Everyone thinks Gryffindor are the main characters. Gryffindor is just loud. Sometimes I think I should’ve gone to Slytherin when I say things like this. But Slytherin never would have worked. They want power and I only want knowledge; It’s not my fault people think knowledge makes me powerful.
Why is it so difficult to find a pinterest photo of a teenage girl without a full face of makeup to represent my OC. I swear. Every half-asian teen is super pale and wearing lipstick???
Ru was born to muggle parents in London, England on the 26th of May. Her mother was a White British woman named Lucy Brambley and her father was a Taiwanese/Chinese citizen and businessman named Ethan Tsai, who resided in the United Kingdom for several years in the 2010’s. The couple had a short marriage and separated when Ru was 3 years old. The girl remained in England with her mother and they moved to Birmingham soon after. Birmingham is where she grew up.
Her father returned to Taiwan and now lives there with a different wife and their children. He sees Ru occasionally when he is visiting the U.K. but they are not close. He tends to make up for his absence with allowances and gifts of her choosing during visits, however there is little emotional connection between the two. He was not alerted to Ru’s magic and is unaware of the magical world or Hogwarts’ place in it. He believes that Ru has simply gotten a scholarship to an English boarding school as that is all the information she and her mother gave him. Ru does not think he needs to know she’s a witch as long as he sends the funds for school fees and asks his normal level of questions (which is very few). Ethan is likely an ESTP personality type. Ru’s wizard blood is actually from Ethan’s side of the family but he has no knowledge of this family history; Ru’s magical heritage & inheritance may be explored more in the future.
Lucy Brambley is likely an ENFJ personality and cares deeply about her daughter, however she can be a bit overprotective at times. She rents a small Tudor-style home in Birmingham with a large flower and vegetable garden in the back where she lives with Ru (when her daughter is not at Hogwarts) and two pet ferrets, Smudge and Pebble.
Lucy homeschooled Ru from ages 4-11 before the Hogwarts letter came. The girl was academically gifted and Lucy let Ru follow her interests. The young girl would often finish her studies by lunch and then spend a lot of time reading (mainly fantasy, science fiction, and historical fiction novels, along with some folklore), playing out of doors in the garden, neighborhood, or nearby woods, and following creative pursuits, particularly sketching and watercolor. With this kind of self-directed schooling, Ru developed a slightly nonconformist streak from a young age.
Ru’s entire close family are muggles and so she was surprised to get her letter from Hogwarts although she had had suspicions that there was something magical about her. Because of all her reading on fay lore she had wondered long ago if she was a changeling or some sort of half-fairy (e.g the “selkie” incident). but discovering wizarding and acceptance to a magic school was even better than her earlier theories.
First Instance of Magic
Ru’s first instance of magic occurred at the age of 8, when her head went underwater in a kiddie pool. She found that she was still breathing, pulling oxygen from the water instead of drowning.
The incident was an act of magical self-preservation. However, being muggle-born (with no knowledge of the wizarding world) and a fanciful child who believed in fairies and similar creatures, Ru hoped she was part selkie for the longest time afterwards.
Her false belief in possible selkie heritage was disproven once her Hogwarts letter arrived and she discovered that she was fully human but of the wizard variety. Finding out she can do magic has been the most exciting event of her life so far.
Physical Description
Ru is a slightly tall girl for her age with light brown or olive skin and freckles across her nose and cheeks. She has brown slightly upturned eyes from her Southeast Asian heritage on her father’s side and loosely curling dark hair from her English mother. She is rather thin and lanky but not very athletic. In fact, she is rather clumsy despite her energetic way of moving. She often wears school robes, but when she has time away from academics Ru can be found in old fashioned linen dresses and skirts and with wild flowers (weeds, but she would never call them that) woven into her hair.
Mental Description
Ru is generally a very motivated girl and is committed to academics, especially now that she gets the chance to learn magic after her muggle upbringing. She cares deeply about people, nature, and creatures, and she loves anything whimsical or strange. She reads a lot and practices formal logic and philosophy studies in her free time, along with some art and fiction writing. She is very committed to a theory that she can figure out the basis of magic and write her own spells. While Ru is usually a well behaved student and liked by the school faculty, she’s not above breaking “unreasonable” restrictions in search of knowledge. Her unusual ideas on magic fuel many of the plot-driving situations Ru finds herself in.
Note: Ru is not open to romantic relationships at this age.
Theme song:
Adjacent characters but not really exactly inspo. Basically, these are just the closest girls in canon and Ru may have made friends with them if they had been born in the same era:
”Mum named me Runa because she liked the sound of the word. But Dad jokes that it was fate. I’m his little Ru ( 儒 ), a true scholar. I’m beginning to believe in fate here at Hogwarts.”
