[ToxicShadow]

Even when she was a child, Yukia was aware that she was not quite like other kids. No one else had pale, white hair and unusually pale eyes, if not a shade of blue. And that was only the obvious, physical differences that could be seen at a single glance. Outside of those things, her skin always felt colder than that of other children. Or, rather, in her case, she noticed that they always felt warmer, and some would remark that her hands felt so cold all the time.

[ToxicShadow]

She was not so entirely alone, given that her mother had the same pale, almost pure white, complexion, pale hair, and unusual eye color that she did, but that was the only other person that Yukia knew that was just like her. Her father looked more like the other children, and the other adults she saw, too. Yukia often thought that she looked nothing like her father, even though some other adults would occasionally make comments that they had the same nose, or something to that effect.

[ToxicShadow]

Of course, it wasn't until she was a little older that she realized that some people probably just said that to reassure either her or her father, like they were grasping at anything they could to say that she looked related to him somehow. And she was even older before she realized what some people might have meant by it; that maybe she wasn't really his child after all, since they looked nothing alike at all.

[ToxicShadow]

Her physical appearance and cooler body temperature weren't the only things different about her, either. When she got upset, sometimes, it would get very cold. So cold, it might snow, or something would freeze. Eventually, her parents told her that that was also something very different from other children. If she cried and got upset, she could cause a snowstorm, but other children could not. And that some people would even be scared by her unique ability, if they found out about it.

[ToxicShadow]

The older she got, the more she learned about herself. That her mother was what might be called a yuki-onna, or a snow woman, even a snow demon or snow spirit, depending on what one read or whom they asked. Because she was born a girl, she took more after her mother than her father, whom was a human without any particularly unique abilities. So not only was she different than the other children when she was growing up, but very different.

[ToxicShadow]

She learned the history of her family, to some degree, once she reached her teen years. In the past, her mother once lived among a clan of yuki onna deep into the mountains. Outsiders, those that were not also of yuki onna heritage, were not permitted to remain within the clan's village for long. While she would have been accepted there, given that she was a half child, her father would have been unable to remain with them.

[ToxicShadow]

So, when her mother fell in love with the stranger that she rescued from a terrible snowstorm on the mountain and nursed him back to health, she made the decision to leave the village with him, so it never became a question of living without him or not. It never became a question of, if they happened to have a child in a future, if that child would be able to know her father or not.

[ToxicShadow]

Her mother, eventually, gave up the home she knew, and left the mountain with her father. They got married, and lived their life together. It took a lot of adjusting, especially for a yuki onna that was used to it almost always being cold, but she managed. And when Yukia was born, she was even more glad with the decisions she had made, even though it was no doubt difficult for the both of them to pretend they weren't so unique.

[ToxicShadow]

On the other hand, her father was a human that was originally raised on a small family farm. It had been his grandfather's farm, and his father's, but it didn't end up being his passion. Her father was more interested in working in the bigger city than working on a farm, even though he always had a soft spot for the kind of lifestyle he grew up with. He could not deny that living in a small town, living off the land, was a decent living.

[ToxicShadow]

It just wasn't what he wanted for himself, as he grew into adult. He preferred living in the suburbs, and having a commute that wasn't too long into the city to work. It ended up being a decent place to raise a child once he settled down with Yukia's mother, while they still had access to big city things. And her mother was happy anywhere, so long as she got to remain with the man she loved.

[ToxicShadow]

More than old enough to make her own decisions about life now, Yukia had finally decided what she wanted to do with her life. She was curious about where her mother came from, but after growing up in a small city alongside humans and with all of its amenities, it was not a life that would appeal to her. But the city didn't quite feel like home, either.

And it was because of that, that she was here.

[ToxicShadow]

Even though her father had moved away from the farm when he was old enough and capable enough to do so, the property, farmhouse and all, remained in his family, even after his father had passed away. Though, as he learned, the small town was doing poorly, especially without someone to care for the farm. Most townsfolk had their own private gardens to produce their own food, but it was still difficult to function without a fully operating farm.

[ToxicShadow]

The last he heard was that yet another family was moving away from the town. All that remained was the old mayor, an elderly woman that once ran the general store, and a few others. It could hardly even be called a town now and, certainly, had less of a population than the yuki onna village that Yukia's mother had been born into.

Based on these facts, her father assumed that it wouldn't be long before the town of his childhood was entirely gone.

[ToxicShadow]

Yukia, on the other hand, had an entirely different idea.

Hearing about it made her all the more interested in the place where her father grew up. A small town made up of humans, but humans that lived in a place where they believed in the goddess of harvest and magical harvest sprites that served the goddess. Would they not be afraid of someone like Yukia? Her father had not been afraid of her mother, perhaps because of where he had been raised.

[ToxicShadow]

Perhaps it could be a place for her. A place more comfortable than the city, and more comfortable than a village that was so far outside of the more developed world. A rural life had some appeal to the young woman.

Initially, her parents, her father, especially, weren't all too sure that going out on her own would be the best for her, but she reminded them of the choices they made. They'd done the same thing; chose their own paths.