Kenta Saito

Mister Saito is a successful businessman living in central Tokyo, he lives with the general populace successfully.

## Appearance

Kenta is a large man. Very large by Japanese standards. A megre diet and regular exercise ensure that he's relatively slim. He has a well define physique, but it is normally hidden under a suit, or a loose shirt and slacks. The man adamantly refuses to wear tight clothing. His range of casual shirts ranges in style and colour. All of it is reasonably well fitting and tailored. He doesn't usually wear much ornamentation aside from the occasional tie, and a durable watch as a staple.

He has a blocky and defined face, although most of it is covered by a well kept beard that spans his cheeks, chin and upper lip. Both the beard and his head hair are jet black. He keeps the latter tied back, but a few strands always manage to bothersome fall across his eyes. Said eyes aren't exactly black, but many will claim they are if they find themselves in a stare down with the man. In that event, he also has a straight scar running horizontally with the ground below his eyes, and across the bridge of his nose.

## Personality

Kenta was brought up in a safe, small, town in the North of Japan. As such, he never had to experience the full weight of the CCG, nor the struggle to survive on Tokyo's streets. This lead to Kenta rejecting his ghoul aspects in all areas but feeding. His parents cared for him and his siblings, so he wasn't exposed to his kind's world until much later in life. Attributed to all this, is the way in which he generally goes about life. Kenta is an open, humble and benevolent person. He's happy to meet and chat with almost anyone, just for the sake of it. Unfortunately such openness can lead to him being a bit too obtuse for his own good. He has very little social filter in most scenarios, and often offends others easily. If there is a wrong thing to say in a situation, Kenta will be the one to say it.

Kenta sees himself as a philosopher first and foremost. His doubled majored at university in economics and philosophy. The former he followed for a career, the later for a hobby, but both with equal fervor. It is best not to let him run off on a rant about whatever philosophical topic takes his interest, as one could be stuck there for hours on end. He's morally opposed to killing, adamantly. He has never killed someone. If he has to fight, he'll try to incapacitate his foes, rather than simply going for the kill as most of his kind do. That's not to say that he's a saint though, not by any means. Kenta has a severe temper that can be sparked through a number of avenues, the simplest being causing him harm, or mentioning anything to do with his daughter. He's tenacious in regards to searching for her, and currently that is his only real goal.

Despite taking criticism and compliments with grains of salt, Kenta can be very boastful when he wants to be. If he's just landed a new contract, made a big deal, or his daughter has done something, anything, he will be happy to spend another's time talking away.

In his hobbies, such as racing, exercising and talking, Kenta can be very competitive. It dismays him that he can't compete in sports due to his physiology, so he got into racing to satiate his competitive drive. Naturally, a love for cars stems from such a passion, along side his affinity for literature and cinema.

## History

Kenta was born an raised in a small town in north Japan. It wasn't quite rural, but it was certainly far enough from the boot of the CCG that he and his family could live in relative peace. They were the only ghouls in the town, and managed to stay alive though blood donations and suicide victims. Kenta's mother was a nurse at the local hospital, and in that day it wasn't hard to fudge the books to explain a few missing bags of donated blood, or an amputated limb. As stated before, this lead him to mostly neglect his ghoul attributes. He learned how to fake eating human food at a young age, went to school, played sport, did well at sport, had friends, normal things. All in all it was a good childhood. Kenta's parents were kind people, and he got along well with his adopted siblings.

At 18 Kenta graduated High School, but he didn't go to university right away. Instead, he stayed to work with his father at their family buisness of construction. Eventually, after both his sister had left for larger cities and university, Kenta left also. He went to a smaller university on the outskirts of Tokyo. While not prestigious, it allowed him to stay out of the human/ghoul fray a bit, and allowed him to live off his savings. Food was the biggest problem. Kenta was certain that he didn't want to indulge any temptation for killing, but he knew that he would if his hunger worsened to that point. He lived on the edge for that first year. It didn't do any good to think about how his sisters were doing. He knew that they'd likely given into the instinct. What Kenta got by on was the scraps left by other ghoul murders and the few suicides he did find by stalking out hotspots. It was the roughest he'd ever had to live up until that point, and it would remain the roughest even once he was older.

What fished Kenta off that knife's edge was meeting the local ghoul gang. They'd tried to attack him in an alley, but had stopped once getting a better smell of him. Kenta had no idea that it was possible to smell other ghouls. They explained to him that they didn't want him hunting on their turf, but were surprised to find that he'd already been living there a year without hunting. Such morals had him become the joke of the local ghoul gangs. No one would acknowledge him aside from laughter. Not only was he a 'vegetarian', but he wasn't much good in a fight either. The took equal joy in both facts. Still, this ended up being a blessing in disguise. A small group eventually reached out to Kenta about his issue. They had a network of like minded ghouls, who subsisted off the kills of others, and gathering suicide victims. Obviously, Kenta joined. He had to provide services like turning up to turn showdowns to look big, or help with the body collection, but really it was a very good deal for him.

Unfortunately, this fell apart towards the end of Kenta's last year at university. In fact, the entire area fell apart. As turf wars became more prevalent, it was no longer safe to just be a ghoul. You needed a side. This also brought the CCG's attention down on the area, and suddenly Kenta had to avoid them too. He was lucky it was his last year. He wouldn't have lasted another. Kenta was quite aware of this, and so decided to make the move to central Tokyo. Some of his ghouls friends called him mad. They might have been right. Kenta's reasoning was that he'd rather deal with pretending to be human to get around the CCG, than trying to navigate ghoul politics. Contrary to the belief of his friends, it worked. Kenta was able to get a job working for a small consultancy firm, and went right into saving up capital. It turned out that there was very little suspicion of one being a ghoul if one lived peacefully in a ghoul free environment. That wasn't really his only reason for moving there though. Kenta had befriended another ghoul within the group who happened to be an anatomy student at year ahead of himself. Together they formulated a plan on how they would feed themselves, after the collapse of their organization. Being a year ahead, Kenta's friend had already secured a position working in the morgue of a hospital in the 2nd ward. Their arrangement worked out to his friend cutting off both arms of a cadaver before they were cremated. He would then smuggle those out, and sell one to Kenta for a fee to cover the risk. They kept the scheme between themselves for years after that.

In those years, Kenta would enjoy success after success. He eventually left his job at the firm to enter into venture capitalism at the age of 27. His assets grew exponentially year after year through smart investments and stock trading. He slipped up a few times in regards to straying too close to other ghouls, but he stayed in safe circles for the most part. It was in this period of time that Kenta conceived his child with then girlfriend Hakura. They broke up shortly after, but she still had the child. Kenta was just 25 at the time, she was 21. Ghouls have no access to civil services to allocate visitation rights and other such things, so Kenta found himself having to pay Hakura to visit his daughter, Heisha. Unbeknownst to Kenta, Haruka was part of a ghoul supremacy movement known as Aogiri tree for many years. She always remained a low ranking member, but had joined 2 years after having the child, and remained indefinately afterwards. Kenta hated her mother and loved his daughter in equal proportions. He never learnt about Aogiri, nor how his daughter was being half raised in their care. Whenever he'd visit he'd take toys, presents, coffee treats, anything he could that he felt made their time more meaningful. His biggest fear was her not knowing him, or being taught to hate him by her mother.

That fear was never realized. When Heisha was 4, she loved both her father and mother. Kenta and Hakura made sure to have their fights well out of earshot of the girl. Kenta wanted to take her in and provide for her, teaching her to not become a killer. Hakura took this as an affront to her own way of life, and was adamant in that she wanted to raise their daughter to be a 'proper ghoul'. Slowly, the fear of the CCG overshadowed whatever fears he had about her mother teaching her wrongly.

Kenta hadn't wanted to believe it when he'd approached their house in the 21st ward to find police and CCG cars parked outside. Investigators and police officers had swarmed the place like wasps. He saw the body of Hakura and stood there in shock, hidden by the rest of the crowd that had gathered. From what he'd heard, she hadn't put up much of a fight. Had he not been in such shock, Kenta probably would have rushed those officers and died for it. What kept him back after the shock was a small bit of hope. He never saw Heisha's body. She would have been 8 at the time. From that point on, he dedicated all his time to trying to find anything that might confirm she lived. Anything. He didn't find anything.

That event was in March 2016. Kenta hasn't lost any of his fervor, but he's tempered it to embers in the coals. He keeps up outward human appearances for safety, maintains his portfolio for income, and keeps up with hobbies for his sanity, but every night he scours the city digitally and physically for any indication that Heisha wasn't killed in that CCG raid.

## Powers and Abilities

**High strength:** This is more due to his frame and constant use of the gym, rather than excess consumption of human or ghoul flesh. Kenta can outperform most any human in feats of strength, and holds his own with other similarly experienced Koukakus. He has no problem using his heavy blade.

**Skilled driver:** Through racing most weekends, Kenta has built up both an impressive collection of cars, and the ability to drive them impeccably. He's not at the level of professionals, but he's close. He's won a number of semi-pro races.

**Durable:** Although his regeneration is nothing fantastic, due to both his kagune type and low mass of eaten meat, Kenta has quite the thick skin. Punches that would cripple humans bounce back as if hitting metal. He's taken peperings of Ukaku shards in the past, and was still able to go on to fight effectively. He also has impressive reserves.

**Aikido Black Belt:** Aikido was one of the sports that Kenta took part in in school, and one he continued throughout adulthood. He made it to the first level of a black belt, but didn't progress any more for fear of being found out as a ghoul. It is primarily a defensive martial art.

**Combat:**

**Strengths:** As stated above, Kenta is both abnormally strong and durable. He can deal out equal punishment to any he takes, and still have the stamina to press on. Racing also provides him with fantastically tuned reflexes. While these reflex arcs aren't tuned to combat, they're still helpful for responding to threats quicker than most.
**Weaknesses:** Kenta is not an experienced fighter. He prefers to find a verbal solution before a physical one. He's been pressed into fights in the past, but overall his experience is far, far less than most ghouls. He's not particularly fast, nor very skilled with offensive martial arts. He's never properly applied Aikido in a battle against either ghouls or investigators. He has an injury to his left knee that often means it's hard for him to respond to attacks coming from that side. He also eats relatively little for a ghoul, limiting his regeneration and kagune growth.
## Kagune

**Type:** Koukaku

**Appearance:** Silver in colour, with a sheen like steel, Kenta's Kagune forms across his right arm like medieval plate armour. It his hand, it transitions into a short and thick blade, and forms a small handle underneight for grip.

**Strengths:** Kenta's kagune is extremely durable for his rate, and provides good defence for the right side of his body.

**Weaknesses:** It has a very short range, and the blade is tied to the movement of his forearm.

**Mechanics:** With focus, Kenta can extend and retract the blade portion of his armoured arm. This can have enough force to piece ghoul flesh.

## Relationships

 Haruna Suzuki | Haruna was the information broker who Kenta met when looking for information on Aogiri. She was Kenta's first view into the reality of a ghoul's life, and humbled him by being so willing to share information about her past. She offered to help Kenta look for his daughter, citing the fact that she would like to write about it.

## Trivia

* Kenta often bakes and brings it to his neighbors, since he cannot eat it himself

* He can do a cartwheel

* He has a pet crow that rides on his shoulder

* He is a coffee snob, but doesn’t actually know anything about coffee

* Kenta has excellent penmanship, learnt in high school

* He can play guitar with both left and right handed, but he is not ambidextrous

* In an effort to get closer to his daughter, Kenta learnt how to style and braid a girl's hair

* His lips become chapped easily