Tsubaki Yayoi

Tsubaki Yayoi is Jin Kisaragi's childhood friend, Noel Vermillion's former roommate from the Military Academy, and a member of the non-official Novus Orbis Librarium's Zero Squadron. She is a playable character starting with BlazBlue: Continuum Shift.

Information
During the Military Academy, she was close friends with Noel and Makoto. She's described as a straight A student, and has a rather no-nonsense personality. She's very serious and reserved, and is a member of the dignified Yayoi family. By the end of BlazBlue: Calamity Trigger's True Ending, she is assigned by Hazama to kill Noel and Jin. She originally appeared as a non-playable character in the Calamity Trigger Story Mode. In BlazBlue: Continuum Shift, Tsubaki heads to 13th Hierarchical City of Kagutsuchi to search for Jin Kisaragi and Noel Vermillion. Unbeknownst to Tsubaki, Hazama is just using her to gauge Jin's Power of Order, and to push Noel further into becoming Mu-12.

She uses an Ars Armagus called "Izayoi". When Tsubaki found Jin, he told her to get rid of Izayoi because it "steals the light from the user's eyes", implying it would, after a certain period of time, cause her to go blind.

Tsubaki is revealed to be a fan of Hakumen, going so far as to own all the books and movies based on the exploits of the Six Heroes. In Hakumen's Story Mode, he indirectly reveals that in the past she had been his secretary instead of Noel. While they had more time together, he ultimately neglected her for his own exploits. She pleaded for him to stay when he had left, but continued on, and she was killed as a result. To remember the mistake he had made, he named one of his attacks in her honor. After her fight with Noel, Hazama tells Tsubaki that because of Noel's continued presence, she took Tsubaki's place as Jin's secretary, relegating Tsubaki herself into assassination tasks. Tsubaki, already slowly losing her sight due to overuse of Izayoi becomes depressed and angry at Noel, believing she stole everything from her (though Hazama left out that Tsubaki would have died anyway in the timeline where she is with Jin). Hazama uses the surfacing of these emotions to his advantage by having Phantom use its sorcery on Tsubaki to manipulate her jealousy for his own purposes. The critical point of her jealousy is reached when she pleads Jin to back down, telling him that she only wanted to be with him, and wishes Noel were dead. Ultimately rejected by Jin, Tsubaki sides with Hazama and the Imperator as her eyes turn red and her white clothes become black.

Material Collection Information

 * Hobbies: Singing
 * Likes: Historical dramas
 * Dislikes: War

Personality
Tsubaki is a serious, mature, and intelligent person. She has always followed her orders from the NOL and has complete faith in them (likely to honor her family name). She has always had a childhood crush on Jin, and deeply loves and cares about him. She was also good friends with Noel, Makoto and Carl when they were at Military Academy. However, when Hazama told Tsubaki about the alternative timeline where she was always with Jin as his secretary and how Noel usurped that position away from her, she becomes extremely jealous. She begins to harbor a hatred toward her best friend that, once manipulated by Phantom's sorcery, evolves into a desire to kill her in order to be with Jin.

Appearance
Tsubaki is a young woman with long red hair and blue eyes. She wears an white cloak with an eagle eye mask to cover her face. When she is in battle, she wears the Izayoi hat, a Japanese-style military uniform, and black military boots.

When she becomes corrupted by Phantom's magic, her eyes turn red and her entire uniform becomes black.

When not on a mission as a member of the Zero Squadron, she wears a white cloak and black tights with her white military boots. Her hair is hidden under her white beret as well as under her cloak.

When she was in the Military Academy, she wore a blue headband with her standard uniform, except that she wears a longer skirt, black tights, and brown boots.

When she was a child, she had short hair that she kept in a bob cut and wore a pink kimono.

Powers and Abilities
Tsubaki's fighting style is an interesting interpretation of the standard "sword and shield" style of traditional Western swordplay, where her oddly shaped, floating book acts as a small buckler shield. Tsubaki's short sword is capable of adopting a variety of shapes, sometimes as appearing as a fencing foil, a whip sword, a floating claymore or even a staff. Her book, similarly, can change its form. Lights and angelic imagery feature prominently in Tsubaki's fighting style, such as wings and feathers appearing around her for various attacks. Because of how her Drive works, her style is punctuated by moments of gathering light energy before rushing down opponents with long protracted combination attacks.

Movelist

 * Movelist
 * Combo List
 * Changes in Unlimited Mode

Musical Themes

 * Condemnation Wings - Tsubaki's theme
 * Memory of Tears - Tsubaki Yayoi VS Noel Vermillion
 * Childish killer - Tsubaki Yayoi VS Jin Kisaragi

Stages

 * Hanging Gardens - A quiet conscience sleeps in thunder.

Arcade

 * AD2200/01/07, ARCH ENEMY

Story

 * regret sin

Gallery

 * Click here to view all images of Tsubaki Yayoi

Trivia

 * Tsubaki's birthday, March 14th, falls on the same day as White Day in Japan and Korea which is an mirror equivalent to Valentine's Day where girls respond to boys who gave them gifts on the said holiday. This reflects her relationship with Jin as his birthday is Valentine's Day.
 * Interestingly, in the drama track The Wheel of Fortune, it is revealed that Tsubaki actually loves chocolate, so much that Jin advised her that it was harmful for her health.
 * "Tsubaki" means "Camellia" in English, a camellia is a huge beautiful flower that has no scent and wilts easily.
 * Coincidentally, the Lyrical Version of Comdenation Wings is called "Cry Camellia".
 * Her seiyu, Asami Imai, is regularly a part of Bururaji (BlazBlue Radio) along with Kanako Kondo and Tomozaku Sugita.
 * Tsubaki's Astral Heat uses what is believed to be the NOL statue, and bears a great resemblance to the move Nibelung Valesti from the Valkyrie Profile series.
 * Tsubaki's Guilty Gear counterpart could be a reference to Zato-1/Eddie, as he sacrificed his eyesight for power, and her weapon will eventually claim hers. Additionally, both Tsubaki and Zato-1/Eddie had romantic feelings for someone who had defected from their organizations (Jin defecting from the Library, and Millia abandoning the Guild of Assassins). Gameplay wise, many compare her fighting style to Order Sol, in regards to the both of them requiring to charge a special meter to pull off more powerful attacks (though in her "Help Me, Kokonoe!" segment, she politely asks Kokonoe to refrain from the Order Sol jokes).
 * Another Guilty Gear counterpart Tsubaki could be a reference to is Ky Kiske, due to both characters' devout sense of justice and right and wrong, to the point of seeing the world in 'black and white' as the phrase goes. Tsubaki even has a palette swap that greatly resembles Ky available via DLC (Millia Rage color scheme).
 * In Taokaka's gag reel, Tsubaki admits to having a secret "fetish" for period adventures, even going so far as introducing herself as Robin Hood to Carl Clover.
 * During her gag ending in Continuum Shift, Tsubaki admits that she hates pandas, upon seeing the panda (Lao Jiu) in Litchi's hair. Though the reason for this is unknown. Strangely, she is extremely gullible in the gag ending, as she even believes that Litchi (who at the time was drunk) had been taken over by Lao Jiu and gets 'coerced' into cosplaying and getting a new Peking duck.
 * The name of Tsubaki's Armagus, Izayoi, means "sixteen-day-old moon" in Japanese. A sixteen-day-old moon has just passed its fullest phase, so it is at this point that its brightness begins to decline. This is another clear reference to Izayoi's blindness-inducing nature.
 * TubakiName.pngn the game's files, mainly the images for character name graphics from places like the selection screens, a file for a name "Tubaki Yayoi" is found. This is a common mistake Japanese people make when romanizing the "tsu" sound.
 * Some of her special moves bear names from movements/chants for a Requiem Mass.
 * All of her special moves have latin phrases for names.
 * She has a total of three costumes: her robes with the mask, her combat dress and her Astral Heat clothes. None of them are particularly revealing, which shows her conservative nature. Also she has a fixation on Jin and is friends with Noel making her somewhat similar to May - she has a crush on Johnny and she's friends with Dizzy.
 * Both Makoto and Taokaka have "felt" her breasts (Makoto does during Carl's gag reel, and Taokaka during her story mode).
 * Tsubaki could be compared to Kaname Tōsen from the Bleach series due to their dedication towards the idea of justice. Also, both blinded by her ideals to the point of attacking her closest friends.
 * Tsubaki also resembles the appearance (Hair and eyes) of Makise Kurisu from the anime Steins;Gate, and they both share the same voice actress.
 * Based on Mu-12's winquote against Tsubaki in Continuum Shift 2, the Izayoi's side effect has already affected 65% of Tsubaki.
 * Her surname Yayoi means march (the month of her birthday), life (maybe a reference of her death by her weapon) and extensive (a reference of her overuse of Izayoi).
 * A coincidental VA allusion with Julie Anne Taylor seems to make Tsubaki similar to Tohno Akiha from Tsukihime: both characters harbor possible romantic feelings for their childhood friend (who was raised along with them platonically) along with Hakumen/Jin's voice allusion with David Vincent with Assassin from Fate/Stay Night. Both Assassin and Akiha are from series by the same company, Type-Moon.
 * All Special Moves of Tsubaki can be done with all the Command Buttons (A, B, C, D) except for Macto Maledictis which can be done only with C and D, Confutatis Maledictis only with D, and Requiem Aeternam only with C.
 * The Dark Version of Tsubaki may possibly be the Default color on the next release of BlazBlue, as shown in the True Ending.
 * One of Tsubaki's color paletes resembles that of Megurine Luka from the Vocaloid series.