and servant, to mutual friendship, then love.
Abilities: Victorique de Blois has almost all of the traits and abilities the Grey Wolves are famous for: she has superhuman intellect (her "wellspring of wisdom") that allows her to crack even the most difficult of cases, as well as a budding ability to predict the near future, although it's less "predicting the future" in the magical sense and more like "anticipating the most probable events based on current evidence with high accuracy." Although she won't display the second skill until she's older, during the Second Great War, she does predict Kujou's arrival to the top of the library, informing him that he was chosen as the sole fragment of chaos with which to vanquish her boredom, likely because of their similarly ostracized natures. Appearance-wise, she has the same pale skin, blonde hair, and emerald green eyes of the Grey Wolves... in addition to their small stature and relatively weak bodies.
This is compounded, however, from the long period of time she has spent trapped in a tower, unable to interact with the outside world. She can barely run without falling on her face and the slightest bit of pain is unbearable to her and brings her to tears. She reacts quite badly early on to Kujou playfully flicking her forehead, for example, crying, rubbing at her forehead, and demanding that he never speak to her again ("I never thought you were that kind of man!"). When she saves Kujou's life in the Village of the Grey Wolves, holding him up until he can climb to safety, her hands are red and badly bruised for days after the event, although she hides them from him after that so he won't see how it hurt her to save him.
She also falls sick a bit easily, likely because of how little she interacts with the outside world, catching a cold at least twice in the series; once, because she fell asleep dressed too lightly in an untied kimono (that she was too arrogant to accept Kujou's directions in wearing) and the second time because her loving father dumped her in a sack, dressed only in her very light nightwear, on a cold, stone floor and locked her up in cell on Beelzebub's Skull.
Again, likely due to her very (literally) sheltered upbringing, she can't stand the heat of summer sunlight without her parasol, although she stubbornly tries to stay out in it, when everyone aside from her left campus grounds for summer break, to feel like she's enjoying a summer vacation. She doesn't really enjoy it, sweats profusely, and looks horribly uncomfortable until Kujou returns and shades her with the parasol she couldn't open.
When her mother tells her to crack the code and display her survival instinct, she manages to shoot a bomb on a faraway bridge while leaning out from the back of a train with a pistol that only has one round left in it. All without ever shooting a gun before, although she was familiar with the way guns work in theory. Kujou supported her to make sure the recoil wouldn't send her flying, but otherwise, she did it by herself. Victorique also manages to settle for a decision that would crack the code, ensure her survival, while also being kind. Instead of withholding the Box of Spirit that would surely have a great effect on the balance of power between the Academy of Science and Ministry of the Occult, she takes the most crucial piece of evidence, hides it away, and hands over the box itself and the rest of its contents to the boy who was only retrieving it because his younger sister was held ransom for it.
So, Victorique is clever and capable of pulling off some unexpectedly (even to her) great things in a pinch, but as a whole, not very strong physically and especially prone to pain and illness. Because her mind works at a faste pace than most humans, her genius is easily misunderstood for childish nonsense; for example, she tries to bring a great deal of luggage for their trip aboard the Queen Berry, but Kujou forces her to leave it all behind, thinking she had brought far too much ( why would she bring food? A chair? A doll, a compass, and snacks? This is too much! ). He pays for it by being left, standing beside her while she sits at dinner using Madame Roxanne's invitation, and he has nothing to eat and nowhere to sit. She does reward him, sarcastically, for his quibbling with a bread roll that she jams into his mouth. Later, it takes them some time to figure out where they are, leading to rather simple tricks deceiving everyone, because somebody forced Victorique to leave behind the compass and the rest of her luggage that her "wellspring of wisdom" dictated was the "bare minimum" of what they'll need...
Payment to Yubaba
Memory: 1. Her few, precious memories of her mother.
2. Kujou's name and appearance.
3. The lyrics to La Vie an Rose, which her mother sang.
4. The reason for her birth, which she discovered by reading Leviathan's pop-up memoir.
5. How to light a pipe.
6. How to read— or rather, just the French letters... in addition to any kanji/kana she might know from arrival? (This should force her to communicate with others to stave off her boredom, if the other losses make her too unsociable!)
7. What her favourite sweet is (macaroons are tied to her mother, so they might mean something special to Victorique... and considering how important sweets really are to her, being one of the few things she enjoys in real life, I think it could fit ^^;;).
8. Avril Bradley, her somewhat friendly romantic rival.
9. All her good memories of her older brother Grevil de Blois.
10. Memories of Professeur Cecile Lafitte; she is well-meaning and trustworthy, even if she is rather hopelessly naive and oblivious.
New Name: Weeell, you could call her Grey Wolf/Hai-iro Okami or Monstre Charmant. Or give her something else entirely! That could be exciting and I'm not picky. ^^;
Samples
First Person: This dear_mun thread is a bit silly, but I think it shows her voice nicely.
Third Person: A very petite blonde girl stood at the water's edge, frowning deeply with her brows knitting, green eyes staring defiantly at the murky water at the base of the otherwise empty tub. Such filth. She bites her lip and tries to tie up the strange and difficult-to-wear garment, drawing it up so it won't get wet. She missed her frills and lace.
She took a deep breath and then poured in some soapy water and began to scrub and scrub and scrub. She scrubbed until her hands turned red and raw, the bones of her knuckles poking chalk white through her skin.
She had not finished more than one third of her work before her shoulders sagged and her arms shook weakly underneath her. She fells face-first into the water and whimpered in pain. Pathetic.
She had never worked like this before, had she? Expending this much effort and pushing her body like this was so far out of her realm of experience that she felt hopeless.
The water, once warm, then felt as cold and desolate as the stone tower's floors. The soap-scented air tasted of despair.
When her tear-clouded eyes closed, her stillness allowed her to forget the water. She only felt the cold and it was no different from then.
Was she going to give up and die now? Would she die a death as meaningless as the life she lived?
Her cynicism decreed that there could not have been a more fitting an end for her pathetic existence. In spite of this, she remembered her few joyful days outside of the cage her father had chosen for her. Those days brought light and warmth to her life in cold darkness. Her stagnant heart dared to hope once again...
It was not going to end so easily.
She raised her head, her eyes snapping open and her numb fingers clawing the water as she closed them into fists.
There was still a case to solve. While it was doubtlessly true that this was her most difficult case yet, that should only serve to encourage her further! Solving puzzles was her favourite pastime, after all. She decided she had to get to the bottom of this, even if it meant pushing herself in a way she had never done before; her memories might be gone, but her wellspring of wisdom remained unadulterated.
A Grey Wolf's survival did not hinge on the integrity of her memories, but on her instincts and intellect!
She rose proudly, with her shoulders back and head held high, ignoring her half-soaked kimono and dripping wet hair.
... even if it meant that the Grey Wolf might have to forsake her lofty pride, however briefly, for the sake of survival.
Her cheeks reddened to a shade approaching that of her now mercifully unfeeling hands and she took a deep breath before quickly resuming the action of srubbing the rest of the tub's walls clean.
Name/Nickname: Bird
Age: 20
Dreamwidth Username:
inkedfeathersContact: monstercharmant on plurk
Current Characters in Game: N/A
Do You Need A Invite Code?: ~~~~NOPE~~~~!
Character
Character Name: Victorique de Blois
Canon: GOSICK (anime)
Age: 15
Appearance: Beautiful and cute, like a life-sized bisque doll, but a bit eerie... also, only about five feet tall. ^^;
Canon Point: Episode 21: The Bells of Christmas Eve Toll at the Heels of Time
History: Victorique was born to the Marquis de Blois and his mistress Cordelia Gallo on December 25, 1910 in the Kingdom of Saubure. It is said that after the Marquis Albert de Blois discovered that Cordelia Gallo was suspected of murder and that that was the reason for her banishment from her home village of Grey Wolves, he broke off their relationship and kept the child hidden from the world.
The truth of the matter was that Albert de Blois had abducted Cordelia Gallo and forcibly impregnated her to produce an heir with the unique bloodline of the Grey Wolves which gave them their distinct appearance (small-bodied, pale, blonde, and green-eyed, similar in appearance to the green-eyed pale-furred wolves that surround their ancestral home) as well as super-human intelligence.
Cordelia's suspicion of murder was used as a pretext to cover up Albert's actions and gave him reason to send Cordelia away to an insane asylum (no better than a death sentence in that era) and confine their daughter to a cold and dark tower, just as he had done with her mother for the year leading up to Victorique's birth.
Victorique was raised without love and very little human contact, treated less like a daughter and more like a mine to be harvested, owing to her great intellect. Her older, legitimate brother Grevil de Blois is a police inspector, most likely due to his father's standing as an aristocrat and head of the royal Ministry of The Occult, but his intelligence is average at best. Victorique cracks his most difficult cases from the shadows, spoon-feeding him her deductions, and he takes all the credit and receives puff pieces in the papers.
When her mother came to visit her daughter for the first time, many years after her birth, she was horrified to see that Victorique lived in the same horrible conditions she herself had suffered under. The girl was thin and barely able to cry. She gifted Victorique with a pendant with her picture in it, as proof of their bond as mother and child. She promised that no matter where Victorique was, even if she could not cry out, as long as she had this with her, her mother would come to her rescue.
Years later, at the age of 14, Victorique was enrolled in the Saint Margeurite Academy, which was used as a secret armoury by the Kingdom of Saubure in the past. Once again, she was confined, not allowed to step foot outside of the campus without permission from either her father (who almost never gave it) or her older brother (who was somewhat more sympathetic). She skipped most of her classes, spending her days at the very top of the library's tower, eating sweets, reading multiple books, and further sharpening her mind even further.
The other students feared her and nicknamed her The Golden Fairy of the Library, after a popular spooky story about a fairy of infinite intelligence who would seemingly guide those who were lost, only to devour their souls as payment.
Due to her minimal contact with humans, she hid away whenever anyone else went up there, but she decided to stay out of some curiousity when the Japanese exchange student Kujou Kazuya climbed up the stairs.
An outcast much like herself, she took to befriending Kujou who had unfortunately received the nickname of the Black Reaper (based on the popular ghost story The Reaper Who Comes in Springtime) thanks to his unusual features of black hair and black eyes, in her own manner, although it began merely as a way to fend off boredom. She called him instead by the name Springtime Reaper and informed him that he was late... that he will come here again, at noon, tomorrow. That is what her Wellspring of Wisdom has told her. Kujou runs away in fear, claiming that a doll had told him his fortune.
After witnessing her elder brother taking credit for the induction Kujou watched her give him from her tower, in a very roundabout way (with Grevil pretending to speak to Kujou so he wouldn't have to face his sister), Kujou was infuriated. He decided that Victorique had the right to enjoy at least part of the reward, so Grevil de Blois invited him (and his sister by association) onto the yacht he was given as a gift for solving the mystery of the murder of Madame Roxanne. Victorique had rarely ventured into the outside world before meeting Kujou, so when her brother gave them permission to come board the yacht, Victorique started pointing at everything outside in excited wonder, enthralled by the simplest of sights, like newspaper stands and showed remarkable ignorance of everyday things (when Kujou called out to hire a carriage to their destination, Victorique wondered if this was sorcery or if the man was a servant of his).
Aboard the yacht, Victorique discovered an envelope addressed to Madame Roxanne, an invitation to the Miniature Garden Box Evening... and so they stumbled upon another mystery, aboard a ship built to be an exact replica of one with a bloody history that had sunk years ago.
Initially, Victorique treated Kujou more like a servant and a plaything, a source of amusement and relief from her boredom, rather than a friend but gradually grew to care deeply for him, even though she was still haughty and prideful. If she is Sherlock Holmes, he is her Watson. He collects clues to report back to her (she calls them "fragments of Chaos") and makes innocent observations that aid her in her inductions ("reconstruction of the fragments of Chaos"), with the help of her natural abilities ("her Wellspring of Wisdom").
Even when she was a safe distance away from Ned Baxter when he appeared to be dead on the replica Queen Berry (he was one of the guests there) and she realized he was faking his death and not to be trusted, she still pretended to be scared so that the unwitting Kujou would be forced to stand by her side... in order to keep him away from the potentially dangerous man, even though it hurt her precious pride.
One by one, passengers aboard the ship were killed by hidden traps, until one went mad and tried to kill the others, just like the Hares on the real Queen Berry.
Victorique later revealed Ned as as the "Hunting Dog" used to spur the children (the "Hares") aboard the real Queen Berry into suspecting one another of being his killer (he played dead then too, to rouse their suspicions) and prompted them to kill one another... and so, she solved one part of the mystery. Ned then decided to kill them to silence them, but Kujou led Victorique to the radio room so she could send a distress signal, while he fended off the much older man.
Victorique cried out, not wanting him to go out and fight him, forcing him to promise that they would go back together.
In the end, Kujou managed to win the fight against Ned and they were rescued. The authorities apprehended the one responsible for recreating the ship from years ago, who turned out to be one of the surviving Hares from the real Queen Berry; she was protecting Kujou and Victorique from Ned, because the only people she wanted to kill were the men responsible for the victimized childrens' deaths years ago. Victorique explained that she recognized her as the culprit because she lied to them on the ship, claiming to be a rich woman, despite walking shortly before stopping and turning, the habit of someone who had spent much of their days in small, cramped spaces, not large mansions. She also revealed that she had a gun hidden in her bag from the start.
When the culprit was taken away to be punished, she crossed paths with her friend, the maid responsible for the death of Madame Roxanne, and returned to her the pendant she gifted her with on the ship years ago.
Madame Roxanne was a fortune teller who set loose hares and had a hunting dog chase and devour them, basing her predictions on which hares survived... the children, all of different nationalities, were the hares. The ones who survived predicted the countries who would be victorious in the then-upcoming Great War. Madame Roxanne was meant to board the replica Queen Berry and attend Miniature Garden Box Evening to be killed by the culprit, because she was responsible for the childrens' deaths, but had already been murdered in the previous case.
In this manner, many of the mysteries Kujou and Victorique solved together were connected, relating to the Kingdom of Saubure's past, the Great War, and the upcoming war...
However, in a stark contrast to the way she solves cases for Kujou's sake without asking for payment now (apart from her usual pestering for either more mysteries or sweets), she demands things of Grevil. When she was still locked up in her tower and Grevil was desperate to prove the innocence of the girl he adored, citing love as his reason, Victorique could not understand the meaning of the word. He later tells her that an ordinary human being would have asked for him to stop loving her as payment, if they truly wished to see him suffer. But Victorique, a Grey Wolf, could not understand such a simple thing... so she demanded that he wear his hair in a ridiculous pompadour as payment, because pride was all she held dear.
Because she solves crimes for Kujou without asking for payment, Grevil is astonished and decides it's too invaluable a skill not to use him as a way to get Victorique to solve mysteries without asking for heavy prices.
She breaks down in tears when Grevil reminds her of that incident from her youth, claiming that she has changed... that she does understand love now, but he still thinks of her as a being incapable of love.
After Kujou read a classified ad in a newspaper calling all descendants of the Grey Wolves to celebrate the Summer Festival in their ancestral home, he decided to bring it up to Victorique as something that might stave off her boredom. He did not expect her to become so interested in it as to sneak away from the Academy the very same night to take a train there. When he followed her, it was revealed that her mother, Cordelia, had been banished fifteen years ago for murdering the previous Village Elder Theodore.
With his help, Victorique manages to solve the mystery and absolve Cordelia of her sin by revealing the real culprit.
While in the village, Kujou takes part in a ceremony where children ask the village elder questions and he responds with the answers conveyed to him by the spirits of their ancestors. The question he asked was whether or not he and Victorique would be together forever...
The elder delivered a prophecy: "you will not die together. Years from now, this world will be shaken by a strong gale. Your bodies are light. The gale will surely separate you both. But fear not! Your hearts will never be apart."
Victorique also asked the elder a question, although she lied to Kujou about the reason for her tears and claimed she only asked if she would grow taller. The truth was that they both asked the same question and received the same prophecy in answer.
After Victorique solves the mystery, the real culprit also goes mad and plans to burn down the entire village. Once again, Kujou protects Victorique, but falls off when the only bridge connecting the Village of Grey Wolves to the outside world is burned down and broken. Victorique holds onto his hand, trying to pull him up, even as he loses consciousness and she loses her mother's precious pendant in her struggle. He wakes up and reaffirms that now is not the time in which they will part and she pulls him up to safety. They return to the Academy together.
Victorique gains a romantic rival and a second friend (well... eventually) in Avril Bradley, an exchange student from England. They do not get along at first, because Avril was already developing feelings for Kujou when she meets her, so she decides to tease Victorique by calling her a monster and wolf-human hybrid. She later apologizes, but Victorique has settled on derisively nicknaming her the Farting Newt. Although Victorique is initially jealous of Avril for spending time with Kujou and even breaks down in tears after haughtily rejecting an offer to spend time with them together because she didn't expect Kujou to really leave her behind, she later realizes Kujou is not interested in being anything more than a friend to Avril.
Later, Victorique discovers an old book by a famed, masked alchemist known as Leviathan who served the previous king. The author arrogantly poses a challenge the reader, which Victorique takes very personally. She also hates the book for its tasteless design (a pop-up memoir? Really?) and when Kujou tells her about the rumours around school of an alchemist and the movie based on those rumours, she decides to solve the mystery, uncover his identity, and the secret behind his false alchemy.
She finds the lost gold that Leviathan hid, proves that his alchemy was a farce, and finds his final resting place, as well as revealing his true identity as an African man and the only survivor of the workers that had been brought over to the Kingdom years ago to transport the royal gold before being killed and thrown into a mass burial to forever keep the gold's location secret.
She claims she knew this much because she was the same as Leviathan, meant as a tool for the storm. He used his knowledge of the gold's location to create the illusion of creating gold from nothing, gain a high standing, and influence the kingdom's politics to protect his home country from further oppression. In addition, his book mentioned his encounter with Albert de Blois, shortly before Leviathan's own demise, where the former demanded an army of homonculi to prepare for the second storm. Leviathan's advice for the man who sought power was to reproduce with a woman of a rare and powerful bloodline... so Victorique learned of the reason behind her birth.
Her father decided she had been out and about too often lately, reprimanded her brother, and sent her away to a convent on Beelzebub's Skull, as bait for her mother and Brian Roscoe. With the help of Victorique's mother, Kujou travels to where Victorique is held and saves her.
Cordelia gives Kujou a ring to deliver to her daughter, telling him to pass it on to her (perhaps to replace the pendant she lost for Kujou's sake) and tell her that her that "maman still loves her adorable little girl, just as she always did." She also tells him to encourage her daughter to show her survival instinct.
Victorique's father had rigged the convent to flood, but Kujou manages to outrun the water and jump into the back of a train while carrying Victorique, promising to always protect her. Aboard the train, they become the unwilling participants in yet another bloody contest... the prize? The Box of Spirit. The Box of Spirit is a tradition of the Grey Wolves, carrying several items that serve as proof of a Grey Wolf's heritage. This particular Box of Spirit belongs to a man of high standing in Saubure and could tip the balance of power in the kingdom. Kujou and Victorique survive, secure the box, and return it to its rightful owner, Jupiter Roget, head of the Ministry of Science. This is interesting because the Grey Wolves are mystics and supernatural by nature, proving again that hypocrisy of the two Ministries. Victorique returns the box to him, but she returns it incompletely, keeping the one part of it that reveals his birthplace as her trump card for the second storm.
Later, Victorique's father takes her away from the Academy yet again. She tries to cut off ties with Kujou to keep him from getting involved, but Kujou is too stubborn. Her father, not understanding how she works, tries to force her to solve the mystery of the late Queen Coco Rose's death, while keeping her bound with ropes and surrounding her with candle lights and the strong scent of incense. She knows they're meant to sharpen her senses with them, but laughs at his methods, because even though he is the head of the Ministry of the Occult, his methods were still based on the same scientific principles that Leviathan's false alchemy did.
Kujou, with the help of Brian Roscoe (Cordelia Gallo's friend and fellow exile from the Village of Grey Wolves), gathered clues and broke into the place Victorique was bound, rescued her and gave her what she needed to solve the mystery.
Victorique used half-truths to close the case, suggesting that the real Queen Coco Rose, contrary to the popularly romanticized story, had not been in love with the king and instead loved the masked alchemist Leviathan. The reason the queen seemed like an entirely different person, cheerful and happy, when she was moved to the country side away from the palace was because she actually was a different person. A nearly identical double was hired to pose as the queen to hide the fact that he had killed the real Queen Coco Rose in a fit of anger when he found her with her newborn mullato child.
This was only part of the story, but Victorique kept the rest secret. On the carriage she rode back to the academy with Kujou, after closing the case, they met the real Coco Rose and her grown-up son.
The truth was that there was a third Coco Rose. Unbeknownst to the king, a trusted friend from Coco Rose's home country came to work as a maid in the palace and, because she resembled Coco Rose, switched places with the Queen just before the king entered and found her with the baby.
In short, the maid was killed by the king who believed her to be the queen, the double was hired to act as Coco Rose to cover up the queen's supposed death, and then the double was killed to hide the secret. The real Coco Rose lived a quiet, peasant's life with her son.
When they arrived at the academy, Kujou muses that since they were back at the academy, Victorique would likely be bored. She agrees that she would certainly be bored, but admits regretfully that boredom was better than putting Kujou in danger.
He smiles at her and they hold hands as they return to the quiet days of books.
AU History: N/A
Personality: Victorique is, at first glance, a contradictory, unsocial person. Her diminutive height and childlike features are at odds with her very mature voice, penchant for pipe tobacco, and her perpetually bored, unphased expression. She is often quiet, but prone to angry outbursts due to her impatience, cynical, oftentimes dramatic, and she is just as likely to be acid-tongued.
She looks much younger than the average fifteen year old thanks to her bloodline, physically closer to a ten year old, but behaves much older than she is. She is old-fashioned, even for her time period, both in her behaviour and her way of dress (it's the roaring twenties! Have a girl decked out in hand-me-downs from the Victorian era). Her manner of speaking is very refined and suitably old-fashioned, while simultaneously blunt and rude, particularly when she's annoyed.
Although her bloodline also makes her naturally inclined to developing great intellect, Victorique occasionally acts childish, calling Kujou names and kicking him when she's angry, rolling around the floor repetitively when she's bored, and pouting when she doesn't get to have her way. Sometimes, she throws tantrums or acts rashly, like when she reacted to Avril's name-calling and hair-pulling by lifting her desk over her head with the intent of throwing it on Avril. Victorique is also very fond of sweets, especially macaroons.
Like the stereotypical image of Sherlock Holmes, she has a habit of smoking a pipe, particularly when she is about to deliver her induction, usually prefaced by announcing that she will "reconstruct the fragments of Chaos with [her] Wellspring of Wisdom." She can be rather dramatic sometimes, which can make her harder to take seriously sometimes, such as when she predicts that Kujou will be the one who will fend off her boredom and that he will visit her again... it's probably a self-fulfilling prophecy, because she said to him, but it's also suggestive of the fact that Grey Wolves develop the ability to effectively predict the future to a certain extent as they grow older.
Her method of induction is similar to Sherlock Holmes as well. For example, when Kujou recounts the theft of a nun's plate that happened earlier that morning, when Avril was admiring a music box that suddenly exploded, scattering smoke, the nun shouted, and the crowd was distracted by the sudden flight of a flock of pigeons throug the smoke, Victorique decides that the case is a bore, because the only possible culprit is the nun herself. Proper nuns do not set spread-legged like men, this nun sat spread-legged, therefore, she was not only not a proper nun, but she was hiding the cage of pigeons under her skirt, as well as the plate. The music box was set to explode when someone tried to crank it, she opened the cage under her skirt to release the pigeons into the resulting smoke and used the distraction she created to slip the plate under her.
Due to her upbringing, she's not very sociable, preferring to hide whenever someone she doesn't know goes up to her part of the library. She prefers reading books by herself to attending class with her peers. She hides so often that she's become something of a myth at the academy and one thief even tries to convince Kujou that he's such a lonely, friendless person that he made her up and that the Golden Fairy has no existence outside of being a figment of his imagination.
When Victorique realized Kujou was in trouble, she overcame her fear in order to assault the thief by throwing books from the top of the staircase and keep her from harming Kujou.
Conversely, when her older brother's long time crush Jacqueline climbs up to the top of the library, Victorique sits stiffly, shivering and sweating with anticipation, singing to herself in a vain attempt to convince herself that just because Kujou isn't around, doesn't mean it has to be scary...
When Jacqueline spots her, Victorique does not move an inch, convincing the former that she's a life-sized bisque doll. When Jacqueline picks her up and hugs her, commenting that she's so warm, she'd almost swear she was alive, Victorique recovers from her momentary shock and informs her "although it is regrettable, I am indeed alive."
This is shown only subtly in the anime, as in the previous example of her meeting Jacqueline, but is shown in more detail in the original light novels: Victorique's way of thinking switches from a more structured and restrained "human" manner and a more feral way ruled by instinct. This accounts for her survival instinct and some of her stranger mannerisms, especially when she's provoked, like the way she bares her teeth, lashes out at others, or crawls into small and cramped places to hide.
As far as solving cases, stating her conclusions, and questioning witnesses and suspects, she is much more skilled at that, even though she is still blunt and has her strange moments (for example, when someone says something that she deems ridiculous or impossible, she tends to assume they're joking, and so offers a very stilted and bizzare polite laughter to humour them). She only seems to have a great deal of difficulty with connecting with people on a more personal level, although she's losing that fear of other people thanks to spending so much time with Kujou and Avril.
Victorique adores her mother, even though they were separated very shortly after she was born and did not see eachother again until about ten years had passed since then. Still, her relationship with her mother is the closest to a normal familial relationship she has.
Her relationship with her brother is strained, but far better than her relationship with her father. For most of the series, he never looks her in the eye or addresses her personally, using Kujou as a sort of medium to communicate with her. Although he also holds seems to hold a distaste for Cordelia Gallo and Grey Wolves in general, Grevil gives Victorique permission to leave with Kujou more often than his father would like. He even argues with his father when he thinks the latter has done too much to Victorique (namely, bidning her with ropes, overwhelming her senses by surrounding her with dim candle lights, rhythmic chiming of bells, and the strong scent of incense) in trying to force her to use her abilities.
Her relationship with Kujou develops from that of a master and servant, to mutual friendship, then love.
Abilities: Victorique de Blois has almost all of the traits and abilities the Grey Wolves are famous for: she has superhuman intellect (her "wellspring of wisdom") that allows her to crack even the most difficult of cases, as well as a budding ability to predict the near future, although it's less "predicting the future" in the magical sense and more like "anticipating the most probable events based on current evidence with high accuracy." Although she won't display the second skill until she's older, during the Second Great War, she does predict Kujou's arrival to the top of the library, informing him that he was chosen as the sole fragment of chaos with which to vanquish her boredom, likely because of their similarly ostracized natures. Appearance-wise, she has the same pale skin, blonde hair, and emerald green eyes of the Grey Wolves... in addition to their small stature and relatively weak bodies.
This is compounded, however, from the long period of time she has spent trapped in a tower, unable to interact with the outside world. She can barely run without falling on her face and the slightest bit of pain is unbearable to her and brings her to tears. She reacts quite badly early on to Kujou playfully flicking her forehead, for example, crying, rubbing at her forehead, and demanding that he never speak to her again ("I never thought you were that kind of man!"). When she saves Kujou's life in the Village of the Grey Wolves, holding him up until he can climb to safety, her hands are red and badly bruised for days after the event, although she hides them from him after that so he won't see how it hurt her to save him.
She also falls sick a bit easily, likely because of how little she interacts with the outside world, catching a cold at least twice in the series; once, because she fell asleep dressed too lightly in an untied kimono (that she was too arrogant to accept Kujou's directions in wearing) and the second time because her loving father dumped her in a sack, dressed only in her very light nightwear, on a cold, stone floor and locked her up in cell on Beelzebub's Skull.
Again, likely due to her very (literally) sheltered upbringing, she can't stand the heat of summer sunlight without her parasol, although she stubbornly tries to stay out in it, when everyone aside from her left campus grounds for summer break, to feel like she's enjoying a summer vacation. She doesn't really enjoy it, sweats profusely, and looks horribly uncomfortable until Kujou returns and shades her with the parasol she couldn't open.
When her mother tells her to crack the code and display her survival instinct, she manages to shoot a bomb on a faraway bridge while leaning out from the back of a train with a pistol that only has one round left in it. All without ever shooting a gun before, although she was familiar with the way guns work in theory. Kujou supported her to make sure the recoil wouldn't send her flying, but otherwise, she did it by herself. Victorique also manages to settle for a decision that would crack the code, ensure her survival, while also being kind. Instead of withholding the Box of Spirit that would surely have a great effect on the balance of power between the Academy of Science and Ministry of the Occult, she takes the most crucial piece of evidence, hides it away, and hands over the box itself and the rest of its contents to the boy who was only retrieving it because his younger sister was held ransom for it.
So, Victorique is clever and capable of pulling off some unexpectedly (even to her) great things in a pinch, but as a whole, not very strong physically and especially prone to pain and illness. Because her mind works at a faste pace than most humans, her genius is easily misunderstood for childish nonsense; for example, she tries to bring a great deal of luggage for their trip aboard the Queen Berry, but Kujou forces her to leave it all behind, thinking she had brought far too much ( why would she bring food? A chair? A doll, a compass, and snacks? This is too much! ). He pays for it by being left, standing beside her while she sits at dinner using Madame Roxanne's invitation, and he has nothing to eat and nowhere to sit. She does reward him, sarcastically, for his quibbling with a bread roll that she jams into his mouth. Later, it takes them some time to figure out where they are, leading to rather simple tricks deceiving everyone, because somebody forced Victorique to leave behind the compass and the rest of her luggage that her "wellspring of wisdom" dictated was the "bare minimum" of what they'll need...
Payment to Yubaba
Memory: 1. Her few, precious memories of her mother.
2. Kujou's name and appearance.
3. The lyrics to La Vie an Rose, which her mother sang.
4. The reason for her birth, which she discovered by reading Leviathan's pop-up memoir.
5. How to light a pipe.
6. How to read— or rather, just the French letters... in addition to any kanji/kana she might know from arrival? (This should force her to communicate with others to stave off her boredom, if the other losses make her too unsociable!)
7. What her favourite sweet is (macaroons are tied to her mother, so they might mean something special to Victorique... and considering how important sweets really are to her, being one of the few things she enjoys in real life, I think it could fit ^^;;).
8. Avril Bradley, her somewhat friendly romantic rival.
9. All her good memories of her older brother Grevil de Blois.
10. Memories of Professeur Cecile Lafitte; she is well-meaning and trustworthy, even if she is rather hopelessly naive and oblivious.
New Name: Weeell, you could call her Grey Wolf/Hai-iro Okami or Monstre Charmant. Or give her something else entirely! That could be exciting and I'm not picky. ^^;
Samples
First Person: This dear_mun thread is a bit silly, but I think it shows her voice nicely.
Third Person: A very petite blonde girl stood at the water's edge, frowning deeply with her brows knitting, green eyes staring defiantly at the murky water at the base of the otherwise empty tub. Such filth. She bites her lip and tries to tie up the strange and difficult-to-wear garment, drawing it up so it won't get wet. She missed her frills and lace.
She took a deep breath and then poured in some soapy water and began to scrub and scrub and scrub. She scrubbed until her hands turned red and raw, the bones of her knuckles poking chalk white through her skin.
She had not finished more than one third of her work before her shoulders sagged and her arms shook weakly underneath her. She fells face-first into the water and whimpered in pain. Pathetic.
She had never worked like this before, had she? Expending this much effort and pushing her body like this was so far out of her realm of experience that she felt hopeless.
The water, once warm, then felt as cold and desolate as the stone tower's floors. The soap-scented air tasted of despair.
When her tear-clouded eyes closed, her stillness allowed her to forget the water. She only felt the cold and it was no different from then.
Was she going to give up and die now? Would she die a death as meaningless as the life she lived?
Her cynicism decreed that there could not have been a more fitting an end for her pathetic existence. In spite of this, she remembered her few joyful days outside of the cage her father had chosen for her. Those days brought light and warmth to her life in cold darkness. Her stagnant heart dared to hope once again...
It was not going to end so easily.
She raised her head, her eyes snapping open and her numb fingers clawing the water as she closed them into fists.
There was still a case to solve. While it was doubtlessly true that this was her most difficult case yet, that should only serve to encourage her further! Solving puzzles was her favourite pastime, after all. She decided she had to get to the bottom of this, even if it meant pushing herself in a way she had never done before; her memories might be gone, but her wellspring of wisdom remained unadulterated.
A Grey Wolf's survival did not hinge on the integrity of her memories, but on her instincts and intellect!
She rose proudly, with her shoulders back and head held high, ignoring her half-soaked kimono and dripping wet hair.
... even if it meant that the Grey Wolf might have to forsake her lofty pride, however briefly, for the sake of survival.
Her cheeks reddened to a shade approaching that of her now mercifully unfeeling hands and she took a deep breath before quickly resuming the action of srubbing the rest of the tub's walls clean.
