Katsuo Tomoda

**Katsuo Tomoda** is a character in Okotowari Shimasu. He is a second-year student at Nantoka High School and a sports genius

## Appearance

Katsuo has light skin, dark purple eyes and small yellow eyes. It's said multiple times that he looks bland and normal, enough to be considered an extra by Kou or dismissed entirely by Mayu during the survival game.

According to Keita, Katsuo's most unique features are his ahoge and his unusual hairstyle. It's also worth noting that although he doesn't look so when clothed, he has well-defined muscles once he takes his shirt off.

When wearing the school uniform, he doesn't wear the school's jacket or tie, although that seems to be alright with the school's dress code. It seems he prefers to not wear them because it makes it easier to change in and out of uniforms when helping the sports clubs train.

## Personality

Katsuo comes off as a rather serious person, and he's usually the voice of reason in the group, and the more grounded person in general. He sees himself as Kou's rival, and if something can be taken as a competition, he's guaranteed to want to beat him at it. Even if it's not against Kou, he dislikes the idea of losing in general.

He's very enthusiastic about sports and can get excited when seeing a cool new move.

It's hard for him to be honest about his feelings, and he has a tendency of thinking things over before saying anything, and mulling over things for a long while, as shown when he was worried about Keita even after he told him everything was fine.

He can't read the mood most of the time, which often leads to him saying the wrong thing or acting out of time.

Regarding his romantic feelings, Katsuo can get flustered easily and gets confused by romance, which may lead to him saying or doing something he didn't mean to. However, he is very straightforward once he's sure about his feelings.

## Background

Not much is known about Katsuo's backstory. He used to be part of a tennis club in middle school but was banned from entering high school-level competitions when he used a technique that destroyed the field. Now he helps different teams train by going against them.

When he was a first-year he was in the same class as Keita and Maiko. Despite him not being very sociable, Keita still approached him and tried to befriend him a few times. However, they wouldn't become friends until they became second years and Kou transferred.

## Powers and Abilities

Katso is a very skilled sportsman, partaking in all kinds of sports. He was removed from sports competitions in middle school due to his immense power, being able to blow up an entire court with his special move.

He's also very skilled in any other type of physical activity, not just sports. In chapter 19, he was banned from participating in the festival's booth due to his skill in them, alongside Kou.

It was revealed during the Beauty Contest that he's incredibly popular, managing to get over 200 votes. He lost to Mayu Kurumato in the finals, making him the second most popular student in the school despite his plain appearance.

## Story

Katsuo was first introduced in chapter 3, after he sent a letter to Kou Omori asking him to meet. Kou was confused as to whether the letter was intended to be a challenge or a love confession, but he attended anyway, bringing Akie with him. Katsuo reveals he sent the letter in order to fight Kou, but he quickly declines, stating their fight would likely destroy the school. Despite this, Katsuo is persistent in fighting Kou, until Akie suggests them becoming friends. Seeing as he has no other way, Katsuo becomes friends with the two of them.

He joins their little group, although he is shown to be a bit awkward around everyone else. He's tasked with taking care of the tents alongside Erina during the school campout, but neither of them manages to do a good job.

Once Maiko and Keita join their group, Kou starts feeling nervous about having so many friends, since he's scared his powers might put them in danger. He asks Katsuo for help, saying he wants to look plainer so things won't happen to him. Katsuo isn't happy about being called plain but ends up going with Keita's plans anyways. Then, when Seraphina joins them, he is the only one bold enough to tell her about her weird talking quirk.

During the Survival Game, Keita and Seraphina planned on grouping with him so that he would give the prize to one of them. However, due to his wish to fight Kou, he defeated both of them and Mayu. He states his only objective is to fight Kou, although his grades are bad too. He is then defeated by Erina, as he was too busy talking to notice her.

With the final tests approaching, Keita, Seraphina and Katsuo ask Kou to tutor them, seeing as they all have awful grades. They end up having a group study session in Kou's house, although neither of the three get much study done. Katsuo complains about his body aching and stops studying in merely five minutes. Because of this, he has to take summer classes alongside Seraphina and Keita.

During one of the summer classes, he and Keita are trapped inside the school due to heavy rain. Seeing as Keita has forgotten his umbrella, Katsuo offers to share his. This is the event that kickstarts Keita's crush on Katsuo, although he seems to be unaware of this.

He joins the group during their trip to Hell and the beach, noticing Keita's change of behaviour around him. At a later point during the summer, he starts working part-time at the supermarket where Keita works, where he once again notes his unusual behaviour. Keita is moved by this, and after asking Katsuo what he thinks about him decides he should start acting like normal again.

Back in school, Katsuo participates in the Sports Festival alongside the rest of the class. Since he's the fastest runner in the class, he is chosen to be the last runner in the relay relace. During the event, he momentarily discards his need to turn everything into a competition against Kou in order to make their class win the race. However, he is so focused on that he ended up dropping the baton. Despite this, he manages to get first place. Later that day, while the twins are participating in the three-legged race, Katsuo takes a picture of Keita and Maiko running with Keita's camera, which he then puts away.

During the school trip to Kyoto, Katsuo isn't especially excited about their trip, although he admits Hotaru and Seraphina's enthusiasm is a little contagious. Once they all get to their inn, Katsuo suggests going to the hot springs with Keita, as he starts unbuttoning his shirt. This causes Keita to become nervous and blush, and then flee the scene. Katsuo later asks Kou and Akie about this, and about whether or not Keita's actions seem strange to them, but they don't have much to say.

The next day, as they're walking around Kyoto, Katsuo is constantly being thrown into situations that make Keita nervous, especially being very close to him, although he doesn't seem to mind all that much. He does notice Keita's reaction to this. When Maiko wonders about his behaviour, they agree to have Katsuo sit next to the bus in order to ask what's on his mind. However, he ends up falling asleep against Keita's shoulder before he can say anything.

Back at the inn, Katsuo goes for a walk right before the group starts talking about going to the hot springs all together. Keita goes looking for him, and when he finds him, Katsuo is standing on top of the heart-shaped tile, rumoured to bless all love confessions. Keita starts blushing and thinking about it, and after debating it for a moment, he confesses his feelings for Katsuo. He doesn't know how to react, saying how it's his first time being confessed to. When he's asking Keita some time to think about it, however, he cuts him off, saying how he just wanted to tell him and wasn't even expecting an answer. Keita then rushes Katsuo out of there, telling him to join Akie and Kou at the hot springs. Katsuo leaves, looking back worried, as Keita begins to cry.

To everyone's surprise, Katsuo is selected to participate in the Beauty Contest, being one of the most popular students at school.His participation in the contest only makes him even more popular, even if he ultimately loses to Mayu. After the Beauty Contest, Amu Kiyuu approaches him and asks him out. Despite being rejected, Amu insists until Katsuo panics and says he's already dating someone. Since this doesn't convince Amu entirely, he has to ask Keita to pretend to be dating him for a while.

Amu isn't convinced by their lie but eventually asks Katsuo if he even likes Keita, to which he's able to answer giving various things he likes about him. After Amu becomes convinced of their love and leaves, he properly asks Keita out, for real this time. This surprises Keita, who thought he had been rejected back in Kyoto. Katsuo explains that he just needed some time to think about his feelings, and now that he's done some thinking he knows for sure that he likes Keita, and wants to go out with him. Keita accepts, but both of them decide to keep their relationship a secret from their friends since it may make things awkward.

## Relationships

### Kou Omori

Katsuo first approached Kou with the intention of fighting him and becoming his rival, driven by some feeling he couldn't explain. Kou declined, saying fighting him would only endanger his life and the school, and then offered to instead become friends. Katsuo accepted and joined Kou's group as his second friend, although he still feels some sort of rivalry towards him, trying to best him during sports events and even the summer festival.

### Keita Narabuko

Keita and Katsuo have known each other since they were first years. Keita tried to approach Katsuo a few times and was friendly towards him, but Katsuo turned him down each time. When Keita joined the group, Katsuo seemed reluctant to accept him as his friend at first, but ended up being dragged into his plan to make Kou stand out less, trying to be the voice of reason. Keita is the only person who doesn't think Katsuo looks plain, which he appreciates. Katsuo has now become good friends with Keita, as noted by Maiko. He worried about Keita enough to suggest sharing an umbrella so he wouldn't catch a cold during their summer classes, and ever since Keita developed feelings for him, he noticed the way his attitude changed towards him. Keita has a tendency of dragging Katsuo into his ideas, which Katsuo follows more or less willingly, such as when he carried Keita on his back to find the girls during the summer festival.

During the School Trip, Katsuo mentioned how he's able to differentiate the twins even with their hair down by the length of their hair.

It was revealed in chapter 29 that he has feelings for Keita but was unable to properly express them when Keita confessed to him during the Kyoto trip. After the two of them pretend to date in order to drive Amu away, Katsuo confesses his true feelings and asks Keita to date him for real. He accepts, and the two of them begin dating in secret so that their other friends won't feel awkward around them.

As of chapter 37, Katsuo seems worried that his relationship with Keita hasn't advanced much since they started dating.

### Maiko Narabuko

They don't seem to have an especially deep relationship, although they both care about Keita in their own way.

### Seraphina Klein

Katsuo was the only person blunt enough to tell Seraphina her speech was weird, which made her cry. Despite this, it doesn't seem as if Seraphina thinks any ill of Katsuo. They're both part of the dumb trio, having to take summer classes to make up for their failing grades. During the summer classes chapter, Katsuo was shown to care about Seraphina's wellbeing, as he noted that her giving Keita her umbrella would just leave her without anything.

### Mayu Kurumato

Katsuo defeated Mayu during the Survival Game, which caused her to become scared, but also resentful of him. When they met during the School Trip, Mayu was surprised when Nene was able to see Katsuo as well. However, during the Beauty Contest, it was revealed that Mayu held a grudge against Katsuo for defeating her, and wanted to win against him. Despite this, Katsuo didn't remember what he'd done to make her resent him, but she defeated him nevertheless. At the end of the battle, Katsuo asked her how he could become strong like her, showing he's grown from not minding her to respecting her strength.

### Amu Kiyuu

Katsuo seems to be rather neutral towards Amu, although he didn't appreciate it when she confessed to him. She could be seen as the reason Katsuo told Keita his real feelings, but he doesn't seem to have any strong feelings towards Amu herself.

## Gallery

The beginning of an eraKatsuo and Akie, winners of the second popularity pollKatsuo during the beach episodeKatsuo blushingKatsuo in chapter 25's coverKatsuo shirtlessKatsuo blushing
## Trivia

* His surname literally means "Is a friend". His name comes from the word "katsu", which means "victory, win".
* It was revealed in the 2016 Christmas Special that he has a dog named Ran.
* Although he seems to have a talent for all kinds of sports, he is most interested in tennis. He used to be a part of the tennis club in middle school, and when asked about who he looked up to the most, his answer was Spanish tennis player Rafa Nadal.
* Katsuo is similar to Tobio Kageyama, from the anime Haikyuu!!, both in appearance and in personality, as well as being introduced originally as a rival but becoming friends with the protagonist.
* In the first anniversary popularity poll, Katsuo won first place along with Akie.
* Erbez has said that Katsuo is the character they enjoy drawing the most out of the main cast.
* According to his character information page, he's surprisingly good with kids, thanks to him being the oldest of five children.
* He has a little collection of miniature cars he's had since he was a kid.
* He can't stand sitting down for two hours without moving his body somehow.