A/N
Before I start issuing more chapters, I would like to clarify that my ships, OTPs, and headcanons go awry from time to time, so let me just explain a few things. I ship Maria with Brunei during precolonial times (OC/OC ship). Indonesia and Malaysia are her big sisters, one doting and one over-protective. The Philippines was only composed of several trading kingdoms at the time, and she and Brunei were so well known for trade that China recognized them as the Queen and King Traders of the South. When Antonio Carriedo invaded the Philippines, he sort of kicked Brunei out, along with the other Southeast Asian nations, and adopted Maria. She resented him at first, but after a while, seeing that Antonio was trying to educate her despite all he had done, she decided to give up trying to escape for a while and to learn new things from the invader. She currently sees him as her father. He introduces her to Alejandro (Mexico, or Nueva España) and only allows her to play with him. While growing up with Antonio, she catches Arthur's eye and he tries to pursue her (my OC/Canon ship). He tells himself at first that he was only befriending her because of her riches and just to spite Spain, with whom he has always had a rivalry with. Arthur eventually admits to himself that he might have fallen in love with Maria, but Antonio discovers this and makes quick work of getting the Englishman out of the islands. As the years went by, the hold of Spain weakened due to continuously being defeated by England and the Netherlands, and the Philippines was eventually sold to America. Maria was at first enamored with Alfred, but soon realized that she was only like a little sister to him and that she was only trying to forget the first English-speaking nation who had first landed on her shores. She urges Alfred to give her independence in the hopes of meeting Arthur again. Alfred obliges, but a year before she was to be declared independent, World War II erupted. Kuro Honda, who knew the strategic advantage of having Maria on his side (the Philippines was an archipelago and was the most direct access he had to America and the other SEA nations in addition to being one of the three main resistance powers in Asia, which included Malaysia under the UK, Indonesia under the Netherlands, and the Philippines under the USA), predicted that the invasion of the Philippines would only take six weeks. Despite Alfred and his troops leaving her shores in a weakened state, Maria continued to fight using guerrilla warfare tactics which proved Kuro wrong. It took Japan six months to gain the upper ground, and even then, Filipino insurgents continued to pester them and they only eventually controlled twelve of the forty-eight provinces. The six month delay prevented Japan from taking more of Southeast Asia at the expense of increasing numbers of Filipinos, soldiers and civilians alike, captured, tortured, and killed, and the capital of the country, Manila, decidedly becoming the second most destroyed Allied city during WWII (now do you see why we keep pushing for a legitimate Philippine representation in Hetalia? Hahaha). American forces recovered and returned to the archipelago, putting pressure on the Japanese Imperial Army, which decided to attempt a last ditch effort to defend their territories in the Philippines. Maria was eventually liberated, but at a terrible cost – over a million of her people dead in the bloodiest struggle of the Pacific War. She has slowly but surely recovered since.
Maria currently tries to get along with all the countries since she doesn't have the means to defend herself much from attacks, but with a strategic location and over seven thousand islands, most of her people think the largest threat to her existence comes from within. She is in friendly terms with both Alfred and Kiku, and she gets nostalgic when she hears anything that reminds her of her Papa Antonio and Kuya Mexico.