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Hata no Kokoro
Hata no Kokoro Kokoro Hata More Alternative Spellings | |
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Hata no Kokoro in Hopeless Masquerade The Expressive Poker FaceMore Character Titles | |
Species | |
Abilities |
Manipulating emotions |
Music Themes | |
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Appearances | |
Official Games | |
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Hata no Kokoro (秦 こころ) is a menreiki youkai. She appears in Hopeless Masquerade as the final stage boss.
General Information
Personality
Kokoro, a rather lifeless and emotionally devoid person, had to rely on her masks to properly communicate her emotions. All of her masks are in harmony with one another; when she lost the Mask of Hope, it caused a severe imbalance and she would go berserk. Through the story of Hopeless Masquerade, she strengthened her own emotional capacity and became more lively toward her surroundings.
Ability
- Manipulating emotions
Kokoro has to ability to control emotions. Not only her own, but those of her surroundings as well. Thus when she lost her own mask of hope, and thus her emotions of hope, she tried to regain these emotions by absorbing it out of the heroine, who collected the hope of all Gensokyo, to create a new mask and normalize the emotions of the humans residing at the Human Village.
Possessions
She has a total of 66 masks, all of which depict an emotion. By wearing each of them, she expresses her emotion. Typically, she just uses the masks that represent joy, anger, pathos, and humor. Some of the 66 masks were created under orders of Prince Shotoku. Her new mask of hope, is in fact the face of Toyosatomimi no Miko.
The masks Kokoro uses at some point in Hopeless Masquerade and their most likely corresponding emotions:
- Young woman (Ko-omote, lit. "small face"): joy
- Hannya: anger
- Old woman (Uba): pathos, melancholy
- God of happiness (Fuku no kami): humor, laughing
- Hyottoko: cheerful
- Monkey: troubled, awkward
- Thunder and lightning (Raiden): surprised
- Fox: serious
According to Koishi, the founder of the original mask who describes the original mask of hope like a Jizo statue, it is likely that the mask may not represent "hope", but instead represents "order".
Character Design
Origin
Hata no Kokoro is a menreiki, a type of tsukumogami, with 66 masks, which were used by the father of Sarugaku performance (predecessor of Noh) Hata no Kawakatsu in the sixth century. Hata no Kokoro the youkai was born from these masks after a long time.
By the legend in preeminent Noh playwright Zeami's Fuushika-den, Kawakatsu would be related to Mononobe no Futo, Toyosatomimi no Miko, the group of the Myouren Temple, and perhaps the group of the Moriya Shrine.
In the legend, during the reign of Emperor Kinmei, Kawakatsu was found in a jar as a baby on a river near Oomiwa Shrine. He grew up to be a genius, so the court made him a minister and given the surname Hata. When the country was in turmoil, Prince Shoutoku decided to show 66 dramatic imitations following Shinto and Buddhist traditions. He ordered his right-hand man, Kawakatsu, to complete this task and had 66 masks made for this purpose. After all the plays, peace was restored. This incident became the origin of Sarugaku.
After passing down the secret of his plays, Kawakatsu rode a boat and drifted out to the sea to uphold the tradition that non-human deities or Buddha mustn't leave physical remains. The residents living where the boat eventually landed were cursed, so they enshrined him as Great Rage Daimyoujin (大荒大明神 Taikou Daimyoujin) and later became prosperous. This god is an avatar of Vaiśravaṇa, Bishamonten.
Also, Kawakatsu is said to have provided the wisdom critical to Prince Shoutoku's victory against Mononobe no Moriya, who led an armed opposition against adoption of Buddhism. In another legend, some people say that Mononobe no Moriya didn't die afterward and escaped to Suwa Province. He became the founder of Moriya Jinja and the Moriya clan. When we see Kawakatsu as the center of all the characters in Hopeless Masquerade, we can understand why no one of the group from the Moriya Shrine appears despite their religious activity.
Name
Her full name is Hata no Kokoro, with Hata as the surname and Kokoro as the given name. Hata (the Japanese reading of Chinese surname 秦) clan was an eminent Chinese immigrant clan mentioned in Nihon Shoki. It's also the surname of the masks' original user — Hata no Kawakatsu, who's said to be the reincarnation of First Emperor of Qin Dynasty in Zeami's Fuushika-den.
Her given name is written entirely in hiragana and means 'Heart' (心 kokoro) in Japanese. 心 is also in the Japanese title of the game about her: Hopeless Masquerade (心綺楼 shinkirou).
Design
Kokoro has long, pink hair and pink, empty eyes. She wears a blue blouse with plaid pattern and buttons with various shapes (from top: red star, yellow circle, green triangle, and purple X). Her skirt is in a pumpkin shape, depicting several faces on it. The faces are smiling in when seen in one direction and frowning in another. She always has one of her 66 masks covering some of her face.
Story
The story starts with Kokoro losing her mask of hope. Losing her hope causes her power to control emotions to go berserk, causing the humans in the Human Village to lose hope as well and become enthralled in a religious popularity contest that comes to be known as the "dueling fad". Reimu Hakurei and the others participate in this contest and are eventually guided by Mamizou Futatsuiwa to the Human Village at night, where Kokoro searches in vain for her lost mask. Most of the characters who try to stop her come up with their own solutions to her hopelessness, including Byakuren Hijiri teaching her Buddhism to control her own emotions and Toyosatomimi no Miko making her a replacement mask of hope, but none of them completely work until Mamizou notices the contradictory actions Kokoro is taking and offers her own advice, which is to stop relying on the masks and discover her own, true emotions through meeting (and fighting) a variety of people. In the process of doing so she discovers her own anger at the religious leaders who are taking advantage of the situation, and Reimu, Byakuren, and Miko team up to stop her. Byakuren and Miko both claim that their solutions solved the problem, and Kokoro is invited to the Hakurei Shrine to perform Kagura as an offering to the gods.
Relationships
She was the one who created the masks that Kokoro is based upon and made a new mask of hope for her. Though with the fact the new mask would have turned her back into a mask collection and her anger at Miko and other religious figures exploiting this, the current standing is unknown.
Mamizou during the events of the game watches her and gives her some advice to help her develop.
Because Koishi picked up Kokoro's old mask of hope and refuses to return it, Kokoro considers her a nemesis. This might have changed since she realized her own feelings and stopped relying on her masks.
Additional Information
- A silhouette of Kokoro occupies the front of Hopeless Masquerade's jewel case.
- Kokoro resembles Satori Komeiji in some ways, and both are closely related to Koishi Komeiji in story and abilities.
Fandom
- A popular gag is having her with masks of other known things, such as Kamen Riders (particularly Wizard, who frequently talks about hope), The Stone Mask, due to the frequent popularity of Jojo's Bizarre Adventure within Touhou, Majora's Mask, due to its own popularity, and so forth as opposed to her normal ones.
- Fans have noticed similarities with expressionless but attractive characters such as Yuki Nagato or Rei Ayamami, though with the liveliness Kokoro shows, she ends up developing her own charm.
- Due to the ambiguous situation with her either talking or the masks doing the talking, various artists have either Kokoro herself talking without masks, the masks doing the talking, or all of the above.
- Due to the close ties with Koishi, she is sometimes shown with her. At others it's Mamizou as she helps Kokoro out.