Alice "Crane" Yamada

### Likes

Her being in control of her lifestyle, missions with coherence, being treated with formality

### Dislikes

Unpredictability, being called "Alice" or "Arisu" outside of her family, being treated like an ojou-sama

## Magic

### Principle

Binding, Summoning, Cursing

**Alice Yamada (山田 有栖)** also known as "Crane" or "Arisu", is a member of the Snake Tong's Osaka Security Unit. Hailing from a family who specialize in Binding magic with the use of both Japanese Onmyōdō and Shinto techniques, as well as and Chinese Wuxing*,* Alice, or Yamada as she would prefer to be called, is a specialist in binding familiars, binding locations with protective or presence detecting barriers, and even unbinding familiars from their masters, or unbinding a curse placed on someone. Due to the proximity of Chikabori and its youkai residence in Osaka, she and her predecessors were assigned in the city ever since they the Snake Tong gained a permanent holding there in the 1980s. While she hates combat, she has unfortunately been in many dangerous and violent situations due to her expertise.

## Background

The Yamada mage family is an old lineage, tracing back to the Heian era as important Onmyōji. The family were also avid travelers and researchers, which led them to different parts of Asia throughout the centuries. The decline of Onmyōji influence in Japan as well as the forced isolation of the country resulted in the Yamada being trapped out of Japan for centuries, resulting in them joining the Crimson Courts, while desperately making sure their family specialization of Binding was preserved. By the time Japan opened up once again and the Bureau of Mystics was established, the Yamada have already made contact with Fenghuang and instead of going back to their ancestral homeland, the Yamada followed Fenghuang and became members of the organization. When the Musashibou took advantage of the economic bubble in Japan during the 80s, several assets were acquired in Osaka and thus required security. The Yamada family's expertise resulted in them being assigned as the founding members of the Osaka Security Unit.

Alice was raised to continue the family business of protecting Snake assets in Japan through the use of familiars, location and human binding, and most importantly, Shinto techniques that worked well against youkai supernatural threats. Alice has had a more upper-class upbringing due to her family's previous monetary gains during the economic bubble of Japan, and was raised in a mansion, with servants attending to her whims and the living with the status as an "ojou-sama", much to her chagrin, as she prefers to be judged by her personal merits, not because of her family's past accomplishments. Due to her desire to be more independent, she has since moved out of the Yamada manor and into a small apartment near Cabaret Musashi, her main excuse being it allows her to respond faster to emergencies or incidents requiring her presence.

Due to her magic's nature of requiring preparation time and and a proper workshop were she can set up ritual circles for the best effect, she has disliked direct confrontations with enemies, and would normally send her familiars to fight for her. Unfortunately for Alice, she is still dragged into situations were she is in the frontlines, such as the Chikabori Blues Incident, where she had to go to the Youkai city itself to unbind a curse from one Isa Agnote, who was unconscious in the city, exposing her to the unconventional approaches to missions that Unit 9 members Mirror and Crosshair would take. After the incident was solved, she made a note to herself to take a week off whenever Unit 9 visits Osaka.

## Appearance

Alice preferring a bowtie whenever she needs to wear the Snake Suit.
## Personality

A woman who prefers to maintain an air of professionalism and seriousness, expecting this from others she sees as adults. Due to her upbringing in a manor, she prefers to keep things orderly and formal, and always speaks with politeness unless she is really thrown off her usual composure. She dislikes others outside of her family calling her "Alice" or "Arisu" since she sees it as a childish name, unbefitting of someone who's trying to give off an aura of mature professionalism. The main reason, which she does not share to most people, is that it sounds like a name out of a fairy-tale, which could be in reference to Alice in Wonderland. As such, she prefers it if people refer to her as Yamada instead. She equally dislikes it when someone forgets her name outright, certain Unit 9 members being a prime suspect of this. She always addresses people with -san whenever she speaks Japanese, but omits it whenever she speaks English, and uses a more polite tone of speaking whenever she is talking to someone in English. Due to her mother's native language of Tagalog, she also is proficient in it, and either uses Japanese or Tagalog honorifics when speaking to someone in that language. Her being trilingual is something she takes pride in, as she was always a studious learner. This also applies to her magical knowledge. For years she has combined both regular Sleeper schooling and magical education, as she took her role as a member of the Yamada magi and the Snake Tong very seriously. She dislikes it when people automatically judge her as just some daughter of a rich mage family, as she believes it makes people ignore her determined pursuit in her magical studies. It's rare for her to find someone who she can passionately talk about her expertise in in detail, but when she does, she makes sure to try and befriend that person. One example being Monika Bergmann after the Chikabori Incident. And while she disliked the unpredictability of her teammates, she appreciates conversation with a well-learned magi who has genuine curiosity for different magic.

Alice treats her familiars as precious to her, not uncommon in Conjurers and magi who focus on the school of magical binding. While at first glance, it might be because her familiars take a lot of effort to prepare and give to life, and that is one aspect of it, but the main reason is that she considers them as her own children in a way, and she swears each of her familiars have personalities of their own. Her favorite familiar is her Messenger Cranes, which is also the reason for her moniker in the Snake Tong.

## Abilities

### Magic

Alice Yamada is a talented mage in the school of Binding, combining Chinese Wuxing and Japanese Onmyōdō and Shinto techniques to not only bind familiars or other living creatures to her, to other people, or certain locations, but she can also bind areas of space and prevent people from detecting magical energy from within the area, or set up a perimeter that prevents outsiders from entering or even seeing what is hidden within the space.

She can create her own familiars from the elements of Fire (火), Water (水), Wood (木), Metal (金), and Earth (土), allowing a various selection of familiars for offense, defense, and utility. Her most common Familiars created are Messenger Cranes from the Wood Element, which is made of paper and can be easily carried by another person and as long as the person they want to talk to carries the partner Crane, they can maintain communication through any range, even across the Realms. The one drawback is that because of the potency of her familiars, it requires a ritual circle and other preparations in the area where the familiar will be created, as well as leaving her vulnerable to attacks as she channels the magic needed to bring life to her created familiars or "Shikigami". She can also bind existing supernatural creatures or even other people, such as youkai, to become hers or another person's familiar, which requires less preparation time, but also needs the familiar-to-be to be willing to become one, or be hypnotized into a more agreeable state of mind. She can also conjure entities from the elemental planes or other Border Realm sub-planes, and even Mythic Realm planes to become her familiars for a short time, but the latter is the most costly and she has only ever performed it a few times due to how taxing it is to bring a being from the Mythic Realm back to the Physical Realm.

Alice can also use purification rituals and other techniques from Shinto practices, including the usage of magical items such as Paper Talismans known as Ofuda, or a gohei wand for removing the Binding curses of other magi from those afflicted by them, although she must know the nature of a specific Binding Curse since not every curse can be purified with the basic rituals of unbinding. During the Chikabori Blues Incident, she was completely unable to determine the Forced Summon Familiar in its dormant state until Unit 9 discovered its true nature and also Alice seeing exactly what it does for herself. She can also bind magical manifestations of Shinto techniques into physical form, such as a giant paper talisman that she improvised as a raft so she and her allies could escape Chikabori through its canal, as she has full control of the Bound Paper Talisman and can move it forward like a vessel.

### Martial Arts

While Alice has received combat training for self-defense, and she regularly exercise to keep herself combat-ready, she prefers not to fight her battles directly and either have her familiars or allies do it for her. She still is capable of fending off opponents, but against a highly skilled martial artist,s he is at a disadvantage.

### Equipment

**Snake Key**

Alice's Snake Key is made to look like a tanto, and considered more of a tool than a weapon. The blade itself was made with special materials that are not necessarily strong enough for heavy combat. The pride of the Pranaja Empu smiths, the steel during forging blessed the property to disperse mana. Since it disperses magical energy, the blade of the knife can't be reinforced with magic. However, the reason why it's named a key is because users can create holes within certain points of a Bounded Field. Since the blade merely disperses mana and not outright destroys it, it creates thinned and weakened areas in a Bound Field that is more susceptible of being bypassed physically without triggering an alarm for the owner.

It can also be used against an enemy using Reinforcement on his body. If the Key is stabbed onto the target's arm, for example, the magical energy of the reinforcement spell disperses to other parts of his body and his arm is now more weakened thanks to the lower amount of mana for reinforcement.

**Hidden Gohei**

A ritual tool she keeps handy with her. It is a retractable Gohei wand for purification rituals and removing binding curses and spells from a target. It also makes for an emergency weapon, and was Alice's main tool in forcibly overpowering the Forced Summoning Curse bound to Isa by going against her usual composed approach and simply attempting to break through the curse by hitting Isa in the stomach and constantly casting an unbinding spell.

**S11 'BB' Bulletproof Body Suit**

Standard issue magic armor that Snake Tong provides its members. It is a black suit which was made to be bulletproof (tested with 9mm, 7.62, NATO/.308) and provides magic resistance, dispelling low level spells. It is considered to be one of the iconic uniforms of the Shiai-shi. The suit is made with a composite of multiple magical materials, a major one being Huohuan Bu Silk from a Spider Yaoguai. This makes the Suit durable (enough to withstand modern gunfire and magical projectiles), easily enchantable with magic, and has innate fire resistance. If the Suit was stained, one simply needs to burn the area with the stain and the mess will soon disappear without damaging the cloth.

**Shroud Tie**

Shroud Ties are standard issue magic armor and head protection, cleverly disguised as neckties that allow them to blend in with the Bulletproof Snake suit style. By pulling down the tie and channeling mana through them, the ties transform into balaclava masks that provide full coverage of the head and neck. The material is made to be as bulletproof as the suits and also provide the same magical protection. The Shroud Tie can be deactivated by the user removing the mask, and it will turn back into their necktie forms.

Alice has the standard issue mask, a featureless black mask that hides her face, save for the eyes. She has not customized her mask since she prefers not to even use it in the first place. The only change she made to it is that her tie is a bowtie instead of the standard one.