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Tory Nichols (Peyton List) is an athlete from a poor family. When Tory was a child, her mother worked at a restaurant and would bring home leftovers so that Tory and her younger brother had enough to eat. When the restaurant manager found out, he fired Tory's mother without warning because it was against company policy to take leftovers home (even though, Tory states, it wasn't stealing because the food was already paid for and would go to waste). This experience shaped Tory's philosophy that the world shows no mercy and that people have to fight in a destructive way for what they want.
When she arrives at the Cobra Kai dojo, she impresses both Johnny and Kreese with her kickboxing abilities. She becomes friends with Aisha and starts a relationship with Miguel but develops a heated rivalry with Sam after an incident at the beach club where Sam accuses Tory of stealing her mother's wallet, though this accusation was based on an earlier comment--possibly meant as a joke--made by Tory about stealing or doing something similar. Her animosity toward Sam is further deepened when she finds out that Sam is Miguel's ex-girlfriend and catches Sam kissing Miguel while Tory was still dating him, leading her to strike out at Sam any time she sees them together. A vengeful Tory decides to furiously challenge Sam to a fight in school. Amidst the confusion, the students of the two dojos fight each other in an all-out brawl that ends with Robby accidentally kicking Miguel over a balcony railing and sending him falling off the second floor. She eventually sides with Kreese following the coup at Cobra Kai after Miguel is crippled by Robby at the end of the school fight.
In Season 3, Tory is expelled from school for instigating the school brawl, placed on unsupervised probation, and is forced to take on a day job waitressing at a sushi restaurant to make ends meet for her struggling family as her mother is undergoing dialysis, and is constantly harassed by her perverted landlord Rodney, who makes sexual advances at her, and uses the threat of reporting her to her probation officer to prevent her from retaliating and intimidate her into backing off. Kreese approaches Tory, needing her back at the dojo, and secures her loyalty by threatening her landlord. As Kreese's star student, Tory stops at nothing to exact her revenge on Sam, causing her to break up with Miguel after he disagrees with her desire to seek revenge against Sam and the rest of Miyagi-Do. Later in the season, Tory befriends Robby after he joins Cobra Kai when they find common ground in their broken home lives and their own betrayals from Miguel, Johnny, and Sam as well as their resentment toward their probation and expulsion from school for their roles in the school brawl. Upon finding out that Sam has gotten back together with Miguel and helped him save the All-Valley Tournament from being canceled due to the aftermath of the school brawl, Tory leads the Cobra Kais in an attack on the LaRusso household, engaging the students of Miyagi-Do and Johnny's new dojo, Eagle Fang Karate. She singles out Sam, chasing her into the Miyagi-Do dojo and attacking her with nunchucks. When Tory breaks a portrait of Mr. Miyagi, however, Sam regains her resolve and fights back with a bo staff, disarming Tory. She attempts to escalate the situation, only to be cornered by Hawk, Demetri, and Miguel in the process. Tory retreats, but not before furiously vowing revenge on Hawk, Miguel, and Sam. In response to Tory threatening Hawk, Demetri retorts that Hawk's friends will always have his back.
In Season 4, Tory starts a relationship with Robby and is befriended by Amanda LaRusso, Sam's mother, who helps Tory find another job and with her mother after Tory gets fired from her waitress job at the sushi restaurant for losing her temper and lashing out at a customer. She later turns to Amanda for help with her home situation after being confronted by her aunt Kandace and is later able to return to school after Amanda gives her permission, revealing that she has come to sympathize with Tory due to her sharing a similar past. Sam later reluctantly agrees as well to satisfy her parents, but she remains suspicious of Tory's motivations. During the finals, she faces off against Sam again, but Amanda asks Tory to fight within the rules and expresses hope that the match will finally end the rivalry between the two girls. With Sam combining Miyagi-Do and Eagle Fang techniques, she proves to be a match for Tory who accidentally elbows her in the eye. Despite Terry Silver encouraging Tory to illegally hit Sam in the other eye to win, Tory, recalling their previous fights, fights clean and wins. Much to Sam's surprise, Tory expresses genuine concern for Sam's injuries once the fight is over, showing that she has agreed to honor Amanda's request to end her rivalry with Sam once and for all. Tory's win gives Cobra Kai the All-Valley championship, but Tory is devastated and conflicted when she catches Silver bribing the referee for rigging the final match between her and Sam in Cobra Kai's favor which is why he hadn't deducted a point from Tory after her hit to Sam's eye and had earlier refused to give Sam a point saying Tory was out of bounds even though she stepped out of bounds after Sam scored.
In Season 5, Tory remains in Cobra Kai and breaks up with Robby. Despite this, she is left conflicted by Silver's cheating and is working with Kreese, who is behind bars, to undermine him. During her time in Silver's Cobra Kai, she develops animosity with ruthless new sensei Kim Da-Eun, who physically torments Tory, at one point making her punch a stone dummy for abandoning her match during the Sekai Taikai tryouts. After the tryouts, Tory defects from Cobra Kai and makes amends with Sam. Tory eventually helps the Miyagi-Fang students to expose Silver, coming up with the idea of breaking into the flagship Cobra Kai dojo and hacking into Cobra Kai's server to get the security footage of Silver attacking Stingray. When the video is found to be erased, Tory suggests stealing the security footage of Silver confessing to her that he had bribed the referee. During the fight that follows, Tory falls into trouble with Kim, but both Sam and Devon leap to her defense, Devon defecting when she sees that Tory is in trouble. After Anthony LaRusso posts the footage to the Internet and shows it Cobra Kai, Silver is exposed and ultimately arrested with Stingray also revealing the truth about Silver's attack on him. In the aftermath, Tory makes amends with Robby and they kiss.