Hyoma Kunato

Hyoma Kunato is a young exorcist who specializes in sealing sentient tools and objects called tsukumogami.

He belongs to the Saenome, a group tasked with containing these dangerous spirits.

He is part of the Kunato family, one of the Saenome’s three great houses, and is expected to succeed his grandfather Zouhei Kunato as head of the clan.

Hyoma is known for his intense hatred of tsukumogami, stemming from the brutal murder of his older brother and sister.

He moves into the Nagatsuki household under the pretext of guarding Botan Nagatsuki, a girl who carries the same type of soul as tsukumogami.

His time there forces him to confront his prejudice and better understand the very beings he has sworn to seal.

His voice actor in the anime adaptation is Tsuyoshi Otsuka.

Name: Hyoma Kunato

Gender: Male

Age: 21

(Other basic attributes such as height, weight, blood type, or birthday are not specified in the source text.)

Hyoma has the temperament of an old-fashioned warrior: serious, upright, and unwavering once he has made a decision.

He is strict with both himself and others, which can make him seem rigid and inflexible.

He tends to be misunderstood at first sight because of his sharp gaze and the scar on his left cheek, which give him a harsh look.

Despite this, he is fundamentally honest and sincere, not the intimidating delinquent he appears to be.

His speech is polite but stiff, and he refers to himself with the formal pronoun “myself.”

When he gets flustered or emotionally shaken, his way of speaking slips into archaic, period-drama-style phrasing, making him sound like a samurai out of time.

Hyoma is also somewhat socially awkward and unintentionally funny.

He often takes jokes literally and mistakes the kindness or consideration of others for special training or tests.

He is extremely stoic and hardworking, spending almost all his free time on physical training such as running and muscle workouts.

This relentless discipline reflects how he channeled his grief and rage over his siblings’ deaths into self-improvement and combat readiness.

Normally his facial expression barely changes, and he is not aware of how expressionless he looks.

When he finally smiles properly after making a solemn vow in front of Botan Nagatsuki, she has to point out that it’s the first time she has seen him really smile.

When facing tsukumogami that have harmed humans, his inner hatred surfaces, and his expression becomes terrifying, like a demon or berserk warrior.

The original manga depicts his wrath with especially intense, almost monstrous facial expressions, more extreme than the softened version in the anime.

As a child, Hyoma lost his older brother and sister, who had raised him like parents.

They were slaughtered in front of his eyes by a tsukumogami that was supposed to be under Saenome protection and attacked them by deceit.

This incident burned into him a deep loathing of tsukumogami as a whole.

Since then, he has believed that any tsukumogami that poses even a potential threat should be sealed on sight.

His grandfather Zouhei Kunato, however, prefers to avoid unnecessary violence and takes a more cautious, restrained approach to dealing with tsukumogami.

This sharp difference in ideology creates tension between them and drives much of Hyoma’s early character arc.

Seeing how extreme and one-sided Hyoma’s attitude has become, Zouhei intervenes.

He arranges for Hyoma to live in the Nagatsuki household, where tsukumogami coexist peacefully with humans, under the pretense of guarding Botan Nagatsuki.

Hyoma agrees to spend one year living with them.

His goal during this period is to properly understand what tsukumogami are, beyond his trauma-driven hatred.

By the age of 12, before he was officially recognized as a full Saenome exorcist, Hyoma was already fighting tsukumogami in real combat.

He threw himself into training and tsukumogami hunting, spending virtually all of his adolescence on honing his skills rather than normal youthful experiences.

At 18 years old, he achieved a feat that cemented his reputation.

He single-handedly destroyed Ouu no Onigawara, the “Demon Roof Tile of Ouu,” considered the strongest tsukumogami in the Tohoku region and on par with the famed “Three Great Tsukumogami of Kyoto.”

As a result, Hyoma bears numerous scars all over his body, the physical record of countless battles.

These marks, combined with his demeanor, contribute to his formidable and intimidating presence.

Hyoma’s relationship with Botan Nagatsuki is central to his character development.

Botan is a kind-hearted young woman who carries within her the same type of soul as tsukumogami, making her a special and dangerous existence in the eyes of the Saenome.

Due to a past kidnapping incident, Botan cannot easily trust others at a deep, emotional level.

Even when people are kind to her, there is a part of her that cannot fully rely on them.

Hyoma, after learning about Botan’s past and the grim events that shaped her, comes to respect her resilience and inner strength.

When she tells him she cannot truly trust anyone, he suggests that she try trusting him instead.

He then vows to protect Botan to the very end, offering himself as the person she can rely on without reservation.

This moment is also when he shows his first genuine, full smile, which surprises Botan because she had never seen him smile like that before.

At first, their relationship is simply that of guardian and protected, with some awkwardness due to his tsukumogami hatred and her close ties to them.

Over time, as they live together and face dangers, they gradually grow closer and build mutual understanding.

They are not initially in an explicit romantic relationship.

However, when members of the Nagatsuki household half-jokingly treat Hyoma as Botan’s “future husband,” he mostly ignores it at first, thinking it’s just teasing.

Later, when someone refers to Hyoma and Botan as “betrothed” while they are alone together, both of them blush and become visibly flustered.

This scene hints that Hyoma is beginning to see her as a woman, not just as someone to protect.

Hyoma is an exceptionally experienced and powerful fighter among the Saenome.

His entire adolescence was devoted to training and exorcism missions, giving him both refined technique and real-world battle experience.

He uses the standard Saenome talisman techniques, but his specialty lies in close-quarters combat using hikite, the sacred tools inherited by the Kunato family.

Originally, he wielded the hikite left behind by his late brother and sister, using them both as a means of revenge and as a way to honor their memory.

Because of his fixation on using their keepsakes, he could not fully unleash his own potential with the weapon.

Eventually, in order to truly protect Botan, he accepts and uses his own hikite, breaking through the mental barrier that had been holding him back.

He has fought countless battles against tsukumogami and other threats, explaining his many scars and hardened mindset.

The defeat of Ouu no Onigawara at 18 is considered one of his greatest accomplishments, putting his name in the same breath as legendary tsukumogami.

Talisman Techniques (Fujutsu)

Hyoma uses talisman-based techniques as the fundamental Saenome combat method.

These paper charms are typically used for sealing, support, and utility rather than direct offense in his case.

He has placed barrier talismans around the Nagatsuki household area to ensure Botan’s safety, forming protective wards against hostile tsukumogami.

In battle, he can create decoy images of himself as distractions or apply talismans to wounds to stop bleeding and stabilize injuries.

Although other Saenome might use talismans more offensively, Hyoma mainly employs them to complement his close-range combat.

His real destructive power comes from his family’s secret technique involving hikite.

Kunato-Style Gate-Opening Technique (Kunato-Shiki Kaimon Jutsu)

The Kunato family possesses a secret art that can only be used by the three great Saenome houses, involving their sacred artifacts, the hikite.

This technique is Hyoma’s primary offensive method and is used in combination with his martial arts.

By swinging the hikite as if sliding open a door, he creates “gates” that connect the living world to Tokoyo, the otherworldly realm where the souls of tsukumogami, known as marebito, reside.

Any physical object from the human world that touches these gates is erased, as the gates tear and remove sections of space itself.

In practice, this means Hyoma can cut, slice, and carve away space and any enemies within it.

The technique functions as a form of spatial manipulation, making his attacks exceedingly lethal to both tsukumogami and physical structures.

List of Techniques

Sansa

Sansa manifests a gate that splits into three prongs, like a trident.

Hyoma thrusts this three-pointed gate forward like a spear, piercing and erasing whatever it hits.

Yomogake

Yomogake creates a gate in the shape of a four-part grid or lattice, stretched vertically.

This wide, grid-like gate can sweep across an area, cutting through multiple targets or forming a broad barrier of erasure.

Defensive Form: Onogoro

Onogoro is a defensive configuration that generates a barrier where space itself is severed from the outside.

Within this boundary, Hyoma is protected, because anything crossing the barrier is effectively cut and removed.

This technique is used as a shield against powerful attacks or large numbers of enemies.

It requires precise control, as its defensive nature still relies on the same space-erasing principle.

Sealing Move: Kuubou

Kuubou is a high-level sealing move originally designed to be performed by multiple practitioners working together.

It creates a wide-area barrier that erases everything inside, effectively wiping out enemies and space over a large range.

Hyoma learned this technique from his second cousin Tsuji Hojo.

He then modified it so he can activate it alone by combining remote-controlled hikite with talisman techniques, at the cost of reducing its overall scale.

Because a mistake in output or control could cause the technique to erase the user along with the target, Kuubou is officially classified as a forbidden technique.

Despite the danger, Hyoma is capable of using this move, underscoring how far he is willing to go in battle.

Ikutachi – The Essence of the Kunato Style

Ikutachi is the supreme technique and “true essence” of the Kunato-style gate-opening art, essentially its secret ultimate form.

To use it, Hyoma brings both hikite together in front of him, then pulls them apart like opening a pair of sliding doors, forming a massive gate shaped like a blade.

This gate takes the form of a sword, with power far surpassing any ordinary gate attack.

Its destructive capacity is high enough that, the first time Hyoma uses it, he annihilates several skilled tsukumogami in a single strike.

Ikutachi represents Hyoma’s peak offensive capability and his complete mastery of the Kunato family’s techniques.

Its use typically signifies that the situation is dire enough to justify unleashing the family’s ultimate secret.

Iobiki

Iobiki is a half-open state of the Ikutachi blade gate.

In this form, the gate resembles a thick, short-bladed sword, similar to a mythical ten-hand-span sword, which Hyoma can wield and control more flexibly.

Because it is only half-open, it balances power and control.

This form is useful in situations where precision is as important as destructive strength.

Chibiki

Chibiki is the fully open state of the Ikutachi gate.

In this configuration, the blade becomes a double-edged weapon, with sword edges extending from both sides like a twin-bladed sword.

This form maximizes the destructive potential of the technique.

It allows Hyoma to sweep through enemies and space with devastating, wide-area cuts, at the cost of requiring immense concentration and spiritual power.