i : yael rabizadeh came from america to japan to study abroad at the age of twenty , intending to return home in a few years .everyone knew she was not coming home. she married fast, became a citizen, and in a few years, was expecting a child. hitoshi kikyo, her husband, was somewhat attentive, if slightly bemused. this all changed when the child was born. botan kikyo was born with something terrible in her eyes. she was born with something empty and ancient inside her. she was born, and stared into hitoshi, and the next day his job offered him a job where he’d have to travel around a lot. he took it at once. he only returned for the high holy days. and that was the extent of botan’s interaction with him.
ii : botan, as the reincarnation of helel, was a strange child from the very beginning. he was all scratched knees and gappy teeth. when he was five, yael took him and relocated to the country. as a new, strange outsider, with an unusual appearance, and an unnerving air around her, she did not make many friends. she was also sickly, and hard of hearing , and fell asleep fast, in the strangest places. and then when botan was six, she and yael moved again. again, the same pattern repeated. the only religious place nearby was the local church, who did not take kindly to a young, strange jewish girl. botan was viciously bullied, came home limping. but yael did nothing. in her eyes, botan was a happy, and carefree child, with many friends. botan loved her mother, and did nothing to dispel that image of her yael held in her mind. they moved again. and again. and again. and again. and again.
iii : yael kikyo, in the surface, seemed like a kind, attentive single parent to a sickly child. botan was ill often, and went to the hospital a lot. and yael seemed so worried, so knowledgeable, so concerned. everyone was so supportive, no matter what town they moved to next. who wouldn’t be: a struggling single mother with her ill child - anyone would feel sympathy, right ? yael had munchausen by proxy. munchausen syndrome by proxy is a mental health problem in which a caregiver makes up or causes an illness or injury in a person under his or her care, such as a child, an elderly adult, or a person who has a disability. someone might do this to keep their charge under their control, might have some kind of saviour complex, or to do it to gain sympathy from those around them. yael was all of these. she saw herself as botan’s saviour, and by keeping botan medically reliant on her, she felt in control of him, like she was protecting him. botan constantly being in and out of hospital made her more of a target. and on top of that, she got a reputation for being a disaster magnet. a doomsday cult who had been tracking helel’s reincarnations for generations found her, and would follow her around. a boy with dark bags under his eyes and a nervous disposition who would follow her to every town she went to was her only friend. he’d try to convince her to come home with him. and eventually, she did. what happened there made her away of who she was. what she was. she’d never talk about it, but it happened. and she could never deny it any longer. she was fourteen when she realised the exact amount of what was on her shoulders. the exact weight of the sins she’d committed over thousands of lifetimes. the exact inhumanity she’d always been bearing this whole time.
iv: in ina, nagano, a certain politician was visiting and botan, living there at the time, watched him assault a woman. unable to stand by, she got in the way, and defended herself - as she’d been taught by her mother. she was charged with assault herself, and to her surprise, instead of her mother supporting her, yael was furious, cold, and withdrew herself from botan. botan was sent away on probation to tokyo, the city she’d been born in, to stay with a man called sojiro sakura for a year. labeled as a delinquent, and more than happy to play into that role ( the role she’d been playing her whole life ) , botan settled down in tokyo, still shocked about her mother’s apparent betrayal and change of attitude. a strange app appeared on her phone - she ignored it. she quickly became attached to ann takamaki, and followed her around. the two of them stumbled into the metaverse. upon being captured by kamoshida, something in botan felt the feeling of deja vu , and her fury, her rage, all the anger ( at her mother, at the politician, at this fucking terrible situation , at the world itself ) and awoke to her persona, esther, and defended ann. the two of them found a cat called morgana, who taught them about the metaverse, and how they could change the hearts of rotten adults. and from there, the three of them & ryuji , who joined them later decided to start the phantom thieves of hearts, the change the hearts of the people. and so : botan decided to atone, for sins that someone who bore her heart committed centuries ago.