[OOC] Application to deercountry

[shemara]

Character Base

• Character Name: Mara
• Age: early 20s (assumed)
• Canon (Date/Year Released)/Canon Point: She-Ra and the Princesses of Power (2018)/S4E9:Hero (2019)
• Items Coming Along: Sword of Protection (a sword used as a conduit of She-Ra’s power, with the ability to shapeshift into various items as needed), 1 outfit, 1 pie
• Content Warnings for Character: Coercion, potential war crimes, intergalactic colonialism, death

Character Background

• History:
Mara is from a technologically advanced society of people from the planet of Eternia that began to colonize other planets, especially those with magic so they could mine them for their resources (using magic as energy for their technology). Her people settled on Etheria and proceeded to spread their magic technology all over the planet, learning many of Etheria’s secrets. They learned of She-Ra the great magical avatar of Etheria, who is the Chosen protector of the planet and its inhabitants, then decided to use She-Ra to consolidate the mystical power of the planet so it could be used for a huge intergalactic weapon they called The Heart of Etheria. This would be used to fight against Horde Prime and his forces and strengthen Eternia’s hold on the region.

The Eternians (who will be later known as The First Ones) created The Sword of Protection to control She-Ra, therefore making it so they would have a hand in who the next She-Ra Etheria chose would be. They selected one of their own, a soldier named Mara, to be She-Ra and she saw it as her duty to protect the planet and her people’s interests in it. She was not told what the true purpose of the Heart of Etheria was, but she knew that she had an important part to play in it. Mara was mostly isolated from others on the planet, living in a secluded area with an artificial intelligence guide named Light Hope. Light Hope’s duty was to train her and prepare her for when it was time to complete the Heart of Etheria project, but Mara saw her as a friend. She trained and learned what she could of Etheria and came to really love the planet. She worried about what the Heart of Etheria project might lead to because no one would tell her the full plan. She didn’t want to disappoint her people, but also didn’t want anything to happen to Etheria.

Of course, then Mara met Madame Razz, a native Etherian and things began to change even more. Razz was unpredictable and disconnected, living outside of time and yet within all of time at once. She could be very confusing and backwards, but also was very friendly and in tune with Etheria. She showed Mara that there was more to She-Ra than she had been told by her people and Light Hope, that She-Ra was an ancient power and chosen by the planet itself. It was because of Razz’s disjointed existence with time that Mara learned that there would be a future She-Ra named Adora. She thinks she may have even met her once during a strange situation where she walked out of her command tower and found her there standing some distance away, as time had collapsed in on itself and Mara’s present temporarily collided with Adora’s future. But Madame Razz shifted between these phases of time on her own and Mara listened to her, learning what she could about this Adora that she often mistook Mara for.

She never had the chance to fully embrace being the true She-Ra of Etheria as she found out the truth about the Heart of Etheria and that the plan was to store all of the planet’s magic at its core and then unleash it as a massive weapon on the enemies of Eternia. Etheria would be devastated in the process, killing much of the life on the planet almost immediately and damaging the planet itself so much nothing else would survive long on it. Mara couldn’t let this happen, so she united like-minded people and staged a rebellion. Fighting under the name of Grayskull, she and her rebel squadron fought against Eternian forces to push them off the planet. She tried to convince Light Hope to end the project, but Light Hope’s programming had been overwritten by a near identical A.I. whose sole objective was to ensure than the Heart of Etheria was completed and used as directed.

Mara did what she could to take Light Hope out of the equation and hid the Sword of Protection so she couldn’t be forced to use it to activate the Heart. But all the fighting and draining her power in sealing the sword took a lot out of Mara and her rebellion, leaving her the sole survivor with a potentially fatal wound. She only had one option left and she used it. She used the last resort, opening a huge, immense portal that would transport Etheria into a pocket dimension called Despondos. There she left one final message to Adora, hoping she would never need to see it, and then her ship lost power and crashed landed back onto Etheria. Being already severely injured and completely drained, Mara didn’t survive the impact.

The legend of Mara’s She-Ra would go on to be known for thousands of years after she’s gone. First Ones technology and cultural artifacts will relate parts of her story (most of it having been mythologized by First Ones), and while some people, like the Plumerians, see Mara as a legendary beacon of hope and protection, others do not.

• Core Relationships:
Mara is intentionally isolated while on Etheria to make it easier for Light Hope to be her only point of contact and trust on the planet while she is being trained as both She-Ra and to initiate the Heart of Etheria Project. This doesn’t stop her from making connections with other people, but it does show a concerted effort to keep her from making bonds in canon. Instead, Mara turns things around and befriends Light Hope, develops such a deep bond with her that she thinks of ways to encourage Light Hope to branch out and try to engage more in life. She knows Light Hope is an A.I. but it doesn’t change how she feels about her. She cares so much for her, and believes that Light Hope cares about her too. Having Light Hope’s personality stolen by the alternate programming is enough to make Mara cry and refuse to call what is left Light Hope. Then there’s Madame Razz, someone who has been alive longer than anyone knows and exists both in and outside of time. Madame Razz is a quirky, odd woman, but she opens Mara’s eyes to the deep magic of Etheria and how it’s more than the way the Eternians have taught her to see it. She is both a mentor and a wild elderly woman that Mara feels very protective over. Madame Razz represents everything that Mara loves about Etheria and she doesn’t want anything to happen to her. Then there is Mara’s disjointed and yet very profound connection to her future successor, Adora. Razz mistakes Mara for Adora regularly thanks to her shifting through the past, present, and future at random, and once Mara realizes what is going on, she starts asking Razz about Adora. She tells her about Adora in the future and Mara is both proud and also dismayed because Adora existing means that all of her plans to be the last She-Ra, to prevent the chances of the Heart of Etheria ever being used, fail. So Mara both admires Adora, has faith in her ability to be a far better She-Ra than she had the chance to be, but also feels very guilty that she has to go through everything she does to get to that point.

Character Personality Through Key Moments

(2+) Positive Experiences:
Mara is open. She is very open to new experiences, new knowledge, and new friends. She doesn’t hold herself back from making friends even when she knows it goes against the mission Light Hope is training her for. She meets Madame Razz when she randomly shows up and starts going through her supplies, but instead of sending her away immediately, or reacting with violence, she wants to get know her and see what she can learn from her. She also openly admits to Madame Razz that she has doubts about what is going on and the Heart of Etheria Project and what it might mean for Etheria. She does not voice these concerns to Light Hope at first because she doesn’t want to disappoint her, but as soon as she found someone that she thought she could confide in, she did. Mara embraces the world even though she’s held back by a sense of duty and this is why Etheria as a planet embraced her in return.

Mara is also thoughtful, both in the fact that she puts effort and thought into everything she does, and also in trying to show people that she cares about them. Even though she is training for the Heart of Etheria Project, she’s still taking time to think about what it means and what the consequences could be even before she knows the truth of it. She also tries to encourage Light Hope to have fun and embrace life by bringing her things she thinks she might find interesting. She wants to share her discoveries with her, like when she tells her about the people and creatures she encounters or when she brings Light Hope flowers.

Mara is determined. Whether it’s her duty to Eternia, then to Etheria, or her decision to stage a rebellion, Mara doesn’t give up. She will put herself into any situation, put herself through any trial to accomplish her goal and what she believes is the right thing to do. At first, she was training because she wanted to fulfill her duty to Eternia and she took this seriously, but then she came to love Etheria as a planet and all the things about it and her role as She-Ra only made her feel more connected to this. She felt conflict, unsure of which side she should be on, but once she knew the truth about the Heart of Etheria Project and that it would destroy both the planet and everyone living there, she made her choice. She built a team to help her stage a rebellion and fight back, she refused to let them use Etheria that way. She watched everyone else who stood with her die and still kept going. She dragged Etheria into another dimension to prevent this from happening, knowing she would be hated for it. Protecting Etheria was all that mattered.

(2+) Negative Experiences:
Along with Mara’s determination comes her self-sacrificing nature, that is as much of a flaw as it is a credit to her. She is always putting others first. She gives up her own wants and desires in the service to a greater calling or to others at the drop of a dime and it’s only when she’s about to die that she allows herself to feel bitterness or regret about it, when it’s too late. Being She-Ra at first was a duty to her, and then it became a calling, but she never got to embrace what being She-Ra meant, because the duty to protect and serve was more important. She didn’t even get to properly mourn the loss of Light Hope as a person because she didn’t have time, she had too much to do and too many people counting on her. She accepted that people would hate her and never see her as a hero for all that she did because of her decision to put Etheria into Despondos, even though it was the only thing that saved the planet in the end.

Part of why Mara is so self-sacrificing is her tremendous lack of self-worth. She was raised and trained as a soldier, so her value at first is what can she do for Eternia, what obligations does she have for Eternia. And then after becoming She-Ra, she embraces Etheria as her home and a place she loves, and everything becomes about being She-Ra, the champion and protector of Etheria. She doesn’t see value in herself as a person so much as the value in what she can do for others because she’s been trained to believe that’s the only value she has. Madame Razz tried to show her that She-Ra is her, and that is who she is as a person makes She-Ra She-Ra, not just as title or a duty as a champion, but Mara didn’t fully understand except to see it as the truth for others. She wanted that for her future successor Adora, to be able to embrace She-Ra as herself and not forget her own wants and desires in the process. But does Mara afford this same kindness and hope for herself? Not until it’s too late for it to matter.

Deer Country Attributes

• Canon Powers:
Soldier/Warrior - Mara is a trained warrior who has skill with a sword and is implied to have skill with other weapons the Sword of Protection can turn into, but she shown using it as a sword. She can also do close combat hand-to-hand but really prefers weapons to that.
She-Ra - Mara can transform as She-Ra, which has her grow to 8-feet tall, turns her hair into a glowing blonde mane, giving her superior strength, speed, agility, and the ability to connect to the soul of Etheria and its inhabitants. Being She-Ra also allows her some level of healing powers but up to this point she’s only ever used it to heal herself and nature/the environment. She is limited by the Sword of Protection to only being able to transform when using it. There is the potential to bond with She-Ra without the sword, but Mara never got the chance to do so. And for the sake of the game, Mara will not be able to heal any area of the environment without a lot of effort and focus as this is not Etheria.
Piloting - Mara has skills as a pilot of Eternian military airships and could probably figure out how to pilot other similar ships/crafts with enough time to become familiar.

• Blood Type: Darkblood
• Omen: A size-shifting dragon named Eathur (ether) who looks like his skin is made of crystal. He’s usually small and likes sitting on Mara’s shoulder but when she uses darkblood, he can grow in size. He loves helping Mara doing things even though his small size means he can’t do much, but keeps trying, even if it causes problems or he gets in the way.
• Blessed Day: January 9th and it’ll be the equivalent to the day she first met Razz just because (they don’t follow the same calendar).
• Patron Pthumerian: Madame Generosity
• Blood Power Manifestation:
Mara is going to find that a lot of her power is going to be stronger if she uses her darkblood. The Sword of Protection was created to limit and control the power of She-Ra for the Eternians, and while Mara may at first still believe this to be so, in truth, the reality-warping effect of her darkblood is what is going to allow this. Once she finally accepts and embraces that her own blood (therefore she herself, not the sword) is what leads to this change, she won’t need the sword at all to become She-Ra. Her blood power will also manifest in her omen being able to grow to the size of a horse when she uses her darkblood. It’s not a permanent change, as he will revert to his typical size when she’s not actively using darkblood to call upon She-Ra. So all of Mara’s power as She-Ra will be connected to her darkblood and her own will and belief when she uses it and the more she embraces that, the more even her physical representation as She-Ra will change to reflect this becoming more Mara and less what Eternians manufactured She-Ra to be using the sword. The sword itself can still shapeshift, since that’s inherent to the sword, but everything else will be connected to her blood power.

Writing Samples

One: Captain Garbage
Two: TDM Toplevel

The Player

• Player Name: Kathrine
• Player Age: 18+
• Player Contact: chocolateisbrainfood
• Permissions: Here.

Other Characters

Delete this section if N/A. For application of 2nd / 3rd characters only.

Link to Character 1 overall AC: Fox Alistair
Link to Character 2 overall AC: Sarona Gayle