Zesty

**Ruta Saphindale**, or nicknamed "**Zestyval**" or "**Zesty**," is an English-speaking hobby artist with a career interest in illustration and creating a webtoon comic. They particularly love playing JRPG games, creating OCs (original characters), as well as drawing very cute things of all kinds!

Their icon in particular is both an OC and a Vtuber persona all in one - an OC based on the Chinese Zodiac of the Ox. Zesty is primarily a Vartist, and does not stream.

## Personality

Zesty's personality can be described as shy, but very sweet and supportive. Depending on how much they know you, they can be either quiet and reserved or be very cheerful, flirty, and a bit of a tease as well, though they're also plagued by a case of anxiety. In addition, they're a especially hard worker when it comes to drawing illustrations, putting huge amount of effort to make each of their pieces the best they can be, and train their skills to eventually become on the level of professional artists! However, they're often plagued by procrastination and the real life grind, so it sometimes takes a while for their pieces to be released.

They also have a love/hate relationship with gacha games, though in particular, they have a particular fondness for a Cygames x Nintendo collaborated gacha game involving royalty and dragons...

## Lore

In the future of 25XX within a large space colony traveling the Sea of Stars, a certain Blessling Ox was chosen and trained to be one of the 12 Zodian Generals, a government-sanctioned group consisting of particularly unique individuals from different nations, languages, and Zodiac species designed to solve problems on a multiple nation-wide scale, whether through political matters, public safety, and even military warfare, all so to lead the surviving members of humanity to a prosperous revival of a golden age.

At a young age, this young heir of the wealthy Saphindale family of Scandinavian origin underwent harsh training and naturally excelled at many types of skills in preparation as one of the future 12 leaders of humanity. In public, they're often described as a "polite, and remarkable individual." In private, however, this child went through an uncomfortable and rough childhood, undergoing an identity crisis at one point until a cherished childhood friend gave this heir the courage to change into someone "he," or rather... *she* wanted to be.

Years later, this heir'ess' attends a famous military academy sanctioned by the government alongside many of her 12 Zodian colleagues, officially noted by others to be the unofficial face of the famous Zodian Generals. In public, she's a very polite and kind lady with quite a bit of cunning, though seemingly restrained. In private, however, she's... much less restrained around her friends and colleagues. When asked about it, her 12 Zodian colleagues, or rather in her apparent term "ZFFs" (Zest Frens Foreva! ... she notably has quite a naming sense), often fondly or exasperatedly describes her as a "sweet bouncy flirty fluffball." (a term affectionately coined by Zhen Yin, the Blessling Rat chosen to be the Zodian General of the Rat.)

What's more unknown even to her colleagues, Ruta secretly plays a Vartist persona on the web as a hobby, all the while practicing on a skill her family neglected to teach her about; drawing art, or rather in particular, digital illustrations that she wanted to paint, but was forbidden to do.

In practice of the skills she learned, she's notably trained in the art of warfare; utilizing a combination of explosive elemental mana and martial arts, Ruta prefers to get up close and personal to deal massive damage to her opponents, essentially letting her firsts do the talking in tandem with her pacted mana spirit.

## Memes

* Alexa, play Despacito.
* F
* No U!!!
* OWO/UWU
* Like, Omagah
* Peebo

## Trivia

### OC Lore Details

* Despite the seemingly vague answers the OC character Ruta jokingly gave, she is very implied to be a transwoman.
* The reason for her left broken horn and her scar is related to an incident in Ruta's childhood with her parents in regards to her identity crisis, culminating in distancing herself from her family afterword. Not one word was spoken between them ever since.
* Ruta, despite her nickname "Zesty," is an entirely different person from her character designer Zestyval, though the personalities can be kind of similar.
* As noted, due to use of Ruta as both an OC and a Vartist icon persona for her character designer, they can be both be referred to at the same time as "Zesty," awkward as it sounds.
* Magic, or called Mana in Ruta's universe, does exist. Rather, it exists as a genius loci hivemind capable of making symbiotic pacts with living beings that want to utilize the former's powers. Humanity is one of the many species in the galaxy to integrate this pact system into their society.
	+ In Ruta's case, she's pacted to an Ox-like Mana Spirit called Valdemar, coined by Ruta in nostalgia of her Scandinavian, Swedish ancestry.
	+ Mana, in order to forge pacts with mortal beings such as Ruta, needs create a contract of sorts with them; in exchange for their power, the mortals need to offer one of their internal bone pieces as vessels. Morbid as it sounds, Mana just only needs to possess a part of their bone structure in order to materialize their powers into the Mortal Realm; without a internal vessel of sorts, the mortals cannot use mana at all. The mortals share their life force with the Mana in order for the latter to fully manifest from their home realm to the Mortal Realm as part of their pact.
		- For Ruta, under duress in a dangerous situation, she made a pact with Valdemar to save herself from death. In turn, Valdemar possesses her spine and fully manifests as an official pacted spirit serving as an physical epitome of her Will. Afterwards, she gains a large scar from behind that reaches from her lower facial cheek to her lower back.
* While she does have a birthname different from her current name as Ruta, she vehemently prefers to not acknowledge it.
* Blesslings are basically metahumans who attained the power to synergize and use Mana in Ruta's universe thanks to becoming "Blessed" by a mysterious figure 500 years ago. These Blesslings can be described as humans with beastly features based on the many animals of the Chinese Zodiac, such as Ox, Tigers, or Dragons.
	+ Eventually, the Blesslings live among the "Unblesslings," people who aren't born with a "Blessing." Despite the co-existence, tensions are high between the Blesslings and Unblesslings.

### Other Trivia

* Many people drew happy birthday art for Zesty during the first Group Drawpile!