This article uses material from the “Sanosuke Sagara” article on the Rurouni Kenshin Wiki at FANDOM is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike License.
Sanosuke Sagara is one of the main characters from the Rurouni Kenshin anime and manga.
A street fighter who befriends Kenshin early in the series. As a youth, Sanosuke ran away from home to join the Sekiho Army, a group of farmers and merchants who fought for the Ishin Shishi during the Meiji Revolution. When the Sekiho were betrayed and executed by the other revolutionaries, Sanosuke escaped and becomes a fighter-for-hire to vent his anger. He is hired to attack Kenshin, a former Ishin Shishi, but when Sanosuke is defeated he becomes Kenshin's best friend and fighting partner. His real name is Higashidani Sanosuke.
In the XP4 fics, Sanosuke debuted in the XP4 Heroes Coalition - Kick-Off!.
In the AWA fics, Sanosuke is a student at the AWA Academy.
Appearance[]
Sanosuke is tall man with a lean-build and has a brown spiky hair tied by a bandana, and has brown eyes. He wears an open white happi jacket with black trims, white dogi trousers, his abdomen is wrapped by bandages and his forelegs are also wrapped by bandages, and black slip shoes.
Personality[]
Straightforward and brash, Sanosuke presents a rather complex set of morals despite his relatively simple demeanor. Not particularly occupied with whether a person aligns with "good" or "bad", he instead places importance on whether or not people are honest with themselves or others. Due largely to his experience with the Sekihō Army and the Ishin Shishi of the Meiji Government, Sanosuke is acutely aware that the definitions of good and bad are arbitrary and subjective - often changed or switched depending on who is in a position of authority - and, therefore, does not judge those who choose either path or balk at doing "illegal" or "immoral" things himself. However, he marks lies and hypocrisy as the height of villainy and, as a result, is unusually forthcoming with his own intentions and also bald-facedly critical of others' half-truths.
Though usually displaying a demeanor somewhere between sardonically jovial and bored, Sanosuke is described by those close to him as having a temperament like fire - a fire that smolders with the losses of his past in times of quietude but comes fully aflame when his fists itch for combat. In keeping with his brash and forthright character and in spite of his quick tongue, Sanosuke is more prone to speak with his fists than with his words. For him, there is no greater enjoyment than that found in brawling with strong opponents and no greater disappointment than raising his fists against a weaker man. When Sano's temper is ignited by the victimization of a friend, however, he becomes unable to calm himself until his fists have struck a target, regardless of his enemy's strength.
After coming into contact with Himura Kenshin and the group at the Kamiya dojo, however, Sanosuke has begun to see a deeper path through life. For the most part forgoing his violent nature, Sano soon comes to admire Kenshin and joins the ex-hitokiri's mission to aid the downtrodden and victimized. Along the way, Sanosuke encounters more and more people whose strength he begins to evaluate differently; to those whose inner strength resembles Kenshin's, Sanosuke offers his strong right arm, and to those whose ideals are misguided, Sanosuke seeks to give the same inspiration that the rurouni has given him.
Unfortunately, Sanosuke's brash straightforwardness carries a strong strain of thickheadedness with it. Though rather observant in crucial situations and particularly astute with doling out criticisms, he can often be rather simple-minded, requiring those with sharper minds to explain the finer points of any complex occurrence. Sanosuke is also known to his close friends as a bit of a mooch, skulking around the Kamiya dojo for free meals, borrowing cash from friends without any real promise of reimbursement and racking up a rather large unpaid tab at the Akabeko.
XP4 Fanfics[]
Sanosuke is a member of the Heroes Coalitions and is part of the Omega Force. He also attends the Vanguard Academy as a student.
XP4 Heroes Coalition - Kick-Off![]
Chapter 8, Sanosuke, alongside his team, the Omega Force, infiltrated a warehouse where an unnamed crime syndicate are hiding. After defeating and capturing them, Sanosuke watches the police arresting the criminals and later saw the arrival of Team Extreme in a bus before they all made their way back to Neo-City.
XP4 Heroes Coalition - Neo-City Diaries[]
In Chapter 34, Sanosuke, alongside Rock Lee, rushed inside the Tech Garage of the Training Camp where they put out a burning jeep using fire extinguishers.
In Chapter 44, Sanosuke, alongside the rest of the Omega Force, welcomes Kenichi Shirahama and Lilina for becoming an official member of the team.
In Chapter 63, Sanosuke is amongst the people seen inside the Vanguard Academy.
XP4 Heroes Coalition - Welcome to Herowood[]
On Chapter 4, Sanosuke, alongside Elfman Strauss and Franky Flam, are seen in the main plaza of The Multiverse's Crossroads in Herowood where they found themselves freaked out by Umi Kousaka's hollowed expression.
Abilities[]
Unfortunately, being rather thick-headed, Sanosuke doesn't have many skills outside of the physical realm. However, he makes up for that fact with a body remarkably suited for combat. Despite his lithe frame, he is a man possessed of almost superhuman strength capable of kicking down massive doors, splitting trees in half with punches and kicks, smashing boulders with his fists and incapacitating fearsome opponents with but a flick of his finger. Sanosuke's strength is also what allows him to brandish his tremendous trademark sword--the Zanbatō--as if completely ignoring its significant weight. Though his relative inexperience with swordplay coupled with the blade's unwieldy size make it necessary for him to swing it either laterally or vertically, Sanosuke manages to be quite threatening with it, carving trenches into the earth where his sword strikes the ground and even using it to swat aside cannon fire.
However, even with his monstrous strength, Sanosuke's true advantage in combat comes from his herculean toughness; conventional attacks, armed or unarmed, have little to no effect on him and in those rare instances when he is injured by a powerful opponent, he is usually able to shrug off the pain momentarily and bounce back from most injuries with unexpected quickness. As a consequence of this, however, Sanosuke has almost no concept of self-defense outside of simply absorbing blows; he is unaccustomed to blocking or parrying in a fight and often jumps back into battle before his previous wounds have healed completely.
Futae no Kiwami[]
After his defeat at the hands of Saitō Hajime, it's clear to Sanosuke that his level of strength will be of little help against the enemies to come. Sano's attempts to heighten his usefulness lead him into the presence of Yūkyūzan Anji, who teaches him the basics of his secret technique: the Futae no Kiwami or "Mastery of the Two Layers". With this technique, Sanosuke is able to supplement his prodigious strength with the ability to completely pulverize matter. He does this by implementing a double-strike, first using the proximal interphalangeal joints of his right hand and then folding his hand to strike with the proximal phalanx joints. The first strike counters and negates the target object's natural resistance and the second strike, delivered within 1/75th of a second, strikes the target object before it can recover from the initial blow, thereby causing it to shatter completely.
"Mastery of the three layers" His original technique which along with the first two strikes he pushes open his fist creating a third strike this was used to defeat the creator (Anji) of the two layers.
Trivia[]
- Munetaka Aoki who played Sano in live action film is 9 years older than Takeru Sato who played Kenshin, which is ironic, considering that Kenshin is 9 years older than Sano.
- He is deathly afraid of newly introduced western technology; he doubts the stability of the locomotive, believing it to be an explosive deathtrap, and fears cameras, believing that they suck in a person's soul. Of interest is that these aspects are far more exaggerated in the anime while the manga rarely touches on this.
- Like the rest of the Higashidani family, the origin of his name also involves a direction, in his case the kanji Sa means "Left".
Gallery[]
.jpg "Sanosuke (1).jpg (40 KB)")
