Profile
Haruka
Human (Japanese)
28 years
Cis Woman+ (she/they)
Lawful(?) Good
Oath of Redemption Paladin
As the daughter of the disgraced paladin Ichiro Chibana, Haruka has made it her life goal to restore honor to the family name through kindness and peace. As a nobleman's daughter, she is a bit sheltered -- but not naive. She will strive to do her best in redeeming those who have fallen down the wrong path, but she is not above using her blade when the situation calls for it.
Together, she and her family's sword, Hanabira, will fight to right her father's wrongs and redeem the family name.
Haruka is an overall kind and gentle woman. She believes that every single person is capable of goodness and that there is no soul in this world that is beyond redemption. Before taking up her family’s sword, she worked as a warden for Waterdeep’s prison where she saw firsthand the kinds of people who wind up in imprisonment, and she worked hard to rehabilitate those that she could. The experience taught her patience above all else, as well as how to navigate difficult conversations with near-strangers.
Haruka desperately needs to be needed. She enjoys taking care of people primarily because she feels it gives her a purpose. She has a bad habit of trying to shoulder the burdens of everyone close to her, and an even worse habit of trying to understand and help every “bad” person she meets towards redemption. The cunning evil figure may be able to use that kindness against her – but that kindness should not be mistaken for naivety.
Additionally, Haruka is an optimist to an unhealthy degree. She always tries to look on the bright side – and therefore, very rarely allows herself to feel negative emotions… Until there’s too much to keep bottled up away, that is!
She could be considered loosely lawful good. She’ll try to follow the rules and the law as best she can, but she isn’t above breaking these if she finds it necessary
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It's a longsword with cherry blossoms and the name "千花" etched into the steel of its blade.
Ethereal Resolve. Gives rsistance to being being charmed. If you resist against a charm effect you gain +1d6 damage on your next attack roll.
Polearms for throwing, when she needs a bit of range.
A shield made of wood and steel and painted dark blue. It bears her family crest in the middle.
- gold star stickers
- bedroll
- hempen rope
- tinderbox
- torch
- mess kit
- like 10 silver bars
1 Action
Touch
Instantaneous
Healing
You touch a living creature that has 0 hit points. The creature becomes stable. This spell has no effect on undead or constructs.
1 Action
5 ft.
Instantaneous
1d6 Radiant
You utter a divine word, and burning radiance erupts from you. Each creature of your choice that you can see within range must succeed on a Constitution saving throw (DC 13) or take 1d6 radiant damage.
The spell’s damage increases by 1d6 when you reach 5th level (2d6), 11th level (3d6), and 17th level (4d6).
1 Bonus Action
Self
Concentration, 1 minute
1d6 Fire
The next time you hit a creature with a melee weapon attack during the spell’s duration, your weapon flares with white-hot intensity, and the attack deals an extra 1d6 fire damage to the target and causes the target to ignite in flames. At the start of each of its turns until the spell ends, the target must make a Constitution saving throw. On a failed save, it takes 1d6 fire damage. On a successful save, the spell ends. If the target or a creature within 5 feet of it uses an action to put out the flames, or if some other effect douses the flames (such as the target being submerged in water), the spell ends.
At Higher Levels. When you cast this spell using a spell slot of 2nd level or higher, the initial extra damage dealt by the attack increases by 1d6 for each slot.
1 Action
Touch
Instantaneous
1d8 + 3 Healing
A creature you touch regains a number of hit points equal to 1d8 + your spellcasting ability modifier. This spell has no effect on undead or constructs.
When you cast this spell using a spell slot of 2nd level or higher, the healing increases by 1d8 for each slot level above 1st.
1 Bonus Action
Self
Concentration, 1 min
1d4 Radiant
Your prayer empowers you with divine radiance. Until the spell ends, your weapon attacks deal an extra 1d4 radiant damage on a hit.
1 Bonus Action
60 ft.
Concentration, 10 min.
Buff
A shimmering field appears and surrounds a creature of your choice within range, granting it a +2 bonus to AC for the duration.
1 Bonus Action
30 ft.
1 min.
Buff
You ward a creature within range against attack. Until the spell ends, any creature who targets the warded creature with an attack or a harmful spell must first make a Wisdom saving throw. On a failed save, the creature must choose a new target or lose the attack or spell. This spell doesn't protect the warded creature from area effects, such as the explosion of a fireball.
If the warded creature makes an attack, casts a spell that affects an enemy, or deals damage to another creature, this spell ends.
1 Action
90 ft. / 20 ft.
1 minute
Unconscious
This spell sends creatures into a magical slumber. Roll 5d8; the total is how many hit points of creatures this spell can affect. Creatures within 20 feet of a point you choose within range are affected in ascending order of their current hit points (ignoring unconscious creatures).
Starting with the creature that has the lowest current hit points, each creature affected by this spell falls unconscious until the spell ends, the sleeper takes damage, or someone uses an action to shake or slap the sleeper awake. Subtract each creature’s hit points from the total before moving on to the creature with the next lowest hit points. A creature’s hit points must be equal to or less than the remaining total for that creature to be affected.
Undead and creatures immune to being charmed aren’t affected by this spell.
At Higher Levels. When you cast this spell using a spell slot of 2nd level or higher, roll an additional 2d8 for each slot level above 1st.
- Before Haruka, there was Ichiro Chibana. Ichiro was the heir to a long lineage of paladins & prison wardens, and the Chibana family was a very well-respected noble family in Waterdeep. Ichiro would eventually take up the family sword and take an Oath of Devotion, just as his father had before him. However, he would break his oath at the age of 34, when he slayed an innocent & defenseless citizen for, allegedly, cheating Ichiro out of his money in a game of cards. This singular action of rage and hatred stole away his paladin’s light and set the Chibana family on a darkened path.
- To cover for his crime, Ichiro began to pay the city police for their silence. He withdrew himself from the public eye and pushed anyone around who would dare speak against him, which would more than once end with him silencing their voices permanently. Between this and his inheritance of the role of Waterdeep’s prison warden – as well as his overall unfriendly attitude – the Chibana name grew more feared than respected.
- Still, despite it all, Ichiro took a wife in one Aika Suzuki, a beautiful woman who would be sure to produce for him beautiful heirs.
- Haruka Chibana was born on the first day of Greengrass – Ches 19th – to Aika & Ichiro Chibana.
- Growing up, Haruka was taught that the Chibana family was the most important bloodline of them all. She was told that other people are beneath her, that her mere pedigree put her ahead of the crowd. This was all her father’s doing, of course. But her mother also taught her to be kind. She learned to treat every living being as if its life was just as important as her own.
- These conflicting ideals existed simultaneously for her, though it confused her more than anything. If everyone is equal, then why is it when she visits the prison with her father, all of the inmates are too afraid to look her in the eye?
- (Something would click, one day, when one of her childhood friends denounces her. His father was arrested and sent to the prison her father wardens, and he’s been close to starving to death since he arrived. Haruka questions if anything her father says is worth listening to after this.)
- Haruka’s little sister, Kazue, would be born four years after Haruka – though Haruka would call her her little brother at first. Kazue is the opposite of everything Haruka is. If Haruka could hardly call herself a Chibana, then Kazue is a Chibana through and through. She’s prickly, competitive, mean-spirited, and likes to feel superior to others. But even so, she’s Haruka’s little sister, and Haruka only ever sees the good in her.
- In her teen years, Haruka studied combat, as is customary for the Chibana family. But there was no great push to become a knight like there had been for Chibanas of the past – Ichiro was ashamed of his broken oath and would rather let this tradition go. Still, that wouldn’t stop young Haruka from dreaming of traveling the world and defeating evil!
- No, Haruka’s only job as the heiress to the Chibana name is to marry someone with more money – something her father says should be easy for her, considering her beauty. Her little sibling would inherit the role of prison warden, and Haruka will marry and continue the bloodline… And the prospect of all of this made her feel empty inside. She can understand not becoming a knight, but she’s been to the prison and she’s met with the inmates! She could run it far better than her father ever could. She knows this for a fact.
- To make matters more complicated, Kazue tells Haruka that she thinks she’s a girl when the two are 14 and 18, respectively. Haruka is nothing but supportive, but she knows their father won’t be. Not only would he consider a transgender daughter a great shame, but then he’d be stuck with two daughters and zero sons to carry his name.
- Seven years ago, Haruka was 21 years old and the year-long winter fell over the Sword Coast. This mostly didn’t affect the Chibana family, who were nestled warmly in their estate at Waterdeep – but as the winter dragged on and refugees began to flood the city from the orc attacks, Haruka once again found herself at odds with her father and little sister. Haruka very outspokenly advocated for Waterdeep to send aid to the outskirt villages, even going so far as to donate some of the Chibana fortune to the churches in order to help – but Kazue and Ichiro both believed that it was better to leave the villages to fend for themselves. This led to frequent loud arguments and incredibly tense, frigid air throughout the estate. No one ever came to blows, but it became difficult for anyone to speak to each other in the Chibana house.
- This eventually culminated into a 19-year-old Kazue deciding to join the civil war on the side of the Lords Guard. The night she tried to leave, a massive fight broke out between her and Haruka. Haruka called her an idiot for trying to join a war like this, and in tears, Kazue accused Haruka of not being able to understand when everything is just so perfect and easy for her. The statement stunned Haruka enough for Kazue to slip away into the night.
- For months upon months after the exchange, Haruka waited anxiously for a letter from the guard. What she expected it to say, she didn’t know. Something about Kazue dying in battle? Something about her being the very best warrior they had? Something about her going MIA? Anything? Anything at all?
- But there was nothing. No letter – not from the guard and not from her sister. Nothing.
- (Kazue did join the guard… But she would realize what an awful decision that was months later. Afraid of repercussions and too proud to return home after the stunt she pulled, she just… Ran away. Packed her bags and snuck out of the city the first chance she got.)
- Two more years passed. Haruka, now 26, watched as the man she supported, Dragult Neverember, was found guilty of embezzlement. The city was now bankrupt and had nothing but the scars of war to show for it. Haruka still believed in the cause above all else, and her faith in the idea that the people should be put first is unwavering, but the incident leaves her shaken and unsure of herself. More than anything, she just feels angry that her sister disappeared for all of this.
- But the war is over, and Haruka is left to pick up some of the pieces. Her father forbids her from going out in search of her sister, but that doesn’t stop her from poking around Waterdeep to try and locate her. She ends up frequenting a tavern often – the Yawning Portal – to acquire information from its passing patrons. She never learns anything especially useful (just that Kazue did in fact join the guard at one point), but she does manage to form a few lasting connections.
- More specifically, Haruka befriends Bonnie, one of the barmaids who works there. Bonnie takes an interest in Haruka’s search for her little sister, so she takes it upon herself to keep an ear out for any information she picks up from the patrons she serves. The information she manages to collect is few and far between, but Haruka is eternally grateful for any scraps she can get.
- More specifically, Haruka befriends Bonnie, one of the barmaids who works there. Bonnie takes an interest in Haruka’s search for her little sister, so she takes it upon herself to keep an ear out for any information she picks up from the patrons she serves. The information she manages to collect is few and far between, but Haruka is eternally grateful for any scraps she can get.
- When Haruka is 27, her father begins to press her to marry. He’s been doing that for awhile anyway, but he’s doubled down on his efforts now. It’s suspicious to be sure, and Haruka has no desire to enter a loveless marriage like her parents’, but she does at least try to uphold her duties to her family. She does meet with some of the other lords of Waterdeep, but she always comes away from their meetings feeling more like a piece of meat than a human being. She continues to drag her feet.
- When Haruka is 28, almost three years after the war has ended, Ichiro sits his family down at dinner and announces that the Chibana fortune is gone. He has spent every last piece of it on paying for the guards’ silence, supporting the war, and on his own gambling habits. Worst of all, not only is it gone, but the family is in debt, as they have continued to live on this lofty lifestyle without the dragons to pay for it.
- Haruka is shocked by this news. Her father once again demands – then begs – that she marry someone with wealth, the sooner the better. But all Haruka can do is stare at this pathetic man she once called a father and think about how his hatred and his anger not only left a black smudge on their family name, but likely kept the war on for as long as it was. There’s so much she wants to say to him – to yell at him, to scream at him, to try and get it through his thick skull…
- … Instead, she quietly stands and retreats to her bedroom and packs a rucksack. She decides, then and there, that if her father isn’t going to do anything to fix this, then she will. She’ll fix everything. The money, their name, the city… And she’ll get her sister back doing it, too.
- She doesn’t run away. Her parents are informed of what she’s doing, but not where she’s going. Her mother pleads with her to stay. Her father demands her to return to her quarters at once. But Haruka only offers them a gentle smile and tells them that she’ll send any money she gets at once. And then she’s gone, disappearing into the night just as her sister had before her years ago.
Haruka's father is a flawed and damaged man, she knows. Once, a long time ago, she used to look up to him, but now she recognizes that he's nothing more than a coward that uses his status to push others around.
Haruka wants nothing more than to right his wrongs. Her bloodline has hurt a lot of people, and she would like to try and redeem the family name. Even though Ichiro isn't the sole cause of all this hurt, Haruka tacks most of the blame onto him -- primarily just because he's a face that she knows. Still, she loves her father. Family is family. She has to believe that, if anyone can change, then so can he.
Still... Haruka worries that she'll end up just like him one day. Sometimes she looks into the mirror and only sees his face staring back at her.
Aika Chibana is everything a Chibana isn't. And it makes sense, really, when she married into the family. But it's hard to imagine gentle, soft Aika on the arm of hardened, stoic Ichiro.
Haruka knows there was a time when Aika and Ichiro really did love each other, but she doesn't remember it. It's not that they hate each other now -- they're just... Strangers. Strangers that live together and share the same bed. And that dissonance is likely why Haruka grew up to share more of her mother's traits than her father's.
Haruka loves her mom. She misses her desperately, but she'll keep her advice in her heart as she presses forward: just stay positive, and put one foot in front of the other!
Haruka's beloved baby sister. She would move mountains and smite the gods themselves for that girl. Even though Kazue is in every way their father's daughter and Haruka is in every way their mother's, the two still stuck together through thick and thin throughout the years. Haruka would do anything for Kazue, and she has to think that Kazue would do anything for her in return.
Kazue isn't home anymore. Haruka hasn't seen her in years. Part of Haruka fears the worst -- that something awful happened to her little sister and she'll never see her again. Regardless, Haruka refuses to give up hope. She believes in her heart that, one day, she'll find Kazue. One day, she'll bring her back home.
Though Haruka obviously made a plethora of friends during her teenage years, Bonnie is the first friend that she's made in a long time. The two met while Haruka was scoping out the Yawning Portal in search of Kazue and ended up protecting the barmaid from one of the drunken locals, and the two hit it off pretty well! They're both busy women, so it's not like they get to hang out much, but Bonnie keeps an ear out for any leads on Kazue for Haruka. It's something that she appreciates dearly.
The circumstances of Haruka and Clementine's meeting were less than favorable. Both jumped in to help an orcish woman fight off a group of thugs, but whereas Haruka tried to dispatch of them nonlethally, Clementine sort of... Set them on fire and burned them alive. It was an action that completely bewildered Haruka, but as she got to know Clementine over the course of the next day or two, she came to realize that the druid isn't bloodthirsty or anything. Just... A bit ditzy.
They're party members now, and ironically Haruka feels arguably closer to Clementine out of anyone else in the group, thanks to their shared interest in plants and flowers! She understands now that Clementine truly is a kind person. She's glad to call her a friend.
With Xavo being the wizard of the group (and therefore being entirely unarmored), Haruka feels especially duty-bound to protect him -- not that he has needed it much!
Haruka finds Xavo interesting. Between his connection with his (albeit kind of scary!) bat familiar and the way he blushes when he's called a "friend," she honestly finds him to be pretty adorable. She thinks he has a good head on his shoulders, and she's excited to talk with him more. Overall, she's glad to call him a friend, and she'll do what she can to keep him safe.
Though they've only known each other for a handful of days, Haruka gets the feeling that she and Harriet are two very different people. Harriet tends to rush into danger and cut down even those who have surrendered, which doesn't exactly jive well with Haruka! This disagreement in how to handle these situations has already led to one or two light spats between the two.
Regardless, Harriet is Haruka's party member, and she will do whatever she can to keep her safe. She doesn't believe Harriet is evil or bad or anything like that. They just don't agree, and that's alright.
Haruka would like to spend more time with Harriet and get to know her. She feels like the rogue is holding her out at arm's length. She'd like to understand her just a little better.
Sunia is a relatively new addition to the party, so Haruka doesn't know much about her. All she knows is that Sunia is on the quieter side, and that she's looking for her missing mother -- a goal that Haruka can empathize with. Even though she doesn't know much about her, Haruka has vowed to help Sunia in her goal -- and she means it!
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