Shigure Kōsaka is the supporting character of History's Strongest Disciple Kenichi. She is a weapons master of the Ryouzanpaku, as well as the youngest master of Ryozanpaku and only female master.
She was voiced by Mamiko Noto in the Japanese version, and by Trina Nishimura in the English version.
Appearance[]
As a child, Shigure's appearance was so boyish that even the immensely perceptive Akisame mistook her for a boy.
As an adult, Shigure is a fairly tall and beautiful young woman with a slender frame. She has long waist-length raven hair usually tied back in a high ponytail, peach skin, and light purple eyes. She wears a purple choker around her neck that contains numerous small pins. She normally dresses in a small pink kimono and long purple stockings; underneath she wears bandages over her chest and a fundoshi. When fighting seriously she dons chain mail and wears a black strap to keep the chain mail in place. Her most eye-catching feature is her eyebrows which resemble lightning bolts. She is almost always seen carrying her father's last and finest ever sword; a tsuba-less nodachi strapped to her back with a makeshift grip of bandages wrapped around the hilt.
History[]
Shigure was raised deep in the mountains along with her father, who was a master at both crafting and wielding weapons. During this time, she met Sai Kagerou, who retrieved Setsunamaru from her father and tested it on a swallow, Shigure's "first friend".
On one of Akisame's travels, he discovered the then-nameless Shigure and her father. Because her father was suffering from a terminal illness, he requested Akisame to take his life away in a duel so that he could die a warrior's death. Akisame initially refused, but eventually had to throw him off a cliff after a forced confrontation. Before dying, her father admitted he did not really want to die in battle but was trying to be a bad example so his daughter would avoid repeating his mistakes. Shigure, seeing her father's death, quietly sheds a tear whilst clutching the final sword Hachirobe crafted, the only thing to remember her father by. Akisame then gave Shigure her name (her father never gave her one) after seeing the rain and took her to be raised by Akisame's old friend, the late master of the Kōsaka-style weapons combat. After the old man passed away, Akisame brought Shigure into Ryōzanpaku. Shigure goes on missions to locate swords crafted by her father and takes them out of circulation, keeping her exact motivations for this a secret.
Personality[]
Shigure believes that weaponry should be seen as an extension of the body: simply relying on tthe weapon's strengthalone will not make you a master of it. She seems to have a great deal of love towards weapons, as at one point during the DofD arc she asks to keep a tank, treating it like a pet and even naming it 'Little Cattaleya'. Likely due to her emphasis on the Katsujinken, most opponents she faces end up losing without significant injury or by simply having their clothes torn (which she often does to Miu, Kenichi, and Freya's Valkyries). She seems to be aimed at women probably due to the fact that more times than not, women will stop fighting and try to cover themselves up.
When initially introduced she appeared to be a loner, often avoiding interaction with the other members of Ryozanpaku (besides occasionally Apachai). At the same time, due to her unique childhood experience with Akisame, she has developed a strong respect and loyalty to him, at times seeing like a surrogate father, as she will follow his requests without question. She will usually retaliate violently to Kensei's perverted antics much like Miu. However, she still has a feminine side, blushing in reaction to Akira Hongō refusal to fight her for being a woman and showing she was grateful for someone considering her as a woman.
Shigure is known to occasionally pause between words when talking. She is usually seen with an emotionless demeanor, rarely ever smiling. She is usually seen smiling when proud of Kenichi's progress. She was even cheering happily when Kenichi imitates her while battling Odin and copying her fighting style like the other masters. Shigure also has a great love of animals. Her best friend is her mouse Tochumaru and will not forgive anyone who hurts him.
Shigure seems to have sleeping issues, as shown by Sakaki that she sleep walks and mutters some words in her sleep that Sakaki states is creepy and somewhat scary, making this the only thing he's afraid of. Shigure's behavior has changed noticeably since Kenichi's arrival, as noted by Miu who once wondered if Shigure sees him as more than her disciple.
She begins opening up to the others, and even joins them for meals. She becomes indignant when the other members of the dojo express relief that Kenichi was alright after a training trip with her, though this could be due to her taking their relief as insult to her mastery. Shigure even allows Kōetsuji to tell Kenichi of her past and is quite candid around him.
She would even bathe right next to him, unconcerned with him seeing her nude and even suggests that they bathe together again. Out of all the masters, Shigure trains Kenichi the least, yet it is implied she yearns to train him, and is disappointed with Kenichi's reluctance (and fear) to use weaponry but often tries to convince him to train more. When she finds the ability to give Kenichi words of advice during her task to revive Kenichi as a martial artist, she pumps her fist triumphantly for succeeding as a teacher to Kenichi.
There's a running gag that Shigure has shown to have no modesty in the slightest causing others to be uncomfortable (or pleased) and that usually ends for trouble for others. Such as when Kenichi went to wake her up from a mission she had, she barely had anything on and caused him to gain a nosebleed. She even wanted to bathe with Kenichi, showing no discomfort at all and even fought several opponents naked and not even embarrassed by it. When she fishes for food on her own, she is naked and not uncomfortable at all. She is even fine with undressing in front of others such as Kenichi despite his protests (and Miu covering his eyes).
Abilities[]
- Weapons Master: While being the youngest master of Ryozanpaku, Shigure has repeatedly proven herself to be a formidable person to face. As the successor to the Kosaka-Style, Shigure has remarkable mastery of all forms of weapon combat, earning her the title of "The Prodigy of Sword and Mistress of all Weaponry". She has been seen using weapons like swords, throwing knives, shuriken, a chain sickle, rope, tonfas and even more during her fights, and can hide them on her body and clothes as if she were hiding nothing. One of her favorite weapons is the Katana that her Father made for her, which contains "the Secrets of Steel." Even when wielding dull utensils such as wooden spoons, her attacks have shown to possess lethal might behind them. She is also one of the few master-class, sword-wielding weapon users that has reached the highest level of swordsmanship, "the ability to fuse with their sword." In all the fights she has been in, she has yet to be seen receiving any major injuries even against other master-class weapon-users. Not only has she shown to be able to fight multiple armed and unarmed opponents with ease, she can fight against multiple armed opponents who use different and various types of weapons singlehandly and keep them on the defensive. She proved this when she attacked the Hachiou Executioner Blade of Yami and instigated a 7on1 battle with them by herself, despite the disadvantage, in order to allow Kenichi and Miu the opportunity to escape.
- Innate Talent: Living up to one of her nicknames, Shigure since childhood has shown remarkable athleticism and skill with any tool in her hand. She could skillfully dive for fish and hit any moving target she desired as a means of fun. During her first time wielding an actual weapon against actual warriors, she left the men in awe at her ability to skillfully wield a blade more than twice her height. After her father died and she was raised by master of the Kōsaka-style, she quickly mastered all he had to teach, greatly impressing the old master. In battle, she has been able to easily overwhelm most weapon-masters at least twice her age.
- Immense Speed: Shigure's attacks in battle are shown to be remarkably fast as most people cannot follow the number of strikes she launches. Even when her guard is down, she can in an instant unleash a large flurry of attacks with no wasted movement. The speed of her attacks is so great, that while playing an interactive sword-fighting video game, she discovered that she had to hold back considerably for the system to register her moves. On her feet, Shigure can outrun most cars and is able to easily jump from vehicle to vehicle. Shigure has displayed enough speed to easily defeat an entire group of armed soldiers in an instant. She was able to defeat Sai Kagerou, a sword master, so quickly he didn't even realize she had moved. She was fast enough to attack all seven members of the Hachiou Executioner Blade simultaneously, despite still being at an disadvantage against them.
- Immense Agility: Shigure has demonstrated remarkable grace and balance even while performing the most basic of tasks. Regularly at home, she is seen practically climbing all over the walls to get around. In more extreme cases, she can jump across town from rooftop to rooftop, never losing control.
- Immense Strength: Despite her lithe frame, she is very strong and can cut weapons made of metal to pieces even with dull-edged items, such as a spoon (in the anime, she used a wooden spoon once). She once cut off the cannon of a tank with her sword before jamming the cannon into the tank's side with her bare hands.
- Stealth Master: Keeping to her ninja-like attire, Shigure is highly sneaky when she wishes. Constantly, she is seen appearing from seemingly nowhere without making a sound. Shigure has also used various camouflages to disguise her presence.
- Master Blacksmith: In addition to her knowledge of weaponry, Shigure, like her father, is very talented in forging metal, having gathered sand and dirt to mix together, while using a Metal Flow of water in an Kanna Naga, to make iron sand and gather all the iron in the minerals to forge metal. Shigure also seems to understand the more complex forms of metal working, as she revealed that she was making protective gear for Kenichi's friends using the exact same method used to make Japanese swords. She also understands other, multiple forms of metal working as she stated that making the gear the same way as a Japanese sword was the easy part, and that she would use other forms of metal working to form the metal into the gear, then continue to make the gear the same way as a sword. So far, the only thing that Shigure has been seen making is protective gear, as she has made the chain mail shirts that she and Kenichi both wear, and was shown making the protective gear for the Shinpaku Alliance captains, although it can be assumed that she has also used her blacksmithing skills to make some of the weapons in her arsenal.
- Immense Accuracy: Possibly her most remarkable skill, Shigure has perfect aim with any tool she handles. With projectiles, she can precisely hit any speeding and squirming target from a considerable distant. She can even strike it without hitting any vital points. At close-range, Shigure strikes can skillfully cut through targets with such precision, the sliced target can momentarily appear unaffected. Her precision was also able to destroy Boris's boots when the Sambo disciple invaded Ryozanpaku without harming his feet.
Gallery[]
