Ren Sakakibara

Widely rated as strikingly handsome, on par with Gakushu Asano, Ren is a pale-skinned teenager whose dark hair, rendered brown in the anime, is cut in a clipped kariage style swept over to his right. His eyes are green and almond-shaped.

Ren shares the conceit and self-regard common to the Big Five, yet he wears it quietly and without the rudeness of his peers, a restraint likely rooted in his love of literature. He is an incorrigible flirt who leans on borrowed verse to sweeten his approach to girls. Unlike the others, he tends to sit out the group's habitual mockery of 3-E, and he even praised Yukiko Kanzaki's command of language, hinting at a genuine respect for their talents. Among the five, most would call him the kindest.

His true specialty lies in poetry and the humanities, a field where he is described as a sharp and gifted writer; he often reworks classic verse to lend his words extra charm, especially around the opposite sex. In Japanese studies his rival is Yukiko Kanzaki of Class 3-E, and rather than look down on her he is drawn to her beauty and flirts with her at every turn, to her discomfort and to the irritation of Tomohito Sugino. His closest bond is with Gakushu Asano, who treats him as a genuine equal thanks to his ability, wealth, and drive, and addresses him by his given name. Later material notes that Ren takes up modeling at university, ranks as the second wealthiest figure in the series, and keeps up his womanizing until a stern lecture from Asano finally reins him in.