To New Heights

I like giving my various hunters backstories about how and why they joined the Hunter's Guild. In celebration of the release of MHGU, this story will be a brief autobiography of sorts about the huntress I created in MH Gen specifically to carry over and use in GU.

-.-.-.-.-.

The dry, sweltering air of the Dunes was uncomfortable, but familiar, as it pushed down oppressively against the Hunter. Despite the heat, she did naught but stare unflinchingly across the landscape that spread out before her like a gigantic map. Nothing fazed her.

The Hunter was one of the Wycademy's best, most of her body hidden under the thick plates of a full Brachydios armor set. Short black hair framed a pale face with a pair of midnight-blue eyes. She was known only as Scorpia to her fellow Wycademy Hunters – her background and her true name were forbidden knowledge. And no-one dared ask, at least not anymore. The woman seemed calm on the surface, and this was no illusion. But it was a sinister calmness – her face was stuck in a perpetual mask of neutrality and her dark eyes were cold and unforgiving. Whether she could even feel emotion at all was a question that stumped even the most esteemed scholars of the Wycademy.

But asking her personal questions – or pestering her in general – invariably resulted in rage. At least, what most people assumed was rage, given the look of distant fury that flickered to life in her otherwise chillingly emotionless eyes.

One time, she had dragged a particularly annoying rookie Hunter away from the rest of the hunting party, and met back up with them without the upstart in tow. The Hunters questioned her about the rookie Hunter, but she'd said nothing, only stared at them with the aforementioned faint semblance of rage. Chilled to the bone, they'd moved on and completed their quest without any further questions.

Their missing party member was found by a passing observation balloon three days later, armor-less and covered in scars and bruises. He refused to leave the Wycademy's hospital wing for a week straight, and turned pale and sweaty when someone mentioned the menacing, mysterious huntress.

Although no-one knew exactly what Scorpia had done to him, it had nonetheless been the last time someone tried to pry into her business.

This memory briefly flitted through Scorpia's mind, inspiring a half-smirk to give some kind of life to her otherwise mask-like face. She would prefer to go unnoticed, to fade into the background, but being feared had its perks. No-one bothered her anymore, and even most of her quests were done solo nowadays, which suited her just fine. Scorpia had joined the Wycademy to hunt, not to socialize – certainly not to revisit her past.

And taking down a wyvern by herself was satisfying on a level she'd never felt before.

This hunt was much the same as all the others, at least in most ways. She was going solo again, relying on nothing but her full Brachydios set and her Yian Garuga Dual Blades to help her get the job done. She had a pouch filled to the brim with supplies, ranging from basics to much more specialized equipment. And it was taking place right here, in the Dunes.

Scorpia found that the Dunes was her favorite hunting ground. The empty barrenness of this parched desert calmed her, repressed the bad things that were always tempted to the surface in human company. When the pressures of Hunter society began getting to her, and she felt the urge to do something she'd surely regret, she retreated to the Dunes on a peaceful gathering quest until the weight had lifted. The landscape was beautiful in its own eerie way, and she even appreciated the monsters themselves somewhat. Years of hunting in the Dunes had gradually burned its plains and canyons into her memory until it was like a second home to her.

Home.

The tiny smirk vanished at the thought of home. Anger sparked in the depths of her otherwise cold eyes, and her fists clenched. She hadn't meant to get so lost in her thoughts that she unintentionally dredged up a bad memory.

And with one came more. Unbidden, Scorpia found herself swamped by a sea of memories that reopened old wounds and brought a long-forgotten sorrow back to the surface.

-.-.-.-.-.

Once, she'd been known by another name. Before she was Scorpia, before the Wycademy, her childhood had been rough but bearable. She'd grown up in a small village as part of a poor family. Both of her parents worked, but they'd arranged so that one of them would always be home to look after their sole child while the other was away. Her parents did what they could to provide for her, but they were distant and mostly left her to her own devices. There were no other children her age to keep her company either, and so she'd grown up lonely.

Scorpia wasn't sure exactly when she stopped wishing for human contact, or when she started seeing them as just things that happened to look like her. But by the time she met the man that would become her mentor, she had such a detached view of other people that she neither enjoyed nor regretted doing all the horrible things that followed.

She'd snuck out of her house and went for a wander through the market when she was about… seven? Her memory of when she'd come across her parents and eavesdropped on them was hazy, but what they were saying still rang crystal clear. They were claiming that they'd never planned for a child – that the one who would eventually become Scorpia had been a mistake.

She remembered the words. The confusion. The awful rushing feeling, like she was falling toward the ground from a great height when in reality she was standing still.

She also remembered meeting her mentor. In hindsight, she realized he must have been watching her, maybe waiting for the opportunity to say something. He'd had his eye on her as a potential pupil and ally the whole time.

But all she knew at that moment was that her parents didn't care for her and that the man that approached needed her help. So she allowed him to take her away from her village and vowed to repay him by fulfilling his wishes.

Scorpia felt nothing when she learned, years later, that the lessons he taught her and the combat training she went through was meant to shape her into an assassin under his employ. She merely shrugged when she found out that he was a gang leader from a different city. She didn't bat an eye when another gang killed her mentor and scattered the rest, leaving her to her own devices. She moved elsewhere and continued her… occupation… as a freelancer, taking any job as long as it paid enough to keep her alive.

At that point, she supposed, she was too far gone to care about any of it. She was only Scorpia now.

She could've continued down the same bloody road for years to come, not caring enough to do anything other than what she was good at. But Fate forced her hand when she was eventually hired to kill her parents. They'd moved to a bigger town and crossed some minor criminal of some sort – Scorpia always made a point not to pay attention to the details, they would prevent her from focusing on her job.

Finally, she felt some kind of emotion stir ripples in the stagnant pond that had become her psyche. Rage consumed her and the next thing she knew, their lifeless bodies were at her feet.

But that had been her first and last mistake. Local law enforcers caught the assassin in the act, and she was forced to flee for her life and her freedom – the only things she had left. Her killing career was over.

When her ears first caught wind of a job opening for the Wycademy as a Hunter, Scorpia leapt at the chance. The feared mercenary boarded an airship bound for Bherna… and seemingly vanished into thin air.

-.-.-.-.-.

Scorpia struggled to free her brain from the morass of horrid thoughts threatening to suck her brain down into the quicksand-like depths of despair. Her emotions, disturbed into a chaotic hurricane, settled back down and were swiftly hidden away again, back under her stoic façade where they belonged.

None of that had ever happened. She had no emotions. She'd never been anyone else. There was only Scorpia the Hunter.

But upon revisiting her tortured past, one other memory surfaced from within, bringing clarity and calm to the roiling cauldron of hate that her neutral shell had been crafted to hide.

The memory told her of why she'd been so eager to accept this quest.

"G-Rank", they'd called it. A new airship had been built, and skilled Hunters were being hired to board it and hunt the powerful monsters that the Wycademy had discovered through its surveys. And here in the Dunes, one of those beasts lay in wait for her – one that Scorpia had never encountered, called "Diablos". She was standing at the cusp of a new beginning, and it started right here, in her beloved Dunes.

For the first time in Scorpia's life, she had a reason to give a genuine smile.

This was her first jump to new heights.

-.-.-.-.-.

So yes, this was the character I used in MH Gen, and soon plan to transfer over to the sequel game. Bit dark, I admit, but not every one of my OCs can be all rainbows and sunshine, you know?

Hope you enjoyed this quick little character study, and make sure to leave a review! Happy hunting, fellow Monster Hunters!