"Find me...."
- - Misao
Misao (English: [miˈsæʊ̯]; Japanese: [misa.o̞]) is the tragic character who is the center of the main event of the game. She is a teenage girl who went "missing" three months before the game began.
In the Misao novelization, her full name is revealed to be Misao Furukawa (古川 みさお Furukawa Misao).
Appearance[]
Misao is a teenage fair-skinned girl of petite stature. She has upper-back-length purple hair that is half-tied back in a ponytail, square bangs hanging over her eyebrows, and yellow eyes. Throughout the game, Misao is hardly seen to smile. According to her male classmates, Misao is the least attractive among the female students in her class and she is always seen to have a gloomy aura around her. Misao always has a dark expression, which she commented to be ugly - as it was the consequence of being subjected to bullying and loneliness.
Her attire consists of a standard school uniform. After she got killed, Misao was only seen wearing a white shirt. Notably, unlike some students in her class, she always wears her school uniform formally in both original and remake versions.
Personality[]
Not much is known about Misao, as she has been missing since the beginning of the game. However, according to Aki/Akito, Misao is an ordinary girl who does not stand out among her class and is noted to be shy and lonely throughout the game.
Later as hinted throughout the game, especially in her flashbacks memories, Misao is a meek and timid girl who is helpless and vulnerable both physically and emotionally, making her a perfect target for the bullies. As demonstrated by her being the target of bullies throughout her life from kindergarten to high school. She is incredibly naive, gullible, and socially awkward as she accepts Tohma's 'confession' without a second thought when he asks her out so easily and unaware that the event was Yoshino's attempt to make fun of her in front of the class at that time; written an awkward text to Tohma as a love confession without being cautious of his sweet words; when being bullied inside the girl's bathroom, as she did not know how to choose the right words and her lack of social skill did not help either, which only further provoke Yoshino. Nonetheless, Misao is genuinely kind to others as she helps Aki find her contact lens and climb on a tree to save a cat.
After her death, Misao became a cruel vengeful spirit and becomes exact opposite of her old self as she was blinded by her hatred towards those who tormented her while she was still alive. Vowed to take revenge on those who hurt her, this includes tormenting them after their death. However, it is worth noting that she still attains some of the positive side of her original self as she does not take her revenge on those who were not involved in her death. Evident by Misao sparing Aki/Akito and asks for their help, as well as not attacking Ayaka despite the girl being in her palm as the whole school was sucked into the other world.
Due to being the subject of the bully and always alone, Misao longed for someone to be by her side and be happy. She is haunted by that loneliness to the point of being unable to tell the person's true intention and cannot distinguish between "love" and "obsession" as demonstrated when she drags Tohma to the other world with her. In Akito's route, it is indicated that Misao believes that a romantic relationship can make her happy, despite them only barely knowing each other as friends.
History[]
At the beginning, the only known information regarding Misao is that she had mysteriously vanished three months before the game with many of her classmates believing that Misao was already dead. In addition to that, a conversation overheard by the player from other classmates (Tohma, Yoshino, Saotome, and Kudoh) reveals that she may have had a crush on Tohma that she was bullied by Yoshino before her disappearance. After, several strange paranormal events began and it's discussed amongst the others that these may have been Misao's doing. When Tohma jokingly and mockingly asks Misao to 'spare' him from her wrath, Misao unleashes a true curse and sends the school, and everyone in it, spiraling into an otherworldly realm filled with terrifying monsters and ghosts.
Misao originally contacts the player through their dreams and minds, asking them to "help" and "find her". When she enacts the curse, the player is the only one who can still hear her voice, continually pressing the character to find her.
Misao's Tragic End[]
At the end of the game, Misao reveals to the player what exactly happened to her before her disappearance in a series of flashbacks. First, she shows the event where Yoshino told everyone in the class that Misao had a crush on Tohma. Shocked and embarrassed, she withstood the teasing until Tohma came up to her and responded that he had a crush on her as well, reciprocating her feelings in a surprising turn of events. Yoshino stood by and incredulously commented on the affair until Tohma told her to butt out.
The next flashback showed Misao wondering why Yoshino would blurt out her hidden crush, but she brushes it off in a kind manner and decides to thank the pink-haired girl instead. She then receives an embarrassed text from Tohma, telling her that he likes her and asking if she likes him back. The scene cuts off as she writes her reply.
Misao then shows what happened afterward, in which the text is then printed out and tacked onto a bulletin board for everyone to see. In the background, we see a character sprite of a long, blonde-haired girl that may or may not be Saotome, turning away from the bulletin board when Misao runs up to it before walking away. The text itself is filled with Misao's private feelings towards Tohma, including the poem she'd written, and she runs away in dismay.
In the following flashback, Misao slowly walks back to her classroom, theorizing that it was Yoshino who had taken a peek at Tohma's phone and then published the text. She also correctly guesses that Yoshino herself liked Tohma, but she defends her position as Tohma's girlfriend solidly before she's about to head back into the classroom. Unfortunately, Misao instead overhears Tohma talking to Saotome, saying that she was the only one who he had shown the same text and pressing her for the truth. It's a little vague if Tohma was fooling around with Saotome or if he was just confronting her, but from the outside of the classroom, it sounded more like the former. Most likely feeling betrayed, Misao runs off yet again, but this time a sympathetic Kudoh is seen watching her leave.
In an abrupt change of pace, the next scene depicts Misao being bullied in a bathroom by Yoshino and two other girls. She doesn't fight back, but she does remark that Tohma will never make Yoshino his girlfriend if she continues to bully Misao. This caused Yoshino to become even more violent, finally taking part in actually hitting the poor girl. Determined to make Misao regret her words, Yoshino blackmails her into silence for all the bullying that she's endured up till now. Then, she encourages a boy to "give her lots of love", locking Misao in the bathroom stall to be raped by him.
The next flashback shows Misao sobbing in the bathroom stall, most likely having been left there after the boy had raped her, and night had already fallen in the school. She hears a voice and it is revealed to be Mr. Sohta, who had probably heard her crying, and chastises her for being out so late. Unable to stay calm, Misao breaks down in front of Mr. Sohta and he comes to her side as the flashback turns black.
When we next see Misao, she's seen sitting at Mr. Sohta's desk, with Mr. Sohta comforting her and asking her what was wrong. This directly contradicts a statement the teacher had made to Aki before, in which he had said he didn't have time to listen to Misao and had ignored her. Watching the events unfold in the background, the player then learns that the bullied girl lied to Mr. Sohta about her being raped, probably in remembrance of Yoshino's blackmail. Misao instead tells him that she'd had her heart broken and that she was crying to herself in the corner of the bathroom. The older man replies that he had been like that once, but Misao had found that hard to believe, complimenting on his gentle and popular nature. Mr. Sohta then takes hold of her, causing her to tell him to leave her alone. He continues to pursue her after she attempts to run away, noting that he locked the door so nobody would “intrude on them”.
She backs herself into a corner, but Mr. Sohta continues to pursue her as the scene fades. Off-screen, Misao screams and the teacher yells back, outraged at Misao's refusal to die. When the screen comes back, Misao is dead, with Mr. Sohta standing over her body. It is implied that he rapes her as well.
Mr. Sohta then drags Misao's body to the same bathroom stall where she was raped the first time and holds up a saw, dismembering her body.
Misao's Curse[]
Three months later, Misao invoked a curse upon the school that was only reversed when the player found her head, heart, eyes, arms, legs, and brain, then chose the final sacrifice, the curse filled the school with monsters and traps that often prove fatal on encounter with few exceptions, some traps scary (like the "you're dead" paper) some relatively bland (hitting head on the wall as phone rings), only Tohma, Sohta, Onigawara, Library and the player survive long enough for the collection of Misao's parts however, ether Sohta or Tohma must be killed to end the curse, freeing Misao's soul.
True Ending[]
During the "True Ending", Misao returns to torture the souls of those who died as sacrifices, namely Kudoh, Saotome, Yoshino, and either Tohma or Sohta, depending on who the player chose as the last sacrifice earlier. In all of the player's attempts to bring the sacrifice back to life as reincarnated babies, Misao is a constant presence and she is seen tormenting them all.
When Aki tries to rescue Kudoh, he is in a dark, empty room with clones of Misao surrounding him, all of them telling him things along the lines of dying and suffering. When the player manages to convince Kudoh that the Misao surrounding him is only an illusion from the darkness in his heart, the Misao clones disappear. The real Misao then appears, saying that she didn't hate Kudoh and that she was happy he thought of her.
When saving Saotome, the cutscene continues with Misao appearing while Saotome and Tohma are having lunch together. Upon seeing Misao, Tohma goes to her, acting hypnotized, and proclaims that he was only playing around and lying to Saotome and loved only Misao. Anguished by this, Saotome takes the bat from the player where she attacks Misao and Tohma.
When saving Yoshino, Aki finds Yoshino in the bathroom while being beaten and bullied by three Misao clones. The clones are stopped when the player beats them each with a bat. After Aki talks to Yoshino, Misao then appears her face covered in shadows, and she angrily questions the player's motives for interfering. Aki says that vengeance would not help her soul from moving on and Misao tells her to shut up many times before fading away.
Depending on whether you chose to sacrifice Tohma, his cutscene varies. If Sohta is sacrificed instead, the player will find Misao and Tohma after saving the three other sacrifices when moving on. Misao tries to coax Tohma to stay with her in the dark realm but Tohma is terrified of her, screaming monster as he tries to run away from her. Misao ponders on this, and Aki reveals that her desire for revenge has changed her, and gives Misao the little hand mirror.
When Misao looks into the mirror, it reveals that her vengeance has made her grotesque, making her eyes white with blood dripping down from them to her chest. Horrified at her new appearance, Misao turns and runs away from Aki whilst screaming not to look at her. Aki then consoles her, and Misao's spirit is freed, turning her back to normal.
Aki then returned to the classroom, wondering if it was all a dream. Looking at the chalkboard, however, she sees a message from Misao. She then says "No, it wasn't a dream... I'll never forget you... Misao." The message on the board read "Thank You".
It is unknown if the police/law enforcement investigated Misao's disappearance, however, unless Aki was questioned, the case was most likely thrown out since Sohta, the murderer, was already dead, so there would've been no one to imprison or put on trial.
(As of version 3, you can play the truth mode with the male Aki.)
Relationships[]
Tohma[]
Tohma is Misao's classmate who Misao has a crush on. When Yoshino reveals her crush on him, Tohma admits to also liking Misao, and she - without a second thought, accepts his feelings and exchanges numbers, unaware that his confession of him was rather superficial, simple, and so easy. When Misao texts him an awkward love confession poem in answering his message, Tohma shows it to Saotome - his true girlfriend. He cruelly makes fun of her as he and Saotome are alone and have an intimate moment in the class without knowing that Misao has heard the whole conversation.
Three months after her disappearance, Tohma is still confident that Misao still likes him and brags to Yoshino, Kudoh, and Saotome. After Tohma loudly makes fun of Misao, he unknowingly provokes her causing Misao to pull the students in the class at that time to the other world.
After surviving and witnessing her tragic past and death, Tohma feels guilty and apologizes for his past actions towards her as he returns to the old world with Aki/Akito. However, Misao - who still obsessed with Tohma at that time, and was dissatisfied with his return to the living world, personally took him to the other world with her.
Yoshino[]
Misao was constantly bullied by Yoshino and her gang. Yoshino, with her superiority complex, is always cruel and sadistic with Misao, claiming that she did that to "put her [Misao] in her rightful place". Yoshino and her friends always find a way to bully Misao verbally - beating her with her friends and harassing her, putting her in an awkward position by making fun of her in front of the class. This makes her most hated by Misao and among those whom she hates, Misao longed to take her revenge on Yoshino the most. In True Ending, it is revealed that after Misao was raped in the boy's bathroom, she cursed Yoshino "NEVER FORGIVE". After her death, Misao personally tormented Yoshino just like how she and her group did to her back when they were still alive - gang up and beat inside the bathroom and she beat her to the point that Yoshino became vulnerable and lost her sense of reality. As Aki/Akito has said - this is her retribution for all of her action against Misao.
Saotome[]
Saotome is a rival for Tohma's affections. While Saotome acts cordial towards her, Misao believes Saotome is pretending to act sweet on purpose and resents her. It's unknown if this was true or if Misao was assuming the worst of her due to her jealousy for being Tohma's actual girlfriend.
In the 2024 - Remastered Edition, it is revealed by Miss Library that Tohma likes Saotome for her attractive appearance and he only using Misao to make Saotome jealous and admit her feelings for him as she has already fallen for him after every attempt to seduce her.
Mr. Sohta[]
Mr. Sohta is Misao's teacher who is loved by all students. Before her death, he is presumably the only one to genuinely care about Misao as she is his student. Sohta is the one to find Misao in the bathroom the night after Yoshino abused her. Misao then goes to the faculty room, where she confides in Sohta. As he started to have strange behavior towards her, Misao pushed him away in shock, confusion, and fear towards him. In an attempt to escape, Misao was strangled to death by Mr. Sohta dismembered her body.
Kudoh[]
Kudoh and Misao have an estranged relationship, while they have an inseparable friendship in childhood, the two of them grow apart as they become older. Kudoh distanced himself from Misao, due to her being bullied and being teased in middle school for playing with a girl. Despite his actions, Misao still trusts him and depend on him, but this comes to an end when Kudoh abandon her to be bullied by Yoshino and her group for his ego.
In the Definition Edition and 2024 Remake Edition, Kudoh is shown to be taciturn with Misao, and while he always protects other students from Yoshino, he ignores Misao when she pleads with him to help, which only receives a cruel answer: "This is what you get for dating Tohma". This triggers her hatred towards him for his abandonment and she comes to meet him and kills him among the people who are involved.
Nonetheless, among the people involved, Kudoh genuinely cared about her as he blames himself for her suffering and the curse. Surprisingly, aside from Aki/Akito, he can also hears Misao's pleas of help. When the whole school got suck into another world, while others sought to survive, Kudoh - like Aki/Akito - sought to find Misao and help her. Though it ended up with him injuring his leg and being unable to move, later his confession got rejected by Misao, and killed her. Despite being killed by her and in his death, Kudoh still tries to help her as he helps Aki/Akito retrieve an unreachable Key Item before resting in his grave.
Kudoh himself did not feel that he deserves forgiveness as their relationship was beyond repair and reconciliation. Continues to blame himself in the afterlife and Misao tormenting him with his feelings - creating several illusioned clone of her using his emotions and perspective. Only after Aki/Akito helps him realize this, he finally be freed.
Despite their estranged relationship, they have a lot in common - being formally dressed students; having gloomy aura; being vulnerable to their peers' views and subjects of tease and bully; and being the least stand-out in their class. The only difference is that Kudoh can manage not to make himself a target while Misao is too vulnerable to do so, leading to her tragic death.
Aki[]
The player's character. While they weren't quite friends when Misao was still alive, Misao chose Aki to be the one to find her missing body parts as Aki is the only one among her classmates who did not look down on her nor do terrible things against Misao before her death. Additionally, they expressed their wanting and wishing to be Misao's friend. In Misao's perspective, Aki was also the only person Misao ever talked to who didn't bully or hurt her and had a friendly yet modest interaction with. Among her classmate, she is fond of them to some degree as they are the only student to treat her with compassion and genuineness. At the True Ending, Misao expresses her desire to have them with her in the other world instead of Tohma, Aki/Akito offers to be her friends and this soothes Misao's soul and ends her loneliness. The scenario where their friendship is formed is determined by the player choosing Aki's gender.
Rec Room[]
About Misao[]
The tragic heroine, Misao. Friendless, and far away from family. She lived a lonely life. She fell for a man her polar opposite. She longed for Tohma, and maybe the feelings were mutual. She's an obedient girl, but hides a tricky personality inside. That said, she definitely wouldn't wish unhappiness on anyone when alive. She's likely the nicest of all the characters.
Misao Design Secrets[]
Horribly bullied. You know, tragic heroine and all. Forgive me for that, Misao, but I had a story to write... Since it's said she never stood out, I gave her a very simple design, but I was surprised by the response of her being seen as cute. Misao being bullied by her classmates was there from the beginning, but most of the ending stuff was decided much later. Even I did not think this would end up being a game that struggled to claim "15 and up"... *laughs*
Etymology[]
- The name Misao is written in hiragana (みさお), which has no special meaning. However, when written in kanji (操, 貞, 美佐男, 美佐雄, 美佐夫, 美佐緒, 美佐尾 or 美佐於), it could mean:
- 操 - "control, manipulate, operate"
- 貞 - "chastity, fidelity, faith".
- 美佐男 - "beautiful" (美) (mi), "help, aid" (佐) (sa) and "male, man" (男) (o).
- 美佐雄 - "beautiful" (美) (mi), "help, aid" (佐) (sa) and "hero, manly" (雄) (o).
- 美佐夫 - "beautiful" (美) (mi), "help, aid" (佐) (sa) and "man, husband" (夫) (o).
- 美佐緒 - "beautiful" (美) (mi), "help, aid" (佐) (sa) and "thread" (緒) (o).
- 美佐尾 - "beautiful" (美) (mi), "help, aid" (佐) (sa) and "tail, ridge" (尾) (o).
- 美佐於 - "beautiful" (美) (mi), "help, aid" (佐) (sa) and "at, in, on, as for" (於) (o).
- Misao's surname Furukawa means "old, antiquity, ancient time, used, secondhand" (古) (furu) and "river, stream" (川) (kawa).
Trivia[]
- In the game, Misao's name was written in kanji, the same one as the game's title "操" (Misao).
- In the novel, her name is written in hiragana.
- Ironically, the name "操" (Misao) meaning "control, manipulate, operate" - Indicate her miserable life and tragic fate in the story.
