| “ | Justice? Truth? More than anything else existing in this world, those things are a burden! The things that are needed are "acting" to deceive people and "power" to control others!
|
„ |
| ― Natsu Tanimoto explaining his life philosophy while fighting Kenichi |
Natsu Tanimoto (谷本 夏 Tanimoto Natsu) better known as Hermit, was the Sixth Fist of Ragnarök and is an unofficial captain of the Shinpaku Alliance (albeit strongly denying affiliation with any of them despite the continuing to ask him to join). He is the disciple of Sōgetsu Ma, the holder of the Moon Symbol of YOMI, one of Kenichi's main rivals. He was a second-year student at Kōryō High School and enters his third year by the end of the manga (battle 583).
Appearance[]
Natsu Tanimoto in the anime
Tanimoto is a tall fair-skinned man with blue eyes (violet in the anime), spiky yet wavy chin-length blond hair, with a well-defined built and respectably muscular frame. A noticeable trait of Tanimoto is the change in his eyes during the situation he is in. While maintaining his kind-demeanor, his eyes are big and calm. When angered or fighting, his eyes narrow with small cat-like pupils. A recurring theme in his appearance is that he is considered quite handsome by nearly all girls near his age.
Tanimoto typically wears a white-grey shirt with a red cross on it, similar to the design of a crusader, at school. As Hermit his outfit is very similar to the outfit of his savior when he was a child, Ogata, which give the hint that he was inspired to make his outfit to look like his. Tanimoto wears a dark hood and cloak with arm bands and leather boots, with a pentagram sewn into his leather gloves. Originally, the symbols on his gloves were that of the Roman numeral number six (VI). However, after his defection from Ragnarök, he changes the symbols to a pair of pentagrams.
Personality[]
Tanimoto is the president of the drama club at Kenichi's school and is considered to be the school's "prince", pretending to be a kind and soft-spoken school student, which plays well seeing how he is popular with both teachers and students. To further the illusion that he is a gentle and kind person, he makes sure not to reveal his muscular build, and even claims that the sun is bad for his skin just to prevent his body from being shown off during the camping trip.
He claims to have only joined the drama club to practice deceiving others and is only nice because he perceives popularity as a way to control people. In truth, he is cold, ill-tempered, and extremely prideful. He also whacks Kenichi and Nijima or threaten them whenever they try getting too close (both figuratively and literally). Tanimoto also can't stand it when Kenichi calls him Natsu-Chan (Lil' Natsu) to which he irritably responds, "Who are you calling Natsu-Chan?".
The words left by his sister Kaede "don't lose" affected him tremendously, to the point where he will continue to fight even if he is knocked unconscious as seen in his second fight with Kenichi, and later in his death match with Chou Enshin. However, this also leads to him refusing to quit anything such as when he stubbornly refuses to stop playing Othello with Honoka until he manages to beat her which, in turn, leads to him being regularly forced to do anything she asks him to do, as he loses almost every time. His relationship to Honoka is very similar to his late sister, possibly that he sees Honoka as his little sister from before.
After losing to Kenichi, he regularly discards his kind personality to those that don't already know about his true nature. Despite refusing to accept Kenichi and the others as his friends, Tanimoto's demeanor has changed considerably since meeting Kenichi and his sister. While still maintaining his aloof attitude, he has become less hostile towards people getting close to him, particularly Honoka. Surprised at how strong Kenichi believes in the ideals of friendship and how they have helped him to come so far as a martial artist have also caused him to have doubts about the path he walks and actually comes to Kenichi and his friends' aid, though he always claims he is merely doing it for his own needs such as revenge.
Since his official joining of Yomi, Tanimoto has reached a crossroad in his life; While an unofficial ally of Kenichi, he has intentionally fought each time without killing as a Katsujinken believer, while Yomi is a firm believer of Satsujinken, meaning he is destined to eventually choose one of the two paths. However, with him fighting against the Shinpaku Alliance, it seems Tanimoto has chosen the Satsujinken, however, Siegfried notes he still is good deep down. This was proven true when Tanimoto refused to kill Siegfried despite being a YOMI member. While seemingly certain of his path of Satsujinken, he acknowledges that it is not for everyone and doesn't want people like Miu to follow it. During the Eternal Sunset, it would be revealed he joined YOMI solely to help save his master from the path of the Satsujinken over the fact since he couldn't save his sibling, he would help his master save himself.
A running gag is that whenever Kenichi calls Natsu his "best friend", he immediately becomes infuriated and angrily refutes the claim to which Kenichi either ignores or is oblivious to. However, in his fight for the position in Yomi, he briefly thinks about Kenichi, finally accepting that he is his best friend despite his refusal to admit it.
Skills[]
Natsu using Chinese Kenpo against Shougo
- Chinese Martial Artist: Tanimoto specializes and has become highly proficient in Chinese Kenpo, and seemingly all its various styles and their respective techniques. His primary styles, Hikaken and Hakkyokuken, enables him to have a great control of range both close and long. This requires extensive physical and mental training, as well as knowledge of the body's mechanics. Due to his training by Ma Sōgetsu, Tanimoto's form of combat is more inclined to the Strong Fist Styles which rely more on destructive force. Ma's training style mostly revolved around regularly pitting Tanimoto against specific fighters whose power, skill and experience surpassed those of his disciple at the time by a small-to-medium margin. It was revealed in Battle 256, after watching the progress that Kenichi has made by practicing the basics, that Tanimoto has begun to focus more on the basics of Chinese Kenpo in order to give himself a more solid foundation for martial arts, and to be able to learn more advanced techniques with ease.
- Innate Talent: From a young age, Tanimoto stood out in talent. This made his adopted father recognize his great potential growth to become his future successor to his company. Combined with his unwavering resolve to succeed, Tanimoto has proven himself able to master seemingly any skill or technique he sets his mind to. This has allowed him quickly to master one of Sōgetsu's ultimate techniques in under a few hours and also become highly proficient in a number of skills, including acting, schoolwork, homemaking (purely to stop Honoka from ruining his house), managing the Tanimoto Concern, and especially martial arts. While only a highschooler, Kenichi compared his might to the level of intensity his masters put him through. This talent has also repeatedly helped him to make tremendous jumps in combat prowess. Initially, he was only the 6th Fist of Ragnarok but later surpassed and ultimately defeated the 2nd Fist Berserker. Even his master Sōgetsu, applauded Tanimoto's growth from training himself in such a short time. Shō Kanō, the former leader of Yomi, couldn't believe that Tanimoto lost in battle, believing that no one who wasn't from Yomi should be able to beat him.
- Genius Intellect: Tanimoto has repeatedly shown himself to be a keen thinker. While being raised to become his adopted father's successor, Tanimoto proved to be a quick learner. In school, despite his secret life, he was able to keep up a perfect grade record, effectively tutor others and even manage the Tanimoto Concern online. In battle, Tanimoto is highly perceptive, able to quickly see through his opponent's attack patterns and battle tactics to better counter them.
- Enhanced Strength: Tanimoto is deceptively strong, an attribute from the intense training Sōgetsu put him through. As Tanimoto follows Sōgetsu's philosophy of destroying his opponent, his attacks are shown to be powerful and lethal. With a single hand, he could demolish a tree trunk and crush a car door. In terms of upper body strength, he can easily pick up and throw a man twice his size across a room. An example feat of strength was when he stopped an oncoming fist from a brute twice his size with one hand.
- Enhanced Speed: Tanimoto's is able to strike at such speed and rapid succession, leaving little time for his opponent's dodge or counterattack. He is also just as evasive, able to dodge and block most attacks with no wasted movement and just as easily counter. His speed is demonstrated when he stopped 3 Russian soldiers from killing his principal and pushed them down a cliff before he could turn around, and when he appeared out of nowhere to intercept the first of a brute speeding towards two security guards.
- Enhanced Physical Prowess: Through all the hellish training Sōgetsu put him through, Tanimoto is at peak physical condition, as evident from his well-built muscular frame, which was applauded by Ma Kensei. Mostly, Tanimoto has used his superb shape to excel in all forms of sports at school. In battle, Tanimoto repeatedly demonstrates immense agility and flexibility. He is able to contort and shift his body stance to effortlessly change his attack patterns and strike from various angles. He is also a remarkable acrobat, able to use his agility to jump several stories high, easily do flips and other acrobatic movements and scale various terrains. He is also shown to be highly resilient, able to take a deep stab wound to the chest and sustain great blood loss yet still continue fighting effectively. His prowess is shown to be naturally so high, that it is hard at times for him to hold back, even at a time when he is annoyed with himself for drawing too much attention from breaking school records.
- Expert Manipulator: In his belief that he needs to control others to survive, Tanimoto has become a remarkable actor, able to convince his entire school he is a kindhearted man. He is also able to manipulate situations to further his goals, as seen when he tricked the school into believing Kenichi was a bully to make him push up his training. He was also very crafty in this regard from a young age, able to convince the unsocial Sōgetsu to train him. With these skills, Tanimoto is able to gather information from the underworld.
- Enhanced Endurance: Tanimoto has remarkable endurance, as he was capable of taking a direct knife wound to the shoulder and didn't even flinch despite the blood coming out and fight Kenichi afterwards like it barely affected him. Akisame noted he might've won had he not taken the knife wound for Honoka. In his fight with Berserker, he suffered brutal blows from Berserker and was still able to overpower and eventually defeat him despite the heavy wounds he suffered. He also took a back-fist from Fortuna, sustaining only a bruised cheek. Even against a YOMI member such as Chou he was able to defeat him and sustain little damage.
- Esper-like Ability: Hermit was able to share a conversation with Kenichi by eye contact alone when Kenichi asked about Shigure's situation in Yami.
- Keen Senses: He was able to catch a Russian soldier's knife from midair and easily disarm them. He also managed to sneak around 'D of D island without being seen or noticed without much difficulty. Another example was when he seized his attack on Kenichi when he heard footsteps coming from around the corner of Kōryō High, though it was just Nijima.
- Strong Heart: Kajima stated that Hermit was skilled at concealing his heart when he failed to read his mind through his heart.