Kaito

Nikola (Brother)

Padavina and Chise (Sisters)

Elderberry (Half-Brother)

Icicle, Sleet, and Lunelle (Half-Sisters)

## Application Sheet

Kaito was a gray, white, and sandy-brown male wolf with pale chartreuse eyes. He was the son of Malachi and Kaen, born in Chandor alongside siblings Padavina, Chise, and Nikola. He grew up not knowing his father, and, eventually, set off to find his father. He was unsuccessful, but after several years away, he returned and settled in a new pack: Aryn. There, his story continues. Kaito was created and RP'd by Aschefall.

His younger half-siblings were Elderberry, Sleet, Icicle, and Lunelle, who he never met.

## Personality

* ***Noble, Trustworthy, and Eager.*** Kaito has a strong moral compass that guides the decisions he makes. He has great concern for the welfare of others and will seek to right the wrongs that have been done to others, in whatever ways he can. He is chivalrous and noble, having been inspired by the stories of valor he surrounded himself with in his early years and in his travels. Kaito knows how dark the world can get and hopes to bring even a fraction of light to the wolves he meets. Kaito is trustworthy and reliable in the promises he makes; when he gives his word he intends to keep it. However, he is still learning to be careful not to overcommit himself and is prone to burnout when he promises others a little *too* much. Kaito is an upright and honest young wolf and while many of his morals have grown from what Chandor taught him as a child, they have been reinforced by his recent commitment to the One. While he is still learning about the God of his forefathers, he is eager to continue learning about the One and how he might devote himself more wholly to Him.
* ***Imaginative, Genuine, and Whimsical.*** Stories formed a huge part of Kaito's developmental years. As such, Kaito is a daydreamer and his imaginative nature often runs wild. He loves to think about the what-ifs and possibilities of the wolves and the world around him, and is easily taken by the beauties of the world. He loves to create dances, stories, and songs and does not shy away from sharing these with others to enjoy. While Kaito enjoys sharing the things he makes, he also loves spending time with the other wolves around him and listening to the stories they have to share. In both his practice of healing and storytelling, Kaito is genuine in his care for others, and there is an easy charm about him that may only be described as whimsical, even as his practice of medicine grounds him in present reality. His ideas are playful and perhaps, at times, outlandish, but Kaito doesn't know how to think in any other way.
* ***Oversensitive, Perfectionist, and Prone to Depression.*** Due to his deeply feeling nature, Kaito himself can be oversensitive to criticisms against him. Even if he tries to roll with the punches, he often finds himself awake at night mulling over things that were said days, weeks, even years before. He is easily hurt by rejection, and his perfectionist tendencies do little to help him here. Kaito pours his heart into the tasks he is given and will overwork himself to achieve his desired ends, even if he has already done a job that is "good enough". His failures tend to linger and loom about him. While Kaito approaches medicine with logic, he still has the tendency to let his heart rather than his mind dictate his decisions. Like his father, Kaito is prone to depressive bouts, which he often softens with humor or deflection instead of letting others into the deeper aspects of himself. He is quite guarded when it comes to expressing his emotions and though he is eager to lend a listening ear to others, he is far less willing to let them lend a listening ear to him.

## Pre-Group History

Kaito was born in Chandor to Malachi and Kaen and was one of the middle children in a litter of four. Padavina was firstborn, then him, followed by his sister Chise and brother Nikola. He never knew his father, who went missing and was presumed dead before Kaito was born. Despite his lack of a father figure, he never felt short on love. Kaen cared well for Kaito and his siblings, and under her influence, alongside Chandor's, he began growing into a creative and altruistic young wolf. During his early days, Kaito began to train under Tieru, Chandor's respected healer, though never officially took the task. He grew fond of the art of healing and when he was old enough to travel alone, Kaito left Chandor with the ambition to learn techniques beyond the ones he'd been taught in his pack. He also planned to explore the Domain, and the lands beyond, in search of his missing father.

So Kaito set off and travelled north. However, he quickly learned he was less than ready to be on his own. Traveling alone was much different than going on day trips with Nikola or his sisters. He grew hungrier as the days wore by and though he could hunt smaller creatures on his own, he longed for something more substantial. On a hunger driven impulse, he decided to try and hunt a doe he thought he'd found wounded and alone, but soon found the doe gone and himself on the receiving end of a buck's mighty antlers instead. As the beast charged, Kaito managed to dodge the attacks until he misstepped and was caught by a swing of the buck's head. The buck threw Kaito into the brush and reared up to strike him --

but the hoof blows never came.

A small group of nomadic traders had happened upon the scene and charged to fell the beast. They brought the elk down and saved Kaito's life. As they feasted on the kill and dressed Kaito's wounds, he began to learn of them and grew intrigued by their way of life. Feeling indebted to them for their heroics that afternoon, he decided to travel with them and devote himself to learning from them more than he already knew so he might give back to someone else in the same way they had given life to him. While at first they resisted, insisting he owed them nothing, Kaito was unrelenting, and eventually, the group conceded and welcomed him into their number.

Over the months of travelling together, Kaito learned the arts of medicine and survival. He discovered, too, that he had a penchant for storytelling and became known as their resident bard. He grew close with traders - and with two in particular, an older fellow, Wesley, who became like a brother to him, and a girl, Aria, around his age. As his friendship with the latter grew, so did a deeper care for her, though they never expressed any affection for one another beyond being friends. Kaito hoped he might one day work up the courage to court her, but he feared her rejection and losing the closeness of their friendship if she learned of his love for her and didn't feel the same way about him. So he stayed quiet, even as they spent more and more time together, and he gave more and more of his own heart away.

A turning point in the small group's life came when Kaito happened upon a small band of hunters from a nearby group of refugees. As he spoke with them, he discovered they had come from a place called the Blackwood Vale - and upon further discussion, he learned that this was the pack his father, Malachi, had been born to many years before. Kaito was thrilled - and deeply concerned when they told him their pack had been captured and their lands destroyed. They had lived under the paw of their captors until recent months when their empire had begun to crumble and they had finally managed to pull off their escape. They wished to start anew in a new place and a new land, and after talking with his friends, his small band decided to help them restart in a place they could once again call home.

It was a long undertaking but they finally found a place to settle, and both the band of traders and the wolves of the Blackwood Vale began to establish the valley they had found as a new home where they could settle and rest and live their lives in safety. They traded skills with one another, learning from each other, and it was now, hunting and healing and protecting alongside his distant relatives, that Kaito found himself growing more and more interested in the ways of these wolves and in the God who had delivered them from their land of enslavement, who they simply called The Shepherd. These were his family, and even though he had not found his father, he found wolves who seemed to bridge that gap between himself and the wolf he had never gotten to know.

His relationship deepened with Aria, too, until he finally worked up the courage to talk with her and confess all his feelings to her, but things did not go as Kaito had hoped. Instead, she reacted as he'd feared. She turned him away and insisted they would only ever be friends, and while Kaito did his best to accept this, he found himself hurt by the thought that he had grown as close to her as he ever would. Though things continued as normal, she began to grow distant, and he noticed her spending more time with one of the wolves of the Vale. She spoke to Kaito about him, and he listened, even as his heart broke. Aria began courting the wolf of the Vale in early fall, and they declared their engagement to one another in late winter. As spring approached, so did their wedding, and Kaito found himself leaning into the Shepherd for strength to pull him through to the end. He wished to be a good friend to her -- he wished to stay by her -- but seeing who he thought would be his future begin to set up a life with someone else ripped Kaito in ways he didn't know were possible.

He stayed for their wedding, but was approached by Wesley after the ceremony, who suggested Kaito leave and find his way somewhere else. Wesley saw how these arrangements were tearing Kaito apart, and wanted Kaito to find a place to heal. That couldn't be with the wolves of New Vale. After speaking with one of the elders of the Vale, he was directed to travel northwestward to find his family again, where he might heal in the land of his birth.

Kaito feared being separated from wolves who followed the Shepherd, yet as he prayed, he gained reassurance that the elder gave him wise counsel in suggesting he return to the Domain. And so Kaito listened and went to return to Chandor with Wesley as company until he reached the Domain. From here he aimed his course towards Chandor. Yet the Shepherd would not lead him there. After passing by another pack along the way, he discovered they shared a faith that sounded ever so like the one he had found in New Vale - and it seemed the Shepherd was telling him to stay.

And stay he did, beginning fresh and alone in the lands so close to the place he had once called home.

## External Links

* Official Application Sheet
* Aschefall's deviantART Gallery