Naoko Kirino

**Naoko Kirino** (**Kirino Naoko, 桐乃尚子**) is the main female protagonist of the Pumpkin Night manga and the initial Pumpkin Night for the first 19 chapters of the manga before her love interest, Kazuya replaces her after she seemingly dies, though after Kazuya kills Naruto and his father it's revealed she had somehow survived and went on to reclaim the Pumpkin Night mantle. A mental patient falsely placed in a mental hospital to hide the truth of her disfigurement, she would go on to kill more than 20 people and escape from the hospital, seeking revenge against her former school bullies. Wearing a pumpkin to hide her face, Naoko would begin to stalk her targets and spread horrors and carnage never seen before, all in the name of killing the bullies, particularly during the events of Part 1, then Parts 2 and 3 to a certain extent.

## Story

### Before Pumpkin Night

Naoko was bullied in her middle school for being "weird", mainly by Naruto Kuroki, Asumi, Saki and Arata. The bullying ranged from having her hair or clothes forcefully cut to them just beating her up. The only person not to bully her was Kazuya Makino, who could only watch as this happened as he couldn't muster up the courage to stop the bullying from happening. Regardless of this Naoko developed feelings for Kazuya, he in turn developing feelings for her. The reason for the intense amount of bullying and her being labelled as weird by the four was because of her giant red ribbon with her earrings. Despite how much she'd been targeted, she refused to take off her ribbon in particular. Before the school Halloween party would begin Naoko was found by Kazuya who had been looking for her. Naoko being suspicious that her being nominated for the Pumpkin Queen was a trap set up by the others, Kazuya reassuring her that wasn't the case at all, only the prettiest girl in the school would be up for the title of Pumpkin Queen. Her worries settled Naoko would give Kazuya a quick kiss on the lips before leaving to get ready for the party.

When Naoko was crowned as the Pumpkin Queen, she put a pumpkin mask on her head as part of the tradition with the title. However, it was a trap that Naruto set up by taking sulfuric acid and filling polyethylene bags with it, then taping them in the mask. When she placed the pumpkin on her head, the bags popped and the acid began to horribly, and agonizingly, burn her entire head inside the pumpkin. Nomizu, a student who presumably helped arrange the party and had an unhealthily lustful crush on Naruto, was the only one to notice Naruto high-fiving Arata while everyone else watched in horror and concern for Naoko writhing around in pain, and she quickly realized he had caused Naoko's accident. She would later take the pumpkin mask after it had been quickly removed off Naoko's head before the sulfuric acid could burn it any further.

Realizing Naruto had something to do with her accident Naoko tried to tell everyone else about what had happened, but Naruto's father, Mayor Kuroki, would use his influence to have her locked away in the Hirayama clinic to stop her revealing the truth about what had happened. Her serious injury would be used as the reason for her being locked up, and Kazuya would be told it was fireworks setting Naoko's hairspray on fire was the reason for her burns. Naoko suffered mistreatment while in the Hirayama clinic, constantly being drugged with medication and forced into unsanitary places to sleep, one day however the chairman of the clinic came for an inspection, and with the drugs wearing off in her system Naoko got a good look at Sae Kuroki, Naruto's mother, and recognizing the resemblance she has with her son Naoko quickly put together that her being the chair-person wasn't a coincidence; the entire family had purposely locked her away to stop the truth of her accident from being discovered and to protect their son's reputation. This revelation causes Naoko to go insane with rage from the injustice done to her, and she would plot her revenge not just on her bullies but on Kazuya as well, possibly in her madness she believed he had known what was going to happen to her the whole time. Eventually Naoko finally escaped the from the clinic, but not before she killed more than 20 people, who were either working there or were patients at the hospital, wearing a pumpkin to hide her features. She would create the Pumpkin Night social media account and follow her five targets.

### Pumpkin Night: Seeking revenge

Her first target was Asumi. After following her and sending her a death threat Naoko killed a delivery man at her door and attempted to kill Asumi after she had opened the door, failing when Asumi shut it on her, however as Asumi tries to call the police on her phone, Kazuya call her and tells her about Naoko's recent escape, giving Asumi the identity of her attacker as well as Naoko time to climb into her bedroom window and stab her in the back. As Asumi tries begging for forgiveness Naoko maims her with a knife specially made to have a pumpkin scooper attached at the handle, using the pumpkin scooper to scrape out one of her eyes out and leave the other hanging from her face, pretty much blinding Asumi as she somehow makes her way out of the house in fear, being stalked by Naoko now in possession of Asumi's phone, with Kazuya still on the other line having no idea what was going on. As she tries to escape, Asumi ends up walking into oncoming traffic and gets run over by a van, killing her instantly, much to Naoko's pleasure. After Asumi's death, she finally tells Kazuya on Asumi's phone that she had died, and he would be next. The following day on Asumi's funeral news on Naoko's escape and murder of the staff and patients of the mental hospital are reported on the news, Naoko, living in an abandoned home and having the body of the delivery man and Asumi's eye in a jar, is ecstatic about her murders being mentioned and vows that everyone will know the terrors of the Pumpkin Night.

Her second target was Saki, after realizing Naoko followed all five of them on the social media site Saki begins to go into paranoia and realizing why Naoko was after them, ran off in panic during Asumi's funeral, she's found by the year head, Hirokawa, who begins asking questions as he found out Saki had known Asumi for years and has heard suspicions Asumi's death wasn't an accident and wonders if Saki knows more than she's letting on. Before Saki can reply however Hirokawa is impaled in the head by Naoko, who followed Hirokawa to Saki's location. After dislodging her knife from Hirokawa's head Naoko uses it as a means to leap to Saki and bash her nose in with the pumpkin scooper of her knife before bashing her repeatedly in the face. Tying Saki up into a bag after incapacitating her Naoko sets off the school's fire alarm to distract everyone else from noticing her walking around in the open and heading right to Asumi's casket and placing Saki right on top of Asumi's body, intending for her to be cremated and burnt to death when Asumi's family cremate the casket. As the car leaves with the casket Kazuya sees Naoko on top of the school building waving at the car before leaving, making him realize where Saki was after she ran off. Naoko watches Kazuya, Naruto and Arata start to leave the school for the crematorium to try and save Saki, vowing to Kazuya that, no matter how hard he tries there wouldn't be any forgiveness for what has happened to her. To buy her time Naoko hangs the dead and further mutilated body of Hirokawa from the school building, distracting the three just enough for her to get off the roof of the school and find a motorbike and a steel pipe. Using the bike she catches up to Kazuya, Naruto, and Arata after the get in a taxi and uses the steel pipe to attack the front window of the taxi, causing it to crash and injure the three while also killing the taxi driver, and escapes to drive near the crematorium to film the moment the cremation and, by extension, Saki's death begins. When the smokestacks begin to smoke Naoko is ecstatic and this attracts the attention of two police officers who Naoko quickly kills as she resumes her filming. However, Naoko soon learns that Saki survived being burnt alive, though was left badly burnt in the process, and goes to the hospital to finally kill her, sneaking in through the air vents into the operating room Saki was in and causing her a great deal of distress with just her appearance. She kills the doctors and nurses in the room before turning her sights onto Saki, who begs for Naoko to stop before being electrocuted to death by her, the resulting electrocution causes a minor power cut which causes mild concern, before one of the doctors or nurses kicks the door before finally dying. Realizing this has gotten some attention Naoko hides Saki's body, hides all her clothes including the pumpkin, and begins to cut into her face and body in an attempt to look like Saki as much as possible before taking her place on the operating table. This works as when Kazuya sees Naoko he believes her to be Saki, having been horribly mutilated by Naoko before escaping, Naoko continues pretending to be Saki while Kazuya, Naruto, and Arata have no idea Saki is already dead.

After getting cleaned up and bandaged up Naoko, still posing as Saki, pretends to be asleep while listening in on Naruto, Arata, and Kazuya's conversation. Still, under the belief Naoko is Saki Naruto, remembering Asumi's death was ruled as an accident and how quick the two policewomen and Hirokawa were killed, voices his theory that Naoko wants to torture and play with them instead of downright murdering them, and rather than telling the police what's actually been happening Naruto suggests sorting Naoko themselves as she'll come after them anyway, Naoko staring at both Naruto and Arata the whole time until her focus goes onto Kazuya and his gloomy expression, telling him in her head it will all be over soon. While this goes on a doctor and a nurse in the morgue discover rather than eight bodies sent to them after Naoko's attack on the doctors and nurses there were nine, an additional victim, Saki who was badly burnt had been found. Naruto and Arata leave Kazuya alone with Naoko, who begins to get reminded of happier times with Kazuya before her accident as well as more recent events such as her killing Saki and taking her place on the operating table, Naoko then sees Kazuya has fallen asleep and uses this, along with Naruto and Arata not being there, as the perfect time to try and strangle him to death. Before she can do this Naoko is caught off guard when Kazuya mumbles her name in his sleep, making her wonder what he was dreaming about, quickly pretending to be asleep again when Kazuya awakens from a nightmare of the last time he interacted with Naoko before the accident. Naoko is left alone when Kazuya walks out and gets tricked by Matsui of the police force and his partner into talking to them, as this happens Saki's parents, who had been away and heard about what had happened to their daughter, rush into the hospital room where they believe Saki to be, only to be horrified to see the state their "daughter" is in. Naoko, finding out these two were Saki's parents thinks about how much she's looking forward to killing them just like their daughter. Naoko opens her eyes much to Saki's mother's relief before being stabbed in the tongue with a syringe by Naoko, telling her to shut up after she had made such a racket after coming in. When Saki's father tries asking why his daughter would attack her mother he quickly has multiple syringes thrown at his face, blinding him in one eye as Naoko finally drops her ruse, musing her Saki's own parents couldn't even tell Naoko wasn't even their daughter before quickly criticizing Saki's mother on her personality, seeing her much like her mother Saki was, saying it's no wonder Saki became a terrible person. It's at this point Saki's mother realizes who Naoko is after being told about her by Saki, saying Naoko deserved what had happened to her as punishment for being a "monster", Saki's father trying to stop her from saying all this to Naoko. Realizing Naoko broke out for revenge Saki's mother repeatedly calls her a monster before being savagely stabbed in the eyes by Naoko repeatedly with syringes in rage, not stopping even when shards of the syringes stick into what's left of the eyes. As she keeps stabbing Naoko quickly dodges an attack from Saki's father, who unintentionally smashes his wife's head with the chair he was using, he is then quickly killed by Naoko who slits his throat with what's left of the syringes, afterwards cutting off both their heads, disemboweling Saki's father, shoving their heads into his stomach and placing some flowers into the stump of his neck before causing a fire to cause panic as everyone makes their way for the elevators to escape, Matsui, his partner and Kazuya having arrived on the same floor after Kazuya finds out Naoko had killed Saki and taken her place. During the panic Naoko, who has stolen a hoodie and a pair of trousers, takes advantage of the chaos and sneaks into the elevator with Kazuya, finally coming face to face with him properly and effectively trapping him with her.

### Reuniting with Kazuya and confronting Naruto

Telling Kazuya it's about time he recognized her Naoko reveals her reason for taking Saki's place; she knew Kazuya would be in the hospital and had wanted to spend more time with him, though as she herself admits it's only for a fleeting moment, though seems to tease him by asking if she scared him, causing Kazuya confusion over her not killing him right now, Matsui is too late to get back in the lift once he spots her, having gone out to help with the fire. Once the elevator gets to the ground floor Naoko says her farewell to Kazuya, saying she hasn't forgotten and she was saving him as the last to be killed, as she leaves Kazuya begs her to stop and finally apologizes for his friend's prank during the Halloween party, as he asks for her forgiveness though it's at this moment Naoko finally reveals what Kazuya had been told about her accident was a lie, the firecrackers igniting her hairspray wasn't what caused her face to get burnt, the pumpkin has been made especially for her. Kazuya is naturally shocked at this revelation and asks why he was lied to instead of being told the truth, but more importantly why Naoko didn't try telling anyone about this sooner, Naoko telling him she did try but everyone turned a blind eye to her, after that she decided to do things on her own. As she leaves the hospital Naoko blows Kazuya a kiss before skipping out the front door and escaping on the bike she had used before.

Much later, Naoko goes after her next target: Naruto himself. She arrives at the school just in time to witness Nomizu showing Naruto the very same pumpkin mask that burned Naoko's head to begin with. She then sexually blackmails Naruto into dating, and possibly marrying her willingly, or else she will hand the pumpkin over to the police as the one piece of solid evidence that will lock Naruto and his parents up for life. Before Naruto can give her his final answer, Naoko stabs Nomizu through her left breast with a hook and hangs her from a nearby tree, terrifying Naruto with her appearance. She tells Naruto it's been a while since they met, and that she overheard Nomizu's entire blackmail threat exposing him as the true culprit behind her disfigurement. She then goes to tell off Nomizu for attempting to administer justice upon Naruto before she could get a chance to do so herself, saying that if she were smarter in her blackmail plans, more careful with her justice-seeking actions, and less lustful toward someone who doesn't even like her to begin with, it wouldn't have come to this. While Naruto is grateful to Naoko for saving him from Nomizu's sexual blackmail, he nevertheless tries to convince her that he didn't mean for her to be disfigured, and that it was just meant to be a prank. Naoko responds by kicking the still screaming Nomizu so hard that she passes out and wets herself from the intense pain. As she turns, Naoko sees Naruto rushing at her trying to hit her. Luckily, she quickly brings a switch blade out and slices his hand in half, severing his thumb a bit in the process. As Naruto screams in pain from this injury, Naoko knocks him out by hitting him with a cinder block.

Putting the next part of her plan into action Naoko drags both Naruto and Nomizu to the gym storage room, ties Naruto to a pole, and using the wire from the hook attaches it to two pullies in the room and around Naruto's neck, leaving Nomizu untied so when she moves the wire will tighten around Naruto's neck, something he finds out when he regains consciousness, panicking and thinking the whole thing was an execution. Naoko begins to live stream Naruto's torture, demanding he reveal what actually happened on the night of the Halloween party to all the people that will be watching, promising to let him go if he does, though she starts to threaten him when he takes too long to say anything, with Naruto finally revealing what he had done to the pumpkin. Naruto demands to be let go, reasoning that now he's confessed what he's done his life was now over, Naoko however goes back on her promise, stabs Nomizu in the side of her head, killing her instantly, and wastes no time ripping the hook out of her breast and attaching it to the storage room door, Naruto realizing in horror that if anyone were to open the door while the wire was still around his neck it would cut his head clean off, something Naoko taunts him with with sadistic delight. Naruto tries his best and begs Naoko to forgive him for what he did, Naoko coldly reminding him that no one gave her any forgiveness while they were bullying her; when she screamed or cried none of her tormentors gave her any forgiveness, and the more she cried the more intense the bullying got as it only encouraged Naruto and his gang, the only person never to join in was Kazuya as he refused to take part in the bullying, Naruto notices a change in Naoko's expression and the way she talks when it comes to Kazuya, taking advantage of her feelings towards Kazuya Naruto lies to Naoko and claims it was Kazuya's idea to bully her in the first place. While she doesn't fall for this lie, as she knows what kind of person Naruto is, Naoko does get riled up enough for her to get distracted, giving Naruto time to untie his hands, in part thanks to his injured hand still bleeding, and takes the wire from his neck and wraps it around Naoko's right hand, a split second after this happens the door of the storage room is opened by Arata; both he and Kazuya having been one of the many people who saw the live stream, and with Arata correctly guessing where Naoko was, with the door opening Naoko's hand gets serverly injured in the process, with a few of her fingers cut off.

Being distracted by the immense pain Naoko fails to notice Arata coming right behind her and begins brutally attacking her; with a hard kick to the stomach causing her to throw up before another hard kick in the face breaks her pumpkin, Arata quickly begins punching her violently in the face, with Naruto encouraging him. Naoko calls out for Kazuya in her head before Arata begins choking her, Naoko trying her best to call out for Kazuya. Before she can be killed by Arata Kazuya kicks Arata in the back, having had enough of being a bystander while Naoko gets hurt, and stops the attack. Ecstatic that he finally saved her Kazuya confesses his feelings to Naoko, bringing her to the verge of tears, saying that while it was a bit late Kazuya finally confessed to her much to her happiness. However their happiness together is short lived, as they get so distracted by their feelings for each other that they don't notice Naruto and Arata right next to them, who then proceed to knock them out with baseball bats.

Naoko eventually regains consciousness just as both her and Kazuya, gaffer-taped from escaping, are about to be dropped into a 20 metre hole in a construction site by Naruto's father, Mayor Kuroki, in order to kill them so the truth about everything that's happened won't be revealed to the world. Naoko taunts Naruto, Mayor Kuroki and Arata, telling them that as the "invincible Pumpkin Night" her return is in evitable and she'll crawl out of hell itself to kill them all. In anger Mayor Kuroki quickly drops the pair down the hole, all while Naoko laughs insanely.

### "Death"

Surprisingly Naoko isn't killed on impact, however her fall is tragically cushioned when she falls onto multiple poles, impaling her, she is found in this state by a horrified Kazuya, having survived after Nomizu's body cushioned his own fall. Kazuya is horrified and distraught until Naoko wakes up, although she tells him she knows this is it for her and things were getting dark, wishing she could have killed Arata, Naruto and his father, and more importantly spend time with Kazuya once it was all over, in particular go to the beach with him, hoping it will be a lot of fun. In tears Kazuya promises that once they get out of the hole they'll go to the beach together, with one last smile and a "yay" with tears in her eyes Naoko slumps back dead on the poles, much to Kazuya's despair.

### Aftermath

Although dead Naoko would leave a lasting impact thanks to her actions; her words would leave Arata paranoid and absolutely terrified for the rest of the night after he sees Matsui's partner dressed up as Pumpkin Night, making Arata believe Naoko had indeed come back, this resulting paranoia would extend to anything Halloween related, pumpkins in particular, resulting in him punching a mother just for buying her young son a pumpkin toy and even considering going to the police to reveal the truth about what had caused everything to happen. More importantly Kazuya goes insane from having learnt the truth about what had happened to Naoko and seeing her die, after burying Naoko in a nearby forest Kazuya would take her spare pumpkin and go on to become the next Pumpkin Night and later on has his own costume and pumpkin mask. Calling himself the Pumpkin King Kazuya hunts down though fails in killing Arata (with Naruto killing Arata for suggesting going to the police), later on successfully killing Mayor Kuroki and subjecting Naruto to humiliation, the crowd Naruto ran to while being chased by Kazuya believing his claims he would be killed was all a joke for Halloween and making him feel how Naoko must have felt when they all bullied her, before Kazuya corners Naruto in an alleyway, bashes his head in, slices a section of his skull off before killing Naruto by pouring a whole bottle of sulfuric acid into his head. Kazuya is caught after someone spotted him atop a rooftop gleefully dancing and holding Naruto's severed head, having gone completely insane Kazuya is admitted to a mental hospital with his identity protected by the law, Kazuya makes claims that Naoko is actually alive, though is this likely brushed aside by the staff as part of his insanity.

### Return and loss of memories

After Kazuya's murder of Naruto and his father, along with him being put away, Naoko's hand rises from her grave and her eyes open, revealing somehow she had survived her impalement but was critically injured. Crawling out of her grave Naoko dragged herself on the ground until she was found by Ryuchi Higa, a doctor walking his dog at the time Naoko woke from her injury induced coma. Seeing she was barely alive Ryuchi quickly brought Naoko back to his home, a mansion in the middle of the forest near Hoshinomiya in order to perform surgery on Naoko. After ten hours Ryuchi saves Naoko's life along with recreating her right hand and also performs a face transplant on Naoko, restoring her face to how it used to be before her accident, although thanks to the accident melting the deepest part of her face the subcutaneous tissue has hardened to the point that the transplanted skin won't settle and keeps going necrotic after a while, resulting in numerous transplants. However despite her life being saved the trauma caused by her impalement and near death experience causes Naoko to develop amnesia, forgetting certain things such as the police investigator Matsui and more importantly Kazuya. Ryuchi realizes he could use Naoko in order to "cleanse the world" and make it pure from his point of view (despite Naoko seeking to cleanse the world of all bullies, real or alleged) and helps Naoko recover before putting his plan into action.

A year later Naoko has returned as Pumpkin Night, with Ryuchi putting his plan into motion, having her kill four people already before being tasked to kill a business man who had accidentally run over a mother and her child, but didn't get any medical help for the both of them resulting in their deaths. Riding on a motorbike Naoko catches up to the limo the business man is in and kills everyone except for the business man with shotgun, leaving him for last as she reveals why she's after him, and despite his pleas that he'll turn himself in Naoko bashes his face in with the handle of the shotgun, modified to have sharp spikes built into the handle, killing him. News of the Pumpkin Night's latest murder is soon broadcast, though by the time since Naoko resumed her murders everyone has gotten used to the Pumpkin Night's actions to the point that there was even merchandise of Pumpkin Night made (some of which oddly are the same as in real life) and was being sold. In addition, a cult fanbase of sorts was made in support of her, even outside of Japan (including within foreign militaries such as the US Army), confined to the dark web for many reasons regarding criminality, in spite of criminals being a potential target. Matsui, who had been on the Pumpkin Night case, and one of the few people to believe Kazuya's claims, sees this latest news report, goes to the location of Naoko's grave, possibly being told by his partner where it was, and begins to dig, his suspicions finally confirmed when he finds it completely empty, not believing that the Pumpkin Night is still alive, unaware of the fact that Naoko was watching him from afar. Naoko proclaims that she is in fact alive all while giving the unsuspecting Matsui the middle finger with a sinister look in her eyes before climbing up a tree and gets ready to get behind and confront him and revealing her restored face to Matsui, prompting him to start chasing her. Naoko manages to lose Matsui thanks to him twisting his ankle during the chase and runs back to hide in Ryuchi's mansion, Matsui catching up but eventually leaving as he's unable to enter thanks to Ryuchi's dog barking violently at him. As he leaves Naoko gets worked up and confused as to who Matsui actually is, still having lost her memory for a whole year, Ryuchi comes in hearing her and tells her to not over do it as her memories will return in time. Finding out Naoko went outside Ryuchi advises her that, while he knows she wants to get her memories back, she has to refrain from any aggressive acts, as he's not sure he could live with himself if anything happened to her. As Naoko reassures him she's been out in the forest before Ryuchi notices something on her cheek, her face has started developing cyanosis, another transplant needing to be done as soon as possible. Naoko can tell by Ryuchi's expression that the face transplant hasn't worked again, but says she doesn't care as it's even a miracle she's even alive right now before kissing him, Ryuchi thanks God for delivering Naoko to him as he then looks at the assortment of weapons and the Pumpkin Night pumpkin before thinking if it wasn't God then maybe it was the Devil. Later she would go on to kill a Yakuza gang for their part in tricking people out of their money, the last victims being an elderly couple who committed suicide after being robbed of their money. As she goes on to kill most of the Yakuza Ryuchi, wearing a mask of his own, arrives and aids her by killing some of the Yakuza, and despite the only surviving member pleading for his life once he finds out why Naoko came after them she proceeds to bash him violently with her foot before cutting his head in half, killing him, Ryuchi sharing a kiss with her after congratulating her on her kill, intending to continue using Naoko for his own insane desire to "cleanse" the world.

### Memories restored and rescuing Kazuya

After an unknown period of time Naoko's face returns to it's previous state, forcing her to wear a cloth mask while Ryuchi works in his study trying to find a way to fix Naoko's face permanently. While walking outside her memories, of Kazuya in particular, begin to surface, causing her confusion as she remembers the confession but not the person who confessed to her. Deciding to go back to where she was buried in the hopes it may help her recover more of her memories she's met by Matsui, recognising him from their encounter the last time they met in the forest, and after he makes a comment on how Ryuchi couldn't fix her face she immediately reveals two picks and begins to attack Matsui, making him lose his footing and twisting his ankle again. Before she is able to finish him off however he tells Naoko that Kazuya is waiting for her, Matsui having revealed her survival to him before going to find her, she slams the picks into the ground and her memories finally come back to her as she begins to cry, fully remembering Kazuya and happy he was still waiting for her after all this time. Wanting to see Kazuya Naoko asks Matsui where he is, and after being told he was in a clinic she begins to panic, asking if it was the Hirayama clinic in particular. Finding out from Matsui it is indeed the Hirayama clinic Naoko begins to reveal everything to Matsui; about how the Kuroki family had intentionally locked her away to the abuse she and the other patients were put through. Realising Kazuya is in trouble Matsui tries phoning for backup, however Naoko impales his hand and phone with one of the picks into a nearby tree, running off as she intends to go and save Kazuya by herself, she gets changed into her Pumpkin Night gear and prepares to leave on her bike before being encountered by Ryuchi, having heard the sounds of her starting the bike up. As Ryuchi demands that Naoko come with him and begins to yell how she was his in order to "cleanse the world" he quickly realises Naoko has regained her memories and is promptly run over by her as he refuses to move from where he stood, she soon escapes and begins to drive to the clinic to rescue Kazuya.

### Battle at the Hirayama Clinic

She arrives at the clinic, crashing her bike and encountering a guard in the process, who notifies the clinic and is revealed to have molested her when she was imprisoned at the clinic and yet was spared from her wrath. Taking a chance to settle a score with him, the two fight and afterwards she brutally kills him by slicing his face out, brain included, by a blade embedded in her right shoe, and slashes his throat too. Afterwards, more guards show up, and she disposes them with her shotgun, causing them to freak out after many causalities. This catches the attention of Sae, who takes advantage of Naoko's connections to the clinic besides her past presence. Once inside, Naoko goes over to where she thinks Kazuya is being held but turns out Ayumi is there instead, bound up, and then she kneels down in tears, as it's shown Ayumi is a mother figure to her, all while Ayumi tries to warn her. However it was all a ploy to capture Naoko by Sae and her forces and Naoko was knocked out by a anesthetic drug and had her mask taken away. She then gets dragged to a testing room and subjected to electrical torture and drug tests; in the meantime Ayumi tells Sae in her holding room that she not only got very attached to Naoko at the expense of her psyche but also assisted her in her escape, which resulted in the scarring of half her face. During the tests and torture, scientists are baffled at the seemingly normal stats of Naoko's mind in spite of her personality and that Naoko enjoys the torture. Sae then tries to use different drugs to hurt Naoko more but no effect and has her taken to the MRI to scan her brain more, in spite of concerns further scanning might hurt her at least. However, she breaks out when the scanning was about to start and slaughters the staff men doing the scanning, the surviving ones tried to lock up her up but she manages to bust the door open with a fire extinguisher. They try to flee but the hallway connecting the MRI room got sealed off, much to the confusion of almost everyone. Then a big, odd-faced man called "Baby Face" who acts and dress baby-like comes in the hallway, under orders by Sae, to take on Naoko, who, despite her insane nature, is baffled and surprised by him. Yet she takes advantage of this, and tricks Baby Face to not only think she is his mother but kill the staff men for "hurting her" and he does so with his brute strength, which shocks even Naoko. Afterwards she tells the truth in a dismissive manner, which angers Baby Face, yet it was all a ploy to have him damage one of the doors blocking the hallway. She nearly succeeds but is beaten down by Baby Face and nearly disposed of but then she utters his real name, Shingo. This stuns the staff watching the fight as well as Sae, who all point out Shingo's mother was killed by Shingo's hugs in the past, making them think she somehow knows his mother before by supernatural means, though it's unclear if she happens to have remembered him before while she was there before or a fluke, regardless if said fluke is supernatural. In the meantime, Ryuchi, who is in a hospital talking to the investigators, tells them that in addition to supposedly being truly "dead" for a period of time, when she got back up she apparently gained the ability to talk to the dead, which has supposedly partly motived her to kill the bureaucrat and the scam artist criminals in the first place, hence why she brought up their victims' pictures on her phone before killing them at those times. This supposed ability applies to Shingo's mother, of which leads the mere mention of the name and pleading for mercy leads to Shingo putting her down and befriending her for somehow knowing his mother, and breaks down the door for her. Sae tries to have the two gassed by toxic gas but thanks to Yuki's hacking, it fails, and in the meantime his hacking helps them by using the lights as a guide to Kazuya's location, and the two go off to continue the rescue.

After Shingo takes down a barred gate, he and Naoko encounter more guards who are quite terrified of them and try to flee only to come across Kazuya, who is bloodied up and having a severed head from one of the guards in his holding area. He reveals he brutally disposed of them there and does the same to the guards trying to flee. His violent, insane nature oddly disturbs and upsets Naoko, who is used to his pre-Pumpkin King self, of which makes her think he is not her Kazuya. After the killings he sights his sights on the two, his demeanor terrifying Shingo, and goes off to kill Naoko, having been brainwashed by Sae into thinking Naoko is still after him like before. His superhuman nature baffles Sae, yet is content with the plan to use the Pumpkin King against the Pumpkin Night. At this time, it's revealed by Yuki that the two were subjected to an experimentation program to create super-soldiers that originated from harmless drug testing that got taken over by Tatsuo, with the testing on Naoko a failure and the testing of Kazuya a success. Shingo tries to defend Naoko but gets his eyes hurt by Kazuya, one of them gouged out, which knocks him down to the ground, and Kazuya attacks Naoko all while she struggles to find a way to bring back to his "senses". She manages to barely by talking to him after being trashed around which manages to snap Kazuya back into knowing and loving Naoko yet it seems to be no avail as it turns out he's still manipulated into killing her by a re-arranged nerve that controls him, making him ignore any and all concerns of death, trying to straggle Naoko to death. At the same time, a ghost taking on the form of Kuroki Naruto appears behind the two, as supposedly witnessed by not only the two but also Shingo to an extent, which tells Kazuya of said nerve and that he has the option to either cut the nerve at the risk of his death or submit to the program and have Naoko dead. Kazuya is undecided and the supposed ghost disappears with Shingo getting up and punching Kazuya to the ground, angering Naoko at this but this bring back Kazuya into his "senses" and the two bond together as a couple and they all go off to not only rescue Ayumi but also kill Sae. After they bring Ayumi out, the couple plus Shingo go off to finish off Sae but Ayumi is shot dead from behind, falling down face first with her brain matter splattered in front of her, which catches the attention of Naoko to her concern and then sadness, reminiscing of their past together.

Enraged, not being one to take the loss of Ayumi well, considering her mother-like relationship, Naoko sought to take revenge upon the military unit sent by Farms via Sae to kill everyone in the clinic despite the firearm advantage by the latter group. However, it would be fulfilled in part by Shingo's intervention, smashing the unit brutally (with Naoko cheering him on) and Kazuya joining in on the fight to save her and avenge Ayumi's death. They leave the clinic together as a couple and then relocate to Okinawa to live in a beach house, where they have a good life over there. Yet she has to deal with Kazuya's condition which might possibly kill him sooner or later and is incurable according to Ryuichi, though he mentions a way for the couple to "stay together forever", which makes Matsui very concerned.

### **Battle at Naoko's Beach House**

Sometime after the events of Part 2, Farms's PMCs locate and move in to the beach house only to be ambushed by Pumpkin Night's crew. Ironically, Naoko didn't do the killing and was nearly going to kill one of the soldiers. Yet she did the heavy lifting when fighting Farms's robot spider drones with superhuman finesse. After that, she was going to get a snack from Yoshimoto, but another drone not only damages her mask but kills Yoshimoto in the process and that there were more after her. She decides to stand her ground and fight off the wave, to the impression of her fans around the world, even in what indicates Ukraine (in spite of the anachronistic element of the conflict there). She barely got exhausted but kept going to the shock and awe of Larry, and managed to get all of the drones sent after her destroyed with the help of Ryuichi and Shingo. However, Larry sends missiles after the house, killing Shingo, wounding Ryuichi, and destroying the house in the process, to Naoko's great dismay.

## Personality

When described by Saki her, Naruto and Arata make it seem that Naoko has a very creepy personality and way of acting, in short describing her as disgusting, and in flashback's when she's shown getting bullied she's shown to be screaming as a reaction, however this is far from the person Naoko actually is. Before the accident Naoko was a cheerful, childish and intelligent girl, she has a passion for Halloween and was shown to be very excited when she was crowned the "The Pumpkin Queen", she also has a strong personality and isn't willing to give in to anyone, as shown by how, even after being beaten and having her hair cut short during a school trip she refused to stop wearing her trademark bow and by her openly showing how she feels towards Kazuya, kissing him on the lips before heading off to get ready for the Halloween party. She was shown however to be scared of her bullies, the previously mentioned flashback actually showing her crying as a response to the bullying, and eventually, in her own words, thanks to the amount of bullying and abuse she was subjected to she began to see the Saki, Naruto, Arata and Asumi as demons, with the only exception being Kazuya, who never once joined on.

Because of the trauma, along with discovering she had been locked up to cover up what Naruto had done, Naoko became a psychopathic, sadistic and ruthless girl, killing her bullies and even innocent people who get in her way. It's implied Naoko had suicidal thoughts in the past due to her arms being covered in scars, also implying Naoko became a cutter after the accident and trauma.

She also mispronounces other people's names on purpose (e.g Chaki, Kachuya, Nyaruto, etc), although it's implied in chapter 3 of Pumpkin Night Gaiden that the mispronouncing might actually be a speech disability.

Despite what she has become Naoko still retains some of her quirks; mispronouncing names, her intellect when it comes to stalking her victims and thinking on the spot to avoid instant capture and some of her childish personality is still shown to have remained intact along with her feelings for Kazuya, blowing him a kiss and then skipping out of the hospital after killing Saki's parents. The one aspect of her that's unchanged is her crush on Kazuya, despite her claiming to him she was going to kill him last, when talking about him she would talk very fondly rather than hatefully, her feelings for Kazuya would be used against her by Naruto however, distracting her long enough so he could escape his bonds and severely injure her right hand, and when Kazuya finally confesses his feelings towards her, even with her face as it is she lets go of any hatred she might have had for him and starts to cry happily, confessing her feelings in turn.

After having survived her fatal fall in the construction site and being saved by Ryuchi Higa, Naoko loses her memories, in particular of Kazuya, and becomes loyal to Ryuchi for saving her life, to the point she starts to fall in love with him and begins killing people as a "vigilante", aside from which she still retains her personality and quirks along with her incredible violence. She slowly starts to remember Kazuya a year later before Matsui fully reminds Naoko of him, restoring her memories of both Kazuya and everything that had happened a year ago. With her full memories restored it's shown her feelings for Kazuya are just as strong as they were a year ago, and she begins to panic for his safety once she finds out he's in the same clinic she had escaped from. With regards to her amnesia Matsui theorizes that Naoko herself purposefully made herself forget everything that had happened to her, as her life had been nothing but a living hell for her, and to protect herself after surviving the fall she forced herself to forget everything. In addition, she has the supposed ability to talk to spirits of the dead, even of her bullies, as apparently evidenced by her mentioning the victims of her targets on her smartphone and her knowing Shingo's name somehow. Again after the timeskip, Naoko, despite the beginning of her career as a "vigilante", seems to have avoided killing innocent bystanders in the process, possibly to keep her credentials as someone to supposedly look up to in spite of her antics in Part 1, which does not fool Matsui, or rather some kind of pragmatism in terms of saving the energy to kill the bully instead of being wasted on said bystanders.

In Part 3, she seems to have the ability to dodge laser beams shot by the drones, with her pupils noticing the firing with superhuman ease, either by "supernatural" means, or by the drugs put into her from the experiments, as well as being able to deflect them with her knives, though that can be attributed to the design of said knives, which must be custom built for that purpose. She also can dodge missile attacks with ease too.

## Appearance

* Naoko being chosen as "The Pumpkin Queen"
* Naoko's head getting burned
* Naoko's profile pic on social media as the Pumpkin Night
* Naoko's picture when she was at school
* Naoko according to the bullies (Bamboo Comics version)
* Naoko according to the bullies (Manga Line version)
1/6
Before the accident, Naoko is a girl with shoulder-length brown hair, topped with a giant red ribbon, yellow heart earrings, and light brown eyes. As she was voted for the Pumpkin Queen based on the prettiest girl usually being voted it's clear other people thought she was pretty, Kazuya included. After the accident Naoko's face became severely burnt, the most damage being done to her nose and mouth, causing her teeth to always be on display, along with this her hair had been burnt off, though by the time she had escaped the mental hospital it had grown back. Her body, her arms, in particular, are shown to have scars all over them, implying Naoko cut herself. Her clothing as Pumpkin Night is a high school uniform consisting of a short-sleeved white shirt, a skirt, black leggings, and high school shoes, she is usually seen wearing a pumpkin on her head to hide her disfigurement, the pumpkin itself is made unique with how Naoko has made it; the left eye is bulkier than the right, resembling warts slightly, the right eye has veins drawn on it with the mouth being in a wide smile that makes Naoko look like she's grinning insanely as it only shows her teeth, to finish it off Naoko has put her ribbon on the pumpkin so that her victims can recognize her. After being saved by the doctor Ryuchi Higa Naoko's face is restored through skin transplants, although this isn't able to last long thanks to the damage originally done to her face and multiple transplants have to be done as the skin keeps going necrotic, forcing her to wear a cloth face mask. After having her right hand destroyed by Naruto Ryuchi manages to fully recreate Naoko's hand (either by her own fingers or possibly someone else's), after this it's either always seen bandaged up or while killing people Naoko will usually wear a glove over it. Her hair also became very short after her accident, although after a year had passed it grew back to it's original length, with Naoko once again donning her giant red ribbon.

In Part 3, when unmasked, she has a bandage covering her right eye and side of her face, indicating that she still has to deal with the necrotic condition that grew once again, with it being barely visible around the bandage, though the eye area seems ironically transparent when she dons the Pumpkin mask, as her right eye is visible yet still functional. Especially when later on, her right eye is clearly visible when unmasked again, although the condition had spread across her face once again. In addition, she wears a two piece swimsuit, even before she took off her clothes during the fight with the first robot spider.

## Trivia

* It was never explained if Naoko is an orphan or if she has parents.
* **"Nao"** means **"honest"** and **"sincere"** while **"Ko"** means **"little girl"** (this is ironic, considering her psychopathic, sadistic and ruthless nature after her humiliation).
* Naoko shares some traits with three famous slasher villains from various horror films:
	1. Naoko face is horribly burnt just like Freddy Krueger's face from the Nightmare on Elm Street series.
	2. Naoko wears a Halloween based item like Michael Myers with his Captain Kirk mask from the Halloween series.
	3. Naoko with Jason Voorhees from the Friday the 13th series; both want revenge for a wrong done to them (Naoko wants to kill the people who caused her accident and had her falsely locked away in a mental hospital while Jason wants revenge for the way he was treated and for his mother's death) but one has shown the ability to come back from the dead after being killed, as the other one needed help from Ryuchi Higa after he found her critically injured. They both also have a loved one Jason his mother Pamela and Naoko has Kazuya her love interest both of whom also became killers. In addition, she shares the supposed ability to talk to the dead, with Mrs. Voorhees with her son (possibly) and with Jason towards his now dead mother; this is also a trait shared with Michael Myers in the Rob Zombie directed sequel, Halloween 2 (2009) where he has "talks" with his dead mother who committed suicide as well as seeing her angelic form.
* Chapter 3 of Pumpkin Night Gaiden, the prequel manga focusing on how Naoko escapes from the mental hospital, reveals some facts about Naoko not mentioned before in the main manga; namely that Naoko might possibly have a learning disability, ADHD and a speech disability, implying heavily that Naoko's quirk of mispronouncing names might actually be part of her speech disability.
	+ Although despite the learning disability it hasn't hampered Naoko's intelligence as she had come up with a number of plans of tactics to hunt her victims down easily.
* Unlike most slasher villains, she also uses firearms since the beginning of Part 2, making her on par with the Terminator units from the eponymous series and Manic Cop in regards to that, though she still prefers to use knives and melee objects the most.