Naoko Kirino

Naoko Kirino is the main female protagonist of the Pumpkin Night manga and the initial Pumpkin Night for the first 19 chapters of the manga before her love interest, Kazuya replaces her after she seemingly dies, though after Kazuya kills Naruto and his father it's revealed she had somehow survived and went on to reclaim the Pumpkin Night mantle. A mental patient falsely placed in a mental hospital to hide the truth of her disfigurement, she would go on to kill more than 69 people and escape from the hospital, seeking revenge against her former school bullies. Wearing a pumpkin to hide her face, Naoko would begin to stalk her targets and spread horrors and carnage never seen before. Before the accident, Naoko is a girl with shoulder-length brown hair, topped with a giant red ribbon, yellow heart earrings, and light brown eyes. As she was voted for the Pumpkin Queen based on the prettiest girl usually being voted it's clear other people thought she was pretty, Kazuya included. After the accident Naoko's face became severely burnt, the most damage being done to her nose and mouth, causing her teeth to always be on display, along with this her hair had been burnt off, though by the time she had escaped the mental hospital it had grown back. Her body, her arms, in particular, are shown to have scars all over them, implying Naoko cut herself. Her clothing as Pumpkin Night is a high school uniform consisting of a short-sleeved white shirt, a skirt, black leggings, and high school shoes, she is usually seen wearing a pumpkin on her head to hide her disfigurement, the pumpkin itself is made unique with how Naoko has made it; the left eye is bulkier than the right, resembling warts slightly, the right eye has veins drawn on it with the mouth being in a wide smile that makes Naoko look like she's grinning insanely as it only shows her teeth, to finish it off Naoko has put her ribbon on the pumpkin so that her victims can recognize her. After being saved by the doctor Ryuchi Higa Naoko's face is restored through skin transplants, although this isn't able to last long thanks to the damage originally done to her face and multiple transplants have to be done as the skin keeps going necrotic, forcing her to wear a cloth face mask. After having her right hand destroyed by Naruto Ryuchi manages to fully recreate Naoko's hand, after this it's either always seen bandaged up or while killing people Naoko will usually wear a glove over it. Her hair also became very short after her accident, although after a year had passed it grew back to it's original length, with Naoko once again donning her giant red ribbon. When described by Saki her, Naruto and Arata make it seem that Naoko has a very creepy personality and way of acting, in short describing her as disgusting, and in flashback's when she's shown getting bullied she's shown to be screaming as a reaction, however this is far from the person Naoko actually is. Before the accident Naoko was a cheerful, childish and intelligent girl, she has a passion for Halloween and was shown to be very excited when she was crowned the "The Pumpkin Queen", she also has a strong personality and isn't willing to give in to anyone, as shown by how, even after being beaten and having her hair cut short during a school trip she refused to stop wearing her trademark bow and by her openly showing how she feels towards Kazuya, kissing him on the lips before heading off to get ready for the Halloween party. She was shown however to be scared of her bullies, the previously mentioned flashback actually showing her crying as a response to the bullying, and eventually, in her own words, thanks to the amount of bullying and abuse she was subjected to she began to see the Saki, Naruto, Arata and Asumi as demons, with the only exception being Kazuya, who never once joined on. Because of the trauma, along with discovering she had been locked up to cover up what Naruto had done, Naoko became a psychopathic, sadistic and ruthless girl, killing her bullies and even innocent people who get in her way. It's implied Naoko had suicidal thoughts in the past due to her arms being covered in scars, also implying Naoko became a cutter after the accident and trauma. She also mispronounces other people's names on purpose (e.g Chaki, Kachuya, Nyaruto, etc), although it's implied in chapter 3 of Pumpkin Night Gaiden that the mispronouncing might actually be a speech disability. Despite what she has become Naoko still retains some of her quirks; mispronouncing names, her intellect when it comes to stalking her victims and thinking on the spot to avoid instant capture and some of her childish personality is still shown to have remained intact along with her feelings for Kazuya, blowing him a kiss and then skipping out of the hospital after killing Saki's parents. The one aspect of her that's unchanged is her crush on Kazuya, despite her claiming to him she was going to kill him last, when talking about him she would talk very fondly rather than hatefully, her feelings for Kazuya would be used against her by Naruto however, distracting her long enough so he could escape his bonds and severely injure her right hand, and when Kazuya finally confesses his feelings towards her, even with her face as it is she lets go of any hatred she might have had for him and starts to cry happily, confessing her feelings in turn. After having survived her fatal fall in the construction site and being saved by Ryuchi Higa Naoko loses her memories, in particular of Kazuya, and becomes loyal to Ryuchi for saving her life, to the point she starts to fall in love with him and begins killing people as Pumpkin Night as a vigilante, aside from which she still retains her personality and quirks along with her incredible violence. She slowly starts to remember Kazuya a year later before Matsui fully reminds Naoko of him, restoring her memories of both Kazuya and everything that had happened a year ago. With her full memories restored it's shown her feelings for Kazuya are just as strong as they were a year ago, and she begins to panic for his safety once she finds out he's in the same clinic she had escaped from. With regards to her amnesia Matsui theorises that Naoko herself purposefully made herself forget everything that had happened to her, as her life had been nothing but a living hell for her, and to protect herself after surviving the fall she forced herself to forget everything.