Kaoru Furushou

Name: Kaoru Furushou

Gender: Female

Affiliation: Yokosuka Girls' Marine High School, Blue Mermaid

Rank: Second-Class Safety Supervisor

Place of birth: Hiroshima City

Voice actress: Megumi Toyoguchi

Kaoru Furushou appears in the anime High School Fleet as the instructor assigned to the class of the main heroines.

She is also a senior to Mashiro Munetani.

She is portrayed as a caring teacher who watches over her students warmly.

At one point, she tells Akeno Misaki that she hopes she will become the kind of captain she wants to be.

During the training cruise, Furushou served as captain of the instructional ship Sarushima, an Independence-class littoral combat ship.

When Harekaze arrived late because of trouble in the engine room, she suddenly ordered an attack using the Mk.110 57 mm single rapid-fire gun.

This shocking action led to a battle with Harekaze.

Sarushima was eventually stopped and sunk by Harekaze's practice-head torpedo, though all crew members survived.

After the battle, Furushou reported to the Public Security Control Bureau that the students aboard Harekaze had mutinied against their instructor.

That report caused the situation surrounding Harekaze to spiral into a major crisis.

After Sarushima sank, she was left drifting at sea and remained unconscious until she was rescued and taken to a hospital.

Later, she was questioned by the Safety Supervision Office.

During questioning, she stated that she remembered giving the order to fire on Harekaze.

However, she was deeply confused because she could not explain why she had made that decision.

The same was true of the entire Sarushima crew.

They remembered following the captain's orders, but none of them understood why they had obeyed in that situation.

The ship's logs had also been erased, making it extremely difficult to determine what had happened.

Even so, Furushou's concern for her students and her regret over her own failure showed that she was fundamentally a good person.

Furushou is presented as a devoted and compassionate instructor.

She sincerely cares about her students and feels responsible when they are endangered.

Even after the Sarushima incident, she worries about the Harekaze class rather than focusing only on herself.

That combination of professionalism, kindness, and remorse makes her especially memorable.

Within the story, the exact cause of Furushou's abnormal behavior was initially unclear.

From the viewer's perspective, it was strongly suspected to be connected to the mysterious rat-like organism later identified in episode 8 as RATt.

It is therefore highly likely that she was suffering from some kind of mental disturbance caused by that organism.

This suggests that the attack was not an act of her own true will.

However, proving such a condition inside the world of the series would have been extremely difficult.

Demonstrating that a rat-like creature was responsible would have been even harder.

Because of that, Furushou and the others involved faced the possibility of punishment.

Their careers and futures could have been severely damaged if the truth was not established quickly.

The situation was already serious, and headquarters had warned that if the school could not resolve matters internally, the Blue Mermaid main force might be deployed for public order action, including the use of force.

On the other hand, this also implied that if the matter could be handled within the school, it might not be escalated further.

Since many similar abnormal incidents involving Blue Mermaid training ships were occurring elsewhere, Furushou alone was unlikely to bear all responsibility.

Still, the need to uncover the facts was urgent.

Eventually, the cause behind the Sarushima case and the wider series of incidents affecting Blue Mermaid training ships was exposed as the rat-like organism.

This was clarified through the efforts of Harekaze crew member Minami Kaburagi and one of Furushou's superiors, Mashimo Munetani, among others.

In episode 12, Furushou returns after recovering from her injuries.

She boards Tenjin, a sister ship of Sarushima, and comes to support Harekaze during the operation to rescue Musashi.

She leads Hiei, Maikaze, Hamakaze, and Admiral Graf Spee.

Her participation also carries the feeling of atonement for the earlier incident.

A small setting detail adds extra flavor here: both Sarushima and Tenjin are named after islands floating in the Pacific Ocean off Kanagawa Prefecture.

In the film version, Furushou reports to the captain and executive officer of Harekaze that the current captain of Hiei will be taking a leave of absence for medical treatment.

She also praises Mashiro Munetani's excellent ability and informs them that a request has been submitted for Mashiro to become captain of Hiei.

During this scene, the displayed academic record lists Mashiro's height as 160 cm, even though her setting materials give it as 159 cm.

This implies that she had grown slightly over the course of the story's timeline.

Later, when Yokosuka Harbor is blockaded because of pirates and the involvement of Susan Reyes, other Blue Mermaid ships are unable to depart.

Furushou conducts questioning of the rescued Susan Reyes.

She also shows unusual kindness by allowing Susan to meet Harekaze's captain and executive officer, even though such a meeting would normally not be authorized.

That moment highlights her flexible judgment and considerate nature.