Marina Nixa

"“I didn’t attend Beacon to have fun! I came here to learn how to fight monsters! And, more importantly, to learn how to help people!”"

Appearance
Marina appears as a petite girl of average height, garbed in mostly black, navy blue, and white. With her default outfit, she wears a short, navy blue shoulder-cape with a black trim that covers her right arm up to the middle of her forearm. The cape also holds a small imprint of her emblem in black. This is over a sleeveless black waistcoat with navy blue buttons, which somewhat masks a white tank top. She wears black gloves which have prominent flared-out flaps that are colored navy blue, ending at the lower reaches of her forearms. Over her waist is a small black utility belt; the pouches are colored navy blue. In addition, her lower wear consists of a flared, black combat skirt with navy blue trimming that reaches the middle of her thigh. She wears black combat boots with blue laces. Stillgewässer is sheathed at her left side by her utility belt in a decorated scabbard.

Marina’s nightwear is a simple, loose light blue tank top and accompanying short shorts. When she’s alone, she sometimes wears light blue bunny slippers. On particularly intimate days, she wears a sheer, dark blue nightgown over a pair of lacy, navy undergarments.

Marina typically has short, flared black hair with dark blue highlights. She has thin lips and a button nose, with full cheeks. Her eyes are of a similar color to her hair highlights, though of a slightly lighter shade of blue. Her skin is pale and clear, while her build is slim and lithe. Her bust is very sizable for someone of her build, however.

Her emblem is an elaborate navy blue seashell.

Personality
Marina is confident and strong-willed. She is pragmatic and practical, often seeing the logical sides of things and always makes sure that a situation ends with an advantage being added to her. She is sometimes cynical and pessimistic, though this contrasts with her sense of moral justice, and she is an idealist at heart. She believes in the greater good and works towards ways to help others. Generally, she is a nice person. Take care when disagreeing with her, though, as you will be having a long debate.

Marina is very intelligent and gets high marks at school, though she has trouble applying learned lessons, especially ones that she doesn’t consider very important. She strives to always do better, though that sometimes comes at a price and she isn’t always right when it comes to what she defines as “better.” Sometimes, she just discards things that she doesn’t like outright. To wit, she is the type of person that creates plans for little things and requires herself to carry them out. She’s also the type of person that would sympathize with a dying person, but would intimately understand that if something has to happen, then it has to happen, and there’s nothing one can do to change that.

Marina is sometimes contrarian and very often critical. There’s much to be said about the fact that her personality and views would be better suited to politics than a hunter. However, it also says something about her that she chooses to pursue a dangerous, adventurous occupation rather than do something that might have better use of her skills. She is a hunter at heart and maintains that the best way to help people is to actively do something about the problems, rather than indirectly affect them. It’s the difference between a commanding officer and a lawyer.

She is very good at socialization and easily makes friends. Despite her propensity for serious subject matter, that doesn’t necessarily mean that her likes and dislikes can’t crossover with the interests of others. Incidentally, this lets her be a pleasant presence, even if she can be overly serious at times. However, this also leads to very easy fallings-out with her friends, and people might not talk to her for long periods of time if they find she’s said something they found to be contentious.

She has little vested interest in romance, though she attracts many friends and admirers due to her good looks and her aptitude in combat. This is not to suggest, however, that she doesn’t have any interest in romance at all.; quite the contrary. However, she realizes that her time at Beacon isn’t the best time to pursue such things, especially when she could be focusing on her studies instead. She sees no distinction between a non-platonic relationship with either gender.

History
"“Blue seas, born of dedication; she searches for her own path.”"

Marina was born as the seventh daughter of the owners of the Nixa Fishing Company, a contemporary partner of the Schnee Dust Company, owning a number of stocks in it. Her mother died soon after childbirth due to illness, and thus, Marina never knew her mother. Her father kept the Nixa Fishing Company going, focusing almost entirely on it as paying a lot of attention to his daughters reminded him too much of his deceased wife. Despite this, Marina reports to having a good childhood, mostly in part to her older sisters. Marina never had any corporate or political ambitions and thus had little interest in running the company that her father had crafted, leaving said ambitions to her older sisters, something that they were glad for. The less competition, in their minds, the better.

From a young age, she had always looked up to the hunters and huntresses that protected Vale from the Grimm, and she never lost her sense of awe for those heroes. This was in part due to the Nixa line having had a great number of hunters and huntresses that were prominent in Vale’s history. Incidentally, her father was something of a pariah in the family, having not gone to combat school and instead insisted on a career of business, despite having forged his own weapon. However, her father had a similar respect for the heroes of Vale.

As such, her father enrolled her in a prestigious combat school. Initially, she was allowed to use her grandfather’s old signature weapon, Kabbelung. She chose her grandfather’s weapon over her own father’s sword, at her own father’s behest and much to the delight of her grandfather. Gradually, she was able to craft her own weapon, Stillgewässer, after a number of iterations. Marina continues to improve on Stillgewässer’s design, optimizing it for her evolving needs.

In school, Marina was moderately popular and never felt like she was out of place, owing to her good looks and pleasant personality, though she did get into conflicts with a lot of the people she disagreed with. Graduating a year early due to high marks, this easily set her up to be invited to the prestigious Beacon Academy.

Abilities
Marina is a very versatile fighter, competent in both ranged and close-quarters combat, though not necessarily better than those who are practiced in one of those categories. However, she cannot overpower anyone by sheer force, so she is truly in her element when she can take an enemy by surprise. As such, many of her moves and abilities are stealth-based and revolve around finding weak spots to exploit in enemies. She is nimble and moves fast, and thus her close-combat capabilities involve a lot of running and sliding, mainly to avoid getting hit as she has low constitution.

Marina’s signature weapon is a DERS (Dust-Edged Rifle Sword) called Stillgewässer. It is a combination bolt-action rifle and Ninjato. As a Ninjato, it is oversized and wide as the hilt alone is longer than both of her hands can hold, and the blade is easily a foot longer than is normal. However, the sword is exceedingly light and it can slice through flesh cleanly, quickly, and quietly. Its hilt is black with the folded wrapping colored navy blue. The blade is pure silver, as is the bolt-action handle. The blade is also separated into two segments, though it is difficult to notice it at first. The segment farther up the blade can fold into the other segment via a button on the underside of the hilt, allowing it to be much more portable - and this is, in fact, the way it’s meant to be when it’s sheathed. Ammunition is loaded into the feeder directly using magazine strips.

Stillgewässer has two modes: sword mode and rifle mode.


 * Sword Mode: In this mode, it is a long and very effective stealth sword that can affect massive amounts of damage, given time and effort. In addition, there is a trigger on the side of the hilt facing the user that activates a series of Dust-powered energy emitters on the blade, allowing for a full series of variable attacks, anywhere from fire to ice to lightning based on the type of ammunition used.


 * Rifle Mode: In rifle mode, the sword is flipped so that the blade is facing up. To actually active this mode, one simply needs to twist the hilt, causing the trigger to shift for easier access and forming a basic rifle shape. A soft leather under-casing is taken from the scabbard and placed on the underside of the blade as a grip. The rifle shoots from the end of the blade. It then fires Dust-powered ammunition that, when expended, is removed from the rifle using the bolt. It has optional add-ins, like a variable-zoom scope and suppressor, though it, by default, has iron sights on the tail end of the hilt where the blade is. Additionally, when Stillgewässer is in portable mode, it can be used as a sort of mechanized sawed-off rifle, similar to a very large pistol.

It’s difficult to notice, but the scabbard is actually just as much a part of the weapon as the sword itself. Many of the add-ons are stored in the scabbard, especially the leather underbelly used in rifle mode. Because of how quickly the change in mode needs to occur at times, Marina has become incredibly adept at swapping parts out very quickly.

It would be remiss if there was no mention of Kabbelung, the weapon that her grandfather had crafted and used as a hunter. It is a VPSH (Variable Projectile Sword-Handgun) based upon an even earlier design from an unknown point in the Nixa family line. A combination katana and matchlock pistol, it was relatively simple in comparison to many modern weapons. Its black hilt held a trigger just underneath the blade guard and a barrel that jutted out from said blade guard. Pulling the trigger would let the gun portion of the sword fire Dust-based ammunition. The blade was long and silver, seeming to be incredibly sharp even after decades of service. It was kept in a highly decorated sheath.

Marina is fairly competent at utilizing her Aura, though she is not as good as many others when using it. Her Semblance allows her to enter a state wherein she can move very dextrously, which allows her to move quickly and dodge attacks, as well as quickly swap out parts of her weapon. This is also useful for scaling structures and circling her opponents.

Misc.

 * Marina is an excellent swimmer.
 * Marina is a terrible cook.
 * Marina has a wonderful singing voice, though any time she tries to sing, it’s always when she’s sick and can’t use her voice.
 * Marina has a large number of clothes and outfits due to her secret love of fashion.
 * Marina knows how to play the violin.

Trivia

 * Marina is loosely based on the main character of Hans Christian Andersen’s The Little Mermaid.
 * Marina’s name is derived from the German word “marine” which means “navy” in English.
 * Marina’s last name Nixa is derived from the German word “nixe” which means “mermaid” or “water nymph” in English.
 * Stillgewässer is a German word meaning “still waters.” It is also somewhat of a pun, as the word “still” is similar to the German word, “stille” which means “silent.”
 * Kabbelung is a German word meaning “crosscurrent.”