Kureno Sohma

Kureno Sohma is one of the supporting of the Fruits Basket series and and cursed by the spirit of the rooster/bird/sparrow of the zodiac. He appears only in the manga and 2019 anime.

Appearance
He has auburn hair and reddish-brown eyes.

Personality
He is depicted as a polite and selfless young man. Arisa Uotani describes Kureno as "like Tohru" because of his over-the-top politeness and scatterbrained idiosyncrasies, and Saki Hanajima and Akito Sohma both compare his selflessness to Tohru's.

According to Natsuki Takaya, while he was still cursed, he did not like others to see his animal form, which was a sparrow instead of a Rooster.

In an author's note, Takaya described him as possibly the most lonely of those affected by the curse, because of his isolation.

History
In his mid-teens, about ten years before the series begins, Kureno's curse was somehow broken, but because of Akito's distress he promised never to leave. Kureno and Akito have a sexual relationship, and when Shigure learned about it, some time before the start of the series, in retaliation he slept with Akito's mother, Ren. Akito keeps Kureno away from the rest of the family to hide that he is no longer cursed, and Kureno does most of Akito's work as the head of the family.

As a result, Kureno is so sheltered he is 26 when he first visits a convenience store, where he meets Arisa. Despite their mutual attraction, he stays away from her because, he claims to Tohru, of his promise to Akito. When Akito locks Rin Sohma away for trying to steal her father's box, it is Kureno who frees her.

As the zodiac curse begins breaking down, Kureno eventually admits he is partially responsible for keeping Akito coddled and fearful by being too obedient, and Akito angrily stabs him in the back. When Kureno is released from the hospital, he moves out of the Sohma compound with Arisa's help, and in the final chapter, Arisa is preparing to move in with him.

He never blames Akito for his injury and still feels a responsibility to care for her. He says the best thing he can do for her is to erase his existence. Hence his moving out of the Sohma home.

Trivia

 * He is the first of the cursed Sohmas to have his curse broken.
 * Like Isuzu Sohma, he never make appear in 2001 Anime of Fruits Basket but he appeared in the anime as the finch constantly in Akito's company.
 * Takaya derived his name from the third month of the traditional Japanese calendar, kurenoharu or "late spring";[115] he was supposed to have been named after the ninth month, the month of the Rooster, but according to the author, she mixed up his and Momiji's positions in the zodiac.