Hazama

**Hazama** (ハザマ), also known by his extended codename **Hazama Honoka** (ハザマ＝ホノカ),[2] is a former captain of the World Void Information Control Organization’s Intelligence Department. In reality, he was an artificially created human designed to be originally the host vessel for Yūki Terumi. He originally appeared as a non-playable character in the Story Mode of *BlazBlue: Calamity Trigger*, but starting with *BlazBlue: Continuum Shift*, he became a playable character.

## Appearance

Hazama’s appearance is taken after the shady, creepy archetype. He is depicted with bright green hair and an ever-present smile with his eyes closed, belying a demonic nature. He wears a simple black suit with a white shirt underneath, short brown gloves, and brown steel-toed shoes (that conceal hidden knives at their heels). He dons a pair of black trousers held up by two brown belts. He completes the outfit with a black fedora hat to close the shady visage. When allowing Terumi to take over his form, he removes his hat and tie, his hair spikes upward, and he opens his eyes, which are gold with snake-like slits for pupils. His smile also becomes that of a psychopathic killer.

In *Centralfiction*, he later reveals he has a cracked hole on his left side of his chest (as a result from the wound from Trinity in *Chronophantasma*), which is shown to be completely hollow which also hints at his nature as a mere vessel made of Blue Grimoire.

His appearance also changes to how Terumi’s hair is styled whenever he takes over Hazama’s body, though after the events of *Chronophantasma*, Hazama himself is still able to invoke his appearance during anything that involves Terumi’s powers despite the two being separated.

## Personality

Hazama maintains a calm and quiet demeanor around most people, pretending to be harmless as a member of the Intelligence Department. He claimed to hate fighting and preferred to avoid conflict. This, however, was simply a guise to his true nature. When people saw through it, he showed his true colors as selfish and manipulative; destroying other people’s lives and twisting their beliefs for his own gain. He has no qualms with killing those who get in his way and shows absolutely no remorse for his actions.

He is shown to be just as cruel and detached as Terumi himself, working in sync with him with almost no problems and taking just as much pleasure from the suffering of others as he did. Hazama takes every opportunity to upset others by mocking them, deliberately provoking them, or even bringing up and prodding at a sensitive topic; all for his own enjoyment. Even when he was on the losing side of a conflict, he would take the time to insult and taunt his foes.

His cruelty seems to be born as a result of the fusion with Terumi, as he only has his nice demeanor in *Centralfiction*. It’s revealed that while he still retains his trickster persona as he had his memories all along, though he has his own desires different from Terumi’s and wants to become his own entity. It’s still shown that while he is still sadistic he is more subtle and simply manipulates people into doing his biding until they stop being useful to him. His desires are more different in that unlike Terumi who wants a world ravaged from the true meaning of despair, which later develops into a masochistic-ish desire to understand the meaning of pain (both inflicted on himself and on others) in order to feel alive partly due to the near-fatal wound inflicted onto him by Trinity.

Oddly enough, akin to Terumi’s initial vessel Kazuma Kval, Hazama shares the latter’s love for boiled eggs.

## Powers and Abilities

In battle, Hazama wields the Arch-Enemy Event Weapon named Snake Pair: Ouroboros; a steel hook crafted in the shape of a snake that he summoned in front of him, attached to a chain of green/black energy, which he could use to attack opponents from afar, or reel them in, as well as zip around the battlefield quickly, if not instantly, and close gaps between him and his foes. On the other hand, he also uses Balisong-style butterfly knives for close-range attacks, along with having hidden knives that stick out of his shoes’ heels. Most of his attacks are similarly based on summoning green/black energy and serpentine apparitions to attack his foes, with his Astral Heat being a gigantic cobra of green energy composed of many smaller snakes. Outside of his Magic Formula prowess, Hazama is incredibly nimble and flexible, his moves vaguely reminiscent of dance techniques. Hazama also knows a Magic Formula which allowed him to summon his fedora out of nowhere, which to him often came in handy whenever he lost it in battle.

He possesses Bleu Grimoire, which is revealed to be his whole body being made from it. When activated, a large magical circle known in his Overdrive as **Jörmungandr** (ヨルムンガンド *Yorumungando*) enveloped him, slowly sapping away vitality of anyone who steps inside. Also, Ragna was unable to use his own Blue Grimoire, as Terumi/Hazama have extreme knowledge of it to the point of being able to shut down other Grimories. This was until Ragna absorbed Lambda’s Idea Engine to bypass such a law and render Terumi/Hazama’s grimoire useless in the same manner.

Hazama’s Drive is **Ouroboros** (ウロボロス *Uroborosu*), utilizing his Event Weapon’s namesake to soar around the battlefield using his weapon to pull him in, regardless of whether or not Ouroboros has made contact, in order to make up for his lack of long range or projectile attacks. Above his Heat is a counter for his Ouroboros that determines how many times he can pull himself in (3 at max). Though it usually recharges after two seconds, he can get some back by simply hitting the opponent with the weapon and allowing it to click a second after it lands. However, the chain itself tends to lose its potency the further away it contacts its target from Hazama’s firing point.

Hazama’s Bleu Grimoire also carries the same weakness that Ragna’s Blue Grimoire does: Celica Ayatsuki Mercury’s magic element-nullification shuts it down by merely being within his presence. However, as Hazama’s entire body is made from the grimoire, the effects are much more potent. He becomes almost crippled, and while he still retains the ability to fight, his power is nowhere near the level it normally is.

## TMNT X Pokemon

Hazama likes to manipulate his members to do what he says. He even manipulate Karai to attack Leo

## Trivia

Naming
* “Hazama” (狭間) is Japanese for “loophole”. However, when using kanji 挟問 (*hazama*), it gains the meaning “narrow space”, which is a place in the Boundary.
* His technique naming-motif is snakes, which also parallels his nature that nods to how snakes are negatively portrayed in most forms of mythology and media. Terumi also follows this motif as well.
* Hazama’s Drive name, “Ouroboros”, refers to either a serpent or a dragon. The Ouroboros is usually represented by a snake biting its own tail, symbolizing infinity or a never-ending cycle. This image is also shown in Hazama’s crest. His Overdrive is called *Jörmungandr*, which references the Jörmungandr of Norse mythology that grew large enough to bite its own tail, signifying the worlds end if it ever let go. Coincidentally, the symbol of Jörmungandr looks somewhat similar to the top half of Hazama’s crest, Ouroboros (and the aura surrounding Hazama also moves in a slow cycle). Tying into this, Hazama and Terumi also have other snake-based references:
	+ His and Terumi’s two Distortion Drives,**Orochi Burensō** and **Orochi Burensen** are a clear nod to the Yamata-no-Orochi of Shintō mythology.
	+ His other Distortion Drive **Mizuchi Rekkazan** (蛟竜烈華斬), references the jiāolóng/mizuchi aquatic deity of Chinese origin, which is also usually used as a Japanese term for either a rain dragon or hidden genius.

Appearance
* In the anime, it is shown that the serpent apparitions Hazama summons in-game are actually Ouroboros coated with dark energy.
* In *Centralfiction*, Hazama’s hair no longer spikes up after performing his Astral Heat, nor does he remove his hat, all due to no longer Terumi possessing his body.

Other
* Hazama’s birthday falls on the International Dance Day, a reference to the fact some of his sprite movements and one of his alternate color palettes are based on Michael Jackson.
	+ April 29 was also celebrated as the Greenery Day from year 1989 to 2006.
* Hazama has been described by the creator, Toshimichi Mori, as “having no redeeming quality”.
* During the extra scene from the Arcade Mode of *BlazBlue: Continuum Shift II*where he unleashes Mu-12, he is briefly voiced by Spike Spencer.
	+ In all new scenes in *BlazBlue: Continuum Shift Extend*, he is voiced by Doug Erholtz.
* Noel commented that Hazama likes to swallow his hardboiled eggs whole rather than eating them. This is in line with Hazama’s snake-like tendencies. This habit was shown in the *BlazBlue: Alter Memory* anime.
* As of *BlazBlue: Centralfiction*, Hazama no longer has special interactions with people related to Terumi due to Terumi becoming a separate entity from him despite the fact that *Nightmare Fiction* still plays for his matches with Ragna even though they no longer have the same animosity from the previous games.
* Hazama is the one of two characters who enjoys Noel’s cooking, as seen in her *gag ending*, the other being Mai Hazuki.
* Although Hazama gets his *bad ending* by losing to Jin, he must lose to Ragna to get his *Help Me, Professor Kokonoe!* section in *BlazBlue: Continuum Shift*.
* Relius had to “kill” Terumi to get him to appear in ghost form and later infiltrate Takamagahara. This can lead to the assumption that Terumi must be run out of his body by injury, or otherwise have it rendered inaccessible for him to appear in ghost form.
* Hazama’s dislike for cats is often referenced in the omake segments of the series, while during his gag ending in *BlazBlue: Continuum Shift* and for one of the gag endings in *BlazBlue: Chronophantasma*, it is revealed that he is actually allergic to them (this also extends to any other cat-based entity).
	+ Terumi himself however, is not affected by this, as this allergy still applies to Hazama as shown with his encounters with Taokaka in *BlazBlue: Centralfiction*’s arcade mode.

Appearances in other media
* *TrolololHazama* was a Zen United/Arc System Works Europe prank created for the European release of *BlazBlue: Continuum Shift II*. Before the release, there was a site with a *BlazBlue: Continuum Shift II* News Countdown (which is now offline) and in the source code of the site there was a *ultimateblazbluenews.html* link. Under the link can be found a YouTube video with a Hazama-styled *Trollface* and a flashing *NICE TRY* caption.
	+ The background music is Zen United/Arc System Works Europe’s version of the song *I Am Glad, ’Cause I’m Finally Returning Back Home*, which was originally performed by Eduard Khil. This version lacks vocals and the music is in a chiptune style.
* Hazama is one of several characters, namely Ragna, Jin, Rachel, Hakumen and Platinum, who are playable in *Lost Saga*.