Characters / Ayakashi Triangle - Ayakashi

Ayakashi Triangle Main Character Index
Main Characters | Humans | Ayakashi

Ayakashi (妖)

The disparate variety of spirits that inhabit the world beyond typical human perception.

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General Tropes

• Alternate Character Reading: "Ayakashi" in Japanese is usually spelt "あやかし", but outside of the title, the manga always spells it with the kanji "妖" (whose closest standard pronunciation would be just "aya"). This allows for several bits of wordplay:
  • The kanji is also found in the standard spelling of "youkai (妖怪)", reflecting how ayakashi are based on traditional youkai.
  • "Ayakashi medium" is written "妖巫女 (ayakashi miko)". "妖" by itself can mean "attractive/enthralling" but also "disaster", reflecting the sway ayakashi mediums hold over weaker ayakashi and the more dangerous ones they attract.
  • Humanoid ayakashi are referred to as "jinyo (人妖)", an old Chinese term for monsters taking human form. Their earlier stages, which simply have some human features, are called "iyo (異妖)". By the series' own use of the kanji, those can also be parsed as "human/strange ayakashi".
• Animate Inanimate Object: Tsukumogami are a type of ayakashi that take over inanimate objects, giving them a physical body even regular humans can see. There are many other ayakashi that resemble tsukumogami in the traditional youkai sense, however they only resemble household objects without being corporeal.
• Cast from Hit Points: Ayakashi powers are fueled by the same energy that sustains their existence. If they overuse them, they disappear.
• Clap Your Hands If You Believe: Ayakashi become more powerful when many humans believe they exist. Since they're usually invisible to most humans, this tends to be based on superstition instead of their actual deeds.
• Dream Walker: Ayakashi can enter the dreams of the humans they possess. By extension, Suzu is able to through her omokage.
• Energy Beings: Ayakashi lack physical bodies, or even spiritual energy, and are made completely of Life Energy. Garaku even calls them "energy organisms".
• Fading Away: Ayakashi who've lost their purpose start to weaken and disappear. When this nearly happens to Shirogane, he starts wallowing over his failure as his body burns down to a small sprite until he reaffirms his desire to regain his power.
• Gods Need Prayer Badly: Ayakashi gain power from humans believing in them or especially worshiping them. Most ayakashi will weaken if people stop putting belief in them, but ayakashi with enough self-assurance, such as Shirogane, can retain their power even without worship, though their power will cease to grow or be replenished if lost by other means. They also don't need to be known as ayakashi for it to take effect; Garaku enjoys global recognition for his art, even if few are aware that he isn't actually human. While a lot rarer, it is actually possible for humans to benefit as well, which is where the first Ayakashi Medium came from.
• Good Is Old-Fashioned: Soga acknowledges that the most violent ayakashi nowadays are ikon and their spawn, the only types specified as modern occurrences, while more traditional ayakashi can be dealt with more peacefully. However, the exorcisms were quite prevalent in the past, when the older types of ayakashi were being created more, suggesting the worst of them were simply exterminated (or sealed away, like Tadare) and not replaced.
• The Heartless: Some ayakashi are born of negative human thoughts, and so tend to be the most malicious.
• Invisible to Adults: Children are more likely to be able to see ayakashi, at least in some circumstances, but usually stop as they gain more human relationships.
• Invisible to Normals: Ayakashi cannot be seen, heard, or even remembered by humans unless they have some kind of spiritual power (even if they aren't able to use it) or the ayakashi takes deliberate efforts to make themselves visible. Some have a presence so weak, even the spiritually attuned like Matsuri and Suzu may fail to notice them.
• Made of Bologna: If Shirogane's any indication, ayakashi don't generally have internal organs, they're just full of spectral energy that bleeds out if damaged. If they're strong enough, they can survive and even recover from things like dismembered limbs and losing almost half of their head. Having said that, there are exceptions. While most Omokage don't even bleed, a particularly high quality one can have the option to accurately duplicate internal human anatomy, to the point that even a doctor wouldn't be able to tell the difference without the right Magitek.
• Nature Spirit: Many ayakashi are created from natural phenomena that don't involve humans. This presumably includes ones like Shirogane and Ponosuke, which are basically intelligent animals.
• No Body Left Behind: Ayakashi's bodies disappear after exorcism, though sometimes the exorcism physically annihilates their body first.
• Not Always Evil: The majority of ayakashi are actually peaceful, it's just that the violent (or at least troublesome) type are more plot-relevant and likely to display humanlike intelligence. Even then, the most dangerous ayakashi are generally formed from human malice in the first place.
• Our Ghosts Are Different: Ayakashi aren't ever the spirits of deceased humans, but some resemble such because they were created by dying humans (and are based on traditional youkai that are ghosts). They presumably become the basis for ghost folklore in-universe by humans who can't tell the difference. The series even refers to certain ayakashi as onryou, a term usually used for actual ghosts.
• Our Spirits Are Different: "Ayakashi" are what the series calls all spirits of disparate origins, abilities, and behavior. The main things they have in common are being Invisible to Normals and made entirely of haku. Despite being a Japanese term, it's applied to spirits from all over the world.
  Seigen: As it is said there are a myriad of gods, ayakashi can come into existence in this world from various sources—from nature, animals and plants, as well as from human actions and thoughts.
• Purpose-Driven Immortality: They don't age, but generally have some sort of action that's fundamental to their existence. Sometimes these are Ghostly Goals they fulfill to cease existing, but more commonly they're repeatable activities done to continue existing, that vary from the mundane to the extremely harmful. It also seems possible, if difficult, for an ayakashi to change what their purpose is, as Sosuke's goes from eating ayakashi to trying to redeem himself for those he's killed.
• Tulpa: When most people still believed in ayakashi, they would attribute natural phenomena to them, and their belief created new ayakashi.

Recurring ayakashi

Tanumaro

Tanumaro (タヌマロ)

Voiced by: Hina Kino

A kettle/tanuki ayakashi that was friends with Matsuri and Suzu until the former drove him off.

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• Ascended Extra: He was a Recurring Extra in various shots of crowds, then had a prominent role when Suzu became King of Ayakashi. Many chapters later, he makes another appearance where he's tricked into putting a spell on Matsuri.
• Bucket Helmet: While the pot may be part of his body, the lid is removable, and he even tips it like a hat.
• Heel Realization: Suzu points out Matsuri is choosing not to break out of Tanumaro's illusion until he's satisfied with the punishment he's dealt out, making Tanumaro realize he's reject Matsuri's sincere desire to make amends.
• Inept Mage: He's talented enough to perform several jutsu, but not to undo them (and he doesn't have the common sense not to use them).
• A Lizard Named "Liz": His name is a portmanteau of "tanuki" and "-maro", a common name suffix.
• Master of Illusion: His steam clouds can trap people in discomforting illusions, though he doesn't seem to control what they are. Tanumaro is also far from a "master", as he can't even stop his power once it's started.
• Mind Manipulation: Tanumaro's powers go beyond regular illusions, as he's able to give Matsuri Identity Amnesia and make him think he's a regular girl.
  Befuddling the human mind is a basic skill for an ayakashi tanuki!
• Power Incontinence: He can start his steam cloud illusion, but hasn't learned to undo it yet.
• Space Master: Besides putting his target in an illusion, his steam can make them intangible to anything but ayakashi.
• Tanuki: Tanumaro is a tanuki ayakashi specifically based on the folk tale Bunbuku Chagama, where a tanuki disguised himself as a tea kettle. However, the tea kettle body is his natural state and it's something his clan, if not all tanuki, share.
• See the Invisible: His "Manifestation Vapor" technique can make ayakashi in it visible even to normal humans.
• Too Dumb to Live: While still training with the Steamy Visions Jutsu, Tanumaro uses it on Matsuri, despite not knowing how to stop it. If Matsuri couldn't undo it himself by dispersing the steam, it could have continued until he'd used up all his energy and disappeared.
• Tragic Bigot: Tanumaro thinks humans and ayakashi can't live together, because Matsuri betrayed his trust and forced him away from Suzu while saying that almost exactly.
• Unwitting Pawn: Shadow Mei easily pulls Tanumaro into her plan to break Matsuri and Suzu up, goading him into putting a spell on Matsuri as a prank that she knew he couldn't undo.
• Verbal Tic: Ends his sentences with "-nu".
• We Used to Be Friends: Years ago, Tanumaro was one of many ayakashi Suzu and Matsuri befriended, but was forced away by Matsuri when he began suspecting every ayakashi as a threat to her. He's very bitter when Matsuri tries to make peace again, but ultimately accepts his offer.

Donpa

Donpa (ドンパ)

Voiced by: Daiki Kobayashi

^{Click here for Donpa's corrupted form.}

A kappa ayakashi who was friends with Suzu and Matsuri in their childhood. He is the third ayakashi that ends up corrupted and tries to attack Suzu.

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• Ascended Extra: After being a Recurring Extra for quite a while, he gets a supporting role in chapter 86, and becomes a corrupted villain in chapter 112.
• Extendable Arms: As traditional for a kappa, Donpa can make one arm extend by having the other retract.
• Fantastic Medicinal Bodily Product: The secretions from his head bowl are used in Ninja-exorcist tool cure all ointment.
• Hulking Out: Being corrupted draws out his latent power to make him a huge slab of muscle, though his shell doesn't grow with it.
• Kappa: He is a child-sized kappa with most of the usual traits (turtle shell, beak, grass skirt, likes to eat cucumbers and shirikodama), except the top of his head is simply bald instead of a bowl (though it still contains liquid).
• Overly-Long Tongue: Donpa has a tongue that can extend to many times his body length, which he would use to take a human's shirikodama from their anus.
• Picky People Eater: When corrupted, Donpa tries to use the Crimson Gourd to make wine from the ayakashi medium. Though he sucks Matsuri in by accident as well, he doesn't do the same to Reo when she answers him. Either he'd rather fight without using the gourd than include a different human, or was so focused on Kanade he forgot he could use the gourd against anyone else.
• Razor Wind: When empowered, he can shoot the water from his head as discs that can cut through stone.
• Soul Eating: A shirikodama is an imaginary ball located within the anus in Japanese mythology, representing the soul. He considers eating a person's shirikodama to be a delicacy, and victims of it do not die in this setting, but do become foolish.
• Top-Heavy Guy: His corrupted form has an enormous torso and arms, but squat legs.
• Vegetarian Vampire: Kappa often eat human shirikodama (though this does not seem to be fatal in this manga), but Matsuri convinces Donpa not to—even if they offer it voluntarily—because Suzu would not want him to.
• Verbal Tic: Ends his sentences with "-ppa".
• Weapons That Suck: His clan are in possession of the Crimson Gourd from Journey to the West, which can suck in anyone who responds to the holder calling their name. Donpa breaks it out when he's corrupted and tries to use it against the ayakashi medium.

Biruko/Lippy

Biruko (ビル子)/Lippy

^{Click here for Lippy's corrupted form.}

An benign iyo born from the love and desire gathered in the town's entertainment district.

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• Ascended Extra: Originally one of the ayakashi shown hanging around Suzu in her youth in the first volume (in the background of the first chapter and by name in chapter 7), Lippy reappears in volume 9 when Shadow Mei wants to become a better kisser. Later on, she has a minor role giving Kanade a love potion and then becomes another corrupted ayakashi after Suzu.
• Beauty Equals Goodness: Lippy is quite strange looking, but far less monstrous than any other iyo, and unlike them isn't violent. Her corrupted forms is somewhat more humanlike, but in a way that's much creepier.
• Blue-and-Orange Morality: When Lippy is corrupted, she thinks coercing Suzu into sex with boy Matsuri, even drugging her in the process to make her more cooperative, is doing her a favor by "relieving her frustration".
• Celestial Body: She uses Love Wave by lifting her skirt to show the image of a galaxy underneath.
• Charm Person: Being corrupted makes her kisses go from a simple bludgeon to projectiles that force people to fall in love with her, after which they'll stand in place and enthusiastically chant her name.
• Costume Evolution: In Suzu's youth, Lippy appeared wearing no clothes but a ribbon in her hair. When she shows up in the present, she's wearing a black dress and has changed her hair to a (very small) bun with no ribbon.
• Dub Name Change: Her name is changed in different languages to convey a similar meaning. In Japanese, it's "Biruko", an abbreviation of "kuchibiru (lips)" with the "-ko" feminine name suffix added on. In English, it's "Lippy". In Spanish, it's "Morritos", slang for a pouting expression.
• Eyeless Face: She has no facial features except lips.
• Gag Lips: Her bright, plump lips take up her entire face. She can even create another pair on a wall that people can practice kissing on.
• The Heartless: She was born from the lust of humans who hang around the entertainment district.
• Immortality Field: When corrupted, she makes a Love Hotel her "castle" where attacks are either blocked or negated entirely. Her Charm Kiss and indirect ability use aren't affected.
  In the world of love, there are no weapons allowed.
• Mars Needs Women: Lippy drools over a drawing of Masurao shirtless and accepts it as payment. She may or may not know he's actually a jinyo.
• Obliviously Evil: Unlike other corrupted ayakashi sent after Suzu, Lippy wasn't given an order to kill her. Instead she was told to get Suzu to have sex with boy Matsuri, which unbeknownst to Lippy will transfer a fatal curse.
• Orgasmatron: Love Wave makes people so sexually-sensitive, they can't even stand. Girl Matsuri can barely keep any kind of composure just from pulling her phone out of her pocket.
• Token Heroic Orc: She's the only iyo introduced so far that's sane and mostly nonviolent.
• Toxic Friend Influence: Shirogane thinks Lippy telling a young Suzu how great kissing feels is part of why she's so "shameless".
• With Great Power Comes Great Hotness: Disturbingly parodied; Lippy's corruption gives her a hyper-exaggerated Big Beautiful Woman's figure and long, wavy hair, but she still has the same inhuman face and arms.

Masurao Sujimori

Masurao Sujimori (筋森益荒男)

Voiced by: Kanehira Yamamoto

A musclebound English teacher at Matsuri and Suzu's high school. He is actually a muscle jinyo born of strong thoughts of soldiers in the battlefield.

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• Badass Teacher: A ex-mercenary mountain of a man whose lectures intimidate even a trained ninja like Matsuri.
• Black Eyes of Evil: His eyes are shaded over, making him look scarier.
• Bruiser with a Soft Center: Seen completely melting and cooing over Shirogane's cat form. After he ends up scaring Matsuri, he frantically apologizes.
• Face of a Thug: He's hugely muscular jinyo with perpetually shaded eyes, but he loves cats and chose to pursue educating children in favor of the wars that gave birth to him.
• Kindhearted Cat Lover: Loves to pet cats, to Shirogane's displeasure.
• Non-Standard Character Design: He has highly-caricatured body and facial features unlike any other character, almost like a buff counterpart to the principal in To Love Ru.
• Retired Badass: A caption identifies him as a mercenary before he became a teacher, and he still wears his dog tags.
• Sheep in Sheep's Clothing: After discovering he was a jinyo, Suzu and Matsuri worry he had joined Mei's evil plan and kidnapped Yayo. Really, all he did was keep them from her during Yayo's tutoring.
• Stern Teacher: Frequently scolds his students for inappropriate behavior or not focusing on their studies.
• Super-Strength: Masurao simply shoving his chest outward is able to send Matsuri flying.
• Super-Toughness: His muscles are so hard, Matsuri can punch him square in the chest without leaving a mark.

Ponosuke Ninokuru

Ponosuke Ninokuru (ニノ曲ポ之助)

Voiced by: Satomi Arai

A humanoid pigeon ayakashi that serves the Ninokuru clan, working directly under Soga.

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• Adoptive Name Change: Ponosuke took the Ninokuru family name upon becoming their servant, making him the only non-humanoid ayakashi with a surname.
• Bird People: Ponosuke is a pigeon that wears clothes and has a human-like body shape, though his neck is so short, he's halfway between humanoid and Cephalothorax. Strangely, he has both wings coming out of his back and wing-like arms in his front.
• Bumbling Sidekick: In trying to serve Soga, Ponosuke often shows he's bad at keeping secrets, tends to cause embarrassing accidents, is incredibly gullible, and sometimes acts a lot more pompous than his skill warrant him to be.
• Familiar: A small supernatural being that acts as Soga's assistant and spy.
• Feather Flechettes: Ponosuke can twirl to summon a cloud of feathers, not as weapons, but to simply obscure visibility.
• Fingerless Hands: Ponosuke's arms are like the wings of an actual pigeon simplified to a flipper, which can manipulate objects in a human way without any kind of Feather Fingers.
• I Owe You My Life: He swore to serve the Ninokuru clan because Soga saved him from a wild cat.
• Instant Messenger Pigeon: A rather literal example; he's a pigeon that's acted as Soga's messenger, and his powers allow him to appear and disappear in a flash.
• Loose Lips: Muga hears of Soga's troubled love life from Ponosuke, which he regrets sharing after it gets Soga subjected to a brutal training exercise.
• Morality Pet: Suzu decides from Ponosuke and Soga's mutual respect that Soga can't be as bad as he looks.
• Old Retainer: A likely-ageless ayakashi serving a exorcist ninja, though he's mostly loyal to Soga specifically, sometimes even lightly doting on him.
• Only Friend: Soga is very antisocial, so Ponosuke is practically the only one close to him (though Soga insists he's a "familiar", not a friend).
• Say My Name: Frequently shouts out "Master!" whenever something embarrassing or unfortunate happens to Soga.
• Shipper on Deck: Ponosuke wishes Soga would generally lighten up and get a girlfriend. He's elated when Suzu invites Soga to lunch, and Matsuri and Shirogane don't show up as expected. Later on, Ponosuke starts to take notice of Matsuri and Soga's connection, and wonder if Muga is right about them being a good match.
• Tengu: Ponosuke is a much Lighter and Softer version of a kotengu based on pigeons instead of crows. He's a humanoid bird that dresses and uses a staff like a yamabushi, but instead of being stupid, violent, and human-sized he's fully-sapient, peaceful, and only a bit bigger than a regular pigeon. Ponosuke also has wings coming out of his back, like a daitengu. An extra in the second volume outright calls him a "pigeon tengu (hatotengu)", and includes concept art for a yatsude leaf fan.
• Trademark Favorite Food: He loves beans, and can hardly control himself from scarfing them down on sight.
• Verbal Tic: Ends his sentences with "po". Even his eating uses the onomatopoeia "pori". This carries over into English manga, but the subtitles for the anime changes it to occasionally replacing a word's first syllable with "po".
• Undying Loyalty: He's unreservedly loyal to Soga and the Ninokuru clan, not a supposed "King of Ayakashi" like Shirogane.

Suzu's Omokage

Omokage (オモカゲ / 分身)

An ayakashi duplicate of Suzu. She was at first created by accident and acting on unconscious desires, but Suzu later learns to recreate and control her at will.

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• Criminal Doppelgänger: It's a duplicate of a person visible even to regular humans, and doesn't care what it does to fulfil their desires. Suzu's omokage almost breaks into a dairy just to get a crepe.
• Doppelganger Link: Suzu shares some senses with it, including smell, the feeling on her lips when it kisses Matsuri, and exertion when it tries to pull a metal shutter up. Seigen worried it could manifest strength beyond what Suzu's body can handle and seriously hurt her, but it's later shown to only transfer pain, not injury.
• Enemy Without: It's a manifestation of Suzu's subconscious desires when she fell asleep, stressed over how she could help Matsuri.
• Equippable Ally: The author describes Suzu's merging ability as melding the ayakashi with her omokage and wearing it like a costume, hence why she can have new body parts growing through her clothes.
• Fighting Spirit: It's Suzu's Life Energy formed into a solid duplicate of her that does her bidding.
• Faux Flame: Bits of spectral flame spew out when it hits its head on a tree, and it disappears into them when it's satisfied.
• Ghostly Goals: It dissipated as soon as it (thought) it fulfilled Suzu's desires: First, to kiss Matsuri in hopes it would reverse his transformation. Second, to eat a fresh crepe.
• Helping Hands: Suzu can summon free-floating parts of her omokage, which unlike the whole thing seems to be normally-invisible.
• Inconsistent Spelling: In Japanese, "omokage" may be spelled purely in katakana or as an Alternate Character Reading of "分身", which is usually used for the word "bunshin" (lit. "alter ego/other self", but often used in fiction to describe Self-Duplication powers).
• "It" Is Dehumanizing: In the English version, Suzu's omokage is at first called "it" as an antagonist, and later "she" after Suzu manifests her at will.
• Mini-Me: Suzu can make her omokage extremely small, which she calls the "Issun-boshi/One-Inch Samurai Version", and uses it to sneak around. Unlike the full-sized version, she later learns to control more than one (up to ten) of them at once.
• Power Incontinence: Even after Suzu gains control, her omokage will disappear if she's very surprised. It may also try to manifest desires Suzu represses, such as nearly confessing to Matsuri that she loved him.
• Remote Body: After some training, Suzu can consciously create and control it.
• Sudden Name Change: In the English version, omokage have a sudden name loss when the translation company changed along with the magazine. The former always leaves the term in romaji, whereas the latter replaces it with varying generic descriptions like "another self" or "part of [Suzu]". "Omokage" is used once again from chapter 101 onward.
• Technically Naked Shapeshifter: Omokage bodies include imitations of the clothes their makers were wearing when they split off. This doesn't give away Matsuri's omokage because they were created naked at the same time the original was pulled out of their clothing.
• Vampiric Draining: It gets its strength from Life Energy drained from Suzu. If she didn't have plenty to spare, it could have weakened or killed her.
• Xtreme Kool Letterz: In Japanese, "omokage" means "image/visage (of something)". The normal word is spelt in kanji as "俤" or "面影", but the type of ayakashi is spelled differently.

Ikon, Iyo, and Jinyo

Ikon (異魂) / Iyo (異妖) / Jinyo (人妖)

The ikon's form in Lu's dream.

^{Click here for examples of some iyo.}

Ikon are a recurring type of ayakashi made of negative human thoughts, which proliferate by taking haku from humans and other ayakashi. Eventually, they begin to mutate into solid forms with human-like features (called "iyo"), with some becoming outright humanoid ("jinyo").

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• Beast with a Human Face: Jinmenken (literally "human-faced dog") are a type of iyo that have fanged human heads on top of squat, hairless, and doglike bodies.
• Bishōnen Line: As ikon mature, they become iyo, who have some human-like features (mostly a face or several). The most powerful turn into jinyo, who are fully sapient, outright humanoid, and eventually become indistinguishable from humans when not using their power.
• Black Eyes of Crazy: Jinyo sclerae often turn black when they exert their powers or become enraged, as displayed by Hinojiki and Shadow Mei.
• Body of Bodies: Iyo have human body parts in utterly bizarre body structures. Arms and fingers are arranged like legs or tentacles on invertebrates, while eyes, faces, and heads are spread all over their bodies or clumped together in one place.
• Brown Note: Lu taking and looking at a picture of one allows it to possess her. Exorcising the ikon makes it disappear from the photo, suggesting it was physically inhabiting the medium.
• The Corruption: Bits of ikon are like a pollutant, as even minor exposure tends to make ayakashi more malevolent and harm living organisms' health.
• Dark Is Evil: All appear to be made of ephemeral black mass of, which for ikon are fully visible in the form of screaming skulls.
• Eyes Do Not Belong There: An iyo Yayo and her sisters run into has a grapefruit-sized eye bulging out of its mouth.
• Human Outside, Alien Inside: Jinyo are initially humanoid masses of blackness that grow to be fully human-looking, but the latter form appears to only be a shell grown over the latter. Whenever injured, their human-like flesh cracks like stone to show the same darkness beneath.
• Humanoid Abomination: The ikon that entered Lu's dream had its faces form a bipedal shape, albeit without a real head.
• Hulk Speak: The ikon in Lu's dream spoke to her, but in fragments.
  You life force... is delicious. Gimme... more!!
• Mars Needs Women: Iyo can exhibit sexual lust for humans even when they're very inhuman-looking. When Reo gave Matsuri a set of sexy gear, it actually managed to distract a herd of ravenous jinmenken, and Lippy was once bribed with a photograph of Professor Sugimori (who isn't human, but looks exactly like one).
• Made of Evil: While many ayakashi are born of negative human emotions, ikon are made entirely of them.
• Metamorphosis Monster: Ikon start as amorphous black Blob Monsters that eventually take semi-definite shape upon consuming haku. Then, as iyo, they form fully-solid bodies with humanlike elements (mostly faces and articles of clothing). Some become jinyo, which are humanoid or even outright human-looking.
  Soga: You could say that they're larvae of malicious ayakashi.
• Monstrous Cannibalism: They're just as willing to get haku from other ayakashi as from humans, only instead of draining them like a parasite, they eat them alive.
• More Teeth than the Osmond Family: The one that showed up in the forest attacking other ayakashi had a mouthful of huge pointed teeth and a tongue constantly sticking far out.
• Not Always Evil: They are at first assumed to always be dangerous and predatory to humans and even other ayakashi. But it's eventually shown not only are the sapient ones able to gain morality beyond their base instincts, some are benign to start with. Suzu and Matsuri even discover they'd been friends with an iyo since they were children and their English teacher is a jinyo.
• Perception Filter: Jinyo are able to specifically manipulate muggles' perception of them to blend in. When Shadow Mei started attending school as Suzu's cousin, not only does everyone believe it, they act as if she'd been around for a long time. Hinojiki clearly looks like a child, but is able to convince people he's just a short twenty-year-old. It even seems to work unconsciously, as after Hinojiki visits and leaves the school, none of them remember he was ever there.
• Possession Burnout: Like an omokage, an ikon drains Life Energy from its human host, but more slowly. Lu ends up on the verge of passing out after a few hours, and it's implied it would have killed her that night if it wasn't removed.
• Prophet Eyes: One of the few parts of them that aren't pitch black are their milky-white eye(holes).
• Shadow Walker: Jinyo can appear and vanish into clouds of darkness.
• Technically Naked Shapeshifter: Jinyo can form and dissolve clothing from the shadowy material that makes up their body, though they've been shown or implied to be wearing physical clothing as well.
• They Look Like Us Now: Fully-matured ikon become jinyo. They not only look and can act like humans, their presence may be mistaken for human even by the most spiritual aware.

Garaku Utagawa

Garaku Utagawa (歌川画楽)

Voiced by: Atsushi Tamaru

Garaku's human form

^{Click here for the object Garaku was born from.}

An ayakashi born from an ink brush, who has a human form and identity as a famous painter. Though he considers himself a follower of Shirogane, the cat himself doesn't accept his loyalty, and he claims benevolent intent toward Suzu and an interest in making her more powerful.

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• Abhorrent Admirer: A (presumably) nonsexual example: Garaku gives Shirogane a lot of unwanted attention, partially because he loves cats. He'll fawn over how cute he is, and pet Shirogane's smaller form until his fur sticks up.
• Aloof Ally: Garaku wants Suzu to grow stronger, and saves Matsuri's life once, but would prefer they solve their problems themselves. More than once he's been shown watching them in danger from the sidelines without interfering.
• Ambiguously Evil: The Exorcist Ninja Association has watched Garaku Utagawa for over a century without any idea if he was dangerous or not. He tries to develop Suzu's powers to draw her at her full potential to see her past life again, but what he's willing to do to accomplish that is unknown. Later chapters lean heavily into him being Good All Along, as his loyalty to Shadow Mei is just a means for her to recover from her trauma instead of killing humans.
• Animate Inanimate Object: Subverted; Garaku is the tsukumogami of an ink brush that was used for many years, but his form is that of a human. The volume extras specify the brush did not itself come alive, rather it absorbed the painter's thoughts and feelings, then created Garaku from them.
• Art Initiates Life: He can turn his ink paintings into constructs under his control, which is made more effective by his ability to instantly create enormous, complicated figures on his surroundings.
• Artsy Beret: A renowned painter who wears a beret decorated with a pair of penheads.
  Yayo: Well, he certainly looks like an artist.
• Awesome Anachronistic Apparel: Like Matsuri, his clothing of choice is primarily old-fashion Japanese, even wearing geta instead of modern footwear.
• Back from the Dead: He sacrifices himself to protect Shadow Mei from the Gogyosen, and reverts to a lifeless brush... until Suzu's life energy as the complete ayakashi medium revives him.
• Beethoven Was an Alien Spy: It's implied by Garaku's date of birth and name that the painter he was created from was Kuniyoshia Utagawa. Kuniyoshi often drew cats and used them in place of humans, hence Garaku's love of them.
• Belated Love Epiphany: He didn't realize he was in love with Mei until after she was killed.
• Beware the Nice Ones: He's largely averse to violence, and would rather focus on his art... which lets him maintain widespread recognition, thus considerable power, in an era where people are generally less superstitious. His affable attitude is replaced with a sadistic Slasher Smile and cold indifference as he kills his former master. Then he snaps backs to being cheerful just as suddenly.
• Born as an Adult: He was born Naked on Arrival, looking like a human teenager. Currently, he looks like an adult, but if he aged naturally or deliberately is unknown.
• Celebrity Masquerade: To the public, Garaku is a famous artist, known for his skill in a variety of genres. As human recognition empowers ayakashi, being a celebrity directly makes him more powerful.
• Celibate Eccentric Genius: While he definitely has romantic feelings for Mei (which somewhat extend to Shadow Mei), he insists that a painter ayakashi like him has no need for sexual attraction. He brushes off the latter's teasing about getting to see her nude, and instantly shoots down her request to practice tongue kissing.
• Doppelgänger Gets Same Sentiment: He allies with Shadow Mei after she's unsealed, as she's an omokage of his beloved Mei Hirasaka, even though he acknowledges that her personality couldn't be more different. However, he does not support her misanthropy, and wants Matsuri and his friends to gradually mend her broken heart.
• Expository Pronoun: In his flashback to around when he was born, Garaku used the rough, masculine pronoun ore. In the present, he uses the relaxed but still informal boku (men are more likely to do the opposite as they mature), indicating how he's adopted a more laid back attitude.
• Fake Defector: A rather frequent occurence. His introduction arc has him suddenly trap Matsuri and Suzu and pretend he's hostile to them as a test; a later arc has him lead them into the clutches of a powerful ancient ayakashi that he used to obey, to draw it out. Finally, Garaku initially claims to side with Shadow Mei just because he can't turn down a request from a version of the woman he loved, even if he knows she doesn't want what the real Mei would. Turns out he was actually trying to make Shadow Mei stop being evil and acts as Matsuri and Suzu's Stealth Mentor. He let Matoi in on it fairly early, but Matsuri eventually figures out the truth by himself.
• The Gadfly: Garaku isn't afraid to egg on Suzu's concerns to provide further motivation to develop her power. For instance, when Suzu was worried Matsuri was acting more like a girl, Garaku mentions hearing that Matsuri enjoyed wearing some cute clothes.
• The Glasses Come Off: He removes his glasses as he starts fighting Suzu and Matsuri under Shadow Mei's order.
• God in Human Form: He's an ayakashi whose "basic" form is indistinguishable from a human without the spiritual awareness to detect his power, and resembles the human who used him when he was just an inanimate object.
• Healing Hands: His paint can patch up injuries, at least on ayakashi, by replacing their damaged flesh.
• Heart Drive: The brush Garaku was born from rests inside his body. After the rest of him is destroyed, he appears deceased, but Suzu's Life Halo accidentally restores him.
• Heroic Sacrifice: The Gogyosen exorcise him by targeting Shadow Mei, forcing him to use himself as a human shield. His death leaves behind the ancient ink brush he was born from.
• Holding Back the Phlebotinum: Notwithstanding his paintings' weakness to water, Garaku is amazingly powerful, but rarely willing to use that power to the protagonists' benefit. When he eventually does offer to protect Suzu, it's implied Garaku only did so because he knew Matsuri would refuse, and Suzu would like it better that way.
• Horrifying the Horror: His ghastly wraith of a former master is absolutely terrified as Garaku proves himself immune to their power and summons a dragon that kills them.
• Human Pincushion: The Gogysen end up putting over a half-dozen swords through his back, destroying all of his body but the brush.
• I Am Not Left-Handed: Garaku shows in the final battle that he can create drawings out of pure haku instead of ink, making them waterproof. This was hinted at mid-way into the series when the seal he puts on Matsuri couldn't be washed off.
• Imagination-Based Superpower: Garaku can create anything he can draw. This includes moving creatures, but also objects like walls, chains, and duplicates of things he wishes to steal.
• Kill It with Water: As they are made of soluble ink, Utagawa's drawings are dissolved by water.
• Logical Weakness: Garaku needs a brush to make art. If it's broken, he's largely powerless—which is why he carries a backup.
• Love Makes You Evil: Garaku at least claims to side with Shadow Mei just because he can't turn down a request from a version of the woman he loved, even if he knows she doesn't want what the real Mei would. Turn out he's lying, and probably trying to get this version of Mei to stop being evil.
• Mad Artist: He's relatively functional, but still tends to suddenly drop everything to sketch inspiring sights, even during tense confrontations. He'll even sketch as he walks, not caring about things like bicycle traffic or climbing to dangerous heights.
• Meaningful Name:
  • "Garaku" contains the kanji for "brush-stroke (画)" and "comfort (楽)", fitting for an artist with a laid-back attitude who was born from an ink brush.
  • "Utagawa" is the name of a school of ukiyo-e artists.
• Mellow Fellow: Usually a very affable and calm type, though the sincerity of this behavior is sometimes questionable.
• The Minion Master: A multitude of Utagawa's drawings can fight for him at once, in great size or number.
• Morphic Resonance: His hair, especially when poking out of his hat, resembles the bristles of the paintbrush he was born from.
• My Greatest Failure: He was powerless to save Mei from being drowned as a Targeted Human Sacrifice, Forced to Watch while beaten and restrained.
  Garaku (to Matsuri after sealing his powers): Doesn't it feel so sad... to be powerless?
• Ninja Log: He can instantly create an ink decoy of himself to take attacks in his place.
• Obfuscating Stupidity: He plays up his gushing over Shirogane as a means to drag the cat away from Suzu and Matsuri, leaving Suzu alone to try using her power to cure Matsuri.
• Opaque Nerd Glasses: His large, circular glasses sometimes become opaque. Depending on the scene, they can make him seem more nerdy or function as Scary Shiny Glasses.
• Paper People: His octopus, and possibly other drawings, can move around as flat features on surfaces even without coming out of them.
• Powers Do the Fighting: Utagawa relies heavily on his drawings to handle his opponents, dedicating what physical abilities he possesses to drawing faster (enough so to draw on his opponents).
• Purely Aesthetic Glasses: Garaku normally wears glasses, which have actual glass lenses, but don't seem to do anything, given he's a humanoid spirit. He's shown without them in flashbacks to his "youth" (as much as he had one), and can fight without them.
• Really 700 Years Old: He's been around since the end of the Edo Period, making him about 150 years old.
• Shapeshifter Default Form: He usually looks human, but refers to that as his "basic" form. He already looked human, but younger, when first born from an ink brush, suggesting it's a "true form" to some extent.
• Shipper with an Agenda: Garaku sees Matsuri as the best way to awaken Suzu's powers, and so has repeatedly arranged for them to be alone together. Conversely, he doesn't want them to get too close together, concluding Suzu will advance most swiftly if she believes her love is just out of reach.
• Sinister Surveillance: One of his more suspicious activities is to have his small drawings carry a camcorder around to covertly keep tabs on Suzu and Matsuri.
• Super-Speed: Garaku can make large, complex drawing instantly and seems to be able to move fast as well, catching up with an opponent he launched into the sky and exiting battle via Flash Step.
• Supernatural Sealing: Garaku can draw a crest on a human's hands, applying a curse that seals away their spiritual powers, though abilities that only involve controlling kon internally are unaffected. Despite being drawn with ink, washing the physical mark off does nothing to remove the curse.
• Tentacled Terror: One of his drawings is a giant octopus that ends up (suggestively) grabbing Matsuri and Suzu.
• Trickster Mentor: Besides openly mentoring Suzu to use her powers, Garaku also covertly puts her in situations that will bring them out.
• Wild Card: He's not much for loyalty, and will give his aid to whoever advances his personal interest. Garaku seemingly considered himself a follower of Shirogane simply because he thought the cat ayakashi was cute. Yet even though it goes against Shirogane's wishes, he helps Suzu train her ayakashi medium powers for the chance to draw her at full power. He eventually declares his loyalty to Shadow Mei just for being some version of the woman he loves, but turns out to be a Fake Defector—likely hoping Shadow Mei can be led away from destructive goals.
• Youkai: He's identified as the tsukumogami of a famous artist's brush.
• Zerg Rush: He makes a swarm of rabbits and frogs to overwhelm Matsuri and take his scroll.

Sosuke Hinojiki (spoilers)

Sosuke Hinojiki (日喰想介)

Voiced by: Yoshitsugu Matsuoka

^{Click here for his form shortly after becoming a jinyo.}

^{Click here for his form after his defeat.}

A jinyo (humanoid ayakashi) born from an ikon. Before becoming fully human-like, he fought Shirogane, and they injured each other before retreating. He posed as a high school student to kidnap Suzu and feed on her power.

After his initial appearance ends with his defeat and exorcism, Sosuke is revived by Shadow Mei to act as her servant, and himself plans to get revenge on Matsuri.

---

• Accidental Pervert: Sosuke attacks Matsuri while he's using the toilet simply because he was alone, not expecting Matsuri to react as if he was a peeping tom. Either Sosuke underestimated how much Matsuri had gotten used to being female, or just generally doesn't understand human shame.
• Ambiguous Syntax: After his Heel–Face Turn, "Devouring Shadow" is replaced with "Wicked Devourer". While the former is a shadow that eats people's haku, Sosuke's inner monologue specifies the "wicked" are what the latter eats. The ambiguity is even more emphasized in Japanese, where they're called "Kagebami (影食)" and "Magabami (禍食)", which mean "Shadow/Evil Eater".
• Arc Villain: The manga's first extended story arc, which takes up the majority of the third volume, centers on defeating Sosuke and his army of iyo.
• Arch-Enemy: He proved more than a match for a fully-powered Shirogane, which pressed the latter into his initial goal to devour Suzu. Shirogane remains hostile toward him even after he revives as a better person.
• Antagonist Abilities: As a villain, Hinojiki used Devouring Shadow, which created a sense of dread as it could strike unseen from any direction. Its heroic restoration, Wicked Devourer, acts like an extension of Hinojiki's body as he directly attacks.
• Ascended Demon: After Engulfing Shadow is destroyed, Sosuke's hunger ceases and he makes it his life mission to make up for the ayakashi he's killed.
• The Atoner: After he's saved from his out-of-control powers by Matsuri and Suzu and learns what empathy is, he vows to make up for all the ayakashi he sadistically devoured.
• Back from the Dead: After Matsuri's exorcism scatters Sosuke to the wind, Shadow Mei is able to gather his energy back together to reform his body, albeit imperfectly.
• Bad Powers, Bad People: Engulfing Shadow is almost inherently lethal, eating people's life away, and Sosuke's Heel–Face Turn involves him losing it.
• Bad Powers, Good People: He eventually decides he can use his power to devour ayakashi alive because they're dangerous and malicious enough that it's necessary to protect the innocent.
• Bait the Dog: He introduces himself as another human who can see ayakashi, and approaches Suzu to heal an injured one he found. Then he eats it, revealing it was all a trick to taste Suzu's haku (most likely he injured it to begin with) before taking her away.
• Battle Butler: After he's saved from Shadow Mei's cruel servitude, he gets hired by Lucy to work at her mansion, and develops Wicked Devourer to protect her.
• Beauty Is Bad: He has a pretty, innocent-looking face that makes everyone take notice, but his behaviour is fundamentally the same as any ravenous ikon.
• Because You Were Nice to Me: Seeing Suzu show concern for him inspires Sosuke to feel the same for others for the first time.
• Bitch in Sheep's Clothing: Sosuke did his best to seem like a kindred spirit to Suzu, acting shy, meek, worried about ayakashi, and enamored with her in particular.
• The Blank: Before he became flat-out human-looking, the jinyo that would later call himself "Sosuke Hinojiki" was a human-shaped mass; solid black, barring his stark-white teeth.
• The Bus Came Back: After over 50 chapters absent, Sosuke returns to the story, having become a steward at Lu's mansion.
• Card-Carrying Villain: Sosuke will proudly declare that he's a deceitful sadist, though he attributes it to a jinyo, the ayakashi closest to humans.
• Combat Pragmatist: Although quite arrogant, Sosuke is quick to resort to misdirection (lying about how his powers work, attacking from the front while Engulfing Shadow comes at his enemy from behind) or outright underhanded methods (attacking Suzu as a distraction to create an opening).
• Confusion Fu: Engulfing Shadow can materialize anywhere in Sosuke's view, letting him completely blindside his enemies.
• Crippling Overspecialization: His Engulfing Shadow devours the haku that ayakashi and their jutsu are made of, allowing him to overwhelm Shirogane even after the latter regains his full power. However, it only devours haku, so Matsuri force-feeding it his kon-based wind ultimately does him in.
• Curious Qualms of Conscience: Seeing Suzu crying as he died, despite the bad thing he'd done to her, makes Sosuke unwilling to eat other people or ayakashi. He's confused and infuriated that something he did without question now feels wrong.
• De-power: After Shadow Mei sends Engulfing Shadow out of control, Suzu and Matsuri destroy it, leaving Sosuke unable to use it again but also causing him to cease hungering.
• Demoted to Dragon: He was the series' first Arc Villain and seemingly died. When he shows back up, he's serving a new major villain, Mei.
• Death or Glory Attack: Though Engulfing Shadow is devastating if it makes contact, it's also fragile, and any damage it suffers carries over to his actual body. For this reason, it's usually held back until the target is distracted or otherwise unable to counterattack.
• Discard and Draw: After losing his Engulfing Shadow, he develops a new power, Wicked Devourer, consisting of a pair of phantom hands with mouths.
• Emotion Eater: Although he feeds on Life Energy, the emotions of those he takes it from affect the flavor. Since he was born of negative emotions, pain, sadness, and fear make it taste better to him.
  Hurting them… devouring their friends in front of them… instead of giving them a quick death, toying with them as they attempt to escape… This deliciously changes the taste of haku.
• Energy Absorption: His Engulfing Shadow can absorb haku even from ayakashi jutsu, completely nullifying them. It doesn't work against human ninjutsu, because those are made of kon.
• Evil Is Hammy: He makes a big show of explaining himself to Suzu, with some outright flamboyant hand gestures.
• Explaining Your Powers to the Enemy: Subverted. Sosuke actually lies about how his powers work, claiming that he can devour the haku of anyone he touches, but he really just summons a mouth that devours haku within its vicinity. Sosuke even mocks Matsuri for actually believing he would explain how his abilities work to the enemy and proudly states he's not trustworthy. When the revived Matsuri deduces that he can't devour kon at all, Sosuke's Inner Monologue confirms this, but he refuses to say it out loud to avoid giving Matsuri an advantage and instead continues to lie. Unfortunately for him, Matsuri easily sees through his lies and is able to successfully exploit his weakness with a technique.
• Explosive Leash: When reassembling him, Mei planted one of her black origami inside, making it possible for her to torture or kill him at will.
• Faux Affably Evil: Bits of insincere politeness are mixed in with his smug condescension. He even calmly addresses Matsuri on a Full-Name Basis, despite Matsuri furiously calling him "jinyo".
• Fighting Spirit: His most powerful ability, Engulfing Shadow, is a spectral human mouth that eats haku, which he can manifest anywhere in sight up to a considerable distance, and is how he's able to eat ayakashi too large for his humanoid mouth. However, it's also a giant gaping weak point that will damage his actual mouth, so he usually reserves it for surprise attacks.
• From Nobody to Nightmare: Sosuke started off like any other ikon, but gradually accumulated enough power to rival the ayakashi king himself.
• Glass Cannon: He can instantly incapacitate seemingly anyone by taking away their haku, but it's implied his durability is far less impressive. Once he consumes almost all of Shirogane's haku, Sosuke gains his Super-Toughness along with it. However, his mouth remains a weak point, leaving him a literal "Glass-jawed Cannon".
• God in Human Form: He is a jinyo, an ayakashi that's visibly very much like a human. Unlike Garaku, this seems to be his natural form, and even his spiritual presence is difficult to distinguish from that of a human.
• Good Hurts Evil: Sosuke finds still-inhabited places like a school "tiring" for the positive thoughts they possess, and prefers to hang around an abandoned hotel.
• Hope Crusher: Sosuke took Suzu alive, letting her friends follow after so he could kill them. Seeing their bodies would fill her with despair, making her haku taste that much better.
• Humans Are the Real Monsters: He considers his callous, hedonistic disregard for the lives of both humans and ayakashi as a natural result of being created by humans.
  Suzu: You're really sick.
  Sosuke: That's right. The same as you humans.
• Humanoid Abomination: When he first became a jinyo, he was a featureless silhouette, and only became indistinguishable from a human later on.
• Inhuman Eye Concealers: Sosuke eventually wears an eyepatch to cover a facial injury that shows his shadowy innards.
• Knight of Cerebus: Unlike Shirogane, he's played completely seriously as a threat, and the Rescue Arc he incites caused major changes to the series status quo. After his revival, he keeps going for the same gravitas but isn't strong or intimidating enough to pull it off, instead becoming The Comically Serious.
• Last-Name Basis: He's referred to exclusively by his (self-appointed) surname.
• The Law of Diminishing Defensive Effort: Despite easily devouring jutsu from a fully-powered Shirogane, and wanting to eat Suzu, he physically defends himself from her haku-infused origami, which clues Matsuri in that his Engulfing Shadow can only devour pure haku.
• The Man Behind the Monsters: A humanoid ayakashi that leads a group of much more monstrous-looking iyo.
• Man of Kryptonite: Although a tough customer even to an exorcist ninja, Sosuke's Engulfing Shadow makes him especially effective against other ayakashi. By directly eating the haku that fuels their jutsu and composes their body, he easily negates their attacks and punches right through their defenses.
• Master of Illusion: Sosuke can create illusions of multiple mouths in order to trick the enemy and catch them off-guard.
• Meaningful Name: He eats other ayakashi and "Hinojiki" is spelled with the kanji for "eat (喰)".
• Meaningful Rename: He was Never Given a Name because of his barely-sentient origin, and so came up with his current one upon achieving fully-human form.
• No Saving Throw: Although very powerful ayakashi are resistant to most forms of attack, Engulfing Shadow seems to ignore that entirely to eat right through them. Matsuri was able to recover only because he had an extra store of haku that replaced what he lost.
• One-Track-Minded Hunger: Despite having fully-human intelligence, Sosuke is focused entirely on devouring as much haku as possible, and making it taste as good as he can. His encounters with Suzu suddenly make him doubt himself, and put aside his hunger to resolve the ensuing existential crisis.
• One-Winged Angel: After Shadow Mei suspects Sosuke has failed or will betray her, she induces a Superpower Meltdown in him that turns him into a raging, giant version of his shadowy form with a Belly Mouth.
• The Only One Allowed to Defeat You: He wants revenge on Matsuri personally, and even saves him from Shadow Mei to do so later.
• The Paralyzer: Any body part he takes haku from is rendered paralyzed and numb, though if he takes enough, it's outright lethal.
• Picky People Eater: Sosuke picks his meals for taste as much as the power he'll gain from them. He tried to torment Suzu to make her taste better, and described the haku from Shirogane's curse on Matsuri as "too strong".
• Put on a Bus: After Suzu and Matsuri free Sosuke from Shadow Mei's control, he turns down a room at the Kazamaki residence to go on a Redemption Quest elsewhere.
• Red Baron: "The Gourmet Jinyo"
• Really 17 Years Old: In his childlike form, Sosuke says he's a short twenty-year-old to get a job at Lu's mansion, which they believe because jinyo have power over how people perceive them. Though he's not technically a child in either case.
• Redemption Equals Affliction: His damaged and weakened form after resurrection leads him to switch sides. Afterward, his eye is only partly healed and he remains in his smaller form.
• Rubber Man: He can reshape and resize his body in shadowy form, usually turning his hands into a giant fork and knife.
• Sadist: Inflicting misery on people before he kills them quite literally gives him pleasure.
• To Serve Man: Sosuke is willing to eat humans, and unlike Shirogane, doesn't limit himself to ayakashi mediums, even if they are the most desirable. If Suzu hadn't caught his attention, he would have gone on a feeding spree.
• School Uniforms are the New Black: Sosuke created a Hokusai High School uniform to blend in when first introduced, but continued to wear it in the ensuing battle, though a flashback shows he had other clothes. After his revival, he salvages the same clothing and some scraps to fit his shrunken body.
• Sinister Surveillance: The smaller, hard-to-detect ikon gathered intelligence on Matsuri and Suzu on Sosuke's orders.
• Sleep-Mode Size: After Matsuri defeats him, he spends most of his time by Mei's side as a small black spirit that looks more like a regular ikon. Even when taking humanoid form, he's still much smaller and younger-looking than he was originally.
• The Sociopath: He views the iyo under him as tools, and all other forms of life as a means to satisfy his hunger and hedonism. In his final moments, he does manage to show some empathy for Suzu. Once brought back, he's suddenly averse to eating people and only wants to kill Matsuri, indicating jinyo like him may eventually develop a conscience.
• Sympathy for the Hero: Seeing Suzu crying as he dies, despite the pain he'd caused her, makes Sosuke "lose his appetite". Far from a passing feeling, he outright stops eating even once he's revived.
• Teeth Flying: The blast of wind Matsuri shoves down Engulfing Shadow blows several of its teeth out.
• Too Powerful to Live: Before he can take advantage of the tremendous power he absorbed from Shirogane, Matsuri kills him by taking advantage of his biggest weak point. When he comes back, it's in a much weaker form, and he's unwilling to use his most powerful technique.
• Uncanny Valley Girl: Gender Inverted; he seems like a quiet, polite Pretty Boy, albeit with a bit of a blank stare. In reality, he's a heartless cannibal.
• Vampiric Draining: He can consume Life Energy from people so fast as to cause local paralysis in a single strike, and death in a few more. It's visualized for humans as if he was tearing chunks out of their physical body; for other ayakashi, it's more than a visual.
• Vegetarian Vampire: Ikon-spawn are defined by their hunger for haku, but Suzu's influence has left him unwilling to eat any, even as he wastes away to the point of collapsing mid-battle.
• Willfully Weak: His acquired aversion to eating haku keeps him from using Engulfing Shadow, even in battle against people he specifically wants to kill.

Snegurochka/"Rochka"

Snegurochka (スネグーラチカ)/"Rochka (ラチカ)"

Rochka in her ayakashi form

^{Click here for Rochka's human form.}

A snow spirit from Russia that tries to take the title of King of the Ayakashi.

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• Adaptation Species Change: Though Snegurochka is an embodiment of winter, she is traditionally a corporeal being. In The Snow Maiden, she's not treated as much different than a human. Here, Snegurochka is a spirit that most people cannot see or hear until she makes an effort to make herself visible. Most likely, she is a tulpa created by knowledge of the folklore character, but only matching her as closely as an ayakashi can.
• Adopted to the House: After giving up her ambition to be King of the Ayakashi, she moves into Garaku's studio and takes a human form, pretending to be his niece. After Garaku starts working for Mei, Rochka moves into the Kazamaki house, and Suzu says she's like Matsuri's little sister.
• Alternate Character Reading: One of her attacks is spelled "雪玉乱舞", which would normally be pronounced "yukidama ranbu (wild dance of the snowballs)", but is instead give the transliterated pronunciation of the Russian word "pulemet (machine gun)".
• Arc Villain: Rochka's attempt to usurp Suzu's position as King of the Ayakashi is the focus of the manga's second continuous story arc.
• Benevolent Genie: Her "Podarok" power can give one person a day whatever they most want at the moment, imitating her grandfather. As it's weaker than the original ability, whatever it is will disappear after a few hours at most, which is compared to melting snow.
• Costumes Change Your Size: Her snowshoes are highly cylindrical, yet her (proportionally-human) bare feet outside them are clearly too long to fit inside.
• Defeat Means Friendship: After Suzu calms down her rampage, she and Ungaikyo give up on trying to take her title.
• Elemental Speed: She freezes the ground under her feet to slide around at high speed.
• Emotional Maturity Is Physical Maturity: Snegurochka is likely decades or over a century old, but acts just as young as she looks. Because of this, Suzu feels it's her responsibility as King of the Ayakashi to look after her. Rochka once insisted to Une she could be let in on mature topics, but was ignored and responded in a very childish way.
• The Fair Folk: A cute, mischievous spirit who gladly pulls mean-spirited or outright dangerous tricks on Suzu for getting in her way.
• Fear of Thunder: A lightning storm outside causes Rochka to suddenly huddle on the ground and cling to Matsuri.
• Forgot About Her Powers: Her clothes tend to melt in hot weather simply because she doesn't remember to use her powers to cool them off.
  Soga: Why don't you envelop yourself with cold air? Not that it's any of my business.
  Rochka: You're so smart!
  Ponosuke: (thinking, holding back laughter) She's not so bright, Po.
• An Ice Person: Rochka can lower temperatures and create ice, letting her do things like freeze water in a sink, encase things and even people in ice, and launch giant icicles.
• God in Human Form: Another humanoid ayakashi, though unlike Garaku and Sosuke, normal people still couldn't see her at first. She eventually takes an outright human form, that only visibly differs by the more mundane clothes.
• Gorgeous Garment Generation: Her clothes are apparently made by her ice powers. They melt in hot water, and are shown reformed in a cloud of snowflakes. She can even duplicate a Pimped-Out Dress she's just seen in a photo.
• Horned Humanoid: Antlers form on Rochka's head when she unleashes her power, much like ones on her ice golem's head.
• I Just Want to Have Friends: Despite her powers and harassing Suzu, she's ultimately just a little girl desperate for companions after winding up in a foreign land. When Une, her only friend at the time, turns on her for losing a snowball fight, she becomes so distraught that her powers go out of control until she's comforted by Suzu, who had also suffered from loneliness before meeting Matsuri.
• Like Brother and Sister: After moving into the Kazamaki household, Rochka acts much like his Annoying Younger Sibling.
• Mistreatment-Induced Betrayal: Ungaikyo calls Snegurochka useless as soon as their planned coup fails, causing the snow ayakashi to throw a fit by trashing Ungaikyo's mirror world. Suzu gets Ungaikyo to apologize, after which they become friends again.
• Not-So-Harmless Villain: All of her antics are played for humor, but some of her actions could easily hurt or kill Suzu, and Garaku points out she could easily escalate to something much worse. A bad mood will show how frighteningly powerful and uncontrolled she is, though she may be more of a threat to herself than others.
• Oblivious Adoption: Rochka effectively gets adopted into the Kazamaki household, but (separately) thinks Seigen is her biological grandfather (as much as she understands the concept).
• Only Known by Their Nickname: Mostly goes by "Rochka", a shortened version of her name/title.
• Phenotype Stereotype: A blonde, blue-eyed Russian.
• Poirot Speak: Peppers her dialogue with Gratuitous Russian exclamations, like shouting out "страшно (scary)!" when she tricks Suzu into biting a frozen donut.
• Power Incontinence: Once Rochka gets into an Unstoppable Rage, she loses control of her powers, even as her Berserker Tears turn into Tears of Fear. Without Suzu's Cooldown Hug, she may not have stopped until she exhausted her power and disappeared. Being afraid can also cause her powers to falter.
• The Prankster: Rochka plans to usurp Suzu's title by driving her away from ayakashi with things like freezing her food so she hurts herself biting into it, or making her trip into Matsuri during gym glass. Occasionally, she'll throw in much more dangerous "pranks" (like almost impaling her on a giant icicle).
• Public Domain Character: While most ayakashi are based on types of mythological creatures, Snegurochka is a specific individual from Russian folklore. Garaku describes her in the Soviet tradition where she is Ded Moroz's granddaughter, though the original character had older origins.
• Raised by Wolves: Although Snegurochka looks human and acts like a child, she spent most of her life in a picture book without actual humans treating her like one. This leaves her ignorant of things like completely basic sex education or how extreme cold can kill people. Rochka also doesn't seem to understand how families and relatives work, thinking she and Matsuri are both Ded Moroz's "grandchildren" without piecing together that would make them either siblings or cousins.
  Rochka: Oh! Want me to freeze your intestines!
  Suzu: That'd kill Matsuri!
• Refugee from TV Land: Snegurochka was either created by or summoned into a picture book where she was the main character, referred to as her "spirit vessel (yorishiro)". Rochka speaks of another character from the book as if he was real, but knows he would have to become an ayakashi for that to happen.
• Snowlems: One of her more dangerous abilities is creating a multi-story ice golem with the head of a deer around herself, which she controls while sticking out of its head.
• Took a Level in Kindness: By the time she moves in with Matsuri, Rochka's antagonism to him has completely disappeared, and she's happy to join him in doing household chores.
• Top-Heavy Guy: Her ice golem has a huge, humanoid torso and arms, but narrower deer-like legs. Suzu realizes that makes them a weak point.
• Tsundere:
  • Rochka is initially the Bitter-type to Matsuri, vocalizing her distrust and dislike while holding many more positive thoughts to herself. She even does the classic line:
    It's not like I opened up to you, Kazamaki.
  • After moving into his home, she becomes the Sweet-type, usually getting along nicely but getting loudly upset over things like Matsuri not letting her win at video games.
• Vague Age: Physically, Snegurochka is clearly prepubescent, but her chronological age is unspecified. The folklore character is well over a century old, but this character came from a specific book that could have been printed much more recently. Rochka once insisted she was "not a child", but that could be talking about actual age or just pointing out she is an ageless spirit.
• Winter Royal Lady: She's called a "Snow Princess" and wears a fancy-trimmed fur suit with an elaborate star jewel on the hat.
• Yuki Onna: Tanumaro initially mistook her for a yuki onna, and Matsuri calls her the Russian equivalent thereof after learning her true identity.

Une/Ungaikyo

Une (卯音)/Ungaikyo (雲外鏡)

^{Click here for Une's form in old times.}

A mirror ayakashi that works alongside Rochka to take Suzu's title.

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• Adopted to the House: After giving up her ambition to be King of the Ayakashi, she moves into Garaku's studio to stay with Rochka and then moves into the Kazamaki household with her as well.
• Affectionate Nickname: Referred to by Rochka as "U-chan". The first translation localized this as "Ungai" (probably so people wouldn't mispronounce the "u" part like the word "you"), but the second kept it unchanged.
• Ain't Too Proud to Beg: When Snegurochka turns on her, Ungaikyo does an about face and starts begging for Shirogane's help.
• Beam Spam: Her humanoid form can create several other floating mirrors that can shoot and reflect beams of light.
• Bizarre Alien Limbs: The cloudy "hair" around her mirror body sometimes extends slightly to gesture or grasps small objects as hands would, like sticking out under her mouth for a Noblewoman's Laugh.
• Black Eyes of Evil: Her humanoid form's irises and sclera invert colors when she becomes corrupted.
• Broken Pedestal: She looked down on Shirogane for being "domesticated" and passing his title to a human, and decided to take it herself.
• Defeat Means Friendship: After Suzu gets her to reconcile with Rochka, the two of them give up on trying to take her title.
• Distinguished Gentleman's Pipe: She's occasionally shown smoking a kiseru (even though her face is a mirror), fitting a likely very-old ayakashi. In her humanoid form it is presented as Smoking Is Glamorous.
• Flight: Her mirror form levitates on its own while her human form does so on a cloud.
• Flying Face: Her weaker form is basically a face on a levitating mirror.
• God in Human Form: She looks like a human when she gets powerful enough, though unlike Garaku or a jinyo she's implied (by her speech bubble) to still be humanly invisible.
• Harmless Villain: Her idea to take Suzu's title is challenging her to a snowball fight, and (angrily) keeps her promise to give up once she loses. She is more dangerous when corrupted.
• Hot in Human Form: The form she has at the peak of her power looks like an oiran from the Red Light District of old Edo.
• Inconsistent Spelling: "Une" was originally written "ウネ" in just hiragana, then it was rewritten in kanji in chapter 100.
• Innocently Insensitive: When Matsuri splits into separate male and female bodies, and they're arguing over which one is real, Une innocently brings up that inanimate objects can become ayakashi, leading everyone to think that female Matsuri is merely a personification of the Gender Swap Awakened jutsu. She regrets her choice of words when female Matsuri runs off in an existential crisis.
• Light 'em Up: As a mirror, many of her powers are based on controlling light. Currently, this mostly consists of illusion. At the height of her strength, she can use her power over mirrors to redirect light into a laser powerful enough to melt Reo's blacksmithing hammer's metal head.
• Load-Bearing Boss: If she loses consciousness, her mirror world disintegrates—which can be quite a problem if she's in it at the time.
• Master of Illusion: She can make light projections in her mirror world, creating a Doppelgänger Spin of herself and Rochka. What she doesn't anticipate is that Matsuri's Calm Formation can already see through such illusions.
• Mirror Monster: Besides being a Magic Mirror herself, Ungaikyo can bring herself and others in and out of a mirror world through reflective surfaces.
• Monstrosity Equals Weakness: Une went through the Bishōnen Line in reverse, looking like a human when she was most powerful and taking her mirror form as her power faded with time.
• Morphic Resonance: Her human form has the same eyebrows as her mirror form, wears lipstick the same color as its mouth, hair similar to the clouds around it in shape and color, and the handle sticks out of her head like a hairpin.
• Never My Fault: Ungaikyo and Snegurochka both promise to leave Suzu alone if they're hit by a single snowball, assuming Ungaikyo's illusion meant they couldn't lose. When Matsuri quickly sees through it and defeats them, Ungaikyo blames Snegurochka and calls her useless.
• Phantom Zone: The mirror world she created is an uninhabited copy of the material world, letting her use reflective surfaces to spy on people and create Extra Dimensional Shortcuts. Damaging it has no effect on the other side.
• Powers Do the Fighting: Une's mirror form lacks any physical ability to fight, instead relying on illusions and mirror traveling powers. Though her humanoid form has actual limbs, she stays mostly stationary while attacking with summoned mirrors.
• Really 700 Years Old: Une is about two centuries old.
• Red Herring: Introduced as The Man Behind the Man to Rochka, seemingly insisting they use violence against Suzu and Matsuri, which she'll be able to in her mirror world. Then it turns out Ungaikyo's plan was very benign and easily dealt-with, while Snegurochka proves to be the much more powerful and dangerous one during their intro arc.
• Sudden Name Change: Initially, "Ungaikyo" is treated as a name^*Most uses in the Japanese version are ambiguous, because the language lacks definite articles, but at least one (by Matsuri in chapter 40) only makes sense as a name.. Then, in chapter 43, Matoi speaks of "Ungaikyo" as her species and "Une" her individual name.
• Tertiary Sexual Characteristic: Her "face" has some lines indicative of eyelashes.
• Torment by Annoyance: The most malicious thing she tries is throwing snowballs at Suzu until she gives up.
• Unusual Eyebrows: In both mirror and human form, her eyebrows are only crescent-shaped nubs on the innermost part of her face.
• Weaksauce Weakness: Une avoids the rain, because it causes her to rust.
• Youkai: She is an ungaikyo, specifically the version that's a living creature rather than an inanimate object. She is specifically the tsukumogami of a mirror from the Yoshiwara Red Light District.

Shadow Mei (spoilers)

Shadow Mei (カゲメイ)

Originally an omokage Mei accidentally created in her dying moments, she later gained full sapience but is still driven by the desire that created her—namely to "end the world of humans". Despite having a different origin than an ikon, her malicious nature causes Matsuri and Soga to consider her a jinyo.

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• Absurd Phobia: Mei is desperately afraid of having her picture taken because she sincerely believes in the superstition that it will pull out your spirit.
• Aloof Dark-Haired Girl: She has long dark hair and a haughty and cold attitude, which she maintains even after she stops being a villain.
• Appropriated Appelation: Matoi called her "Shadow Mei" during a fight, which she immediately took a liking to and started using.
• Arc Villain: She's the main antagonist of volumes 7 and 8. Although she doesn't explicitly stops being a villain after, she's reduced to being more of a Sitcom Archnemesis.
• Ascended Demon: According to Lippy, her Love Potion working on Shadow Mei means her heart has once again become that of a human's.
• Awesomeness Is a Force: Upon exerting a significant amount of power, her surroundings quake just from her presence. A kunai accidentally thrown at her head is disintegrated on contact by her Battle Aura before noticing it.
• Bad Boss: After Sosuke defies her orders, Mei beats him and threatens to kill him if he disobeys. She later drives his powers out of control to have him kill Matsuri, not caring in the slightest that he'll die in the process.
  Sosuke: Is that what you do to a friend?
• Bathing Beauty: She has several scenes where she bathes, which she seems to like to do whenever she needs to think.
• Book Dumb: Thanks largely to her upbringing and Fish out of Water status, she gets every question wrong on all of her first set of exams.
• Broken Bird: She was created out of the resentment of Mei at her lowest point, with her only goal being to Kill All Humans. But as she starts to become human once again and gives up on her genocidal goals, she becomes more broken by having to deal with Mei's emotional trauma.
• Butterfly of Death and Rebirth: After she learns to use the Life Halo's power to destroy instead of create, Mei compares the way it sits behind her to a butterfly's wings.
  I will flutter like a butterfly and bring an end to the human world.
• Buxom Beauty Standard: She has the same sizable bust that Mei had, but it's put in much more emphasis than Mei's chest ever was, due to her constant nudity and frequent Male Gaze shots on her chest. Yayo explicitly refers to her breasts as "ginormous" and even Matsuri is in awe of her breasts, referring to them as a "terrifying pressure" and finding them incredibly hard to ignore.
• Can't Act Perverted Toward a Love Interest: Shadow Mei normally cares little for modesty, first confronting Matsuri and Soga while bathing without the slightest concern about her nudity. When Matsuri (unintentionally) drugs her with a powder-based Love Potion, she attempts to bathe with Matsuri so she can provoke envy from Suzu, only to find herself suddenly mortified from being seen naked.
• Can't Kill You, Still Need You:
  • After Matsuri expels her from Suzu's body, and Kanade admits that he helped her move past misanthropy, she deems him her biggest obstacle to her vengeance against humanity. However, she also realizes that outright killing him will lead to Suzu's body rejecting her, so the next best thing is to mess with their relationship.
  • Since she needs to merge with Suzu to obtain their full power as an ayakashi medium, Matsuri is skeptical that she's responsible for the corruption of Bakuzou and Une, who were both specifically trying to kill Suzu. This is made more apparent with the corrupted Donpa, who tries kill Mei as well. The Gogyosen later admit to being the culprits.
• Character Tics: She's constantly putting her extended fingers in front of her mouth, palm in, as a show of haughtiness.
• Dark Is Evil: Her yakko are made of black paper instead of white like Suzu and the original Mei.
• Demonic Possession: She takes possession of Suzu's body.
• Dull Eyes of Unhappiness: Her eyes are always drawn as solid, without any sheen, undermining her superficial cheerful attitude. This carries over to Suzu when Mei possesses her. When she shows signs of getting over her grudge, Mei's eyes are drawn normally.
• Enemy Without: She embodies the darkest feelings of resentment Mei buried deep inside herself.
• Even Evil Has Standards: Despite trying to sabotage their relationship, Shadow Mei is noticeably shocked when Suzu uses her omokage powers to grope Matsuri after Kanade leaves the former's body.
• Evil Doppelgänger: She's a version of Mei with similar powers but driven entirely by her darkest, most hateful desires. She even considers her powers just a recreation of what she had as a human.
• Familial Body Snatcher: She's Mei's Evil Doppelgänger and wants to possess Mei's Reincarnation so she can obtain the full powers of the ayakashi medium.
• Fish out of Temporal Water: Since she's an ayakashi from the edo era, she has little knowledge of how things work, and is especially troubled and confused by modern technology, even getting scared of a bus and being afraid of getting her picture taken.
• Full-Frontal Assault: Matsuri and Soga run into her while she's bathing, and Mei decides to fight without bothering to dress because she knew how Soga would react to a naked woman. When they manage to Ignore the Fanservice, she just conjures clothes back on her in an instant.
• Game-Breaking Injury: She was heavily injured when Matsuri exorcized her from Suzu's body. Though Garaku's paint can patch her up, it and her body will eventually start to deteriorate if she seriously fights for too long.
• Ghostly Goals: Like any other omokage, her fundamental desire is the one that created her—to destroy the world of humans—and she'll presumably disappear if she does.
• Godiva Hair: A scene of Mei bathing has her hair draped over her breast, though the strands are so thin they only "cover" her breast thanks to Barbie Doll Anatomy.
• Good Hurts Evil: As with regular jinyo, Mei is averse to positive human emotions (even if she seems to view them as good things).
  How lovely. Is this what you humans call friendship? It makes me want to puke.
• Good Thing You Can Heal: Mei is less durable than the similarly-powerful Shirogane, as Soga is perfectly able to cut her, but her regenerative powers make up for it.
• Harmful Healing: By using the Ayakashi Medium's Healing Hands with malice, she is able to make life go out of control and die rapidly.
• The Heavy: As Suzu's Hero's Evil Predecessor, she is a central and recurring antagonist throughout the story and Suzu has to make peace with her eventually in order to become a real ayakashi medium and reverts Matsuri and Shirogane's curses.
• Hero's Evil Predecessor: Though the original Mei was just as kind as Suzu, Shadow Mei was born out of Mei's final resentful feelings towards humans, and as such is is evil and has the much-more-realized ayakashi medium powers. (She's also technically older than Suzu, even if she's only been active for a short time.)
• Holy Halo: After training, she ended up rediscovering something even Mei Hirasaka had all but forgotten, the Life Halo. The Life Halo is a circle of life energy centered behind the Ayakashi Medium's head, allowing her to open a door to the outside of Life Energy.
• Humans Are Bastards: Since he was born out of Mei's resentment towards the villagers who used her as a Human Sacrifice, Shadow Mei sees humans as scum and wants to Kill All Humans.
• Inconsistent Spelling: In Japanese, "Shadow Mei (Kagemei)" is first written "カゲ命依" (keeping her actual name in kanji), then afterwards simplified to "カゲメイ" (all katakana). When she's later just called "Mei", the katakana still distinguishes her from her human body.
• Incredible Shrinking Man: Just as Suzu can shrink her omokage, Shadow Mei can shrink herself small enough to ride on her own origami.
• It's What I Do: Although this Mei is independently sapient, she doesn't question the morality of her goals, just seeing it as an inherent part of her being.
  Shadow Mei: I'm just fulfilling the wish of my human body.
• I Just Want to Be Normal: She resents Suzu for being able to leave a relatively normal life with friends and loved ones, while she has Mei's painful memories of the Edo period and is literally Made of Evil.
• Jerkass to One: As her interest in seeing humanity destroyed wanes but her resentment remains, Shadow Mei decides—by his suggestion—to make Matsuri her whipping boy.
• Kick Chick: Her physical attacks are mostly kicks and knees.
• Kick the Dog: One of her first scenes has her literally kicking Sosuke in the head, to illustrate how little empathy she has for others.
• Kill All Humans: She was born from Mei Hirasaka's dying wish, to get Revenge against humanity for murdering her despite everything she did for them.
• Kiss of Death: Matsuri gives her a kiss in order to exorcise her from Suzu's body and wake Suzu up. The kiss gives them a direct connection Shadow Mei tries to channel her Harmful Healing through.
• Kung-Fu Wizard: She uses her powers to fight with origami like Suzu does, but is much more capable of fighting with her bare hands because she doesn't have a human body limiting her.
• Lascivious Beauty Mark: Since she has Mei's body, she also has the beauty mark under her left eye, but unlike her original self Shadow Mei has coy and seductive attitude and is much more willing to use her feminine charms to manipulate others or get her way.
• Letting Her Hair Down: She's identical to Mei, with the only real way to tell them apart is the fact Shadow Mei keeps her hair down, possibly to illustrate how she has a much more wild and seductive personality than the mature and composed Mei that kept her hair in a ponytail.
• Living with the Villain: After her first defeat, she decides to pull a truce with the protagonists, and starts living normally around them, even going to the same school, even though she's still plotting to take over Suzu's body. The protagonists know this, but Suzu hopes living among humans might also soften her up and have her give up on her goals to Kill All Humans.
• Long Hair Is Feminine: Just like Mei she's very feminine and has incredibly long hair, which is even more emphasized by the face she keeps it down.
• Love Redeems: After Garaku is revived from his Heroic Sacrifice, Mei decides to leave her ayakashi medium powers inside Suzu and live by his side.
• Luckily, My Shield Will Protect Me: Her origami can create a very durable turtle that can block attacks, and once she possesses Suzu she can make a shield projected between several yakko servants.
• Made of Evil: Soga and Matsuri consider her a jinyo because her spiritual energy is full of the hate and resentment that created her by the despair Mei felt upon being betrayed and used as a Human Sacrifice.
• Make My Monster Grow: Upon possessing Suzu, Mei can make her own omokage, and instead of making it smaller, she makes it a giant with Glowing Eyes of Doom she calls a "Daidara Botchi".
• Moral Myopia: She gets angry at Matsuri for accidentally subjecting her to a Love Potion (which he dispelled the moment he realized she was afflicted), despite repeatedly and maliciously pulling similar stunts on him (she'd turned him into a cat just a few chapters beforehand) when she stopped trying to kill him outright.
• Ms. Fanservice: She's a very attractive girl with a voluptuous figure that frequently acts seductively or is showing skin. Her very first has her Naked on Arrival, with a Male Gaze shot of her Toplessness from the Back as she bathes, and she soon goes on a Full-Frontal Assault against the protagonists, with only Godiva Hair, Shoulders-Up Nudity and Barbie Doll Anatomy preventing the scene from being explicit.
• Muscles Are Meaningless: Being an omokage converts her tremendous spiritual power into physical force without changing the original Mei's slender frame.
• My Grandson, Myself: When she attends school, she pretends to be the cousin of Suzu, her Reincarnation.
• Naked First Impression: She's first encountered by Soga and Matsuri when they happen upon her taking an outdoor bath. It's implied this wasn't an accident, but a trap to send Soga reeling and lower Matsuri's guard while she goes on a Full-Frontal Assault.
• Nightmare Fuel Station Attendant: Even when she's trying to relax, she can be disturbing. For karaoke, she picks the famously creepy children's song "Kagome, Kagome" and performs it in a very dark and disturbing manner.
• No Sense of Personal Space: She's strangely affectionate toward Matsuri, casually grabbing his face and hugging him in the middle of a fight. She also examines the body of Mei's reincarnation, Suzu, by grabbing her thighs, much to Suzu's annoyance. One chapter visualizes Mei possessing Suzu as feeling her up while she's bound and unconscious while both are naked.
• Not-So-Harmless Villain: After Shadow Mei starts attending school, the pleasantries of modern living largely distract her from her villainous goals, but it's shown she is still incredibly powerful, temperamental, and quick to violence.
• Perpetual Smiler: She's almost always smiling, even though she's never happy.
• Pragmatic Pansexuality: She doesn't hesitate to let herself be seen naked by Soga or forcibly kiss Matsuri if she thinks she can get something out of it.
• Proud Beauty: At first she only used her good looks to manipulate others to fulfill her objectives, but as she becomes more human, she seems to view her beauty more positively and starts being arrogant about it, especially her chest size.
• Pulling Themselves Together: Soga cuts off her arms, but it quickly floats back up and reattaches itself.
• Redemption Demotion: She is introduced as an extremely vicious villain much stronger than almost any other character. A few arcs later, she pulls a truce, but is still both plotting evilly and capable of fighting if she wanted to. But once she goes from biding her time among humans to regaining a human heart, simply being upset makes her incapable of using her powers at all.
• Relationship Sabotage: After her first attempt at a Demonic Possession of Suzu ended in failure due to her feelings for Matsuri, she decides her best course of action is to break up their relationship, so she can take over Suzu when she's at an emotional low.
• Removed Achilles' Heel: Omokage have superhuman strength, but using it usually causes damaging feedback to their creator's body. The original Mei's body is long dead and gone, so her omokage doesn't have to worry about that.
• Revenge Before Reason: In her past lives, she was a victim of All the Other Reindeer, always culminating in her murder. Protecting them from Ayakashi only resulted in the Ungrateful Bastards using her as a Human Sacrifice. Her other personality considered revenge, but thought it through carefully, and ultimately decided on a different tactic, to blend in with normal humans completely. But Shadow Mei has decided to Kill All Humans, even though she is technically of humanity as well. She doesn't seem to have considered what will happen next.
• Sand In My Eyes: She gets teary-eyed when Garaku comes Back from the Dead, but when Kanade points this out, she excuses it as dust in her eyes, despite being in a spirit world inside Suzu at the time.
• Sealed Evil in a Can: The jinyo Mei was until recently sealed in a rock along with several other ayakashi from the human Mei's lifetime. Unlike the others, Mei didn't deliberately seal her away, she was formed inside the rock to begin with.
• Self-Duplication: While possessing Suzu, she can create her own omokage, and have out (though not necessarily control) more than one at a time.
• Sexier Alter Ego: She acts in a much more sensual manner than Mei ever did. This is partly out of pragmatism since she's aware she's attractive and uses it to her advantage.
• Shameless Fanservice Girl: Has no problem whatsoever with being seen naked, only sarcastically chiding Matsuri for "peeping" during his Naked First Impression of her. She's also not above taking advantage of going on a Full-Frontal Assault because she knows that people find her body distractingly attractive, so it may give her an edge in battle.
• Shipper with an Agenda: Mei wants Suzu and Matsuri to break up so Suzu will be easier for her to possess, and so encourages anyone else who'd rather get with Matsuri instead, including Lu and Soga.
• Sinister Surveillance: She frequently uses her black origami to spy on Suzu and Matsuri, which was how she knew the latter’s name as well as Soga’s vulnerability to women before she even met them.
• Sitcom Archnemesis: She eventually makes a goal of tormenting Matsuri, but Mei finds herself unwilling to kill him or even enjoy beating him, instead aiming just to humiliate him (though still potentially endangering in the process).
• Sleeps in the Nude: She sleeps without any clothes, and even her Modesty Bedsheet does not cover much of her, illustrating her sensual and shameless personality.
• Split-Personality Merge: She is far more than just an Omokage. She is an actual separated piece of the Ayakashi Medium. She hopes to merge back with Suzu and Mei Hirasaka while convincing them to Kill All Humans.
• Soul Fragment: After possessing Suzu, Shadow Mei realizes she only has self-awareness because she has part of the original Mei's spirit.
• Sugary Malice: She keeps a cheerful and coy attitude even while being insulting, threatening, or violent.
• Sweet Tooth: She shares Suzu and the original Mei's love of sweet foods, and is impressed at how much modern-day humanity has besides persimmons.
• There Can Be Only One: She plans to take the power of Mei Hirasaka's current Reincarnation, Suzu, to enact her goals.
• Uncanny Valley Girl: This Mei maintains the original's upbeat and pleasant demeanor, even to people she's savagely beating and intends to kill.
• Un-Evil Laugh: She keeps Mei's "ni hi hi/heh heh heh" laugh, though the effect is deliberately jarring rather than comedic.
• The Vamp: She tries to use her looks to manipulate people, including taking advantage of Garaku's attraction to Mei to seduce him and have him side with her. This gets Played for Laughs when she later attempts to seduce Matsuri by pulling him with a Forceful Kiss Matsuri, but it ironically backfires not only due to Matsuri's feelings for Suzu, but because Suzu actually manages to outdo her by pulling Matsuri for a tongue kiss, which Shadow Mei is surprised by since she's a Fish out of Temporal Water her ideas of what is "sexually bold" are very different and she didn't even realize kissing with tongues was a thing.
• Villain Decay: She was introduced as a powerful and plot-relevant villain who managed to defeat both Matsuri and his much stronger mother, and was only foiled via a Battle in the Center of the Mind when possessing Suzu. After that, she continues to be an antagonist but pulls a truce with the protagonists and her Evil Plan from that point forward is mostly trying to sabotage Matsuri and Suzu's relationship, and her character is overall played as more comedic than threatening.

Minor ayakashi

Genba/Human-faced spider

Genba (減罵)/Human-faced Spider (人面蜘蛛)

Voiced by: Ryou Sugisaki

A skeletal, spider-like ayakashi that caused car accidents on a country road. Matsuri exorcises him in the first chapter. Later, it is specified to be an iyo.

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• Beast with a Human Face: It not only has a humanoid head, but many other humanlike faces on its abdomen.
• Broken Record: What little dialogue it provides suggests it's incredibly violent and simpleminded.
  I'll kill you… kill kill kill kill kill kill!
• Clothing Appendage: The shape of and pattern on its head resembles a hard hat.
• The Heartless: It is iyo, and thus developed from an ikon. The helmet-shaped head, clothes like overalls, and it attacking people on the road suggests some connection to construction workers.
• Meaningful Name: His name is spelt with the kanji for "reduce (減)" and "verbal abuse (罵)", reflecting how the only speech he's capable of is violent threats.
• Monstrous Mandibles: Its upper jaw has a pair of sickle-like mandibles on each side.
• No Name Given: Not referred to by name, and may not actually have one in-universe, though the concept art in volume 1 calls him "Genba".
• Starter Villain: Allows Matsuri to demonstrate his exorcist abilities before facing the much more powerful Shirogane.
• Tsuchigumo and Jorogumo: A Giant Spider with a humanlike head and hands.

Tadare

Tadare (襴)

Voiced by: Itaru Yamamoto

A oni-like ayakashi that was sealed in Mount Giboshi. Shirogane broke him out to recruit him as a minion, to little effect.

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• Big Bad Wannabe: Figured he could eat Suzu to become the new King of the Ayakashi, but is easily dispatched by Matsuri's wind ninjutsu.
• Chained by Fashion: Has chains wrapped around his shoulders and a shackle on his wrist, likely a remnant of his sealing.
• Eyes Always Shut: His two regular eyes are mostly shown closed.
• Eyes Are Unbreakable: An intact (regular-sized) eyeball of his is sent flying after his head is sliced in half.
• Off with His Head!: Bisected above the jaw by Matsuri's razor wind.
• Oni: Has the monstrous, giant figure of an oni, though the Third Eye and smaller regular eyes give a little resemblance to a Classical Cyclops.
• Sealed Evil in a Can: Sealed in a small stone tower almost two hundred years ago; its power faded with time, allowing Shirogane to release Tadare even at low power.
• The Starscream: Shirogane thought he would assist in retrieving the scroll from Matsuri. However, Tadare has no respect for an ayakashi "king" with no power, and simply followed him to learn Suzu's location so he could eat her himself.
• Third Eye: Has one large eye in the middle of his brow that opens sideways.
• Top-Heavy Guy: His lower half is not shown in the manga (and actually seems sunken into the ground), but the concept art in volume 1 shows he has a disproportionately squat lower body.

Chochi

Chochi (チョッチー)

A lantern ayakashi who hung around Suzu and pestered Matsuri in their childhood.

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• The Imp: He scares Matsuri for fun, but Suzu insists he doesn't mean any harm.
• A Lizard Named "Liz": "Chochi" is a diminutive of "chōchin", exactly the type of paper lantern he is.
• Small Role, Big Impact: He directly led to Matsuri and Suzu's first meeting.
• Stealth Pun: He's a paper lantern, like those used for decorative lighting in Japanese festivals, which followed around Matsuri. The Japanese word for "festival" is "matsuri".
• Youkai: Based on tsukumogami, specifically a chōchin-obake (paper lantern spirit), though he doesn't appear to be a tsukumogami in the in-universe definition.

Bottle-nosed Roller

Bottle-nosed Roller (とっくり転かし)

A very small ayakashi that possessed Yayo and caused her to trip.

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• Beneath Suspicion: Its spiritual power is so low, even Matsuri's pinwheel couldn't detect it.
• Curse: It possessed Yayo, but instead of controlling her, it simply made her constantly trip.
• Go and Sin No More: Matsuri "exorcises" a spirit such as it by performing a bizarre ritual to scare it away from where humans live.
• Non-Malicious Monster: Described as having low intelligence, apparently not having any idea how its possession affects people.
• Not-So-Harmless Villain: Despite its incredibly low power and causing people to trip seeming like a minor annoyance, he almost makes Yayo fall down a flight of steps.
• Youkai: Similar to a tsukumogami, in this case a small jar, though like Chochi he doesn't have a physical body.

Azubeh

Azubeh (あずべえ)

An azuki bean counter that comes to Suzu after his box of beans went missing.

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• Brought to You by the Letter "S": Written on his apron is the kanji for "bean (豆)".
• Literal Metaphor: He's a "bean counter"; not an accountant, but someone whose sole purpose is to literally count beans.
• Fading Away: Counting his beans is so fundamental to his existence, he'll disappear if prevented from doing so for too long.
• A Lizard Named "Liz": An azuki bean counter named "Azubeh".
• Youkai: Azubeh is an azuki hakari/azuki bean counter. He fits the description of a shirtless imp, though he's less mischievous from what we see, being happy to count his beans instead of making mysterious noises to bother people.

Sohachi-bon

Sohachi-bon (そうはちばん)

A tsukumogami that possessed a cymbal, causing it to fly around and be seen by humans as a UFO.

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• Alien Fair Folk: UFO sightings were reported in the area where Sohachi-bon flew around. After Lu investigates the area and finds "Shiromatsu", he disappears right as Sohachi-bon passes overheard, which she concludes is his spaceship.
• A Dog Named "Dog": "Sohachi-bon" is the type of instrument this spirit has possessed, a cymbal used for traditional Buddhist rituals.
• Eyes Are Mental: Sporting a pair of eyes show the cymbal is being inhabited by a spirit.
• Go and Sin No More: Suzu decides chasing down and catching it was enough punishment, though Matsuri accidentally sits on it, causing it to flee far away.
• Inconsistent Spelling: The English version spells its name both "Sohachi-bon" and "Sohachibon".
• Meaningful Name: Besides describing the possessed object itself, "sohachi-bon" is regional slang for a Flying Saucer or other UFO.
• Pokémon Speak: It can only say "bon", the last syllable of its name.
• Youkai: Identified as a tsukumogami of a cymbal.

Lost house

Lost house (迷イ家)

A spirit inhabiting a vacant house Garaku purchased. It was created by the memories of a married couple who lived there in the 1970s.

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• Astonishingly Appropriate Appearance: It's shaped like a stylized house.
• Domain Holder: Within the house it haunts, it's able to eject Shirogane, seal the exits, recreate furniture, and control the bodies and emotions of people inside while preventing them from seeing anything outside. Only Suzu's awaken power is able to break from its control.
• Getting Smilies Painted on Your Soul: It duplicates the happiness of the married couple on Suzu and Matsuri, in their case helped by them actually being in love with each other.
• Ghostly Goals: It wanted to see the couple who lived in the house again, and happily faded away upon being shown a projection in their image.
• Intrigued by Humanity: It's only interest in humans, not other ayakashi, and ejects Shirogane from the building.
• Made of Good: Formed by the memories of a Happily Married couple.
• Never Given a Name: It doesn't have a name, it's just identified by the type of ayakashi it is.
• Non-Malicious Monster: Suzu and Matsuri can feel it has no ill intent as it puppeteers them.
• Tender Tears: It tears up at the sight of its creators.
• Your Days Are Numbered: It would eventually fade away once its house goes uninhabited for long enough.

Chirizuka Kaiou

Chirizuka Kaiou (塵塚怪王)

The Ghost King of Dust who ruled over the tsukumogami before being sealed away in a stone. Eventually the Ghost King breaks out, and for some reason turns to Suzu for revenge.

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• Always Someone Better: Their wind powers completely overwhelm Matsuri's and bring the young ninja to his knees. But the Ghost King is in turn slain by Garaku, showing off the power ayakashi can obtain in modern times.
• Badass Boast: "All things eventually turn to dust. Fear and respect me, humans. As I command over everything in this world."
• Black Cloak: Everything but its head and hands is covered in a tattered black cloak.
• Blow You Away: Their fan makes gales that transmit their decay.
  It is the wind that transforms all things to dust.
• Combat Hand Fan: It carries a hand fan, which can apply its corrosive powers on contact, disintegrating Matsuri's kunai seconds after they clash, and creates gusts of the wind that do the same.
• Dark Is Evil: A being in a black cloak and black hat, with long black nails, that comes after Suzu with vicious intent.
• Expressive Mask: Their mask sweats in fear of Garaku's true power.
• Fish out of Temporal Water: After being sealed away for 150 years, the Ghost King has no idea how humans have proliferated and developed new technology, or how ayakashi can use that to their advantage.
• Fog Feet: It has arms, but floats around without any visible feet.
• Hat of Authority: Wears an eboshi to signify its position as King of Tsukumogami.
• Human Resources: They made a habit of gathering dust made from human remains, especially those of exorcist ninja who went after them.
• Make Them Rot: It can make things rapidly corrode, including everything around it. For living things, their actual flesh won't rot until its energy spreads through the whole body, which will be stopped and reversed if the Ghost King is defeated, but it will still hurt and weaken them in the meantime. Ayakashi that are powerful enough will simply be unaffected.
• Mistaken Identity: It mistakes Suzu for another ayakashi medium, her past life, who sealed it away. When Garaku explains the difference, the Ghost King decides to hold her accountable anyway.
• Otherworldly and Sexually Ambiguous: Besides the beard on their mask, nothing points to them as a particular gender. In the Japanese version, they use the archaic gender-neutral pronoun ware. In English, Shirogane calls Chirizuka Kaiou "that one" and Matsuri calls them "it". (Their title is translated as "king", but elsewhere the word is treated as gender-neutral.)
• Really 700 Years Old: Garaku said the Ghost King's been around since the Heian period, which would make them over eight centuries old.
• Sealed Evil in a Can: It was sealed away in stone since the Meiji era by an ayakashi medium, but somehow managed to break from its prison.
• Weapons That Suck: They can summon a chest that opens up and sucks things in, making them more powerful by literally gathering dust.
• White Mask of Doom: It wears a stark-white Noh mask, assuming that's not its face.
• You Are the Translated Foreign Word: The English version introduces it by its untranslated Japanese name/title, then afterward by the loose translation "Ghost King of Dust".
• Youkai: Based on a yokai of the same name; it shares the chest full of dust and authority over tsukumogami. Instead of an oni-like creature with a crown, it's a wraith-like figure in a cloak, mask, and noble's hat.

Oshira

Oshira (オシラ)

An ayakashi moth living in the hidden village, who tailors Suzu's ayakashi medium costume.

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• All Webbed Up: To size Suzu's outfit, she uses silkworm threads that take off Suzu's clothes and wrap around her body.
• Equippable Ally: Oshira carries a pair of silkworms, possibly young of her own species, which extrude strands under her control.
• Innocently Insensitive: She starts measuring Suzu's body the instant she walks into her shop, without explaining herself or even making her presence known.
• Moth Menace: Suzu and Matsuri believe she was on the edge of attacking them for intruding, though she was actually just taking Suzu's measurement.
• Multiarmed Multitasking: She uses one pair of arms to hold her silkworms while the other pair write the measurements she takes in a notebook.
• Pretty Butterflies: A very cute moth woman.

Hiderigami/Batsu

Hiderigama (日照り神) / Batsu (魃)

The second of four ancient ayakashi that were released from Mei's seal, an embodiment of drought that causes a heat wave throughout Omiko City.

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• Backstab Backfire: Pretends to accept Suzu's handshake, but actually planned to incinerate her. Matsuri sees his glowing hand and kills him before he can try.
• Cyclops: An ayakashi with only a single, large eyeball.
• Emotion Eater: The suffering its heat waves inflict make the Hiderigami grow stronger.
• Elemental Shapeshifter: It can turn into heat itself, making it impossible to fight. Matsuri's group must lure it out beforehand.
• The Farmer and the Viper: The Hiderigama comes to realize that what Mei Hirasaka said was true. Humans have changed over time and have largely forgotten the existence of ayakashi. Even as it scorched the humans, they did not bend down in fear, and the attention it received from the exorcist ninjas almost resulted in it being slain. Suzu offers it a new life in an old ayakashi village. Seeing Suzu's outstretched hand of friendship, it considers her offer and moves its own hand... to burn her. As a result, Matsuri is forced to kill it.
• Fish out of Temporal Water:
  • Being sealed away in the 19th century, it's completely stunned at how openly sexual Reo and Suzu can act.
    Hiderigami: The world during the Edo Period never had any people like this!
  • The technology humans have developed to deal with heat and drought (like air conditioning and refrigeration) leave him admitting he's far less feared than he used to be.
• Fun-Hating Villain: It hates when people enjoy themselves despite its heat waves, which Reo takes advantage of to draw it out with a beach party.
• Gender Flip: Traditionally, Hiderigami are all-female (though not visibly feminine), but this version uses the mostly-masculine pronoun washi. The English version mostly has characters use "it", but switch to masculine pronouns in its last scene.
• A God Am I: Several ayakashi have been worshipped as gods, but the Hiderigami gets especially into the idea of actually being one.
  Fear me! Worship me!
• Half the Man He Used to Be: Matsuri's wind horizontally bisects it at torso level.
• I Have Many Names: Referred to as both "Batsu" and "Hiderigami". Though more ambiguous in Japanese, the English version makes it sound like "Batsu" is a personal name while "the Hiderigami" is either a title or description of species.
• Jerkass Gods: It's been worshiped as a god and doesn't just get more powerful from the misery it inflicts, it enjoys it as well.
• Just Ignore It: It's so desperate to inflict misery on people with its heat, it focuses its attention on anyone who can ignore it. If its confidence is lost, its power will falter and force it into the open.
• Mistaken Identity: Like Kaiou, the Hiderigami mistakes Suzu for Mei. Suzu corrects him, though it's not clear if he understood or cared.
• Redemption Rejection: Seemingly realizes its time as a feared god has passed, but instead of retiring peacefully, it spends its last moment trying to get petty revenge on Suzu.
• Sore Loser: He realizes that Mei and Suzu are correct in that his time as a dreaded god has passed, but rejects Suzu's offer for friendship and redemption in favor of just trying to incinerate her instead.
• Weather Manipulation: Able to cause an intense, city-wide Heat Wave.
• Youkai: A youkai associated with heat and drought. It has the traditional single eye and matted hair, but instead of being a humanoid with one arm and leg, it's a Cephalothorax with two arms and Fog Feet.

Kubire Oni

Kubire Oni (縊鬼)

The third of four ancient ayakashi that were released from Mei's seal, a long-haired humanoid that kills humans and makes it look like suicide.

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• Conditional Powers: Only humans able to see ayakashi are affected by Kubire Oni's powers.
• Evil Gloating: Moments before it tried to kill Yayo, it started talking with her just to mock her.
• Evil Has a Bad Sense of Humor: It thinks that cutting short the lives of kind people who deserve a good life is hilarious.
• Fog Feet: It has no legs; it's body below the waist is just a tattered robe.
• For the Evulz: Doesn't just kill people for fun, but likes when its victims are kind and virtuous.
  You deserve to have a good life. It would be soooo unfair for it to be cut short. If such a thing were to happen… it'd be hilarious.
• The Heartless: It is an embodiment of the contempt for the living felt by people who killed themselves.
• Humans Are the Real Monsters: Holding a similar view to Sosuke, Kubire Oni blames its inherently murderous nature on the humans whose emotions created it.
  It is the wish of humans to kill other humans.
• Otherworldly and Sexually Ambiguous: Kubire Oni is humanoid, but too monstrous (and their bare chest too emaciated) to identify as male or female. Considering they were born from the emotions of multiple humans, they may be neither. In Japanese, they use the feminine-leaning pronoun watashi. In English, Yayo calls them "her" when mistaking them for a human, most others use "it", and Suzu switches to "they" while praying for them after they're exorcised.
• I Regret Nothing: It thinks that its own pointless death is pretty funny.
• The Noseless: It has no nose or nostrils, just a blank space on its face between its eyes and mouth.
• Prehensile Hair: Its hair is able to move and grab things, using the humans it possesses as People Puppets.
• Psychic-Assisted Suicide: It controls people's bodies to kill them while making it look like suicide, for instance making Yayo step off her apartment's balcony.
• Sealed Evil in a Can: Mei Hirasaka sealed it away in the hope that it would reform by the time of her next life. Unfortunately, even by the time the seal is broken, it is still up to its old tricks.
• Stringy-Haired Ghost Girl: It has the white robe and long stringy hair of an onryo, though it's gender isn't exactly obvious.
• Vengeful Ghost: Though not the ghost of an individual person, it is a murderous entity created by the hate of the deceased—not for any particular wrong-doing, just a general spite toward the living.
• Youkai: Based on a yokai of the same name, which are also created by humans that committed suicide and try to force more to do the same. Traditional kubire oni are the ghosts of those actual individuals, who use a Compelling Voice and hope that they'll get someone to take their place in the afterlife. This version is an inhuman spirit formed by their resentment, that physically controls people's bodies and kills purely out of spite. Oddly, Matoi actually calls it both "ayakashi" and "youkai".

Sukerūpe/See-Thru Loupe

Sukerūpe (スケルーペ)/See-Thru Loupe

An apparently mindless iyo formed from "certain perverted human wishes" that causes people to see through clothing.

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• Punny Name: Its Japanese name is an amalgamation of "suke suke (see through)", "sukebe (lecher)", and "rūpe (loupe)".
• See-Thru Specs: Causes whoever it's in contact with to see through the clothing of those it's paying attention to.

Buruburu/Shiv

Buruburu (震々)/Shiv

An ayakashi born from the imagination of people feeling the chills, which was sealed away in the Edo era and freed by Shadow Mei to menace a beach.

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• Dub Name Change: Their Japanese name is "Buruburu", an onomatopoeia for shivering. The English version makes their name "Shiv", an abbreviation of "shivver". The Spanish version makes it "Tembleque", which means "shakes/trembling (from illness, cold, or fear)".
• An Ice Person: It possesses people to make their bodies (feel) cold.
• Harmless Villain: Making tourists feel cold isn't exactly the most dangerous thing ayakashi have tried. (Fooling around with Matsuri's swimsuit is more questionable, but not something he holds them accountable for.)
• The Noseless: They just have nostrils, not a full nose.
• Otherworldly and Sexually Ambiguous: Like Kubire Oni, its humanoid features are too decrepit to identify a gender. In the English version, Mei refers to Shiv as "it".
• Poltergeist: After being driven from Matsuri's body, it instead possesses his bikini briefs to make them "shiver".
• Sealed Evil in a Can: It was sealed in a rock in the Edo era. Suzu agrees with Shadow Mei that this was far too harsh and lets them off with a scolding afterward.
• Sleep-Mode Size: They take a smaller, less-intimidating form after being expelled from Matsuri's body.
• Verbal Tic: Frequently throws "buru (brr)" into their speech.

Bakuzou

Bakuzou (バク蔵)

^{Click here for Bakuzou's corrupted form.}

A dream-eating ayakashi that would normally help people, but was somehow corrupted to attack Suzu through Ritta's dreams.

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• Accessory-Wearing Cartoon Animal: Wears a haramaki (stomach band) and nothing else in their regular form.
• A Dog Named "Dog": His name is basically a combination of "baku" and "zou", the Japanese word for elephant (albeit using a different kanji for the latter).
• Baku: It mostly resembles a black elephant. Shirogane implies it normally fulfills the roles of protecting humans by eating their bad dreams. This one was corrupted, causing it give people bad dreams, and even kill them inside them.
• Brainwashed and Crazy: It was turned violent and evil by some outside force, most likely an ikon.

Onryou/Vengeful spirit

Onryou (怨霊)/Vengeful spirit

A skeleton ayakashi manifesting soldier killed in a Sengoku era battle. It was disturbed by the ayakashi medium wandering near their grave and possessed Lu to attack her.

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• Combat Pragmatist: Being made from soldiers, it isn't above kicking Matsuri in the crotch or stomping him into the dirt.
• Dem Bones: Appears as a skeleton in armor.
• Demonic Possession: Possesses Lu to fight Matsuri and Suzu.
• No Name Given: Not called by any name, just its broad category of ayakashi.
• Sword and Fist: Fights in Lu's body with a sword and a series of stomps and high kicks.
• Vengeful Ghost: It's born of the hatred felt by many people killed in a battle, though it's not the ghost of a particular individual. In Japanese, it's called an onryou just like Kubire Oni.

Nurikabe/Wall Ayakashi

Nurikabe (ぬりかべ)/Wall ayakashi

A wall ayakashi that Soga and Ponosuke find obstructing a mountain road.

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• Dub Name Change: Despite nurikabe (lit. "painted wall") being a well-known type of yokai, the English version refers to it by the generic descriptor of "ayakashi wall".
• Good All Along: Soga and Matsuri thought it was sleeping in the road for no reason and would have stayed as cars crashed into it. It was actually there to block a landslide from reaching a village beneath the mountain and left before any cars came.
• Heavy Sleeper: Matsuri and Soga are barely able to get it to react, much less wake up.
• Heroic Dog: Its canine features are heavily emphasized and it wants to save a village full of humans just because it could.
• Heroic Willpower: Its powers have not faded in the modern era because it kept a strong sense of self, likely for the purpose of protecting people.
• No-Sell: All Reo's ayakashi-repelling incense does to the nurikabe is make it sneeze, destroying some of Matsuri's clothes.
• Nurikabe: It's an old-fashioned fortress wall with three eyes and canine features—even the "stone" parts are shown in closeup to be a dense mat of fur that Matsuri gets stuck in. Instead of extending to block people it merely stays in place on a road.
• An Odd Place to Sleep: Soga and Matsuri find it sleeping in the middle of a country road. Turns out it was just napping while waiting for something that would happen there later.
• Stone Wall: Literally and figuratively; it simply ignores Matsuri and Soga's attempts to move it without budging or retaliating at all.

Nurarihyon

Nurarihyon (ぬらりひょん)

An ayakashi Suzu encountered in middle school.

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• Youkai: It has the appearance of its traditional namesake and ability to make people unaware of the presence of itself or others.

Raijū/Lightning Beast

Raijū (雷獣)/Lightning Beast

A small lightning ayakashi that Soga chases through power lines and electronic devices.

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• Multiple-Tailed Beast: It has two tails, each of which looks like a cable with an electrode at the end.
• Non-Malicious Monster: It's never shown as directly dangerous to people, Soga just captures it because it's a nuisance that accidentally damages personal electronics.
• Raijū: It's a quadruped with electrical powers about the size of a cat that constantly runs around.
• Ride the Lightning: It turns into electricity to travel through power lines and electronic devices, deleting the latter's data when it enters. Soga captures it with a special leash that keeps it solid.

Tennin/Heavenly Beings

Tennin (天人)/Heavenly Beings

The moon ayakashi while (above) and after (below) Matsuri was afraid of them

Ayakashi that live in the sky, created by human imagination of beings living on the moon. Their form is dictated by the people looking at them.

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• Appearance Is in the Eye of the Beholder: Matsuri saw them as the Lunarians from The Tale of the Bamboo Cutter because he was always afraid Suzu would get taken away like Princess Kaguya. Once Suzu allays those fears, they instead look like a flock of Moon Rabbits.
• Morphic Resonance: Matsuri's fear made them look like moon people to him, but their eyes and eyebrows are the same, their clothes are the color of their fur, and their hair loops look like bunny ears.
• Time Stands Still: They freeze time to eat Suzu's offerings. Suzu was unaffected, either because they wanted to thank her or being the ayakashi medium made her immune. Matsuri wasn't frozen either because he'd recently eaten food she put her haku into.

The Corruption

The Corruption (穢れ)

A mysterious force that has recently appeared targeting Ayakashi, granting them the power they had at their height, at the cost of driving them to attack the current Ayakashi Medium Suzu Kanade.

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• Brainwashed and Crazy: Any Ayakashi it has infected becomes obsessed with killing the Ayakashi Medium.
• Curse: The corruption's primary purpose is to kill the ayakashi medium, taking control of anyone (or at least any other ayakashi) as a means to accomplish such. The final version of the curse is supposed to render the medium Deader than Dead. It ends up sealed inside boy Matsuri, letting the Gogyosen control him to spread it to Suzu.
• The Heartless: The corruption is a spell the Gogyosen created out of their hatred for the Ayakashi Medium.
• Hidden Agenda Villain: All that is known about the Corruption is that Suzu is its intended target. We don't know who controls it, what they want, or why they're using other Ayakashi to do so. It is actually a weapon created by a human spell. The exorcist ninja council created it to kill their Arch-Enemy, the Ayakashi Medium.
• Immortal Breaker: Since Amaterasu is a goddess, killing her for good is difficult. While the Ayakashi Medium she is part of can be killed, she will just reincarnate again. This spell was especially tailored to work around it so that the Gogyosen can finally put her down permanently.
• It Only Works Once: If the current incarnation of the Ayakashi Medium witnesses this jutsu in its true form before it can take effect, it will no longer work on her until the next time she reincarnates. When an Out-of-Character Alert causes Suzu to realize that boy!Matsuri is Not Himself, the Gogyosen's plans are foiled for the current generation.
• Multi-Armed and Dangerous: When Shadow Mei enters boy Matsuri's body, the curse manifests as dozens of arms coming out of a black void to attack her.
• Not Me This Time: Matoi believed that Shadow Mei was responsible for the corruption since Suzu seems to be the intended target but Matsuri doesn't think so. He's proven right when Donpa, under the corruption's influence, absorbs her into the Crimson Gourd along with Suzu.
• Superpowered Evil Side: Any Ayakashi that falls under its influence gains a significant power boost while becoming obsessed with attacking Suzu.
• Those Were Only Their Scouts: The corruption was not spread to ayakashi expecting them to succeed at killing the ayakashi medium. Primarily, they were test subjects for a curse meant to destroy the medium permanently.

Medusa

Medusa (メデューサ)

The series' second foreign ayakashi, it arrives at Lu's mansion in an art shipment and turns everyone to stone trying to make a nest.

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• Amplifier Artifact: Most of its strength comes a sculpture it uses as a spirit vessel, which turns out to also be a Heart Drive.
• Deadly Gaze: Whatever it looks at turns to stone. This doesn't seem to be based on eye contact, as a glancing blow to a person will simply cause Clothing Damage.
• Eye Scream: Matsuri stabs his pinwheel into its left eye so it can't petrify him as quickly with just the other.
• Healing Factor: Matsuri decapitates its snakes and they regenerate seconds later.
• It Can Think: Medusa mostly seems bestial and territorial, but may have deliberately kept its main eyes closed while smashing a mirror so its ability wouldn't be reflected back on it. Hinojiki also thinks it targets Lu because it recognizes her as the mansion's master.
• Medusa: It's a giant fanged Flying Face covered in snakes, mostly seeing through their eyes and only exposing the main eyes to use its petrifying vision.
• No Ontological Inertia: Everyone it petrified changes back to normal once it's slain.
• Snakes Are Sinister: Seigen once told Matsuri that snake ayakashi are particularly dangerous because of humanity's deep-seated fear toward them.

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