`chronicle. - Jung, Mi Rae
`APPLICATION.
NAME: Jung, Mi Rae
NICKNAME: Piggy: Her family gave her the name because they found it appropriate when she was younger..
BIRTHDAY + AGE: 03/31/95 + 19
BIRTHPLACE/HOMETOWN: Mokpo, South Korea
ETHNICITY: Korean
LANGUAGES: Korean (fluent)
HEIGHT/WEIGHT: 175 cm, 56 kg
YEAR: Senior
FACE CLAIM + GALLERY: Baek Su Min + Gallery
BACKUP FACE CLAIM + GALLERY: Kang Sura + Gallery
APPEARANCE/STYLE:
Mi Rae has the perfect appearance: long black hair, a pretty face, white skin, long legs. Even when she is sad her face is pretty and even the school uniform looks lovely when she wears it. In her free time she wears simple and feminine clothes like knit sweaters in pastel colours, flowery dresses and light skirts. Everything about her literally screams pretty and and every now and then someone would accuse her of looking somewhat fake.
That at least is the image her classmates have and that Mi Rae tries hard to keep up. In reality she would just prefer to walk around in jumpsuits and to keep her hair in a bun, as she usually does at home.
PERSONALITY:
Mi Rae literally appears to be a walking cliché. She's pretty but not the brightest. Her grades are good enough to get through but no one would call her smart by any means. She's not particularly witty either, so to most people it's clear that she would ultimately end up as a model or someone's wife. Whether they like her or not, almost everyone would agree that she's like a lovely but empty vase. What almost no one knows though, is that her aim was exactly that.
When Mi Rae grew up, her parents just wanted her to be always happy and cheerful. Her grades weren't bad, she was chubby, strong and almost vulgar. People who bullied her or her friends she would simply beat up. But then her mother became ambitious and decided that Mi Rae would have to change if she wanted to be more, Thus, Pretty Mi Rae was born. When she would really like to laugh about corny jokes, to dress comfortable and to fight injustice, she instead sticks to generic words and actions and appropriate friendships.
Pretty Mi Rae finds it harder to make friends than Old Mi Rae because she is constantly afraid of anyone discovering who she really is. She also wants to make sure that her friends fit her image, so people who stick out for some reason, whether it's optically or through their actions, wouldn't do.
She is generally well-liked by both her classmates and her teachers because there's nothing edgy about her but she does miss the old carefree friendships she used to have. She also feels bad for lying und genuinely wants to become the person she is playing, simple because it would make everything easier. That way she literally spends all her time and energy on perfecting herself, giving her even less time to study for exams.
The problem with Pretty Mi Rae is that she can't follow her ideals of justice any longer. Unable to use her fists or harsh words, she tries to solve arguments through kindness but realizes how half-assed her attempts are because she can't just stand up for oddballs as she used to. Others either see her as pretentious, precious or simply naive, not as someone who really knows what they are doing.
**(Edit)** The more time passes, the less Mi Rae knows who she is supposed to be. She never thought of questioning her family, to her their word was absolute, so her mother's decision to turn Mi Rae into a 'proper girl' never seemed odd to her. At first it even was fun, like a role-play and as long as she was in Mokpo it wasn't that much of a burden because everyone knew what she really was like. The moment anyone tried to bully her, she could just switch back for a moment. She didn't even realize that there could come a point when she would have to fully be Pretty Mi Rae, without any breaks, so she was happy when she slowly became more beautiful and looked more like other girls in her neighbourhood. She thought that there could be an in-between, a self that was both carefree and pretty. But then she ended up in a boarding school to get rid of all her past flaws.
Cheerfulness is her biggest strength, or so she was always told by her family, so she forces herself to ignore every doubt. To her it just wouldn't seem right to question her family. No matter what she thinks of her parents' life and their profession, her mother wants her to be better than them, so to Mi Rae it's only natural to try and become that person her mother wants to see. But at some point she just got lost in that gap between her new self and her old self.
Especially because she is close to graduating and to living her own life, she gets more and more obsessed with perfecting herself. The illusion is perfect but inside she just can't seem to change. She still wants to do all the things she used to do since childhood and to laugh and spend time with friends she really likes, but every time she falls back she suddenly feels guilty, as if she disappointed her mother. Sometimes she feels split, as if there was a freak living inside her empty shell. Sometimes she thinks it's alright, she can be herself inside, but when she imagines her future, she feels doutbful. Because the moment she becomes careless, she could fall back and become Old Mi Rae, the ugly duckling who would end up like her mother, the butcher's wife.
She wants to be cheerful and positive but instead she just is confused. She doesn't know what's wrong about being like her mother and deep down she knows that she used to be happier as a child, but she can't stop, so her aim is to become empty. She thinks of it as steps. Every day she would have to delete part of Old Mi Rae, to make room for Pretty Mi Rae and sooner or later she would be able to fill the gaps with her new, improved personality.
Another problem of course is that the gap between her and her family also grows, because her parents and her brothers still are more like her past self. At home she can act freely to a certain degree but only as long as she doesn't leave the house. To her family she is like a jewel, like the personification of a Lotus flower growing on dirt. They are content the way they are but as the family's only daughter, Mi Rae is the one who will have to marry and leave the house, so her mother really wants to see her as a rich and beautiful wife.
There are moments when Mi Rae does mind, but she knows how much time and money her family spent on her to give her a chance for a better life, so she can't complain. Still, she hates how uncomfortable she sometimes feels at home, as if even her closest family were just rewriting all the memories they have of her. It happens more and more often that her brothers make fun of the way she laughs or even her natural accent. It pains her to see that not even her family wants her to be Old Mi Rae.
TRIVIA:
- always wanted to become a patissier
- cake is in fact the only Western food she likes; usually pretends to love Italian and French food though, just for her image
- used to speak with a really heavy Mokpo accent that sometimes comes through
- sometimes talks to herself when she's angry or frustrated and becomes almost incomprehensible
- loves any kind of joke or pun but tries not to laugh out loudly after her brother told her that she would sound like a pig getting slaughtered
- constantly checks mirrors to make sure that she looks good; even trained how to cry prettily
- still finds it hard to walk around in short skirts and always makes sure it isn't stuck anywhere after using the toilet
- loves pro-wrestling and used to train moves with her brothers
- drools in her sleep
- officially her hobbies are knitting, reading, cooking and to take long walks through parks and along beaches
- only knows how to cook traditional Korean meat dishes
- does like to read but almost only comics for boys
- always keeps a sweater her grandmother knitted in her desk in case anyone asks for proof
- actually neither wants to be famous nor some wife, but doesn't have the heart to tell her mother
POWER + BACKUP POWER: Metamorphosis/transformation + Shapeshifting
Strengths: can instantly change into someone completely different (kind of like Mystique just less badass)
Weaknesses: can only change into humans she has seen or met before and can't stay in that shape for more than ~10 minutes. Also, doesn't have full control over the final shape and can't undo it by herself. She basically has to wait until she goes back naturally.
TIMELINE:
- 1995-2011 - Born and raised in Mokpo to a family of five
- 1995 - She was born as the youngest child in a family of butchers. Just like her two older brothers and her parents she grew up to be quite sturdy. Other kids tried to bully her but she learned how to fight for herself.
- 2009 - The Beginning of Project Pretty Mi Rae. Her mother's old classmate paid a visit to Mokpo after having disappeared to Seoul after graduation. She showed around pictures of her model daughter and her wealthy fiancé and told everyone about the upcoming grand wedding ceremony. Mi Rae's mother, who always disliked that classmate, felt defeated. Her daughter was tall and cute but the only boys she ever brought home were bullies she fought and befriended. So Mi Rae's mother decided to change something. It started with a simple diet and grew into an obsession. She even collected money for an eyelid surgery and got Mi Rae to act more feminine. There wasn't much Mi Rae could do since it was 'for her sake', so she figured that if she was going to be a patissier, it wouldn't hurt to be a little prettier.
- 2012-2014 - St. Pauline Prep
- 2012 - After almost three years of training Pretty Mi Rae is put to the test and becomes an instant success. No one finds anything unusual about her new self and the only odd thing probably is her Mokpo home. She of course tells everyone that 'her family owns their own business but finds it better to leave out the details.
- 2014 - She discovers her power when she wakes up as Old Mi Rae one day. She pinches her own cheek, literally stares at her own reflection turning back into Pretty Mi Rae and thinks that her mind was just playing tricks on her. The next time it happens, she accidentally changes into her male PE teacher, startling the hell out of all the girls in the girls locker room. After becoming Old Mi Rae once more, she wonders whether she can control the power and starts to experiment with it.
FRIENDS/RIVALS/LOVE RIVALS/ENEMIES:
Yoona // SNSD // Friend // funny, friendly, smart // They're friends because to Mi Rae, Yoona is the kind of person she aims to be. She likes her but realizes that Yoona maybe also only befriended her because they were obviously compatible.
Hyolyn // Sistar // Rival/ Friend // easy-going, honest, moody // Hyolyn finds something about Mi Rae incredibly fishy and they don't get along, no matter how many friendly conversations Mi Rae tries to initiate. Things change when Hyolyn, who can turn invisible, sees how the PE teacher doppelganger turns back into swearing Mi Rae.
LOVE INTEREST: Park Chanyeol
BACKUP LOVE INTEREST: Byun Baekhyun
PERSONALITY: He's caught between contradictions. A person who doesn't laugh, he wouldn't befriend because there wouldn't be much to talk about. It's not that he is unable to have serious thoughts but serious conversations always just leave him bored and depressed. So to his surroundings he seems almost stupidly carefree and often puts other off with careless remarks or jokes that go too far. His biggest concern in school is that he really wants an ideal high school romance but that he can't make reality and fantasy match. He prefers innocent and pure girls, exactly the type of person he finds hardest to talk to.
TIMELINE:
- 1997-2012 - He grew up in Seoul with his father and his brother. His mother left them shorty after his fifth birthday, so he can't really remember much about her but according to his father she was 'false' and 'laughed too much' about his jokes. Normal females just wouldn't do that. Proper females were supposed to be earnest.
- 2012-2014 - St. Pauline Prep
- 2014 - He realizes that he can turn himself into liquid when he falls down a chair as he's looking for a book on the top shelf in the library, and turns into a puddle instead. It freaks him out because it takes him a while to change back and it has to happen a few more times before he understands what is happening to him. He thinks of it as a good joke at first, but it slowly becomes harder for him to change back to his original self whenever he transforms; as if his true form wasn't his real body any longer but his liquid one.
RELATIONSHIP:
He idolizes her because to him she is perfect, no matter how many people call her fake. She meanwhile thinks he's incredibly funny, so although she can't laugh openly, he always cheers her up. They can't really have conversations but consider each other to be exactly the kind of people they would like to spend time with, although it's obvious just why that wouldn't work.
POWER + BACKUP POWER: self-liquidation + rubber bones
QUESTIONS/COMMENTS/CONCERNS: Ugh, okay... I think I somehow disregarded that the genre isn't comedy. I wanted to create simple, happy-go-lucky characters who are caught in modern ideas of what a teenager is supposed to be like. At first her family was a lot weirder actually. Tbh, I kind of imagined her as a minor character as I wrote her because she's not supposed to be amazing in any way,
SCENE REQUESTS:
- Her running into him as Old Mi Rae.
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