Ushio

Should one ask the right people in The Teikodian Empire about the city's greatest chef, they would not be directed to a gilded palace kitchen, but to a story of ash. Ushio once wielded knives with the precision of a master calligrapher, their chef's kimono a symbol of culinary artistry. The mask was for show, the specs for detail. But the Empire's hunger for grandeur devoured their small restaurant in a blaze of "urban renewal." Ushio tried to save it, fighting the flames until their back was scorched and their spirit broken. All that remains is the discipline of a warrior without a purpose. They heard a tale of Hotaru, a chimp consumed and remade by fire, and now live in terror of the heat that never quite left them, fearing that the next spark will not be from a forge, but from within.