Clouded Soul - Miao Profile

This is big spoilers for the first book obviously so if you don't want that, avoid. I got really indepth here and essentially planned out Miao's arc. The volume 1 outline is gonna be pretty easy to do after this.

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Miao, starts nameless as this is the name Jun will give her

20 y/o, Female Awakened Beast (White Tiger)

Appearance- About 5.6ft, fair skin, tiger ears and tail, wild neck length wavy white hair, striking blue eyes, tiger-like patterns on her torso, thick dot-style eyebrows. Wears rough wild-girl clothing at the start but will get fancier outfits.

Personality- Exceedingly prideful, stubborn, and full of herself. Rude and arrogant, but fiercely loyal. Tsundere as fuck. She’s the queen of cats and views herself as such, but will chill out a bit over time and with more interaction.

Aspect- Dominance

Affinities- Agility, Power

Overview- Born to a lone white tigress on a small mountain by the name of Cat’s Paw Mountain(named for its shape), Miao started life as a typical tiger cub. She doesn’t know her father(potential future drama point) but she shared the mountain with her mother for her first few years of life until a passing chaotic spirit attacked the mountain. Her mother sacrificed herself in the battle trying to protect Miao, though she was unable to finish the job. The death of her mother caused Miao to develop a sense of self and thus had a spiritual awakening at a remarkably young age for an animal (perhaps owing to her unknown father, if he was a spiritborn with a particularly frowned upon fetish for transforming and lying with beasts?). She took a human form and gained the Dominance aspect upon her rebirth, using it to subdue the enemy spirit and finish it off.

Now alone in the world, Miao took up the role of the protector of Cat’s Paw Mountain like her mother before her and began looking after the many cats who lived there. Whenever she wasn’t lounging around doing cat things with her cat friends or hunting, she would occasionally explore the nearby human world and sometimes steal things that caught her interest. As an awakened beast, she gained basic knowledge of the soul refinement process and somehow managed to get herself to the stage of Clouded Adept. She forged two affinity cruxes and is able to use them effortlessly with her aspect, but her race has made it very difficult to further her power and she'll enter the story at a point where she's locked in place.

Her arc will be Jun's first adventure after his training comes to an end, taking place southwest of Shimmering Bay in a village known as Low Claw. When Jun enters, the village is undergoing a plague of rat-like chaotic spirits that they just can't root out. I say spirits instead of just normal rats so that things look more dire and it's harder to get rid of. There’s some sort of crack in reality that they keep coming out of and their nest can’t just be rooted out.

The villagers are suffering from decreased food stores and have been forced to start overhunting in the forest at the base of Cat's Paw Mountain just to keep themselves fed. This food shortage has an effect on the cats on the mountain, forcing Miao's hand. The hunters of the village have been getting attacked by an unseen spirit they're calling the Vengeful Tigress or something along those lines and upon learning of Jun’s status as a Clouded Apprentice they petition him with a small magical reward for his advancement, something of a local treasure they keep in case they ever need to hire someone of his ilk.

Jun accepts primarily to help, but the prize is a nice bonus. To establish the weirdness of the rat problem, Jun will hunt down one of their nests and destroy it only for it to remanifest a few minutes later elsewhere in the village. It’s not a problem he can solve at his level of advancement, so he focuses on the problem he can solve.

He heads into the forest and soon has an encounter with the tigress, but the ensuing battle is very fast paced Jun can’t keep up well at all. He loses handily, only getting a glimpse of his enemy at the end of the fight. He is taken by her beauty but her comments leave him to suspect there is more to this story than he was led to believe. She makes a point of sparing him, spelling it out so he can tell the village to stop taking too much from the woods. They have a small discussion about it, but she refuses to budge.

Jun reports this back to the elder and believes that the tigress can be reasoned with, making it his goal to find a peaceful solution.

The next day, Jun heads into the woods again with the intention of sitting down and talking with the tigress. She is just as hostile as the day before, kicking off a second round. This time, Jun is able to keep up better and it impresses Miao. He’s able to land a few glancing blows this time but in the after fight he correctly guesses that she is still holding back on him. No reason to use all of her strength on a fly buzzing around her ear, she claims.

This time, they manage to have a discussion in the post fight where Jun gets some more details out of her about the state of the mountain. This is also where he names her Miao. They trade some personal details and you see a spark of chemistry but she won’t budge on allowing hunters in the forest. Jun simply remarks that he won’t stop showing up until she allows it, claiming he’ll be back tomorrow. She is somewhat excited at getting the chance to fight him again but plays it off and doesn’t admit to it.

The third fight is more even- until Miao starts making use of her affinities. Then the perceived gap becomes wider, but their talk after this one makes the most headway of all. They get to talking about her strength but she opens up about how she’s hit a snag in her advancement and she hasn’t been able to progress for a long time. He breaks down how common this is with sacred beasts and explains some of the lore to her and how she might work past this with a human contractor, but she posits he’s trying to trick her into this kind of relationship. He counters innocently that no, he’s just being honest. But he wouldn’t mind it if she wanted to tag along with him on his journey as his partner of sorts. Miao shows some interest in this but she gives the impression that she can’t leave her mountain, leaving it vague for now but asking if he’ll show up tomorrow, too. He will.

Let me cut in here to explain some background stuff.

There is a background plot happening at the same time as this. Right as Jun sets out from his training with Wufei Ren, Sasei Li will have a mini chapter that paints some of the bad guy's motivations for the next few books. He summons his son, Shan, and informs him that there's been sightings of a female white tiger sacred beast at the designated region. This is very surprising and not something you hear of often in Little Haven. Estimates her power level as Clouded Adept at best, and he means for his son to take this tigress as his wife. Binding their clan with one of the most powerful varities of sacred beast might be enough to earn them favor with the main family, so he commands Shan to make it happen.

Because of honor he insists that Shan not go and do so himself but instead pick one of his cousins to lead a strike team to capture the beast. Shan has a moment to show his nature here as he thinks it would be better if he approached genuinely and made an actual appeal, bringing up the benefits a spirit would gain from the marriage, but Li will lecture his son in the main discipline of their clan- control. They don't appeal, they take what they want, and this tigress is no exception. Besides, the tigress should be honored to marry into the Sasei clan. Shan will hesitate, showing some of his true character but ultimately comply, picking out a cousin of his and some men to send that will appear halfway through the arc.

After the end of the third day we’d briefly change perspective to a scout that reports to the big bad of the arc, someone skilled in veiling his power so he hasn’t been caught by them. The Sasei clan has been observing this as it develops and there’d be a little mustache twirl moment where the bad guy is like we’ll wait and see if he’s this kid is able to tire her out fully one of these days and make their job easier. Tells minion to keep them posted.

Flashforward to the sixth fight in as many days and Jun is seriously keeping up. Miao’s attitude has changed a lot toward him, being open and friendly during their battle. She’s never had someone so strong to face off against, and even though he’s still weaker than her, it’s more fun than she’s ever had. She’s left about half drained this time. After the fight, they talk about the situation with the village. It’s not getting better. Miao feels bad now but tries to brush it off, but Jun’s empathy is rubbing off on her.

This will be where he springs his plan on her, revealing that he brought along a couple of the spirit rats in his pack and he asks Miao if it would provide sustenance to a cat or not. She tries one out, which he wishes he could unsee, and to her surprise it tastes pretty good. Jun petitions her to move her cats into the village where they can solve both problems. The cats will eat the spirit rats, and then Jun will boldly insinuate Miao will be free to go wherever she wants with whoever she wants.

This will get a reaction out of her as she tries to get what he wants out of her specifically, and he comes out with it saying he’s grown to like Miao a lot this last week and when he leaves Low Claw, he would prefer they did so together. Miao allows herself to fantasize about the world beyond her lands and the strong opponents she might face, but she brings herself to touch on something awkward. She blatantly points out that Jun wants her as his mate, yes? She can smell his pheremones and the lust has been getting heavier day by day.

Jun sees no reason to deny this but is casual about it, explaining, yeah, but he missed out on his formative years because of his backstory. He tells her the details and she’s really sympathetic yet impressed about how far he’s come and she’s interested in seeing if he can go as far as he wants to. His drive appeals to her animalistic instincts and she becomes more attracted, but it’s still a lot to consider. She asks to be certain that he wants her as his mate, yes? He tries to calm that notion so he doesn’t seem overeager but she’s very intense about the question, making it clear she wants an answer with conviction. He gives it to her and says yes, and she doesn’t regard it much.

Miao turns away after taking the remaining rats, telling him to come back tomorrow after she’s had time to think. She’ll give him an answer after she’s consulted with her cats. She’s secretly all smily and excited behind his back as she runs away.

The scout, having witnessed all this, reports back that they kind of need to act now or she’ll end up as used goods for the young master. Luckily she’s down to about half power, and now is the best chance they’ve had to strike, anyway. They mobilize.

We’d get a cute chapter starting with Miao celebrating on her mountain right afterward, talking to the cats about Jun in unfiltered praise now that she doesn’t have to tsundere-ify her words around him. It would be really cute, but she’d feel guilty about leaving her cats behind. She asks them if there was a way to make sure they were always well fed and protected, would they be okay with leaving the mountain? The cats would answer in unison yes, but before she can explain the plan to them, the Sasei clan would attack the mountain and Miao specifically.

She fights and kills some of the minions without remorse during a small battle scene where we see how vicious she is when she’s not holding back, before the big bad threatens to kill one of her cats with a knife and some of the other men follow his lead. They explain their business with her and how she’s going to wed Sasei Shan (planting the idea of a spiritual marriage in her head so she can be the one to spring it later on), or in words she can understand, become the mate of their clan’s heir. She laughs at this but they emphasize how she really doesn’t have a choice. Miao tries to order them around with her Dominance, and while a few succumb and let go of their hostages, not all of them do (those with enough mastery of their Control aspect) and she’s forced to comply.

She gets tied up and bound with talisman rope to seal off her power, but before she’s taken away she manages to tell one of her cats to go and find Jun, which it does. Jun is back in the village drinking tea with the elder and recounting his run in with Miao today. The elder recognizes the boy is in love and envies his youth after Jun admits to it. He hopes that this plan of Jun’s works. They’re more than happy to take in the cats if it will help, but-

The cat shows up and it is desperately trying to convey something to Jun. He is able to intuit that something is deeply wrong and he bids the elder farewell- only for the elder to offer the powerup resource early out of kindness if it will help him save the tigress, reckoning they need her to broker the deal, yes? Jun will humbly accept and leave after consuming the reward which restores his power for the day and will prove even more beneficial once he’s able to cultivate it.

Jun leaves and the cat leads him with its nose to find Miao and is shocked when he finds a camp belonging to his enemy, the Sasei clan. He asks the cat if they took Miao, it meows confirmation before darting away. He rations out their likely motive, knowing how strong an asset a white tigress sacred beast would be to any clan, especially if they performed a spiritual marriage and created a spiritborn bloodline with her.

The thought makes him sick, and he sneaks into the camp to free her. He isn’t sure he can defeat this many by himself, but the men are partying and drunk over their perceived success.

Jun manages to find her and frees her, and in her explosive anger she bursts out and starts a big brawl against the drunken low-level refiners. The big bad inserts himself into the battle, taking on Miao as Jun handles most of the weaker fodder. Miao is still weakened from her fight with Jun and the villain is able to fend her off successfully for the most part, though it brings him halfway down, too.

Jun is worn out from his half of the battle and things look bleak, causing Miao to inquire about the contract thing more and how it works. They manage to make one mid-combat, and Miao floods the rest of her chi into Jun and trusts him to take care of this. She watches the ensuing battle with the Sasei clan big bad of the week and Jun is able to use her power almost perfectly, and the battle would end with his first successful use of calling upon his power affinity thanks to Miao sharing the same one.

Before knocking the bad guy out he’d make some remark about how this tigress is already spoken for or something. After the battle Miao would tease him for being presumptuous on that front, but lets him have his moment. She suggests they kill them all but he’s not about mindlessly killing and gets into his personal justice. Miao doesn’t really agree with him on any of it, but she likes his idea for justice so she allows him to do it anyway. He binds all the survivors with rope and spare power seal talismans, leaving their fates to chance. Maybe some of them will die, maybe they all will, but either way, it’s only fitting. To show that Jun isn’t a naive idiot, we’ll see that some of them indeed die from his choice later.

Resolution time begins as Jun and Miao stumble into the village and are taken care of by the elder. Some of the people aren’t happy about Miao, but when she awakens late the next day, she’s very apologetic for attacking their hunters and promises to make things right.

Before that happens, Jun returns the power he borrowed and Miao is shocked at how much he was telling the truth. It feels so much better now that he’s filtered it and after a quick test drive she sees for real how she might become a lot stronger if she stayed with him.

She takes Jun to her mountain for the first time and gathers up her ‘people’, keeping them up to speed on everything. They dart off at the promise of easy living, as they are only cats. She is disgusted by their shamelessness in a comical moment.

They’re alone now and Jun wonders if they should follow the cats and make sure that whole thing goes okay, but Miao is uninterested and thinks they’ll be fine without her for a while. She would rather stay here with him for now, if that’s okay. He’s surprised but receptive, and she takes him on a tour of the mountain she grew up on and ruled.

They end up somewhere romantic looking and it’s sunset by the time they’re done. She ends up admitting she wanted to see it all one last time before she left. Jun confirms her intentions. Yes, she’ll come along with him on his journey... but she brings up how a contract isn’t enough for her. Miao brings up that the Sasei clan was talking about an even more powerful form of contract- the spiritual marriage. She asks if he knows anything, and he does. She’s unsurprised. She asks him if it’s a lewd thing and he answers truthfully that yeah, partially.

She calls his interest out on it and he owns up to having pestered his master for the details because she cuts him off on wanting to make up for lost time, yes? He confirms, then she chides him for taking even longer, telling him to hurry up and tell her what they need to do to make this happen. Jun is super excited and she’s all blushy, but she stands by what she says and reaffirms her intent on becoming his ‘bride’- copying the terms she heard the Sasei clan say.

Jun gets everything ready and they have a little ceremony and they each lift a cup of magic alcohol to each other’s lips and say the vow, then kiss. Their first time ensues and she is suspiciously submissive, revealing that her dominance aspect does not relate to her tastes in mating. She wants to do it from behind at first but they switch halfway through and they finish missionary which she likes a lot more. Though it must be noted he discovers she likes being spanked during this- it’s a cat thing.

The next day the arc wrap-up is completed and when they return to the village as husband and wife they find the cats so well integrated it’s like they’ve always lived there. It almost pisses Miao off. The village formally forgives her and she gives one last address to her subjects about how they better not forget her and that she’s still their sovereign no matter what, to which all the lazy cats meow in unison. She and Jun take off and their adventure together begins.

From there, Miao's development would be growing closer to Jun as his first wife, slowly becoming less arrogant and more humble, and early on she will train Jun with his affinities since she's more advanced than him. She can be hypocritical at times, as she will grow accustomed to human luxury and adores spending the night inside the magic camp house and prefer to lazily ride on Jun's shoulder in the form of a tiger cub as opposed to walking around everywhere on her lonesome. She also grows to love many human amenities, such as jewelry and fancy dresses, as she believes they amplify her regal nature. Also she’s a cat and just likes shiny things.

When it comes to expanding the family and Jun taking other wives, she has a very animalistic perspective about it. Jun is a strong male, and a strong male having many mates is just the way of things. She carries no personal jealousy towards any others he ends up with, quite the opposite. It does a lot for her ego to be wife #1, even if he doesn’t play favorites. The other two planned girls also indulge her on this as they understand how cats work.

She also knows that having more spiritually bonded wives makes their sex refinement more potent and actively encourages him to expand since it will lead them to become stronger. Strong Jun = happy/aroused Miao.