Name: Ari Carmichael
Nicknames: Andromeda
Age: 17
Appearance: 
Love Interest: Nope
Personality: Ari tends to be bright and expressive, and her emotions show easily on her face - regardless of what they might be. She enjoys video games and popular culture, listens to music, and boldly faces the challenges that get in her way. All in all, a fairly peppy sort of girl.
Bio: Religion has always been an important part of life in Japan - and this was quite true for the Carmichael family, who moved to Japan after the second World War to help with reconstruction. In particular, Ari's grandparents were doctors and helped to treat many of the injured, a fact which ultimately led to the family receiving full citizenship. Ari herself has no Japanese blood - her father married another foreigner - but she was raised as the child of two cultures. That may have contributed to her open-mindedness about the family religion.
Ari is the follower of an entity she refers to simply as "
Okami" - a word usually used to refer to the deities of Japan, but which can
also refer to certain kinds of wolves, especially if they've been deified themselves. The Japanese language is rather interesting that way. That probably would have been the end of it if not for two important details.
First, things in Japan had steadily been going downhill, simmering over with near-constant conflicts in and around the town of Inaba. Second, Okami had a long-standing rivalry with one of the Tenko over the best way to resolve issues. The heavenly fox in question - who'd eventually be known as Kyori Hoshiko to a certain group of humans - felt that the best method for resolution was cooperation and care on a truly personal level. Wolves, on the other hand, had... different ideas. Since olden times, humans and wolves had largely lived apart from each other - humans hadn't raised many animals or hunted for food, so they hadn't competed with wolves for land or meals. Okami felt that humans needed to be more obedient... and couldn't help but take notice when Kyori formed an all-too-personal relationship with someone.
That was where Ari came in. Okami had been the guardian of their family for three generations now, and felt that it was time to press her case a little more obviously - not just for the sake of her rivalry with one of the fox spirits, but to establish her ideas within the Amatsu as a whole. The wolf deity began gathering information, especially on the one she'd decided would be the target of her hunt - Kyori's chosen human. The boy was known for a 'shoot first' sort of philosophy, emphasizing the style of magnifying and then unleashing the power of the sun.
Ari's gifts were selected as deliberate contrasts to this - and in particular, they were designed to embody Okami's philosophy that worshiping the gods offered humanity the strength to endure trials. Unlike the offensive orientation many had, Ari's given abilities were primarily defensive in nature - intended specifically to help her endure the blows of others and ultimately come out ahead.
Incidentally, unlike her patron, Ari doesn't take this rivalry personally. That is, she thinks Rednal is an amusing (if strange) person - not someone she'd want to date, but hardly a villain that must be cut down no matter what. Nevertheless, she puts all of her heart into serving Okami because of the spirit's protection. Having heard at least some of what's been going on, Ari genuinely believes that humanity needs to align with its traditional gods in a clear hierarchy instead of trying to stand strong on their own, and she hopes she'll be able to prove Okami's beliefs by not just beating Kyori's chosen human in a fight, but by getting him to
acknowledge that her philosophy is better. That's her only criteria for success - simply winning a fight isn't enough to satisfy either of them.
After all, she does have a little brother that she adores... and she'd do practically anything to create a world where he could be safe from the whims of malicious gods.
(It's probably worth noting that despite some surface similarities, Okami doesn't get along with the greater faction of Law. The wolf spirit certainly doesn't want humanity to be mindlessly obedient drones - but she does think modern culture has pulled them too far away, and that they need to be shown the 'proper' course. To put it another way, Okami's beliefs are less "we're the gods so you have to do what we say", and more "we are
your gods and want to help you, but we need you to act a certain way before we can give you that help". She's fundamentally on the side of humanity, but disagrees with Kyori - and some of the other gods - about the exact relationship they should have.)
