Characters / Master Detective Archives: Rain Code - Makoto Kagutsuchi

Master Detective Archives: Rain Code Main Character Index
Main Characters (Halara Nightmare) | Makoto Kagutsuchi

Warning! All spoilers below are unmarked.

It's virtually impossible to list tropes for this game without spoiling everything or creating Self-Fulfilling Spoilers because of the large amount of twists and Murder Mystery-related tropes it contains.

Makoto Kagutsuchi

Voiced by: Atsumi Tanezaki (Japanese), Brandon Winckler (English)

^{Click here to see him under his mask.} "Are you really shocked? Naturally, I knew at first sight. Because you and I have the same face."

^{Click here to see him as a Mystery Phantom.}

The CEO of Amaterasu Corporation, and the Big Bad Evil Twin of the WDO's Number One.

He is the main antagonist of Chapter 5, preventing "Yuma" from, yet also aiding him in, finding out the truth of Kanai Ward.

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A - E

• Affably Evil: Although he is manipulative towards the detectives and other relatives Makoto still speaks in a polite tone even after his reveal. He is also never rude to anyone even going far as to try and make friends with anyone he speaks with. Although Makoto is rude towards Yuma in the final battle this is only done to push Yuma into battling Makoto as hard as he can.
• The Alleged Boss: As Makoto explains himself, despite holding the position of Amaterasu Corporation's CEO and ranking above Yomi, he doesn't have the power to officially dismiss him from his position because Yomi is also as powerful as he is, which is why Makoto lures the detectives over to Kanai Ward in the first place so he can use them as a distraction and disband the Peacekeepers himself by exposing Yomi's illegal methods of getting into power, thereby placing him under lawful arrest.
• Ambition Is Evil: Albeit with the intent of countering the more openly sadistic and self-centered Yomi Hellsmile, the overarching plot of Makoto luring the detectives over to Kanai Ward so they can oppose Yomi for Makoto to be offered an opportunity to personally take him down while Makoto keeps the detectives oblivious to everyone in Kanai Ward actually being defective homunculi and Yuma being the true Number One centers around Makoto seizing control of Kanai Ward for himself.
• Anonymous Benefactor: In his plot to usurp Yomi Hellsmile and take over Kanai Ward to protect the homunculus residents from outside interference, Makoto is the one who summons Master Detectives, along with the original Number One, to Kanai Ward and, consequently, causes the entire game to happen.
• Anti-Interference Lock Up: What he does to the other Master Detectives besides Yuma once he successfully ousts Yomi from power, abducting them and locking them up in his penthouse while he places Yuma and Kurumi in the restricted area.
• Anti-Villain: The well-intentioned variety. All Makoto wants to do is protect the homunculi in Kanai Ward and give them a safe place to live, but he crosses some ruthless lines to achieve such a goal.
• Arch-Enemy: To the real Number One. According to Shinigami's flashback on the reason why Yuma made a pact with her in the first place, that being to battle his homunculus clone, he is this for Yuma's pre-amnesia self. Eventually his post-amnesia self too.
• The Atoner: In the epilogue after his Heel–Face Turn, he's working nonstop to make up for the all the crimes he's committed while making the city more beneficial for the homunculi. He even attempted to turn himself in, but the public opted to have him remain as CEO.
• Badass in a Nice Suit: He's a cunning criminal mastermind, and he prefers to do his deeds looking professional in a purple suit with a blue tie.
• Bad Samaritan: His real motivation for assembling detectives in Kanai Ward to investigate the city's mysteries, keeping the detectives alive and out of Yomi's reach, helping Yuma enter Amaterasu's research lab, and rebuilding Yakou Furio's agency, is so he could use them as opposition against Yomi and be given the opportunity to overthrow him and take his place as Kanai Ward's overall ruler no matter the cost while keeping them unaware of Kanai Ward's truth, although his plan is for the sake of the residents' well-being as defective homunculi than for himself.
• Batman Gambit: His overarching plan summed up. Makoto expected both the WDO and Yomi to act exactly as he had intended them to, and because they did, he got the desired results, that being removing Yomi from power and luring Yuma into the Mystery Labyrinth.
• Became Their Own Antithesis: He is the true form of the WDO's Number One ("Yuma Kokohead" raw and with his memories), who is typically a heroic figure among the world and renowned for his genius in the WDO, but the original Number One's heroism became the opposite when this version of Number One turned to committing crimes instead of solving them, a total contradiction to what the original Number One stands for.
• Being Evil Sucks: It takes a lot of battling and fighting him in the Mystery Labyrinth in his relentless attacks, but once he's reduced to a Villainous BSoD after realizing the consequences of the things he's been doing have only been creating more chaos, he considers that what he's been doing has only been damaging him more internally, and he starts to wonder what he can do besides the amoral things he's already done to keep Kanai Ward safe until Yuma offers him the solution that... there isn't one, and it's better to leave it for the residents to deal with themselves. He, of course, follows through with this option, returning to the real world and atoning for what he did to Kanai Ward.
• Benevolent Boss: Compared to Yomi, the Peacekeepers' director, Makoto is notably rather benevolent to Amaterasu Corporation's employment circle, as shown with his concern for the power struggle between himself and Yomi. This is somewhat downplayed in The Reveal, however, in that, while he does care for Amaterasu Corporation as the CEO, his main motive for becoming CEO (through blackmailing the UG) was actually to shut down Project: Homunculus, Yomi's and Dr. Huesca's failed research project that resulted in all of Kanai Ward's human population dying.
• Beware the Nice Ones: Makoto is Yuma Kokohead's original self with his memories intact; Yuma has been shown to be affable throughout the events of the story itself, having carried over to Makoto, and the Number One he's based off of is quite the altruistic detective. Makoto himself, on the other hand, is a determined extremist who goes to great lengths in his misguided protection of a city of homunculi, including manipulating the very detectives the game revolves around for his own ends, essentially being a version of Yuma that has gone completely beyond reason and morality due to breaking under pressure.
• Beware the Superman: He is a copy of Number One of the WDO, who is known for being highly intellectual, and also possesses Coalescence like Yuma, but because of his status as a homunculus that also allows him immortality, he became an overprotective Knight Templar criminal mastermind upon discovering the existence of homunculi less fortunate than him in the confines of Kanai Ward.
• Big Bad: Makoto is the homunculus clone of Number One of the WDO, or Yuma, in other words, having been corrupted by Yomi's actions in the backstory, becoming a heroic figure turned to a villainous ruler, and his goals regarding his protection of the homunculi of Kanai Ward are the cause of the conflict and trauma that Yuma suffers through during the events of the game.
  • The Unified Government creating Makoto is the indirect cause of Dr. Huesca's overarching failed experiment using Kanai Ward's residents, since their success in creating him is what encouraged Huesca to experiment on Kanai Ward's residents in order to catch up with them, accidentally making the defective homunculi of them that end up killing and replacing Kanai Ward in the first place. Out of everything Makoto notes during the Final Battle, he fails to address his indirect responsibility in being the unwilling catalyst for the cause he's trying to fight for in the first place.
  • He is the one who enshrouds Kanai Ward in its overarching mysteries, that being the rain and isolation, having done both to keep the defective homunculi safe from sunlight and the world. He also led the homunculi to believe themselves to be human from the start, which is why the rain and isolation in question appear so confusing outside of context. He also sets up the mass kidnapping case by means of posing as Number One of the WDO (due to being his clone) to capture death row inmates and bring them to his factory to convert them into meat buns for the residents of Kanai Ward to eat unwitting of the fact they were made of ground-up human flesh. This drive to protect is the reasoning behind his main goal of ousting Yomi, which also included Chief Yakou sowing confusion through his and Yomi’s plot to kill Dr. Huesca enough to find evidence against him, which he does in Chapter 4, which he searches for so he can take full control of Kanai Ward from Yomi.
  • He is the one who sends Master Detectives to the Kanai Ward branch of the World Detective Organization (the Nocturnal Detective Agency; the main protagonists of the story) in the first place, specifically trying to draw them over to Kanai Ward with fake mysteries. Of course, this also allows Yomi the opening to kill dozens of them as a result of him drawing the detectives over. Once the detectives finally complete the job of ousting Yomi like he wanted them to, he gets rid of them and forces Yuma to find the truth himself by any means necessary, placing him in the restricted area where the homunculi were first tested and motivating Yuma to pit himself against Makoto in the final battle.
• Big Bad Friend: In every sense of the word. He's the Big Bad who tries to befriend Amnesiac Hero Yuma Kokohead and his eccentric detective friends, and he uses that friendship to lure Yuma into a trap of his making multiple times over.
• Big Brother Is Watching: He knows everything about Kanai Ward and its residents, right down to even knowing Kurumi is The Informant and knowing every detail of Yakou Furio's submarine. When asked about how, he answers that it's due to his love for Kanai Ward.
• Big Fancy House: As we learn in Chapter 3, Kanai Tower, the tallest building in Kanai Ward, is his state of residence. Also serves as Chekhov's Gun as he uses it to trap the Master Detectives besides Yuma during the events of Chapter 5.
• Black-and-White Insanity: Makoto perceives himself as what Kanai Ward needs, while he perceives Number One, his rival and original who only wants to solve cases for others' sake, as "Kanai Ward's true evil", and considers that enough of a reason to Kill and Replace him out of necessity. Well, before his Heel–Face Turn, that is, at which point he abandons the plan.
• Blackmail: He threatened to leak the UG's unethical homunculus research to the world in exchange for Kanai Ward's isolation, which he describes as "negotiation".
• Blatant Lies:
  • His offer for Yuma and the detectives to search around Kanai Ward for evidence on the homunculus research following Yomi’s removal from power in Chapter 4. Makoto, keeping himself hidden for his own safety, obviously would not allow detectives to roam around Kanai Ward with the Peacekeepers no longer obstructing them and eventually find out his true goals. As he reveals in Chapter 5, this was indeed the case.
  • In Chapter 5, he claims that he's "been taking [the situation in Kanai Ward] seriously the entire time" when Yuma accuses him of playing games. While this is most certainly true due to pitting the detectives against Yomi Hellsmile and secretly being an extremist for Kanai Ward's sake the entire time, it most certainly doesn't seem like this considering he spends the entire game up to that point quite literally joking around.
• Bookends: The first time Yuma meets Makoto, he's taking a bath. Their final meeting prior to Yuma entering the mystery labyrinth is at the ruins of an old bathhouse.
• Boomerang Bigot: Yuma, a human, calling the homunculi he's protecting "some defects" particularly enrages him, but Makoto himself has no problem calling the homunculi "pitiable" despite being one himself. Makoto also declares that the way he's providing for their needs as defective homunculi (forcing them to live in a cage of rain, lying to them about their humanity, covertly feeding them human flesh, and isolating them, all against their consent) is the only way they can survive in "a world that sees them as monsters", despite him offering no actual evidence of this. Makoto's latter justification is arguably what enrages Yuma.
• Bright Is Not Good: Being a copy of Number One (Yuma Kokohead/the protagonist), his primary colors are a glaring purple and white. However, he's also the Big Bad of the story, and has been manipulating the detectives the entire time.
• Bunny-Ears Lawyer: The weird, eccentric guy with a hidden agenda in the Menacing Mask who lives in Kanai Tower turns out to be the highly-competent CEO of Amaterasu Corporation. The “bunny-ears” part ends up being subverted in Chapter 5 as he’s revealed to be far more pragmatic and serious than he first presents himself to be, but still applicable.
  Yakou: Amaterasu’s CEO…is this weird guy in a mask?!
• Cain and Abel: As the essential relative of Yuma, having been created from his DNA, he has a murderous rivalry between him. However, Makoto is the younger sibling than the older one, having been created only three years ago.
• Cassandra Truth: While he was Evil All Along like many of the characters suspected, it turns out that their doubts about Makoto’s love for Kanai Ward were completely wrong and he meant what he said about his devotion to saving Kanai Ward. This is especially apparent in Chapter 4, where Makoto tells Yomi that he's watching over Kanai Ward and Amaterasu Corporation. Yomi angrily rebuffs that he is the one who's doing things for the city because of his "righteous justice", but it turns out that Makoto is the one who's actually responsible for all of the citizens' well-being, as he's providing for their needs as defective homunculi by blocking out the sun and feeding them human flesh against their wits, with even Yomi being unaware he's just another pawn in this scheme.
• Cast as a Mask: Inverted. Even after his Dramatic Unmask and The Reveal that he is Yuma's clone, he retains the same voice as he did while wearing the mask, but both actors immediately shift their tone so that they're almost an exact match for Yuma's voice.
• The Chessmaster: Makoto is the one responsible for bringing the detectives to Kanai Ward, introducing Fink the Slaughter Artist to Yakou Furio as part of his plan to distract Yomi Hellsmile and his underlings in Chapter 4, alongside the constant rainfall, isolation, kidnapping plot, and the constant deception of Kanai Ward's citizens regarding their true identities, while no one was aware of his responsibility the entire time. He also manages to get the Peacekeepers to work according to his ideals despite them typically refusing to listen to him, as the events of Chapter 0 happen due to the isolation he applied to the city (as Yuma explicitly notes in Chapter 5), and his rumors about "corpses rotting in the rain" ends up tricking the Peacekeepers into cleaning up the various bodies around the city for him, since they're too corrupt to care for if said rumors are true.
  Yuma: It must also be the reason they were so strict about keeping this place isolated from the outside world.
• Clipped-Wing Angel: During the beginning of his final phase as the final boss, he transforms into a colossal Mystery Phantom that looks like a musclebound version of his masked self. He looks huge and intimidating, but after Yuma evades three of his attacks, Shinigami assumes her own giant form and dazes him with a punch to the face, after which Yuma obliterates said form with a single accusation statement. Makoto proceeds to spend the rest of the fight in his smaller cloaked form and ironically proves to be more formidable in that state than as a giant.
• Clone Angst: His motive for everything he does on-screen and before the present day.
• Clones Are People, Too: The linchpin of Makoto's extremism is that he views the homunculus clones of Kanai Ward's residents as having as much value as their original selves.
• Complexity Addiction: Would prefer to manipulate the governmental faction that created him, a city of hundreds of people, a corporation clueless to its own mistakes, and a global detective organization he can manipulate with ease due to being a copy of its leader than find a simple solution to his problems. It doesn't end well for him, destroying his mental state and leading to his own downfall.
• Condescending Compassion: Although he is genuinely sympathetic to the defective homunculi of Kanai Ward and their predicament, with him committing all his crimes for their sakes out of empathy, he doesn't seem to have high opinion on their capacity to handle their issues on their own, viewing them as pitiable, helpless beings in constant need of supervision and control while keeping them in the dark about their true nature, all against their consent.
• Consummate Liar: For three years straight, that is. He constantly lies about the presence of homunculus in Kanai Ward, to both the citizens and the detectives, and everything he does centers around that lie. Eventually he reforms and tells the truth instead, and realizes it's for the better.
• Contrived Coincidence: The same guy who's hiding Kanai Ward's truth, isolated the city, created the rain cloud generator, and shut down Dr. Huesca's homunculus research just happens to also be the one behind the mass kidnapping case, the one who sent the detectives to Kanai Ward, and Number One's clone who intends to Kill and Replace his original counterpart.
• Control Freak: Makoto will do anything to maintain his control over Kanai Ward's citizens and keep them blind to their true selves, even if it means usurping the only obstacle preventing him from doing so (Yomi) by any means necessary, at least as the Big Bad. Yomi himself, as the cause of said nature, is, of course, doing the same for his own reasons, except far worse and far more selfishly.
• Corrupt Corporate Executive: In comparison to the other executives in the company, he's far more corrupt than they could ever be, but unlike them, he has good intentions but is extremely misguided. Though Makoto's Affably Evil self isn't fake, in reality, he's the story's Big Bad and a highly unscrupulous extremist, moonlighting as a serial kidnapper and enforcing cannibalism on Kanai Ward's homunculus residents so they can be sustained, all while keeping them in the dark about the fact they're not human, and as part of his plot to provide for them through unethical means, he assembles Master Detectives in Kanai Ward so they can oppose his rival, Yomi, and Makoto can personally overthrow him from his position as director of the Amaterasu Corporation Peacekeepers in his even deeper plot to Kill and Replace his detective rival, Number One, leader of the WDO, as the CEO is a clone of Number One, and as part of that plot, he intends to further abuse his authority by leading any further outsiders away from Kanai Ward so its secret can be kept. Adding to this, it's notable that all of this revolves around Kanai Ward rather than the Amaterasu Corporation, showing that he is very eager to ignore his duties as the CEO for the sake of the city itself. Yuma reforms him to actually pay attention to managing the company through more ethical methods, and in turn, this also improves Kanai Ward's current condition due to Makoto no longer abusing his power just to take hold of a city of homunculi.
• Corrupted Character Copy: Appropriately given his name, he has notable parallels to the situation Makoto Naegi faced in Danganronpa 2: Goodbye Despair. Both take it upon themselves to defend outsiders the rest of the world would happily write off by going against the wishes of a nominally Big Good organization, but while Naegi's solution to help the Remnants of Despair is only really complicated by outside factors and entirely helpful on the face of it with him never wavering from his desire to help, Kagutsuchi's situation requires him to commit a number of terrible acts and he can feel himself being crushed by the weight of it and backed into a corner unsure whether to keep with what he's doing.
• The Corruptible: He's a clone created with DNA extracted from Number One of the WDO, but you wouldn't realize that at first considering how easy it was for him to turn into a villain with no distinguishing heroic traits present, though he plays the role of an Anti-Villain for Kanai Ward's homunculi instead.
• Could Say It, But...: During Chapter 5's investigation and during the Final Battle in the Mystery Labyrinth, Makoto casually drops hints to his identity as Number One's homunculus clone, such as when he notes that Yuma is possessed by a death god, and his note about a specimen escaping from the UG. While in the Labyrinth, he also says that Coalescence is Number One's Forensic Forte, and he used Coalescence to sneak into the Mystery Labyrinth unnoticed, trying to encourage Yuma to work out himself that Makoto is the homunculus clone of the WDO's Number One, and "Yuma" is his original. In the latter case, he's essentially stalling Yuma's realization for the sake of doing so than for any real purpose, since his Kill and Replace plan was already in motion once Makoto guided Yuma into the Mystery Labyrinth to trap him there.
• Crazy-Prepared: He basically plans out the main plot of the game ahead of time, and survives to implement it due to all this planning (being unkillable by normal means may have helped as well). A prime example is his home, Makoto explaining he lives alone in Kanai Tower with all security being run by machines, as he knows with Yomi's connections anyone he hired as security or help would have a good chance of being a spy or assassin. As confident as he seems, he is very cautious, and does what he can to avoid confronting Yomi until he is ready unless he absolutely has to. Revealed in Chapter 5, the Weather-Control Machine he installed in Kanai Ward's bath house also has a prerecorded city-wide warning for the residents to take shelter if it were ever turned off, therefore concealing the truth of them being UV-allergic defective homunculi even if the machine were to become inactive, because the warning alerts them to escape from sunlight and therefore keep the truth hidden, meaning he had prepared for the event in which someone would actually turn off his cloud machine that's covering up the sunlight in Kanai Ward.
• Create Your Own Hero: Zig-zagged. Makoto took on his current identity indirectly because of Yomi and Dr. Huesca's actions in the backstory and is a clone of Number One, the top detective of the WDO and a good guy overall, but events ended up shifting Makoto's personality and motivations drastically from that of his origin, resulting in things taking a much darker, more tragic turn. He's still good at heart, but he's been turned into a desperate Well-Intentioned Extremist due to angst over his nature as a clone and trying to keep a years-long masquerade up for so long, with his internal conflict eating away at his conscience.
• Create Your Own Villain: Downplayed. As a clone of Number One, AKA Yuma/the protagonist, Yuma's past self is responsible for Makoto's Start of Darkness, as the original Number One is responsible for Makoto's lone wolf attitude that drives the plot in the first place. However, it's evident in Makoto's self-righteousness that he's committing his crimes largely of his own volition, making Makoto mostly responsible for using Number One's intelligence for evil.
• Creating Life Is Awesome: He is a perfect homunculus of Number One of the World Detective Organization created in the Unified Government research facility after they hired Amaterasu for competition, meaning he's an artificial immortal supergenius whose only real weakness is himself. The moral issue in this, however, is that he also became evil in the process because he was completely unrestrained upon said creation, becoming a mad extremist for Kanai Ward upon discovering that there were other homunculus clones less fortunate than him.
• Creepy High-Pitched Voice: His masked self has an unnerving shrill voice muffled by said mask's plastic casing that sounds like he's putting on an act, which serves as a hint that he isn't quite what he seems regarding his affable demeanor, and of course, he isn't.
• Criminal Doppelgänger: Justified, as he's a perfect clone created with the DNA of his original self, so he is exactly the same as the Yuma Kokohead/Number One he's based on in every way besides having turned to anti-villainy, appearances included. It's noted that Yuma is the one who gets accused of Makoto's crimes In-Universe thanks to Makoto stealing his identity as Number One, according to the death row inmate's memo, so there is a legitimate case of Mistaken Identity.
• Cyclops: Regarding his general design, his mask has only one eye. His true face, on the other hand, is a normal human face.
• Cynicism Catalyst: Knowing that Yomi would be an issue for Kanai Ward, homunculus citizens or not, largely contributes to Makoto's extremism, as he believed that there would be no hope for the city if he was the one under control. As such, he brought detectives to Kanai Ward to distract him, and Makoto achieved his ideal outcome of the Peacekeepers no longer running Amaterasu Corporation and Kanai Ward like tyrants... with Makoto being the tyrant instead.
• Dark Messiah: Despite the feared Peacekeepers being part of his company, Makoto is generally well liked and trusted by Kanai Ward's residents, and Makoto also perceives himself as a savior. However, they are unaware he is a criminal mastermind who's been deceiving them about their true selves the whole time, except for Yomi, who is understandably suspicious of him due to the way he showed up and achieved so much so quickly.
• Dead Man's Switch: As Makoto explains at the end of the final Mystery Labyrinth, despite being the Big Bad, if he were to die, Kanai Ward would fall into ruin since he's the reason the defective homunculi are able to live the way they do, and the UG would be given the opening to take control of the city themselves. Yuma spares him in return because of this, allowing Makoto the alternative of telling the truth himself.
• Death Seeker: He denies this in his final confrontation, but it's indicated that the way he sets up the Final Battle with Yuma was because deep down, he was crumbling from the weight of everything he did to keep Kanai Ward safe and wanted to be judged. As he puts it, he doesn't fight to lose, but he did coerce Yuma into using the Mystery Labyrinth so that he and Yuma could compare each others answers to Kanai Ward's problems in a way not possible in the real world. If it turned out Yuma's answers were better, Makoto was quite willing to die in penance.
• Declaration of Protection: Declares his protection of Kanai Ward during his boss battle, making his motivations completely clear to Yuma, though he's unaware of what he's really doing beyond said protection.
  "I only have one wish. To protect the citizens of this city... For the homunculi of Kanai Ward to live in peace. I'll do anything to accomplish that. I don't care what I must sacrifice. I will protect Kanai Ward. And you...will die here. Your death is necessary for Kanai Ward's peace."
• Decoy Backstory: Offers two decoy stories as a cover for why he wears his mask, the second one about it being unable to come off immediately being disproven in Chapter 4 when he see him take it off right in front of us to scan his face.
• Determinator: Of the Hidden Villain kind. While Yomi himself is determined in the sense that he's willing to brutally murder anyone who opposes him with zero remorse and embodies the idea of self-righteous pride in every sense of the word, Makoto is determined to keep Kanai Ward's homunculi safe from the world after Yomi and Dr. Huesca led Kanai Ward to turn into a dystopian disaster of a city through their corruption and is willing to keep up a lie and conspire to kidnap criminals for three years straight for the sake of this goal.
• Detrimental Determination: He wants to protect Kanai Ward and its citizens (of whom are homunculi) at any cost, even if it means committing many crimes for their sake, refusing any direct help from others, and manipulating various people into falling under his whims when they least expect it. As is evident in the end of his boss battle, this ends up causing him great distress and the weight of his own villainy ends up making him have an emotional breakdown.
• Devil in Plain Sight: Every single character recognizes that Makoto is potentially dangerous, due to being so secretive, with even the game itself noting that he's hiding too much of himself. He is much unlike Yomi, who is extremely blunt about being an evil bastard. So no surprises that he's actually the main antagonist of the game and the one behind the overarching kidnapping plot all along.
• Didn't See That Coming: He is visibly shocked upon seeing Shinigami help Yuma out against his Storm of Blades in the final phases of his boss battle, following when Yuma calls out his plot against Yomi and Dr. Huesca. Ironically, right after he declared his being alone, too.
• Didn't Think This Through: Makoto arranging for detectives to investigate Kanai Ward without proper protection only gave Yomi the opening to execute them in self-defense. Not that he addresses the fact since the survivors were good enough for his goals.
• Did You Actually Believe...?: At the end of Chapter 5's investigation, Makoto basically tells Yuma off for blindly trusting him by telling him about the defective homunculi after he and the detectives spent Chapter 2 onwards trying to find out about the homunculus research and where it was conducted, while Makoto knew the real truth the whole time as the Big Bad.
• Dissonant Serenity: While Kanai Ward is overrun by Yomi and the detectives end up suffering under Yomi's despotic rule, Makoto, meanwhile, maintains a cool demeanor even when describing that he knows that Yomi's corruption is destroying Kanai Ward's peace, and even while Yomi is in his presence, insulting him and acting like a complete asshole to him. Justified as he is a clone of the famously stoic Number One, so he is obviously not going to have any significant response to an intense situation, and he obviously always has a plan in mind (that being using the Nocturnal Detective Agency to bait Yomi out).
• Does Not Like Spam: His profile lists his dislike as "olives". Ironically, the like is "raw ham". This even being in his profile in the first place is a mystery but it's possibly for the joke.
• Doppelgänger Attack: He duplicates himself twice during his boss battle, the first time to confuse Yuma and the second time to overwhelm him.
• Easily Forgiven: The Nocturnal Detective Agency are quick to forgive him after Halara's agreement with him off-screen, despite him anonymously aiding in Chief Yakou's murder of Dr. Huesca that led to his death in the first place and Halara in particular being sad over his death. He's also forgiven for impersonating Number One of the WDO in order to send death row inmates to Kanai Ward and converting them into meat buns, and the entire population of Kanai Ward forgive him despite knowing everything that he did, deciding instead that he should remain Amaterasu's CEO.
• Emperor Scientist: Kanai Ward's de facto ruler who designed a Weather-Control Machine to keep the homunculus clones of its citizens subdued, well aware of their weakness to UV light.
• Escaped from the Lab: He escaped from the UG's lab by himself, ending up at Kanai Ward, and the rest is history.
• Even Evil Has Standards: As the Affably Evil clone of Yuma, he has standards.
  • He hates the Peacekeepers for their destructive behavior and the damage it's caused to Kanai Ward, which is why he's trying to usurp them and give the citizens a better ruler.
  • As part of his mass kidnapping plot, he only targets criminals already set to die for Kanai Ward's food supply, rather than people who live normal crime-free lives.
  • Makoto is fully aware Kanai Ward's homunculi are defective, but believes it's better for them to continue living normal lives than to allow the UG to flatten Kanai Ward and leave them to die.
• Evil All Along: While he does save Yuma and the detectives at the beginning and end of Chapter 3 and helps Yuma infiltrate Amaterasu Corp, he ends up being exposed for his mass kidnapping, murdering, and impersonation crimes as the Big Bad in Chapter 5. Downplayed, in that his concern for the Kanai Ward is entirely sincere, and he ultimately has a Heel–Face Turn. He also counts as a Hidden Villain as, while his name and status as Amaterasu Corporation's CEO are known, his true identity as the one kidnapping criminals and taking them to his factory within Kanai Ward's restricted area isn't revealed until Chapter 5, where he takes Yuma to said restricted area and gives him information about the defective homunculi within Kanai Ward and their biological needs, along with information about a perfect homunculus that escaped from the UG, in reference to himself.
• Eviler than Thou: Not morally, but he's every inch the plotter and manipulator Yomi thinks he is; in the climax of Case 4 it's revealed he was spending the whole game quietly gathering evidence of Yomi's corruption and proof he was part of a criminal conspiracy with the victim, and he gleefully wins over everyone to his side after Yuma exposes his true intentions to the Peacekeepers, including Martina, Yomi's own mistress and second-in-command. In fact, if anything, his sympathetic traits make him a better plotter than Yomi ever could be, as he has more ability to inspire loyalty and a sense of empathy that allows him to account for how others will act. As well as this, when his plans are revealed in Chapter 5, it turns out that Yomi was just another pawn for Makoto to use as part of the many crimes he gets exposed for during his Mystery Labyrinth, and what he's been doing in Kanai Ward was in fact way beyond Yomi's comprehension since Yomi himself wasn't even aware of it the entire time.
• Evil Genius: Being a clone of Number One of the WDO, he also shares his intelligence, but used it for committing crimes rather than solving them, leading to the events of the game.
• Evil Knockoff: He's supposed to be a clone of Number One that was intended to help the UG with an immortal homunculi army. Due to gaining self-awareness as a homunculus clone, he instead ended up escaping into Kanai Ward and turning the research back on them by threatening to release it to the public in exchange for Kanai Ward's isolation.
• Evil Overlord: Kanai Ward’s de facto leader, being the CEO of Amaterasu Corporation, the corporation controlling every aspect of the city, and the one hiding the truth of the city’s residents being homunculus clones of their former selves, including the clones of the Peacekeepers. Director Yomi Hellsmile believes he’s the one in control as Director of the Peacekeepers, but Makoto’s only steps ahead of him in that regard, more than Yomi could ever comprehend.
• Evil Plan: His goal all along was using the detectives as a means to oppose Yomi Hellsmile, have him ousted from power, and take his place the sole ruler of the city of Kanai Ward. Unlike Yomi, he actually did have a plan the entire time, and Yomi's inability to think about anyone but himself provided him the opening for this plan's success.
• Evil Running Good: As Number One's homunculus clone, he is able to take control of the WDO while also being CEO of Amaterasu Corporation at the same time, while the WDO itself is completely unaware that he's actually Number One's Evil Twin. This is what allows him to conduct the mass kidnapping case by ordering the organization to gather death row inmates and send them to his factory to convert them into meat buns.
• Evil Twin: Of Yuma Kokohead/the original Number One. They're exactly the same people, sharing the same DNA and personality before the Shinigami pact erased Yuma's, and are both Masquerading As the Unseen to accomplish their goals. However, Makoto went crazy under the pressure of being an immortal created by the UG, and wanted to take any means necessary to protect the defective homunculi of Kanai Ward by taking the initiative for himself, negotiating with various people to become Amaterasu's CEO, taking down the Peackeepers by any means, and enacting a global kidnapping of death row intimates in order to feed the defective homunculi, while pretending to be the original Number One. Meanwhile, Yuma wants to solve all unsolved mysteries in the world for the sake of others and ends up becoming enemies with Makoto upon discovering what he had been doing in Kanai Ward against his knowledge prior to erasing his memories, and becomes a friend to the Nocturnal Detective Agency as he investigates what Makoto has been doing after sneaking into Kanai Ward under a different name. This results in a Red Herring where it seems Yuma is being attacked by his own Mystery Phantom in the final Labyrinth, but in fact it's Makoto's Phantom without his mask, not disguising his voice, and hooded to hide his hairstyle.
• Evil Versus Oblivion: While Makoto simply holds Yomi accountable for being the cause of Kanai Ward's destruction, which motivates him to assemble the detectives in Kanai Ward, the other reason for his protection of Kanai Ward's homunculus citizens is because the UG would otherwise wipe them out and take the city off the map upon finding out. Makoto uses this moral dilemma to tell Yuma off for wanting to expose the city's secrets to the world, but ignores any alternative solutions until Yuma discusses them.
• Evil Virtues:
  • Responsibility. Makoto takes up the position of being responsible for the wellbeing of Kanai Ward's residents, and he will go to any lengths if it means they're protected. Of course, this is because he and the rest of the residents are homunculi, and the UG would wipe Kanai Ward off the map due to seeing the homunculi as a threat.
  • Love. He repeatedly talks of his love for Kanai Ward, and he is entirely sincere about it, to the point that he berates Yuma for believing it to be a lie. This, of course, also coincides with his sense of empathy.
  • Ambition. Makoto's primary goal is usurping control of Kanai Ward from Yomi, who is also ambitious. Unlike Yomi, Makoto's ambitions are actually for a good cause, but he is extremely misguided in regards to that cause and thinks that his extremism is necessary for his purpose.
  • Empathy. Makoto empathizes with Kanai Ward's homunculi because he's a homunculus himself, which is what drives him to extremism in the first place.
  • Determination. Makoto will do anything to accomplish his goals, and even implies that he will become "the devil" if it's for the sake of protecting Kanai Ward.
  • Honor. Makoto willingly accepts his loss at the end of his boss battle, and doesn't fight back any further once Yuma wins. In fact, he allows Yuma to kill him as punishment for his crimes.
• Expressive Mask: In his sprites, the mask he wears changed depending on his emotions. This doesn't carry over to his model.

F - N

• Face–Heel Turn: Has one in his backstory, formerly being a good guy as Number One of the WDO, only to get the inspiration to commit crimes than solve them and cover up the truth of Kanai Ward no matter what when he first discovers the defective homunculi.
• Face of an Angel, Mind of a Demon: As a clone of Number One, he also possesses his face, or rather Yuma's face, underneath the mysterious mask he wears, which is notably very feminine and, for lack of a better term, delicate. The man underneath that face, on the other hand, is a ruthless extremist who is exceedingly manipulative and will do anything to achieve his goals. It takes a lot of opposition for him to reform and become more like the real Number One again.
• Fallen Hero: Played with. He is Number One of the World Detective Organization with his memories intact and after a Face–Heel Turn, but in the context of Kanai Ward itself, he is providing more for the city than the likes of Yomi ever could thanks to his unethical means of catering. Despite this, he is incredibly antagonistic about his devotion, actually sides with no one on the side of good until he redeems himself, and is willing to lead the Amaterasu Corporation because Yomi would take his place otherwise (no thanks to the former CEO's Head-in-the-Sand Management of the company). He also sees his actions as morally right regardless of the fact that they clearly aren't, and is beyond reason for the most part. Yuma has to battle him twice and give a whole Kirk Summation about his wrongdoings for him to realize what he's really doing.
• False Friend: While Makoto makes a genuine attempt at being friendly to Yuma, who happens to be his original counterpart, only so he can betray him later as part of his plan to Kill and Replace him, he is only like this towards Yuma. Regarding Yakou and the others, he is really only saving them so he can use them for his personal agenda.
• Fatal Flaw: His insistence on having to do everything on his own. While he's got just about everything, from genius intelligence to massive corporate wealth to immortality, he's clearly reached his limits from the stress of shouldering Kanai Ward's citizens' happiness. Once Yuma convinces him to share the truth with the people and let them decide how to solve the problem, things turn out better for everyone.
• Final Boss: The final opponent standing between Yuma and Shinigami's way in solving the last Mystery Labyrinth and the story's overarching mysteries as a whole.
• First-Name Basis: In Chapter 4, one of the Peacekeepers, as well as Martina at the end of the chapter, formally refer to him as "Chief Executive Makoto".
• Flaw Exploitation: It comes with his Batman Gambit that sets the entire game in motion. As he is a clone of Number One of the World Detective Organization, he knew the detectives would come to Kanai Ward to investigate regardless of the risk of the isolation he placed on it, which would fulfill the plan to oust Yomi, and also knew that Yomi would fall into the trap he set up for him as he's blatantly incapable of thinking beyond himself enough to understand other people are willing to do anything for someone else's sake, and as a result, Makoto ends up overpowering him in the end.
• The Gadfly: A villainous example. Makoto often likes to joke around with others prior to being revealed as the game's main antagonist, especially Yuma, but this is mostly so he can hide his true criminal mastermind self than for personal amusement.
• Gadgeteer Genius: Being Number One's homunculus clone, he is able to create and code fully-functional advanced technology all on his own, such as the automated security for his home base, Kanai Tower, and the Weather-Control Machine producing the eponymous rain over Kanai Ward.
• Genghis Gambit: Makoto intentionally posits Yomi as the detectives' enemy so he can use them to distract the Peacekeepers for him, while keeping them unaware of his true goals, allowing him to take Yomi's place in Kanai Ward's hierarchy.
• Gentleman Snarker: Plenty of his lines prior to him showing his true colors as the Big Bad just ooze with a great deal of snarkiness and superiority, despite him still being rather affable as he delivers them. It's a hint that he's not quite as nice as his surface makes him appear to be.
• Gone Horribly Right:
  • While the Unified Government's success in creating a perfect homunculus led to Makoto's successful existence, it also encouraged Dr. Huesca of Amaterasu Corporation to try and create homunculi of his own to catch up. Said homunculi would end up being clones of Kanai Ward's residents, of whom were defective and ended up killing and replacing all of Kanai Ward, and eventually, leading Makoto into covering up the truth upon escaping the UG's lab and entering the city to find the catastrophe occurring in real-time. Essentially, this means Makoto's existence indirectly led to the overarching catastrophe that happened in Kanai Ward under Amaterasu's supervision, further solidifying his role as the overall Big Bad.
  • The Unified Government decided to use the DNA of Number One, the smartest guy in the world, as a basis for a homunculus. While it resulted in a perfect specimen, it also meant the specimen was smart enough to be self-aware, figure out exactly what he is, and plan an escape they couldn't stop. Their inability to control him meant the UG's plans to make an expendable obedient army could not even get off the ground and making more of him would likely have the same result.
  • Having Number One's brain and memories meant he was a super genius. But it also led to him sharing Number One's biggest character flaw, his inability to open up and ask others for help. The reason Yuma won in the end was because Number One erased his old personality via the pact, allowing Yuma to convince Makoto of the merits of trusting others.
• Good Counterpart: To Yomi. They're both the villainous directors of Amaterasu Corporation who are equally responsible for everything that happens in the game, but Yomi is the reason Makoto is a villain at all, and he's pretty much the cause of Makoto's desperation converting him from Number One to who he is now. Makoto is also actually altruistic and trying to help the citizens, to some degree, if very misguided, while Yomi is plainly delusional and only thinks he's doing good things, when he in fact isn't and is the cause of the destruction that Makoto is trying to fix. Makoto is also genuinely friendly, despite being a villain, while Yomi is a reprehensible, self-serving jerkass from start to finish, and would've absolutely destroyed all of Kanai Ward and Amaterasu Corporation had he become CEO instead of Makoto.
• Greenwashed Villainy: In Chapter 3, it's revealed that a hydroelectric power plant using the endless downpour in Kanai Ward is used to power the city. It was actually made by the Amaterasu Corporation, AKA Makoto. As we discover later, it turns out that the rain is the responsibility of Makoto himself due to his cloud machine, and he's using his power as CEO to cover up this fact by pretending to be eco-friendly, when the constant downpour is in fact having a negative impact on Kanai Ward's environment beyond keeping its homunculus citizens subdued. Since he couldn't make this himself, it's highly likely Makoto pretended the issue of the rain was a sign of natural disaster to the researchers who could create a power plant of such magnitude, therefore concealing that he made the rain happen himself while also making them follow his orders.
• HA HA HA—No: In Chapter 4, when Yuma asks him if homunculus research is being conducted in Amaterasu's research lab, he laughs and shrugs off the question.
  Yuma: I've learned about the existence of immortal monsters known as homunculi. The existence of a secret lab may be related. Could it be that homunculus research is being conducted in that lab? Research on those immortal monsters.
  Makoto: ... Hahaha! Immortal monsters?!
• Heel–Face Turn: After he returns to the real world he decides to listen to Yuma’s words and tell everyone they are all homunculus including the entire truth of everything in Kanai Ward.
• Hesitation Equals Dishonesty: When Yuma asks him about "Kanai Ward's Ultimate Secret" and the idea of "homunculus" in their first meeting, he pauses in shock since he's unable to answer anything about either without revealing himself as the Big Bad, since he's the one working behind the scenes to cover up the two conspiracies.
• Hidden Agenda Villain: Makoto actually seems to invoke this up until Chapter 5, trying to keep himself hidden through any means possible, whether it be confusion or distraction in an attempt to guide people away from asking too much about him. Eventually, he reveals his intentions, but only to his original (Yuma Kokohead) while in the Mystery Labyrinth with him.
• His Own Worst Enemy: In spades. The weight of his misdeeds causes him to hate himself more than he would anyone else, and the extents he had to go to accomplish his goal isn't something he's too proud of. Despite this, Makoto keeps up the masquerade he's trying to hold up to keep Kanai Ward safe from the Unified Government, and if he had succeeded at having absolute power, he would have been stuck that way for eternity due to himself and the city being homunculus, which are an immortal species, potentially outliving the rest of humanity and, due to those homunculi needing human flesh to survive, the rest of the city besides him would've eventually died too, leaving Makoto alone in the city. Even before that, he'd have to tell the homunculi what they are anyway, as they'd (eventually) notice that they aren't ageing or dying naturally after over three years.
• Honest Corporate Executive: Subverted. Makoto presents himself as Yuma's ally in spite of being Amaterasu's CEO, but he turns out to be an extremist Corrupt Corporate Executive like the majority of the company's factions, though he's an Anti-Villain rather than a typical corrupt executive like the rest, since his evil actions are intended to benefit Kanai Ward than himself.
• Horrifying the Horror: Even Shinigami, the death god Makoto knows is possessing Yuma, fears him and is constantly on high alert whenever he's around.
• Hyde Plays Jekyll: He is basically the true Number One with his Superpowered Evil Side taking the helm, but he pretends to be good-mannered to fool others into thinking he's sincere with his words and actions, when, of course, he's not.
• Hypocrite:
  • At the end of Chapter 4, Makoto openly condemns Yomi for abusing his power as Peacekeepers director by conspiring with Amaterasu Corporation's head researcher to leak technological information to other enterprises so he could bribe others into following his whims. In the following chapter, it's revealed Makoto also abused his power as CEO and a clone of the WDO's Number One to conspire with the WDO by ordering death row inmates to be sent to his factory in the restricted area so he could kill them and turn them into meat buns to feed Kanai Ward's homunculus residents and make them complacent. Downplayed in that, while Yomi's conspiracy transpires for his personal gain, Makoto's transpires due to his love for Kanai Ward's homunculi.
  • He also condemns Yuma for "going around killing criminals" with Shinigami's powers after entering into Kanai Ward, but that is not only a result of Makoto's negligence regarding the homunculus' awareness of their own mortality (despite wanting to protect them), Makoto does exactly that as part of the game's overarching plot, and on a global scale with the assistance of the entire WDO, something he himself takes note of only moments before.
  • He condemns Yuma for wanting to expose Kanai Ward's truth and "destroy the peaceful world" he built up, and uses it as his excuse to kill him, despite Makoto himself being the reason that Yuma came to Kanai Ward at all and Makoto being the one to lure him to the city with false mysteries to oppose the Peacekeepers.
• I Am Not Left-Handed: Makoto convinces everyone around him, at first, that he's a completely inconspicuous CEO with a grudge against Yomi, and has wholly good intentions behind what he does. The other detectives, especially Halara, aren't convinced in the slightest, and rightfully so. In the final battle, Makoto goes all-out by isolating Yuma in the Mystery Labyrinth and using his Coalescence on him, forcing "Yuma" to face the truth that Makoto is actually Number One's homunculus, and "Yuma" is the true Number One.
• I Am the Noun: During his final confrontation, he declares himself to be "Kanai Ward's Ultimate Secret"; his existence effectively enables the rest of the Ward to continue as it does.
• Identity Breakdown: As a homunculus, he is essentially a perfect clone in both memory and personality of Number One; however, realizing he was a homunculus changed his motive from finding and revealing the truth at any cost to hiding the truth of the Kanai Ward no matter how destructive it becomes.
• I Did What I Had to Do: Until he was given encouragement from Yuma to let Kanai Ward's residents work out the truth themselves, he thought the only way to keep them safe was to keep them away from the WDO by any means necessary, negotiate the city's isolation with the UG, and kidnap death row inmates from around the world to feed in the form of meat buns in order to sustain their homunculi bodies.
• Ignorance Is Bliss: Exaggerated, as it's pretty much his entire ideology as a villain. He believes the residents are better off not knowing the truth of what happened to them three years ago and how he chose to cover it up from them, therefore making them ignorant to their true nature and keeping Kanai Ward running as a city. Said ideology ends up being proven wrong and played for reality before said ideology was revealed in the Final Battle, as all of the residents had been in a state of complete and total depression as a result of his extremist methods in keeping them ignorant of their status as defective homunculi and felt no bliss whatsoever, mostly because they still thought themselves to be the same mortal humans they were three years ago when they really aren't.
• I Just Want to Be Normal: Makoto holds this belief for himself, and tries to claim it on behalf of the other homunculi, that because he and the homunculus residents of Kanai Ward won't be accepted as being the same as humans, he has to hide them from the world at any cost. He eventually achieves some capacity of normalcy when he finds out the UG will accept him and the defects after all.
• I'm a Humanitarian: While kidnapping and killing criminals to provide the homunculi of Kanai Ward with human flesh was a Necessarily Evil crime on his part, it's quite unethical of Makoto to deceive them all into resorting to cannibalism in order to survive. He also doesn't need the humans to sustain himself, as it's for the others that he's providing it for and he is absent of the flaws that the defects have, but in spirit, he himself is the cannibal in this situation.
• Immediate Self-Contradiction: Makoto explains that he knows everything about Kanai Ward, which includes Amatetasu Corporation and its subordinates, but as he's taking Yuma to the underground research lab within Amaterasu HQ, he claims he doesn't know who's working from within to overtake the company. As it turns out, he knew all along, and that person was Yomi working with the company's head researcher, Dr. Huesca, and he was using Yuma as bait for Yomi.
• Immortal Genius: Since Makoto is a perfect homunculus, he is also immortal. He is also a clone of Number One of the WDO, the greatest mind in the world.
• Impersonating the Evil Twin: A horrifying inversion. Makoto is the Evil Twin impersonating his original, Yuma, and he has been doing so for the past three years just to manipulate the WDO into luring death row inmates to his factory to convert them into meat buns for the homunculus residents of Kanai Ward by pretending to be Number One, whom Yuma actually is.
• Inspector Javert: Makoto's reason for luring Yuma/the original Number One to Kanai Ward is because he saw Yuma as a mere threat to be rid of, believing himself to be more responsible as his homunculus clone because of his overwhelming revelation regarding the homunculi, and the fact that he himself and all of Kanai Ward are a population of homunculi.
• Insufferable Genius: Downplayed. He isn't an outright jerk about it, but he's incredibly proud of how successful he is in his intelligence and scheming. Most explicitly, he praises his work on his cloud machine, boasting that he made it with "his genius ideas and the world's best technology".
• Ironic Name: Makoto can mean “truth”, but Makoto tries to hide the true nature of Kanai Ward's residents from them. As for his surname, "Kagutsuchi" is commonly associated with fire, which is ironic due to Kanai Ward's constant rainfall, an environment where fire is extinguished if lit.
• Irony: A very complicated example that also doubles as hypocrisy. He spends his entire existence protecting homunculi who killed their original selves and then took their position as their original selves, an incident of which he tries to hide from them during the three years they were present in Kanai Ward as one of their own, and yet his entire plan the whole time was to kill his original self as part of a plan he was very much doing out in the open, as he is a homunculus of Yuma himself/Number One of the WDO, as part of said plan to hide the truth from them, essentially doing the exact same thing that got the others involved in the incident that he's trying to cover up in the first place.
• I Shall Taunt You: He repeatedly tries to provoke Yuma in the final chapter by calling him an "empty shell" and pointing out how he's lost all his friends in his search for Kanai Ward's truth. This is actually to provoke Yuma into fighting him in the Final Battle, as he sees his original self as a Worthy Opponent.
• "It" Is Dehumanizing: A variant. He rhetorically calls the human death row inmates he kidnaps and uses for the meat buns "ingredients".
• I Work Alone: His Fatal Flaw, which carried over from being Number One's homunculus clone with his memories intact. He does everything throughout the story up to Chapter 5's Mystery Labyrinth on his own, and it ends up breaking him down in the end when Yuma forces him to face the truth of his actions.
• Jack of All Trades: Fame and influence by being CEO of Amaterasu Corporation and a clone of the WDO's Number One? Check. Impossibly large amounts of money? Check. Superintelligence unrivaled by anyone in the world but his original? Check. Resurrective Immortality as a homunculus? For sure.
• Kill and Replace: One of his motives for luring Yuma into the final Mystery Labyrinth was to kill him there so he could completely take over the World Detective Organisation by posing as Number One. However, the insanity of this plan is pointed out, as having to run the large international organisation alongside Amaterasu Corporation would certainly destroy his already stressed out mental state.
• Knight of Cerebus: Played With. He does appear throughout the game as one of the main characters following the end of Chapter 2, but he doesn't quite fit the trope since he keeps up his Affably Evil persona. It's only after Yomi is removed from power over Kanai Ward like he wanted to from the start that he ends up becoming a true terror for the player and the main characters both by showing how much of a villain he really is behind that persona, following when he catches the agency in his sleeping gas trap by tricking Yuma into carrying it around with him.
• Knight Templar: Makoto only desires to help the defective homunculi of Kanai Ward live safely. Due to him thinking hiding the truth is his only option, though, he's forced to cater to their needs by taking the amoral path of blocking out the sunlight to prevent them from going berserk and dying, and kidnapping death row inmates to use as meat buns to feed the homunculi. He holds the belief that hiding the truth and his methods of doing so are absolutely good, even though everyone recognizes the evil he's really showing. He stops doing this when he reforms, letting the UG and the residents themselves work out the solution to their problems instead.
• Lawman Gone Bad: Makoto Kagutsuchi is a perfect clone of a Great Detective of the WDO - Number One - turned Affably Evil criminal mastermind Big Bad.
• Lethal Chef: Like his original counterpart, Makoto is also terrible at cooking a quality meal, according to the loading screen trivia, so he takes the alternative of fast food to sustain himself instead. Knowing this before The Reveal serves as a hint that he's a clone of the protagonist, the only other person in the setting known to be bad at cooking, and "Yuma Kokohead" is disguised as the real Yuma who can cook. It also confirms that Yuma's lack of skills are true and it's not due to the residents being flesh-hungry homunculi.
• Let Off by the Detective: Twofold. "Yuma"/Number One decides to let him decide how the truth of Kanai Ward should be revealed rather than punish him directly for antagonizing others out of a personal agenda, and after Makoto decides to take the simple path of revealing the truth upfront, he attempts to turn himself in due to his sense of honor, only to have his request turned down due to him being seen as an effective CEO by the public. Both of these instances are a case of an investigator essentially letting him go. However, for Makoto, he has to face the consequences of his crimes, so letting him go unpunished (beyond his defeat in the Mystery Labyrinth) is essentially a worse outcome in his case.
• A Lighter Shade of Black: Compared to Yomi, his main rival for power in the Kanai Ward; both of them are very ruthless and manipulative rulers, who are very much the source of the misery the Master Detectives undergo, and they both contribute their share of crimes, Makoto's having a much worse effect on the titular detectives since he pitted them against Yomi in the first place, and is the one who knocks them unconscious at the end of Chapter 4. However, Makoto is trying to save Kanai Ward's homunculi, is genuinely empathetic, and is an Anti-Villain who happens to be a clone of Number One of the World Detective Organization, who does possess Number One's virtuous personality, and said virtues are what drive him. On the other hand, Yomi is purely The Caligula and is a self-centered, apathetic Royal Brat who only cares about his own power over others and is willing to massacre anyone who dares to oppose him with zero remorse, who is also responsible for Kanai Ward being a place where crime and disaster can thrive at all.
• Loss of Identity: Zig-Zagged. He is Number One's homunculus clone, and therefore is exactly the same person as Yuma. However, Makoto does not see it this way, as he refers to Yuma, the true Number One that he's based on, as a different entity, even though he's the exact same person as Makoto. Alongside his angst as a homunculus possibly distorting his personality completely, Makoto is no longer the original Number One, and has instead turned into the one thing that the original Number One despises: a ruthless criminal mastermind willing to exploit other people by any means necessary. However, the only reason that Makoto goes to extremes in the first place is because of Number One's values, though Makoto doesn't realize it at first, for example: being independent (he does everything on his own), being pragmatic (willing to go to any lengths), being idealistic (he thinks that his solutions will work no matter what), and yet confounding it with cynicism (secretly thinking that none of said solutions will work in the end).
• Love Makes You Evil: And go incredibly far to fulfill it. His genuine love for the defective homunculi of Kanai Ward is the primary motive driving his actions, as he repeats time and time again.
• Luke, You Are My Father: When he first meets Yuma (who Makoto is secretly a clone of, having been created from his DNA), he asks Yuma to tell Number One that "his son is in trouble" as a Sarcastic Confession. In an implicit way, Makoto is telling Yuma that he himself is that "son" in question, but Yuma doesn't realize this at the time, as he's unaware of Makoto's true self. Played With in that, as they are clones with exactly the same genes and are technically the same age beyond Makoto's creation date, Makoto's more of a sibling.
• MacGuffin-Person Reveal: "Kanai Ward's Ultimate Secret" is not an entity as the Master Detectives of the WDO had assumed; it's Makoto, as he's the real Big Bad they've been pursuing this whole time.
• Malevolent Masked Man: Despite wearing an incredibly unsettling mask, Makoto Kagutsuchi is relentlessly friendly towards Yuma and the other detectives, proudly proclaims his love for the citizens of Kanai Ward, and actively helps Yuma in his investigation, including helping to keep them safe from the Peacekeepers. Even after he is revealed as the Final Boss, he turns out to be a Well-Intentioned Extremist who genuinely believed that his policy of burying the truth was the only way to keep the people of Kanai Ward happy. Averted with his actual face with it being an exact copy of Yuma's.
• The Man Behind the Man: Downplayed. Makoto is the CEO of Amaterasu Corporation, and therefore is in a position of power above Yomi, the leader of the Peacekeepers, but just because Makoto is his boss, it does not mean he is Yomi's commander.
• The Man Behind the Monsters: He, a perfect homunculus who doesn't lapse into violence when subjected to sunlight or turn into a zombie upon revival, and the CEO of Amaterasu Corporation, provides for the needs of a populus of defective homunculi, which are essentially a zombie horde that lapses into violence when subjected to sunlight of which default to the identity of false humans, by kidnapping criminals for their food supply, blocking out the sunlight, lying to them about their humanity, and isolating Kanai Ward.
• Manipulative Bastard: And goodness, does he do it a lot.
  • The overarching manipulations he commits to start with luring the WDO over to Kanai Ward in order to wither away Yomi's underlings and eventually distract him enough to find evidence against him. The plan works out exactly and Makoto gets what he wants in the end, thanks to Chief Yakou falling for his schemes.
  • Regarding Chief Yakou, Makoto introducing him to Fink the Slaughter Artist in the first place is what allowed Yakou to kill Dr. Huesca and cover up his involvement in the murder using Fink’s hitman notoriety to falsify himself as his victim, which would lead to his death, from the start. Fink was the key element within Yakou’s plot, as without him, not only would he not have someone to frame for the murder, but Yakou wouldn’t have someone to frame for his own murder in an attempt to cover up what truly killed him. This would not only allow Makoto the opening to find evidence to incriminate Yomi, but it would also allow Makoto to kidnap the NDA without Yakou’s interference by also tricking Yuma into carrying a gas trap into the agency.
  • He manipulates the Unified Government to fall under his whims by blackmailing them about the homunculus research, threatening to release it to the public unless they do whatever Makoto asks of them.
  • He tricks Yuma into getting Makoto into the Mystery Labyrinth by holding hands with him, allowing Makoto to connect with Yuma’s pact to Shinigami and enter the Mystery Labyrinth. Not only that, but also pretend to be a Mystery Phantom and make Yuma believe he didn’t just secretly break into the Mystery Labyrinth without Yuma noticing.
  • Regarding Kanai Ward as a whole, he tricks the homunculi into thinking that the meat buns are made from non-human meat, and convinces them that they're still human while covering up the Blank Week Mystery. His previous blackmailing also allows him to become Amaterasu's CEO and shut down the homunculus research to prevent Yomi and Dr. Huesca from having power over his decision to do so. As well as this, he'd convince the homunculi residents that the clouds blocking the light were real instead of produced artificially.
  • In order to become Amaterasu's CEO and kidnap the death row inmates, he had to trick everyone into believing he wasn't Number One's immortal homunculus clone. For the former, everyone believed him to be a completely normal person named "Makoto Kagutsuchi" who just happened to take hold of Amaterasu, while in the latter, he makes the entire WDO believe that he's the original Number One by disguising as him to order the mass kidnapping of the death row inmates he'd use for the meat buns from the WDO. He would also wear the signature mask and come up with lies about why he wears it to divert attention away from why he's wearing said mask, the real reason being to hide his true face.
• Man of the City: He's pretty much dedicated his existence to protecting Kanai Ward's homunculi from any threats to their livelihood, by any means necessary. He's more cooperative with the residents post-Heel–Face Turn, though.
• Man of Wealth and Taste: An infinitely rich MegaCorp CEO who wears a purple suit with a gold pattern, accompanied by a white shirt, blue tie, and black boots.
• Mascot Villain: Serves as the game's mascot antagonist, appearing absolutely everywhere in promotional art and being the focus on the game's cover art.
• Master Actor: Downplayed. His politeness isn't faked, but he has very successfully tricked everyone who didn't know that he's a clone of Number One of the World Detective Organization into thinking that he's just some random newcomer to Kanai Ward; and tricked the whole city into believing he's not a villain, when it turns out he very much is, albeit a morally grey one. Additionally, unlike Yuma — his original self — Makoto has his memories, making this disguise even more difficult considering Yuma had to erase his memories to pretend to not be the true Number One.
• Mean Boss: Downplayed. He turns out to be a variant of one to Yomi in particular since he was planning to get rid of him from Amaterasu the whole time and used the detectives as bait to lure him out, and he counts into the "boss" part because Yomi is technically his subordinate. Of course, getting rid of Yomi was a best-case scenario; the issue behind this is why Makoto got rid of him, that being to take his position and become Kanai Ward's sole ruler. He lacks the attitude since he is actually polite and never insults anyone including Yomi, but his actions show what he really thinks of him. In Chapter 5, he also says that he "quashed his [and Dr. Huesca's] complaints" about him forcibly shutting down Project Homunculus straight after taking the position of CEO, but it's rather vague as to how specifically he meant this, though it implies he rightfully wasn't too polite about hearing said complaints.
• Memory Wipe Exploitation: When meeting him at the beginning of Chapter 3, Makoto is fully aware that Yuma is the true Number One of the WDO and he's his homunculus clone, but he waits until Yuma (who is clueless to both of these things, unlike his true self) does what he had brought him to Kanai Ward for in the first place - that being allowing Makoto to oust Yomi Hellsmile - and after trapping him in the Mystery Labyrinth to reveal this fact to him.
• Menacing Mask: Makoto's signature. His mask is a perpetually smiling skull face with one eye, a stuck-out tongue, and a blank, soul-sucking gaze. He wears it for the majority of the game to hide his face until Makoto reveals what's underneath it when "Yuma" eventually realizes he's Number One's clone, and had to hide the fact from everyone else around him.
• Mike Nelson, Destroyer of Worlds: While the murder cases can indeed be blamed on the fact that there are characters who are willing to cross those lines just for the sake of it, along with the countless presumed executions from the Peacekeepers, everything that happens between the residents themselves in the game's story are actually the responsibility of the Big Bad Makoto Kagutsuchi's refusal to tell the residents they aren't mortal and are in fact a population of immortal homunculi, making him responsible for manslaughter. After all, knowing they're immortal would make them realize they aren't mortal or even human, and therefore would stop them from murdering one another, but his negligence to tell them this leads them all to believe they're still mortal. The likely exception to this may be Yomi Hellsmile who commands the Peacekeepers, since he's too apathetic to care for if the residents are mortal or not. The things that happen following his rule happen completely indirectly, and even in terms of when he acts on his own during Chapter 4 and 5, he gets Dr. Huesca and Yakou killed indirectly, and then attempts to indirectly kill Yuma with the Mystery Labyrinth. Makoto is strongly an extremist, but his more vile actions only happen as a consequence, and seemingly the only time he's shown actually having killed someone is Fink the Slaughter Artist, who was a villainous assassin.
• Milking the Giant Cow: One of his signature poses is holding his arms out to each side out of self-confidence, as if to 'hug' something but not actually doing it.
• Minor Major Character: He is the CEO of the Amaterasu Corporation, and the Big Bad of the game by proxy of that, but he only appears at the beginning and end of Chapter 3, then aids Yuma at the beginning of Chapter 4, only to get captured by Yomi, return at the end of the chapter for a brief moment, and then spend much of Chapter 5 speaking to Yuma via intercom and the rest of the chapter physically battling Yuma in the Mystery Labyrinth after the Deduction Denoument. Compared to Yomi, who is active in every chapter — mostly through his minions — this is quite a small amount of appearances for someone as major as Makoto. Justified, as he is specifically a Non-Action Big Bad and mostly uses his mental power for his schemes instead (being a clone of Number One of the WDO).
• Mirror Character:
  • Makoto wants to take control of Kanai Ward just as, if not more so than, Yomi does. Their intentions are different, however, as Makoto wants to actually protect Kanai Ward's people, as opposed to Yomi, who is very much willing to kill those who cross him and just wants to take control for the thrill of having godlike power over others.
  • He effectively is Number One, and still shares a lot of Yuma's idealism and loner complex.
• Mister Big: Despite being Amaterasu Corporation's CEO, the one at the top of the company ladder, since he's a clone of Yuma, he also shares his original self's 150cm height, which he compensates for by wearing platform shoes.
• Mole in Charge: Makoto was never meant to be CEO of Amaterasu, being a copy of an already-existing heroic figure who's already in charge of the heroic WDO... while simultaneously also pretending to be the leader of the WDO he's only a mere impersonator of. He got into that position in both cases solely through blackmail of the UG, the name he's actually associated with, having been created by the UG itself.
• Morality Pet: Downplayed. The Amaterasu Corporation Peacekeepers appear to somewhat respect Makoto, due to him being their boss, and acknowledge his position as CEO, but the fact that he's an authority figure seems to be the only reason. Since Yomi leads them, and Yomi is the one who actually opposes Makoto, they are very willing to follow along with the orders that Yomi posits against Makoto out of fear for him, as shown when they willingly comply with Yomi's orders for Makoto be taken out of Dr. Huesca's critical lab.
• Most Definitely Not a Villain: When Yuma hesitates to ask Makoto for help investigating Amaterasu's research lab for homunculus research in Chapter 4, he assures him he's not Yuma's enemy. In actuality, he is, being his main rival and the cause of everything in the story.
• Motive Rant: His final confrontation with Yuma is essentially him ranting about why he did such actions like isolating Kanai Ward, kidnapping criminals, and blocking out the sun with eternal rain.
  Makoto: I had no choice. They must eat in order to survive. Besides, I never took innocent people. I gathered criminals with no chance of rehabilitation, and simply accelerated their sentencing. You saw the memo as well. Besides, they were all on death row anyway.
  Yuma: That doesn't make it right!
  Makoto: At any rate, that's not just my crime. [...] The procurement of these "ingredients" was done with the full cooperation of the World Detective Organization.
• Motor Mouth: When he lies to Yuma about why he always wear his mask, Yuma pretty much has to get him to stop talking.
• Mr. Exposition: A wide majority of his lines serve as infodumps for any particular context, this especially being prominent when telling Yuma about Ama-Pal and Dr. Huesca's security system in the research lab.
• Mundane Utility: His Forte allows him to use the abilities of any other person he has access to. So when he kidnaps the detectives, including the likes of Fubuki and Vivia, what does he do? Copy their handwriting.
• Murder by Suicide: What he does to Chief Yakou in Chapter 4. Yakou would not have gone through with killing Dr. Huesca by Suicide Attack under Yomi's manipulations if he wasn't given a means to hide his true cause of death by gas through a stab wound, which Makoto allowed to happen by introducing him to the hitman Fink.
• My God, What Have I Done?: By the final confrontation it's made very clear that he's beginning to crumble under the weight of everything he's had to do to keep Kanai Ward safe. He even admits that he can't keep up the lie forever but doesn't know what to do.
• Naked First Impression: When Yuma regains consciousness in Makoto’s home and leaves the room he’s in, he finds Makoto taking a bath.
• Near-Villain Victory: Everything in Chapter 5 was going according to his plans, with no one realizing that he's actually a villain due to being so Affably Evil, including the WDO (plus the NDA), Amaterasu Corporation's lower-ranking members, the UG, and Kanai Ward itself. All he needed was to Kill and Replace the original Number One via the Mystery Labyrinth and he essentially would've gained unlimited power. Thankfully, he gets talked out of it and has a Heel–Face Turn. And even if Makoto had succeeded in his replacement, "Yuma" resigned from his position as Number One, and since Makoto is a clone of Yuma, the WDO would have dismissed him anyway because his original counterpart was no longer in the position he intended.
• Necessarily Evil: Indeed, Makoto's actions are intended for the defective homunculi surviving within Kanai Ward, as the sun being blocked out prevents them from going on a violent rampage until eventually dying, and without human flesh to eat, that of which he provides by killing death row inmates, they will eventually die of hunger as their bodies require specific nutrient combinations found in human flesh to keep functioning. The actual issue is that he tries to cover up their true identity from them and refuses to reveal it for any reason whatsoever, which is where his more evil side comes into play, as it's not only the reason why he conceals the city's secrets in the first place, it's also why he's trying to Kill and Replace Number One of the WDO, AKA the protagonist. Alongside this, the other issue that establishes his evil is that he attempts to justify himself.
• The Needs of the Many: Terrifyingly so. Makoto believes that the many within Kanai Ward's homunculi residents can be saved if he takes advantage of a surviving few's naivete, namely the detectives and Yomi himself. He also chooses death row inmates for his three-years kidnapping plot under the implied belief that executing them faster will save the many within the human world from a few criminals.
• Nerves of Steel: Even when in the presence of the homunculus clones of Yomi Hellsmile, and later Dr. Huesca in Chapter 4, who are pretty much the reason Makoto's doing what he's doing for Kanai Ward's residents due to them accidentally replacing the residents with homunculus clones as a result of a rushed experiment, Makoto maintains his affable demeanor and takes the situation at hand with little irritation. Justified in that he knows he has both of them outmatched because he knows his overarching plan to use detectives as opposition against Yomi, as well as his covert aiding of Yomi's plot to eliminate Dr. Huesca's clone, will go exactly as he planned, and eventually, by the end of Chapter 4, he does indeed outmatch the both of them when he exposes Yomi for his crimes following Huesca's death at Yakou Furio's hands.
• New Era Speech: The very first thing he does after Yomi Hellsmile's arrest and his removal from power is declare that Kanai Ward will have some changes and be under new management, though only Yuma is the one to hear it. Little did Yuma know, Makoto was referring to himself taking charge.
• Nightmare Face: Or rather "Nightmare Mask". During the final battle, two of the masks he switches between involve a disturbing recolor with the same expression as he normally does, in the colors blue and yellow, and the other two include his eye swirling in insanity with a stuck-out tongue and a purple mask glaring with a single red eye. Regarding his maskless face, he also displays a sadistic Slasher Smile, and also a disturbed shadowy face.
• Nightmare Fuel Station Attendant: Makoto's mysterious voice, secretive nature, creepy mask, and uncanny motions seem creepy and indicative of his status as a villain, of which they are, because he is a villain, the main antagonist, to be exact. However, as we learn later on, this is completely unintentional on his part, as he's actually a clone of Number One of the WDO, which means that he's an Anti-Villain and doesn't intend to be creepy, making him Innocently Insensitive. Even following his reveal, he takes no notice of this behavior and keeps acting in an off-putting way while maintaining his stoicism as Number One's clone.
• Ninja Pirate Zombie Robot: An immortal homunculus clone of a detective organization's supergenius leader who also leads a corrupt corporation.
• Non-Action Big Bad: During the majority of the game, most of his evil comes from the fact that he's a Manipulative Bastard and uses his intelligence to scheme in the background instead of confronting the protagonists outright, unlike Yomi, who does the exact opposite and always confronts them personally. He only does any real fighting when he tricks Yuma into getting trapped in the Mystery Labyrinth, at which point they fight each other in an extravagant Duel to the Death, the duel of which is actually irrelevant to his main manipulations that span the events of the whole game despite being his main reason for bringing Number One of the WDO to Kanai Ward.
• Non-Answer: Everytime one of the detectives asks for his true identity, he uses one of these, in varying forms, so he can keep up the act of not being the true Number One's homunculus clone. In Chapter 5, he uses a Show, Don't Tell answer instead by using his Coalescence to show Yuma that he's actually Number One's homunculus clone by sneaking into the Mystery Labyrinth.
• Non Sequitur: Usually accompanies it with his exposition before he's revealed as the Big Bad, going on long, irrelevant rants about random things to make himself seem more innocent than he actually is.
• "Not So Different" Remark: In Chapter 4, while riding down to the secret lab with Yuma, when discussing his power struggle between himself and Yomi, Makoto notes that he and Yomi are "not so different." The level of truth in said statement would be much bigger in hindsight.
• Not So Stoic: Makoto maintains his composure for much of the game, even when in the presence of his biggest rivals, and he tries to hide his inner hatred for Yuma, his original, through his blunt and snarky attitude. However, when he's demanding Yuma to expose his crimes, and is calling Yuma out as Kanai Ward's true enemy in the Final Battle as he's planning to kill him off, he ends up shouting his words aloud in a desperate rage, having reached the point where he can no longer tolerate his presence.
• No, You: In Chapter 5, this is basically Makoto's exchange with his original counterpart. At some point, Yuma believes he's too far gone to be considered morally right regardless of his intentions and calls him "evil incarnate!" Then some time later, he flips the argument and calls Yuma the evil one instead.
  Yuma: You are evil incarnate!
  (a few moments later)
  Makoto: To this city...you are the real evil, detective!

O - Z

• Obfuscating Stupidity: Makoto spends the entirety of Chapter 3 to Chapter 4, when he's physically interacting with Yuma, pretending to be a Bunny-Ears Lawyer of a CEO who likes to mess around with others for entertainment. Then it's revealed he's a pragmatic criminal mastermind who's been taking the situation with Kanai Ward seriously and the detectives were his pawns for his conspiracy against Yomi Hellsmile the whole time, while they were all none the wiser.
• Obviously Evil: In appearance and behavior, despite keeping up a nice demeanor so he's revealed to be Evil All Along at the end of Chapter 4, he almost intentionally acts suspicious, hiding his face with a creepy mask and speaking in riddles, while also avoiding answering any personal questions and never saying why. His profile also says he has ulterior motives. The game plays with your expectations by having Makoto never explicitly show himself doing anything villainous on-screen, and in fact aiding the protagonists instead, but despite his actions, the constant secrecy should be a hint that he's actually an antagonist.
• Offstage Villainy: Aside from his hiding the truth of Kanai Ward's residents, kidnapping criminals, and trying to kill the protagonist, much of Makoto's crimes are said by word of mouth of the other homunculi or in his long-winded and increasingly desperate Motive Rant during Chapter 5. This makes him somewhat of an Unreliable Expositor in regards to the UG and the WDO since there are no flashbacks or the like to show how exactly his manipulation of the two factions was actually done, and we only hear of their cooperation with him from his word rather than theirs. Despite it happening mostly off-screen, the results of his villainy are ultimately very clearly real, meaning that what he is saying is still the truth, even if it's unseen.
• The Only One Allowed to Defeat You: Him stopping Yomi from killing Yuma (and the other detectives) only to set up their duel within the Mystery Labyrinth following Yomi's defeat appears like this, as he actually was intent on killing Yuma the whole time in order to replace him, but of course, wouldn't let the Peacekeepers steal his opportunity to do so. Makoto says as much, as it was part of his plan to personally trap Yuma there as The Perfect Crime.
• O.O.C. Is Serious Business: How close is he to the breaking point? The homunculus of the famously self-reliant Number One, who is just as self-reliant himself, outright pleads for help at the end of his boss fight.
• Orcus on His Throne: Despite Makoto being the Big Bad, he spends the majority of the game idling about in Kanai Tower while the Peacekeepers cause chaos for the detectives on the ground. It's only when he uses Yuma as bait for the detectives in Chapter 4 does he become more of an active threat himself as part of his plan to lure Yomi out of his headquarters so he can gather evidence of his crimes.
• Pacifism Breaking Point: He ends up giving one to his original (Yuma), and Yomi ends up giving one to him. The original Number One, being the top detective of the WDO, is implied to have followed the idea of resorting to actually peaceful methods to solve cases and internal corporate struggles; Makoto ends up falling outside of this when protecting the homunculi, resorting to murder of all sorts to achieve his goals, and this includes having to manipulate circumstances to give himself an opportunity to oust Yomi from power in the process since he was getting in the way of said protection. As for Yuma's breaking point, Makoto ends up urging the original Number One to make a pact with a death god.
• Pay Evil unto Evil:
  • Fink is Killed Offscreen and thrown into Kanai Ward's restricted area by Makoto following Chapter 4. However, Fink himself is a ruthless assassin-for-hire with a 100% success rate, making him a villain too.
  • Played for Horror. The human bodies he kidnaps globally in order to get ingredients for the meat buns to feed the homunculi of Kanai Ward are specifically death row inmates, who were not only criminals themselves but were also bound to die anyway.
• The Pirates Who Don't Do Anything: Downplayed and justified, then subverted. Only in regards to his formal title, Makoto is not shown to be managing his own employees that much, let alone disciplining them, and seemingly allows them to act as unpredictable as they do, despite having total control over them as the literal CEO of Amaterasu Corporation. He tells Yomi to withdraw at the end of Chapter 3, wills an answer out of one of the Peacekeepers regarding the intruder in Chapter 4, and personally has Yomi removed his position at the end of the same chapter, but aside from that, he isn't that commanding or imposing. As it turns out, the real reason he became the CEO in the first place wasn't to order the employees around but rather to shut down Dr. Huesca's homunculus research and have the unlimited power to hide Kanai Ward's truth, Yomi legitimately is much too powerful to control anyway, and he ends up actually making an effort to manage the company when Yuma redeems him at the end of the game.
• Playing Both Sides: Implied. In the final battle, Yuma argues back that the WDO wouldn't have sent detectives to Kanai Ward without a directive (the directive in question being to search for Kanai Ward's Ultimate Secret). Makoto's response, alongside Yakou's cluelessness in the prologue, indicates that there was never a directive at all and it was only Makoto subtly manipulating the organization to work against his own company by sending the detectives to Kanai Ward, implying that he intentionally brought the detectives to Kanai Ward so they could battle him, which included keeping them alive from the rogue Peacekeepers working under him.
• Please Kill Me if It Satisfies You: He gives Yuma the option to reap his soul via Shinigami at the end of his Mystery Labyrinth, with the alternative being to stay behind, as punishment for his misdeeds.
• Power Copying: Due to being Number One's homunculus he can also use Coalescence.
• Pragmatic Villainy: Unlike Yomi, his rival, Makoto actually does want detectives to fix Kanai Ward's devastation by reforming it of its corruption, which is mostly thanks to Yomi's schemes to get into power (ironically, Makoto's actually a detective too, being a clone of Number One of the WDO). It turns out the real drive for this is because he's conspiring against Yomi for his own goals and is using the detectives to oppose him so he can become the city's sole ruler and permanently keep Kanai Ward a secret from the world by using his position as CEO and as Number One's clone to do so.
• Purple Is Powerful: He wears a purple formal suit and is a company executive who is also the Big Bad.
• Purple Is the New Black: The suit he wears is predominantly purple, and he turns out to be the main villain of the game, and, in terms of his ability to scheme surpassing Yomi's, very much stands out in his villainy. His outfit is specifically a business outfit, which is traditionally black, but his is purple instead.
• Rags to Riches: Was born as a homunculus clone with nothing but his intelligence at his disposal, but said intelligence is precisely what gets him to the top of Amaterasu Corporation's hierarchy when the company's original CEO abdicated his position to Makoto three years ago.
• Raised in a Lab: Naturally, being a homunculus clone. Specifically, raised in the Unified Government's lab, and it's caused him great distress ever since.
• Rank Scales with Asskicking: He's the top authority of his company, and of course, when battling his original self in the final chapter, he holds up the fight incredibly well, almost winning in the first phase and even successfully driving Yuma to despair just before the second phase. As for the second phase in question, he ends up being a Zero-Effort Boss.
• Reasonable Authority Figure: Though still quite the extremist Corrupt Corporate Executive in his own right, Makoto is actually far more reasonable than the Peacekeepers are throughout the entire story. He not only acknowledges they're a problem within Amaterasu Corporation, but he actually knows that Kanai Ward's citizens have real issues beyond the tendency for rampant crime, that being that, thanks to Yomi and Dr. Huesca, they have to live as defective homunculi, which is arguably the bigger priority to take charge of. Of course, with Makoto knowing they have this problem, he could quite easily change his goals and kill them all instead by simply leaving them to go berserk and die, but despite having this control, he refuses to do this. This is in comparison to Yomi, who is capable of killing anyone who gets in his way with the power he's amassed, and very willingly abuses it just for his personal satisfaction.
• The Reveal: His role as the Big Bad, since he's so Obviously Evil, is not the surprising element. Makoto's true identity and his goals, on the other hand, can qualify, since it's revealed that not only is he actually a clone, he's also a clone of the protagonist, who is the true Number One of the WDO; along with this, what he's actually doing for Kanai Ward and why he's doing it in that the residents are actually ultraviolet-allergic flesh-hungry defective homunculi clones of Kanai Ward's original residents, which also reveals that the clouds producing Kanai Ward's rain and the meat buns sold around the city are actually for the safety of the homunculi in question, whom don't even know they're homunculi anyway and think themselves to still be human.
• Rival Final Boss: Retroactively, he is Yuma's main rival, being his Evil Twin taking advantage of his identity as the leader of the WDO, and he's also the Final Boss in Chapter 5, and defeating him and encouraging his Heel–Face Turn is necessary to complete the game's story. However, unlike other examples, he's not just his rival, as he's also the Big Bad.
• Sanity Has Advantages: Compared to Yomi, Makoto's scheming involves precise judgement and an Excellent Judge of Character, something Yomi lacks as he's too sociopathic to care how others think and is only focused on removing any competition to his position. Makoto willingly exploits this element of Yomi, allowing Makoto to win over him at the end of Chapter 4 when this reaches its peak.
• Saying Too Much: Revealing his Kill and Replace plan to Yuma as part of his Breaking Speech allows his opponent to have the advantage over him in the end, since he knows what Makoto’s true goal is.
• Screw the Rules, I'm Doing What's Right!: A dark version of this. The only reason that there is even a Kanai Ward for the detectives to be sent to in the first place is because Makoto refused to listen to the UG's request to have the defective homunculus citizens within it be permanently killed off after Amaterasu's research led to catastrophe, due to empathizing with them, as he's a homunculus too. In turn, Makoto decided to protect them from the UG's personal goals of erasing them after deeming them monsters... by any means necessary.
• Screw the Rules, I'm Famous!:
  • Knowing himself to be a copy of Number One of the WDO and then becoming the CEO of the MegaCorp Amaterasu Corporation and gaining control and influence over everyone in Kanai Ward really went to his head.
  • As Amaterasu's CEO, his isolation of Kanai Ward is specifically done to prevent outsiders from making entry. That is, until Yomi grows too powerful and he feels inclined to lure Master Detectives over to oust him from power.
• Secondary Color Nemesis: He primarily wears purple attire, while his hair color is a grayish blonde, and he is also the Big Bad.
• Serial-Killer Killer: The unnamed death row inmates Makoto kidnaps likely consist of a whole assortment of serial killers set to die by other law enforcers, but his own three-years worth body count is just as incalculable as he kills them for Kanai Ward’s food supply.
• Shadow Archetype: To Yuma/the original Number One. Makoto is Yuma's natural desire to help others no matter the cost and refusal to work with others having taken a dark path, as he ended up committing crimes for his cause due to the belief in its necessity and thought he could rely upon no one but himself to do so when protecting Kanai Ward's defective homunculi from the world, which ends up backing him into a mental corner where he decides that openly telling the truth and letting the residents he's trying to cater to work everything out themselves is the best option at his convenience. He also negotiates with the Unified Government, his creators, to keep the homunculi alive and send imports over to the city instead, as opposed to letting them exterminate the homunculi.
• Shadow Dictator: According to Makoto, he rarely walks around on the ground level of Kanai Ward, so the public rarely sees him and he never interacts with anyone while living in solitude despite him being the head of the corporation running the city following the homunculus incident in the game's backstory. Chief Yakou doesn't even know he's the current CEO of Amaterasu Corp, despite living with him for over three years straight as the NDA's chief, until meeting him at the end of Chapter 3.
• Shoot the Dog: To some degree, everything Makoto does on-screen and in his backstory is something he believes he's forced to do despite its amorality because he believes it's the only way to save the homunculi of Kanai Ward created from Dr. Huesca's failed experiment. His original self proves him wrong, and he uses more ethical means of helping them instead.
• Shoot The Dragon: Makoto's primary goal in assembling detectives in Kanai Ward is overthrowing Yomi Hellsmile, the rogue director of the Peacekeepers technically working under him, in order to take his place as ruler.
• Sir Not-Appearing-in-This-Trailer: Downplayed. He does in fact appear in advertising of the game pre-release and is referenced a lot, with his profile also appearing on the game's website as "Masked Man", but in terms of prominent advertising, he is essentially completely absent (bar the launch trailer though there is still little to nothing said about him in it). This turns out to be because he is the game's actual Big Bad and showing him to the audience upfront would make it too obvious of that fact, since he blatantly looks like a villain. Instead of Makoto being promoted as the main antagonist, Yomi Hellsmile and the other Peacekeepers take his place and are promoted as the main antagonists instead; however, Yomi turns out to just be a Disc-One Final Boss, and Makoto is the real antagonist of the game, with there being no ambiguity for this by the time of Chapter 5.
• Slasher Smile: Both his masked and unmasked self feature one. The masked smile is only on his sprites but it's played off as being somewhat creepy, yet mischievous. His unmasked smile with his true face is far more obvious and clearly displays the insanity lying within him.
• Sliding Scale of Antagonist Vileness: The Big Bad of a game with some serious Hate Sink antagonists initially seems creepy and Faux Affably Evil, but after the reveal it turn out he's a desperate Well-Intentioned Extremist at worst.
• The Smart One Turns Traitor: Makoto shows himself to be the wisest in regards to Amaterasu Corporation's internal struggles, as well as Yomi's corruption, trying to help the detectives fight against it as an advisor and Yuma's friend. The reason for this is because he's the Big Bad, and his overarching plan revolves around taking him down, as the detectives learn very quickly once Yomi is truly defeated and Makoto takes his place.
• Smug Snake: Not initially, but in Chapter 5, when he's eventually accomplished his goal of ousting Yomi from power, he acts contemptibly self-satisfied and self-assured that the climax of his plan will go off without any issues. As per usual with this trope, Shinigami encouraging Yuma to fight for the truth to the end leads to his downfall and reformation.
• Sole Surviving Scientist: Somewhat. Once he enters Kanai Ward following the failed homunculus experiment from Amaterasu Corporation three years ago, he's practically the only person with any expertise on what homunculi are who is still alive and not a violent, murderous, cannibalistic zombie. His solution? Isolating the city and blocking the sun out with clouds to revert them to their original state like nothing ever happened.
• Sorcerous Overlord: As the CEO of Amaterasu Corporation, Makoto is the one who rules over Kanai Ward as the Big Bad. He's also a clone of the WDO's Number One and possesses Coalescence like his original self.
• Spanner in the Works: He unwittingly prevented Yomi Hellsmile (or rather his homunculus) from becoming the CEO of Amaterasu Corporation after infiltrating Kanai Ward and remedying it of the homunculus fiasco that occurred thanks to Dr. Huesca's incompetence as the company's head researcher. He turns out to be just as willing to abuse his power once he becomes the CEO himself despite this.
• Special Person, Normal Name: He's a clone of Number One of the WDO who is an evil entity with immortality, who is also an extremely successful schemer, and he is called "Makoto". The name "Makoto" is actually rather common for a male.
• Spoiled Brat: A villainous example. Since Makoto was born as the superintelligent Number One of the WDO, he's never had to work for it at all the same way his original has. He was simply given the privileges at will and at birth, quite literally, while also having all the knowledge in the world as the WDO's leader, transforming him into a ruthless Knight Templar Evil Genius. His formal present title of Amaterasu's CEO isn't something he worked for either, as the former CEO only gave him his position because he blackmailed the Unified Government... and that's about it. The former CEO didn't even know of Makoto's expertise nor background, so him being a better leader than he was came as a surprise to him, which meant he just blindly gave Makoto that position. His attitude revolving around this certainly doesn't help matters.
• Start X to Stop X: In order to fix Amaterasu Corporation's past mistakes regarding Yomi Hellsmile's excessive corruption as a company executive and head researcher Dr. Huesca's failed homunculus experiment resulting in the extermination of Kanai Ward's original residents, Makoto becomes... Amaterasu Corporation's leader and immediately abuses his power as a means to hide the truth, in turn creating a Vicious Cycle.
• Storm of Blades: In his final phase, he summons ten more Solution Blades, in addition to the one he's already wielding, that fly around at Yuma for his attacks.
• Super Prototype: He was the first known successful attempt at creating a homunculus, and remains the only known perfect homunculus. This is due to the UG having been able to access the most ideal genetic material to grow him from, namely Number One, a mind that could handle all that being a homunculus requires. All other homunculi, in addition to being made by someone else via potentially inferior techniques, also use less ideal genetic material. As a result, he needs no human flesh to sustain himself, can go into the sun without lapsing into a violent fugue, and can revive without damage to his mind.
• Take Over the World: Subverted. Shinigami assumes taking over the world is his motivation when he mentions wanting to run both Amaterasu Corporation and the WDO and dismisses it as cliché, but his desires truly only extend as far as protecting Kanai Ward.
• Taking Up the Mantle: It's implied in the epilogue that, considering Dr. Huesca died twice and will no longer come back since his only clone is now a zombie, Makoto takes up the role of head researcher following his death since, despite said head researcher allegedly having died, somehow products by Amaterasu Corporation designed for the homunculi are being made en masse for Kanai Ward's residents. The only way this would be possible is if Makoto acted as head researcher as well as CEO and instructed them to make products specifically designed for the well-being of the homunculus residents, a contrast to the questionable things that Amaterasu made with Dr. Huesca as the head researcher.
• Token Good Teammate: Played with. Makoto is the only present day member of the Amaterasu Corporation who can be considered allegedly having virtuous goals due to his sense of empathy and a strong desire to protect the residents from the UG at any cost (in a horribly misguided way), and he's also the only homunculus in Kanai Ward that doesn't go on a violent rampage around the city when subjected to sunlight, revive as a mindless zombie upon death, nor require the need to satiate himself via specifically human flesh, also making him a Token Heroic Orc. However, he's also the Big Bad of the game because of these traits, which makes him into an Anti-Villain. This is justified, as he's a clone of Yuma/Number One, right down to his fundamental personality underneath the circumstances that led to his Face–Heel Turn.
• Tomato Surprise: Makoto is the mastermind behind the events of the game. However, Yuma knew this In-Universe, which is why he decided to personally confront him after erasing his memories of being Number One of the WDO... Of course, it turns out that's what Makoto was hoping he'd do.
• Tom the Dark Lord: "Makoto Kagutsuchi" doesn't sound particularly threatening for a self-justifying extremist Corrupt Corporate Executive Big Bad, especially when compared to his rival, Yomi Hellsmile.
• Trapped in Villainy: How Makoto views his predicament. Since he believes himself to be the only one capable of saving them, he is convinced he has to become "the devil" if it's for the sake of Kanai Ward's homunculi and saving them from being executed by Makoto's creators, the UG, which involves killing Yuma after luring him into a trap and taking his place in the WDO.
• Treachery Cover Up: Part of his reason for trying to kill Yuma after showing him the truth of Kanai Ward by sending him to the restricted area is so he could hide his criminal activity and keep Yuma from ratting him out to the public, allowing him to keep up Kanai Ward's masquerade from within.
• Turns Red: During the final segments of chapter 5, his mask turns literally red as Yuma is solving the truth.
• Twin Switch: How he kidnaps the death row inmates. He switches places with the original Number One so he can manipulate the WDO into mass kidnapping said death row inmates and carrying them over to his factory to convert them into meat buns for the homunculi. He attempts to invoke it fully when he tries to Kill and Replace "Yuma", the original Number One, so he can control the WDO for real.
• Uncle Pennybags: The incalculably wealthy CEO of Amaterasu Corporation who also tries to befriend the Master Detectives of the Nocturnal Detective Agency. Tries to befriend.
• The Unfettered: Nothing will deter Makoto from his goals, being Number One’s homunculus clone. Kanai Ward’s overrun with rogue homunculi? He covers up the truth once they forget their massacre of their original selves and builds a Weather-Control Machine to combat their weakness to UV light. Yomi’s too powerful? He lures detectives over to overthrow him. Those detectives succeed? He tries to Kill and Replace his original so he can take full control of Kanai Ward via the WDO while also running Amaterasu Corporation.
• Using You All Along: Revealed dramatically in Chapter 5, the only reason the detectives were in Kanai Ward is because Makoto, as Amaterasu's CEO, was using the detectives as opposition against Yomi so he could take him out of the picture, seeing him as an obstacle in Makoto's own goals regarding its citizens. Yuma's response to this information is understandably one of absolute fury.
• Villain No Longer Idle: Well, "idle" isn't quite accurate since he's constantly playing his cards on-screen, but specifically, he shows his true colors and starts taking full action against the remaining detectives once Yakou dies and he exposes Yomi, trying to kill Yuma and kidnapping the other detectives to prevent them from getting in the way.
• Villainous BSoD: By the end of the Final Boss fight, he doesn't even try to argue anymore, represented by his noise statements falling harmlessly to the floor before they even reach Yuma.
• Villainous Rescue: He comes to save Yuma and Vivia with evidence of Yomi's dealings with Dr. Huesca when he confronts them in Dr. Huesca's critical lab just as he's about to ruthlessly fill them with bullet holes, accompanied by Martina after he had rescued her from Yomi's attempt to execute her. Turns out it was actually for a bigger plot involving the detectives and exposing Yomi is exactly what he wanted.
• Villain Reveals the Secret: Turns out Makoto knew all along that Yuma was possessed by Shinigami and used the Book of Death, because he also knew he was the original Number One, using the Book of Death to hide his Coalescence and kill the culprits of the murder cases happening in Kanai Ward while playing the role of "Yuma Kokohead".
• Villains Out Shopping: Invoked. Makoto mainly uses this trope to draw attention away from his hidden motives up until Chapter 5, playing dumb and pretending to be a normal, casual person just like everyone else in Kanai Ward, when really, he isn't.
• Villain with Good Publicity: Naturally, being the CEO of Amaterasu Corporation, the all-encompassing MegaCorp praised and worshiped all around Kanai Ward, as well as living at the highest point in the city, that being Kanai Tower, he is this. Residents appear to not question the CEO ever, even though, as it turns out, he is a manipulative force. He has such a positive reputation that, even after confessing to Kanai Ward as a whole about the truth of his actions, they still want him to keep his position despite him desiring not to.
• Visionary Villain: His goal is to turn Kanai Ward into a place for the homunculus defects created accidentally by Dr. Huesca to live in peace and isolation from the rest of the world. By any means whatsoever.
• Walking Spoiler: He spends most of the game manipulating the WDO and luring Yomi into a false sense of security, so it's hard to describe him and his true motives without also giving away his role as the true Big Bad. Also, every twist in the game revolves around his true identity as Number One's homunculus, so it's impossible to talk about him without revealing a significant detail in the plot that doesn't get revealed until his confrontation in Chapter 5.
• Well-Intentioned Extremist: Makoto covered up the truth of Kanai Ward, used the Master Detectives as pawns to oust Yomi Hellsmile in order to take his position, and conspired to kidnap criminals as well as isolate the city and create a cloud machine to block out the sunlight as part of a plot to protect its homunculus citizens from the outside world, with his attempt to replace his original counterpart to permanently block the city off from being investigated even counting into this. By his word, he is doing it out of love, as opposed to power for the sake of power (like Yomi); but said extremism still makes Kanai Ward into a dystopian environment, and doesn't dissolve Yomi's terrible influence as a Dirty Cop, only making it worse, something he is oblivious to.
• We Need a Distraction: Played for Drama. He introduces Yakou to Fink the Slaughter Artist as part of Yomi's plan to manipulate Yakou into killing Dr. Huesca for himself, and also uses the detectives themselves as part of that same plan, so Yomi would be distracted enough to focus his wrath on the Master Detectives rather than Makoto, which would allow Makoto the opportunity to expose Yomi of his corruption as he had intended all along and take Yomi's place as Kanai Ward's overall ruler, in his plot to protect the defective homunculi within the city. Once said distraction is complete, those detectives are no longer of use to him and he then uses them in the final chapter as part of his plan to Kill and Replace his original counterpart.
• White-Collar Crime: Identity theft. He pretends to be his original so he can manipulate the WDO to fall under his whims, and crafts elaborate schemes of all sorts as a result of his power to do so.
• Why Don't You Just Shoot Him?: In a literal sense. He has Yuma (the real Number One) cornered and alone in the restricted area's bathhouse that no one outside would dare to visit and find his body in, threatening to shoot him and intending to kill him anyway. He instead lingers and goes for a "no trace" method by using the Mystery Labyrinth's soul erasure mechanic against him. He admits later that he wanted to "compare answers" with Yuma by using the Mystery Labyrinth, and thus didn't simply kill him.
• A Wolf in Sheep's Clothing: While his Affably Evil personality isn’t fake, he downplays how dangerous he really is until Yomi’s defeated in Chapter 4, at which point his true colors are revealed to Yuma and the detectives.
• Woobie, Destroyer of Worlds: Downplayed somewhat since Makoto isn't portrayed entirely sympathetically and is somewhat of a Knight of Cerebus of his own come Chapter 5, but deep down, he's a very broken, angst-filled immortal clone of a renowned supergenius who didn't want to be created, and he had to pull some ruthless, even murderous unjust acts to keep his own homunculi kind safe from the world and in secrecy within Kanai Ward, making him the Big Bad of the game in the process.
• The World Is Not Ready: Besides love and angst, the other reason he tries to hide the truth of Kanai Ward's residents being homunculi is because the UG and the entire world would reject them and try to kill them. He tries to negotiate around this when he tells the truth after some encouragement, and the UG accepts them in the end.
• Would Harm a Senior: Indirectly, that is. Despite having standards, he willingly aids Yomi and Yakou in their goal of killing the senior head researcher of Amaterasu, Dr. Huesca, by covertly introducing Yakou to Fink so he could find evidence against Yomi, which is what drives most of Chapter 4's conflict.
• You Have Outlived Your Usefulness: While he merely imprisons the other Master Detectives after they play their part following Chapter 4 to prevent them from interfering, while also faking their deaths, he specifically tries to eliminate Yuma/the original Number One in order to replace him and take control of the WDO. He subverts this when he's convinced to trust the residents with the truth of them being homunculi instead of holding the burden, therefore convincing him to spare Yuma in the end.
• You Know Too Much: He personally disposed of Fink the Slaughterer after his job to whack Chief Yakou was done.

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