Kanae Kocho

Kanae is a slim girl, taller than Shinobu but still small beside most slayers, with pink lips set against pale skin. Her long, straight black hair reaches below her waist beneath short bangs, and her pale violet eyes glint with reflected light. Atop the regular Corps uniform she wears a white butterfly-print haori that fades into turquoise and pink, the very one Shinobu would later inherit, plus green butterfly hair clips, one of which becomes a memento for Kanao.

Cheerful and lighthearted, she is nearly always smiling in her sisters' memories. She doted on Shinobu and held a somewhat naive dream of a future in which humans and demons could one day coexist peacefully. For all her gentleness she could be firm, and she even spoke tenderly to the demons she killed, as though sending them gently on their way.

After a demon murdered their parents, Kanae and Shinobu vowed to protect others from demons so no one else would endure what they had. Kanae went on to adopt the emotionally numb Kanao, handing her a coin to help her make decisions and trusting that the child's shut heart would open over time. As with the other Hashira she deeply respected their leader Kagaya Ubuyashiki, once gently scolding Sanemi for snapping at him.

Fatally wounded by Doma, she pleaded with Shinobu to give up the fight and simply enjoy a long, happy life, telling her that nothing would please her more than seeing her sister grow old in peace. Even as she lay dying she felt pity for the hollow, feelingless demon who had slain her, and her spirit would later push Shinobu toward the resolve she needed to defeat him.

Kanae cleared Final Selection and rose to Flower Hashira, a title granted only to those who have slain a member of the Twelve Kizuki or felled around fifty demons. Perceptive enough to see past Doma's fake warmth and recognize his emptiness, she had great endurance and, unlike the physically smaller Shinobu, the sheer strength to behead demons with an ordinary blade.

Her chosen style was Flower Breathing, which she honed well enough to face a century-old Upper Rank. Her adoptive sister Kanao picked up the same forms merely by watching her, including a perilous final technique that strains the eyes to their breaking point at the risk of blindness. Kanae's pink Nichirin katana shattered during her hopeless fight with Doma.