sugary perfume.

A girl who works at her family’s confectionery, and whose personality doesn't betray the sweets she’s associated with. Relentlessly hospitable, she’s perfectly suited to being the poster girl of her family’s business. To the embarrassment of many guests, she lacks shame in voicing her appreciation for others — the intensity of her sincerity is both intimate and warm. She glows with whimsy and her kindness is widely considered to be her best quality.

Chao Xing doesn't have strong situational or spatial awareness. She doesn't passively register the color of buildings, the time she arrives, nor where the closest exit is. Whenever she goes there’s a belonging she’s left behind, a new bruise from running into furniture, or knocked over decor. She only has the capacity to focus when she is giving something her undivided and active attention. Because of this, she doesn't have observations to report outside of her intended tasks and struggles to follow conversations when multiple topics are being discussed at once. Interactions are the easiest for her to go through when she's being strictly managed by someone else. While she functions well when there is a set agenda, she understands that most people are unwilling to accommodate her clumsiness and characterizes herself as being a dense good-for-nothing.

Having low confidence in herself, Chao Xing takes comfort in fictional worlds where you can be liked for trying your best. She immerses herself in romantic books with happy endings, and gets sad reading stories where the characters all go their separate ways. While she can’t picture herself being in love stories, she uses them as ideal models of simpler, kinder worlds that she can reify through her actions.

With her compassionate nature and personal difficulties concentrating, those around her will assume that Chao Xing is lenient when it comes to measuring results. In reality, she sees herself as a prime example of why having good intentions isn’t enough. She’s listened to the disparaging comments of her peers and the frustrations of her family members her whole life. However, Chao Xing knows that her inability to meet the standard doesn't exempt her from trying. As much effort as she puts in, she agrees that she’s not up to par and diligently works to improve at anything she has proven competence in. She puts her faith into numbers and takes class ranks and grades seriously, as they’re closest thing to an objective scale that she has. Since she's not used to praise, she will readily allow others to trespass her boundaries if it means that she will maintain their approval. Being good to people around her is an obligation that she chases, even if it means not respecting herself.

miscellaneous.

• Her hometown is Yokohama, Kanagawa.
• She has a habit of speaking faster than she thinks, and regularly has to take pauses in order to fully process what she wants to communicate. Since her family is Chinese and she also has issues with auditory processing, many make the assumption that Japanese is her second language when it's actually her native language.
• She has a sister named Ai Mei, who is three years younger than her.
• Chao Xing is aromantic but doesn’t realize this, pressuring herself to develop bonds like the stories that she regularly engages with.
• Her hair is naturally black. Starting in junior high school, she began dyeing her hair to be the same color as the protagonist of a shoujo manga that she’s admired ever since she was a little girl.
• Her favorite color is purple, but her closet is filled with cream-tones and pinks so that her hair is able to properly stand out.
• She garners significant attention for her family’s store just based on her whimsical appearance and personality.
  • Most notably, she was a frequent subject of a famous photographer's series that took place on her street. This also led to her finding work as a model.
• Although she is considered a talented confectionist, Chao Xing's family doesn't acknowledge her as a proper professional as they dislike the unintended attention that she receives outside of her skillset.
  • While her parents don't mean to disregard her, they also don't want to encourage the current direction of her career. They disapprove of the push that scouts and recruiters have towards Chao Xing becoming a personality, as they value her stability and find the entertainment-world to be shallow and fleeting.
• Chao Xing sometimes uses a stage name with a different surname for public media, replacing Xue with Xiangcao (香草 meaning “vanilla”) or simply going by Xiangcao.
• She has a deep admiration for Otoha Ueha, who is a good friend of hers.
• Since the school dress code is loose, she doesn’t wear a uniform ribbon after losing it several times in previous years.
• Her cheeks are always rosy.
• She collects Sugarbunnies merchandise from Sanrio, with Shirousa and Primausa as her favorite characters.
• Cherries are her favorite fruit.
• Some of her hobbies include collage and solving jigsaw puzzles.