Mori Hibana

Original

**Mori Hibana** (火花森) was a student in Kaeno Shinjomu's Class 1st, and a participant of the Killing School Life featured in Kaeno Shinjomu V1. Her title was **Ultimate Hypnotist** (超高校級の催眠術師 lit. Super High School Hypnotist).

## History

### Prior to the Second Tragedy

Mori Hibana was born in Takayama, Japan to a family with no other siblings, and was raised an only child. From a young age, Mori was often left home alone. Her family was well off for sure, so it's not like it was horrible for her to begin with. Her mother, a workaholic business woman, and her father, an emotionally distant pharmacist, were not home to take care of her often after she started school. Being an only child with absent parents lead to her having issues developing social skills and making friends, but she was already a naturally quiet person and it did not mean much to her.

However, all of this quiet alone time often left Mori very bored. This resulted in her spending most of her days not in school at the local library, which she would either be dropped off at by her mother during the day or when she would bike there once she was older. There, she began to interest herself on a wide variety of subjects from a young age, but only two commonly held her focus: Shintoism, and hypnotism.

From books and videos found online, Mori took the first steps into hypnotism at age nine, after easily hypnotizing a classmate to do simple commands like clapping and jumping. This peaked her interest more, deciding then to dedicate her life to what would seem to be her natural-born skill. By the time she was twelve years old, she had taken on many advanced techniques, and even had honed her talent enough to be capable of hypnotizing extremely large, unsuspecting crowds without their knowledge.

Her interest in Shintoism did not end, either. Despite her parents being mostly secular, Mori still involved herself in religion as much as possible after reading everything she could. Once she was old enough, and until she was a little over fifteen, Mori volunteered as a shrine maiden at a nearby shrine, spending most of her days after school working, and taking part in most festivals.

Both of her main interests persisted greatly in her life, keeping her out of trouble and on the right track for a well balanced and successful future. However, after her father had accepted a new job at a pharmacy, she found herself visiting him at work in an attempt to finally build a close relationship with her father. This lead to her inevitable discovery of drugs, with them being so close and attainable, and she had compulsively stole some painkillers whilst nobody was looking. This was the start of Mori's extreme addiction, where she began taking advantage of her dad's position to get a hold onto medications to try, and to sate her newfound habit. Her addiction drove her to the point of desperation to where she would hypnotize her own father once she had gotten caught once for stealing, and was kicked out by one of the workers.

Due to her new obsession, Mori was often too high or withdrawn to continue her hobbies the same as before. She quit her job as miko at the shrine, and only used her talent to acquire more drugs. Her parents were well aware of her addiction, as she was often just found lying in bed staring at a ceiling, or suffering from effects of withdrawal, but both were too detached from her or too busy to make a serious attempt at stopping her.

### Killing School Life

Mori woke up into the killing game the same way as the other students, and actively took part in many of the trials. In chapter one, her biggest secret for the motive was her drug addiction. Later on, Mori's forbidden action was that she was not allowed to look others in the eye. This, however, was not a problem to her, as after the death of Kyoung-mi Park and Jeong Park, Mori had taken it upon herself to hide in her room, and sometimes the girl's bathroom, avoiding being seen by her peers entirely outside of trials and investigations. After all of the female students other than Mori had been killed or executed, Mori moved to the bathroom entirely. In the last five trials, Mori played a large role in class trials, her mind much clearer than it had been before.

After the end of the final trial and Masayuuki Taisho's execution, Mori was saved by the future foundation and currently lives among the other survivors of the second tragedy, including the participants of The Killing School Trip. Post killing game in the sanctuary, Mori now attempts to form relationships with the other survivors after realizing what she had taken for granted during Masayuuki's killing game, but holds a resentment to the survivors of The Killing School Trip. This is because she feels as it wasn't fair that they did such horrible things to each other in the game, but we're still allowed to cheat death, whenever her friends were not. Also, now out of the killing game, Mori remains sober due to her believing that surviving what she did was a second chance to improve herself, and she wouldn't want to go against that.

## Appearance

Mori is a young woman of above average height and a lanky build, who is commonly known for her almost sickly appearance during the killing game. She has dark brown shoulder length hair which she allows to lay straight and neat, a mid-toned complexion and narrowed brown eyes, and wears no makeup. She can be remarked as appearing very plain and proper looking. Her clothes consist of a brown cardigan worn loosely on top of a green and white a-line dress with a brown belt. She wears brown tights and dark brown dress shoes with laces.

## Personality

Mori is at first seen as unreadable and hard to talk to, with an air of mystery surrounding her, but when gotten close to she is extremely polite and considerate of others. She is easy to get along with, as long as she does not feel a sense of belittlement, which she is often overly concision of. However, due to her past addiction, Mori faces heavy withdrawal during the killing game, and as a result slowly becomes extremely irritable, anxious and it is easy to frustrate, especially when it comes to defending herself. She always analyzes a situation before action, unless overtaken by her emotions, and generally looks towards the greater good. She tends to be very slow in conversation, wanting to think deeply of her response before speaking, but most of the time, this results in her sounding extremely thoughtful, or other times convoluted.

Mori also holds deep beliefs in Shintoism, and has her many own beliefs following the strong course of both fate, and what is expected of human beings in the universe. She is very black and white when it comes to these ideas, though her ideas alone are very simplistic and can sometimes be considered common sense. Though, Mori does also believe that the course of fate should always be accepted, as unfair as it may be, because all things happen for a reason. These ideas only became strengthened after the second tragedy, however.

## Talent

### Ultimate Hypnotist

As the Ultimate Hypnotist, Mori has the ability to hypnotize and influence the thoughts and actions of others, including large groups of people. It is possible for her to use this for hypnotherapy, recreationally and for her own benefit.

## Relationships

### Family

#### Hana Hibana

Mori's mother. Her mother worked very often, so they never had a very close relationship. However, unlike her father, Mori does appreciate her mother very much and cares for her deeply. While Hana did not make any attempts to help Mori struggling with addiction, she never got visibly angry with her and took care of her on her worst days. Mori can distantly recall some fond memories with her mother, like her mom driving her to the library every weekend before and after work, reading bedtime stories as a child sometimes, and her mother quietly tending to her when she was sick or going through withdrawals. It can be assumed she died during the second tragedy.

#### Touya Hibana

Mori's father. The two of them were never very close, with her father either constantly working at the pharmacy, or that he rarely came home until extremely late at night (which Mori had always assumed was him cheating on her mother or getting drunk). The two were always extremely formal and distant with each other, especially in Mori's teenage years when she had become involved with addiction and Touya began to ignore her completely. However, Mori does feel extremely guilty using his work as her own personal supplier for drugs, though she does also feel he is at fault for her ever becoming addicted. It can be assumed he died during the second tragedy.

## Quotes

* "I've tried to detach myself from the situation at hand more than anything. I rather not have my emotions weigh into things like these as they please, although that isn't very hard for me. The people lost deserve better than for me to pretend I knew them."
* "...I believe fate is in play here, and it isn't right to intervene or disagree with fate, of course, no matter how cruel it is. Fate has taken over twenty children, which is cruel of it, but it is the same fate that has brought me, and all of you survivors, here and alive."
* "No dumbass, have you EVER met a bear that can hold a watering can!?'

## Trivia

* Mori's first name translates roughly to forest, the character often pertaining to the sacred forests surrounding Shinto shrines. Hibana often translates to spark, or flash.
* Mori's favorite foods are salty foods like crackers and pretzels, and strawberries are her favorite fruit.
* According to Mori, she has come close to dying at least six times in her life.
* Earlier Mori designs had her in simpler clothes, and with messier hair.
* Mori is the only female survivor of Killing School Life
	+ This makes her and Tsuyo Kogiyumi both the only technical female survivors of both of their respective killing games.
* Mori had an intense crush on Masayuuki Taisho, as seen by their interactions during the last few trials.