Post by mugenginga on Sept 14, 2009 2:07:42 GMT -5
Full Name: Botan
Nicknames: N/A (although Yuusuke is known to use various euphemisms for her)
Apparent Age: Early Teens
Actual Age: ? (Around 40 years)
Height: ? (Average)
Weight: ? (Petite and skinny)
Gender: Female
Race: Spirit
Alliance: Good
Home: Reikai/Spirit Realm
Franchise: Yuu Yuu Hakusho
Physical Description
Botan technically has two forms, but they are so similar I'm listing them as one. The main difference seems to be style of dress.
Botan is small, petite, and very cute. Her skin is a touch pale for her apparent Asian ethnicity, but its not freakish or anything. Her eyes are big and bright, often holding a whimsical cute charm. However, they quite firmly hold to the definition of eyes being the windows to ones soul and they show her emotions clearly. However, she tends to be pretty cheerful and as such her eyes have a general cute appeal to them. Their color is dark purple bordering on black, although in the right light they can take on an almost pink color. Her chest is fairly small.
She has long sky blue hair that you will never see her wearing in anything other than a high ponytail. If for some reason it were to go down, such as from a fight, it would reach just past the mid-point of her back. She uses a simple hair band to keep it up, coordinating the color with the dominant color of her outfit, although its often not visible. It seems a little wild at times. Her bangs are loosely parted in a way that sort of frames her face, the tips hanging in front of her ears. She also has two thin and very long strips that hang down past her ears, both reaching to her stomach.
Her favorite outfit (and the only kind you'll see her wearing in her true spirit form) is a kimono. She likes all kinds, but for practicality purposes she'll only wear a simple cotton one when in her true form. It tends to be one color with complimenting colors, her most well known being pink with white and a touch of red for accent, both focused mainly on the obi sash (the cloth "belt" seen on kimono). She does, however, love ceremonial kimono with fancy prints. She has a preference towards ornate sakura/cherry blossom print. Her kimono are always wrapped "properly" in that the left side goes over the right. Whenever she has on kimono, she'll wear tabi (Japanese toe socks) and Japanese sandals of the minor accent color.
In human form she will wear clothes that allow her to fit in or do her job. This had ranged from outlandish "fortune telling" clothes to a simple school uniform. Due to the specifics of her human form in relation to her spirit powers, she can wear whatever she needs to without access to a clothing shop. Her favorite outfits tend to be jeans and sleeveless shirts, preferably of the tighter variety to accent what little chest she has. She also has a great love of the color pink. In general she'll wear things that allow her to effectively become a "non person", or in other words, to blend right into a crowd and escape notice.
Weapons
The gondola oar she rides in spirit form is the only weapon she generally has on hand. She uses it similar to a bat. While it isn't the most skillful weapon, it works for bludgeoning purposes. In human form, she has no problem using a baseball bat in a similar fashion and shows signs of being able to use any makeshift bludgeoning weapon if the need arose. This includes things like brooms and frying pans. She's not really skilled with these, but if the options are death or swinging a broom around like a madwoman, she will gladly take the latter.
She has been known to take her frustration out upon others with her oar as well, but she would never try to really hurt a fried or ally this way. Kind of like a slap to get someone to calm down. Yuusuke has been on the receiving end of this a fair number of times.
Abilities/Powers
In spirit form, she has access to all of her powers, but in human form some of them are muted or completely unavailable. That will be pointed out for any applicable powers.
Botan is able to channel Reiki/Spirit Energy into various purposes, all of which share the factor of healing or warding away harm. She can channel this energy to cure minor wounds or speed up recovery time, both of which have been immensely useful in the past. However, the healing ability is pretty much limited to minor wounds. Everything else will simply have an accelerated healing time. It works the best if she has access to herbs and salves, particularly those of the Reikai.
She has shown the ability to ward off curses, but she must maintain constant focus on doing so. It's a huge drain on her Reiki and if she keeps it up for too long, it can knock her clean out. She tends to avoid doing it for that reason unless the situation absolutely requires it. It is known for making an already tense situation more urgent.
Her human form is an ability in its own way. Technically, its merely a shell to house her spirit form rather than a true form all on its own. It is unclear where it comes from in canon, but it is more than likely she gets it from the Reikai and takes it to the Ningenkai/Human Realm through some spiritual means. If she has no time to return the shell back to the Reikai, she can simply expel her true form from said shell, leaving a hollow "puppet" behind. She very much dislikes this method, as it understandably freaks people out. This includes any Reikai Tantei/Spirit Realm Detectives that don't happen to know of her ability to do this, such as Yuusuke. She is able to clothe the shell in whatever the situation requires by using the limited access to Reiki this form possesses.
In spirit form she has an oar that she rides around "side saddle" in the fashion of a witch's broom. The oar is the long kind used in the cliched image of Venetian gondola boatmen, and is actually an indication of her purpose and powers as a spirit guide.
As a spirit guide, she is able to communicate with spirits and help guide them to the transitional position between life and the land of the dead, located in the Reikai. She is also able to cross over between the Ningenkai and Reikai at will, although she must fly to do so. She is unable to fly without her oar, but if it were smacked away from her she could call it back. It would require some time to get to her, as it would have to fly towards her. She is also able to communicate with animals, particularly those with innate spirit energy such as tanuki/Japanese raccoons and kitsune/foxes.
Not so much a skill as a quirk, but normal humans can't see or hear her in spirit form. Demons can without exception, and some unspecified humans and species of animals are able to depending on their power level and sensitivity to spirits. There are varying degrees of being able to pick up on her spirit form among the sensitive humans, the lowest being those that are aware of a presence, the highest and lowest percentage being fully aware of her and able to interact. Being psychic does not mean you are of the small percentage that can fully interact with her. Psychic abilities manifest themselves in many ways, and only those that manifest as able to fully interact with spirits would get the full interaction with her. It should be noted that its possible to only be able to hear her if ones powers manifest in that manner.
Skills
Botan is fairly capable in makeshift combat, but its unclear if it is a skill or an act of desperation. She is also an expert and herbal healing techniques of both human and spirit origins. Due to the spirit ones being more effective, she tends to favor them but if she were forced to, she is capable of gathering herbs from a forest or makes salves and the like. She uses these powers in conjunction with her Reiki healing abilities for maximum effectiveness.
She is so knowledgeable about herbs and such from various worlds at it would be odd and a little disconcerting if she did not know the identity of an herb. She isn't as good as Kurama, but that is merely because she can not speak with the plants. She tends to focus on the positive aspects as well, where Kurama focuses on the potential deadliness of vegetation.
Personality
Botan is a sweet girl who is known for making stupid mistakes, mainly due to her naive tendencies. On the surface she's a chipper airhead with little understanding of how things work and an annoyingly sweet personality, and it is not uncommon for people to pass her off as such. All of this hides her more positive qualities. She is a hard worker and takes her duties very seriously. She cares deeply about her friends, although she is known to express it oddly. She does wear her emotions on her sleeves, however, and it is nigh impossible for her to hide what she is really feeling.
She is a bit off the wall and easily interperted as "odd". She loves to run around saying random things like "Bingo bingo!" and often comes across to people as too chipper. Her skills at her job or in dealing with a dire situation often only come out in said dire situations, and she is known for tripping herself up frequently. She comes across to many as little more than a small girl, but its more because she likes that characteristic zest for life and cheerfulness and enjoys being perceived that way.
She has an immensely large heart and doesn't handle stress as well as she probably should, at least when you consider her job as spirit guide and assistant Reikai Tantei. She takes orders from those she considers her superiors well and will follow them to the best of her ability, although that doesn't put her above whining about them. She is easily dumbfounded and likes to poke fun at people, but its all out of friendship. She doesn't rage much, which separates her a bit from the main members of her inner circle. It is likely she is as laid back as she is because she trusts that her friends and allies can handle it. Sometimes she thinks too simply, but it balances out in the end.
Botan is probably not somebody you'd want to have work on her own, but put her in a group to support her weaknesses and she is a great asset to a team. That little ray of sunshine to help ward off the gloomy clouds.
One quirk of her personality that should be pointed out is her attention to the chain of command. This includes lying to Yuusuke if Koenma orders it, seeing as how Koenma is the second highest ranking member of Reikai government. However, she doesn't like doing things like that.
History
Botan was born/created explicitly for the purpose of being a spirit guide. She did not have a childhood in the human sense of the word. She spent the average amount of time training before becoming a spirit guide, and is somewhat well known for pointing out she is new at the job. However, Reikai denizens view time in a different way than humans due to the lack of inherent mortality humans possess. She has been doing her job for a few decades, but in terms of spirit guides, that still makes her quite new at the job.
When the unpredicted death of Yuusuke Urameshi occurred, she was dispatched to inform him of his fate. She wasn't sure how to break it to him at the time because his death wasn't supposed to have happened. His selfless act of pushing a child out of the way of a speeding car was more than a little unexpected by the Reikai considering his personality. She arrived just as he was realizing what had happened to him and in her somewhat forward but quite cute way told him he was absolutely right.
After talking with him for a few minutes, being more than a little amused at how accurate his personality profile was, she realized she had to inform him he should not have died that day. He raged a bit at being told his death was useless and she told him that because of the surprise it had been to the Reikai, he would be given a chance to be revived. His other option would be to wander the earth as a ghost due to the afterlife not being prepared for him and his final judgment being undecided.
She gave him time to think about it and it was the grief and anger expressed by those that knew him that made him decide to take the test. She took the teenager to the Reikai and introduced him to Prince Koenma, heir to the spirit realm throne and son of the temperamental King Enma. Koenma rather forcefully handed Yuusuke a golden egg, telling him the test was to watch over it. Botan actually knew about the test, but denied it when asked by Yuusuke on orders from Koenma. The egg would become an angelic creature if he did good deeds and a demon that would eat his soul if he did bad ones. It was to be kept a secret as to not skew the test.
Botan accompanied him on the test. Various events and misadventures occurred in a somewhat episodic fashion, eventually leading Koenma and the Reikai council to allow Yuusuke to return to his body before the egg hatched. One of the leading reasons was Yuusuke's slow biorhythm, in that if he didn't return soon he'd have to wait another fifty years. Yuusuke successfully returned to his body after some hijinks and it seemed like his experiences with the Reikai were done.
However, he wasn't aware that Koenma and the Reikai had other plans. The egg that was to be his trial had not hatched. Koenma dispatched Botan to tell Yuusuke about a new mission. He was to become a "Reikai Tantei" aka "Spirit Realm Detective". While he could have said no Botan would have made sure to pester him into doing it, so he begrudgingly accepted, a fact that was in his best interests. After all, the egg fed off the energy of his heart. Not that he knew that, but if he had insisted on saying no it likely would have boded very ill for the teenager's soul.
The mission also involved a new assignment for Botan. While she would keep the powers inherent in being a spirit guide, she would become the assistant detective to Yuusuke. Which basically came down to being a messenger girl for the Reikai, although she was also to provide backup to to the teenager.
Botan took her new duty seriously, making sure to inform Yuusuke of missions and details and even vouching for him behind the scenes, although the specifics of it means she never got any credit for this. After all, Yuusuke never knew of it. She was also charged with giving the teen access to the "Seven Detective Tools" of the Reikai. One at a time as to conserve his energy, although events around his first mission quickly threw the plan to distribute them out of whack and he got two in less than a week.
His first mission was not one Botan nor even Koenma thought him ready for, but Koenma's fear over his father's rage forced it upon the teen. It was actually Koenma that showed up, very panicked and in spirit form, to inform Yuusuke of his mission. Botan would later arrive to help clear up some of the details. Yuusuke succeeded in the mission and defeated the soul eating demon Gouki and two others by the names of Kurama and Hiei, although it was over three separate encounters.
Botan informed him of other missions such as fighting the demon Rando to protect the Reihado techniques of Master Genkai, defeating the Four Saint Beast demons to protect the world from invasion by demonic bugs, and even rescuing an ice demon by the name of Yukina. Some of these missions imparted new Detective Tools, although even now Yuusuke has not been given all of them. The last of these major tasks directly lead into the Dark Tournament. While Botan didn't have the skill to participate, she was able to badger Koenma into taking her, Yuusuke's mother, Yuusuke's girlfriend, and Kuwabara's sister as spectators. He went in human form, although he wasn't the least bit happy about the situation.
Her help during the tournament was rather minimal, and in the end she was just a spectator. She was crushed when Master Genkai was killed as a result of events in and around the tournament. And despite Yuusuke's reaction was actually one of the most surprised when the woman quite literally came back from the dead.
After the tournament, things settled down. Until Yuusuke vanished less than a week later. Keiko, Yuusuke's aforementioned girlfriend, raged on Botan due to a promise Yuusuke had made to inform her of new developments in his job. Feeling rather overwhelmed, the already confused assistant Reikai Tantei flew to the Reikai only to find poor Koenma all but buried under a pile of paperwork. She didn't even get the chance to inform him why she was there before being flatly told that he already knew, but had been too swamped to get a message out. He told her to arrange a meeting of the participants in the Dark Tournament.
All but Master Genkai showed up, with the added addition of Keiko due to her insistence at being kept in the loop and the odd puppy-penguin hybrid looking Spirit Beast Pouh. Pouh had hatched from Yuusuke's egg and was a sign he had passed his test. But anything involving danger to Yuusuke was vital to it as its life depended on Yuusuke's soul remaining in the realm of the living. As for Master Genkai, she chose to abstain from the meeting, claiming that she was sure the situation had been caused by his own actions and refused to be bothered with helping "the idiot".
Koenma informed the team that Yuusuke had been drawn to another world far removed from any known by the group. He had been researching ways to access it and had figured out how to open a portal for a short amount of time, complaining/explaining that his paperwork was due to Yuusuke's unknown actions in the world. This other world seemed to have a very strong barrier around it, making it more than a little difficult to get through.
The group ranted, and it was loosely decided that Botan should go. For one, she had powers and was a mediator of sorts between two of the three dominant worlds the group knew. It was entirely possible she could contact the Reikai of this other world and work something out to get Yuusuke returned. She had abandoned her human shell and taken spirit form when Koenma forced open the portal. And Kuwabara ran through. The portal reacted poorly and snapped shut, leaving the group unsure where to go next.
Kurama volunteered to go because he could fight and Kuwabara was not known for inciting warm fuzzies in others. Especially in dealing with Yuusuke. Koenma conceded for reasons of his own, which he refused to elaborate upon. The next day, he called Botan to his office where the poor girl saw the paperwork had gotten even worse, presumably thanks to Yuusuke's actions. He quickly assigned her to help him with it. A few days later after some heavy coaxing (read as harassment) from Botan, Hiei chose to go through the portal. Probably to get away from Botan. Koenma arranged it.
After a week had passed since Kuwabara pulled his stunt and Botan's life having lost all peace thanks to the paperwork and Keiko, she all but begged Koenma to let her through the portal. It wasn't just the way that they'd had to move Koenma out of his office due to the stacked paperwork. Botan was getting more and more worried. They had not been contacted by the Reikai of this mysterious other world and even Koenma was still rather in the dark. Pouh was fine, but the worry about Yuusuke was still present.
Koenma forced open the portal to allow Botan through (after insisting she take her human form so she had access to it in the other world), although it was getting harder each time. It seemed the other world was rebelling against the repeated forced invasions. Botan nearly got cut in two as the portal snapped shut behind her, but she made it through the portal to Dimension Island. And would quickly fall victim to the realization that time flowed differently on the island than in their home world.
Hiei insists I say that he is the victim, not Botan.
Other
Botan fits into the same continuity as both my other Yuu Yuu Hakusho canon characters and those created by Jilak. It is a manga based continuity (which explains a few conflicts in the history) and all of them are pulled from after the Dark Tournament arc but before the Sensui Saga arc. Things that occur after the Dark Tournament arc are considered non-canon to these characters, or an alternate timeline if you will (although things stated to be backstory during this time are still taken as canon.) As such, things that occur after the Dark Tournament might still occur, just under different circumstances.
There are still three unrevealed Detective Tools at the time they are pulled from canon, which Botan does not have on her due to an oversight on her part. Koenma has them and will bring them when he shows up in the RP, although it will likely take time for him to bother to reveal them.
Her hair color is unclear in the manga, as one picture has shown her with blond hair. Since fans recognize her with blue hair thanks to the anime and manga is often hard to make out from being black and white, I have treated her hair as blue. Call it a fanon screw up if you must. Some inside jokes of YYH canon only work if her hair is blue as well, so I just went with it.
Pictures
Spirit Form (manga): www.onemanga.com/Yu_Yu_Hakusho/1/31/
Spirit Form (anime): ourzodiacproject.com/39botan.jpg
Human Form (manga): www.onemanga.com/Yu_Yu_Hakusho/40/09/
Human Form (anime): i58.photobucket.com/albums/g264/Moonlight_Meika/yu%20yu%20hakusho/BotanDressedUp.jpg
Nicknames: N/A (although Yuusuke is known to use various euphemisms for her)
Apparent Age: Early Teens
Actual Age: ? (Around 40 years)
Height: ? (Average)
Weight: ? (Petite and skinny)
Gender: Female
Race: Spirit
Alliance: Good
Home: Reikai/Spirit Realm
Franchise: Yuu Yuu Hakusho
Physical Description
Botan technically has two forms, but they are so similar I'm listing them as one. The main difference seems to be style of dress.
Botan is small, petite, and very cute. Her skin is a touch pale for her apparent Asian ethnicity, but its not freakish or anything. Her eyes are big and bright, often holding a whimsical cute charm. However, they quite firmly hold to the definition of eyes being the windows to ones soul and they show her emotions clearly. However, she tends to be pretty cheerful and as such her eyes have a general cute appeal to them. Their color is dark purple bordering on black, although in the right light they can take on an almost pink color. Her chest is fairly small.
She has long sky blue hair that you will never see her wearing in anything other than a high ponytail. If for some reason it were to go down, such as from a fight, it would reach just past the mid-point of her back. She uses a simple hair band to keep it up, coordinating the color with the dominant color of her outfit, although its often not visible. It seems a little wild at times. Her bangs are loosely parted in a way that sort of frames her face, the tips hanging in front of her ears. She also has two thin and very long strips that hang down past her ears, both reaching to her stomach.
Her favorite outfit (and the only kind you'll see her wearing in her true spirit form) is a kimono. She likes all kinds, but for practicality purposes she'll only wear a simple cotton one when in her true form. It tends to be one color with complimenting colors, her most well known being pink with white and a touch of red for accent, both focused mainly on the obi sash (the cloth "belt" seen on kimono). She does, however, love ceremonial kimono with fancy prints. She has a preference towards ornate sakura/cherry blossom print. Her kimono are always wrapped "properly" in that the left side goes over the right. Whenever she has on kimono, she'll wear tabi (Japanese toe socks) and Japanese sandals of the minor accent color.
In human form she will wear clothes that allow her to fit in or do her job. This had ranged from outlandish "fortune telling" clothes to a simple school uniform. Due to the specifics of her human form in relation to her spirit powers, she can wear whatever she needs to without access to a clothing shop. Her favorite outfits tend to be jeans and sleeveless shirts, preferably of the tighter variety to accent what little chest she has. She also has a great love of the color pink. In general she'll wear things that allow her to effectively become a "non person", or in other words, to blend right into a crowd and escape notice.
Weapons
The gondola oar she rides in spirit form is the only weapon she generally has on hand. She uses it similar to a bat. While it isn't the most skillful weapon, it works for bludgeoning purposes. In human form, she has no problem using a baseball bat in a similar fashion and shows signs of being able to use any makeshift bludgeoning weapon if the need arose. This includes things like brooms and frying pans. She's not really skilled with these, but if the options are death or swinging a broom around like a madwoman, she will gladly take the latter.
She has been known to take her frustration out upon others with her oar as well, but she would never try to really hurt a fried or ally this way. Kind of like a slap to get someone to calm down. Yuusuke has been on the receiving end of this a fair number of times.
Abilities/Powers
In spirit form, she has access to all of her powers, but in human form some of them are muted or completely unavailable. That will be pointed out for any applicable powers.
Botan is able to channel Reiki/Spirit Energy into various purposes, all of which share the factor of healing or warding away harm. She can channel this energy to cure minor wounds or speed up recovery time, both of which have been immensely useful in the past. However, the healing ability is pretty much limited to minor wounds. Everything else will simply have an accelerated healing time. It works the best if she has access to herbs and salves, particularly those of the Reikai.
She has shown the ability to ward off curses, but she must maintain constant focus on doing so. It's a huge drain on her Reiki and if she keeps it up for too long, it can knock her clean out. She tends to avoid doing it for that reason unless the situation absolutely requires it. It is known for making an already tense situation more urgent.
Her human form is an ability in its own way. Technically, its merely a shell to house her spirit form rather than a true form all on its own. It is unclear where it comes from in canon, but it is more than likely she gets it from the Reikai and takes it to the Ningenkai/Human Realm through some spiritual means. If she has no time to return the shell back to the Reikai, she can simply expel her true form from said shell, leaving a hollow "puppet" behind. She very much dislikes this method, as it understandably freaks people out. This includes any Reikai Tantei/Spirit Realm Detectives that don't happen to know of her ability to do this, such as Yuusuke. She is able to clothe the shell in whatever the situation requires by using the limited access to Reiki this form possesses.
In spirit form she has an oar that she rides around "side saddle" in the fashion of a witch's broom. The oar is the long kind used in the cliched image of Venetian gondola boatmen, and is actually an indication of her purpose and powers as a spirit guide.
As a spirit guide, she is able to communicate with spirits and help guide them to the transitional position between life and the land of the dead, located in the Reikai. She is also able to cross over between the Ningenkai and Reikai at will, although she must fly to do so. She is unable to fly without her oar, but if it were smacked away from her she could call it back. It would require some time to get to her, as it would have to fly towards her. She is also able to communicate with animals, particularly those with innate spirit energy such as tanuki/Japanese raccoons and kitsune/foxes.
Not so much a skill as a quirk, but normal humans can't see or hear her in spirit form. Demons can without exception, and some unspecified humans and species of animals are able to depending on their power level and sensitivity to spirits. There are varying degrees of being able to pick up on her spirit form among the sensitive humans, the lowest being those that are aware of a presence, the highest and lowest percentage being fully aware of her and able to interact. Being psychic does not mean you are of the small percentage that can fully interact with her. Psychic abilities manifest themselves in many ways, and only those that manifest as able to fully interact with spirits would get the full interaction with her. It should be noted that its possible to only be able to hear her if ones powers manifest in that manner.
Skills
Botan is fairly capable in makeshift combat, but its unclear if it is a skill or an act of desperation. She is also an expert and herbal healing techniques of both human and spirit origins. Due to the spirit ones being more effective, she tends to favor them but if she were forced to, she is capable of gathering herbs from a forest or makes salves and the like. She uses these powers in conjunction with her Reiki healing abilities for maximum effectiveness.
She is so knowledgeable about herbs and such from various worlds at it would be odd and a little disconcerting if she did not know the identity of an herb. She isn't as good as Kurama, but that is merely because she can not speak with the plants. She tends to focus on the positive aspects as well, where Kurama focuses on the potential deadliness of vegetation.
Personality
Botan is a sweet girl who is known for making stupid mistakes, mainly due to her naive tendencies. On the surface she's a chipper airhead with little understanding of how things work and an annoyingly sweet personality, and it is not uncommon for people to pass her off as such. All of this hides her more positive qualities. She is a hard worker and takes her duties very seriously. She cares deeply about her friends, although she is known to express it oddly. She does wear her emotions on her sleeves, however, and it is nigh impossible for her to hide what she is really feeling.
She is a bit off the wall and easily interperted as "odd". She loves to run around saying random things like "Bingo bingo!" and often comes across to people as too chipper. Her skills at her job or in dealing with a dire situation often only come out in said dire situations, and she is known for tripping herself up frequently. She comes across to many as little more than a small girl, but its more because she likes that characteristic zest for life and cheerfulness and enjoys being perceived that way.
She has an immensely large heart and doesn't handle stress as well as she probably should, at least when you consider her job as spirit guide and assistant Reikai Tantei. She takes orders from those she considers her superiors well and will follow them to the best of her ability, although that doesn't put her above whining about them. She is easily dumbfounded and likes to poke fun at people, but its all out of friendship. She doesn't rage much, which separates her a bit from the main members of her inner circle. It is likely she is as laid back as she is because she trusts that her friends and allies can handle it. Sometimes she thinks too simply, but it balances out in the end.
Botan is probably not somebody you'd want to have work on her own, but put her in a group to support her weaknesses and she is a great asset to a team. That little ray of sunshine to help ward off the gloomy clouds.
One quirk of her personality that should be pointed out is her attention to the chain of command. This includes lying to Yuusuke if Koenma orders it, seeing as how Koenma is the second highest ranking member of Reikai government. However, she doesn't like doing things like that.
History
Botan was born/created explicitly for the purpose of being a spirit guide. She did not have a childhood in the human sense of the word. She spent the average amount of time training before becoming a spirit guide, and is somewhat well known for pointing out she is new at the job. However, Reikai denizens view time in a different way than humans due to the lack of inherent mortality humans possess. She has been doing her job for a few decades, but in terms of spirit guides, that still makes her quite new at the job.
When the unpredicted death of Yuusuke Urameshi occurred, she was dispatched to inform him of his fate. She wasn't sure how to break it to him at the time because his death wasn't supposed to have happened. His selfless act of pushing a child out of the way of a speeding car was more than a little unexpected by the Reikai considering his personality. She arrived just as he was realizing what had happened to him and in her somewhat forward but quite cute way told him he was absolutely right.
After talking with him for a few minutes, being more than a little amused at how accurate his personality profile was, she realized she had to inform him he should not have died that day. He raged a bit at being told his death was useless and she told him that because of the surprise it had been to the Reikai, he would be given a chance to be revived. His other option would be to wander the earth as a ghost due to the afterlife not being prepared for him and his final judgment being undecided.
She gave him time to think about it and it was the grief and anger expressed by those that knew him that made him decide to take the test. She took the teenager to the Reikai and introduced him to Prince Koenma, heir to the spirit realm throne and son of the temperamental King Enma. Koenma rather forcefully handed Yuusuke a golden egg, telling him the test was to watch over it. Botan actually knew about the test, but denied it when asked by Yuusuke on orders from Koenma. The egg would become an angelic creature if he did good deeds and a demon that would eat his soul if he did bad ones. It was to be kept a secret as to not skew the test.
Botan accompanied him on the test. Various events and misadventures occurred in a somewhat episodic fashion, eventually leading Koenma and the Reikai council to allow Yuusuke to return to his body before the egg hatched. One of the leading reasons was Yuusuke's slow biorhythm, in that if he didn't return soon he'd have to wait another fifty years. Yuusuke successfully returned to his body after some hijinks and it seemed like his experiences with the Reikai were done.
However, he wasn't aware that Koenma and the Reikai had other plans. The egg that was to be his trial had not hatched. Koenma dispatched Botan to tell Yuusuke about a new mission. He was to become a "Reikai Tantei" aka "Spirit Realm Detective". While he could have said no Botan would have made sure to pester him into doing it, so he begrudgingly accepted, a fact that was in his best interests. After all, the egg fed off the energy of his heart. Not that he knew that, but if he had insisted on saying no it likely would have boded very ill for the teenager's soul.
The mission also involved a new assignment for Botan. While she would keep the powers inherent in being a spirit guide, she would become the assistant detective to Yuusuke. Which basically came down to being a messenger girl for the Reikai, although she was also to provide backup to to the teenager.
Botan took her new duty seriously, making sure to inform Yuusuke of missions and details and even vouching for him behind the scenes, although the specifics of it means she never got any credit for this. After all, Yuusuke never knew of it. She was also charged with giving the teen access to the "Seven Detective Tools" of the Reikai. One at a time as to conserve his energy, although events around his first mission quickly threw the plan to distribute them out of whack and he got two in less than a week.
His first mission was not one Botan nor even Koenma thought him ready for, but Koenma's fear over his father's rage forced it upon the teen. It was actually Koenma that showed up, very panicked and in spirit form, to inform Yuusuke of his mission. Botan would later arrive to help clear up some of the details. Yuusuke succeeded in the mission and defeated the soul eating demon Gouki and two others by the names of Kurama and Hiei, although it was over three separate encounters.
Botan informed him of other missions such as fighting the demon Rando to protect the Reihado techniques of Master Genkai, defeating the Four Saint Beast demons to protect the world from invasion by demonic bugs, and even rescuing an ice demon by the name of Yukina. Some of these missions imparted new Detective Tools, although even now Yuusuke has not been given all of them. The last of these major tasks directly lead into the Dark Tournament. While Botan didn't have the skill to participate, she was able to badger Koenma into taking her, Yuusuke's mother, Yuusuke's girlfriend, and Kuwabara's sister as spectators. He went in human form, although he wasn't the least bit happy about the situation.
Her help during the tournament was rather minimal, and in the end she was just a spectator. She was crushed when Master Genkai was killed as a result of events in and around the tournament. And despite Yuusuke's reaction was actually one of the most surprised when the woman quite literally came back from the dead.
After the tournament, things settled down. Until Yuusuke vanished less than a week later. Keiko, Yuusuke's aforementioned girlfriend, raged on Botan due to a promise Yuusuke had made to inform her of new developments in his job. Feeling rather overwhelmed, the already confused assistant Reikai Tantei flew to the Reikai only to find poor Koenma all but buried under a pile of paperwork. She didn't even get the chance to inform him why she was there before being flatly told that he already knew, but had been too swamped to get a message out. He told her to arrange a meeting of the participants in the Dark Tournament.
All but Master Genkai showed up, with the added addition of Keiko due to her insistence at being kept in the loop and the odd puppy-penguin hybrid looking Spirit Beast Pouh. Pouh had hatched from Yuusuke's egg and was a sign he had passed his test. But anything involving danger to Yuusuke was vital to it as its life depended on Yuusuke's soul remaining in the realm of the living. As for Master Genkai, she chose to abstain from the meeting, claiming that she was sure the situation had been caused by his own actions and refused to be bothered with helping "the idiot".
Koenma informed the team that Yuusuke had been drawn to another world far removed from any known by the group. He had been researching ways to access it and had figured out how to open a portal for a short amount of time, complaining/explaining that his paperwork was due to Yuusuke's unknown actions in the world. This other world seemed to have a very strong barrier around it, making it more than a little difficult to get through.
The group ranted, and it was loosely decided that Botan should go. For one, she had powers and was a mediator of sorts between two of the three dominant worlds the group knew. It was entirely possible she could contact the Reikai of this other world and work something out to get Yuusuke returned. She had abandoned her human shell and taken spirit form when Koenma forced open the portal. And Kuwabara ran through. The portal reacted poorly and snapped shut, leaving the group unsure where to go next.
Kurama volunteered to go because he could fight and Kuwabara was not known for inciting warm fuzzies in others. Especially in dealing with Yuusuke. Koenma conceded for reasons of his own, which he refused to elaborate upon. The next day, he called Botan to his office where the poor girl saw the paperwork had gotten even worse, presumably thanks to Yuusuke's actions. He quickly assigned her to help him with it. A few days later after some heavy coaxing (read as harassment) from Botan, Hiei chose to go through the portal. Probably to get away from Botan. Koenma arranged it.
After a week had passed since Kuwabara pulled his stunt and Botan's life having lost all peace thanks to the paperwork and Keiko, she all but begged Koenma to let her through the portal. It wasn't just the way that they'd had to move Koenma out of his office due to the stacked paperwork. Botan was getting more and more worried. They had not been contacted by the Reikai of this mysterious other world and even Koenma was still rather in the dark. Pouh was fine, but the worry about Yuusuke was still present.
Koenma forced open the portal to allow Botan through (after insisting she take her human form so she had access to it in the other world), although it was getting harder each time. It seemed the other world was rebelling against the repeated forced invasions. Botan nearly got cut in two as the portal snapped shut behind her, but she made it through the portal to Dimension Island. And would quickly fall victim to the realization that time flowed differently on the island than in their home world.
Hiei insists I say that he is the victim, not Botan.
Other
Botan fits into the same continuity as both my other Yuu Yuu Hakusho canon characters and those created by Jilak. It is a manga based continuity (which explains a few conflicts in the history) and all of them are pulled from after the Dark Tournament arc but before the Sensui Saga arc. Things that occur after the Dark Tournament arc are considered non-canon to these characters, or an alternate timeline if you will (although things stated to be backstory during this time are still taken as canon.) As such, things that occur after the Dark Tournament might still occur, just under different circumstances.
There are still three unrevealed Detective Tools at the time they are pulled from canon, which Botan does not have on her due to an oversight on her part. Koenma has them and will bring them when he shows up in the RP, although it will likely take time for him to bother to reveal them.
Her hair color is unclear in the manga, as one picture has shown her with blond hair. Since fans recognize her with blue hair thanks to the anime and manga is often hard to make out from being black and white, I have treated her hair as blue. Call it a fanon screw up if you must. Some inside jokes of YYH canon only work if her hair is blue as well, so I just went with it.
Pictures
Spirit Form (manga): www.onemanga.com/Yu_Yu_Hakusho/1/31/
Spirit Form (anime): ourzodiacproject.com/39botan.jpg
Human Form (manga): www.onemanga.com/Yu_Yu_Hakusho/40/09/
Human Form (anime): i58.photobucket.com/albums/g264/Moonlight_Meika/yu%20yu%20hakusho/BotanDressedUp.jpg
