Mara Moran

### Relationships

Achillean Kyber (close friend), Miles Kyber (student, estranged), Lucan (close friend), Alex Adams (friend)

## Other Information

### Debut

The Runner

Mara Moran is a fictional character created by Alejandro Pineda. They made an appearance as a major character in The Runner, as well as a supporting antagonist in The Kyber Realm.

## Appearance

Mara Moran is a person of average stature with a muscular build with short shoulder-length brown hair, tanned skin, and placid dark blue eyes described to look like pools of water. They are stated by Alejandro Pineda to not usually use gender-conforming pronouns. They wear a black vest over a plaid red and black shirt, as well as blue jeans and light brown boots laced up at the front. This outfit is described as somewhat nuanced and creative, as Mara is rather unusual for a trainer due to being rather young.

## Personality

Mara has a very reserved and serious personality, and shows little to no care for speaking. They revealed to strongly dislike socializing, and much prefer training, most of the time alone. They have also admitted to not understand social cues and signals, even going as far as to communicate using sign language with close friends as an alternative. Despite this, Mara is very lawful and strong-willed, and holds a strong sense of justice. They are incredibly loyal and protective over their close friends, defending them almost like an older sister would. This is what initially led them to train so many people in their world. They are said to have a hatred for cruelty, and due to this showed a strong distrust for Danny Herrera upon meeting him and has gotten into many different arguments with Achillean Kyber because of his lack of moral judgment. Mara is a major supporting character in The Runner, and acted as a supporting antagonist to Crystalland in The Kyber Realm.

## Abilities

**Overall Skill Level**: Contrasting their inferiority complex on their position as a Sentry, Mara is without a doubt one of the most skilled fighters in the Kyber Realm. Achillean Kyber, indisputably the world’s most powerful combatant, admitted several times that their defensive techniques and abilities far exceed his own and that they are one of few people with strength that rivals his own. Miles Kyber claims that when their confidence is at its fullest, Mara is the stronger of the two.

**Master Hand-to-Hand Combatant**: Mara possesses incredible skill in hand to hand fighting, able to put Jaime Payne, a talented martial artist with a powerful physique, on the back-foot to the point of lethally pressuring him. They specialize in strong kicks, punches, and jabs with all of their body to quickly incapacitate the opponent. However, Mara’s talent truly shines when protecting themselves from oncoming attacks given their passive nature and distain for reckless action.

**Immense Speed and Reflexes**: Mara is incredibly fast and agile, showing to be capable of moving at incredible speeds when in combat. They showed this skill by effortlessly blitzing and killing Levin, a member of the Dozen and by extension the twelfth most powerful hyper-entity in existence, in a single blow. Because of the little time it takes them to swing a sword, Mara is also able to perform large sweeps with in quick succession, forming winding patterns in the air with the effect. They even displayed the ability to contend with Azuma, one of the fastest beings in existence, for an extensive period of time.

**Immense Strength**: Mara possesses superhuman physical strength due to years of training and conditioning. This is proven to be far above average, as they were able to hold down a skeleton with their bare hands and even proved to be capable of creating a small snow storm just with the swing of their sword. Mara was also stated by Lila to have the arm strength of a piglin brute, one of the strongest animals in the Nether. They also displayed the ability to clash with Achillean Kyber, a man able to pierce the bodies of four of the best combatants in the world and stop an enchanted blade all with his bare hands, in a sparring match without any signs of muscle strain. Said battle even resulted with the two breaking each other’s swords simply by unleashing respective techniques, despite the weapons being made of iron.

**Immense Stamina and Endurance**: Mara possesses a great amount of stamina from their training, which is shown several times to be way above that of the average person. They were able to fight their way through the Skylands, battle Achillean Kyber, and survive the chaos of the final stand subsequently while protecting Lila Frost for a portion of it. They were even the last person standing by the end of the battle despite nearly losing an their arm and suffering several major injuries. Mara also showed little to no notice of their arm and side being taken off by Alex Adams during their battle, even when their Repair Combat Art was inactive, going as far as to unleash a Personal Realm one last time in order to heal.

## Fighting Style

**Libero**: Mara is a versatile type of defensive player, being capable of playing several positions on the field utilizing their flexible combat style. They have displayed the ability to appear where and whenever their side needs them on the back side of their formation, and even having the unique ability to fend off attacks from several locations at once with their sheer speed and physical strength. Mara excels against opponents with fast and numbered attacks due to their defensive techniques, namely **Calming Splash**, which prioritizes countering and deflecting rather than aggressive retaliation.

**Master Swordfighter**: As their generation's strongest Flowing Style user, and due to an extensive amount of experience growing up, Mara is an incredibly skilled fighter, and is regarded as one of the greatest of all time, hence their position in the Warriors. This was put on display when they easily decapitated Levin, the same member of the Dozen that was overpowering Lila Frost, without the Lower Ranked hyper human even realizing it.Their impressive strength combined with honed speed, agility, and flexible techniques make them a formidable opponent for even the strongest of beings, including Azuma. They were even praised by the Higher Rank on numerous occasions, even going as far as to completely negate his **Shatter** technique and briefly overwhelm him once they obtained the Effect Manifestation Mark.

**Flowing Style**: Mara's fighting style is very similar to the motion of a dancer, and is primarily defensive, utilizing water-like patterns with the sweep effect in battle. They prefer to use only a sword for combat due to the extra maneuverability, but also carry a bow for ranged combat and due to Moran's extensive skill in archery. Their moves are mainly defensive, many of which resemble different aspects similar to the movement of water, and are therefore mostly defensive (as they do not prefer aggressiveness). Mara is incredibly good at using this fighting style, and due having incredible adaptability and reflexes, and even created their own technique that maximizes the potential of the style's defensive capabilities. Moran has been described by Lila to be "nothing short of amazing" in combat.

**Techniques**:

* **First Technique: Single Surface Slash**: a singular, large horizontal sweep in front of the user. This is powerful enough to slice straight through tree trunks.

* **Second Technique: Roundhouse Sweep**: the user leaps into a cartwheel and performs a circular sweep around their body, creating a wheel-like slash.

* **Third Technique: Constant Motion**: a continuous sequence of motions in which the user consistently moves in wave-like formation. With this technique, Mara is able to fend off attacks from even the strongest opponents.

* **Fourth Technique: Rapid Current**: the user creates a large, winding sweep in the air by moving in a relatively circular motion. The unpredictability of the attack, much like that of strong currents, makes it very difficult to avoid.

* **Fifth Technique: Crossing Slashes**: two large overlapping sweeps around the user powerful enough to block rapid and powerful attacks.

* **Sixth Technique: Whirling Storm**: the user slashes in a funnel pattern around their body while descending, creating a whirlpool of sweeps.

* **Seventh Technique: Counter Critical Thrust**: the user performs a powerful forward thrust, creating a shock to essentially halt incoming attacks. This was powerful enough to counter Achillean Kyber’s Branching Impact technique.

* **Eighth Technique:** **Downpour**: the user performs several straight downward slashes around themselves, creating a basin of shocks that can fend off a large group of opponents at once

* **Ninth Technique: Single-Second Fire**: the user darts around the opponent while firing arrows rapid succession, made to stay in form on shaky or unstable terrain. Due to its speed, it requires a great amount of agility to perform effectively.

* **Tenth Technique: Dancer's Elegance**: a form of movement in battle similar to that of a dancer, Mara splashes water around them while slashing in a vortex formation, creating a powerful sweep propelled by the splashing movement that increases with momentum.

* **Eleventh Technique: Calming Splash**: the personal creation of Mara Moran, the user draws a bucket and uses it to splash a large amount of water down at their feet. They then use its movement to block any incoming attacks or objects. The movement is sufficient to interfere with and essentially slow down or cancel the opponent's attacks completely. This technique was powerful enough to almost completely halt Achillean's **Shatter** technique.

Techniques