Akako Ogawa

(Non-cannon)

Akako's working attire

**Akako Ogawa** (小川 紅子 *Ogawa Akako*) is a demon hunter, serving under the Demon Slayer Corps and secretly following the orders of the member of twelve kizuki.

## **Appearance**

Akako is a short, frail woman with two stitched wounds on her face. Her lips are painted red, while her nails are covered with red and white nail polish, matching the beads on her red, cherry blossom hairpin. She appears to be in her middle to late twenties. Her eyes are dark brown, similar to her medium long, wavy hair, which is mostly styled in a bun.

Akako's uniform is designed as a dress coat with a capelet, decorated with a small, white bowtie on its collar. She is usually seen wearing a gradient, floral, maroon haori over her uniform, in order to keep her sword concealed.

Akako wears couple of white belts, one of which is merely there as an accessory, while another is used for carrying sword's sheath and a small, white waist bag, where she stores her tools.

With her uniform, Akako often wears black, knee-high boots with white shoelaces.

## Personality

Akako appears to be prone to zoning out randomly, which is a result of using escapism as a coping mechanism too often, during her rough childhood. It heavily interferes with her daily life, as she keeps forgetting things and getting lost during missions, much to her sarcastic crow's amusement.

Akako usually keeps to herself, rarely initiating a conversation, unless it is crucial. For the most part, she is laid-back, apathetic and expressionless, rarely ever experiencing any intense emotions, especially when it comes to positive feelings. Anxiety, fear and anger are the most common emotions for her.

Despite appearing quiet, shy and polite, sometimes only a slight push is all what it takes for Akako to go on a rampage, revealing her massive anger issues and the trait to hold grudges for a long time, waiting for the perfect opportunity for revenge.

Akako's rebellious nature has little to no sense of loyalty towards any communities, she prefers to favor specific individuals over groups. She does not seem to have much respect for traditions either, as she refused to accept the idea of an arranged marriage and get stuck with the person she would not love.

Her usual, reserved attitude seems to disappear during the team missions, when she initiates taking charge as a strategic fighter, giving orders to everyone, including higher ranking demon hunters, which causes their deep irritation. Akako also shows to have rather competitive nature, always trying to perform and look better than others.

Around her love interest, Akako appears to be attentive, sweet, gentle and caring, always ready to pamper him as much as she can, nearly worshipping him like a deity. Akako's deep feelings can be alarming in multiple ways, including the times when she becomes extremely jealous without any solid reason, revealing her unhealthy possessiveness and threatening to hunt him down and behead him, if he will take interest in anybody else. Whether or not she is truly capable of hurting the man she loves, is a mystery for Akako, whatsoever, which she does not want to unfold.

## Breathing style

Mist breathing, first and third forms only, since the other forms require speed, which she lacks greatly, at least in her legs.

## Equipment and fighting style

Akako carries standard nichirin sword of an uncommon maroon shade.

After failing to master breathing techniques, due to having weak lungs, Akako came up with an idea to wear a corset under her clothes, in order to adjust the way she breathed, until she would do it right, which made her the first ever demon hunter to master breathing style artificially, rather than being naturally skilled or giving up on trying. Eventually, Akako got used to breathing properly, thanks to her corset and she even mastered total concentration breathing, without ever realizing it.

To compensate for her weak body and low speed, which prevents her from using more than two forms of her breathing style, Akako carries poisoned darts arrows in her waist bag. Unlike the famous insect pillar, Akako has no apothecary skills to concoct strong poisons, so she merely crushes wisteria flowers and coats her arrows with their liquid. These weapons are incapable of taking demon's life, however, they can be used for paralyzing enemy for a moment, which can be crucial for Akako, who has no chance of catching up with demon's movements, otherwise. Her strategy consists of laying traps or waiting until the enemy is very close to its potential prey and striking when it is overcome with hunger, unable to detect the hunter, approaching. Akako's colleagues strongly disapprove of her risky methods and believe that the weaklings like her are better off, quitting.

## History

Akako was born in Tokyo suburbs, in a family of a traveling merchant and a foreign translator. She was still little, when her father left home, remarrying another woman and never contacting his old family ever again. Her mother often took her anger out on Akako, seeing her as nothing but a burden that reminded her of the man who left them.

Regardless of hating her house with a burning passion, Akako scared away her suitors after growing up, refusing to stick with a wrong person, believing that it would be even worse than living with an abusive parent. Akako was determined to find another way to get away from home, however, earning money did not seem to be her strong point.

One night, their house was attacked by a female demon, who was in hurry to find a shelter from the rising sun.

Akako tried saving her mother, attacking intruder with a kitchen knife, believing that she was a serial killer, responsible for the disappearances that began to occur in their area lately, as Akako was not the one to believe in myths and legends. Seeing that the enemy instantly regenerated each wound, Akako finally realized that the invader was not a human. Luckily for her, the demon talked too much, so Akako figured out, that she could defeat her opponent by raising curtains and letting sunlight illuminate the room, as sun had already risen by now.

The demon was already disintegrating, when two young slayers arrived, voicing their regrets for not making it in time to save Akako's mother and praising her for defeating the demon on her own, despite being an unsuspecting civilian. Hearing a compliment about having a potential to become a demon hunter, Akako initiated joining them, hiding her real motive from everyone.

Akako was determined to track demons and learn more about them, in order become immortal like them by any means, even if it meant turning into a demon herself.

She spent two years, experimenting on relatively weak demons she managed to capture alive, convincing headquarters that she researched enemy's weaknesses to destroy them easier, keeping her true plans secret to avoid execution. Eventually, Akako had to give up, admitting that after all this time, her research was completely fruitless.

Akako grew extremely frustrated, deciding to quit her job as a demon hunter and at least live as long as her mortal lifespan would allow, without risking her life weekly, but she failed to find another stable job. Having no other choice, Akako continued her work as a demon hunter, her heart filled with envious rage at the sight of the demons, not understanding what they did to deserve immortality more than her. Akako found a new goal, becoming a pillar and earning enough income to finally enjoy a luxury life.

Returning from another assignment without her crow, after he flew away to report Akako's successful mission to headquarters, Akako lost her sense of direction, as she expected. Aimlessly wandering around in a desperate search of her way back home, Akako heard noises, following them just to find a demon, preying on the wounded civilian.

Akako hid herself, waiting for the perfect moment to strike, though, by each passing minute, she found herself more and more captivated by the beauty of her target, to the point that she was tempted by the idea of kidnapping him like her former test subjects, only to preserve him and keep him safe from the other demon hunters.

Approaching the charming demon, she was petrified to learn that her attractive target was none other than Enmu, the most powerful lower moon. Akako lost the hope of surviving his attack, however, she put up a better fight than she would expect from herself, against the strongest opponent she ever faced, without any preparations. Enmu barely managed to put his opponent to sleep, deciding to give her a happy dream, in order to let her guard down, until her spiritual core would be destroyed. He was utterly shocked to learn that he played major part in her dream, as her love interest.

Akako managed to escape dream world once again, however she ended up dropping her sword, after she noticed huge grasshopper on her weapon. Assuming that the hunter was completely disarmed now, Enmu approached Akako, planning to toy with her, before devouring her. After a moment of hesitation, Akako paralyzed him temporarily, using the remaining poisoned darts arrows from her waist bag.

She picked up her sword, returning to her paralyzed enemy to behead him, but failing to do so and walking away, after commenting that it would be a shame to deprive world of such beauty. Just as she feared, demon regained his movements before she could go far enough, however, he decided to leave her alive this once, for returning her favor and retreat, since sunrise was nearing. He threatened to rip her apart, if she would try to follow him.

One month later, their paths crossed again. After saving Enmu from one of her colleagues, Akako finally gathered enough courage to ask him out on a date, staring down at the ground as she expected to hear him laugh. Much to her surprise, he agreed, with one gruesome condition: If she wanted to see him again, she had to become his undercover agent and fulfill his orders, until she would eventually detect the location of headquarters and report it to Enmu. Akako was terrified by his offer, knowing that it meant risking getting executed. After taking very long time to think, in the end, she was unable to reject his offer, accepting the fact that she would do nearly anything, just to be with him. She did not pay much mind, when he said that if she helped *that man* to find headquarters, he could have rewarded her with his blood, realizing that those words were most likely said for convincing her, knowing how long she sought immortality. Akako easily saw through Enmu's lies, manipulation and desire to end her life, but she chose to serve him faithfully, either way.

She continued working for Enmu, until he met his demise by the hands of other demon hunters. Hearing about his defeat, was beyond devastating to Akako. She never expected him to die before her, despite being so sly, strong and careful. Blaming herself for not being by his side, when he needed her help most, Akako lost her control from grief and hatred towards every demon hunter, assaulting the group of her colleagues in a blind rage and taking most of them by surprise, massacring all of them but the last man of the group, who managed to execute her on the spot and leave her for dead, mortally wounded.

Fortunately for Akako, her dying body was found by Muzan Kibutsuji, who saved her life by turning her into a demon, hoping to use her strong craving of revenge against their mutual enemies.

## Relationships

### Shou

Sarcastic, old, male crow companion of Akako, who likes annoying his human ally, eating treats, whining, playing simpler table games and getting belly scratches, without admitting. Akako is deeply irritated by him sometimes, but she still pampers him like he were her son.

### Nameless traveling merchant

Akako's negligent father. She does not remember him often, but when she does, she is not think of him very highly or fondly.

### Nameless mother

Akako continuously faced verbal abuse from her mother, occasionally, it would turn into physical violence as well. Considering everything, Akako did not take too long to move on from her death.

### Shion

Publically, Akako's boyfriend. Another servant of Enmu, who is solely used for escorting Akako to his hiding spot, without any suspicions arising about her occasional disappearances, or her crow initiating to follow her around everywhere.

### Enmu

Akako's secret ally, master and enemy. His original plan was to manipulate Akako and use her, before eventually taking her life, but their bond seemed to grow unexpectedly strong after time, causing him to get mildly attached to the puppet he controlled. Without admitting it to himself, Enmu kept coming up with the excuses to delay devouring her, until he eventually ended up dying sooner than her, unable to harm Akako in the end, due to his lack of motivation to destroy his favorite spy.

Akako was strongly infatuated with him, since the moment she laid her eyes upon the pretty demon, wondering if he was beauty itself, incarnated. She hoped her feelings would fade soon, however, much to her horror and dismay, she could not help falling for him more and more.

## Trivia

* Among her colleagues, Akako is known as a Crazy Scientist, due to her past experiments on demons, even if they had no idea about the extent of her true madness. Akako is not sure, if she feels insulted or flattered by this alias, whatsoever; as she does not even have close to satisfactory scientific knowledge.
* Akako got her scars from a random female demon, when she got too careless during a mission, not realizing that paralyzed target partially regained her movements.
* Akako prefers to avoid crowded places, especially the ones that are filled with her judgmental colleagues (such as the Butterfly Mansion or The House with the Wisteria Family Crest), unless she is seriously injured and unable to afford staying at the hospital, with her modest, Tsuchinoto income. That was the reason she allowed the random old lady she saved, to treat her wounds for showing gratitude. As a result, her scars lingered on her face way longer than they should have.
* She was very insecure about her stitched face, until her demon crush told her, that he liked seeing her broken. Even though it was more of malicious teasing than a compliment, Akako grew to love her scars after that evening.
* Her MBTI type is INFP.
* Akako does not have Demon Slayer Mark.
* Her blood type is unknown, however, she definitely is not a marechi. That being said, due to her trait of eating only the most delicious food, despite her low income, her taste is still somewhat exceptional to demons.