Kokonoe Mercury

Kokonoe is a scientist at Sector Seven, and an important supporting character in the BlazBlue series. In Continuum Shift, Kokonoe hosts her own omake series alongside Litchi's, called Help Me, Professor Kokonoe!. She is a playable DLC character in the console version of BlazBlue: Chronophantasma.

Information
Tager's and Lambda's superior at Sector Seven, and also formerly Litchi's and Lotte's. She is a half-breed and the daughter of Jubei and Konoe Mercury, two of the Six Heroes, though she shows unexplained disdain for this fact, supposedly "staying angry for weeks" when Jubei is mentioned.

She has a deep hatred for Terumi, because he killed her mother, Konoe, and her aunt. She also has a strong dislike of Hakumen, but cooperates with him because she needs the Susano'o Unit to defeat Terumi and cannot figure out how to separate him from it. During the events of Continuum Shift, it is revealed that Kokonoe has created and stockpiled hundreds of nuclear warheads in her lab. Hakumen mentions that it was weapons like those that decimated the world a hundred years prior. In the end, after Ragna the Bloodedge successfully turned Noel Vermillion back into her normal state, his left arm was destroyed. Kokonoe was able to make Ragna a new mechanical arm, stating that a man who has not been in the habit of asking for favors asked her a favor. This man was Jubei, and she agreed to do that favor, while also mentioning that they had not seen each other in 20 years.

In the past, she worked alongside Relius Clover under a group known as the "Sin Architects". The story behind this was further explained in Continuum Shift II's second Extra Story - that which is inherited. Kokonoe was offered a job by Relius to work on the Nox Nyctores; however, she refused. Relius then showed Kokonoe the then-newly created Ignis and Nirvana, after which they left to open the Cauldron. After Relius opened the Cauldron, the Black Beast was released, and Relius proceeded to tell Kokonoe that the only way to stop it is for her to use magic inherited from Konoe. Relius explained that the very core of Nox Nyctores are created through part of the Black Beast, and Kokonoe's mother Konoe was the one who created the Nox Nyctores. She is skeptical of using magic, but after hearing Tager's scream, she no longer hesitated and unleashed Konoe's power - Snap Weapon: Infinite Gravity. She became exhausted afterwards and Relius decided to show his true colors; at this, Kokonoe became enraged and Nirvana (under her control) strikes Relius down, supposedly killing him.

In Chronophantasma after her father fought Phantom, she is informed that Phantom is actually her own mother, who revealed to be alive, but brainwashed by Izanami.

Personality
Kokonoe is a rather serious and cynical woman with no regard for emotions, and always strives for Tager to complete his missions without fail; however, she can on rare occasions be quite personable, mostly around her creations. She is displayed and perceived as cranky and foul-mouthed most of the time. She and Taokaka possess a few similar personality traits, something that most note as "more in common than they realize", due to their impatient nature and short attention span. She has some traits of her father and her mother.

Appearance
Kokonoe appears as a fairly young adult catgirl with a slim build. Her eyes are a golden-amber with visible bags under them, due to working overtime in her lab. She has pink hair which she keeps tied in a specialized style consisting of a long ponytail backing up longer tufts resembling large cat ears, which tend to overshadow her actual animal-like ears, which fade into white at the tip. Her attire consists of an altered, scientist version of the usual Kaka jacket with a white coloration. A hole at the lower base provides room for her twin, cat-like tails. She also wears a pair of small spectacles, and is never without her trademark lollipop.

The over-sized sleeves are cut at the sides to make it easier for her arms to slide in and out of them. She wears a pair of red capri pants with a black belt adorned by a large cat bell. The attire is completed with a pair of white mules with heels similar to the boots the Kaka Clan wears, but with no vamp, allowing her to take them off almost reflexively as her story mode render shows her barefoot in one of her feet.

When she was young, she had short hair and kept it in a pigtail, and wore the same yellow ribbon that she wears as an adult. She also did not wear spectacles. In terms of clothing, she wore a jacket similar to Taokaka's except with the hood down, and with a black collar.

Powers and Abilities
Despite being active on the battlefield as much as any character, Kokonoe doesn't participate in combat a great deal. Her forte comes in the form of her grand knowledge of magic and science and being the daughter of Konoe supplements this. While she has not shown any of her own creations, her prowess as a scientist is frightening, her alterations to organic and non-organic matter being second to none, even causing the normally ruthless and intimidating Hakumen to shudder at the promise of an 'upgrade' from her. Her prominent works thus far have been the revival of Tager through cybernetics and the activation of Lambda by bonding Nu's soul to the empty homunculus.

Due to comments dropped by both Hakumen and Hazama, and also being the daughter of both Jubei and Konoe, Kokonoe could be one of the most powerful individuals in the BlazBlue universe, though she refuses to admit it as it greatly angers her.

In gameplay terms, Kokonoe has been described as a powerful rushdown character with many options; she is the only character, save Jin, who can freeze an opponent, for example. Kokonoe also brings front her many creations and tools into battle by using robots, a wrench, a specialized 'drill hammer' and a gigantic Mecha-Tager. It should also be noted that she is not above using magic in battle.

Trivia

 * Kokonoe's birthday, April 18, is Invention Day.
 * Kokonoe's Guilty Gear counterpart perhaps may be Crow: both are great-minded scientists (Kokonoe reviving Tager, and Crow producing the Robo-Ky series). They also have humorous moments with their creations (I.E. Golden Tager with Kokonoe, while Crow and Robo-Ky constantly argue with each other). There is, however, more emotion between Kokonoe and Tager, while there is more strife between Crow and the Robo-Ky series; to that end, Crow's Robo-Ky (Ky), Roboemkin (Potemkin), and Robo-Justice (Justice) are mimicked onto Mecha-Tager (Iron Tager), Silver Hakumen/Silver Samurai (Hakumen), and Mecha-Tao (Taokaka).
 * There's also a bit of Baiken from Guilty Gear in Kokonoe's portrayal: she has the same bad temper, the same short attention span, and the same rough speech. She is also on a similar mission: to get revenge on the person that killed her mother, much like Baiken's quest to kill "That Man" in revenge for her parents' murders. Hakumen even goes so far as to say that Kokonoe is the incarnation of vengeance itself. On the physical side, she has the same sort of high ponytail as Baiken, including her pink haircolor being similar. She has not inherited Baiken's chest size however, though she does seem to have an oral fixation, much like Baiken's constant pipe smoking.
 * In Rachel's's "gag" ending, after Bang's exclamation, Kokonoe mentioned it as it were "a million voices crying in anguish, and were suddenly silenced." This line may be familiar to Star Wars fans; in A New Hope, Obi-Wan Kenobi exclaims almost exactly the same line after the Death Star blew up the planet Alderaan.
 * In Continuum Shift's Story Mode, every time a character chooses a bad ending path, that character would appear in a segment called "Help Me! Professor Kokonoe!", where Kokonoe would give each characters advice on which to choose their path to the true ending.
 * In the series, Kokonoe was the only non-playable character shown to have her own character artwork. One reason for this could be that Kokonoe appears in Continuum Shift's Arcade mode talking to most of the cast.
 * In Tager's Arcade Mode, during VS Hakumen intro, Hakumen taunts Kokonoe saying her: "Why not come to battle yourself?". Due to Kokonoe being the daughter of the two strongest beings, as argued by Hakumen, he also taunts her saying that she has possibly enough power to stand against Yūki Terumi, which is actually possible (as shown at the end of Hazama's "Help me! Professor Kokonoe" Section, where an unknown object goes towards Hazama (presumably a missile), while Kokonoe arguing that "Hazama never thought anything, ever again. The End".)
 * Also, in one of the extra scenarios from BlazBlue: Continuum Shift II, she uses a spell that her mother used, called "Infinite Gravity".
 * The thoughts of Kokonoe as a fighter resurface again in Valkenhayn's Help Me section, in which she goes insane over the fact that she is not a playable character yet. Valkenhayn comes up with an on-the-spot excuse that she is their "secret weapon" for when the series goes stale.
 * Kokono is the kun'yomi reading of the kanji letter for the number "nine" (九, on'yomi: kyū, kun'yomi: kokono); possibly a play on her mother's alias, Konoe. Kokonoe (九重) is also the name of a sumo stable.
 * Apparently, the lollipop she licks is silvervine candy, which may possibly (or jokingly) give her skills for her eloquent speech, as shown in Taokaka's "Help me! Professor Kokonoe" ending, where Tao eats one whole and starts making long sentences with words that she could not have used otherwise. Kokonoe then states that she had no idea the candy would have that kind of effect on someone from the Kaka clan.
 * Kokonoe is the third character to complain about having small breasts, along with Noel and Platinum. She gets extremely irritated at Makoto's breast size during her own "Help Me! Professor Kokonoe!" segment.
 * Kokonoe has the fastest dash of all the playable characters in the series.