Kiku Hoshimi

Kiku Hoshimi (キク) is a side character in Call of the Night. She is a vampire who wants to drink Mahiru Seki's blood. Kiku is the oldest known vampire in the series, being over 500 years old. According to a theory, if a vampire sucks the blood of a human they are in love with, the human will die. Kiku has been testing this theory for centuries, always disappointed by the result, in which her partners end up alive and become vampires, causing her to leave them.

Appearance
Kiku is a young-looking woman with a noticeably prominent forehead and a pretty appearance, featuring a narrow face, shoulder-length light brown hair, and eyes with a piercing and unsettling gaze. She prefers to wear coats, tops, skirts, stockings, and high heels.

Personality
Kiku has an unpredictable personality; on the outside, she seems friendly and empathetic, and thereby quickly becomes friends with Mahiru Seki, who meets her often due to his part-time job as a flower courier. She is the vampire with the most underlings; according to Hatsuka Suzushiro, she has over 50 of them, although she often mentions that she doesn't really want to have underlings and accidentally transforms them. She usually abandons them after they turn into vampires.



She is exceptionally secretive and enigmatic, watching people from afar and almost always being ahead of others in situational awareness. With the exception of her late friend, Kiku rarely ever spends time with other vampires, though she has connections that she uses to her advantage. Azami says that she will know if someone tails her for too long. If she gets directly confronted, she either makes sure to silence her opponent or flees and uses her environment to her advantage. Kiku is a highly twisted individual who enjoys toying with people and is arrogant as she sees herself as superior compared to vampires like Nazuna, mockingly calling her out for risking the exposure of vampires to humans despite doing the same, not caring about the consequences of her actions. She is happy to use intimidation to scare off people who try to get in her way, torture or murder them, and has a terrifying presence.

Like that of Haru Nanakusa, Kiku's objective is to become human again. While she was bored with her life as an immortal vampire, it wasn't her main reason, unlike Haru's. Kiku believes that falling in love with a human will let her become human herself.

Due to her unsuccessful search for love, Kiku is mentally unstable. When she confronted Anko Uguisu, she had a breakdown, laughing maniacally, and simultaneously boasting and despairing over nobody, not even herself, knowing "what is fucking wrong with her." She is incredibly insecure and believes that Mahiru has to sacrifice everything for her, lest the love isn't real in her eyes. She doesn't know what love feels like in the first place and bases her expectations on romantic stories, such as those in movies.

Mahiru Seki
They met when Mahiru delivered flowers to her place, and she started to chat with him. Sometime after, they started going out together and got along well. Kiku complimented him and listened to Mahiru whenever he wanted to say something, always telling him what he wanted to hear. She later revealed to Mahiru that she was a vampire and said she had no intention of turning Mahiru into a servant. After Mahiru chose to stay with her regardless, she had a crazed expression on her face, thinking that Mahiru might be the one whom she would fall in love with. After that, they spent more time off-screen, and Kiku caused a drastic change in Mahiru's personality, manipulating him to abandon his friends and family, leaving her as the only person he had left, which was her plan from the beginning. She hasn't sucked his blood yet.



After arriving in Hokkaido and spending more time with Mahiru, Kiku fell in love with him. At first, she felt incredibly euphoric and happy. However, that love turned into despair when she discovered that Mahiru hasn't fully let go of his past and still held Kou and Akira dear. Despite being in love, Kiku didn't understand him and took it as a sign that Mahiru didn't truly love her, asking herself if she wasn't good enough for him. She then decided to take action and attempted to murder Kou.

Azami
Kiku and Azami have known each other since Azami worked under a Yakuza boss who was in a relationship with Kiku. She stood up for him, scolding the boss for making jokes at Azami's expense. Because of Azami's shy and reserved nature at the time, Kiku didn't think he was interested in girls until an assassin shot everyone. Azami sacrificed himself to save her, for which Kiku drank his blood in commemoration and, to her surprise, turned him into a vampire. Unlike her other underlings, she met with Azami afterward and taught him several things about vampires. Even though they didn't see each other for the next 35 years, she remembered him and was aware of the work he did for her behind the scenes and expressed gratitude for it.

Haru Nanakusa
Atypical for her relationships with other vampires, Kiku was close to Haru and even had an affectionate nickname for her. They shared the same goal, to become human, and frequently argued over various topics surrounding that goal. These two women seemed like real friends to Haruka, who was present during those meetings and conversations.

However, Kiku's sympathy for Haru doesn't extend to Nazuna, whom Kiku was happy to torture despite her being Haru's daughter.

Abilities

 * Vampiric abilities: Like all vampires, Kiku has superhuman strength, can levitate, phase through solid objects, regenerate, is much more durable than a human, and is extremely fast. After falling in love with Mahiru, her powers start to get weaker. Her regeneration is much slower and she doesn't have the strength to fly.


 * Control over animals: Kiku was seemingly able to control a hare.


 * Telepathy: Kiku seemed to have talked through said hare with her mind and pretended to be the hare in order to lure a prince to her, so she could suck his blood.


 * Vampiric charm: Kiku, like a typical vampire, has a supernatural charm that can strongly influence a human's thinking and can convince that human to go along with everything she wants, even if it's something they would usually oppose. Mahiru does notice that there is something weird. He says that when near Kiku, he loses his ability to think and does whatever she wants.

Trivia

 * Kiku lived since Century XVI and was also searching for love outside of Japan; She was in California in 1970, on a ship in the Atlantic ocean in 1998, and was found in a place that was reminiscent of a European fairy tale.

Quotes

 * (To Mahiru) "A middle-schooler, huh, ~ I couldn't tell since you looked so mature."
 * (To Kou) "Hey, Yamori-kun. 'Those who disturb someone's romance'... Do you know what happens to them? In this case...they get eaten by a demon... I suppose."