Malina was born in Toltecatl of the Coastal-Nation of Alapelagias. Her mother was one of the priestesses of Inogir, previously a huntress, and her father was an elite hunter who had been permanently stationed in Toltecatl due to his marriage. From a young age she was interested in hunters and her mother’s work with Dust and aura, though in the beginning she didn’t want to become a Huntress. Her mother and father were quick to encourage the life of danger much to Malina’s initial dismay. Despite this, Malina eventually caved, either under the pressure of her mother or under the desperation to be loved, and began to strive toward becoming a huntress.
When Malina came of age to enter Harbor Academy, Alapelagias’ primary school, she excelled at her studies and surpassed most of her classmates. At the end of her first year, she had ended up in the top 10% of her class and was very knowledgeable of Dust and Aura for a girl her age. The second year at Harbor marked the beginning of basic combat training. Malina, like all students was given a chance to both design her own weapon and her own armor. She chose to model her weapon off of the staves she had seen around the Temple of Inogir, with a few modifications of her own and a dust based assault system, and her armor after her own mother’s old Huntress as requested by her mother. During the year, Malina was able to have her aura unlocked, her semblance discovered, and excelled at combat sparring with other students. She did so well, in fact, that she brought herself up to the top 5% of the class upon the end of the year.
During the summer break, her father, while back from a hunting mission, pulled her aside to talk to her. He told her that because of her high scoring tests at school, she was selected to be given the chance to take part in the Pseudo-Faunus project, a project started by the high council of Alapelagias to provide high achieving youth with combat augmentations in early life. In order to advance the Alapelagian people in general, people with high combat skills were given cybernetic versions of faunus parts from both existing faunus and nonexistent faunus. Malina chose to accept the offer and was taken to the capital city in order to receive the part of her choosing. In the end, she chose a scorpion tail with interchangeable poison chambers and named it “Manticore”. Upon returning to Toltecatl, she was put into a special class along with others who were offered the same augmentation and accepted. In the class they were taught both the more advanced combat, like all of the other students, but also how to properly use their individual augmentations. While she didn’t outperform the other students in her class as she had the previous years, she still did well and received special tutoring from her father when he was home from his missions, as infrequent as that was.
At the end of the year she told her parents that she wanted to go Beacon Academy in Vale. Her parents told her that if she were to be accepted into the Academy, they would pay for her trip over as well as send her monthly supplies of Dust and Foci, if she needed it. Upon hearing this, she wrote out her application, send in her combat reports, and waited. Eventually, a message came for her from Vale stating that she had been accepted. Elated, Malina began to pack immediate for her ride over, once she was packed and ready she said her farewells to her parents and boarded an airship headed to Vacuo. Once in Vacuo, she transited onto a large boat for the rest of her journey. Once she finally arrived in Vale, she boarded an airship and stepped onto the property of the prestigious Beacon Academy.