App
Mun
Name: Eddie
Livejournal Username: N/A
E-mail: mellollama at gmail.com
AIM/MSN: wordbending/curdtender at hotmail.com
Current Characters at Luceti: N/A
Character
Name: Medli
Fandom: The Legend of Zelda: The Wind Waker
Gender: Female
Age: 13? It's not specified
Time Period: After Prince Komali gains his wings, shortly before Link awakens her as a sage and takes her to the Earth Temple
Wing Color: Pure white, same as her regular pair
History: On her and her people
Personality:
Medli's entire life is her various responsibilities and expectations placed on her as the attendant to the Rito's deity and the mother figure of their prince, both of which bleed over into nearly every part of her personality.
The biggest example of that is in her in-game biography, which says that she "puts incredible effort into everything she does." If their patron dragon deity Valoo doesn't need tending to (and he's pretty needy), she spends hours practicing her instrument. If she's not doing that, she pores over the ancient language that Valoo speaks. If she's not doing that, she's working on studying every facet of her education she can get her hands on, and if not that, tending to the education of the young Rito boys and girls who have yet to grow their wings. Basically? Eats, breathes, and shits hard work.
This has a few important consequences of its own, primarily that she has little time for normal socialization. Even if another Rito in her peer group were to ask her anything you'd ask any other teen, she'd be completely out of her element, and that'd only be worse in the already strange world of Luceti. And while she doesn't intentionally isolate herself from other people, and in fact makes an effort to be social in the few points she has the time for it, things like "an actual friendship" and especially "romance" don't really enter her mind in the first place. This can be seen in her relationship with Komali, where he sees her as the love of his life and she sees him as a surrogate son ("Watching Prince Komali grow up fills me with pride... I wonder if this is how a mother feels?"). It's also apparent in the way she interacts with Link, where (unlike many many other Zelda women) she sees him foremost as a hero and a relationship between them isn't even teased. It's not that she's incapable of it so much that the way she's been raised and her endless studying has pushed all that into the backburner.
The other important consequence, as also said by her in-game bio, is that "there are times when she seems to be spinning her wheels." Already not born with a particular talent for many of the various skills required of her, she seems to have hit something like an additional road block where she's getting diminishing returns for the time and effort she's invested. Altogether, this means all her hard work has left her only a little above average in almost all of her skill sets. Not only does this tie back into why she works as hard and as much as she does, but as you can imagine, this is immensely frustrating.
It's that and her lack of friends that tie directly into one of the most critical parts of her personality: her poor self-esteem. She's casually self-deprecating ("She was kind and brave... I'm not worthy of being mentioned in the same breath as her"; "I'm not exactly bursting with confidence here"; "There's actually something I can do to help this world"), chastises herself for saying the wrong things ("Where is my mind?"; "Oh, but just listen to me go on!"), and blames herself for everything that goes wrong with the tribe she's been entrusted with ("If only I had a little more of her strength"; "I may be partially to blame for the bad turn Komali's taken"). So many things about her can be explained by this feeling that, no matter how hard she works or what she does, she just isn't good enough. This all ends up creating a kind of mental feedback loop: her poor self-esteem means she feels she has to work harder, which means less time to make friends, which hurts her self-esteem, and so on.
Still, although her self-esteem issues tend to come out unintentionally pretty often, she does her best to stuff them down and put on a brave face for the world. She appears friendly and cheerful, and is always selfless and caring, going out of her way to help others however she can and in any way she can. She's sympathetic to other people's fears and worries and is always willing to lend an ear, a hand, or a harp. She hates seeing people upset, in danger, or suffering (partially because, if it continues, she'll blame herself). In other words, she's very much a tiny mother hen, and just as much so to adults in need as children.
Her natural tendency to overwork herself, and the way she can get very very stubborn when she's set her mind on something, means that she can also overextend herself in the helping department. Look no further than how she responds to Valoo being tormented by one of Ganondorf's cronies, preventing Komali and the other Rito children from gaining their wings: enlisting the help of a total stranger, she charges into a volcano with nothing more than the clothes on her back and a grappling hook, single-handedly making it a good distance before being captured. And, even when she's rescued, she tells the guy with the sword to go on and not worry about her! For a young girl with some obvious self-esteem issues, she manages to have serious guts. Sometimes suicidally so.
However, she is just that: a young girl, one that's lived on an island totally isolated from the rest of the world but for its various postmen. She's naturally curious about the outside world and the people in it, and she often forgets herself and blurts out her incredulity ("Wow! You really do have green clothes and a strange-shaped hat...") or rambles. She's also very naive, like a lot of Zelda characters who believe the world is basically good. Unhelpfully, not only does living on an island in peacetime mean that she has no reason to believe otherwise in the first place, but the game she comes from is probably the least grimdark of all the modern Zeldas. Sure, Ganondorf still blows up islands for fun and profit and will gladly kill the hero if he's in the way, but even he gets a bunch of monologues giving him a sympathetic backstory. So while she's not totally ignorant to the concepts of suffering, the experience itself is very foreign to her, and evil for evil's sake isn't an idea she's at all grasped.
But this young, responsible, self-conscious, brave, innocent girl wouldn't have her life any other way. Which is why it's a shame it's about to be completely flipped on its head.
Strengths:
Physical:
Flight: That's levitation Holmes Like all Rito who have proven their physical and mental maturity by reaching the summit of Dragon Roost, she can fly. Much more than running, though, flying is hard and the technique for it requires practice. She can only fly for about fifteen seconds before she has to touch the ground and breathe again, which is enough to cross a moderate gap or reach the roof of a two story building. Using the wind to her advantage can increase this distance, but it's generally easier to just take the elevator.
Strength and Endurance: While flying, she can carry Link, who is at least her own body weight. Not for very long before she has to rest (only a few seconds at most) but still! Resisting that kind of gravity with just her wings would take some serious limb and upper body strength. And don't forget that she does run up and down a mountain for a living! She can't quite run marathons but, compared to the average 13-year old girl, she doesn't tire easily.
Mental:
Intelligence: Medli might be naive, but she's not stupid. She's no Death Note chess master but she's capable of quickly learning the basics, keeping up with complex concepts, and recollecting wide swaths of information. This is reflected most clearly in-game not just as an extrapolation of her time spent studying, but in how she speaks. I mean, really, the only other Zelda characters you see saying things like "atmospheric currents", "evolved", or "unsurpassed in her dealings" are all over twice her age. So while we rarely see her learning directly, it's safe to assume that she's pretty good at it, and that's a useful skill for her and her allies.
Skills: She's pretty good at various things too! Stringed instruments, ancient languages, and dragon pysch 101 canonically. Headcanonically, she is also the attendant to Valoo, which makes her second only to the chieftain's wife in terms of her importance as a woman in the Rito social ladder. Her duties as an attendant, preparing Rito children for their meetings with Valoo and girls to be the heir to her position, also give her responsibility for many Rito children. As such, she has a variety of useful domestic skills: she can sew and repair clothing herself, she's a capable cook, she brews a mean herbal tea, she can treat certain wounds, and she knows a thing or two about how to take care of kids.
Emotional:
Maturity: Bleeds heavily over from the mental section, but Medli's lofty responsibilities mean that she tends to act way older than she is. Again, this is seen in the very formal way she speaks, not just in "unsurpassed in her dealings" but in things like "please don't get offended by his manner - he has no bad intentions, I promise". But she's also shown to understand the value of hard work and diligence, she is diplomatic, she's not prone to panic when things look bad, and she's quick to accept her responsibility when she knows she's made a mistake or is putting someone in danger.
Bravery and Loyalty: As mentioned earlier, she charged into a volcano with no means of defense in the name of protecting her homeland. And then waded back into the danger zone without a second thought once she was rescued. Although this Medli is being taken before Link takes her to the Earth Temple, it's worth noting that she only hesitates at the idea of leaving her home to enter another dangerous monster-filled dungeon when she knows it'll mean abandoning Komali. She has a lot of courage, and she'll do absolutely anything to protect her home, her people, her friends, and the world around her. Even if it sometimes seems pretty suicidal.
Maternal: That "I wonder if this is how a mother feels" line really sums it up, I think. But as the attendant to Valoo, she has responsibility for a lot of other kids, and that duty means that treating everyone like one of her own children has become the default for her. The protectiveness and kindness she now shows to everyone may end up being as much of a burden as a boon if she allies with the wrong sort, but it is sure to get her friends in the always unhappy world of Luceti.
Weaknesses:
Physical:
Just About Everything Else: um ok combat-wise
Well, let's see: she has no desire to fight, she can't throw a punch, she can't take a punch, she doesn't know how to use a sword, and if she tried to use the bomb flowers that grow on her island she'd probably blow herself up. Little wonder that she went into Dragon Roost and the Earth Temple without a means of non-green-clothed defense, and even less of a wonder that she ended up getting captured and had to be rescued. No secret martial arts skills here, that's for sure.
In Luceti, her endurance and ability to carry things will be even less of an asset next to the amount of naturally strong, experienced fighters out there. Much less the Malnosso robots.
Mental:
Naive: Nothing changes that you're still just a kid in the end, after all. In this respect, Medli's immature in a lot of ways: she's totally ignorant to the idea that the world can be a nasty place for pretty much no reason whatsoever (she describes monsters out for her blood as just being "mean"), she's very very trusting (she asks a complete stranger to meet her alone then throw her across a room, and still believes in him even if he throws her into a wall cough), and she has zero concept of people being con artists or two-faced. Altogether, all it'd take to manipulate her would be to hide your true intentions and act pleasant, and she'd never give you so much as a squinty look.
Jack of All Trades, Master of One: Medli may have a wide variety of skills, and the ability to apply her knowledge to learning new ones quickly, but the only one that it can definitely be said she excels at is music. Otherwise, she's at most above average, and other people with specialties in those skills will outclass her pretty easily.
Social Failure: neeeeeerd Being a Mature Adult and working every waking hour means that it's kind of hard to relate to your peer group on more than a mother or teacher level. Just look at how she sees Komali, who the mother line is referring to, and you'll see that casual friendships and not-so-casual romantic relationships aren't really her forte. If she even sees them as that and not a mother or teacher relationship in the first place, which she usually doesn't.
Emotional:
Stress and Self-Esteem: Girl's a bundle of nerves. As mentioned in the personality section, she works herself practically to death but has serious self-esteem issues that tell her she still isn't good enough for Komali, the world, her home, anyone. While she acts happy and well-adjusted most of the time, the way she talks about and doubts herself shows how this affects her on a subconscious level at the very least.
In Luceti, taken away from everything she's worked for and is responsible for, this would likely be worse. And there's only so much stress you can handle before your pleasant facade starts to show some cracks.
Other People > Herself: You might consider this a strength, but she takes it so far that it really isn't. She'll gladly throw away her life and everything she loves to protect the people she cares about, even if there's no chance whatsoever of her succeeding, and it's impossible to convince her to change her mind. Just look at how she runs into Dragon Roost for an idea of how she will gladly not just break her expected social roles, which from what we can see of Rito culture are a big deal, but run straight into certain death if she considers it necessary to help others. And this can get her into big trouble at best, end up hurting the people she cares about even more at worst, and is certain to bring her a lot of additional stress and trauma in Luceti either way.
Samples
First Person:
Oh, hello again! I know I haven't spoken much lately - I have so much work to do, it seems - but I was told to take a break today, so I went out and admired this land's flora. It's so different from that of my home! My people live on an island, you see, and the goddess Din made it's mighty peaks dry and volcanic. It's well-suited to the Great Valoo and our gift of wings, but not really meant for plant life, so we have to import many goods.
Oh, but how I must be boring you all... so enough about my land. Please, tell me about yours! What grows there? What is your home like? And, if you don't mind terribly, where did it all come from?
I'm sorry, I know that's a lot of questions! Please don't feel as if you have to answer.
Third Person:
When she wakes, Medli is sure she still hears the note she had been playing reverberating in the air, loud and sharp over the distant sounds of crashing waves and rustling branches. But when she gets to her feet, she knows right away that it was just a hope and no more. Her harp is nowhere to be found, and even the attendant's dress she had worn every day for so many years has been replaced by something strange and uncomfortable. All she has left now are Valoo's scale and her foot-wrappings, both in a sad little pile in the shadow of the mountain, half-buried in what remained of the snow.
She doesn't need to see the snow, nor feel the cold it brings, to tell her that she's been far from her home for a long time. But, still, it is a mountain she's been left at. A fitting place to be abandoned, but what comfort was the landscape without the sounds of Komali's footsteps or the Great Valoo's mighty roar? How hurt they must be, she thinks, all because she had dropped her guard! And what will Komali, still standing at the cusp of adulthood, do without her guidance?
"Stay calm," she tells herself firmly, steeling her oddly sore shoulders and shaking those thoughts away before she can spiral any further into panic. "Remember what you've been taught!"
Right, breathing! Just like Komali's grandmother had shown her. One deep inhalation to bring one's mind to a focus, one long exhalation to expel unnecessary worries, repeat as necessary. And when that is done, return to work. So she breathes, in then out, then sets out to shake the snow off what remains of her things. Her foot wrappings are gathered and put on first, for the comfortable familiarity of the leather as much as not wanting one of the last remnants of her home to blow away. Then, she picks up the scale of Valoo that grants her the gift of wings.
Only then does she notice the impeccably clean book sitting nearby. When she picks it up, she turns it over in her hand, surprised by it's light weight. It's not as shocking to her as the presence of her name, emblazoned in huge letters on it's cover, which quickly leads her to decide to deal with that at a later time. It certainly might be a message from her captors, but then she'll need time to read it, won't she? And right now, she knows she needs to reach a goal before daylight fades and leaves her lost in the cold. Anything would do, as long as it got her on the right track: people, a port, or even some kind of clue of her captor's actual whereabouts. Perhaps they could help her better in person! Or at least tell her where her real clothes were.
She turns toward the forest, squinting at the horizon, quietly glad that the morning sun is behind her. It doesn't take her long to see them, strange structures jutting above the tips of the forest and through the rise and fall of the green-white landscape. Even she can tell it's a civilization, although she can only guess at who or what lives there. Not that it'll be a problem, she's sure!
So, renewed with the energy of progress, she takes a step forward.
Name: Eddie
Livejournal Username: N/A
E-mail: mellollama at gmail.com
AIM/MSN: wordbending/curdtender at hotmail.com
Current Characters at Luceti: N/A
Character
Name: Medli
Fandom: The Legend of Zelda: The Wind Waker
Gender: Female
Age: 13? It's not specified
Time Period: After Prince Komali gains his wings, shortly before Link awakens her as a sage and takes her to the Earth Temple
Wing Color: Pure white, same as her regular pair
History: On her and her people
Personality:
Medli's entire life is her various responsibilities and expectations placed on her as the attendant to the Rito's deity and the mother figure of their prince, both of which bleed over into nearly every part of her personality.
The biggest example of that is in her in-game biography, which says that she "puts incredible effort into everything she does." If their patron dragon deity Valoo doesn't need tending to (and he's pretty needy), she spends hours practicing her instrument. If she's not doing that, she pores over the ancient language that Valoo speaks. If she's not doing that, she's working on studying every facet of her education she can get her hands on, and if not that, tending to the education of the young Rito boys and girls who have yet to grow their wings. Basically? Eats, breathes, and shits hard work.
This has a few important consequences of its own, primarily that she has little time for normal socialization. Even if another Rito in her peer group were to ask her anything you'd ask any other teen, she'd be completely out of her element, and that'd only be worse in the already strange world of Luceti. And while she doesn't intentionally isolate herself from other people, and in fact makes an effort to be social in the few points she has the time for it, things like "an actual friendship" and especially "romance" don't really enter her mind in the first place. This can be seen in her relationship with Komali, where he sees her as the love of his life and she sees him as a surrogate son ("Watching Prince Komali grow up fills me with pride... I wonder if this is how a mother feels?"). It's also apparent in the way she interacts with Link, where (unlike many many other Zelda women) she sees him foremost as a hero and a relationship between them isn't even teased. It's not that she's incapable of it so much that the way she's been raised and her endless studying has pushed all that into the backburner.
The other important consequence, as also said by her in-game bio, is that "there are times when she seems to be spinning her wheels." Already not born with a particular talent for many of the various skills required of her, she seems to have hit something like an additional road block where she's getting diminishing returns for the time and effort she's invested. Altogether, this means all her hard work has left her only a little above average in almost all of her skill sets. Not only does this tie back into why she works as hard and as much as she does, but as you can imagine, this is immensely frustrating.
It's that and her lack of friends that tie directly into one of the most critical parts of her personality: her poor self-esteem. She's casually self-deprecating ("She was kind and brave... I'm not worthy of being mentioned in the same breath as her"; "I'm not exactly bursting with confidence here"; "There's actually something I can do to help this world"), chastises herself for saying the wrong things ("Where is my mind?"; "Oh, but just listen to me go on!"), and blames herself for everything that goes wrong with the tribe she's been entrusted with ("If only I had a little more of her strength"; "I may be partially to blame for the bad turn Komali's taken"). So many things about her can be explained by this feeling that, no matter how hard she works or what she does, she just isn't good enough. This all ends up creating a kind of mental feedback loop: her poor self-esteem means she feels she has to work harder, which means less time to make friends, which hurts her self-esteem, and so on.
Still, although her self-esteem issues tend to come out unintentionally pretty often, she does her best to stuff them down and put on a brave face for the world. She appears friendly and cheerful, and is always selfless and caring, going out of her way to help others however she can and in any way she can. She's sympathetic to other people's fears and worries and is always willing to lend an ear, a hand, or a harp. She hates seeing people upset, in danger, or suffering (partially because, if it continues, she'll blame herself). In other words, she's very much a tiny mother hen, and just as much so to adults in need as children.
Her natural tendency to overwork herself, and the way she can get very very stubborn when she's set her mind on something, means that she can also overextend herself in the helping department. Look no further than how she responds to Valoo being tormented by one of Ganondorf's cronies, preventing Komali and the other Rito children from gaining their wings: enlisting the help of a total stranger, she charges into a volcano with nothing more than the clothes on her back and a grappling hook, single-handedly making it a good distance before being captured. And, even when she's rescued, she tells the guy with the sword to go on and not worry about her! For a young girl with some obvious self-esteem issues, she manages to have serious guts. Sometimes suicidally so.
However, she is just that: a young girl, one that's lived on an island totally isolated from the rest of the world but for its various postmen. She's naturally curious about the outside world and the people in it, and she often forgets herself and blurts out her incredulity ("Wow! You really do have green clothes and a strange-shaped hat...") or rambles. She's also very naive, like a lot of Zelda characters who believe the world is basically good. Unhelpfully, not only does living on an island in peacetime mean that she has no reason to believe otherwise in the first place, but the game she comes from is probably the least grimdark of all the modern Zeldas. Sure, Ganondorf still blows up islands for fun and profit and will gladly kill the hero if he's in the way, but even he gets a bunch of monologues giving him a sympathetic backstory. So while she's not totally ignorant to the concepts of suffering, the experience itself is very foreign to her, and evil for evil's sake isn't an idea she's at all grasped.
But this young, responsible, self-conscious, brave, innocent girl wouldn't have her life any other way. Which is why it's a shame it's about to be completely flipped on its head.
Strengths:
Physical:
Flight: That's levitation Holmes Like all Rito who have proven their physical and mental maturity by reaching the summit of Dragon Roost, she can fly. Much more than running, though, flying is hard and the technique for it requires practice. She can only fly for about fifteen seconds before she has to touch the ground and breathe again, which is enough to cross a moderate gap or reach the roof of a two story building. Using the wind to her advantage can increase this distance, but it's generally easier to just take the elevator.
Strength and Endurance: While flying, she can carry Link, who is at least her own body weight. Not for very long before she has to rest (only a few seconds at most) but still! Resisting that kind of gravity with just her wings would take some serious limb and upper body strength. And don't forget that she does run up and down a mountain for a living! She can't quite run marathons but, compared to the average 13-year old girl, she doesn't tire easily.
Mental:
Intelligence: Medli might be naive, but she's not stupid. She's no Death Note chess master but she's capable of quickly learning the basics, keeping up with complex concepts, and recollecting wide swaths of information. This is reflected most clearly in-game not just as an extrapolation of her time spent studying, but in how she speaks. I mean, really, the only other Zelda characters you see saying things like "atmospheric currents", "evolved", or "unsurpassed in her dealings" are all over twice her age. So while we rarely see her learning directly, it's safe to assume that she's pretty good at it, and that's a useful skill for her and her allies.
Skills: She's pretty good at various things too! Stringed instruments, ancient languages, and dragon pysch 101 canonically. Headcanonically, she is also the attendant to Valoo, which makes her second only to the chieftain's wife in terms of her importance as a woman in the Rito social ladder. Her duties as an attendant, preparing Rito children for their meetings with Valoo and girls to be the heir to her position, also give her responsibility for many Rito children. As such, she has a variety of useful domestic skills: she can sew and repair clothing herself, she's a capable cook, she brews a mean herbal tea, she can treat certain wounds, and she knows a thing or two about how to take care of kids.
Emotional:
Maturity: Bleeds heavily over from the mental section, but Medli's lofty responsibilities mean that she tends to act way older than she is. Again, this is seen in the very formal way she speaks, not just in "unsurpassed in her dealings" but in things like "please don't get offended by his manner - he has no bad intentions, I promise". But she's also shown to understand the value of hard work and diligence, she is diplomatic, she's not prone to panic when things look bad, and she's quick to accept her responsibility when she knows she's made a mistake or is putting someone in danger.
Bravery and Loyalty: As mentioned earlier, she charged into a volcano with no means of defense in the name of protecting her homeland. And then waded back into the danger zone without a second thought once she was rescued. Although this Medli is being taken before Link takes her to the Earth Temple, it's worth noting that she only hesitates at the idea of leaving her home to enter another dangerous monster-filled dungeon when she knows it'll mean abandoning Komali. She has a lot of courage, and she'll do absolutely anything to protect her home, her people, her friends, and the world around her. Even if it sometimes seems pretty suicidal.
Maternal: That "I wonder if this is how a mother feels" line really sums it up, I think. But as the attendant to Valoo, she has responsibility for a lot of other kids, and that duty means that treating everyone like one of her own children has become the default for her. The protectiveness and kindness she now shows to everyone may end up being as much of a burden as a boon if she allies with the wrong sort, but it is sure to get her friends in the always unhappy world of Luceti.
Weaknesses:
Physical:
Just About Everything Else: um ok combat-wise
Well, let's see: she has no desire to fight, she can't throw a punch, she can't take a punch, she doesn't know how to use a sword, and if she tried to use the bomb flowers that grow on her island she'd probably blow herself up. Little wonder that she went into Dragon Roost and the Earth Temple without a means of non-green-clothed defense, and even less of a wonder that she ended up getting captured and had to be rescued. No secret martial arts skills here, that's for sure.
In Luceti, her endurance and ability to carry things will be even less of an asset next to the amount of naturally strong, experienced fighters out there. Much less the Malnosso robots.
Mental:
Naive: Nothing changes that you're still just a kid in the end, after all. In this respect, Medli's immature in a lot of ways: she's totally ignorant to the idea that the world can be a nasty place for pretty much no reason whatsoever (she describes monsters out for her blood as just being "mean"), she's very very trusting (she asks a complete stranger to meet her alone then throw her across a room, and still believes in him even if he throws her into a wall cough), and she has zero concept of people being con artists or two-faced. Altogether, all it'd take to manipulate her would be to hide your true intentions and act pleasant, and she'd never give you so much as a squinty look.
Jack of All Trades, Master of One: Medli may have a wide variety of skills, and the ability to apply her knowledge to learning new ones quickly, but the only one that it can definitely be said she excels at is music. Otherwise, she's at most above average, and other people with specialties in those skills will outclass her pretty easily.
Social Failure: neeeeeerd Being a Mature Adult and working every waking hour means that it's kind of hard to relate to your peer group on more than a mother or teacher level. Just look at how she sees Komali, who the mother line is referring to, and you'll see that casual friendships and not-so-casual romantic relationships aren't really her forte. If she even sees them as that and not a mother or teacher relationship in the first place, which she usually doesn't.
Emotional:
Stress and Self-Esteem: Girl's a bundle of nerves. As mentioned in the personality section, she works herself practically to death but has serious self-esteem issues that tell her she still isn't good enough for Komali, the world, her home, anyone. While she acts happy and well-adjusted most of the time, the way she talks about and doubts herself shows how this affects her on a subconscious level at the very least.
In Luceti, taken away from everything she's worked for and is responsible for, this would likely be worse. And there's only so much stress you can handle before your pleasant facade starts to show some cracks.
Other People > Herself: You might consider this a strength, but she takes it so far that it really isn't. She'll gladly throw away her life and everything she loves to protect the people she cares about, even if there's no chance whatsoever of her succeeding, and it's impossible to convince her to change her mind. Just look at how she runs into Dragon Roost for an idea of how she will gladly not just break her expected social roles, which from what we can see of Rito culture are a big deal, but run straight into certain death if she considers it necessary to help others. And this can get her into big trouble at best, end up hurting the people she cares about even more at worst, and is certain to bring her a lot of additional stress and trauma in Luceti either way.
Samples
First Person:
Oh, hello again! I know I haven't spoken much lately - I have so much work to do, it seems - but I was told to take a break today, so I went out and admired this land's flora. It's so different from that of my home! My people live on an island, you see, and the goddess Din made it's mighty peaks dry and volcanic. It's well-suited to the Great Valoo and our gift of wings, but not really meant for plant life, so we have to import many goods.
Oh, but how I must be boring you all... so enough about my land. Please, tell me about yours! What grows there? What is your home like? And, if you don't mind terribly, where did it all come from?
I'm sorry, I know that's a lot of questions! Please don't feel as if you have to answer.
Third Person:
When she wakes, Medli is sure she still hears the note she had been playing reverberating in the air, loud and sharp over the distant sounds of crashing waves and rustling branches. But when she gets to her feet, she knows right away that it was just a hope and no more. Her harp is nowhere to be found, and even the attendant's dress she had worn every day for so many years has been replaced by something strange and uncomfortable. All she has left now are Valoo's scale and her foot-wrappings, both in a sad little pile in the shadow of the mountain, half-buried in what remained of the snow.
She doesn't need to see the snow, nor feel the cold it brings, to tell her that she's been far from her home for a long time. But, still, it is a mountain she's been left at. A fitting place to be abandoned, but what comfort was the landscape without the sounds of Komali's footsteps or the Great Valoo's mighty roar? How hurt they must be, she thinks, all because she had dropped her guard! And what will Komali, still standing at the cusp of adulthood, do without her guidance?
"Stay calm," she tells herself firmly, steeling her oddly sore shoulders and shaking those thoughts away before she can spiral any further into panic. "Remember what you've been taught!"
Right, breathing! Just like Komali's grandmother had shown her. One deep inhalation to bring one's mind to a focus, one long exhalation to expel unnecessary worries, repeat as necessary. And when that is done, return to work. So she breathes, in then out, then sets out to shake the snow off what remains of her things. Her foot wrappings are gathered and put on first, for the comfortable familiarity of the leather as much as not wanting one of the last remnants of her home to blow away. Then, she picks up the scale of Valoo that grants her the gift of wings.
Only then does she notice the impeccably clean book sitting nearby. When she picks it up, she turns it over in her hand, surprised by it's light weight. It's not as shocking to her as the presence of her name, emblazoned in huge letters on it's cover, which quickly leads her to decide to deal with that at a later time. It certainly might be a message from her captors, but then she'll need time to read it, won't she? And right now, she knows she needs to reach a goal before daylight fades and leaves her lost in the cold. Anything would do, as long as it got her on the right track: people, a port, or even some kind of clue of her captor's actual whereabouts. Perhaps they could help her better in person! Or at least tell her where her real clothes were.
She turns toward the forest, squinting at the horizon, quietly glad that the morning sun is behind her. It doesn't take her long to see them, strange structures jutting above the tips of the forest and through the rise and fall of the green-white landscape. Even she can tell it's a civilization, although she can only guess at who or what lives there. Not that it'll be a problem, she's sure!
So, renewed with the energy of progress, she takes a step forward.