Tenko Chabashira

"Keep your chin up and live life facing forward!"

- Danganronpa V3: Killing Harmony

Tenko Chabashira (茶柱 転子 Chabashira Tenko) is a student in Ultimate Academy for Gifted Juveniles and a participant of the Killing School Semester featured in Danganronpa V3: Killing Harmony.

Tenko is titled as the Ultimate Master (超高校級の「合気道家」chō kōkō kyū no “aikidō-ka” lit. Super High School Level Aikido Master). She is a practitioner of the martial art she created with her master, called "Neo-Aikido".

Early Life

 * Before Joining Danganronpa

Tenko Chabashira is a normal talentless high school girl who participated in the 53rd Season of Danganronpa, a famous worldwide reality show made by Team Danganronpa.

Tenko and the other talentless fifteen students undergo the fabrication process, where all of their past memory and personality were heavily fabricated. She also received the talent and title of Ultimate Aikido Master. All of this were done for the sake of satisfying Danganronpa's audience from all around the world. After the fabrication process done, Tenko and the others entered the Ultimate Academy for Gifted Juveniles as a whole different person, officially commencing the 53rd killing game season known as the Killing School Semester.

Tenko attended Stone College Prep High School (亜巌大付属高校) during her high school days. However, it is unclear if this memory of her is a part of the fabrication made by Team Danganronpa.


 * Fabricated Past

After she successfully participated in the 53rd Killing Game, Tenko's memories and past were fabricated by Team Danganronpa as follows.

Tenko used to live with her parents, with her father being a complaining drunk according to her. As a child, Tenko suffered from severe anger tantrums and overactivity, to the point that her parents were worried that she might not be able to fit into the society. Not knowing how the handle her, they sent her to live in a temple to help discipline her mind.

However, it seemed that Tenko was trouble even for the priests, so they had to come up with something else. During her mental training at the temple, she called the head priest "Master" and respected him greatly, and thus he declared himself the Master of martial arts. The head priest and Tenko came up with the martial arts of "Neo-Aikido", an unusually aggressive form of Aikido, to channel Tenko's energy into a constant activity. Neo-Aikido helped Tenko and made her notably calmer, though she still remained very aggressive and overactive when compared to the norm. However, she also seemed to take the made-up martial arts maybe a bit too seriously, and dreamed of making it a national sport.

The Master also begun to use Neo-Aikido as a way to develop Tenko's moral compass. As practitioners of Neo-Aikido, Tenko and her Master even used to wear masks and acted as "heroes of justice", helping people during day and night. This included things like carrying old woman's belongings, helping a child cross the street, catching thieves and punishing cheaters and sexual predators, and even helping girls who had tough break-ups.

In order to control her bad habits, the Master begun to claim that various things would weaken her Neo-Aikido spirit and thus should be always avoided, such as being too excited about Christmas or Valentine's Day, eating more than three sweets a day, or failing to keep her environment clean. He also wanted her to not get too close with boys and thus told her that interaction with them would weaken her. Tenko believed everything without questions and took it all very seriously. She already had a dislike for men, seemingly due to her drunk father and all the sex offenders she had seen, but this turned into hatred as she begun to consider all men enemies that would drain her spirit and prevent her from mastering Neo-Aikido (though, she never realized that this should've logically included her Master as well). She believed that men shouldn't even touch her. Other bad influences from the Master included the belief that ex-boyfriends deserve severe physical punishments, and that you can even use unfair methods such as weapons or attacking before the match starts.

The Gofer Project
Part of the fake backstories created for Tenko and the other fifteen students was The Gofer Project, which supposedly happened before the killing game started. It was initiated by the government after countless meteorites crashed into Earth. To try and preserve the last vestiges of mankind before the Earth's destruction, the government decided to select a number of excellent human beings, put them in a spaceship, and have them escape.

Tenko and fifteen other high school students were chosen to participate. Not wanting to abandon their loved ones, they attempted to escape from the plan.

Around that time, an extremist cult came into power. They believed that the meteor crashes were a punishment humanity brought upon itself, and having heard of The Gofer Project, they tried to stop it. As a result, the “Ultimate Hunt” started and spread throughout the world, and the sixteen students were hunted down.

The government then decided to counter the situation by faking the students' deaths, calming down the “Ultimate Hunt” while providing protection to the students. The Gofer Project was then put into action while the Earth was being destroyed. Tenko and the others went to the space in a massive colony spaceship, the true form of Ultimate Academy of Gifted Juveniles.

Kokichi Oma, one of the participant of the plan, declared himself as a member of Junko Enoshima's Remnants of Despair who masterminded the Killing Game and let Monokuma entered the spaceship, effectively forcing Tenko and the others to participate in the Killing Game.

It should be noted that Tenko has no complete recollection of the event, as she was murdered before she actually received a complete memory about The Gofer Project by the Flashback Light in Chapter 5.

Killing School Semester
After Monokuma announce the beginning of Killing School Semester, Tenko followed Gonta Gokuhara to search for an exit in the secret tunnel under the boiler that he discovered while investigating the academy. However, no matter how many times they tried to escape, their attempt will always ended up in vain. Tenko who didn't want to stop trying and showed hostility toward Kokichi Oma who speak the truth about her classmates being tired eventually returned back to her dorm due to the impossible circumstances for her and the other to push forward, since Monokuma and his children revealed that the tunnel was actually a trap.

To save themselves from being executed since no one didn't obey Monokuma's order to kill each other in the last day of the time limit, Tenko and six other people planned a strategy meeting in the game room in school's basement. Before the strategy meeting, Tenko and Kaito Momota searching for Rantaro Amami who exited the room before. Along the way, they stumbled upon Kaede Akamatsu and Shuichi Saihara who told them that they succeed in catching The Mastermind behind the Killing Game inside the library.

The three including Tenko immediately rushed their way inside, only to find Rantaro's corpse lying in front of a bookshelf. Tenko screamed in shock, terrified by his lifeless body. Later during the investigation, Tenko has his eye set on Angie Yonaga who wander alone, since the group agreed to not investigate the murder alone.

In the Class Trial, the group managed to point Kaede as the culprit, which Tenko couldn't believe. She, Kaito, and Gonta tried to prevent her from being dragged into her execution by facing the Exisals before they were stopped by Kaede. After watching her execution, Tenko cried, saying that Monokuma is a ruthless one for killing her friend in such a brutal way.

The Summoning Ritual
After discovering Angie's body along with several other students, Tenko offers to commune with Angie's spirit and find her killer by performing a ritual. Assisted by the other students, Tenko lies in a position similar to in the center of a circle inscribed with magical symbols. A cage, cloth, and statue are placed on top of her to complete the ritual. Unbeknownst to Tenko, Korekiyo hid a, a traditional Japanese weapon similar to a sickle, under the cloth covering the cage that would later be responsible for her death.

The students turn off the lights in the room and sing together as Tenko prays and attempts to commune with Angie's spirit. However, Korekiyo stomps on a loose floorboard during the ritual, sending Tenko flying off the ground. Her neck is pierced by the kama above the cage, killing her instantly. The other students discover Tenko's corpse after the ritual, much to their shock and confusion. Himiko is shown sobbing upon the discovery of Tenko's corpse.

Name
Her first name kanji 転子 tenko, means "rolling child". This is a reference to her talent, as Aikido includes rolling in its techniques. Her last name kanji, 茶柱 Chabashira (lit. "tea pillar"), is a figurative term referring to a how, when drinking green tea made with chopped tea stalks (see Kukicha), a few thin stems can go through the kettle into the drinker's cup and float around near the surface of the liquid. Chabashira specifically is when one such stalk ends up floating completely upright - an uncommon occurrence that is considered a lucky omen.

Alternate Fates
In Danganronpa V3: Killing Harmony (Demo Version), Tenko was inside the cafeteria along with Himiko Yumeno and Kaito Momota. She introduced herself to Kaede Akamatsu, who thinks that Tenko is cute, automatically making her blush and feeling embarrassed. However, when Kaede asked confirmation from Makoto Naegi, Tenko doesn't need his answer, showing her dislike towards men.

During the incident of Yasuhiro Hagakure's murder, Himiko was having a tea with Tenko in the cafeteria. She gives her the lecture about the different between magic and witchcraft and stated that during that time there were always only two of them. However, Tenko noticed a male entered the kitchen but didn't have time to put a closer attention since Himiko's lecture intensified and doesn't let her to have a free time until the body discovery announcement was broadcasted by Monokuma.

Appearance
Tenko has a fair skin tone, sharp green eyes and long black hair put into two long pigtails. Her hair is held by long white ribbons, a large green bow with a white floral pattern and she also wears a purple headband with a star-shaped adornment on the left side of her head. She wears a blue school uniform top that stops above her bellybutton, a frilly blue skirt, white socks with a blue stripe that end under the knee and. She has a beauty mark under the left side of her mouth and she has a pink choker with a yellow bell.

Personality
Tenko is an incredibly noisy and generally cheerful person. She wears her emotions plainly and has a habit of yelling out in a loud voice to show her fighting spirit. She suffers from overactivity and directs her energy into her Neo Aikido, though she claims that she is much calmer when compared to her childhood. She has also described herself as being "not very good at thinking" and appears quite gullible. She also refers to herself in third person in the Japanese version.

As a Neo Aikido practitioner, Tenko takes pride in facing the opponent from the front, and she courageously tries to confront the "Exisal" killing machines. Indeed, despite being an Aikido practitioner, Tenko can be very aggressive and quickly resorts to violence, insisting that it's self-defense. She takes pride in inventing the Neo Aikido along with her Master and throughout the game, she will constantly threaten guys or Monokuma with her deadly Neo Aikido techniques, saying that it is very powerful. However, she admits that compared to Gonta Gokuhara's incredible power, she had no match for him. As a part of her Neo Aikido skills, she is also shown to be capable of reading the minds of those she throws.

Due to past experiences and her Master's irresponsible teachings, she feels strong hatred towards boys, to the point of referring to them as "awful boys" (lit. replacing part of the normal word for boys with the kanji for death) and openly stating all men should perish. She believes that interaction with boys will drain her Neo-Aikido spirit, and thus considers them her enemies. She also seems to believe that boys are much more likely to do negative and deceiving things than girls, like always being the first to lie and always shifting the blame right away. She dislikes boys so much that even the nice things they do can cause her to react very negatively. For example, she doesn't like boys praising her. If a boy compliments her looks, her expression will die in an instant. She also never allows a boy to touch her, throwing him reflexively if they even attempt to try. Her dislike of boys is portrayed as a very emotional and irrational opinion, as there are moments when a boy acts sensible and Tenko feels like agreeing with them, but then refuses solely because they are a boy. However, since there isn't much any actual reasoning behind her dislike for men, there are also moments when she seems to completely forget her hatred for a moment and she is shown to comfort boys such as Shuichi during moments of distress, occasionally does other acts of kindness for them and is at rare moments able to admit that a boy can be a good person. Despite her hatred of men, she is is capable of respecting them, like Gonta who is very sincere and deeply cares about his classmates.

Contrasting her hatred towards boys, Tenko likes other girls much more. This includes those who have had male-to-female surgeries, as mentioned by her during her last Free Time Event. During dangerous situations, she recklessly rushes to protect all the girls, and only them. She also gets very shy and humorously humble if a girl compliments her looks, blushing strongly and insisting that her looks definitely aren't good. She appears attracted to girls and is especially fond of idols, often having dreams about them, and dreaming of becoming a "pampered celebrity" herself. Himiko is her favorite, and she often admires, wishes to accompany and fusses over her, which annoys the magician. However, Tenko is also shown to act embarrassed and panicky if Himiko points out her possible attraction to girls, and she seems to be shy about telling Himiko about it.

Tenko also occasionally has a more panicky side in other situations as well, as she seems to panic in a class trial if she is suspected to be the culprit, and overall tends to react strongly in humorous ways. In the demo version, when Kaede talks to her after the murder, she immediately panics as she assumes she is being suspected. Despite her very emotional side, she can give others right kind of advice, usually after throwing them and reading their emotions.

Despite her loud and aggressive nature, she is polite to everyone, even boys, referring them with the formal suffix "-san" (original Japanese release only). Her politeness is so powerful that it surpasses her hatred toward boys. She also accepts boys to be practitioners of Neo-Aikido out of necessity, though she isn't fond of the idea and just considers them "tolerable". However, according to her words, she apparently wouldn't have any problem with the rare men who have fully mastered Neo-Aikido. In her Love Suite event, it's shown that she can even develop feelings for a boy if they are a fellow Neo Aikido practitioner, and it's apparently her fantasy to meet a boy like that. She is also very loyal to anyone she considers her best friend or a role model. This is seen in the way she risked her life in order to prevent Kaede Akamatsu from being executed, and her relationship with Himiko.

Ultimate Aikido Master
Tenko's talent as the Ultimate Aikido Master is a fabrication made by Team Danganronpa. Due to that fact, it is unclear whether Tenko is a talented Aikido practitioner in the past.

Tenko and her master developed a new style of Aikido named the Neo-Aikido. Different from the original teaching of Aikido, the Neo-Aikido that Tenko invented is more aggressive and has many offensive techniques. Tenko even believes that the only true way of training for Neo-Aikido is actual battle.

According to Nekomaru, despite her talent, she lacks refinement and does whatever she wants with her body.

In other languages
Tenko's talent as it appears in official translations of Danganronpa V3: Killing Harmony.

Relationships

 * Ultimate Academy for Gifted Juveniles:

Himiko Yumeno
Tenko is shown to be very interested in Himiko since the first chapter. She constantly tries to get Himiko's attention and spend time with her, sometimes quite obviously trying to flirt with her, like telling her she can rest her head on her lap or offering to give her a massage. She describes Himiko as "small and cute", and occasionally even drools whenever she seems to think about something suggestive concerning Himiko.

Himiko tends to get overwhelmed by this and is often annoyed by Tenko, telling her to stop and wishing to be left alone. Despite this, Tenko persistently admires Himiko and promises to always be on her side whenever, and wherever. Notably, she is the only other student who seems to genuinely believe in Himiko's magic and just like her she keeps insisting that she is a real mage instead of magician. Tenko also often attempts to convince Himiko to take up Neo Aikido, but she always declines, claiming to be too lazy.

Tenko is very protective of Himiko and was usually the one to save her from incidents, like when she was attacked by bugs. In Chapter 2, she also tried to convince Himiko not to perform her dangerous trick. During the second trial, when Angie turned against Himiko, Tenko protected her from all the suspicion towards her, saying that she will believe in Himiko no matter what and doesn't think she is a person capable of taking the others' lives. Thanks to this act, Himiko begun to warm up to Tenko. She didn't find her annoying anymore and begun to join in her activities.

Tenko later becomes jealous and worried when Himiko decides to follow Angie's footsteps in worshipping her "handsome" God. She asks Himiko if she's into handsome types and why she doesn't go for Tenko instead. Himiko then asks Tenko if she swings that way, slightly shocking Tenko who then turns embarrassed and nervously tries to explain it's not like that. In Chapter 3, Tenko even joined the Student Council led by Angie only so she could be close with Himiko and protect her. However, they get into an argument after Tenko outrightly tries to ask Himiko to leave the council. Himiko refuses as she uses the council to cope with the killing game situation, though it also causes her to shut in her feelings.

In the end, Tenko fulfilled her role as a protector for Himiko, as she was the one who told Himiko to stay back and voluntarily made herself as the medium, ultimately ending her life in Chapter 3. She also gave Himiko advice about being open about her emotions. When Tenko is murdered, Himiko has a breakdown and tries to act according to Tenko's example in the future.

During her second Free Time Event with Kaede, Tenko is directly confirmed to have romantic feelings for Himiko and attraction towards magic-users and idols in general, apparently having a tendency to dream about them. She shyly explains she doesn't feel guilt about it or anything, but asks Kaede not to tell Himiko about it. However, Kaede fails to understand what she even means by being attracted to Himiko.

During the bonus mode Love Across the Universe, when Shuichi talks to Tenko in order to spend time with her, she repeatedly mutters Himiko's name while blushing and wonders why she is so cute. She then calls her perfect and her ideal girl, and she and Shuichi then spend time talking about how cute Himiko is.

Angie Yonaga
Tenko has a strange relationship with Angie since the start and Angie is the only girl she isn't that fond of. Tenko who doesn't believe in God's help sees Angie as a weird person, as she is always happy during the killing game knowing that God is on her side. When Angie answers Himiko's questions about Atua, Tenko is immediately suspicious of brainwashing.

Tenko later begins to dislike Angie and becomes jealous when Himiko decides to follow Angie's footsteps in worshipping her "handsome" God. In Chapter 3, Tenko even joined the Student Council led by Angie only so she could be close with Himiko. She betrayed Angie and the Student Council in the end when she guided Shuichi and Maki to the Student Council's exclusive study research.

However, Tenko was devastated to find Angie dead and tried to resurrect Angie with the others by performing a ritual to reveal the killer. However, she failed when she got killed by Korekiyo.

Gonta Gokuhara
Despite Tenko's hatred toward boys, she often has the same way of thinking with Gonta as both of them always wanted to protect their friends from dangers. While Tenko openly declared that she will only protect girls, Gonta volunteered himself as the boys's protector.

Tenko wondered how different Gonta is from any generic boys, for example, Gonta cries easily whenever one of his friend is dead and he wasn't able to protect them. Tenko, who also follows him to cry asked him why a man like him was able to cry so easily.

Kirumi Tojo
Tenko treats Kirumi as a friend and seems to trust her as well because of her talent. Tenko felt relaxed when Kirumi gave Tenko a massage on her back and took quite care of her which Tenko felt pleased. At first, Tenko didn't believe at Shuichi at first when he suspected Kirumi as the killer but accepted it then. She seems to be one of those people who encouraged Kirumi to run away from her execution.

Korekiyo Shinguji
Tenko refers to Korekiyo as a weird creep and doesn't like it whenever he tries to speak in a creepy way because of her hatred towards males.

Even though she hates males so much, Korekiyo thought that Tenko is fit to become his older sister's "friend" in the afterlife. He was touched by her willingness to protect Himiko by joining Angie's Student Council and later offering to be part of the ritual in Himiko's place.

It's also possible that with her wariness towards men, Korekiyo believed she would keep other men away from his sister.

Kaede Akamatsu
Kaede has a tendency to compliment Tenko's looks, surprising her and causing her to blush. Due to her prejudge against boys, Tenko warns Kaede about Shuichi, even though there is no any real reason for it.

Tenko doesn't believe that Kaede is the one who killed Rantaro Amami in the first case, even go far in risked her own life to prevent her from being executed along with Kaito and Gonta. After Kaede requested her and the others to stop, she witnessed the execution and started crying afterwards.

K1-B0
With him being neither a boy or a girl, Tenko considers K1-B0 "barely passable", not treating him as harshly as boys, but neither being as nice towards him as she is towards girls. K1-B0 is unsure whether or not this should be considered robophobia.

Tenko later asks him to join her, Himiko and Angie to relax and be pretense celebrities while being pampered by Kirumi. However, K1-B0 doesn't really understand how it works, especially the parasol which doesn't really seem to have any actual purpose. Tenko then a bit meanly answers him that a robot like him wouldn't understand what it means to feel like a celebrity.

Shuichi Saihara
During the bonus mode Love Across the Universe, at the Love Suite, Tenko referred to Shuichi as her brother due to him being able to best her in a battle with his strength. She chooses to see him as more than a simple blood relative due to him taking the path of Neo Aikido along with her. She organized the mock battle and bet so that whoever lost would be at the mercy of the others command, allowing them to do what they wanted. She plucked up the courage to state the reason why she made such a bet was because she liked Shuichi, revealing her feelings for him and wishing to engage in a relationship. She stated that the offer still stood for him to do whatever he wanted with her if he felt like it.

Quotes

 * -|DRV3 Demo=

DRV3=

List of Appearances

 * -|Games=
 * Danganronpa V3: Killing Harmony (Demo Version)
 * Danganronpa V3: Killing Harmony
 * -|Manga=
 * New Danganronpa V3: Minna no Koroshiai Shin Gakki Comic Anthology
 * New Danganronpa V3: Minna no Koroshiai Shin Gakki Comic Anthology Volume 2

Trivia

 * Other characters who also speak in third person within the series beside Tenko are Ibuki Mioda, Monaca Towa, Gonta Gokuhara, and Angie Yonaga, though Tenko and Angie only do so in Japanese.
 * In a poll hosted by MyNavi, fans voted Tenko the 8th most popular Danganronpa V3 student.
 * She does not know how to swim, as mentioned by her in Chapter 2 when she arrives to the pool with K1-B0 and Shuichi. In the bonus mode Ultimate Talent Development Plan, she asks Aoi to teach her how to swim and it is mentioned she greatly improved her swimming thanks to Aoi.
 * She loves, which gives her energy very quickly after consumed.
 * In the prologue illustration with all the students, Tenko is missing her left hand.
 * Tenko is shown to have attraction to people of the same gender.
 * This is heavily implied in her general behavior towards Himiko throughout the game, but it's directly confirmed during her second Free Time Event with Kaede, when she acts flustered and reveals she is attracted to Himiko. She asks Kaede not to tell her, but Kaede misunderstands it as her being attracted to Himiko's title as a "magician". Tenko also reveals she is attracted to "magic users" and idols in general, having a tendency to dream about them.
 * She is sometimes seen drooling whenever she seems to think about something suggestive concerning Himiko.
 * She has called Himiko her "ideal girl" in the bonus mode Love Across the Universe and official manga.
 * During Chapter 2, Tenko is jealous when Himiko appears attracted to Angie's "handsome" god, asking her why she doesn't go for Tenko instead. Himiko then directly asks her if she swings that way, shocking Tenko and causing her to embarrassedly claim it's not like that.
 * In her official English profile, it's mentioned that compliments from women will "make her heart aflutter" while the same compliments from men will "could result in [them] getting thrown across the room".
 * During the bonus mode Ultimate Talent Development Plan, she appears attracted to Sakura Ogami, stating that she apparently makes her "long for a different direction from Himiko".
 * In her Love Suite fantasy event, it's shown that she can also be attracted to and develop feelings for a boy who is a fellow Neo-Aikido practitioner, as she doesn't dislike them nearly as much as most boys.

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