Chun-Li is a video game character from the Street Fighter series, originally debuting in Street Fighter II. The first female fighter in the series, she is an expert martial artist and Interpol officer who relentlessly seeks revenge for the death of her father at the hands of M. Bison.
At the age of five, Chun-Li saw her first classical Chinese play, Peking Opera, and her first Bruce Lee movie, which fascinated her and also became part of the reasons why she started practicing martial arts.
She began by learning Tai Chi. However, Tai Chi was much different from the gorgeous movements she remembered from Peking Opera. Soon afterwards, her father taught her Hongquan as well as various basic exercises from then on. With that, Chun-Li’s skills in Chinese martial arts improved rapidly. Chun-Li used mostly kicks when fighting. This was something she picked up from her father, who was also said to have "legendary legs." Chun-Li continued to develop her kick attacks, embracing techniques from a variety of fighting styles, such as Chinese martial arts, capoeira, battle karate, and taekwondo, thus eventually creating her own style.
Chun-Li would later become a detective at the age of eighteen in hopes of finding her missing father. She later followed in her father's footsteps and become a narcotics investigator at the I.C.P.O (International Criminal Police Organization), also known as Interpol, working as the organization's anti-Shadaloo investigator. Chun-Li was known as the "black sheep of the I.C.P.O.", as she was investigating Shadaloo for the illegal sales of narcotics and weapons when said evil organization got their hold of the high-ups of Interpol.
Chun-Li was an Interpol investigator who had been searching for clues to the recent disappearance of her father. Getting into a friendly spar with an old teacher of hers and friend of her father, Gen, he gives her a lead into who may have killed her father—the mysterious crime syndicate Shadaloo. Finding its leader, M. Bison, she demands he tell her what happened to her father. To her surprise, Bison attacks and basically makes quick work of her, then flies away, laughing at her and telling her if she attacks him again he will kill her just like he did her father. With tears in her eyes (the last she swore to ever shed), Chun-Li swore vengeance.
Chun-Li teamed up with a United States Air Force member, Charlie Nash, to try to track and take down Shadaloo. She then ran into someone she would not have expected at all. It was Charlie's good friend and fellow lieutenant, Guile. Telling Guile he should not get in over his head and to leave the two be, Chun-Li learns he has orders to bring Charlie back. Attempting to use force to stop him, Guile immediately appears and holds her in his arms telling her that she can't force Charlie to not make what is right and for good intentions; nonetheless, she insists that she and her partner be left alone, to which Guile replies that he will never abandon friends in need.
After eventually learning that Bison tricked the Air Force into canceling the planned bombing of the main Shadaloo base, Chun-Li rushed over to the two soldiers to tell them they were tricked and would have to destroy the base on their own. Chun-Li with Charlie and Guile proceeded to the Shadaloo base located in Thailand to plant bombs around the base as Charlie and Guile headed inside to destroy the Psycho Drive, but Guile then came rushing out, grabbing Chun-Li and telling her Charlie had urged both of them to get away.
Meanwhile, Ryu was fighting with M. Bison. Along the way Chun-Li saw a young girl escaping with several others (who turned out to be Cammy) and she found Ryu and escaped with him. Later Guile told her that Charlie was inside of the Shadaloo base during the explosion marking his apparent death in the process. Despite being distraught over the initial lack of evidence to prove Shadaloo's crimes, Chun-Li managed to shut down the operations of the Shadaloo evil empire.
Chun-Li received an invitation to the second World Warrior tournament, and discovered that Bison had apparently survived the Thailand base's destruction. With this, she had the clear motive of destroying Shadaloo and avenging her father once again. During the tournament, Chun-Li and her allies manage to reach Bison and engage him in combat that reaches the forest. During their fight with Bison, They managed to overpower the Shadaloo dictator with Chun-Li weakening Bison with a powerful Kikosho that destroys part of the forest. When Guile urges Bison to surrender, Bison refuses and instead commits suicide by using all of his Psycho Power to make a huge explosion that blasted away, but didn't kill, Chun-Li and the other fighters who attempted to stop the dictator. With Bison's apparent suicide, the government exhaustively investigated Shadaloo's base and concluded that Bison and the other bosses had also died, despite no evidence being shown to prove that the cataclysm happened.
Some time after the fall of Shadaloo, Chun-Li, Guile and Cammy are summoned to a theme park to stop the rampage of Juri (a operative from Shadaloo's weapon division S.I.N.) who is wreaking extreme havoc. While Guile and Cammy try to evacuate the civilians still trapped, Chun-Li faces Juri just as she executes a rogue S.I.N agent and a woman. Juri seriously injures Chun-Li but before she can execute her, she is forced to flee when Guile and Cammy arrive due to her artificial eye malfunctioning. Guile later informs Chun-Li about their failure to apprehend Juri.
Donning her outfit, she returns to Interpol and teams up with Guile and Cammy to take down S.I.N. and discover what really happened to M. Bison. After she recovers from being defeated by Juri Han, she enters the new international fighting tournament to take down S.I.N once and for all. On her way, she is approached by Abel, who is searching for any leads on the Shadaloo organization. During the tournament, she also pursues Gen, who is also participating, for more answers about her father's death; Gen refuses and she is unable to force him. She then confronts C.Viper and almost blows her cover because Viper was "impeding" her investigation. Later she encounters Juri once more, who she tries to arrest and although she is able to defeat her she is unable to bring her into custody. Infiltrating the S.I.N. dam facility, she is trapped when Vega activates the base's self-destruct sequence. She is protected from the ensuing collapse by Gen, and is eventually rescued by Guile and Abel.