Akari Kurahashi

Akari in the MV

**Akari Kurahashi** (暗端 アカリ, *Kurahashi Akari*[?]) is an original character by Guchiry. She is the protagonist of the song *Cast a spell.*

## Appearance

Akari has long black hair which reaches a little lower than her elbows which has red strings with tassels at the end tied to short braids on both sides of her hair. She wears a big bow on her collar that has what resembles a cross knot in the middle. On her right hand she wears a black misanga, which are hand-made good luck charms made from knotted threads that are used as bracelets. She also has pitch-black, baggy eyes that look gray during certain scenes and look rather cat-like.

In her first outfit which acts as her school uniform, she wears a high-waisted, pleated, one piece, pinafore, black dress that goes just above the knees, the waist band as two red buttons and the dress has a square neckline. This goes over a white dress shirt with long lantern sleeves. She also wears black leggings and black shoes.

In her second outfit, she seems to be wearing the same white shirt and leggings, except she is now wearing a black hoodie, grey shorts with two red stripe on both its side and white shoes.

## Personality

Akari is shown in the MV to be a vengeful person with her attempt to curse her classmates, going as far as to visit a shrine and record the entire ritual. She doesn’t think far ahead since she doesn’t predict the potential consequences of her actions at the shrine.

In school she is shown to be isolated and a lonely type of person who keeps to themselves. She secretly feels disgust towards her classmates from their popularity, possible bullying or from feeling left out. When things go south, Akari is quick to panic and runs away from her situation showing her potential cowardice.

Akari may be a religious or superstitious person from her belief in curses and good luck charms while being paradoxically nihilistic with her praying that “God is dead, there’s no salvation”.

## Etymology

**Akari** (アカリ, ***Akari***[?]) means nothing in particular in katakana, but in kanji it may be **Aka** (明, ***Aka***[?]) means "bright" or **Aka** (赤, ***Aka***[?]) meaning "red". **ri** (里, ***ri***[?]) means "village" or **ri** (莉, ***ri***[?]) meaning "white jasmine".

**Kurahashi** (暗端, ***Kurahashi***[?]) means "dark end" with **Kura** (暗, ***Kura***[?]) meaning "dark" and **hashi** (端, ***hashi***[?]) meaning "end".

## Story

In *Cast a spell*, Akari visits a shrine around 1 am with a video camera recording her performing a ritual reminiscence of the Shrine visit at the Hour of the Ox ritual onto her classmates after seeing them joyfully converse with each other at school as Akari is left out alone. Later she returns home to take a nap and wakes up around 2 am according to her digital clock. Then she decides to goes outside to walk in the streets to refresh herself. Afterwards, she sees ghosts and spirits around her, including a pure white cat spirit and she starts runs away from them only to trip on a soda can. Akari then sees herself being surrounded by the candles she used in the ritual and finds herself awake back at her house. After 3:13 am, Akari comes back to the shrine and sits herself inside her ritual circle. Her fate is left unknown as Akari's camera is left running at 3:43 with no one but a white spirit cat sitting in front of the mini shrine and a black cat looking into the camera.

## Trivia

* She is featured in Chapter 3 of *Conspiracy Theory*.
* She has no particular family problems and is just a negative person.
	+ She may have survived in *Cast a spell* with Guchiry mentioning her curfews may have become more stricter or it refers to the curfews of her classmates.
* She was designed to look creepy like Mene and Luchika.
* The bow she wears on her collar may be made of two seperate pieces of string as shown in her reference art.
* When she wakes up in *Cast a spell*, the red ribbons are still on her head even though her braids are undone and stay behind her hair.

## References

1. ↑ https://twitter.com/bomless\_race2/status/1602965601219383296
"アカリは特に家庭事情の不和とかはなかったみたいですね ただただ陰キャというかなんというか……/It seems like Akari didn't have any particular family conflicts. She's just a negative person or what can I say..."
2. ↑ https://twitter.com/oxn\_sub/status/1602966100827729921
"おうふ…警察やら学校から連絡があったおうちの方は大変ですね…😰/Oof...it's tough for the householders who have been contacted by the police and the school...😰."
https://twitter.com/bomless\_race2/status/1602966795262234624
"相当カンカンに怒ったでしょうね… 門限とか厳しくなったんじゃないすかね/They must have gotten really angry... I think the curfews has become more stricter."
3. ↑ https://twitter.com/bomless\_race2/status/1645420204086943745
"キモい女とかキモい男を曲の主人公にしがちなんだけど、/I tend to make creepy women or creepy men the main characters in my songs,"
"メネもルチカもアカリも粘着質な陰の者たち独特のキモさ前面に出せてて好きすぎる/I love how Mene, Luchika, and Akari bring out the unique creepiness of the sticky people in the shadows."