Houjin Jun Chi

Name: Houjin Jun Chi
Birthday: May 5th
Age: 21
Gender: Male
Element: Fire

Height: 6'3
Weight: 180 lbs
Hair Color: Golden, Orange, Red
Hair Length: Shaggy, Just above the Shoulder
Eye Color: Flame Orange
Skin Color: Tan
Body Type: Athletic

Personality: Houjin was a creature of fire, and it showed; heavily. Impulsive, impudent, and hot headed; those where favorite descriptors of the teen. Most of his clan saw him as normal; outsiders couldn't understand how he managed to go a day without being attacked over his brash personality. Never one to waste words or sugar coat; Houjin could best be described as brutally honest; beyond the level of fault. Could he lie? Of course; the young Jun Chi could lie with the best of them, if he needed to. He just preferred to tell it how it was; far as he was concerned, there was no time to waste with pretty words and coddling. His was a world of fast moving action and posturing; the ones that burned hottest burned brightest. They tended to burn out young as well; be he found he cared little about this possibility. Better to focus on getting things done then throttle back and fail. That being said; he could be friendly enough; even if he tended to offend people with his lack of a verbal filters. He was used to people moving in and out of his life; it was all too common in the youth of the fire sages. Acolytes where injured and washed out; elders burned out and where hidden away; people died on missions, of old age, accidents, etc. It was just the way of life.
Likes: Hot, hotter, and hottest. Houjin thrived in the heat. Spicy foods, warm climates. Fire, always fire surrounding him; whether a true burn or the flames of his own hair. Make it hotter, make it brighter. Light, heat, spice, warmth... that was what the male craved with every fiber of his being. Bright colors, sunny days, the rolling warmth of the campfire flames; always more flames. Fire burned in his veins, fueled his life. Even on those rare days that he took a step back to relax; he could be found sunbathing or sprawled on the warm stone hearths that surrounded the massive bonfires that littered his home temple. He loved to care for his clans Salamander summons; the babies were hatched and grew to adulthood in the very hearths they maintained; part of the agreement they had reached when the clan signed the contract with them; they would raise the young salamanders in exchange for the boost to their own fire prowess. A rather nice, trade off; Houjin had always believed.
Dislikes: Cold, ice, dark colors, rainy days. Houjin hated them all. Cold made his bones ache uncomfortable, dulled his wits and smothered his flames. Appalling. Ice was hard and wet; solid yet not, far to cold, even in the warmth of the sun, for his tastes. Dark colors where oppressive, killed the atmosphere of a room or a person. Well, smokey colors where an exception, but where smoke existed, so did fire, and fire was bright and hope, and warm, and made the world better. Rain... too much rain. Oh, he liked water well enough; but a cold rain, blocking the sun and making everything wet and soggy and nasty... That he hated. Better to be bright and warm and crisp; useful. Rain was pointless, beyond making sure the trees and grass grew; but he could do without the cold. A warm spring shower was lovely, refreshing. Cold winter rain? No, he could go his entire life without another one of those and be happier for it.

History: Houjin was born in the middle of the hottest day of high summer, in the middle of a rather nasty heat wave. While the rest of the village baked under oppressive heat the Jun Chi fire sages flourished. Bright hot, sunny weather made them a happy clan. The children played under the sun, the adults trained harder then ever. This was the atmosphere that Houjin was born into. His mother was lucky; Jun Chi had a predisposition towards difficult pregnancies; but Houjin had been relatively easy. A few minor hiccups, but over all easy enough. He was one of the rare babies born with a full head of hair; fiery and bright. In generations past; he would have been instantly marked for special training; placed in special programs to prepare him for the life of a High Sage; never trained in active combat, never allowed outside the clan compound until he was well into adulthood and ranked among the elder sages in power and knowledge. The practice of segregating children that where “marked by the flames”, as Houjin would have been considered; had been discontinued in the time of his great-grandfather. So it was that Houjin was spared a life of loneliness and isolation; and allowed to grow up with his cousins and siblings; just another one of the dozens of new sage acolytes born every year. He was lucky to actually know and be raised by his own parents; children of the Jun Chi where normally raised by the clan as a whole; however his parent's high ranking within the clan allowed them to circumvent this. He was raised by them and with his younger brother; Jeice, 5 years his junior and to all the outside world just a normal human with no bending abilities. Not entirely uncommon in the clan; those born without fire in their veins were still valuable members of the family, the monks that focuses entirely on the spiritual and not the martial aspects of their lives.

His was a happy enough childhood; filled with warmth and fun and plenty of hard times, but not once did his sunny disposition falter. It wasn't until his grandfather came to visit with he was just turning 11 years old did anything of significance change. His grandfather was a strict man; hard and cold and sharp like the lightning only the most powerful elders of the clan were able to use. In all his years, he had only met his grandfather once before, as a small child on his mother's knee; and it had not been the most pleasant experience. It had turned into an enormous fight between his father and grandfather; the context of which he had long since forgotten. The reappearance of his grandfather was not met well; he had come with a small army of strangely dressed men and was making even stranger demands. He was calling for all of the young acolytes to board his vessel and leave with him; threatening violence against the clan if they did not. Nothing made sense to him; and he called out to his grandfather demanding to know what was going on. His brother was standing beside him, clinging to his robe and cowering slightly; he was only a young boy of 6; and he was scared by all the insanity happening around him. Their grandfather merely looked upon him with cold, almost dead eyes, and began blasting them with fire so hot that it actually managed to burn Houjin; who's own fires were so hot and his body so resistant to other's flames that he could enter the lava pools below the clan's compound by age 7 without difficulty; something only the most experienced fire sages had been able to accomplish. He fought with his grandfather, his only desire to protect his brother from the fighting. He was no match for the elder however; the elder was a lightning bender and Houjin had no training in redirection or creation of his own lightning; a blast to the back sent him to the ground; barely conscious and unable to move.

He watched his grandfather lift his brother by the throat and demand that he fire bend; even a lick of flame or smoke would and he would spare the boy. Jeice struggled against the grip, his eyes glowing with the ferocity of a firebender, but the unearthly glow of the long forgotten Energy Benders. His greatest secret, and Houjin's own; his brother had recently begun manifesting signs of natural energy bending; one of the rarest, and most coveted, bending abilities that had ever existed. However, his power was untrained, unrefined, and only just beginning to manifest; even if he had known what to do with it, he lacked the sheer force of will of his grandfather; and was easily overpowered. Failing to produce any sign; that the elder could (or would admit to) see(ing); of being a firebender; he snapped Jeice's neck and blasted his heart right out of his chest with a bolt of lightning, tossing the charred corpse of his grandson away like a piece of trash. That was the last thing Houjin saw before blacking out; and the last time he ever saw his home temple, or his own family; again.

The next ten years of his life were a living hell; he came to find out that his grandfather had been banished from the clan for his extreme views and amoral treatments of their people; he used them like tools to further his own ambition; and in the time after his banishment before Houjin's birth, he had joined up with numerous shadow organizations and military interests around the world and formed a 'school' of sorts; really a cover for a brainwashing and military training facility that took kidnapped benders of all types and made them into obedient little soldiers for hire. His grandfather had high hopes for him; he was a prophecy child, according to clan lore after all. To this, Houjin basically said fuck you, and spent his entire time in the school fucking over everything he could in secret, while plotting how to get out. In his later years there, he came to find that he wasn't the only one able to resist the methods and fuckery of the school; within his own age group he was able to find several people that became dear friends; an airbender named Natsu and an earthbender named Kei; they became almost his captains for several years. In the groups below them, two young twins, a metal and water bender duo that came to be important for their small size and memories; they could fit into the service corridors and vents to make maps of the entire school for Houjin and the others. Towards the end of their stay, just months before they made their escape; three new benders appeared; first, a waterbender named Arawn; pig-headed and just as big of a jackass as Houjin had become. Then, an airbender named Avery, hotheaded, but damn reliable when working towards the same goals. Her best friend Marquetta, an earthbender with a strange personality but loyal to the end. Perfect additions; powerhouses that they desperately needed and new skills to work with.

It was a full moon, the night they broke free. The twins caused all manner of mechanical hell, disabling security systems and making sure that they couldn't be tracked as they moved across the school. They made their way to the front gate, the only way in or out via land; the school was backed against a rugged cliff and overlooked jagged rocks only partially submerged below icy cold water. A no go via the back, and no access the air travel; as the plane used for travel to and from the school was kept in a secondary complex outside the main gate. The battles they faced were intense; the brainwashed masses of the school used to stop them, the teachers battling to kill no matter what. They were successful enough in their fights; most of the students were incapacitated without doing excessive damage; and the teachers were... terminated with extreme pleasure. While the rest went to open the gate and clear the way, Houjin and Arawn went after his grandfather; the source, the final battle.

It was a clusterfuck. Houjin was damn good, and he'd learned well during his time in the school and he was easily able to hold his own against the flame attacks. Arawn was kept busy keeping the last of the teachers and students from interfering in the battle between the firebenders; and for a few minutes it looked like Houjin might just win.

And then Natsu appeared; glassy eyed and very obviously under the spell of the brainwashing. It was long known he was susceptible to the conditioning; but had always been easy to break out of; a simple knock to the head and his mind would reset, a leftover quirk of a nasty head injury sustained as a child. Now... this was different. This was stronger, heavier. This was going to stick. Houjin's grandfather was using the same tactic he'd used once before; turned the very thing that Houjin loved most in the weapon of his demise; first his brother, and then the closest friend, and surrogate brother, he'd ever had. Houjin was... unable to keep fighting as he had; he refused to hurt Natsu, but Natsu in his brainwashed state had no trouble hurting him. Houjin took horrible damage from his friend's attacks; deep gashes and welts, broken bones, everything the airbender could deal. In the end; Houjin was nearly defeated; Natsu had him by the throat was was waiting for the order to end it when he was finally able to break somewhat free of the conditioning. His mind was mostly his own again; but his body was not; his body obeyed only the Headmaster; only Houjin's grandfather. Natsu begged Houjin to end it; he couldn't bear living as that man's puppet slave for the rest of his life. It broke Houjin's heart in half to do it; but he knew he had no choice. A bolt of lightning through the heart; just the same as Jeice; only this time, it was Houjin firing it; the first time in his life he had ever used the element. Natsu died with a smile on his lips; knowing he was finally free of the insanity of the school, and that he'd been himself in his last moments. Houjin was reduced to tears; a broken heap of blood and wounds weeping for the loss of his entire world for the second time in his life; something no one should have to endure.

His grandfather approached him, ready to end it; when Arawn stepped in finally. Everything else was dead save the three of them; and Arawn wasn't about to let himself or Houjin join the ranks of them. He fought the elder firebender with all he had left; calling to Houjin to get up and help him, calling that they had to end it; while Houjin just knelt in a broken heap.

Arawn had no chance on his own; his water sources were limited, but the fire of the Headmaster was not; Arawn was about to be roasted when a second bolt of lightning cracked through the air; right into the chest of the Headmaster and exploding his heart out the front of his chest in a pile of cooked meat and gore. Houjin wasn't about to let it happen a third time; not to Arawn too; not to the last of the little family he'd made with them. Natsu was gone, but he still had Arawn and Avery, Kei and the twins; he'd make sure they survived. He had too; there was no other option.

His grandfather was dead; and they made their escape, running for their lives until they found a hidden air temple in the mountains; got the word out that the school was destroyed and that the benders were free; and would be needing a LOT of help to recover. From that point, the group split up; Arawn and Houjin left together; Avery and Marquetta left to find Avery's grandmother; and Kei took the twins to find their parents. This separation lasted the better part of 3 years before they managed to find each other again; Kei had found the twin's family and joined them, he only came back to say his final goodbyes; Marquetta was gone and Avery wouldn't say why, but he wasn't going to push the subject. Together again, they looked forward to the future unknown; and hopefully a less eventual life.

RP Sample: "Are you... kidding me?" Houjin just stared between the note in his hand and the guard/teacher that had handed it too him. Welp, there went his day. Some retard staffer tried to go AWOL? Joooooy. Now he got to miss his free periods, and likely lunch, to take care of it. "Ya'd think the fact that he's a former student would clue them in to how badly this shit fails..." he was mumbling to himself now, the elder having departed without a word. "Baaah, and I wanted to sleep more." He took off down the hall; right past the mess hall, libraries, classrooms; all of it. The arenas where out on the far edge of the school, far away from the main student areas and near the outta walls. He bypassed the stadium entrance; he wouldn't be watching, he'd be destroying. There was a secondary entrance, a door that appeared as nothing more than a storage closet, until it was unlocked and you saw a direct entrance to the stadium floor.

He walked right out; ditching the top half of his jumpsuit and tying the loose ends around his waist. Practiced, quick. Like he'd done this thousands of times. Inside the fight zone where three guards and the deadman, another firebender that was struggling and screaming like a maniac; a maniac that knew the truth. Part of Houjin broke a little; hearing the man spout the truth and knowing it fell on deaf ears of students and guards. A flick of his wrist send the earthbender guards falling through the hard packed dirt, leaving them alone now. The other male was still chained, unable to move. The meaning was obvious; the Headmaster had decreed execution, not demonstration. Lovely. Houjin moved close, the blasts of exhaled flame from the other barely warm to him.

"I do apologize for this, friend. You had the great misfortune of discovering reality too late to be saved." Houjin turned to the stands, noticing now that there were dozens of students assembled; younglings up to 4th years his age. Joy, audience. Time for a sho-.... oh boy. That... was Avery in the second row. And above her... no... the twins... shit, he had to do this in front of Orran and Alexei? Fuckfuckfuck. Where was Natsuru to protect them from watching this? Gods, he could almost hear their sniffling, see the tears they wouldn't shed. They idolized him... and to have to watch him commit murder? He felt sick already. Forcing himself to turn away, he refocused on his target, a shot of white hot flame from his hand melting the chains binding the other. "If you wish to make this quick... knock yourself unconscious. I can shield the battle from the children..." Of course, when the prisoner fled, he could only sigh. Well, he tried.

Houjin was brutally quick in this, stance assumed in moments; flattened fist used to guide his intensely hot flame around the outer edge of the battle area; both a wall to keep the other from escaping and harming the students, and because he could create a screen for the final blow. Stance change, arms moving back and fists closing as he broke int a run, daggers of flames appearing in his hands. Geography was his friend; using a small hill and a blast of fire from his feet to propel him up and forward; in front of the fleeing man. The daggers became whips as he flung hands forward, whips wrapping around the male and actually tightening like they where made of something solid. Yanking on hand sent the male spinning; disorienting and causing him to fall. Even as he ran; this would be quick if Houjin had any say; the wall of flame roared toward the sky; roar of the fire blocking out the screams as the deserter was... well roasted alive by the sheer power of Houjin's flame; the entire school would have flash heated for moments when the flame wall went up.

When it fell, there was little left beyond a charred spot and Houjin himself, entire body surrounded with flame and looking very much like a flame demon; until the fire extinguished and the lick of smoke rising to the sky took on a distinctly dragon-like appearance before vanishing. With only a nod to the guards now approaching, he moved towards the students; voice booming with the authority he projected like a shield, "This is what happens when you violate the rules! No one escapes and lives!" That would be enough for the majority; the pointing arm dismissing them. He flagged the little twins over, one of the only chances he would have to see them before they escaped themselves. "I wish you didn't have to see that..." They clung to him a moment, silent like he'd taught them to be if they couldn't remain in control of what they would say. With a pat to their heads he pointed Avery out, "Trust her, she's a new friend. Now go, before someone notices." They only nodded and ran to rejoin their group; Houjin watching them leave before moving towards Avery. "So, what d'ya think of the bullshit they do to anyone that snaps post school?"

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