Torumarin Houseki

Marin at her debut

> *"I'm going to be blunt... this is the reality of the world we live in. Our world.. is a cruel world of endless warfare."*
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> - Marin to Banshee Hashiame
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**Marin** (full name: **Torumarin Houseki**,宝石トルマリン; *Houseki Torumarin*) is a kunoichi of Konohagakure's Houseki Clan serving as an ANBU known as **Spider Mask**. She was taken in by the force at 13, which recruited her for her talents and unique usage of her clan's Kekkai Genkai. As she spent her years in the force, she grew to regret joining due to the atrocities she was required to commit as a member. To cope, she leads a double life, alternating between the persona of a kind but forgettable Jonin and a cruel and overzealous ANBU agent until the day comes that she can finally leave the ANBU force.

## Background

Marin grew up without a father in the aftermath of the Third Great Shinobi War. She would watch the other families at the playground and say that none of them lacked a father like she did. During her later stay in the Academy, Marin's new teacher revealed that her father had been killed during the Eight Tail's Rampage during the war. At the time, she didn't understand the problem and was unmoved, but gradually began to feel a growing emptiness.

In the Academy, Marin found herself always the smallest, lightest kid in her classes. She didn't want to spend her time with the low-performing children, so she was forced to learn to punch above her weight class and became a taijutsu specialist. At age 10, she was top of her class, and was the second highest next year. She graduated with an A in all subjects and general exceptional performance, and fluently passed her jonin-sensei’s test.

After becoming a genin, her mother had Marin look through her father's belongings. Among them was a letter addressed to her by her father revealing how much he desired to come home to be with her. Finally, understanding the emptiness she had felt, she awoke Crystal Release and accidentally sealed her tear ducts shut, then sobbed herself to sleep.

To begin her career as a ninja, her genin squad began conducting missions. In her spare time, she practiced with Houseki Clan jutsus and worked to blend it with her taijutsu. During an escort mission, she was attacked by a chunin while alone, and broke his nose with a primitive version of Tourmaline Fist before fleeing. Her strange jutsu and acceptably tranquil personality made her a target for ANBU recruitment, and she joined the force almost as soon as she was 13.

## Personality

Marin's most prominent trait is her tranquil, mellowed, and somewhat drowsy demeanor. She is blissfully calm and outgoing, and thinks on very rational terms. She is a deep, heavy thinker; when speaking to others, she comes across as having her mind be elsewhere because she multitasks conversation and deep thought. She is a curious woman who is easily intrigued by new things: people, concepts, sights, et cetera. She is a compassionate person with a strong moral compass, which leads her to be highly repulsed by her career as an ANBU.

Sometimes, though, she seeks to be alone so that she can focus on her thoughts. Marin likes the moon, which she feels is quite lonely as well. Philosophically, realistic judgement is very important to Marin. Overestimation and underestimation are both equally as incorrect to her and she very much dislikes being underestimated. Marin believes in peace and despises war. She also dislikes Jinchuriki as a concept; unlike most who dislike Jinchuriki, her anger is aimed at the governments that use them and, to a degree, at the Tailed Beasts within.

As Spider Mask, she plays the role of a jingoistic, overzealous patriot to her village. Violently averse to basic human ideals such as bonds, this facade fully subscribes to the robotic personality that ANBU are supposed to display. She is unfeeling and violent, emotionally moved only by her love of country. She is highly sadistic, shown when she decided to make a training dummy out of Miroku after a brief argument.

In the aftermath of Burial Island, Marin spent years alone and approaching her limit, turning her into a broken and antisocial husk of what she once was. Whereas she only seemed to be spaced out before, now her mind is both truly in another place and nowhere at all. She frequently disassociates with herself and is strongly reclusive. When interacting with others, she has an explosive, overwhelming friendliness and her curiosity has become somewhat excessive. Her emotional stability has become shaky and she is prone to mood swings when stressed. In secret, she has developed habits of self-harm.

## Appearance

Marin is a pale-skinned woman with hazel eyes and straight black hair. Marin is fairly above-average in height and is a particularly curvaceous woman boasting a narrow waist atop wide hips as well as an above-average breast size and prominent rear (as noted by Miroku Oki). Marin is also particularly athletic in appearance. As an ANBU, she wears the standard black uniform under grey protective gear. On her face, she wears a white and black mask depicting the face of a spider.

Before the Second Stone and Leaf, she wore a plain, messy bob, but grew out hime bangs that covered half of her forehead and started pushing her hair behind her left ear after the war. A common motif in Marin's fashion choices in her jonin persona is black coloration and button-ups. Before the Second Stone and Leaf War, she wore black short-shorts, a button up shirt, thigh-high transparent leggings, and standard shinobi sandals. Afterwards, her outfit became a black, buttoned-up crop-top without sleeves and with a turtleneck collar. She wears grey, high-waisted tights, and knee-high shinobi sandals. Between the tights and her top, a smidgeon of midriff was visible, but after scarring her abdomen she began wearing a fabric wrap around her waist. She bandage-wraps both of her hands. In both iterations of her jonin persona, she often wore tourmaline-jewel earrings.

In Part 2, Marin has lost a lot of her musculature, causing her stature to shrivel and round out. Her skin has paled more and become sickly, and she has developed prominent eye bags. Her habits of self-harm have left her with a large number of cut scars on her arms and thighs. To hide the former, she has taken to exclusively wearing long-sleeved clothes. Her current favorite outfit is a black and white parka, grey uniform pants, and black shinobi sandals. Her calves and one of her thighs are wrapped in athletic tape and she has a single thigh pouch. She's taken to wearing a mask concealing her lower face and a black forehead-protector headband.

## Abilities

Marin is a highly skilled ninja, as shown by her ANBU recruitment at merely 13 years of age. After the Konoha Crush, the standards for Jonin had considerably dropped, but Marin's ability as a ninja fit within the original standards. She is exceptionally proficient in taijutsu which stemmed from a training regimen intended to overcome her diminutive stature as a child. Though she is no longer small, her specialty in taijutsu remains.

She possesses the Crystal Release Kekkai Genkai, a selective KG that spawns among Houseki clan members, and combines it with her taijutsu with destructive results. Her signature technique is Gemstone Release: Tourmaline Fist, which is a combination of Earth Release: Earth Spear and Crystal Release: Crystal Armour to create a deadly nintaijutsu attack. Furthermore, as a member of ANBU, Marin boasts notable skill in kenjutsu. Marin has a sensitive, scarred abdomen due to taking a heavy earth-chakra punch to the stomach later exacerbated by a partially-unhealed attack by suicide bombers.

### Jutsu

* Crystal Armour
* Crystal Release: Crystal Lance
* Crystal Release: Crystal Needles
* Crystal Release: Crystal Wheel
* Crystal Release: Growing Crystal Thorns
* Crystal Release: Jade Crystal Blade
* Crystal Release: Jade Crystal Hexagonal Pillars
* Crystal Release: Jade Crystal Labyrinth Technique
* Crystal Release: Jade Crystal Mirror
* Crystal Release: Jade Crystal Prison Technique
* Crystal Release: Jade Crystal Wall Eighth Formation
* Crystal Release: The Gods' Crossings Technique
* Crystal: Giant Hexagonal Shuriken
* Crystal: Hexagonal Shuriken: Wild Dance
* Earth Release: Earth Spear
* Earth Release: Hiding Like a Mole Technique
* Earth Release: Tearing Earth Turning Palm
* Gemstone Release: Tourmaline Fist
* Jade Crystal Clone Technique

## History

### Debut

When Miroku Oki's mother was killed by ANBU, he went off alone to reflect and mourn. Marin appeared before him and joined in, allowing him to vent his frustrations and ideas to her. He was almost immediately entranced by her beauty but managed to push it down to vocalize his frustrations with the village. When he was finished, their conversation turned to flirtation as Miroku promised he would take her on a date when he became the Hokage, to which Marin agreed. Shortly afterwards, they became something of friends, and Marin wound up joining in on a Rasengan training session between Kenjiro, Miroku, and Fumiko who accidentally revealed she and Kenjiro were Jinchuriki. Horrified, Marin feigned indifference but quickly fled. The trio attempted to pursue and find Marin to attempt to talk to her, but were unable to find her for she'd actually taken a relaxing retreat in the hot springs.

Despite her fear for Jinchuriki and disdain for the Tailed Beasts, Marin made the tough decision not to tell. She'd been sensing a great, bad omen for a while and felt as if the Jinchuriki would suffer it the worst. Furthermore, she sympathized with how stuck they were in their current positions and felt sympathy for them as people despite what they were. To that purpose, Marin appeared before Kenjiro as a member of ANBU and revealed her identity to ensure she could be trusted. She told the Four-Tails Jinchuriki that she would not be snitching on them for the aforementioned reasons. For a moment, the two even seemed to get along well, and the subject of Miroku came up much to Marin's humor. However, the Marin that appeared before Kenjiro was one of her Jade Crystal Clones that crumbled away at the end of the conversation. The next day, Marin returned to her brutal ANBU work and violently arrested a treasonous Konoha citizen in broad daylight. This almost caused an altercation with an unaware Miroku.

### Second Stone and Leaf War

Shortly before Konoha's forces moved out, Marin went to get some training in at the Forest of Death. Miroku showed up, so she quickly left a clone transformed into an Iwa-nin and hid. When Miroku attempted to flee to report the presence of Iwa-nin in the village, Marin confronted him as Spider Mask and demanded he left, explaining that the Iwa-nin was just a clone. However, Miroku stubbornly decided to argue with her, so she attacked him. The fight began with her aggressively engaging him with taijutsu, pushing him back. Miroku swiftly retreated and created a squadron of clones, which narrowly avoided a barrage of shuriken from the ANBU. However, one of the clones protected the real Miroku from a shuriken, giving him away; Spider quickly kicked him and sprung off of him, killing a clone attempting to flee with a scroll using an explosive-tagged kunai. Using a clone that survived a shuriken hit, Miroku then began to set up a Rasengan. The ANBU operative swiftly tried to interrupt him with a body-flickering kick. This kick managed to kill the clone, but the real Miroku jumped up and rained down a deadly Earth jutsu on her.

It turned out that he had killed a clone, however, and Spider threatened to report him, then called him an idiot. Miroku responded by saying that he'd rather be an idiot than a person like her, then said that if the world was full of people like her then she should kill him. The ANBU obliged, but found herself attacked by a Rasengan out of nowhere by two of the clones from earlier. She parried with crystallized arms, but the real Miroku struck her with fist hardened by Earth Release chakra, sending her flying. Despite the brutality of the blow and the bleeding it caused, Marin got back up. Willing to continue fighting but his energy and enthusiasm plummeted, Miroku put up a stance. Within seconds, the two were already in a bout of taijutsu again, in which Marin swiftly came out the victor after landing several hits to the face and sending him flying to the forest floor with an axe kick. Afterwards, Marin, feeling strong guilt underneath her facade, had a Crystal Clone approach and order him to leave. However, she had hit a clone, and Miroku admitted he was stubborn and attacked her with a earth tunnel attack which grinded against her crystalline armor. The tunnels split off, and one turned into Miroku and sent her clone flying with a punch. Mid-flight, Marin switched places with her clone and let herself slam into a tree, pretending to be defeated as she sat in silence.

During the Second Stone and Leaf, Marin served in an ANBU group moving somewhere behind the Recon Team along with the rest of Konoha's forces. During this, she is seen having killed an Iwa guerilla, whose body is flattened against a tree. Looking off into the moon, she thought of it as a bad omen as she declared to herself that war was troublesome. In the invasion of Iwa, Marin was injured by a group of Iwa suicide bombers. Afterwards, she was partially healed by Banshee Hashiame, but became aggressive as he spoke of his ideals of camaraderie and his self-pitiful attitude. She physically assaulted him, but was impaired by her injuries. Eventually, she chased the young medical-nin away.

### After the War and Burial Island

Some time after the war, Marin and Miroku met to have hot chocolate during the Winter. Marin began to space out for real and wish she were a lazy star, but Miroku suddenly snapped her out of it to ask how she felt about him. Misinterpreting him, she said she did not hate him, then began to space out again when Miroku got to the point and wondered if there was any romantic feeling actually. She revealed that she wasn't really interested and didn't have time for relationships, but reaffirmed to him emotionally that were he to become Hokage and free her from being ANBU, she would gladly take him up on their old promise.

During the events of Burial Island... *placeholder*

## Relationships

### Miroku Oki (Friend)

On the surface it is painfully clear that Miroku is romantically interested in Marin, initially based on physical attraction he was surprised to find out he genuinely really liked her as a person. Marin has promised to go on a date once Miroku becomes Hokage.

### Kenjiro Honda and Fumiko Akimochi (Acquaintances)

After Fumiko accidentally revealed that she and Ken were Jinchurikis, Marin made the difficult choice not to snitch, gaining the gratitude of Kenjiro.

## Trivia

* Marin has an excellent singing voice.
* Her favorite color is green and her favorite food is ramen.
* Marin has notably expensive tastes in food and for this she is a favorite customer at Ichiraku's.
* Torumarin is the Japanese word for 'Tourmaline', a colorful gem most often known for being pink. The name of her clan, 'Houseki' refers to gemstones or jewels.