Hozumi

Hozumi is a minor antagonist in the series.
==Appearances==
* Soul Hackers 2: Minor antagonist
==Profile==
Hozumi is a summoner working for the Devil Summoner group Yatagarasu. His work involves taking care of high-level threats as a last resort, calling himself "Yatagarasu's insurance." His alias "The Shadow," combined with Arrow's unawareness to who he is, imply a high level of secrecy in his work.
Hozumi is ruthless in his professionalism and loyalty to Yatagarasu, emphasizing on the importance of directly taking the prominent threat, Figue, out by any means necessary, and rectifying the issues Raven's betrayal have caused. It goes so far that he intervenes in Ringo's mission per an official letter of delegation from command, under the premise that he should collect the Covenants and kill Figue to do so.
His worldview, however, is bleak, and is rather based around personal benefit and absolute power, without any actual loyalty to ideals, and he's merely using morals to trick the group into forming an alliance with him, even going as far as to attempt to confuse Arrow by labeling him a potential traitor to Yatagarasu and the people he fought to protect should he get in his way. Additionally, he uses former member Raven and "taking accountability for his actions" as an excuse, which Milady points out that they're only acting on since they actually have something to get out of it. Hozumi doesn't deny her argument, only scoffing at it as "it's how the world works."
Ringo and co. even point out that the sides between Yatagarasu and Phantom Society themselves are the reason the violence never stops, and that him willing to using force to take care of Figue makes him no better than her. Because of that, he's treated as an outsider to the conflict by the group, which wants to mend things with her friend. Even when directly countered, he's not swayed in any way, simply voicing that ideals mean nothing without the power to back them up, before commencing battle.
When defeated, Hozumi admits he underestimated their power, before dryly beckoning them to solve Figue's problem themselves.
He wields a katana with a large handguard, the blade not even passing through the center to the tang. In his fight with Ringo and the others, to preserve energy for eliminating Figue, Hozumi uses his reserve team of demons while acting primarily as their support, claiming he only needs to use them to take out the party. In defeat, he accepts his loss with casual understanding, watching nonchalantly as Ringo and the others go to confront Figue with his encouragement.
==Stats==
===Soul Hackers 2===
==Strategy==
Hozumi will mostly spend the fight using his skills to buff his party, attacking very rarely with a normal attack. Every one of his demons has the Ally Counter ability, which can see any party member potentially being attacked by all four of his demons at once should they attack Hozumi directly, potentially leaving them near death unless they Resist, Null, or Repel Physical/Gun attacks. Hozumi will respond to any party member being fully buffed with Reformat, resetting the entire party's buffs at once. He will prioritize resummoning his demons over Reformat and has no reaction to debuffs aside from his usual buff skills. He will not respond with Reformat to only two attributes being raised on a party member.
The party can avoid being subjected to constant assaults from Ally Counter by focusing their attacks on Hozumi's demons instead, leaving a Sabbath as the primary means of dealing damage to Hozumi. Otherwise, the party can spend their turns healing or buffing should they not be able to strike a weakness. If Saizo has the Recovery Stack skill, setting him up as a designated healer can also aid the party in increasing the Stack count. Once Girimekhala is summoned, the party can potentially deal 700+ damage in one Sabbath by utilizing Stack Optimization during a turn where the party doesn't have to also focus on healing.
==Quotes==
==Trivia==
* The set of demons Hozumi summons in battle are all demons that the Demi-fiend from Shin Megami Tensei III: Nocturne has used at one point.
==Gallery==
File:SH2 Hozumi 2.png|Cutscene
File:SH2HOZUMI.jpg|Cutscene
File:SH2HOZUMI(2).jpg|Cutscene