Korsica

**NOTE**: This page contains spoilers for the game, so caution is advised.
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* 3D
* Ally
* Postgame
* Artwork

**Korsica** is one of the central antagonists (and later protagonist) in Hi-Fi Rush. She is the head of security at Vandelay Technologies, and the youngest boss of the game's six main bosses.

Following her boss encounter, she joins up with Chai and the others as a summonable Assist, being able to put out fires and stun enemies from mid-range.

## Profile

"*KORSICA

With a fiery temper and a strict sense of justice, you certainly do not want to get on Korsica's bad side.

And yet, some say the head of security is among the more reasonable of the company bigwigs. Unfortunately, with Chai in her sights, negotiation is out of the question.*"
―Character profile on the Hi-Fi Rush website

## Appearance

In her default appearance initially, Korsica is a light-skinned person with red hair and blue eyes. Normally, Korsica's hair is stylized to have spikes on the front, with a blue hair tie for her ponytail. Korsica sports a red jacket with black highlights and a striped yellow collar. The jacket itself is vaguely v-shaped, and a single v-shaped button holds the jacket closed over the right side of her chest. Korsica also wears blue shorts with black pantyhose, and dons white boots with grey highlights.

Following Korsica's recovery after Kale's attack, her default design gets updated. She gains numerous scars, ranging from a temporary cut under her eye, to some on her arms. Her jacket's sleeves are also ripped, exposing her new robotic implants. Korsica's jacket is cut shorter, and is now void of the v-shaped button, thus exposing her shirt and the newly sustained injury on her chest. Her pantyhose also receives an assortment of rips, and she now wears Hibiki sneakers with yellow laces and black soles. When Kale is defeated and Roxanne is reinstated as CEO, Korsica's uniform is only slightly changed, keeping the sneakers and implants, with a new jacket design that is permanently open.

At the beginning of the game, Korsica was noted for being the only boss in Vandelay Technologies that lacked robotic implants of any sort. Following her injuries however, she gained blue robotic implants near her heart and on her arms, notably with the entire left shoulderblade covered in black tissue with glowing cyan lines - in concept art of the Fashionista costume, it has scars on the back, indicating an injury just as serious as the one by her pacemaker-like implant. It is unknown if this boosted her combat abilities subsequently, as these implants were installed to save her life.

### Outfits

After beating the game once, Korsica can be customized to wear several outfits, which alter her designs for both during cutscenes and when she's summoned as an assist.
You can check them out in the gallery.

## Personality

Korsica is described as having a fiery temper, a strong will, and being rather humorless and hardworking. In comparison to Vandelay's other bigwigs, she's been stated to be the most reasonable and levelheaded, though that seems to matter little to them over her inexperience. Korsica takes her job as the Head of security seriously, constantly reminding her staff of proper procedures and memorizing all of her passwords to account for the lack of a Passkey. Because she's the youngest and newest Head of Department, she unreasonably puts her all into showing work to prove herself to Kale, leading to insecure behavior that doesn't fit her abilities.

Her attitude is one of skepticism and logic. Though not necessarily mistrusting, she can discern that things felt off since her promotion at Vandelay. Because of this, she is the only department head without full access to SPECTRA, as well as the only head to have doubts about Kale's leadership. Similarly to Peppermint, Korsica is a careful planner and decision maker, much to the frustration of the lazier Post-Kale units under her. Korsica is prone to letting anger get in the way of her judgement, possibly because of her huge focus on work performance.

## History

When she was a child, the area she lived in was struck by an ecological disaster, but Roxanne Vandelay helped the people in her home town rebuild. This inspired Korsica to join Vandelay Technologies, believing that it was the only company doing the right thing.

Unknown to her, Kale deliberately hired her to test his ability to influence the most serious of workers, and she chose to disregard her grievances with him because she assumed that was how leadership was. She was purposefully made unaware of Kale's secret conspiracy within the company, not questioning her limited access to SPECTRA information until Chai and Peppermint started their revolution against the company.

## Powers and Abilities

Korsica is well versed in physical combat, and is equipped with two flexible, electric stun batons. They allow for relentless strikes in a similar fashion to eskrima/arnis and can be thrown close-range, in conjunction with her impressive agility, which allows her to use Rhythm Parries repeatedly. She can also merge her batons together to create a bo staff-like weapon, allowing her to attack her opponents from afar and create strong cyclones, which can be used to put out fires, overload fan equipment and stun enemies.

### Regular

* *"Korsica, you've got this?" / "Switch it up!"/ "Try this out!"/ "Show 'em, Korsica!"/ "Here we go!"*
	+ "Leave it to me!"
	+ "Just focus!"
	+ "Let's get 'em, Chai!"
	+ "Don't worry about me!"
	+ "Back off!"
* "Time it right." (during Assist)
* "Focus, Korsica..." (during Assist)
* "Got it!" (sucessful Assist)
* "Not much time!" (sucessful Assist)
* "Go now, Chai!" (sucessful Assist)
* "Ugh, messed up." (failed Assist)

### Combat

* "Well, this is awkward." (first time using Assist)
* *"Round 'em up, Korsica!"/"Here we go!"/"Try this out!"/"Korsica, you've got this?" /"Korsica!"*
	+ "Oi!"
	+ "You all right, Chai?"
	+ "Back off!"
	+ "How's this?"
	+ "Leave it to me!"
	+ "Let's get 'em, Chai!"
* *"Look who's on our side!"*
	+ "We'll do it together!" (High Security Risk)
* *"Counter!" / "Korsica!" / "Get 'em!"*
	+ "Stop it!"
	+ "Good timing!"
	+ "Very precise, Chai!" (High Alert)
* "Showmanship's all you've got!" (Track 9 Boss)
* "Get out of our way, Mimosa!" (Track 9 Boss)
* "You don't scare us!" (Track 10 Boss)
* "Stay focused, Chai!" (Track 10 Boss)
* "Chai, I can help with this one!" (Big Bad Wolf start)
	+ *"There we go!"* (sucessful Big Bad Wolf)
* "Together, we *can* go up against him!" (final Big Bad Wolf)
* "Stay strong!" (Track 12 Boss Part 1)
* "You can do this, 808!!" (Track 12 Boss Part 1)
* "Kale, I'll never forgive you!" (Track 12 Boss Part 2)
* "I'm here with you, Chai!" (Track 12 Boss Part 2)
* "Chai, we can't lose this!" (Track 12 Boss Part 2)

## Trivia

* After her boss fight, players are tasked with one last beat hit in order to catch Korsica - if they fail, they receive a different cutscene and dialogue, alongside a D rank in the "Korsica Catch" section specific to the fight.
	+ The game originally was going to prepare the player more for this event, however, the devteam found it funnier if the event could be missed, therefore opting to catch the player off guard.
* Korsica is voiced by Sarah Elmaleh in English, who voices for Despondent Pyre from *Halo Infinite*, Cube Queen from *Fortnite*, and additional voices in *God of War: Ragnarök*, *Spider-Man: Miles Morales*, and *Ratchet & Clank: Rift Apart*.
	+ Korsica is voiced by Yū Kobayashi in Japanese, who voices Ruri Tsukiyono from *Digimon Ghost Game*, Black Maria from *One Piece*, Sasha Braus from *Attack on Titan*, and Enkidu from *Fate/Grand Order.*
* Korsica was the only character among the board to not be outfitted with Armstrong or Vandelay tech, until after she had sustained injuries caused by the CH-AS1R.
* It is implied that Peppermint has feelings for Korsica, but though they have a good relationship, it's unclear if the feelings are returned.
* Korsica, Roxanne, Rekka, and Zanzo are the only characters not named after food or drinks. However, there is a brand of tea called 'Corsican Pear Spice', from the French island of Corsica, showing a connection with both the Vandelay bosses and the team of heroes.
* Despite being her boss battle theme, *Negotiation* is never used as a leitmotif in cutscene songs involving her; instead, parts of *Security Breakout* are used.
* Inspecting her work computer with a free camera tool reveals several easter eggs:
	+ She has several cat GIFs on her desktop, across from actual work folders.
	+ Hiding her attempts at breaching SPECTRA files, she has two open browser windows; the first one being "Top 5 Ways To Make Your Boss Happy", describing the game's current situation in the style of advice articles.
	+ The second is "How To Brew Your Own Coffee", an actual recipe for pour over coffee. Oddly, she's still drinking decaf in the postgame credits, suggesting she never attempted it.
* Though her boss fight shows her stun batons partially opened at the cyan top even while separated, as an Assist, they're shown closed unless joined together.
* Korsica's Fujin costume from the Arcade Challenge! Update! is inspired by **Fūjin**, the Shinto god of wind. He is usually depicted as a red headed, green skinned humanoid, much like the outfit. In addition to her wind powers, the god is also depicted in conflict with Raijin, the god of storms, similar to her parallels with Chai.
* Though exaggerated in animations and accounting for the increased length and flexibility of the sticks, Korsica's attacks seem to be inspired by *Sinawali* techniques in Arnis martial arts, a high-speed use of the double batons while switching their stances to catch an opponent off-guard.

## References

1. ↑ https://twitter.com/johnjohanas/status/1631906847509864448?s=20
2. ↑ https://twitter.com/johnjohanas/status/1633080317371387904?s=20