Guren

Guren keeps her light blue hair in a spiky ponytail, a few long strands hanging loose around her face, and she favours red lipstick above fair skin and dark eyes. She wears a green dress with one sleeve long and the other short, a red turtleneck under a fluffy white collar, and brown gloves, with a red one-piece beneath it and brown sandal boots on her feet. As a child her outfit was a teal short kimono, a grey turtle-neck, a jade-green cord at the waist, red shorts, navy blue sandals, and light purple wristbands, the strands by her face shorter back then.

Guren comes across as secretive, keeping largely to herself, and she showed early on a ruthless, sadistic streak, thrilled at the promise of a slaughter. Vain and intensely proud, she was bound to Orochimaru with near-obsessive devotion, sinking into despair and isolation when passed over as his next vessel. She clashes bitterly with Kabuto, whom she deems unworthy of Orochimaru. Everything shifts once she meets Yukimaru: nursing him through illness, she grows attached and crystallizes a flower for him that will last as long as she lives, and her loyalty to Orochimaru begins to crack under the guilt of the harm she has caused.

Shunned as a girl for her strange powers, Guren was taken in by Orochimaru after he wiped out her village, drawn to him out of envy for his strength. Sent to level a town as a test, she passed out from overusing her gift and awoke healed by a kind woman, later revealed as Yukimaru's mother, whom she was then made to kill to keep her master's favor. She rose to be one of his strongest, most loyal followers, though when Orochimaru grew impatient he chose Gen'yumaru over her as a vessel, driving her into isolation.

Her signature art is the Crystal Release, able to turn almost any matter, even airborne moisture, into an endless armory of crystal so dense that even Wood Release cannot pierce it. She raises crushing walls and snowflake shuriken, rides constructs through the sky, scries on distant places, and, most deadly of all, crystallizes foes at a molecular scale until they burst into dust. Skilled in close combat, she matched Kakashi, evaded Naruto's Rasengan, and fought Rock Lee and Tenten together, and in a pinch she trades away part of her life energy for extra chakra while sealing one-handed.

To ready his plans, Orochimaru dispatches Kabuto to collect Guren, who tests the medic with an attack before returning to the hideout. There she pits Orochimaru's prisoners against one another and forms a team from the survivors, among them Gozu and Rinji, killing sixteen who try to rebel. Given the chance to supplant Sasuke as vessel, she is sent away with Yukimaru, cares for him when he sickens, and warms to the boy, crystallizing one of his beloved flowers. Rejoining her squad, she traps Hinata in crystal to cover her men's retreat, but Team Yamato breaks through and frees the girl. Kabuto then leads them to a lake to rouse the Three-Tails; unable to hold the beast, she expends what chakra remains to shield Yukimaru and the rest. Later, tending an ailing Yukimaru, she is intercepted by Naruto, whose very different view of Orochimaru makes her question her path. When she returns and hears the boy play a grass-whistle, the tune makes her realize it was her hand that took his mother's life. Wracked with guilt, she begs Kabuto to spare the boy more pain and offers her own services against the Konoha ninja. Resolved now to protect Yukimaru, she fights beside Naruto against the Three-Tails, which swallows them both. Inside its belly they argue over where Yukimaru belongs, until she learns Naruto is the Nine-Tails' jinchuriki and sees his sincerity; she admits her guilt and agrees the boy's place is with Naruto. After escaping, they save Yukimaru from Rinji, who is Kabuto in disguise, and the boy forgives her. To shield Yukimaru she battles Rinji's reanimated body, crystallizing them both and falling into the water, only for Gozu to rescue her. Following the war, Guren, Yukimaru, and Gozu appear in the crowd outside Konohagakure.