Sakura Deluna Backstory

Born to Inosuke Deluna and his wife, Byleth Hashibira some 20 odd years ago, Sakura lost their mother shortly after their birth. She was buried in The Imperial City. Some time after her death, Inosuke left the Knights of the Empire, taking his newborn child with him to travel the lands outside the Mythic Isle, becoming a mercenary in the process and starting his own mercenary company with his brother, Amious.

The reason for Inosuke's departure began with the circumstances behind Sakura's birth. Sakura's mother was a Kalashtar, a compound race created from the union of humanity and renegade spirits from the plane of dreams, spirits called Quori. Kalashtar are often seen as wise, spiritual people with great compassion for others. But there is an unmistakable alien quality to the kalashtar, as they are haunted by the conflicts of their otherworldly spirits.

However, like all Kalashtar, Sakura's mother was unable to fully merge with her Quori. Sakura's mother eventually fell in love with Inosuke, who had received the touch of Kalashtar blood when she gave him her blood after he took a mortal wound in her stead. The union of the vessel and inheritor of the vessel's blood resulted in the birth of Sakura. However, both the mother and child were too feeble, the latter especially having no heartbeat. Dying herself, the mother pleaded to Inosuke and the Emperor to transfer the Quori into her newborn. The transplant was a success and the child was revived, but at the cost of the mother dying. Inosuke, shocked by his wife's death, had a doctor examine his newborn to discover that they had a pulse, but no heartbeat.

Inosuke's existing suspicions of the Empire grew after this event, especially with Sakura's unusual behavior, neither crying nor laughing as a baby. A while later, he sought a way to leave the Empire by any means. Starting a blaze, he used the event to claim that his child had perished in the blaze. Supposedly heartbroken by the deaths of his wife and child, he left the Empire and secretly took Sakura with him. He formed his own band of mercenaries under the moniker, "The Blade Breaker," mainly to mask his movement throughout the realms so spies of the Empire could not easily track him or his child.

During Sakura's childhood, Inosuke shared little information about the Mythic Isle, the Empire and especially his past. Especially after Amious left the mercenaries to find his own path, their true birthdate and age was forgotten, with Inosuke claiming they were born after the fire to a different woman who supposedly died of illness. Inosuke trained Sakura in combat, until eventually she joined his band of mercenaries and gained a fearsome reputation for her merciless and expressionless disposition in battle, soon being known as the "Ashen Demon" as a result.

Sakura has a very subdued personality and has difficulty expressing emotion. Even as a newborn, they neither laughed nor cried. People they are especially close to, such as Inosuke and eventually Lorelei, are able to tell how they are feeling despite their limited emotional visualizations. A handful of their fellow mercenaries note that their outward expressions hardly vary. Some express surprise whenever they simply smile. According to Amious, this trait of theirs may in part come from their father, as Inosuke does not show his emotions easily either and can also be difficult to read. Due to Inosuke concealing a lot of information about the world, they are curious about the influence of the Empire, the mystery of the Kalashtar, and the dynamic of the Mythic Isles.

Eventually, Inosuke was slain on the battlefield. Hired to fight alongside Emon against a demonic incursion in a terrible battle, they fought tooth and nail to carve a path out for the rest of the mercenaries, but eventually succumbed to their wounds. Inosuke died with a melancholy smile on his face, as for the first time in his life, he witnessed his daughter shed a tear while he laid there dying in her arms. All he left her with was a ring that he had given to her mother before she passed away.

The other mercenaries had all died except for two, one of them was Knob, a hobgoblin warmage that had served the Hidden Moon banner loyally, and the other was a member of the company that hired them, a redheaded girl named Vi who inexplicably vanished moments before. However, this ring woke something within Sakura, the dormant Quori that had existed within her, slumbering, had finally risen from their long rest. With this, a part of Sakura began to wake from their slumber as well. Feeling grief, sadness, and vengeance for the first time in their life, Knob and her carved through the battlefield, finishing the job her father started, her weapon burning with the flames of their soul the entire duration. At the end, she collapsed from exhaustion, just in time to meet Lorelei, who had been traveling to meet her at her own mentor, Amious' request.

Lorelei took care of Sakura until she was able to recover, though it seemed that whatever had woken within her was not in the same state anymore. Lorelei explained that Amious had sent her to watch over the daughter of his brother, and the two became fast friends as they bonded over shared stories of Sakura's father and uncle. In a short time, Lorelei was appointed the co-leader of the Hidden Moon Mercenaries, as they elected to continue the band in honor of those they had lost. Eventually, Sakura had a strange dream and woke Lor in the middle of the night with more emotion than she had ever seen before.

"We need to go to the Mythic Isle."