Reika Hakurai

Reika Hakurai is one of the main characters of Mai Ball, along with Mai Miyano. She is a first-year student at Kijiyama North High School, and is a centre-forward for the girls' football team**.** Reika is the founder of the team and club captain.

## Background

Reika first comes across Mai and Kunimitsu training in the local park. She has long admires Kunimitsu given his footballing ability, and initially disliked Mai due to her closeness to Kunimitsu. Reika plans to become Kijikita Boys'  coach to get closer to him, however she is turned down by Ryuzu Mishio, the current coach. Therefore, even though she had only been playing for two months, she made her own girls team to be able to play in front of him.

## Appearance

Reika has long, flowing silver hair and sharp hazel eyes. She wears white and red boots, and ties a red ribbon in her hair. Socially, she prefers to wear modest and pure outfits. While she owns a lot of skirts, she is confident of being able to pull off any outfit. Also often wears a cap with a transparent visor when not playing.

## Personality

Reika has absolute confidence in her own abilities and hates to be beaten. She quite happily considers herself to be better than other people and will use such people to achieve her own goals. She constantly tries to improve, while expecting the same of her teammates. As captain, she is willing to lead from the front by example, and is happy to sacrifice herself for the good of the team. While she can be combative, especially with Mitsu, she can also be very warm towards her friends. She is absolutely in love with Kunimitsu, and her mood can change to be much softer when she is around him.

## Chronology

Reika holds trials for girls to try out for Kijikita Girls' FC, her brainchild team. After seeing Mai's footballing ability, especially her first touch when controlling hard passes, she approaches Mai to have her take a trial. Mai initially fails, however after pressure from Kunimitsu, Reika gives her a second chance to impress. Reika allows Mai to join the team after Mai scores against her, then proceeding to faint during one of her daydream fantasies, suitably impressed with her ability. She allows Kunimitsu to become coach of the team, and he decides that she will be the team's centre forward and captain.

*Main Article:* Kijikita vs. Kijinan I

After Mishio threatens to force Kunimitsu to leave his role as coach of the girls team in order to focus more on his own playing time, Reika arranges for Kijikita to play a friendly against Kijinan as the team's first ever game, on the condition that Kunimitsu can stay provided that Kijikita win. Reika scores a hat-trick against Kijinan even with Jaina Airi-Mishiki being subbed on, helping Kijikita to a 5-5 draw. Although Kunimitsu should have then been forced to resign, she manages to persuade the Principal and Mishio to allow him to stay.

Reika arranges for Kijikita to take place in the upcoming tournament, however warns that any player who fails an exam will be kicked out of the team. After seeing how useful Konori Shindou has been to Mai when helping her study, Reika woos her into becoming an assistant coach for Kijikita.

*Main Article:* Kijikita vs. Franklin

By half-time against Franklin, Kijikita go in 1-0 down at the break. As Kunimitsu is away playing for the boys team, the girls have to develop their own strategies. After Mai proposes that everyone play in a different position, Reika is the only player who does not change position, remaining as the centre forward. She does, however, suggest the 'genenpressing' strategy and her closing down is key to containing Franklin. Reika scores Kijikita's first official goal with an overhead volley from Yuika's high ball. Her constant running has a considerable impact on her, as she misses a quiet easy chance and later collapses due to lack of energy. Despite her exhaustion, she manages to pick herself up and continue running. She later fakes another collapses, tricking Ritsu Miyama into being closed down again by her teammates. This allows Kijikita to regain possession, and Rinka eventually scores to take the lead. Her and Mai's pressure on Dute Serbanov in the last minute of the game ensures that Franklin do not get the equaliser, allowing Kijikita to progress. She does pick up an injury in the process, which seems to affect her again in the game against Seririn.

*Main Article:* Kijikita vs. Seirin

Kijikita take a 5-0 lead against Seirin, with Reika notching a hat-trick with ten minutes to go. She pulls up with cramp a few minutes later, which may have been brought around due to excessive running both in this game and the previous game against Franklin, and her clash with Dute Serbanov. Yuika inspects her leg and decides it would be best to take her off the field. Despite Reika's protests, Kunimitsu agrees and has her subbed. Although a stretcher was called, Kunimitsu princess-carried her off the field, to the envy of her teammates. This event has an effect on the game, as the Kijikita players become distracted and concede four goals. Luckily, Konori shouts out that the carry “doesn't count.”  The girls then begin focussing again and see the game out to progress to the semi-final.

After the Seirin game, the team realise how dangerous it is to rely on Reika so much by having her be the “ringleader” of the team. Reika decides to hold another set of trials where each outfield needs to score three goals to progress, and the last player standing will be the new ringleader. Reika and Mai are the two players remaining, and with Reika 2-1 up, she forfeits due to fatigue, happy to stay on as the ringleader. She does, however, give up the captaincy to Mai so that she has slightly less responsibility. Mai's first act as captain is to bench Reika for the first half of the game versus Kuryuin to give her more of a rest, which Kunimitsu supports.

*Main Article:* Kijikita vs. Kuryuin

With Reika starting on the bench, Kijikita go 2-0 down to their opponents, largely due to the efforts of Amane Tatamaru and Mirai Takenou. After Reika is subbed on at half time, Kijikita get a better grasp of the game. She and Mitsu regularly combine to make progress up the field while chasing the two necessary goals to equalise. Kijikita eventually draw level, however Amane dives again to win another penalty, seemingly losing the game in the final seconds. However, with Amane's distractions with her own self-obsession, Reika further distracts her by laughing as she steps up to take the penalty. This plan works to perfection as Amane slips while taking the penalty, thus wasting the opportunity. Rinka quickly pounces on the ball, throwing it out to Reika who plays a long ball downfield to Chidori. Chidori, Mai, Mitsu and Kiiro then combine on the break to snatch the winner with the final play of the game. Despite Amane initially being disappointed with her mistake and Kuryuin's defeat, she becomes totally infatuated with Reika, even asking her to form an idol group with her.

On one of her days off after dispatching of Kuryuin, Reika is called out for the day by Amane, inviting her to a futsal tournament to play alongside herself and Mirai. Reika, not knowing that this was Amane's intention, initially tries to leave but eventually decides to stay after intervention by Mirai. In this match, Riria Konbaru's Kijiyama Unions, which is a team consisting of herself and four young boys, handily defeat Reika's team.

*Main Article:*Kijikita vs Kijinan II

Prior to the final versus Kijinan, Reika has to give Mai a pep talk and remind her of her duty to play well, so that she does not offend the teams that Kijikita had previously defeated, as she had been letting her nerves show before Reika's intervention. Despite effectively firing up her teammates with her talk before the game, Reika is unnerved by the sight of Riria starting in goal for Kijinan, and this continues to play on her mind as the game progresses.

With Kijinan racing into an early 3-0 lead and Kijikita struggling to threaten their opponents' goal, Reika changes the team's passing strategy to try and find any weak points in the Kijinan defence. While Kijikita conceded one of the three goals during this period, they manage to stop any further goals for the next half hour of play before half time. Kijikita's big gamble for the second half starts with moving their attackers back into defensive positions, leading to Reika man-marking Chizuru Asakuji. This plan works from the off, as Reika makes several blocks to deny Chizuru. Reika argues with Mai after she had been making excuses about the quality of their opponents, explaining her belief that due to her love for Kunimitsu, if she is beaten on the field, he is beaten too. Her exclamation of love for Kunimitsu and earnest smile invigorates Mai. Later in the game, Mai wins consecutive freekicks and advances Kijikita's position, her charge eventually coming to an end on the edge of the Kijinan box. Reika steps up to take the shot, but fools everyone by playing it short to Mai, who then wins a penalty following a foul by Jaina. Although Riria manages to deny Mitsu and then Kiiro on the rebound, Jaina ends up accidentally scoring an own goal after the ball bounces off her knee. With Kijikita now only 3-1 down, they grab the ball to kick off while they still have momentum, however Reika is shocked to see Jaina on the verge of tears following her mistake and thinks to herself that she must be hallucinating. Following a save by Rinka, Reika again denies Chizuru on the goalline, throwing herself in front of her point-blank header. Reika makes another key block when Jaina follows in on a rebound, getting her leg in the way of her vicious drive. Reika then plays a key part in Kijikita's second goal, picking up possession after Chidori stole the ball from Jaina. She charges towards the box, however, realising that she was about to be tackled, backheels the ball to Kiiro. Kiiro then shifts the ball to Mai, who fires under Riria to make it 3-2.

Desperate to equalise, Reika plots with Mai to have her make option runs nearby to Jaina, hoping to pull her or any other defenders out of position to create an opening. This eventually pays off, as a ball into Mai attracts the attention of both Jaina and Kijinan's left back, Shuuko Samejima, freeing up space on the right wing. Reika drifts into this position and receives the ball from Mai, hammering a volley into the top corner to make it 3-3. Following the equaliser, Kijinan take Riria out of goal and play her in her former #10 position, which worries Reika to no end, remembering how she had outclassed her while playing futsal. Reika battles with Jaina late on and even manages to fire a shot on target, however her opponent's brave block with her head clears the danger. Following another Kijikita gegenpress and a tackle on Jaina by Chidori, Reika manages to get another shot on goal, however the strain of the game has left her knees buckling and the shot is caught fairly easily by Kijikita's replacement goalkeeper. This proves to be disastrous, as the keeper quickly throws the ball out and following a long ball forward by Riria, Mia scores with the final kick of the game to win the tournament for Kijinan. Left exhausted by her efforts over the course of the game, Reika is unable to move from the position she shot from and remains stood there, albeit crying and wobbling, until Mai approaches her after the game.

After the one-year timeskip in the final chapter, Kijikita are taking on Franklin and are 2-1 down. Reika notches a goal following a pass from Mai with a fine volley low to Akira Tahara's right hand side, earning the plaudits of Kijikita's new first-year players Ee-chan and Maa-chan, who idolise her and Mai as Kijikita's “double aces.” Following the game, in the Miyano bathhouse, Reika is horrified to find that she has finally sunburned while playing football. While walking home with Mai, Reika reveals that had they won the final of the qualifiers, she would have confessed to Kunimitsu, and that she would also do so if they won the next one. She also revealed that she had also set herself ridiculous goals to achieve before confessing, such as scoring six goals in the first half, scoring from the centre circle with her eyes closed, and making Mai run for 15km during a game. Kijikita are shown to have reached the final again this year, once again facing Kijinan in the final. Reika and Mai lead their teammates out onto the field for one more showdown with the old enemy.

## Trivia

* She competed in many sports in middle school, including tennis, judo and gymnastics. She came second in the Under-15 tennis league.
* Reika achieved the best grades out of any of the first years at the school entrance exams.
* Her hobbies are playing sports and reading.
* She is in Class 1-A with Yuika, Kiiro, Mitsu and Yoko.
* Always wears long-sleeved kits so that she doesn't tan unevenly, as she would not want Kunimitsu to see her with sleeve tans.
* Chidori reveals that Reika has two dogs, which are the only things she truly loves apart from her teammates and family.
* Her family seem to have considerable influence, as they run a transport company, own a beachside resort and a hotel chain (where rooms are 30,000 yen a night). Mai has visions of the Hakurai group being a yakuza-like organisation.
* Reika can scare away cockroaches simply by glaring at them.
* Her favourite drink is assam tea, and cannot stand coffee.
* To the surprise of her teammates, she is good at singing modern idol songs at karaoke.
* Loves fried sushi rolls and fried tofu.
* She supports Liverpool FC and often watches football on the television at home with Chidori.

## Relationships

Kunimitsu Hasuga: Reika loves Kunimitsu both for his personal qualities and footballing ability. She does not hesitate to allow him to become coach of her team, and she always goes by what he says, even if she does not initially agree with it.

Mai Miyano: While she is initially wary of Mai given her closeness to Kunimitsu, she and Mai become close friends once she joins the team, even becoming quite sister-like.

Mitsu Kurodate: Reika and Mitsu both admire each other's play, and they form a lethal partnership while playing. However they often argue given that they are the two fieriest players on Kijikita.

Chidori Kakiha: Chidori and Reika are cousins and also live with each other, therefore naturally understand each other the best. Chidori becomes much more sociable when she is alone with Reika. They like to watch football together on the television.

Amane Tatamaru: After Amane becomes infatuated with Reika's style, skills and looks, she obsesses over her so much that she tempts Reika to play a game for her futsal team along with Mirai.  She also asks to create an idol group with her.