Shuuya Kano

Shuuya Kano (鹿野 修哉 Kano Shūya) / Kano ( カノ) is the third member of the Mekakushi Dan. He's also the one who came up with the name Mekakushi Dan on his own initiative.

He is the foster brother of Kido, Seto, and Ayano Tateyama. In most Routes, due to working with Ayano before her suicide, he is the only active member who is aware of the Snake of Clearing Eyes and its plans before the present day.

Appearance

 * Kano has short, choppy blond hair that is slightly longer on its right fringe and golden cat-like eyes. He wears a short-sleeved hoodie that has no zippers and reaches below his hips. It is black with three white circles on each side of the lower bottom half of the hood, and its interior lining is identical with an inverted color palette of white with black circles. According to Jin, Kano's design was supposed to be something like a gambler, but calmer. His hoodie has an "Othello" design and is reversible, but the white side of the hoodie does not suit him. Underneath his hoodie, he wears a tucked-in beige shirt that has a cut collar that is loosely sewn back together with decorative string and sleeves that end above the elbows. He wears a black belt with dark blue jeans that are tucked into his black boots, which reach to about halfway up his shins and have three thick straps buckled above the ankles. In the anime, he wears a dark gray shirt on August 14th and his usual beige shirt on the 15th.


 * When he was younger and before Ayano's suicide, he wore a slightly different hoodie. It is similar to the one that he uses now, albeit without the black and white spots.


 * In Kagerou Daze -in a day's-, Kano wears a short-sleeved lapeled beige coat with over a black and white shirt that has three white dots like his original design's hoodie. He wears his shirt tucked underneath blue jeans and a black belt. On his feet he wears brown Oxford shoes.

Personality

 * Outwardly, Kano has an easygoing, laidback personality and always has a smile on his face. He seemingly rarely takes anything seriously and is often scolded for it. Because he teases Kido, Marry, and Momo a lot he's considered to generally be a flirt, but, when it counts, he's worth relying on.


 * His actual personality, which he hides behind his ability most of the time, is quite subdued and mature. Despite this though, he is shown to still be occasionally emotionally volatile and struggles to communicate his feelings healthily. When he was a kid, he was frequently physically abused by his single mother. He did not blame her, but rather himself for upsetting her so frequently, viewing himself as "defective". He often wished that he could hide his injuries so that his neighbors would stop gossiping and he could stay with his mother who he was extremely attached to regardless of her treatment of him. About ten years before present plot, he and his mother are killed by robbers when trying to protect each other. While he was in the orphanage with Kido and Seto, he was the more emotionally mature of the three. Because of this, he came to believe and even further internalize the idea that he had to shoulder his problems alone. Even in present day, he seems to be distrustful of others and carries around self-loathing tendencies, believing himself to be "useless". He is cynical and pessimistic, wondering if it's too late for him to ever change or be "saved" from his own ability, which has forced him to "continue lying" for nearly a decade.


 * He becomes much more heavily involved with the Kagerou Daze compared to most of the rest of the Dan when he learns about the Snake of Clearing Eyes' plot from Ayano. After her death, the Snake of Clearing Eyes forces Kano to follow its commands by threatening his new family's lives. Ayano's suicide, which occurred in front of him, heavily affected him, and his frustration at his situation drives him use his ability to haunt Shintaro and Ene in separate Routes.


 * In Manga Route 2, he does not work for the Snake of Clearing Eyes but is still aware of its plot to create a new Medusa thanks to Ayano, whom he has cut ties with. After Kido is attacked by the Snake of Clearing Eyes, he uses his ability to appear calm despite his grief and takes control of the Mekakushi Dan as its new leader.

Eye Ability

 * Deceiving Eyes (目を欺く Me wo Azamuku): Kano eye ability allows him to change what people perceive him as; he can change how he appears, sounds, and even feels to others and can thus impersonate other people and animals. He can only use this ability on himself and not others. To be able to use his ability to its best potential, he must know as much as his target as possible, such as their looks, voices and smells. His ability usually cancels out if he feels physical pain because it reminds him of himself, just like how remembering someone's characteristics makes him perceived as them.

Songs
Main: Minor:
 * Children Record
 * Yobanashi Deceive
 * Summertime Record
 * Kisaragi Attention
 * Konoha no Sekai Jijou
 * Losstime Memory
 * Ayano no Koufuku Riron
 * Outer Science
 * Shounen Brave

Trivia

 * Like the other two from the orphanage he is referred to with his last name rather than his first name.
 * His favorite prefecture is the Saga Prefecture.
 * Jin stated that, although Kido is No. 1 of the Mekakushi Dan, Kano actually plays the role of a leader in the story.
 * His hoodie was a gift from Ayano when they were younger. However, in the manga, it was a gift from Ayaka to be used to hide their eyes when their powers would activate.
 * Kano is the shortest boy in the team compared to the male Mekakushi Dan members (aside from Hibiya, who is still in elementary school). In one anthology, Kido stated that the reason why Kano still wears boots even in scorching summer is to make himself look taller.
 * According to the character designs booklet in Newtype Magazine 2014, it is stated that Kano's charm point is his eyes.
 * He was the quickest to learn how to control his ability, excluding Ene, Konoha, and Kenjirou.
 * When he, Kido and Seto were children, Kano was the tallest out of the three.
 * Kano has poor balance and is easily motion sick.
 * He gets flustered easily and has trouble filtering which emotions he shows, which is why he rarely genuinely smiles.
 * His official age is stated to be 17 in Sidu’s art collection book (2015) as well as in his official character profile from the anime magazine PASH, making him slightly older than Kido. Seto is the youngest of the trio. Kano is also in the same school grade as Kido and Seto. In Yobanashi Deceive IV, Ayaka tells the Trio that Ayano is 'older than you all by one year... Odd, didn’t the administrator tell you?' Because Kano's birthday is May 10, he is the oldest of the Trio and closest in age to Ayano, as his birthday occurs before the main story that happens August 14th-15th.
 * Kano has taken on the forms of a black cat (various Routes), his mother (only specified in the Novel Route), Ayano Tateyama (various Routes), Haruka Kokonose in the Mekakucity Actors Route, Momo Kisaragi and Azami in the Novel Route, and Marry Kozakura in Manga Route 2. The latter two forms are taken on when the Mekakushi Dan attempt to stop the Snake of Clearing Eyes.
 * In the Novel Route's Kagerou Daze VII -from the darkness-, Kano promises to the Dan he'll stop following what Clearing says, which implies he will drop some previous forms such as Momo and Ayano when Deceiving Shintaro, particularly, as he also felt remorse for what he had done to Shintaro.
 * In the Music Route, he is also briefly seen a handful of times as a female in Yobanashi Deceive, who wears a female version of Kano's own outfit. Official, contributing and previous artists such as Sidu, Wannyanpoo, and Mahiro Satou have since drawn various drawings of Kano's female form as well, though this design has yet to appear within the main storyline.
 * Kano's female form is called "Kanoko" in Japan.

Quotes

 * "Uwaaa! Marry, those clothes are really cute! Since you look like a seal…" - (Children Record Booklet) 
 * "Ah, my most ugly heart. I hate, hate, hate it, so I can’t help but sneer all the time." - (Limited edition version of Mekakucity Records) 
 * “Ah, I’m so dirty. I can’t tell anyone about my real feelings” - (Limited edition version of Mekakucity Records) 
 * "What? A TV anime? But such a thing doesn't exist, right? Just kidding, there is gonna be one!" - (Mekakucity Actors Commercial) 
 * "Meow," - ( Kagerou Daze V -the deceiving-  ) 
 * "That’s what I always strove for: a life without drama. One where I never got in the way of anyone." - ( Kagerou Daze V -the deceiving-  ) 
 * "Thanks to lies piled atop lies, I've become completely unable to say what I really mean any longer. It's irritating." - ( Kagerou Daze V -the deceiving-  ) 
 * "I don't understand myself at all. What do I like? What don't I like? What do I want to achieve? Why am I here? What am I, really, on the inside? I still had no idea." - ( Kagerou Daze V -the deceiving-  ) 
 * "...Yeah. I won't let the world just have its way with me like this. No way. I need to survive, survive and get happy, no matter what." - ( Kagerou Daze V -the deceiving-  ) 
 * "Even when faced with the end of the world, nothing changes between us. I thought everyone except me had changed. I was barking up the wrong tree the whole time." - ( Kagerou Daze V -the deceiving-  ) 
 * "They told me to do my best, but I couldn't keep my part of the bargain. That was the most painful thing of all." - ( Kagerou Daze V -the deceiving-  )