| “ | You've lent us your strength but we have strength we can lend you too. | „ |
| ~ Neko Kuroha |
Neko Kuroha is the lead heroine of Brynhildr in the Darkness. She is a rank B Magician that escapes at the beginning of the story. She is also the Vice President of the Astronomy Club, and one of Ryouta's main love interests. Her research number is 7620.
She was voiced by Risa Taneda in the Japanese version, and by Jamie Marchi in the English version.
Appearance
Neko is a beautiful young girl with dark blue hair, violet colored eyes, and large breasts. On left one she has a 3-dot birth mark that forms a triangle. She wears a white dress with a black collar, decorated with white lines, a purple bow on her chest, black arm sleeves, and black stockings. At times, she puts on a mask to conceal her face.
Personality
In the beginning of the story, Neko acted as a very cold girl and was expressionless when introduced to the class. This was due to the fact that she and Kana were running out of medicine and only went to school to prevent deaths of two students that went there. Neko is actually very cheerful and somewhat clueless (mostly due to her losing some of her memories every time she uses her powers). When alone, she enjoys singing about the people she's saved and helping people, thinking of herself as a superhero of sorts. Around others, she is very quiet and doesn't speak unless she is spoken to, preferring to avoid conflict. However, when her friends are in danger or have been harmed she gives off a very threatening aura, such as when she thought Ryouta or Kazumi were bullying Kana . She often displays signs of jealousy when Ryouta's relationship with Kazumi (or other women) is called into question, unintentionally using her destructive powers in order to release her frustration; breaking a school window with her magic when Ryouta asked that Kazumi accompany him in the city and breaking several tree branches when she thought they went on a date and kissed. She refers the other witches with the suffix "-chan", even those who are her enemies, such as Kikako. When Neko regains her memories, she mercilessly attacked Valkyria with a smile trying to kill her 'Onee-chan' for murdering thousands of people. She also became more open and direct, losing her cluelessness, happily talking to Ryouta casually and even kisses him. Her extreme change in demeanor even caused Ryouta to wonder who exactly she is. Afterwards, she unfortunately loses all of her memories and acts quite cold and very distant from everyone, especially Ryouta.
Plot
Kuroha Neko is first introduced in Chapter 1 of the manga and Episode 1 of the anime as a transfer student arriving at Ryouta Murakami's school. She is initially believed to be the childhood friend of Ryouta, whom died trying to prove to Ryouta that alien's existed. When approached about this she insists that she is not his childhood friend and that they are meeting for the first time, and slaps him when he asks her to "show him the area below her armpit." While gazing at stars at the observatory after school, Neko arrives and after displaying her ignorance when it comes to basic scholarly knowledge and her unusual level of strength, she leaves him with a prophecy - "Do not leave the observatory, no matter what." However, Ryouta ignores her prediction and tries to walk home only to be caught in a rockslide. Moments before being crushed by a boulder, Neko appears and somehow cuts the boulder clean in half. Questioning her on how she was able to do that, Neko reveals that she's an artificially created magician that escaped from a research laboratory and displays the Harnessed on the back of her neck. She tells him that she is hiding from the Organization because she will be killed if she is captured by them. The next day Neko doesn't go to school and finds Ryouta visiting her to give her paperwork and tell her about the trip to the ocean, he also brought food for Kana and Neko. Ryouta told Neko about the trip to the ocean, Neko told him she couldn't go to the ocean, for she would run out of pills before the trip. After Ryouta left, Kana offered to sacrifice herself so Neko could have enough pills to go to the ocean but Neko declined it. Neko came to school the next day but didn't come the day after that. Ryouta went to visit Neko and find her bleeding, Neko explained that it is because she didn't eat her pills. Kana explained to Ryouta that because of him Neko was waiting until the last moment to take the pills. Neko then finds that the house got burnt by the fire and the pills were burnt also. Ryouta then offered for him and Neko to raid the factory, but in the end they only found two boxes.
Relationships
- Ryouta Murakami - Their relationship is complicated. Ryouta and Neko were childhood friends and were in love with each other. In their childhood, one day, Neko wanted to show Ryouta an alien she met. Walking on a pipe edged along a concrete wall,the two maneuvered over to the place where Neko supposedly met the alien. However, the sound of a guard yelling caused Ryouta to lose a grip and he fell of. At this point, Neko extends her hand out to Ryouta who grabs it. This causes them both to plummet down into the waterfall. When Ryouta was commissioned out of the hospital, he was told that Neko had died upon impact causing him to shed tears until he could only remember her nickname, Kuroneko, and that she had three moles under her left armpit. Years later, they are reunited when Neko transfers into his class, but she had forgotten all of her childhood memories due to the experiments she went through. Over the course of time when Ryouta began to help her, she falls in love with him once again, displaying signs of jealousy when other girls get clingy. As such, she subconsciously breaks things in the surrounding area. Neko is oblivious to her own affections for him while Ryouta tries avoid those situations that cause misunderstandings (especially in front of her). Ryouta is willing to throw his life away to protect her and vice-versa. For example, he pushes her away from Valkyria's attack and she later does the same as Valkyria throws a knife at Ryouta. At this moment, Ryouta pushs her third button causing her to be Kuroneko once again. She affectionately calls him Ryouta and confessed to him again, kissing him when he tearfully apologize about that time. The two promise that after everything was over, the two would talk about everything over the years. After successfully stopping Valkryria, Neko hangs up and faints after landing gracefully to the edge of a cliff. The ledge then begins to collapses from underneath but Ryouta dives to save her from falling, refusing to let go of her hand even if he dies. Managing to pull her up, Neko regains consciousness and asks him who he is. After she loses her memories yet again, Neko begins to act very hostile and annoyed at him, telling him to stay out of her business multiple times. Despite this attitude, deep down, she is still in love with him, yet doesn't understand for her heart was beating fast after seeing Kazumi act 'friendly' to him in such cases, she still subconsciously breaks things around the proximity like she always had. Her new attitude to Ryouta might be a result of the lie Kazumi told her that she and Ryouta were together. Later on, when she, Hatsuna, and Kazumi get jobs as maids at a 'maid' cafe, she sings about not caring who kisses who once again as a result of Kazumi having an indirect kiss with Ryouta after (force) feeding a spoon of ice cream and fed a cherry by Hatsuna (forced mouth to mouth). The two had done it under the guise of it being part of their job as of which Ryouta had to play along. However, he didn't want to do it in front of Neko. Coming across a notebook her previous personality left behind, Neko rediscovers her feelings for Ryouta and regrets pushing him aside. Taken back to Vingulf, Neko reminisces her new memories and realize all happy ones included Ryouta. Getting her lowly half eaten by Loki, she begged Ryouta to press her top button, restoring her once more, and regains her romantic feelings for Ryouta.
- Kazumi Schlierenzauer - Kazumi was the one who enrolled Neko into High-school. Both of them are good friends but Kazumi tends to annoy Neko by flirting with Ryota or harassing Kana. Kazumi is shown to be jealous of Neko due to the fact that Ryouta's affection will always be toward Neko. However, after Neko loses her memories, Kazumi takes advantage of that and lies about her own relationship with Ryouta under the belief that she and him don't have to suffer along with Neko due to her memory loss.
- Kana Tachibana - She is best friends with Neko. Both are willing to sacrifice themselves for each other. During their time in the institute, Kana was taken care of by Neko. Neko also talks to Kana about her feelings a lot as seen when Neko speaks about Ryouta's effects on her and how she becomes pained when Kazumi and him get along despite that being a good thing. Kana quickly asks if she's joking as even she would know about that. Panicked, Neko questions if she has a fatal illness to where Kana responds that Neko's feelings for Ryouta are romantic. During their time at the institute, when Kana was deemed useless and was going to be exterminated, she smiled, foreseeing it in a prediction. Kana believed that at least she wouldn't be a bother to Neko any longer. Neko, however, immediately destroys a wall in the room after overhearing and stands between the scientists and Kana. Despite having a beacon attached to her harness and threatened with ejection, Neko stands firmly between them, threatening them that she would destroy the Institute. Due to being the trump card to Valkyria if she goes rouge, Neko was only given three months in the punishment chamber and Kana's case will be delayed. Due to her devotion for Neko, Kana didn't allow herself to move to keep her foresight to prevent Neko's own demise, living through many discomforts. Later on, Kana chooses to press the third button of her harness to save Neko from Valkyria. Currently, she trains to strengthen herself as her physical body was weak from not moving for years to protect Neko, even learning how to kill others.
- Kotori Takatori - She is good friends with Neko. When Kotori first arrived, she was the only one who was willing to give her a chance despite the fact that Kotori could've been a Vingulf witch. In retaliation to this, Kotori was willigg to give up her life for Neko. In the time of Kotori's death, Neko was present and crying as her friend perished with a smile, thanking her and Ryouta and everyone else. Also, she confronts Chisato Ichijiku with tears, about his goal of reviving Rena, telling him off that he hasn't had the right to love another after Kotori revealed to everyone that she had Rena's memories before dying. After Chisato dies protecting Valkyria who proceeds to wipe out the entire world, she and Ryouta survive it for even after Kotori died, she protected them (Grane cancels all magic nearby).
- Hatsuna Wakabayashi - Friend and fellow magician.
- Valkyria (Mako Fujisaki) - Valkyria is Neko's older sister. They are polar opposites - Valkyria's primary color scheme is white and her personality is significantly more demented, childish, and destructive. Mako genuinely cares for Neko at first, which Neko is oblivious to (due to her loss of memories), and Neko sadly told Mako to not make her kill her. It is unknown what kind of sister relationship they have before they are experimented on.
Powers and Abilities
Neko is capable of destructively influencing objects that are in her vision range. She first demonstrates this power when she punctures a hole in the school's swimming pool in order to save a student. Later, she splits a boulder clean in half in order to save Ryouta Murakami. Her powers can be used in a variety of different ways, from outright destroying specific objects to cloaking it around herself in order to deflect bullets. However, the use of her powers cause her to lose some of her memories. They are typically trivial memories, but she occasionally loses important memories. Her memories are full of holes because of this, and most of her childhood memories have been lost.
In reality, Neko was the previous Valkyria, an rank SSS magician, and her full potential is released when Ryouta presses the third button on her Harnessed, returning her memories and granting her with a variety of additional powers:
- Telekinesis
- Barrier magic
- Enhanced physical strength
- Self-targeted teleportation
- Micro black holes
- Regeneration
Quotes
- "You've lent us your strength but we have strength we can lend you too."
- "Why are you calling me Kuroha? Just call me Kuroneko like you used to!"
- "Onee-chan, it'll be boring if I against you with a handicap like that. Before I hang up... I'm going to smack you over and over until that twisted nature of yours get smacked out. I'll have to kill you... If that still doesn't work."
- "I hate Murakami the most!! He's always... lying to me... and then to the me who... lost her memories... I hate her too..."
Trivia
- Her name in katakana is "kuroneko," meaning "black cat."
- According to her character entry in BD material, she likes violet color and don't likes spicy foods.
- From recorded sizes, Neko is sporting second biggest bust in series.
- In Chapter 96, it is implied that Kuroneko and Neko are different personalities for Kuroneko did not follow why Ryouta called her Kuroha when he always called her Kuroneko in their childhood. Another implication is when Kuroneko called out her sister, Valkyria, on the damage to the small town they were in despite her knowing it previous to 'regaining' her memories. After creating a micro black hole to rid Valkyria's anti-matter, she goes back to normal and finishes her sister off after calling Ryouta Murakami-kun once again.
- It's unknown if Kuroha shares the same surname "Fujisaki" with Mako.
- SPOILER ALERT : She kissed Murakami two times on the lips.