Characters / Kado: The Right Answer

Main Characters

Kōjirō Shindō

Kōjirō Shindō

Voiced by: Hiroaki Miura (Japanese), Ian Mead Moore (English)

A highly skilled negotiator working for the Ministry of Foreign Affairs. He is the only person involuntarily induced with a sense of the anisotropic because he was the first person to exit the Kado when at that time, information about humanity had not been fully processed by the Kado. After meeting Yaha-kui zaShunina, he resigned from his current position and became the negotiator for the anisotropic. He treats Yaha-kui as a normal human and is open to the devices Yaha-kui has introduced to humanity but is later convinced otherwise by Saraka.

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• Animal Motif: Shindo has a few origami turtles in his household.
• Arc Symbol: Shindo folds paper animals whenever he's idling, and he gives zaShunina a paper-seahorse bookmark, which becomes a symbol of their bond.
• Ascend to a Higher Plane of Existence: In the end, Shindo and Shinawa end up going into the anisotropic, with Shindo doing it after his death in the finale.
• Brown Note: When zaShunina initially tries telepathic communication with Shindo, the latter is left in head-splitting agony.
• Bunny-Ears Lawyer: Shindou, in spite of his otherwise eccentric personality off-duty, is still considered one of, if not the best negotiator in all of Japan.
• Even the Guys Want Him: Hanamori and zaShunina are among Shindo's many admirers.
• Foreshadowing: In episode 6, Shindou notices that he has been able to work much longer than before...
• Killed Off for Real: Shindo was killed by zaShunina by impaling and pulling out his heart.
• Last Request: In the penultimate episode, Shindo asks Hanamori to do something for him before he headed into the Kado to confront Yaha-kui. We learn in the last episode that he asked Hanamori to raise his child.
• Official Couple: With Saraka, complete with a child by the very last episode.

Yaha-kui za Shunina

Yaha-kui zaShunina

Voiced by: Takuma Terashima (Japanese), Jason Liebrecht (English)

A being from a separate Spacetime known as the "anisotropic" whose intention is to accelerate the evolution of humanity. He chose to enter Japan due to the strong feeling of the Japanese that they are superior to other countries. He progressively introduces four devices to humanity: Kado (a cube with powerful computing capabilities), Wam (a pair of spheres containing infinite energy), Sansa (a cross-sectioned brain which induces a sense of the anisotropic when looked at), and Nanomis-hein (a fragmented sphere which can alter gravity, inertia and mass). While not posing a threat initially, Yaha-kui later reveals his true forceful nature in achieving his goals.

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• A Form You Are Comfortable With: The humanoid guise zaShunina produces to better socialize with humanity.
• Aliens Speaking English: Averted. After his initial telepathic communication attempt fails, it's clear that zaShunina has no idea how to actually communicate with humans.
• Ambiguous Gender: zaShunina's Earth avatar is a figure averaged from all of the people that were on Shindo's plane. Though he's referred to with male pronouns, he was designed with an androgynous, genderless feel, emphasized by the casting for Yaha-kui being genderblind.
• And Show It to You: In the last episode, Yaha-kui rips out Shindo's heart right before the climax.
• Animal Motif: zaShunina catches a turtle at the local festival.
• Another Dimension: zaShunina hails from a realm in between our dimension and another.
• Ascended to a Higher Plane of Existence: Yaha-kui goes back to where he came from as well.
• Benevolent Alien Invasion: zaShunina's purpose, as revealed in episode 3, seems to be to "advance humanity". Step one: Providing perpetual, never ending energy. Step two: start improving the human condition and do away with their limitations.
• Big Bad Slippage: zaShunina becomes the closest thing the series has to a main antagonist (aside from the world superpowers that have by that point been inexplicably shafted from the main plot) after episode 9.
• Blue-and-Orange Morality: zaShunina operates on a bizarre moral level that confounds many. In order to solve humanity's problems, he is ultimately willing to introduce an amount of change that many might perceive uncomfortable.
• Conlang: The language of Yaha-kui's people, often seen in both the Kado and Mado stories with its own meanings.
• Elephant in the Living Room: Even by episode 8, zaShunina is largely ignored by the international community. Or rather, zaShunina is pretty much ignored by any and every government, other than Japan's. That being said, what can be described as a low key Resource War over the Wam that zaShunina bestowed and was intended to be distributed among all of humanity almost occurs when the UN demands all of the Wam to be handed over to them.
• Extra-Dimensional Shortcut: zaShunina exploits them quite commonly.
• Humanity Is Infectious: As zaShunina spends more time on Earth, and as he spends it alongside Shindo, he starts to show more human traits and physically express himself more. As Episodes 8 and 9 show, this is not portrayed as a necessarily good thing, especially for the man he eventually falls in love with.
• If I Can't Have You…: zaShunina asks Shindo to come with him to the anisotropic. When Shindo refuses, zaShunina decides to make him disappear and replace him with a several-hours-younger copy so he can try again.
• Instant Expert: It takes zaShunina roughly a minute to become fully fluent in verbal Japanese, having taken the language from Shindo's cell phone.
• Killed Off for Real: zaShunina ends up being completely destroyed by Shindo and Tsukai's daugther.
• Lies to Children: zaShunina's explanations usually have to be boiled down to this. His problem is that much of what he's talking about lacks even a concept in this universe's laws of physics, and then has to be conveyed using human language.
• Love Confession: zaShunina delivers one to Shindo by asking him to come with him to the anisotropic.
• Lovecraft Lite: Thankfully, instead of the massive Cosmic Horror Story potential he is implied to have, zaShunina only seems to be interested in advancing humanity. So far.
• Mirror Character: According to bonus materials, zaShunina is highly unusual among his kind for taking a proactive approach, much like how Shindo is not an ordinary human.
• Naked on Arrival: zaShunina, who doesn't bother to create clothing for his new human form until Shindo asks him to.
• Non-Answer: Whenever anyone directly asks zaShunina exactly what his motives are, he either dodges the question or talks about his plans as they are now. Episode 8 makes this unsettling, since the pauses in thought before giving any answer were unusually human of him.
• Reality Warper: Nanomis-hein, the fourth invention of zaShunina, enables this.
• Reset Button: Yaha-kui's departure causes all the anisotropic gifts to stop working and the life on Earth goes back to usual.
• Self-Deprecation: In the novel, Yaha-kui thinks somewhat lowly on authors:
  Yaha-kui zaShunina: The living beings known as fiction writers are all mentally ill, to some degree.
• Sufficiently Advanced Alien: zaShunina's technology is so beyond human level it may as well be divine miracles. One of the major plot points of the series is how humanity deals with all the advanced ideas and technology he is imparting on them.
• Time Abyss: He is older than universe itself. At one point he even belittles humanity for having a life expectancy of "less than a billion years".
• Time Master: zaShunina speeds up time during his Love Confession, making Shindo end up spending 70 hours in the Kado without food and water, in almost complete isolation.
• Wham Line: In episode 6, zaShunina delivers the first one so far.
  Yaha-kui zaShunina: Now humanity can take the next step. Shindo. How long has it been since you slept?
• Yandere: zaShunina slowly becomes this toward Shindou.

Saraka Tsukai

Saraka Tsukai

Voiced by: Mao Ichimichi (Japanese), Mikaela Krantz (English)

The International Negotiator for the Ministry acting on behalf of the Japanese government delegation. Whilst not against the anisotropic itself, she disapproves of the devices Yaha-kui zaShunina introduces as they impact "humanity's dignity" and urged Kōjirō to reassess Yaha-kui's purpose. She is later revealed to be an anisotropic being herself and the administrator of the universe humanity resides within.

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• Animal Motif: Tsukai is shown with a turtle in her childhood.
• Entertainingly Wrong: This pretty much sums up the reaction of Saraka's family when she brings Shindou to her father's workshop in episode 8.
• Official Couple: With Shindo, complete with a child by the very last episode.
• Reincarnation: As an anisotropic being, was able to reincarnate into mortal forms throughout history. Currently she's living as a human woman, and her human family is biological.
• The World Is Not Ready: When asked what she thinks of the Wam, Tsukai answers with this, believing humans have just been given a power they are in no way ready for.
• Time Abyss
• Walking Spoiler

Government of Japan

Shun Hanamori

Shun Hanamori

Voiced by: Soma Saito (Japanese), Kyle Igneczi (English)

Kōjirō's co-worker. He became the negotiator from the Japanese government to the anisotropic after Kōjirō passed up the offer and gave it to him.

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• Bunny-Ears Lawyer: Despite his relatively meek personality, Hanamori seems fairly reliable when it matters.
• Parental Substitute: Hanamori serves as this to Yukika, since he ends up raising her until her teen years while Saraka and Shindo are busy in the Kado.
• Plucky Comic Relief
• Straight Gay: Aside from being quite clingy with Shindo, Hanamori displays no typical gay mannerisms and reveals rather casually that he's in love with the other man.

Kōzō Inuzuka

Kōzō Inuzuka

Voiced by: Hiroshi Naka (Japanese), Mark Stoddard (English)

Prime Minister of Japan.

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Shūhei Asano

Shūhei Asano

Voiced by: Kenji Akabane (Japanese), Clay Wheeler (English)

Assistant Secretary for National Public Safety Commission. He went to the same university as Kōjirō.

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Ritsu Natsume

Ritsu Natsume

Voiced by: Shizuka Itō (Japanese), Kristy Sims (English)

Cabinet Secretariat of National Security Agency information team. She went to the same university as Kōjirō and Shūhei. She is in love with Shūhei, but realizes that she "is not capable enough to handle him" so she steps back.

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Science Council of Japan

Kanata Shinawa

Kanata Shinawa

Voiced by: Rie Kugimiya (Japanese), Tabitha Ray (English)

A genius researcher and lead scientist tasked to study the anisotropic. She is one of few people that is capable of creating her own Wam, due to her childlike mind.

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• Arc Symbol: Kanata discovers how to create a source of limitless energy with origami, using nothing but ordinary paper.
• Ascended to a Higher Plane of Existence: In the end, Shindo and Shinawa end up going into the anisotropic, with Shindo doing it after his death in the finale.
• Bunny-Ears Lawyer: Kanata Shinawa is stated by her teacher/mentor/guru (a Nobel Prize winner) to have so much talent that she will earn 10 Nobel Prizes. This, despite being a massive Womanchild (which is another description her teacher gave about her immediately afterwards).
• Instant Expert: It's takes her a few hours at most to crack how the Wam works, giving her the ability to make them.
• Labcoat of Science and Medicine: Obviously, because she's a scientist.
• Plucky Comic Relief
• Smart People Wear Glasses

Others

Takumi Gonno

Takumi Gonno

Voiced by: Takuya Kirimoto (Japanese), Christopher Bevins (English)

A reporter from NNK who becomes interested with the anisotropic. After the video he reported on got billions of views, he got recruited by the CEO of SETTEN, Adam Ward.

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Adam Ward

Adam Ward

Voiced by: Jin Horikawa (Japanese), John Burgmeier (English)

The CEO of the world's largest internet services, SETTEN who takes interest in Kado and personally hires Takumi to report directly inside the Kado.

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Yukika Shindō

Yukika Shindō

Voiced by: Yuu Serizawa (Japanese), Jill Harris (English)

Yukika is Kōjirō and Saraka's 16-year-old daughter. By using Nanomis-hein, they shifted the relative time up to 16 years later and during that time, Shun raised Yukika. Yukika is said to be "Kōjirō and Saraka's trump card" to go against Yaha-kui because she was born from a human and an anisotropic being.

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• Chekhov's Gun: Time manipulatio Yaha-kui uses on Shindo. The protagonists reverse-engineer it and use to raise Yukika till the age of sixteen in much shorter time.
• Deus ex Machina: The anime ends with Shindou and Tsukai's daughter abruptly appearing from the future and defeating zaShunina and resolving the whole conflict before disappearing.
• Half-Human Hybrid: In the final episode, Shindo and Tsukai had a daughter together named Yukika, who was born from a human and an anisotropic being.
• Last Episode, New Character: Shindo and Saraka's daughter Yukika, who has access to her mother's powers and helps take down Yaha-kui, only properly appears in the last episode.
• More Than Infinite
• Tyke Bomb: Yukika was raised by Hanamori as the right solution for the conflict between the mankind and anisotropics.

Atsuhiko Agata

Atsuhiko Agata

Voiced by: Tsuyoshi Koyama (Japanese), Christopher Wehkamp (English)

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• Hunk
• Workout Fanservice: Sergeant Agata is a post-workout version of this in episode 5.