Sugimoto's Group | The Abashiri Convicts (Hijikata's Group) | The Hokkaido 7th Division | The Ainu | Barato's Mob | Others
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General
- Affably Evil: Lots of them are polite and friendly, despite their crimes.
- Asshole Victims: They began killing each other when they figured that they needed to be skinned to decipher the map. Beyond that, most of them are depraved and sordid criminals whose loss isn't mourned.
- Gold Fever: Zigzagged. While a good chunk of the Abashiri convicts are after the gold, many of the ones featured so far were only interested in escaping prison, then resuming whatever they were doing before being imprisoned.
- Human Notepad: On their bodies are tattooed parts of a map leading to a huge stash of gold.
- Let's Split Up, Gang!: They decide to go their separate ways after escaping Abashiri, but promise to go to Hokkaido. Most of them stay distributed across the area, though a few end up in nearby Karafuto.
- Serial Killer: At least five of the Abashiri convicts are prolific serial killers.
- Sorting Algorithm of Evil: The two first Abashiri convicts Sugimoto meet are incompetent crooks who don't even deserve a name. The third, Shiraishi, is competent in his line of work but is still a Butt-Monkey. Then come Hijikata Toshizou and Ushiyama Tatsuma, respectively a Living Legend and a The Juggernaut, whose fighting ability rivals Sugimoto's easily.
Noppera-Bou
- Ax-Crazy: He is said to have hacked seven men to pieces. However, Noppera-Bou denies it vehemently. It's eventually revealed that the men killed each other over whether or not they should trust him after one of them got misinformation from Tsurumi. The only one he butchered of the seven is himself, by skinning off his face and taking advantage of the fact that they were actually eight, this eighth man being the actual seventh man to die. In the end, he is forced to let himself go into jail to avoid his pursuers and continue on with his plan.
- Bald of Evil: Not a single strand left on that grotesque dome.
- Can't Kill You, Still Need You: Averted. This was the reason he was spared and kept alive by various parties despite the heinous crime he apparently committed, as the only person who still know the location to where the treasure is buried, but he's ultimately shot and killed by Ogata on Kinoranke's orders. Whilst Kinoranke viewed it as a Mercy Kill, due to Wilk having changed his mind and methodology towards his plans for a land for the Ainu by focusing his efforts on annexing Hokkaido alone, rather than waging a bloody war to annex parts of Russia that traditionally belonged to the Ainu before, Ogata's lack of hesitation towards killing the biggest lead anybody had towards finding the gold hints that his overall goals were not the same as those of the convicts, or his former allies in the 7th division.
- Boom, Headshot!: He is killed by Ogata with a shot to the head.
- Chekhov's Gunman: He is still alive because he knows the location of the treasure.
- Crazy-Prepared: He tattoed the convicts with a code only he and his daughter Asirpa could read, so that no one else could get to the gold by taking the skins.
- Didn't See That Coming: Tsurumi lampshades this, noting that his plan to fake his own death via Tear Off Your Face and taking advantage of the fact that there were actually 8 men involved in the massacre would have worked for any normal pursuer who only had a general idea of Wilk and his backstory. However, because the man hunting him was Tsurumi, he was able to understand Wilk's plan based on his intricate understanding of him, and track Wilk down despite all his efforts. Wilk ultimately had to take refuge in Abashiri Prison and 'confess' to the murders of the Ainu in order to get Tsurumi off his back.
- Evil Cripple: One warden cut off the tendon of one of his legs, which didn't stop him from committing his nefarious plan.
- Facial Horror: He has a completely burned head and exposed teeth. He's like this due to a literal case of Tear Off Your Face.
- Foreshadowing: As early as chapter 1, when Sugimoto is first hearing the tale of the Ainu gold from one of the convicts, it's stated that Noppera-Bou told them to break out and that he would split half the gold with any of the escapees. This foreshadows the twist that half the gold was all that remains of the original treasure, after the remainder was used to secure land for the Ainu to prosper on.
- Greater-Scope Villain: He is the instigator of the 24 Abashiri Convicts' search for the gold, but is currently in prison.
- Gold Fever: He killed seven men over a stash of gold. However, it is revealed that he probably only saw the gold as a way to finance a greater scheme.
- His Name Is...: He is killed by Ogata with a shot in the head before he can reveal anything about the gold.
- Luke, I Am Your Father: He is purported by Kiroranke to be Wilk, the father of Asirpa. However, Inkarmat claims that Noppera-Bou is not, but that he killed Wilk. When Sugimoto meets him in Abashiri Prison, he turns out to be really Wilk, confirmed by knowledge of Asirpa's makiri and her blue eyes. As for Inkarmat's claim, it's true from a certain point of view.
- Mysterious Past: Little is known about his past beyond the fact that he killed the seven Ainu who gathered the gold.
- Nightmare Face: A completely burned head and exposed teeth.
- Only Known by Their Nickname: Noppera-Bou is a nickname, and it designates a faceless ghost.
- Progressively Prettier: At the beginning, he is portrayed rather realistically and is truly horrifying. However, in later depictions, he has round eyes and a less horrible appearance to make him bearable to watch.
- Talking through Technique: Because he was being moved around regularly to a different cell in prison, he had to use the same code on a few different convicts, and one warden. Also repeating the code was a way to circumvent people like Ueji covering their bodies with tattooes so that no one could get the gold, and people like Tsurumi making fake copies of the skins to confuse people (though he didn't know about either happening).
- Tear Off Your Face: Noppera-Bou sliced his own face off so he could trick Tsurumi that he died with the other Ainu in his group. Tsurumi later finds his discarded face and turns it into a mask.
- Treacherous Quest Giver: The original thief tattooed his map on the convicts so that they'd need to be skinned to decipher the map. Then promised them a share of the gold if they came to Hokkaido.
- Two Aliases, One Character: He and Wilk are one and the same.
Nihei Tetsuzou
Voiced by: Akio Ōtsuka (Japanese), Jarrod Greene (English)
- A Good Way to Die: Nihei wants to die as prey for an animal meaner than he is, and sure enough he is killed by two Hokkaido Wolves.
- Ambiguously Gay: Drops several innuendos during his time. He still had 15 children with his wife, though."How about we head to the river and give each other a good scrub?"
- Anime Hair: Unkempt hair resembling more strips than genuine strands.
- Awesomeness by Analysis: Knows how bears think, helping him get ahead on his hunt.
- Canine Companion: His Shiba, Ryu, who remains faithful to him after he dies by following the scent of his rifle all over Hokkaido.
- Egomaniac Hunter: Wants to kill the last Hokkaido Wolf so he can brag about it.
- Even Evil Has Loved Ones: He once had an infant daughter of unknown fate, and a son who fought in the Qing-Japanese War.
- Evil Poacher: An endangered species only means a rare trophy for him.
- Expy: Of the coach from Noda Satoru's previous work, Supinamarada.
- Fingore: Nihei gets several fingers chopped off during a fight but he doesn't mind it a lot. His shooting finger is still in place.
- He-Man Woman Hater: Downplayed. He thinks that all females are particularly vicious, be it humans or bears.
- Hunter Trapper: An expert in bear-hunting, and wants to try his hand at wolf-hunting.
- Neck Snap: Performing one of these on someone in front of the police wasn't a good idea.
- The Nose Knows: Nihei can smell your state of mind.
- One-Hit Kill: uses a single-shot Murata rifle. That's all he need against bears. See Willfully Weak below.
- Pre Ass Kicking One Liner: "You better be ready to end up as animal shit!"
- Sherlock Scan: Nihei can deduce a bear's gender, age, and if they had any cubs from one look.
- Tragic Keepsake: Kirawus reveals that Nihei's Murata rifle belonged to his only son, who served in the Qing-Japan war and died.
- Willfully Weak: He only uses a dated single-shot rifle because he wants to always be on guard. When Tanigaki claims that he's just stubbornly refusing progress, Nihei retorts back that thinking that you have several shots in your rifle only makes you complacent against bears, which is far more dangerous than only having one bullet.
Henmi Kazuo
Voiced by: Toshihiko Seki (Japanese), Austin Tindle (English)
- A Good Way to Die: He wants a violent death where he's struggled for life.
- Ax-Crazy: Repeatedly stabs his victims and then cuts off their head.
- Bitch in Sheep's Clothing: Henmi acts meek and friendly, but underneath that facade lies a brutal murderer.
- Calling Card: His victims' backs are all carved with the "目" kanji for "eye".
- Combat Sado Masochist: He loves being stabbed with Sugimoto's bayonet.
- Cruel and Unusual Death: Shot at, stabbed multiple times then mauled by an orca. He was overjoyed.
- Death Seeker: Henmi wants to be killed by someone strong.
- Instructional Dialogue: Leads Sugimoto on a tour of various herring processing tools. For each one, he has an Imagine Spot about Sugimoto murdering him with them.
- Interplay of Sex and Violence: He gets a boner every time he sees a gruesome death. He also fantasized sexually about his execution while in prison, if his line to Shiraishi is any indication.
- The Only One Allowed to Defeat You: Inverted. He wants Sugimoto alone to kill him.
- Primal Scene: Seeing his brother being killed by a wild boar and futilely struggling to stay alive.
- Rescue Romance: Develops feelings for Sugimoto after he rescues him.
- Start of Darkness: Watching his brother struggle before eventually being killed and eaten by a wild boar started his obsession with death. Since witnessing the look of despair in his brother's eyes, he's been obsessively trying to recreate that look in other people as he murders them, and wishes for a similar death himself at someone stronger.
- They Look Just Like Everyone Else!: Is able to fool Sugimoto into thinking he's an ordinary herring fisherman for a long time. It takes Shiraishi, who spent time with Henmi as a cellmate, to figure out who he really is.
Kiichirou Wakayama
- Affectionate Nickname: Kiichirou calls Nakazawa "Princess".
- Ass Shove: His finishing move when he fights (and kills) a brown bear with a sword. He even gives a rather crude Bond One-Liner about it.
- Aw, Look! They Really Do Love Each Other: Kiichirou and his lover Nakazawa Tatsuya spend their time bickering, and Nakazawa even tries to send him to his death because Kiichirou cheated on him once. It doesn't prevent Nakazawa from looking for Kiichirou's sword like a prized heirloom or Kiichirou from fighting a bear to the death to save Nakazawa. Both die holding each other's hands.
- Bond One-Liner: "Congrats on losing your anal virginity." To a bear.
- Bury Your Gays: Kiichirou and his lover, Nakazawa, the only two explicitly gay characters of the series so far, die not long after their introduction.
- Connected All Along: We eventually learn via Boutarou that Wakayama was the man who gave the Hidoro family a tattooed skin to pay off his gambling debts, kickstarting the events of the Barato arc.
- Determinator: He is mauled by a bear and Buried Alive by it. He then claws his way out, kicks down the door to Eddie Dun's office, delivers a Bitch Slap to the American and demands the biggest weapon he has. Then he makes Eddie drive him back to the farmhouse so he can use the Maxim gun to kill one of the bears. Finally, he leaps out of a moving vehicle and sword fights another bear to a Mutual Kill.
- Dirty Old Man: Kiichirou's lover and subordinate, Nakazawa Tatsuya, doesn't like it one bit that Kiichirou is eyeing younger men and sleeping around with male prostitutes.
- Do Not Go Gentle: Oh so very much. Choosing to fight a brown bear with a swordnote , paying no atention to little details like dying in the process, is one thing; making crude jokes about it almost with his dying breath is another; but anally raping the mauled bear with the sword as a finishing move takes "defiance" to a whole different level.Kiichirou: Congrats on losing your anal virginity.
- Dying Moment of Awesome: He dies trying to protect his lover from a bear, but not before slicing off one of its paws and nose, then finishing it off by shoving his sword up its ass.
- Enemy Mine: Against three Ussuri bears and with no firearms, Kiichirou calls a truce with Sugimoto until the bears are taken care of.
- Even Evil Has Loved Ones: He genuinely adores his "princess", despite being a ruthless gang boss.
- Fat and Skinny: Kiichirou's the fat to Nakazawa's skinny.
- Gatling Good: Kiichirou uses a Maxim gun to kill a bear. He, unfortunately, runs out of ammo before killing the one remaining bear because he's been Firing in the Air a Lot with it beforehand.
- Gayngster: He's a yakuza boss in a relationship with one of his male subordinates, and also regularly employs the services of male prostitutes.
- Klingon Promotion: Kiichirou became the head of a powerful gang by offing every enemy and rival who was in his way.
- Know When to Fold 'Em: For him, the task of locating all the convicts was too hard and laborious, so he didn't bother going after the gold and even gave up one skin. It's heavily suggested that learning Keiji had vandalized his own tattoo was what ultimately convinced him it wasn't worth it.
- Off with His Head!: When one of the horse-racing team couldn't fulfil his orders, he had them decapitated.
- Reverse Grip: Kiichirou holds his katana this way.
- Tattooed Crook: The difference with the regular Abashiri convicts is that his shoulders are covered in stereotypical yakuza tattoos, but his legs bear the tattooed map of Noppera-Bou.
- Walking Shirtless Scene: After he flees a bear and tosses his belt because bears are wary of snakes, his chest is always in full view.
Suzukawa Kiyohiro
- Adaptation Distillation: Kiyohiro's arc omitted in the anime. He's instead introduced as an ally of Hijikata from the get-go.
- Boom, Headshot!: Koito immediately shoots Suzukawa in the head upon realizing the latter is disguised as Prison Warden Inudo, saying that the real Inudo doesn't drink.
- Bluff the Imposter: Koito demands that Suzukawa disguised as Prison Warden Inudou should converse with him in Koito's native Satsuma dialect, since Inudou spent some time there. Suzukawa, amazingly, answers his questions. Then Koito asks about his drinking habits, and "Inudou" replies that his tolerance has gone down. Koito immediately shoots him in the head, saying that the real Inudo doesn't drink.
- Con Man: His former activity before being thrown in prison.
- Cunning Linguist: Suzukawa is able to speak a little Ainu and is fluent in the very rare Satsuma dialect.
- Identical Stranger: With Nagakura Shinpachi. Both are bald/balding old men who share the same build and beard.
- Master of Disguise: Suzukawa is able to pull off a very convincing impression of Shirosuke Inudou. Moreover, he completely fooled Sugimoto with his Ainu chief persona.
Keiichirou Sakamoto "The Lightning Bandit"
- Anime Hair: His hair forms a spiky crest above his head, giving him a recognizable silhouette.
- Badass Boast: Has one before trying to run away from the 7th Division.I'm lightning. I'll run faster than any bullet they try to shoot at me.
- Bank Robbery: Keiichirou's main activity once he gets together with O-Gin. Although they do commit other crimes, Keiichirou and O-Gin are famous for robbing banks and post offices.
- Chained Heat: Mixed with Working on the Chain Gang. It is said in a backstory that he escaped Kabato Prison with a partner and pushed him under a train to break free.
- Charles Atlas Superpower: Keiichirou's running feats are amazing for an ordinary man. He likes to run fast and once ran 200 km in one day to simply outpace his pursuers.
- Last Kiss: When he's gunned down by a machine gun, he kisses O-Gin one last time before dying.
- Le Parkour: Keiichirou is agile as a monkey. He can jump against walls to reach great heights and scale anything to escape pursuers.
- Outlaw Couple: With O-Gin.
- Unusual Eyebrows: Lightning shaped, just like his nickname. His baby has them too.
Shiton Anehata
- Adapted Out: The anime completely cuts him out.
Hitoshi Nanba explains
on Twitter that when given the plan to animate the series, an Executive Meddling told the director to omit him because the episodes involving him contain bestiality and animal slaughter. The arc was later adapted into an OVA. - Bestiality Is Depraved: Shiton rapes animals, something that numerous characters find more reprehensible than some of the convicts' serial killings of humans.
- Bitch in Sheep's Clothing: Acts like a friendly nature guide when he's around other people, and manages to befriend Cikapasi.
- Escort Mission: Unlike most of the other "convict of the week" arcs, where the main characters have to defeat a convict with some kind of deadly skill, Shiton's arc involves finding him before he gets eaten by a bear and the tattoo is lost.
- Establishing Character Moment: Shiton's first scene has him waltzing through the woods, commenting on the beauty around him. Then, without warning, it cuts to him having sex with a deer.
- Extreme Omnisexual: The term "nature-lover" has never been so literal. Not only does he rape animals, he also grinds his genitals into trees.
- Flat Character: He dies quickly with no characterization beyond being a knowledgeable scholar who rapes the local wildlife in Hokkaido before killing everything he's raped out of guilt.
- Four Eyes, Zero Soul: He wears a pair of round spectacles.
- Good Eyes, Evil Eyes: Subverted. He has wide, sparkling round eyes. However, he is notorious among the Ainu as a depraved criminal who rapes the local wildlife (which they consider holy) before killing everything he's raped out of guilt.
- Nature Lover: Shiton is an expert on the local wildlife, and loves walking in the wilderness, examining and identifying the fauna and flora around him, before raping them.
- No Historical Figures Were Harmed: His name and appearance are based on Ernest Thompson Seton, a Canadian-American author and wildlife artist (and founding member of the Boy Scouts of America) whose animal stories are enormously popular in Japan (with several having been adopted into anime and manga, mostly notably Bannertail: The Adventures of Gray Squirrel).
- Out with a Bang: Shiton dies of a heart attack in the middle of raping a bear.
- Refuge in Audacity: When Anehata rapes a bear, Sugimoto calls him "Anehata-sensei" out of respect.
- Scary Shiny Glasses: Whenever he slips into a murderous spree, this happens.
- Sex Is Evil, and I Am Horny: He seems to snap into a murderous state after raping the local wildlife and brutally kills everything he's raped, judging his intercourse sinful and unacceptable. It may be a coping mechanism for his guilt.
- We Hardly Knew Ye: He dies with very little (but effective) characterization after only appearing in a few scenes through the series.
Gansoku Maiharu
Voiced by: Kenta Miyake (Japanese), Chris Guerrero (English)
- Bishie Sparkle: He often gets sparkles, although he is more of a Hunk than a Bishōnen. The anime gives him rainbow backgrounds and glittery sound effects on top of it.
- Blood Knight: He seeks and enjoys fistfights because he considers it his own form of expression. He's stated to have fought others since his youth which earned him a trip to Abashiri prison. In here he thrived, continuing to start other prison brawls just for the sake of it, and has crossed fists against Ushiyama of all people several times. Gansoku finally says that every time he hears the crowd surrounding his fights, it affirms who he is.
- Flat Character: His mindset is very simple as was his whole life, which can be synthesized into the simple sentence "Gansoku started brawls". He appears to offer a couple of action scenes and humorous lines and then disappears just as fast.
- Good Eyes, Evil Eyes: He has wide, sparkling eyes and is a pretty decent guy besides his love of punching people.
- No Celebrities Were Harmed: Based on "Britain's most violent inmate", the real life Michael Gordon Peterson (otherwise known as Charles Bronson), in his general appearance and love of brawling.
- Perpetual Smiler: He is almost always smiling.
- Specs of Awesome: Despite his round glasses, he's a burly muscled man who's tough enough to be a match for Ushiyama, provided Ushiyama doesn't get a judo hold on him. When he steps in the ring during a stenka session, his first punch throws Sugimoto several paces away, knocking him against the fence.
- Spin Attack: Performs Zangief's Double Lariat to knock away all four of his opponents when they gang up on him.
- Warrior Therapist: When fighting, he feels Sugimoto is angry and asks him why. When the young ex-soldier answers that he is angry at how useless he is to his loved ones, the runaway convict tells him to forgive himself as he recognizes Sugimoto's efforts.
- Worthy Opponent: As with Ushiyama, he shakes hands with Sugimoto once and it's enough for him to appreciate the soldier immediately, looking forward to their next fight.
- Would Not Hit a Girl: Refuses to fight Sofia Golden Hand on account of this, though he changes his mind when she proves to be an extremely capable fighter.
Youichirou "The Manslayer"
Voiced by: Motomu Kiyokawa (Japanese), Daisuke Ono (Japanese; young)
A former hired assassin who assassinated many people, including important and influential figures during the Bakumatsu Period. He's taken the false name of "Shinzou Doi" 30 years ago and lived in Nemuro among the Ainu, taking a wife. At one point he was forced to kill a man who had a grudge against him and was sent to Abashiri Prison for it, recently breaking out along the other convicts to meet his ill wife again. When she died, the elderly Youichirou began working at a fishery. Hijikata decides to go meet him at the fishery.- Assassins Are Always Betrayed: He was betrayed by his master to secure a position within the new government and thrown in prison.
- The Atoner: He threw away his life as a "beast", being an assassin for hire, to live among the Ainu as a "human". Ainu means human, but Youichirou mainly wanted to live a decent lifestyle for the remainder of his life.
- Badass Boast: He's ordinarily meek and soft-spoken, but when someone comes to really threaten his life, Youichirou shows some impressive bravado.Would-be avenger:This is revenge for my father. Pay for killing him with your life.Youichirou:Line up to die then. There's plenty of people who want to kill Youichirou the Manslayer.'
- Battle Cry: Youichirou has the habit of screaming "Tenchu!" with every slash of a sword, meaning "Heaven's punishment!".
- Cool Old Guy: Youichirou is so old he's become senile. But his fighting capacity is still there as shown when he dispatches two bounty hunters with two quick slashes of an ax to their feet.
- Driven to Suicide: Averted. Even though he served a noble lord, he considers seppuku a horrible way to die and tried to live on after he was betrayed by his master.
- The Lost Lenore: Youichirou has lost his wife to illness, and he's got nothing to live for now.
- No Historical Figures Were Harmed: Appears to be loosely based off Okada Izou, one of the four famous assassins of the Bakumatsu period.
- The Old Convict: Youichirou was older than even Hijikata during their shared time in Abashiri Prison, and he feels his age.
- Retired Badass: During his youth, Youichirou was a feared assassin, but nowadays he's just an elderly man working at a fishery.
- Scatterbrained Senior: Youichirou is a sad thing to behold, constantly mumbling to himself and sometimes just standing, staring at the horizon. Even when during fighting situations, he has hallucinations and mixes his memories with what's happening before him.
- Tragic Keepsake: Youichirou has kept a broken piece of a tufted puffin's beak to remind himself of Nemuro and his wife.
- You Killed My Father: Youichirou seems to have been at the receiving end of this line many times, as he was hired to kill specific important people, leaving their families ample opportunity to seek revenge on him.
Sekiya Waichirou
Waichirou is a former livestock veterinarian who suddenly lost his daughter to lightning. Since then, he's been obsessed with luck and god's existence and would poison meals at random just to test the luck of those who crossed his path, using his knowledge of plants and animals to find toxins and slip them in meals. He appears in the story after he's poisoned Hijikata and Ushiyama, prompting Kadokura to try to find them and catch Waichirou.
- Big Ol' Eyebrows: Has huge eyebrows that look like gingko leaves.
- The Chessmaster: Has absolutely no combat abilities, but is able to nearly kill most of Hijikata's group through a combination of subterfuge and blackmail.
- Deadly Game: His MO. He'll either blackmail or trick victims into eating things, with a partial chance that what they eat will contain deadly poison.
- Fair-Play Villain: All of his schemes give the victim a chance to not get poisoned due to his obsession with luck. Sometimes he even arranges it so that he'll die if his victim chooses correctly.
- Master Poisoner: Waichirou has an encyclopedic knowledge of poisons, and will choose a poison with a varying level of lethality depending on his needs.
Matsuda Heita
Voiced by: Akira Ishida (Japanese), Derick Snow (English)
Matsuda Heita is one of the 24 Abashiri Convicts. When he meets Sugimoto and Asirpa's group, he appears to be an ordinary gold panner living his life among a group of gold panners just like him, although he's a knowledgeable and skilled one. However, it is revealed that he's afflicted with multiple personality disorder, and one of them is "the bear", who causes him to kill and eat people like a bear.- Clark Kent Outfit: While the thick clothes required for life in Hokkaido make it true for most of the cast, Heita is probably the biggest case of it, looking like a pudgy middle-aged man when clothed but extremely muscular when he takes his top off. Even Sugimoto is surprised at how strong he is compared to his looks.
- I Cannot Self-Terminate: Heita regains control of his personality just long enough to trigger an arrow trap and kill himself during his fight with Sugimoto. He claims that he deliberately got Sugimoto to drag him towards the trap because "the bear" wouldn't have allowed him to die otherwise.
- In-Series Nickname: Sugimoto and Shiraishi call him "Master Heita" after he demonstrates a few ways to make a lot of money prospecting for platinum.
- Instructional Dialogue: Through Heita, we learn about several gold panning techniques that were popular at the time, as well as the increasing value of platinum.
- Prospector: An extremely capable gold (and platinum) prospector and one of the few actually capable of making a living from it by this point in the Hokkaido gold rush. He's so thorough that Botarou recruits him to find the location of the lost Ainu gold through samples he collected from the lake where Noppera-bou capsized.
- The Reveal: Throughout his arc, we see some of his friends and neighbors getting mauled to death by a bear. At the end, it's revealed that all of these people and the bear are his split personalities.
- Split Personality: He's somehow internalized all of his deceased friends and family, along with a bear. Over time, the bear steadily slaughters all of his other personalities and takes over his body, sending him on a murderous rampage until he finally satisfies his urges and "revives" his previous psyches... until the cycle starts all over again.
- Tragic Villain: Probably the most straightforward case among the convicts. Heita isn't malicious, just extremely mentally ill, and he's not happy about it in the least.
- Your Mind Makes It Real: Asirpa suggests Matsuda's bear persona is the result of him misinterpreting Ainu folklore about wen kamuy, or animal spirits cursed by eating human flesh.
Boutarou the Pirate
See his folder on Sugimoto's Group page.
Ueji Keiji
Voiced by: Nobuyuki Hiyama (Japanese)
One of the 24 Abashiri convicts. Currently disguised as a candy peddler and operating in Sapporo, Keiji is obsessed with disappointing people. He's also a child murderer who abducted, killed and buried children in his garden. He's recognizable by the strange tatoos he's made on his face.- Attention Whore: Not in the standard manner, but if anybody takes note of him, he'll deliberately string them along in order to get their hopes up, only to bring them crashing down in order to cause his target to pull a disappointed expression. He's implied to have gotten himself tattooed as part of the Gold Hunt simply for the attention it would bring him and so he could witness everybody's disappointment over him having ruined his portion of the tattoo. Fittingly, his death comes about from everybody, from multiple varied factions currently searching the town for the tattooed skins still present, ignoring his attempt to show off his ruined tattoo, leading to him suffering an indirect Death by Despair.
- Death by Despair: Not directly, but the disappointment and loss he feels from failing to get his intended reaction from everybody seeing his ruined Tattoo clue causes Keiji to lose his balance and fall from the chimney he'd climbed to his death.
- Even Evil Has Standards: A very weird version. When one of his pranks ends up terrifying a child instead of disappointing him, he thinks to himself that he didn't get the right reaction and he went a bit too far. Of course, he then follows this up by attempting to slowly choke the boy to death in order to get the 'correct' reaction from him, so it's less a case of him having standards, and more about him trying to figure out the right methods to use to get what he wants from his victims.
- Hope Crusher: His entire Raison D'etre. Keiji lives for nothing more than to cause disappointment in others, finding nothing else more funny and worthwhile than a disappointed face after teasing somebody's hopes, no matter their relationship to him, from strangers to his fellow prisoners, whom are of the violent enough sort that they would, and in several cases did, attempt to beat him to death in retaliation for his 'prank' in poor taste. Keiji has no problem risking his life in order to see the exact reaction he craves, such as climbing a large chimney in order for everybody around him to see that he'd deliberately obscured his own tattooed skin with numerous other tattoos in order to erase any hope of them being able to find the gold. Fittingly, it's this failure to achieve his goal that leads indirectly to his Death by Despair.
- Karmic Death: Keiji deliberately puts himself at risk by climbing to a high vantage point where everybody can see him in order to show off his ruined Tattoo, believing everybody will sink into despair and disappointment once they realise the Dismantled Macguffin cannot be put together in full anymore to locate the gold. Everybody giving him a non-reaction instead due to the rest of the searchers having long figured out the code doesn't need every single skin to be solved instead causes Keiji to suffer the despair and disappointment he'd so craved to see in others, distracting him and causing him to lose his balance and slip off the chimney. On his way to the ground, Keiji sees his own reflection in one of the brewery Windows, his disappointed facial expression baring a distinct resemblance to his own father's disappointed expression when he saw how Keiji had tattooed his face as a child, which leads to Keiji expressing happiness as seeing the expression he most wanted to see before his head impacts the ground.
- Laughing Mad: Constantly cackles maniacally.
- Laser-Guided Karma: Keiji is basically a Troll from a non-computer era, pulling mean-spirited tricks or manipulations in order to hurt and disappoint others for his own amusement. Fittingly, his death comes about from everybody doing the best thing you can with an online troll- Ignoring him, despite all his attempts to gain their attention.
- Monster Clown: He's a street peddler, but his face tattoos, love of pranks, and repeated allusions to Pennywise put him in this category.
- Tattooed Crook: He's ink-heavy even compared to the other Abashiri convicts.
- The Unfought: He falls off a chimney and dies without fighting any of the main characters.
- Sad Clown: Despite his constant pranks and laughter, Keiji has a bleak outlook on life, thinking of it as a nonstop series of disappointments.
- Troll: He mostly commits crimes to see the disappointed looks on his victims' faces. After escaping Abashiri, he tattoos over the treasure map markings on his body specifically so nobody could find the gold. It fails to impress anyone.
- "Well Done, Son" Guy: Inverted. Keiji's obsession with disappointing people began with his father, who got rid of his beloved dog when Keiji didn't perform well enough at school.
- Would Hurt a Child: Keiji mostly targets children to kill, though it's less that he has a particular preference (and indeed, we see him troll plenty of adults), but because he's physically weak and adults can beat the shit out of him once they figure out they've been tricked.
Michael Ostrog "Jack the Ripper"
Michael Ostrog is a foreigner who was arrested for gutting a prostitute in Yokohama and after his escape, has restarted his gruesome serial killings in Sapporo. His crimes are creepily similar to those committed by Jack the Ripper thirty years ago in London and all signs point to him as being the real "Jack the Ripper".
- Historical Domain Character: In real life, Michael Ostrog was one of the suspects to be Jack the Ripper, though it was eventually found that he was in a prison in France during Jack's serial killings.
- Interplay of Sex and Violence: Masturbates at his crime scenes, a fact that Usami uses to track him down.
- Mystical Pregnancy: Obsessed with the idea of immaculate conception, in particular an Ainu myth about an island where the women can become impregnated by the wind.
- Jack the Ripoff: His crimes mirror Jack the Ripper's down to the geography. But he could be the original...
