OOC INFO;

NAME: Nata
AGE: 22
CONTACT: bounsweet, discord: lilycove#2584

IC INFO;

CHARACTER NAME: Aya Maruyama
AGE: 16
CANON Bang Dream!
CANON POINT Girls Band Party Chapter 19, as she's working with the other band's vocalists to complete their collaborative song. 
HISTORY:
The Bang Dream wikia kind of sucks when it comes to describing character history, so I will save myself the revision by explaining things here! In terms of universe mechanics, Bang Dream is very slice-of-life. The mobile game follows the story of five different girl bands with different aspirations, all striving towards their own goals and discovering new aspects of themselves through music. The main game story brings all five of the bands together to participate in a festival known as Girls Band Party, but not without some bumps and clashes along the way. 

But before I get into the main scenario, I'll elaborate on Aya's backstory as told from Pastel*Palettes' band story, which is arguably more important. Under an unnamed talent agency, Aya had trained for three years to be an industry-formed idol. Having recently graduated from her training, she was placed into a new type of "idol band" group with four other entertainment industry veterans - former child actor Chisato Shirasagi, fashion model Eve Wakamiya, music technician Maya Yamato, and "talent genius" Hina Hikawa. Upon their first meeting, however, the talent agency informs them that the instrumentals will be played by professionals out of sight, while the girls pretend to play onstage to the audience as Pastel*Palettes. Unfortunately, technical difficulties at their debut performance to a crowd of ten thousand immediately outed their inability to play, and the band was shunned by the media. Aya, who found herself frozen and unable to do anything onstage when the music cut, felt foolish, ashamed, and shaken by her failure.

Following the stage mishap, Pastel*Palettes was put on indefinite hiatus while the girls began music lessons to actually learn their respective instruments. While online criticism of the band continued to be scathing, the band resolved to work hard at becoming a true, working unit. Aya began to try and take the initiative to lead as someone familiar with the idol industry, putting emphasis on hard work that would bring results, but wasn't quite taken seriously by her fellow bandmates. With Chisato and Hina quickly losing interest and Aya's ideals as an idol put into question, the band seemed to be falling apart, until a gig was booked for them at Chisato's private insistence. After her idealization of hard work to achieve dreams was put down by Chisato, Aya began to lose faith in herself and her beliefs of how dreams come true. Thankfully, the rest of the band was able to cheer her up a bit and restore her confidence. 

As the date for their performance got closer, Aya decided to resolve to be truly useful to the band and offered to sell tickets to the show to potential fans in-person. Hoping to use the opportunity to have people get to know them again, the rest of the band (minus Chisato) agreed. Though they had minimal success through five days of selling, Aya remained  determined to make things right in her own way and move forward without regrets. When a downpour of rain caused the rest of the band to retreat from selling, Aya, determined as ever, stayed outside to continue despite it going against logical reason. When Chisato was informed of this by the other band members, she went after Aya just as she was getting ready to give up. Moved, she joined her in her effort, much to Aya's surprise. The two reconciled, with Chisato beginning to understand Aya's point of view, and Aya becoming more flexible on what it means to become an idol. The ticket selling stunt proved to pay off for the band's online reputation, and morale began to slowly trickle back for Pastel*Palettes.

However, their newfound confidence came with a catch. With the performance only days away, the agency staff informed the girls that everyone would be given the opportunity to perform live, except for Aya. Due to her stage fright, they made the decision that it would be safest and best for the band if Aya lipsynced to a recording while the rest of the band performed with their instruments legitimately. Heartbroken and hurt, Aya confided in Chisato about her shortcomings and disappointment about not being allowed to sing, but managed to find inspiration to stand up for herself from her friend's advice. On the day of their performance, she insisted on being allowed to sing, and was granted the opportunity. As a result, Pastel*Palettes managed to shine on stage and charm the audience in their own way, paving the road for more successes as an idol band.

As Pastel*Palettes gains popularity, they are scouted out by fellow girl band Poppin' Party and local live house CiRCLE to participate in a music festival known as Girls Band Party. Together with Poppin' Party, Afterglow, Roselia and Hello, Happy World!, the bands collaborate to create a song for all of them to perform together while getting to know one another along the way. 

"What does it mean to be an idol?"

This is the question that drives Aya Maruyama and her growth as a character. As someone whose dream has always been to be an idol, she begins her career with a very specific idea in mind: to be "sparkling, smiling, and always giving hopes and dreams to fans", the same way that idols inspired her when she was a child. Her experience with leading Pastel*Palettes challenges this view with the varying personalities of her bandmates, but through it all, Aya never strays from her roots. Even when her views are challenged, she does her best to keep faith in what brought her to this point - hard work.

Hard work is a major part of Aya's drive, and she always strives to do her best in every aspect of her life, whether it's her part-time job as a fast food worker, classes, or her idol career. The reason that she does so is simply because of her lack of talent, which she readily admits to Chisato. In terms of entertainment industry work, she doesn't have as much real-world experience or natural ability as the other members of Pastel*Palettes, which means that in order to keep up and move forward, she needs to put in that much more effort to make up for her shortcomings. She recognizes herself as the weakest link in the group in this sense, but it is her intense work ethic that inspires those around her and has the ability to change the opinions and world views of naysayers like Hina and Chisato. The latter calls her "tactless"; Aya is a person that rushes blindly towards her dreams, because it's the only way she knows how to achieve them. However, this isn't necessarily a bad thing - it makes her a determined person, set to her goals even when things appear to be hopeless.

That being said, Aya is definitely the most traditionally "idol-like" in her group. It's been said by her bandmates that she has a "sparkle" to her that inspires people to look at things from a different perspective. She's a dreamer, shimmers with optimism, and gives impassioned, heartfelt advice that comes from her desire to help others. When compared against Chisato's pessimism, Hina's obtuseness to relating to others, Eve's odd mannerisms and Maya's otaku-like tendencies, Aya is probably the most socially well-rounded of her group. Without intending to, her leadership qualities inspire her bandmates to examine their mindsets and find their own answers to the question I raised at the beginning of this section. 

She's still trying to figure out how exactly she should lead as the frontwoman of Pastel*Palettes, but Aya seems to be most comfortable when she's leading in an impassioned, impulsive way rather than adhering to an authoritative, strict guideline. She's a bit naive, very emotional, and gets easily overwhelmed when in a pinch, but is quick to recover and act as a guiding hand when the situation calls for it.  She stays true to herself and her convictions at all times, even when it would be easier to give up or only give the task at hand less than 100% of her effort. Her dream of being an idol is what drives her even when it isn't to her advantage, such as foregoing disguises in hopes that she'll be recognized in public by fans. She appears somewhat vain in this sense, spending her spare time taking perfect selfies and scouring social media for comments about herself in a desire for public validation. As you can imagine, her self-confidence isn't the best, but she's working on having more conviction in her abilities as she learns and grows with the band. 

Aya still has a lot of growing to do as an individual and as an industry professional, but it's a guarantee that she'll tackle every challenge with as much gusto as she can muster up. In order to prove herself to the world and to her own ego, she will continue to persevere, work hard, and do whatever it takes to achieve her dreams.