Hata no Kokoro is a character from Touhou Project, debuting in Hopeless Masquerade as both a playable character and the final boss. She is a menreiki youkai.
Backstory[]
Hata no Kokoro is a youkai of menreiki, and she holds a total of 66 masks. She became a youkai after a long time from these masks which were used by the the father of Sarugaku performance, Hata no Kawakatsu.
When Prince Shoutoku was in war against Soga no Moriya, Prince Shoutoku ordered that Kawakatsu perform 66 types of play for ancient ritual with 66 masks given by Prince Shoutoku. After the plays, the war ended and there came peace.
Story[]
During Hopeless Masquerade, Kokoro loses her mask of hope. Losing her hope causes her power to control emotions to go berserk, causing the humans in the Human Village to lose hope as well and become enthralled in a religious popularity contest that comes to be known as the "dueling fad". Reimu Hakurei and the others participate in the religious popularity contest and are eventually guided by Mamizou Futatsuiwa to the Human Village at night, where Kokoro searches in vain for her lost mask. Most of the characters who try to stop her come up with their own solutions to her hopelessness, including Byakuren Hijiri teaching her Buddhism to control her own emotions and Toyosatomimi no Miko making her a replacement mask of hope, but none of them completely work until Mamizou notices the contradictory actions Kokoro is taking and offers her own advice, which is to stop relying on the masks and discover her own, true emotions through meeting (and fighting) a variety of people. In the process of doing so she discovers her own anger at the religious leaders who are taking advantage of the situation, and Reimu, Byakuren, and Miko team up to stop her. Byakuren and Miko both claim that their solutions solved the problem, and Kokoro is invited to the Hakurei Shrine to perform Kagura as an offering to the gods.
Appearance[]
Kokoro has long, pink hair and pink, empty eyes. She wears a blue blouse with plaid pattern. Her skirt is in a pumpkin shape, depicting several faces on it. She carries a total of 66 masks with her, which all holds a different emotion and face. However, she mainly uses the masks holding the emotions joy, anger, pathos and humour.
Personality[]
Kokoro naturally has a quiet, child-like personality but also a love of the stage, and relies on her masks to properly communicate her emotions. During the events of Hopeless Masquerade all of her emotions are stored in her masks, causing her behaviour to swing wildly as she switches between them. Eventually, however, she manages to develop a sense of self and become less dependent on them.
Relationships[]
- Toyosatomimi no Miko (Known)
- Mamizou Futatsuiwa (Known)
- Koishi Komeiji (Enemy)
- Satori Komeiji (Enemy's sister)
Trivia[]
- It was stated that Hata no Kawakatsu founded the Moriya clan and thus show that she actually has a good relationship with the Moriya Shrine people and that they never joined the religious war.
- A silhouette of Kokoro occupies the front of Hopeless Masquerade's jewel case.
- Kokoro has a color scheme very closely related to Satori Komeiji, and both are closely related to Koishi Komeiji in story and abilities.
- Her full name is Hata no Kokoro, with Hata as the surname and Kokoro as the given name. Hata (the Japanese reading of Chinese surname 秦) clan was an eminent Chinese immigrant clan mentioned in Nihon Shoki. It's also the surname of the masks' original user — Hata no Kawakatsu, who's said to be the reincarnation of First Emperor of Qin Dynasty in Zeami's Fuushika-den.
- Her given name is written entirely in hiragana and means 'Heart' (心 kokoro) in Japanese. 心 is also in the Japanese title of the game about her: Hopeless Masquerade (心綺楼 shinkirou).
- One of her color palettes resembles Reisen Udongein Inaba.
Merchandise[]
