EVERYONE knows about harpies, right? Women with wings instead of arms, and talons for feet, swooping down from on high to scoop men up, and eat or mate with them(sometimes both!). Uncivilized, often portrayed as crude and stupid. Nothing anyone wants to get involved in, right?
... yeah. That's the stereotype. THEN there's harpies like Shiwa.
She's definitely not like the stereotype in many ways. Excessively polite, she's likely not going to utter a single profanity or expletive. She seems taken aback by those uttered in her presence, even! So she's definitely not crude...
Nor does she have talons! She does, in fact, have normal feet, for a human. Nothing at all unusual about them, save perhaps for their softness... which isn't that unusual, if she's spent her whole life flying, now is it? Not that you'd know. Her feet are typically clad in some cloth shoes, if not sneakers, or on some occasions boots. The rest of her attire is often simple and practical... a plain skirt, and a light top. She doesn't seem at all prepared for colder weather, though, in her clothing.... but then, she is new here. Special occasions, on the other hand, require special clothes...
Another difference from mythological harpies? She actually has hands! Soft, warm, delicate hands, hidden underneath the soft, orangish-red feathers of her wings. These are rarely seen, but it's simply false to say she doesn't have hands. Absurd and silly, as well! That's how she'd put it!
However, some things ARE true. For one, Harpies are VERY lightweight! In Shiwa's case, part of this is due to her stature... she's only four feet ten inches tall! At the same time, though, she's STILL lighter than she should be. This is because, like a bird, she has hollow bone structure. She weighs a lot less than a human her size would, simply because of that! However, she's not as fragile as you might expect, due to the other oddities of her bone structure. She's still a bit more breakable than a human, but not by as much as you'd expect!
Really.... she's a STRIKING example of the species. No one is quite sure which bird her variant mimics, but it's definitely impressive. Her feathers are a gorgeous orangish-red shade on her wings, darkening toward the tips. Her tail is silky, and floofy, and almost seems more made up of hair than of fine, slender feathers! Definitely not a steering feature, that. Her own hair is black, but as it nears the tip it turns red.... this, curiously enough, is her natural shade, and as her hair gets longer and longer it gets redder and redder. Her eyes are bright, striking green, and made even more so by the fact that her face has a pair of red mask-like markings, described by biologists as 'war paint', surrounding her eyes. Her skin on the other hand is a light, Asian tone, perhaps Japanese, or from somewhere else in eastern Asia. Under her eyes, she sports a pair of dark blue markings that are apparently a clan indicator. All in all, she's gorgeous....
So why, pray tell, is she so damned SHY!?
Well... she's new here, she speaks the language but is uncertain of herself, and she doesn't exactly fit in, now does she? She came here to learn, but she's never had much education before. Sure, she's learned fast, and passed through elementary levels in a couple of years rather than six, and middle school in one. High school and college await! (she can be played at either level, really). The thing is, though, that she learns too FAST to make friends in school. Still, she's finally slowing down some, so maybe she'll get the chance...
((She LOOKS to be about seventeen, but her actual age could be rather higher than that. Anything else, you can learn via RP. Feel free to PM me if you're interested, but please, not ICly. And, yeah, profile's not the best, but I'm tired.))
Upon observation, she seems to regard fairies and micros as food... natural prey, perhaps? As well, she never squeaks, peeping instead. She seems more comfortable around those closer to her size, if not smaller than her. She's capable of consuming someone larger than her and dragging them up into a tree(climbing OR flying). And she cleans her wings with her tongue, which feels a bit sticky to the touch. The better for trapping fae, perhaps? Also, she seems to sniff at.... well, everything unfamiliar.
Alt by
The_Tower
Art is of Shiwa, by
THIS fantastic artist here. Go check her work out!
