Yugiri

"“I found that getting confused doesn’t help much, I’ll just relax and take things as they come.”"

Yugiri (ゆうぎり Yūgiri) was a high-ranking courtesan from the Meiji era who helped ignite the spark that would later lead Saga to independence after disappearing for several years.

She is currently a member of Franchouchou, where she is titled as The Legendary Courtesan (伝 説 の 花魁 Densetsu no Oiran).

Human
Yugiri has light brown hair, and most of it is worn in a bow shape on her head and two long locks hanging over her shoulders. Her bangs are mostly centered with a curved bit to the right. Yugiri also has light rusty eyes. Despite her age, Yugiri sports a very voluptuous figure that beats even those of Sakura and Tae and is only being beaten by Maimai.

Usually, Yugiri wears an outfit similar to a kimono, with a white and orange plaid pattern top, a purple collar, and a forest green skirt. She also sports dark purple leggings and dark gray boots.

Her casual clothes consist of a kimono, hakama, stockings, and boots, in the manner of a late 1800s student, but with the hakama cut above the knee like a makeshift skirt to show more of her legs.

Zombie
Like the other zombies, she has blue-gray skin and red eyes; she has a scar around her neck. Her everyday clothing looks disorganized and lifeless.

Idol
Her idol outfit changes throughout the series: On episodes 1-6, Yugiri wears a pink T-shirt with the word "five" written on it and a red skirt with white ruffles. Using makeup, she and the other zombies make their skin look like an average human. Yugiri also wears contact lenses to achieve her red eyes that she had as a living person.

After Saga Rock, her idol outfit changed to a red jacket with a plaid decoration, a red skirt with cotton inside it, and knee-high boots.

In life
She was so sought after by Tokyo's wealthy elite that they ended up raising her price through the roof to the point that no one could afford to be with her, making her a dead weight to her employers. A high-ranking government official eventually buys her freedom, but it seems that he took pity on both her and her own company. After the senior government official who bought her freedom passed away, she found herself living in a city where she knew no one and no one knew her. While said official intended for her to live a normal life, it is strongly implied that she does not know how to do it.

Despite taking it easy as she normally does, Yugiri felt a bit lonely after moving to Saga. While she went in exchange for her freedom, she moved to a town where no one knew her (except as a legendary courtesan), and she also didn't know the people there. There is also some implication that she did not know how to live a normal life once she came to Saga.

How Kiichi makes himself loved by her. He is the first person in Saga to socialize with her for reasons unrelated to oiran.

During the events of Saga Jihen, Yugiri proves to have the courage to challenge Itou with her hidden sword in his Shamisen and finally defeat him in a 1 to 1 duel until finally assassinating him, and with the confidence that one day she could be revived, She decides to sacrifice herself for Kiichi so that he can create his new Saga. While it is shown that all of Franchouchou's other deaths were inopportune, accidental, and sudden, and they had no intention of dying at all. Yugiri breaks this trend by saying that her death is a heroic sacrifice that she knew was going to happen. Even when she was about to be executed, she kept her composure and smiled one last time and said goodbye before being beheaded.

Jofuku, who was alive in her time, finds a letter written by her before she was executed, telling her that she was probably dead at the time from taking responsibility for the bloodshed and rebellion in Saga, and tells her to tell Kiichi who came out of Saga safely and guide the new Saga that Kiichi would create.

As zombie
Yugiri remains very calm and traditional in various situations, probably due to the period in which she lived and in which she worked. Despite this, she seems to calmly accept and adapt to the changes in modern Japanese society. Yugiri struggles to remain calm in the face of her resurrection, so as not to be overwhelmed by a world a century ahead of her.

In reality, she has never been seen to have any questions or ask another of the girls about something, since it seems that she is capable of learning very quickly or is simply one of the people who has no doubts when doing something, despite this characteristic she still looks collaborative with the group doing everything that is said without asking.

Although she is not immune to freaking out with others, she is generally able to remain calm and composed in most of her outlandish situations, it is even more impressive because she is the oldest of the group. During the second season of the series, it is briefly implied that when Yugiri is nervous or afraid she uses the comb that Kiichi Momozaki gave her in life, this is demonstrated in the second episode when she wakes up, in the seventh episode in Saga Rock and in his flashback episodes.

She shares a role similar to Sakura. She sometimes acts motherly to the other girls, showing concern and acting in the most mature way. This makes sense given that she is the oldest at the time of death, in addition to Tae and Junko (who is the same age, only two months older). In the design sheets it is mentioned that on her own, her personality is quite strong when the case is required and she is able to take center stage when necessary. She is the most mentally mature of the girls taking the time to analyze situations so she is also quite intelligent, that is why she discovered that Kotaro had a relationship with Sakura in the past in episode 10 of the series, realizing the deal that he had Sakura, besides being the first to wake up.

Every time she sees someone depressed, she physically hits people to get them out of her mood. The problem is that most of the time they have already recovered when Yugiri slaps them and tells them exactly what they were trying to say. The only time she slaps someone in the middle of her depression is in Episode 12 when Sakura is adamant about giving up.

She seems to be the only one that Kotaro won't scold or be a jerk to her, something that even Sakura isn't immune to. Probably because Jofuku would have his head on the wall if he found out that Yugiri was injured in some way.

Skillset

 * Athleticism - As shown in the fifth episode, Yugiri displays a fantastic display of acrobatic skills during the Tarzan Swing round of the Gatalympics. This is because her profession was to entertain through performances.
 * Courtesan (Oiran) - As her title suggests, Yugiri was a courtesan in the Meiji Era while alive, specifically an Oiran, a type of Yūjo (prostitute) who are more so entertainers than physical pleasures. It is possible that since Yugiri is an Oiran, Kotaro Tatsumi resurrected her in the first place as she had experience and skills as an entertainer before. However, it seems mostly to be the influence of the bartender.
 * Musical Talent - As a former entertainer and currently a member of Franchouchou, Yugiri's skills on being musically talented are shown throughout the series.
 * Shamisen-playing - As evident in Episode 2, she has incredible skill on the instrument called a shamisen, able to play fast and move her fingers around the instrument's neck with high speed and skill.
 * Swordsmanship - As hinted in the third episode, Yugiri seems to have some knowledge on "testing swords out on one another." In "Episode 21" she is shown to have exemplary swordsmanship skills as she was able to dodge Shojiro Ito's attack while also having landed one successful blow, which was enough to extirpate the latter.
 * Dancing - Like her musical talent, Yugiri is shown to be adept in dancing as a former entertainer.
 * Cooking and Culinary Arts - As shown in "Episode 16", Yugiri can prepare any meal with the ingredients given to her and she decorates Ai Mizuno's lunch using the nori to spell out "Do your best/You'll succeed."
 * Hula Hooping - Yugiri and the rest of the girls can perform while twirling hoops made of electricity during their performance in "Episode 16".

Natural Abilities

 * Non-senescence - Due to being a zombie, Yugiri retains her age and physical appearance at the time of her death forever and is immune against death. As she, along with the other girls, can endure circumstances that human bodies normally cannot handle, like the lightning bolt in the seventh episode, and instead of suffering a third-degree burn, the girls end up becoming luminous and self-possessed - tuned voices.
 * Detachable Limbs - As a zombie, Yugiri can detach and reattach parts of her body from their sockets with little to no effort, either intentionally or accidentally. However, she is one of the zombies to which no part of its body has fallen for now.
 * Phosphorescent Vision - Yugiri's undead blood-red eyes are shown to be able to glow in the dark.
 * Element Absorption - Their zombie bodies can speed up the process of absorbing chemicals like those seen in Episode 4, where they instantly absorb the medicinal patches, causing their muscles to relax and not be as stiff. In addition to their subsequent concerts and practices, they continue to use the patches. In Episode 7, their bodies demonstrate a battery-like characteristic by receiving an electrical discharge from lightning, glowing a pale blue, and releasing laser beams with their fingers.

Unique Abilities

 * Superhuman Strength - One of the recurring gags with Yugiri is that she suddenly slaps a person in the middle of a talk; however, her slaps are especially powerful and capable of throwing a person through the air.
 * Deadly Hand - One of the recurring gags with Yugiri is that she has to suddenly slap a person in the middle of a talk, however her slaps are especially powerful and capable of throwing a person through the air.

Etymology

 * The name Yugiri means "evening mist" (夕霧).
 * Yugiri is also the name of a character in The Tale of Genji.



Trivia

 * Since her design feels like a combination of things that come out of the word "Oiran," it was necessary to consider the times. They wanted to affirm that Yugiri, alone, could be placed in the protagonist's position, an idol with a strong personality.
 * As revealed by Kotaro Tatsumi in the first episode, specifically the line, "The Legendary Courtesan known only as Yugiri," that "Yugiri" is simply an alias she goes by and is not her actual name.
 * Yugiri does not seem to know her real name, the courtesans used names based on Genji Monogatari/Genji's quantum to prevent their real names from being discovered, at the moment more of this is unknown
 * Yugiri died one month after her nineteenth birthday.
 * Chronologically, Yugiri is the oldest in Franchouchou.
 * Yugiri is second to sports the curviest figure in the group. Beating even Sakura Minamoto and Tae Yamada by three sizes, she was only beaten by Maimai Yuzuriha.
 * The railway bridge in the Saga Jinen MV was built next to a statue of Jofuku in honor of his arrival in Morodomi town and a cycling route also called Jofuku passes through there.
 * Yugiri uses a dialect used in the pleasure district of Kyoto (Shimabara), and Tokyo (Yoshiwara), expressions such as "arinsu" are part of the latter's Kuruwa-kotoba.
 * "Arinsu" is a corruption of "arimasu," which is a formal way of saying "~ da" in Japanese (both in pre-modern and modern times), so it is not a difficult dialect to emulate.
 * In "Episode 14", the bar she works at, Chinatsu, is recalled as "Arinsu." Instead of being a bar, it is referred to as a restaurant. It is currently unknown if this is an error or an intentional change.
 * It is confirmed in this same episode that Yugiri's place of origin is Kyoto, Japan, in the red light district of Yoshiwara.
 * In Yugiri's time, she visited the wolves of Mibu and the Sonno Joi as part of her work.
 * However, in the historical background, both groups had opposite ideals and were in an internal war for control of Japan.
 * As of "Episode 13", Yugiri works part-time as a bartender at a bar named Chinatsu.
 * Chinatsu means a thousand summers.
 * Interestingly enough, this may be a nod to how she has connections with the bartender.
 * Yugiri stands out in her agility to play the Shamisen, as well as in being a lady of "company", the latter due to the time she was working she would be a "prostitute", but she does not maintain a greater antecedent.
 * On April 23, 2021, the series' Twitter account announced that Yugiri would be a VTuber, having her streams at the Chinatsu bar. The stream can be found here on the Official Cygames YouTube Channel.
 * Yugiri has two episodes centered around her so far: "Episode 20" and "Episode 21".
 * Additionally, it is revealed in “Episode 20” that the small red comb with the floral pattern that she uses throughout the series is gifted to her by Kiichi Momozaki.
 * The group picture of her, Kiichi and Ito can be seen in one of the shelves in Xu Fu’s bar, as shown in “Episode 21”.
 * Yugiri has connections to Saga statesmen, including Soejima Taneomi, Okuma Shigenobu and Oki Takato.
 * In 9:50 of Episode 21, Yugiri can be seen sending mails to Soejima Taneomi, Okuma Shigenobu and Oki Takato.
 * Even after 156 years, Yugiri remembers the promise she made to Kiichi about living the Saga that he would create, she still fondly remembers the relationship they had and mentions it in the last episode of Revenge.
 * Yugiri's blood type appears as "unknown" this makes more sense when you realize that the blood tests did not appear until several years after Yugiri's death.
 * Yugiri was the victim of the curse or, more accurately, of an exchange. Kiichi was a nameless boy who wanted to get Saga back, but who became a potential victim of the curse (and politics) in the process. Meanwhile, Yugiri had friends in high places and her death was almost covered up and wiped off the map. If her death had somehow been made public and it had been made public that helping a boy to get Saga back was started accidentally, sparking a riot/attempted revolution. Saga would have gotten a lot of attention from that kind of news, like news worthy of a history book. The curse would have had a harder time keeping Saga "forgettable", preferably non-existent.