Pepper was born into a family of average sorcerers, who mostly kept to themselves and scraped by. They never had any exceptional magic to speak of, so they were largely ignored, and they were okay with that. She first let out smoke when she was about five years old, and found out that her magic is animal transformation!

From then on, she trained to improve her magic, mostly by practicing on herself or inanimate objects. She also took a few cheap classes at magic schools. When she was about seventeen, she made an offering to a Devil and received her mask! She took this as a push to take a risk and opened up a smoke shop selling transformation smoke. It was also around this time that she decided to give herself dog ears and a tail, and would re-cast magic on herself every week or so to maintain them.

Pepper was only proficient in mammal transformation, so she stocked up on smoke from other sorcerers, and made kind of a one-stop-shop. She never made too much profit, but she really loved her job! She continued on like this for a few years, just managing to keep her business afloat.

During his training to regain his devilhood, Asu stumbles upon Pepper's shop and they strike up a conversation. Mostly, he wants to know why she would sell other people's smoke when she has the ability to stock it all herself. When she tries to explain that she isn't good at other variations, he cuts her off and tells her that if she won't commit to bettering herself, she'll never get anywhere.

She ends up taking his words to heart. Over the next year, she pushes and pushes and pushes herself, casting magic on herself over and over until she's studied almost every animal there is. Her shop ends up becoming more popular and profitable, and eventually, a certain Devil ends up visiting her again to see what's changed...!!