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YOUKO KURAMA - MINAMINO SHUICHI - STORY - ANIME - MANGA - ASK - LINK ME

NAME
Minamino Shuichi (G). Although the name Shuichi creates the urge to be self-expressive and generous, we emphasize that it causes restless intensity that defies relaxation. This name, when combined with the last name, can frustrate happiness, contentment, and success, as well as cause health weaknesses in the liver, bloodstream, and solar plexus.

Your name of Shuichi has made you versatile and creative. There is hardly anything you cannot do if you put your mind to it, but a driving urge leads you to one experience after another, seldom finishing what you start. You cannot find peace of mind or lasting contentment in anything you do. As soon as a challenge is met, boredom sets in, and you yearn for another experience. This restlessness makes it difficult for you to assume responsibility and to establish stable, progressive conditions in your life.

Quoted from: HTTP://WWW.KABALARIANS.COM.

AGE
15 at the beginning of the series, 18 at the end.

HEIGHT
152.5cm/5'1" at the beginning of the series, 165cm/5'6" at the end.

WEIGHT
Unknown.







BLOODTYPE
Unknown.

OCCUPATION
Student at Meiou High School.

HOBBIES
Being the ideal son (getting high grades, doing what is expected of him and more), and participating in Spirit Detective activities/work.

PERSONALITY
Minamino Shuichi seems to follow the saying of "Keep smiling and everyone will wonder what you're up to." Well it's true, he keeps smiling (not excessively though), hiding what he is truly thinking beneath the surface. There are times however where his perfect expression mirrors his feelings through either being completely outraged, surprised or just confused, those times are few and far between however. One example is when Maya, a girl from his Junior High class informs him that he was her first love. He apparently had no idea, and it shows clearly on his face. I am surprised that he had no idea, but I suppose being a diligent son, doing chores and getting good grades didn't really leave much time for factoring in the behaviour of girls, even if he was a really old fox spirit on the inside. Shuichi is polite, well-mannered and easily the school heart throb (I wouldn't be surprised if he even had males in his fanclub). He is intelligent, diligent and wise; a good fighter and an amazing friend to those he cares for and trusts.



ATTACKS
Minamino Shuichi's attacks are primarily plant-based ones. Below is a list of the ones we've seen him use so far. The following summaries have been quoted from KURAMA'S TERRITORY.

Rosewhip (Kagon-Retsuzan-Shi). Rosewhip is Kurama's most famous attack. He summons this by pulling a rose from the back of his neck and transforms it to a thick green whip made out of the rose's stem. This attack should not be underestimated because as fragile as it may sound like, this whip bears sharp thorns and is able to cut through almost anything.

Blast Petal Waltz Formation (Fu-Ka-Enbu-Jin). The Rose Circle Waltz Formation is an attack that make uses of sharp rose petals. These rose petals forms a circle surrounding Kurama when summoned. And when commanded to do so, these petals would fly to the opponent and cut him into pieces. These petals can penetrate through almost everything, including very strong shields.

Demon-Eating Plant (Shoukuyuu-Shokubutsu). This technique is probably remembered by everyone as it was the first technique Kurama used when he transformed to his Youko form again at the Black Tournament's semi-finals. He was able to grow this in his hand to blackmail Ura into talking of their true intentions on joining the tournament. These plants has branches that when commanded by Kurama, would eat his opponent.

Shimaneki Seeds. A single Shimaneki seed, if entered to an opponent's body by Kurama, would cause him to get paralyzed and turn into one of the most beautiful elaborate flower arrangement you'll probably see in your whole life (Shimaneki-sou). This seed is also responsible for the plant-sword he used once against an opponent in he Black Tournament.

Tree of Thought Manipulation (Janen-Ju). A product of Kurama's ingenious pissed-off mind-set after having to end a child's life (The Game Master). An attack he used by first tricking Toguro Ani into getting lost within a thick cloud of fog. Kurama managed to grow this tree to imprison Toguro Ani's mind and body. Hallucinations of him fighting Kurama is all he sees. The tree will never stop inducing such thoughts until its prison tire out and died from it.

Demon World Sensitive Plant/Mimosa (Ma-Kai no Ojigisou). This plant is highly sensitive that it attacks anything that moves in front of it. The flowers/leaves of this plant is able to kill an opponent by eating it. This plant is poisonous.

(Kurama's technique in YYH Movie II). This attack of Kurama is only seen at the Yu Yu Hakusho second movie. It make uses of what seems to be a bamboo twig Kurama got as he was bathing at a lake at the movie. It was able to grow countless bamboo (or bamboo-looking) trees that was able to kill his opponent. This part of the movie was one of the rare moments we were able to see Kurama lose his cool.

Healing. Packaged with the power to manipulate plants is the capability of being able to heal. There have been certain moments in the series when Kurama was being referred to as a healer. The suggestion of Yusuke to bring Genkai to Kurama to be able to revive her and the help Yusuke asked from Kurama to heal Sensui were both accounts where we can clearly see that Kurama is indeed a healer.

Quick Thinking. If there's one trait of Kurama that saved him a lot of times, it is that he is a quick thinker. Whether under pressure or not, the cool, collected Kurama always come up with his brilliant concoctions of great ideas. Great fighters must have this characteristic, because they wouldn't be great at all without innate talent in quick thinking.

The Brains. Kurama is known for his great brains. After all, the power of plant manipulation would be put to waste if it wasn't utilized by someone possessing a highly innovative, clever and competent mind. This is the main reason why no one could ever guess his next attack or why no one could ever know everything that Kurama can do. And never will you catch Kurama taking non-thought, stupid risks on any opponent. Everything he does, he makes sure he had considered it twice.

CLASS
In YuYu Hakusho the ranking of demons is done by grade letters. E-class is the weakest class of demons, meanwhile, S, which indicates "Super A-class", is the strongest demon classification. Each class also has sub-divisions of upper (or +), middle, and lower (or -). Minamino Shuichi's class changes numerous times throughout the series, here is a list of the different classes.

ARCCLASS
SPIRIT DETECTIVE SAGA
Three Artifacts D
Holy Beasts C
DARK TOURNAMENT SAGA
Rokuyokai Team a.k.a. Jolly Devil Six C+
Dr. Ichigaki Team C+
Masho C+
Uraotogi Team C+
Toguro Team B-


ARC (cont'd)CLASS (cont'd)
CHAPTER BLACK SAGA
Terrible Truths B
Dangerous Games B
Old Rivals, New Problems / In the Blood / Born Anew B
THE MAKAI TOURNAMENT SAGA
The Three Makai Rulers A
The Makai Tournament A+
MOVIES
Number 1 C-
Number 2 (Normal/Angry) B/B+


FAMILY
Minamino Shuichi now lives with and for his family, mainly his mother, Minamino Shiori. It is in fact how he is introduced into the series, he works work Hiei and a random demon to steal the three artifacts. He abandons the two other demons and promises Yusuke he can have the Mirror of Darkness back when he's finished. He planned to sacrifice his life to save his ill mother who was currently in the hospital It was from her that he learned compassion, sacrifice and love and wished to repay her, regretting the grief he had caused her. Later in the series she remarries to a man who also has a son named Shuichi, and to please his mother (though I doubt normally he would care enough to protest anyway) he acts like a model older brother and step-son.

LOVE INTERESTS
This is a huge section I'll only briefly dabble in right now. Mainly because I find it's difficult to prove either way what Shuichi really feels as he's so good at hiding his thoughts. It's only when Togashi-san reveals Shuichi's thoughts that we get an understanding of what he's thinking.

MAYA
It's a love/hate relationship with a lot of fans. He met her in Junior High, and from what I can tell she spoke to him a lot more than any other guy.I don't know what won him over, or why, or how, all I know though is he did have some feelings for her. Was it love? Possibly, depending on what level and definition you take. Did he want to be lovers? Marry her? Probably not. I'm sure he did have feelings for her. What's my proof? In Volume 7, Two Shot the Special Bonus Episode Maya confesses that Shuichi is her first love. She then asks how he feels about her. He is silent but his thoughts are "... I can't tell you. It's too dangerous to tell you... How I really feel...."

Keep in mind, Youko Kurama has numerous enemies in the Makai world, and various numbers of youkai after him, wanting his blood. They're not stupid, they know he's survived, whether it's through scent or rumours, they know he's in the human world and are looking for him. Now, the youkai, you have to remember aren't nice, fair fighters most of the time. They want revenge and are willing to stop at nothing, sacrifice anyone to get it. So now factor in that if he didn't like her, he could just say "no, sorry," without a second thought and it wouldn't put her in danger, but it's my educated guess that he does have feelings for her but can't tell her because it would only endanger her life as she would be used continually as a pawn.

HIEI
Before I begin I'm not anti-yaoi, so don't bother flaming me, I just believe evidence is proof and without that, it's merely fan-made coupling. That being said, HieixKurama, or vice versa is the biggest fan-made coupling I've ever seen. The basis is the two characters are very quiet, reserved personality types and they don't let many people into their personal life. I can understand where the misunderstanding came from, (they ARE close friends), and it is beautiful to see two cute boys loving each other, but there has yet to be any canon evidence that the two are actually a couple, or exchanging sexual favours. There's billions and billions of doujinshi (fan-made manga) supporting this belief, but Togashi-san has yet to publish anything to proof this coupling, unfortunately.