Mei Amanohokosaka

""I sense it... the 'Azure.'""

Mei Amanohokosaka (天ノ矛坂冥) is a major character in XBlaze Code: Embryo and XBlaze Lost: Memories. She is the Shrine Maiden of the Amanohokosaka clan and works with the Mitsurugi Agency in combating the Union threat in Shin Yokozaki City.

In BlazBlue: Bloodedge Experience, Mei leads the Amanohokosaka Clan and is responsible for the containment of Saya Terumi. She was revealed for BlazBlue Alternative: Dark War on February 10th, 2021 before being released on March 18th the same year.

Appearance
Mei is a young girl with fair skin, purple eyes, and long purple hair that reaches down to the back of her knees. She is usually seen in a white kimono that has long flowing sleeves with small white ropes hanging over them. Over this is a purple skirt with a pattern of a bird printed over it in lavender; the skirt has black frills. Over her skirt is a white obi with a tied bow on the front. On top of her kimono, Mei wears a large black jacket with sleeves as long as the kimono; it has zips on the end with padlocks attached - the main zip of the jacket also has a padlock attached, as do two pockets near the collar. Mei's usual look is completed with a black beret with a skull piece attached to it, and black heeled boots.

In Lost: Memories, Mei has her side bangs tied with white and purple hairbands. Her long hair is tied into a ponytail using a larger version of the same hairband. As she is a student of Hakuo North Academy, she wears its uniform while attending - the only noticeable difference is that Mei's skirt is longer than that worn by others, and that she wears black boots and black tights. While swimming with her friends, Mei kept her hair tied up with a black hairband and wore a simple black two-piece swimming suit. On her wrists are two black straps with belt buckles. The outfit was chosen for her by Souichiro Unomaru.

Personality
Above all else, Mei is defined by her desire to be seen as mature and respectable. Having lost her family at the age of 5, Mei grew up alone and under the control of Souichiro Unomaru, leaving her without friends or a positive influence to learn social skills. As Mei worked hard to master Magic, she developed a lot of pride in herself that would lead to her being defensive in regards to anything she feels would undermine that. Ironically, Mei’s insistence on her maturity actually shows her to be incredibly immature since she is prone to violent outbursts or hurling insults whenever someone annoys her. Unfortunately, she has a very wide range of things that can trigger this reaction, from Touya Kagari’s constant apologizing to her being unwilling to admit she is unable to swim. This seems to be something of a knee jerk reaction as Mei will insult people and run away even when they are nice to her, and she has admitted after the fact that she didn’t want to do that, but was unable to come up with a proper response to kindness. As she continues to spend time with others, she starts to see them as friends and opens up more. This allows her to occasionally show a softer side that cares for their wellbeing, although she will sometimes follow that up by claiming her concerns are purely pragmatic.

While Mei started out as cold and demeaning towards most people she met, she had a particularly strong hatred for Kuon Glamred Stroheim. Mei assumed Kuon to be a pampered princess without real skill as a Mage. This opinion was colored by her longstanding hatred of the Magic Guild as a whole since it was responsible for the downfall of her clan and her currently difficult life under Unomaru’s thumb. However, after Kuon was able to fight her to a draw, Mei apologized for her dismissal of Kuon’s skill, realizing Kuon had worked just as hard as her. Despite them continuing to insult and mock each other, this marked the point where their relationship changed from open hostility to a good-natured rivalry.

Additionally, Mei hides a dark secret that she never wants to be discovered by anyone. She is an otaku with a love of anime and tokusatsu. It is an interest that she thinks is embarrassing and childish so she will hypocritically make fun of Kuon for being a casual fan while she in fact is much more knowledgeable about the subject and is something of an elitist in criticizing others’ preferences.

Powers & Techniques
As an Exorcist, Mei is skilled in the use of Ying-Yang Magic. She has a variety of charms and talismans uses to cast her spells such as healing charms and the Goofball Proximity Surveyor. She can use her magic to enhance one's physical attributes, such as giving Es the strength to jump up a large building to catch Hinata and can even make herself fly. One of Mei's primary means of attack is her  spell, which can immobilize anything it touches. The spell has a variant that can home in on an opponent and even dodge incoming attacks, but can only be used if Mei stands still to focus on it. She also can use the more powerful .

Additionally, Mei has knowledge of Lightning Magic, letting her fire blasts of electricity. She can unleash a barrage of attacks with ' or unleash a single powerful blast with '.

Having been fighting Unions since she was 10 years old, Mei has accumulated a large amount of combat experience, making her an intelligent fighter. While she is not skilled at hand-to-hand combat, she is capable of defending herself from close-range attacks, being able to block Kuon's surprise kick.

Being a descendant of the Azure Shrine Maiden, Mei possesses the ability to sense the Azure, although at a much lower level than her ancestor. This allows her to hear a Union's Discover Call.

In the Mei Route of XBlaze Code: Embryo, Mei allows Sechs to turn her into a Union. This gives her the Drive , which is capable of sealing the power of the Origin of the Grimoire.

XBlaze Code: Embryo Character Report

 * Mei Amanohokosaka

''Grudgingly works with the Mitsurugi Agency. The scion of the Amanohokosaka clan, she has been hunting Unions since she was a child. As a result, she is far more mature than her peers and often has problems relating to them. She practices a unique form of magic which she primarily uses to obtain information, though she will occasionally use her powers in combat. Due to the machinations of the Magic Guild, her clan had to give up their possession of Takamagahara (the Legendary Lands). What resulted was the Wadatsumi Incident and the death of Mei's mother, and the start of an intense hatred of the Magic Guild and its members.''

XBlaze Lost: Memories TIPS Entry

 * Mei Amanohokosaka

'' The scion of the Amanohokosaka clan, she has been hunting Unions since she was a child. As a result, she is far more mature than her peers and often has problems relating to them. She practices a unique form of magic which she primarily uses to obtain information, though she will occasionally use her powers in combat. Since the events surrounding the Embryo, she has taken over the Mitsurugi Agency's anti-Union operations, so her life hasn't really changed all that much.''

BlazBlue 10th Anniversary Official Site Profile
''Related to the Mitsurugi Agency as a collaborator, she is the only daughter of the Amanohokosaka clan and their next head. She has been hunting Drive-Unions since she was a child.''

BlazBlue Alternative: Dark War Official Profile
The Amanohokosaka Family is one with a long and storied past, and Mei the next head. ''She has trained in the art of Exorcism from a young age, and has blossomed into an elite Exorcist. She sets her personal shikigami to work, for both battle and gathering information.''

Despite her young age, she is composed and surprisingly plucky.

Trivia

 * In the BlazBlue 10th Anniversary Character Poll, Mei placed 41st out of the 84 candidates. She scored one place above Cypher Albar and one place below Touya Kagari. She had 288 votes.
 * In her Character Report from XBlaze Code: Embryo, the Legendary Lands Wadatsumi are incorrectly identified as Takamagahara.
 * In XBlaze Lost: Memories, Shikigami Raven is instead translated as Shikigami Crow.
 * Samples of Mei's blood is what powered the weapons used by the Es-N.
 * In Mei's room in XBlaze Lost: Memories, there are figures from various anime, manga, and video game series on her shelves.
 * Tachikoma from Ghost in the Shell.
 * Kyogre, Regigigas, Metagross, Mudkip, and Pichu from Pokémon.
 * Renamon from Digimon.
 * Rin Natsume from Little Busters!.
 * Tsumiki Miniwa from Acchi Kocchi.
 * The eponymous character of Black★Rock Shooter.
 * Mei shares her Japanese voice actress, MINASE Inori, with Tenjo Amanohokosaka, and Homura Amanohokosaka.
 * Mei's moveset in BBDW has a naming theme based around Japanese mythology.
 * Her Astral Heat, Yomotsu Hirasaka, shares its name with Izanami's character theme.
 * Mei is illustrated in the following Grimoire for BlazBlue Alternative: Dark War:
 * 陰陽師の舞 (Dance of the Exorcist).
 * 臨戦態勢 (Preparing for War).