Reimu Hakurei

Reimu Hakurei is the main protagonist of the Touhou Project series along with the deuteragonist, Marisa Kirisame. As the shrine maiden of the Hakurei Shrine, she manages the Hakurei Border of Gensokyo and exterminates troublesome youkai.

In the Unlikely Heroes Chronicles fics, Reimu is a member of the Unlikely Heroes.

Appearance
Reimu is of moderate height. In PC-98 canon, she is depicted as having purple hair and eyes, and she wears a large red ribbon at the back of her head, and red tubes on her sidelocks. From Story of Eastern Wonderland to Mystic Square she wears an outfit like a traditional shrine maiden uniform, with a red hakama over a white kimono.

However, her best known design is that of the Windows era. She has brown-black hair which varies in length and style between games (tending towards long and loose in later works), and her eyes vary from brown to red to even blue depending on the game, but she still wears a red ribbon and matching tubes on her sidelocks. She's still seen in her "shrine maiden uniform", but it now bears little in common with the standard uniform beyond the red-and-white colour scheme (which ZUN has acknowledged). This uniform consists of a red skirt (rather than the standard hakama), a sleeveless red top with a white collar, tied with a yellow ribbon (a red ribbon in Embodiment of Scarlet Devil and Perfect Cherry Blossom, a blue one in Phantasmagoria of Flower View, Subterranean Animism, Hopeless Masquerade, Urban Legend in Limbo and Legacy of Lunatic Kingdom), and a pair of white detached sleeves which expose her armpits and sarashi. Due to the color scheme, she's occasionally called the "red-white shrine maiden". Her shaman clothing and her purification rod came from Rinnosuke Morichika, but it's unknown who designs them. In chapter 7 of Strange and Bright Nature Deity, she used chopsticks with her left hand, and it was stated that she was left-handed (this statement was deleted in the collected edition), but she held a pen with her right hand in Subterranean Animism. It has been speculated by fans that, assuming this wasn't an art error, she may be ambidextrous or just used to writing with her right hand.

Personality
Her personality is straightforward, optimistic, and a bit curious. She's quick to anger if offended, but just as quick to offer help to those in need. According to Komachi, Reimu has an innocent heart that can't truly hate anyone. While rather lazy in her free time, she's highly devoted to her duties as the Hakurei Shrine Maiden, resulting in a "shoot first and ask questions later" attitude to youkai extermination. This makes her known to exterminate youkai indiscriminately, regardless of how much of a threat they represent to her or others. One example is Tokiko, who was ambushed by Reimu while she was, in Reimu's own words, "reading and minding her own business".

Apparently, however, she actually helps youkai in trouble when it really matters. For instance, in Silent Sinner in Blue, she kept Reisen (disguised as an earth youkai-rabbit) at her place to help healing her injuries, giving her the futon she uses to sleep and even going to Eientei to inform its residents that a wounded rabbit was at her shrine. She also treated Shinmyoumaru Sukuna well enough after the events of Double Dealing Character that the inchling gave her a matching kimono as a sign of gratitude. Since it was so small, Reimu had to wear it on the back of her head.

It has been stated that Reimu treats everyone the same, whether they are humans, youkai or gods, giving them no particular respect or disrespect. This habit has caused her to inadvertently befriend many youkai she defeats. While she tries to keep youkai away from her shrine, this is because it makes it harder to gather faith from humans rather than because she dislikes them. At the end of the symposium in Symposium of Post-mysticism, when Reimu goes to break it up, Miko notes that though Reimu says she wants to eliminate all the youkai, she actually just wants to attain a peace in Gensokyo that doesn't require violence, like the others present wish.

Abilities
While many inhabitants of Gensokyo are capable of flying, Reimu's ability extends beyond that; she is someone who excels at floating through life, displaying a level of oneness with her surroundings that has been compared to a hermit. While she "goes with the flow" Reimu displays superhuman instincts and incredible luck, naturally ending up on the path of least resistance through most situations; conversely, when distracted or acting with impure motives she quickly loses her edge. On one occasion observers saw Reimu dodging an attack "like she was made of air" while Reimu herself saw the attack swerving to avoid her;[4] on another Reimu unknowingly walked across a river without getting wet, by stepping on fish that swam beneath her feet. This also makes Reimu's techniques extremely hard for Marisa Kirisame to learn from, since even Reimu herself has trouble explaining what she's doing. The ultimate expression of this ability is Fantasy Nature, which allows Reimu to float away from reality and become impossible to attack; this was considered too powerful for use as a spell card until Marisa gave it a name and time limit.[6] It's stated in the omake.txt of Embodiment of Scarlet Devil that Reimu can control the natural spirits of living things, an ability which isn't listed in any source afterwards. No clear instance of this ability has been displayed in canon. As the Hakurei shrine maiden, Reimu can handle the Hakurei Yin-Yang Orbs, and is trained in youkai extermination techniques as well as standard duties like performing blessings. Reimu is also capable of invoking Gensokyo's native gods into her body, but she isn't well-trained enough to do so reliably. Reimu displays great aptitude with magical barriers (beyond that normally associated with shrine maidens), presumably related to her work in maintaining the Great Hakurei Barrier. Among her techniques are barriers that explode, push enemies (or herself), or act as portals for her other attacks. Reimu is capable of dismantling barriers and seals too complex for Marisa Kirisame and Patchouli Knowledge to understand, with what Marisa calls her "cheat technique".
 * Ability to float
 * Aura manipulation
 * Powers as the Hakurei Shrine Maiden
 * Barrier techniques

Trivia

 * The characters for Reimu's last name (Romanized: Hakurei) literally mean something like "esteemed companion", the first word (Haku) means "wide" or "exposition" while (Rei) means "lovely", "graceful", and "beautiful". Her first name (Romanized: Reimu) means "revelatory dream" or "a vision", the first word read as "Rei" means "spirit" or "soul" while (Romanized: Yume) is read "Mu" and means "dream".


 * The surname Hakurei is also another name for sake, as the maker of the Touhou series, ZUN, is quite the connoisseur of "spirits", so much so that fans often speculate over whether ZUN might be or has been an alcoholic.


 * Reimu has appeared as a playable character in every integer-numbered game in the Touhou series.


 * Reimu was the second extra boss in the Seihou game Shuusou Gyoku.


 * Reimu makes an official appearance as "Flying Maiden" in Graffiti Kingdom, as ZUN was involved in the production of it.


 * Reimu appeared on the cover of all the PC-98 Touhou games, from the first game in the series to the fifth.


 * Reimu was never seen flying with her own power until Embodiment of Scarlet Devil. In the previous games, if Reimu needed to go somewhere far, she would ride on her turtle familiar, Genjii.


 * Although her many profiles suggest that the "Hakurei Clan" and the shrine Reimu lives at have been in Gensokyo for long enough to be considered ancient, there has never been any mention of Reimu's family members, ancestors, etc. It is originally stated that she lives alone at the shrine, but other rarely seen characters (Mima and Shingyoku) are known to stay there or near there as well.