Makoto Nanaya

Makoto Nanaya (マコト＝ナナヤ) is a playable character starting from BlazBlue: Continuum Shift II. She is a former classmate and friend of Tsubaki Yayoi, Noel Vermillion, Mai Natsume and Kajun Faycott as well as a former schoolmate of Carl Clover and Jin Kisaragi from the Military Academy.

Appearance
Makoto is a squirrel-type beastkin young lady with short brown hair, a big curly brown tail, hazel eyes, and large breasts. She wears an NOL uniform with a black balmoral cap to cover her squirrel ears, a jet black cloak, and black military boots. In the end of BlazBlue: Alter Memory, she wears a black NOL uniform dress with a white collar and a short red tie, with two separate long sleeves that have two heavy metal bands and white gloves. This is her standard NOL uniform underneath her black cloak. She also has bandages on her eye and arm after she was severely tortured by Hazama as Yūki Terumi to make Noel gets angrily emotional to break the limiter from her Nox Nyctores, Bolverk.

When she is in battle, she switches her outfit to an orange fighter top showing half of her bosom, two tonfas, black strap panties with an orange skirt-like cloth, long black stocking, and orange boots.

When she was in the Military Academy, she wore a standard school uniform, only with a darker mini skirt, black stockings, and brown shoes.

As a child, Makoto wore a short orange top that bared her midriff and short black tights, and is barefoot.

In BlazBlue: Chronophantasma, Makoto does not wear her NOL uniform as her pre-battle outfit, trading it for an orange collared jacket with folden sleeves which was issued to her by Kokonoe. Kokonoe explains that the people of Ikaruga harbor hatred and resentment towards the NOL, which justifies the change in attire.

Personality
Makoto is a silly, friendly, generally whimsical and energetic beastkin. She also appears to be somewhat scatter-brained, though this trait belies her true aptitude as an Intelligence operative and spy for Sector Seven. She is one of Noel's best friends, though unlike Tsubaki, she harbors no jealousy towards her. She cares deeply for her friends and cannot stand when they fight each other. When she was in Military Academy, she used to be cruel, mean, selfish, and hated humans, but then had a change of heart by Tsubaki's words when she confronted her fellow female classmates who were picking on her. When she, Tsubaki, and Noel were trapped in the lower levels of Kagutsuchi, it was revealed that she just wanted to be accepted for who she is. Makoto also has a serious side when it comes to her friends, and has even confronted Hazama when she discovers what he did to Noel.

During her arcade ending in BlazBlue: Continuum Shift, she lashes out at Hazama for calling beastkins just mere tools created simply to fight the Black Beast, showing her dislike for being discriminated. This is also revealed when Relius, during Makoto's Bad Ending, messes up with her mind, recalling painful memories of being rejected and ostracized as a beastkin.

In BlazBlue: Chronophantasma, while she likes Kagura Mutsuki as a person, she dislikes his lecherous behavior, which includes multiple attempts to flirt with her and Noel, offering the latter drinks which are implied to be alcoholic in nature, and attempts to grab Makoto's breasts. In her special intro with Kagura, he tries to grope her, but she parries and punches him back in response. Many other characters have joked or insulted Makoto based on her sexual outfit and body, with Kokonoe and Noel admitting to be jealous, yet Makoto herself obviously is not embarrassed by it and prefers to fight with such light clothing.

History
She is a squirrel-type beastkin and is considerably hyperactive with a short attention span, though she has proven to be rather cunning when she needs to be. She is outgoing and adventurous. She has a few complexes about her race, but nonetheless, she acknowledges who she is and is proud of it. In BlazBlue: Continuum Shift, Makoto works for the Novus Orbis Librarium Intelligence Department with Hazama but is actually a spy for Sector Seven. In the True Ending, she defects from the NOL after finding out what happened and leaves with Noel and Iron Tager.

In Makoto's arcade ending in BlazBlue: Continuum Shift II, it is revealed that one of the reasons Makoto is in the 13th Hierarchical City of Kagutsuchi is because of her discovery of the several failed attempts by the NOL to create Noel at Ikaruga.

Heart to Heart
Makoto first meets Noel Vermillion and Tsubaki Yayoi in the short story Heart to Heart. She first meets the duo when she arrives to her dorm, greeting them both with a cold attitude and introduces herself as Nanaya before dumping her belongings on her bed and leaving her two roommates in shock.

A few days later, Nanaya was being cruelly bullied by classmates, who pushed her, making racist remarks about her Beastkin heritage. After an exchange of insults, one of her peers attempted to smack her until Nanaya dodged when Noel stood between the two. Tsubaki immediately stepped in, demanding to know what had happened; she was met with harsh criticism from Nanaya, sarcastically asking about who put her in charge, yet the bullies continued to insult her until Noel stepped up and tried to explain what happened. When the bullies began to quash Noel's sliver of courage, Tsubaki ordered them to be quiet and look at themselves in the mirror, however, after all had been silenced, Nanaya left. She was later punished by the student council after another incident.



Some time later, Nanaya saved Noel and Tsubaki from an, otherwise, deadly fall into the abandoned district, using her tail as a cushion for the impact. The lack of Ars Magus to regulate the temperature made the room they fell into extremely cold; Nanaya offered up her tail as a means of warmth for Noel. Eventually the trio began to argue until Noel innocently asked about what was so different between her and Nanaya. This led to Nanaya breaking down into a flood of emotions and the three finally became friends; shortly afterwards, Jin Kisaragi came to their rescue, with Nanaya instantly remarking that he looked "awesome". The student council eventually punished the trio to do the school cooking, later on, Nanaya revealed her real name as Makoto Nanaya to the two and they began to cook.

BlazBlue: The Wheel of Fortune
In the original timeline where Noel Vermillion did not exist, Makoto and Tsubaki met up to talk about Jin and how he had changed after the Second War of Ars Magus. They later went to a cafe where they talked about the Grim Reaper, with Makoto revealing information only available to the Intelligence Department. Soon afterwards, Hazama appeared and began to talk with Makoto, giving her orders to come to his office later; conveniently for the two girls, Hazama paid the bill for their food (presumably to make a good impression on Tsubaki). As soon as he left, Makoto remarked that she hated that man, saying that because despite his generous gestures, he was the type who enjoyed making others suffer.

Much later on, Makoto chased Tsubaki down the streets of the 13th Hierarchical City of Kagutsuchi, trying to stop her from pursuing Jin. They both fell over in front of the branch's gate. Makoto told Tsubaki not to be so reckless, as the Armagus gate would have fried her alive had she touched the door without permission. However, Tsubaki noticed that something was wrong with the atmosphere, and they found out the Armagus gate was disabled. Makoto tried to contact the NOL through her communication device, but something jammed it, so Tsubaki ordered her to go to the Kagutsuchi port and try and contact the NOL while she intended to go after Jin. Makoto begged her to reconsider it, but Tsubaki was determined, so instead, she made her promise to come back for dinner after it was over, not knowing it was going to be the last time they could talk.

BlazBlue: Continuum Shift Extend
In Makoto's True Ending in BlazBlue: Continuum Shift Extend, it was revealed that during Makoto's time in Ikaruga, she had discovered a computer that was still gathering data from the Cauldron. She also found a file on the 12th prime field device created by Relius Clover and that it was none other than Noel.

Before Makoto could go back with the data she collected, the Cauldron knocked her unconscious and sent her soul to a parallel world where she met an injured Jin and Hazama, who was out to kill Jin. They later met up with Bang Shishigami, who decided to heal Jin's wounds. She then met up with Tager and Kokonoe Mercury to give them a disk, but she failed to give Kokonoe the right password saying it was Gnu when it was actually Baa. Kokonoe asked her the date of the disk, and Makoto said it was January 3, 2200. Kokonoe said that disk was useless to them because today's date was December 31, 2199.

Shocked and confused, Makoto headed back to see Jin and found that he has escaped. She runs to the NOL where she met up with Tsubaki. Tsubaki told Makoto that she joined the Zero Squadron just to bring Jin back, and when she was done, she was going back to the 4th Thaumaturgist Squad. This caused Makoto to remember that Tsubaki joined the Zero Squadron out of her own free will after graduation. Then, Hazama showed up and told them that Ragna the Bloodedge was here, making Jin run after him. Makoto told Tsubaki to go after him and that she needed to talk to Hazama. Makoto asked Hazama where Noel was, and Hazama said she would not find Noel anywhere on the planet and that her sudden appearance messed up his entire plan. Before he could attack Makoto, Rachel Alucard jumped in and saved her, explaining the situation and how she can get back to her own world.

After Makoto returned to her own world, Rachel told her what caused her to travel back in time. Rachel pointed to the cauldron and three caskets of the failed clones of Noel Vermillion and told her that Noel and the failed copies are all human-made dolls, just like Beastkin. Rachel asked Makoto what she plans to do now that she got to look at the truth that she was never meant to find out. Makoto said she was going to Kagutsuchi to save her friends.

BlazBlue: Chronophantasma
After hearing Tsubaki is in Ikaruga from Kokonoe, she and Noel ran right out to there.

In the finale, Makoto joins with Tsubaki Yayoi in her Zero Type Izayoi form and Bang Shishigami in the fight against Litchi Faye Ling, Carl Clover and Relius Clover inside a hidden dungeon below Wadatsumi. The two girls gave an opportunity for Bang to activate the device on the Kushinada's Lynchpin but however the tag team of Nirvana and Ignis tries to prevent Bang from activating the Lynchpin. After Bang succeeded activating the Kushinada's Lynchpin then Carl, Relius and Litchi flees together.

Powers and abilities
Because of her Beastkin heritage, Makoto has inhuman reflexes, as well as incredible strength, being able to make an impact crater in Carl's storyline, and her Astral Heat involves her punching an opponent skyward, leaving an imprint of her fist in the moon before it splits apart. The increased strength, however, may be the result of her tonfas, Impact, which allows her to charge the strength of her blows.

It was also stated in the anime, BlazBlue: Alter Memory, she was specially admitted into the Military Academy for her athletic abilities.

In Arcade mode, both Lambda -No. 11- and Nu -No. 13- (also Mu -No. 12- in Continuum Shift) note that Makoto exhibits a surprisingly strong resistance to seithr, eroding at 0.2% of the normal rate. This may correlate with and explain her average aptitude with ars magus; even if she is adept at wielding it, she may simply not be drawing in enough to sufficiently power it.

In her storyline, Rachel states that her "unyielding will" and her strong attachment to Noel and Tsubaki are what kept her soul intact during her journey through the Boundary; likewise, Relius notes that she has a hardy soul, both focused and pointing in multiple directions, and thus was able to "leap across time and space". How this correlates with the rest of her abilities is as yet undefined.

Etymology
Makoto (誠) is a unisex Japanese name that means sincerity and honesty; two virtues that Makoto undoubtedly shows and possess'. Makoto is typically a male name, however.

Nanaya (七夜) is Japanese in origin and literally means Seven Night. Its a fairly uncommon surname and can be used as a surname in some Eastern cultures; however, Makoto's last name is found more in media than it is in real life. Literally, Makoto's name could be read as Honest Seven Nights.

Trivia

 * Makoto said to Noel once that her breast size will increase if she lets a boy massage them, making her face flushed and repenting the thought of that. This also happens in a short story in one of the Official Comics, where Makoto loses her panties.
 * In the BlazBlue: Remix Heart manga, Makoto is implied to be homosexual or bisexual due to the multiple escapades she has with Mai Natsume. These range from kissing her, fondling her and even watching her being forced to touch Kajun Faycott sexually; even when Tsubaki and Noel look away, Makoto watches avidly.
 * In the BlazBlue: Alter Memory anime, Makoto is missing several black stripes from her tail. This error is consistent with each of her appearances in the anime.
 * In Episode 7, the black stripes from her tail are visible only during one of her appearances.
 * In the Highlander Assault mode in BlazBlue: Chronophantasma, if Makoto uses her Big Bang Smash; Distortion against Gigant: Takemikazuchi, then instead of the usual large scale projection of her being shown before she attacks, the camera instead does a close-up on her.
 * Her birthday, April 2, is National Peanut Butter and Jelly Day.
 * All of Makoto's special moves, Astral and Distortions have their names influenced by celestial and astronomical terms.
 * In Chronophantasma's Tutorial Mode, Makoto will teach the Beginner- Offense and Beginner- Defense classes alongside Noel Vermillion; she will also teach the Beginner- Rolling class alongside Tsubaki Yayoi.
 * Makoto's Beastkin Gene is that of a Kagutsuchi Island Squirrel.
 * Upon defeating Rachel Alucard in Arcade Mode in BlazBlue: Chronophantasma, Makoto reveals that she comes from a big family and ironically claims that Rachel's lightning ability could have saved them a lot on electricity bills.
 * Upon defeating Litchi in Arcade Mode in BlazBlue: Chronophantasma, Makoto reveals that she wears her outfit because it makes easier for her to move around.
 * Makoto makes various old-school martial arts manga references during some of her moves.
 * When using Big Bang Smash, she says Moetsukiru hodo hīto!! (燃えつきるほどヒート！！), a reference to Jonathan Joestar from JoJo's Bizarre Adventure.
 * When using Planet Crusher, she yells the infamous Atatatatatatatat!! battle cry of Kenshirō from Fist of the North Star.

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