Kairi

***Kairi*** is one of the several major original characters in the ***Kingdom Hearts series***. Her major roles are in ***Kingdom Hearts Birth by Sleep***, ***Kingdom Hearts***, ***Kingdom Hearts II*** and ***Kingdom Hearts III***. She has also appeared in other games as a minor supporting character.

Kairi is a **Princess of Heart** and is the only **Princess of Heart** to remain among the **New Seven Hearts**. Kairi is the original persona of Naminé. Kairi was born in **Radiant Garden** and currently lives on **Destiny Islands** along with her two best friends, Sora and Riku. Kairi eventually trains as a **Keyblade** wielder to help her allies.

## Story

### **Kingdom Hearts**

Kairi wakes up Sora from a surreal dream and pressures him to collect supplies for their raft. Later, while watching the sunset, she jokes about leaving without Riku, then tells Sora not to change. However, before they can leave, their islands are attacked by the Heartless, and Sora finds Kairi in their **Secret Place**. She turns towards him, looking sad and a little ill, and then a huge gust of wind sweeps through a door in the back of the cave and Kairi flies towards him. Sora opens his arms to catch her, but she vanishes right as she is about to be swept into his embrace.

During this time, it is speculated that Kairi's heart chose Sora as a vessel and when she passed through him, her heart was left behind in him while her body vanished to some distant world. She then becomes the game's driving force, as much of the game's story centers around Sora's and Riku's attempts at finding Kairi. However, Riku is hostile to Sora, having been manipulated by Maleficent into believing that Sora no longer cared for either Kairi or himself.

Throughout Sora's journey, he encounters multiple images of Kairi without knowing about Kairi's heart being a part of his. First, when he wakes up in a motel room after his fight with Leon, and sees Yuffie in Kairi's form and mistakes her to be Kairi until she tells him who she is. Later when he visits the **Magician's Study** behind the door of the **Third District**, Kairi appears to him and tells him how much the study reminds her of their **Secret Place**, but she disappears when Goofy calls to him. When Sora crash lands into **Deep Jungle**, she reappears again for a short moment, right behind Tarzan, then disappears again. Finally, before setting off to **Hollow Bastion**, Goofy and Donald Duck encourage Sora to believe in himself, then Kairi says from within "I believe in you." before pulling him into one of her lost memories about her grandmother telling her younger self a story about the light. These encounters speculate that Kairi was experiencing Sora's journey from within his heart, including befriending Donald and Goofy.

Riku finds her first, but she is in a comatose state, with a vacant, lifeless expression and a limp body. She'd lost her heart and because of her Princess status, her body remained untouched by the darkness that usually produced a Heartless. With empty promises by Maleficent, Riku was convinced that he alone could locate Kairi's heart and restore her to health. When inside **Monstro**, Riku attempts to kidnap Pinocchio in hopes to use his heart to restore Kairi's. This act confuses Sora as he hasn't learned of her fate. His attempt fails and he is forced to retreat.

## Voice Actors

* Hayden Panettiere
* Alyson Stoner
* Ariel Winter