Mara

Mara grew up in a small village on the coast, slightly north of the Copper Mountains. The village she grew up in has no natural resources and the farmland is poor. The only thing the village has, is an ancient tradition in martial arts.

Together with all the other children Mara's training began at an early age. It was hard an merciless, but they knew no other life, and so they all endured. She never excelled during her early years and did not have many friends, but when the time came for her testing she was the first of her class to make it through and earn her sword.

Everyone from her village who make it through the training is expected to go out into the world and sell their skills, bringing the majority of their profits home to keep the school going and the village alive. Mara's first job was to guard a merchant ship from pirates, but the ship never got very far. The ship was hit by a storm and went down. Mara was washed ashore, along with a few of the crew, in the strange land of Takagawa.

She eventually was hired by an annoying ambassador by the name of Guangzhou as a guard for his royal expedition back toward her homeland, and it was during this job she met Mhigo. Mara's luck with ship travel held up though, and they were captured. They did, after much trouble get the ambassador to the place he wanted, and now out of a job, Mara joined up with a group of remarkably strange people.

(I might at some point do a proper write-up of some of her stories, but I am waiting for the burst of motivation needed for such a thing ;) )