Saya

**Saya** is the secondary main character and central protagonist of *Saya no Uta*. She is voiced by Naoko Takano (credited as Midori Kawamura).

## History

**Spoiler warning: *Plot and/or ending details follow.***
### Origin

Saya was brought into this world via the experiments of Dr. Masahiko Ogai, a Japanese doctor working for the Tokyo University Hospital system. The method Dr. Ogai used to bring the creature that would come to be known as Saya is unclear and shrouded in mystery. It is more hinted that Saya was brought into this dimension by occult means rather than science due to the interaction with the character Ryoko Tanbo who had been hunting Dr. Ogai for some time. Although, the lines between the occult and science are blurred at times when Ryoko Tanbo starts reading Dr. Ogai's journal. Saya initially lived with Ogai as he did many experiments on her to determine what exactly he brought into this world. The creature showed signs of intelligence beyond human understanding as she was able to break many mathematical algorithms that no human or even computer had been able to break. Oddly though, the creature swiftly got bored and moved onto to other things. Dr. Ogai was quite surprised to find that the creature had an overwhelming passion for human literature and after reading through many novels the creature first started showing or developing signs of being feminine. Shortly after the creature started this trend, Dr. Ogai started referring to the creature as his daughter and the creature referred to him as its father. Ogai then gave the creature a name, 'Saya', which was the name of one of his childhood pets.

Like a father, Dr. Ogai began care for Saya deeply and in his journal he mysteriously wished in anguish that if only someone could find his daughter beautiful and give her affection as Saya began wanting deeply love and acceptance. Her avid reading habits had made her develop human-like emotions and almost like a child first understanding love she wished for it. Afterward, Ogai and Saya moved to his personal home in a Japanese suburb until Dr. Ogai mysteriously disappeared after going to work, leaving Saya alone. She survived on her own for a while until she decided to go out and find what happened to her father who worked at a local hospital.

### Fated Encounter with Fuminori

Saya lived within the hospital Fuminori was in at the time, feeding mostly on cats, other animals, and supposedly a human infant. She spent her time searching for information on her father and entertaining herself by scaring patients at night with her grotesque image. It was during one of these scares that Saya met Fuminori Sakisaka. Fuminori had survived a near fatal car accident and because of a new experimental operation that saved his life he saw and heard Saya as an ordinary human girl. The catch was that he saw everyone else as a horrific monsters and the whole world as hellish landscape of blood, gore, and monstrosities. Fuminori and Saya became very close and they began living together after Fuminori was discharged from the hospital. They spent most of their time trying to figure out Fuminori's odd mental condition which seemed to be an extreme and exaggerated form of Agnosia and having an unnerving amount of sex.

Saya cooked many dishes to see if Fuminori could stand to eat since his mental condition twisted his sense of taste as well. Later, through an odd series of events he discovered raw human flesh and organs tasted great to him, although at first he had no idea what he was eating as he found that Saya ate the same thing. Saya and Fuminori went onto kill and eat several people including their neighbors and one of Fuminori's friends, a woman named Omi Takahata. Saya even went as far to transform Yoh Tsukuba, another of Fuminori's friends, into one of her species, whose mind quickly shatters from the painful transformation. The reason for this action seemed to be threefold: sexual enjoyment for Fuminori, Saya's own jealousy of Yoh because of Yoh's crush on Fuminori, and was likely also a mere experiment she wanted to conduct to test her abilities.

Saya later tested her abilities on Fuminori's neighbor, Yosuke Suzumi, in an attempt to understand and fix Fuminori's mental condition. She ends up giving Yosuke the same mental condition as Fuminori, which results in him losing his sanity just as Yoh did, and raping Saya. Fuminori witnesses the scene, and kills Yosuke in a fit of rage, afterwards consoling Saya. Saya then offers to change Fuminori back to normal, having figured out his condition.

### Back to Normal Ending

If Fuminori accepts Saya's offer, Saya will kiss Fuminori for the last time and her tongue will slide up into his head, making him pass out.

When Fuminori wakes up, he discovers his mental condition has disappeared and Saya is gone. Fuminori realizes he was living as a cannibal, turns himself in, and is promptly thrown into a mental hospital. Saya visits him after some time, staying on the outside of his cell where they cannot see each other. Using a cell phone, Saya text messages him to say goodbye for the last time. Fuminori confesses his love for Saya, who cries, admitting she will be moving on to another world.

If the player refuses Saya's offer, the story will continue to the next set of choices.

### Koji Tonoh's Choice

Depending on the choice the player made for Koji Tonoh after he discovered the body parts of Omi Takahata in Fuminori's refrigerator, he can make a phone call to two people: Fuminori or Ryoko Tanbo. This choice dictates which two endings the player will get.

#### Humanity Wins Ending

If Koji calls Ryoko, the two confront Saya and Fuminori at the abandoned house they were staying at and holding the abomination that was once Yoh as a slave. Yoh is killed by a terrified Koji after begging for death. Fuminori and Koji begin fighting, but while Koji has the upper hand, Saya ambushes him from behind. Ryoko frees Koji by shooting Saya, tossing a canister of liquid nitrogen to Koji. Koji pours the contents of the container onto Saya, freezing most of her body. Fuminori, blinded by rage, charges at Ryoko and delivers a fatal blow to her left shoulder with his axe.

With her last ounce of strength, Ryoko fires her last shot at Saya, shattering the frozen portion of her body. Fuminori, now realizing Saya is beyond saving, commits suicide by continually bashing his face into his axe. Saya, with the last remaining strength she had, crawls in her damaged form to Fuminori, in an attempt to be with him one last time.

Koji survives, living the rest of his life with a broken mind. He is continuously tormented by nightmares of Yoh, Omi and Fuminori with the massive wounds they sustained at death, and seeing himself in these nightmares as a disfigured monster as well. Koji hallucinates conversations with Ryoko about both of their broken minds, contemplating how he'll manage to keep living. He purchases a single bullet for his revolver, in the hopes that when he is unable to carry on anymore, he can commit suicide, and find salvation in death.

#### Saya Wins Ending

If Koji calls Fuminori, he threatens him with the information he found out, including his cannibalism and limited knowledge on Saya and her species, Fuminori trying to kill him. This led down the storyline to Koji foolishly going alone to the abandoned house Saya, Fuminori, and Yoh were staying at. Yoh jumped him, crying out in a twisted voice asking Koji to kill her. He does so, but did not realize it was Yoh. He then was confronted by Fuminori, where they fought and Koji got a well placed hit to Fuminori's ribs and broke a few. Saya then dropped from the ceiling and tackled Koji, broke his neck, and devoured him.

Afterward, Saya started showing signs of being in pain which got Fuminori frightened. Fuminori consoled Saya but then at her behest they both went outside. She then bloomed like a beautiful and luminescent flower to Fuminori's eyes where she was hinted to have died in birthing her spores to infect the world and begin the process of changing all living creatures on Earth into her species. Whether or not Saya died in this process is uncertain, as well as Fuminori's fate. It is entirely possible that he is transformed as well.

In the epilogue, Ryoko has finished deciphering Dr. Ogai's journal and began transforming into one of Saya's species as the world falls into chaos. She cuts off one of her arms in an attempt to slow the transformation, but eventually comes to accept her fate.

## Personality

From Dr. Masahiko Ogai's observations in his journal, Saya's species mold their minds subconsciously to be as similar mentally to the dominant species of a given planet to be able to envelop them more efficiently. She came into this world only with the motivation to reproduce and turn all life on Earth into her species, everything else was produced later. However, the trait of her mind molding subconsciously by the inhabitants of a planet seems to work against her. Human emotion and logic goes against the goals of Saya's species and can impede her. In the **Back to Normal** ending of the game, Saya outright abandons her goal to convert Earth into her species out of heartbreak since she can no longer be with Fuminori as he would see her as a monster after she fixed his mind. Additionally, Saya lured Yoh Tsukuba to Fuminori's house to change mostly out of jealousy as well.

When she arrived on Earth she did not exhibit many defining personality traits or quirks unlike how the player sees her throughout the visual novel. She developed her distinct personality after being engrossed in human literature for many years. She has a kind heart toward Fuminori and behaves like she has the mentality of a super intelligent child or teenager as she plays, toys, and experiments with earthling life.

## Abilities

Saya is very resilient if not practically invulnerable, being able to survive multiple gunshots and other blunt force trauma attacks. However, severe damage such as having a large part of her body destroyed can kill her, but this required liquid nitrogen to freeze that part of her body first.

Her resilience comes with what her true body is described as by Dr. Ogai's journal, as being a fleshly like sponge or fabric that flexes and expands in all directions which she can control to allow her to move quick and precisely. This allows her to expend enough force to break Koji's neck and rend people open with ease. Her body's trait also allow her cushion and absorb attacks that would cripple most any human.

Saya is capable of modifying the bodies and flesh of any species she has samples of genetic material from which she must ingest to absorb the information. This power can get down to modifying a creature's actual genetic code or perhaps her entire ability's catalyst is based on her power to manipulate the genetic code. If Saya desires, she can completely unweave a creature's body, cells, and genetic code and change it into something else. Large amounts are needed for her to fully understand complex organisms so it takes her some time for her to perfect these abilities. Though this did not prevent her from experimenting on victims to test how far her abilities had developed.

Saya's greatest power is the ability to 'bloom' and envelop an entire world with 'spores'. These spores begin changing all life of that planet into her species. They do this similarly to Saya's ability to change the bodies and genetic code of living beings but on a global scale. The spores would act like a virus and change the genetic code of creature to mold it into one of Saya's species. To get to this point, Saya must go through a long and lengthy process of ingesting large volumes of genetic material from eating and absorbing many various creatures from a given world. Saya's species is then pre-programmed to expel themselves and 'bloom' once their body has processed enough of that planet's various creatures. It is unclear whether or not this ability kills Saya after she completes this process as the visual novel leaves on a cliff hanger after she blooms.

## Appearance

Saya appears to be an innocent young girl in Fuminori's eyes. (Although he quickly realizes this is not the case, he does not seem to care.) Her hair is a dark mint color, and her eyes are a bright piercing emerald. She wears a one-piece white dress with a long, thin purple bow and sandals.

Although her true appearance isn't seen in-game, the widely-accepted theory is that Saya is some variation of Eldritch Abomination.[1]