Star/Asher

HAYASHI MAI!!! hayashi mai was born in a town called azumino. its a nice place! lots of art! fitting for hayashi who was very interested in art and culture and history as a kid. she just liked to learn! hayashi was born as an only child to two lovely parents who took very good care of her. they are both very sweet people and they would do a lot to help grow her love of learning - lots of new books, lots of trips to museums, they just loved how happy learning made her and most of her early ears were really good as a result. she was a happy kid riiiight up until about age ten!

when hayashi turns ten, shes walking home from school and she gets yoinked straight off the sidewalk by someone her dad knows from the business world. shes blindfolded and taken way out of town where she will not be seen again for about a year. the guy who kidnapped her (his name is muraoka takao) brings her to his house, puts her in a closet, and thats basically where she stays for a year while this guy tries to sort out ransom with her dad. hayashi is a smart kid and shes doing whatever she can to escape during this time, but shes also ten so its kind of a lost cause. she goes through some very very unfortunate and very very traumatic things during this time, primarily mental, physical and sexual abuse and barely ever being allowed to leave this one small closet. shes pretty sure her parents have just forgotten about her and arent looking for her anymore.

in reality her dad is desperately trying to pay this ransom but takao is just milking him for money at this point. when hayashi turns ELEVEN, she gets one single opportunity to escape when takao leaves to go get groceries and forgets to lock the door. she books it. she gets help and eventually gets her hands on someones phone and manages to call her parents. she finally FINALLY FINALLY gets to go home but after this point takao doesnt get found. he just never turns up. so shes extremely on edge because he could pop up at literally any time.

from this point on, hayashi is a very very different kid. shes nervous and defensive and unsettled and emotionally volatile. she doesnt have a lot of friends because she cant really relate to any of these other kids anymore and cant really trust anyone. she gets picked on a little bit for being kinda weird, but when people start realizing that she will lash back at you for that, the bullying p quickly goes away and mostly people are just scared of her now.

so hayashi continues trying to get her life back on track for a couple years, but takao is still running around in the world somewhere so she feels like she cant really recover or move on. shes started focusing a lot of her excess nervous energy on making herself unkidnappable just to be super safe, so shes putting on a lot of muscle. she wants to be able to fight. she never wants to be put in a position where she cant defend herself ever again. so because of this, shes KIND OF got a couple of friends now?? mostly theres just some smaller girls in her school who hang around with her because it makes creepy boys leave them alone. shes defence at this point. which she doesnt mind at all! shes happy to help!

but one day, one of these girls comes up to her crying about a guy in their class whos been sneaking upskirts of her. hayashi has a problem with this obviously! so she hunts the guy down, and - resisting the urge to beat the living shit out of him - collects him and turns him in to the headmaster where he is dealt with accordingly. hayashi gets a taste for justice! it makes her feel good to see someone else get the justice that she did NOT get when she needed it. so justice becomes a priority for her, and by age fifteen, its gone from taking on middle school creeps to taking on actual criminals. at fifteen. maybe not safe! and also maybe not legal! but shes having a good time! so hayashi is a bounty hunter now. shes usually working for cash, but sometimes shes working purely for the thrill of it. everythings going well and shes badass and cool.

a lot of her jobs come through a guy named muranaka yuuzou. theyre kind of dating a bit. except hes not a great guy. hayashi was never THAT into him in the first place, but hes mostly just into the fact that shes a very buff girl he likes that and doesnt really care about much beyond that. so its not unusual for him to send her on jobs that are way too risky or dangerous for her without really caring about what might happen. speaking of! on one particular day at age SIXTEEN, hayashi is sent to go track down and bring back a guy named masada hiroshi. shes like aight. goes to find this guy and wouldnt you know, he is not actually named masada hiroshi! he is named muraoka takao and this is the first time shes seen him in about five years!

hayashi is freaking the fuck out. this is the guy. but also she has a job to do. she tries to go through her usual protocol, but shes heated and nervous and scared and emotionally charged and this guy is putting up a BIG fight and things very quickly get out of hand and she snaps. she beats the absolute fucking shit out of this guy. partially because shes panicking, partially because she finally CAN beat the shit out of him and its empowering because he did the same thing to her FOR A YEAR. except shes a lot stronger right now than he ever was. and he dies. she kills the guy. and so shes like oh FUCK. on one hand, shes glad hes dead because he deserves to be dead and he ruined her life and she hates him. on the other hand she just fucking killed a man and thats kind of a lot to process for her.

luckily, this guy virtually does not exist. hes completely off the grid. she gets away with it entirely. but she knows what she did and its haunting for her. useless boyfriend muranaka yuuzou is not much help either and is generally just completely unsupportive of her in general. hayashi starts acting weird again because shes just gotten freshly re-traumatized and he doesnt like this and also doesnt like that theyre not fucking anymore and they end up arguing a lot of the time theyre together. pretty soon after that, hayashi leaves him and now shes out on her own again. better than being with that shithead muranaka in her opinion!

so now hayashi is seventeen. shes working hard as a bounty hunter, her abuser is dead, her parents are still supporting her the best they can and shes pretty much given up on people as a whole. people are awful and they will hurt you. the world is full of awful awful awful people. thats pretty much the mindset she lives by and she considers it her responsibility, as someone with nothing to lose, to clean up the world a bit. she plays it very tough but she is only 17 years old and she is riddled with trust issues and trauma and pessimism. what a life!