Emi Isuzu (五十鈴 絵美, Isuzu Emi) is a character in the manga and anime series Tenjou Tenge. As a member of the Isuzu family she is loyal towards the Takayanagi family thus making her being a close and trustworthy underling and comrade to Mitsuomi Takayanagi. During the latters rulership Emi served as the vice-president of Mitsuomi's Executive Council until their retreat. Currently she is attending at university and works part-time as teacher at Toudou Academy.
Character outline[]
Emi was a third year student at Toudou academy. Not only was she Mitsuomi Takayanagi's second-in-command, but she also harbors a deep respect and love for him. She is very concerned about Mitsuomi given his heart condition, and is probably more protective than she needs to be. Since Mitsuomi's still has lingering feelings for Maya Natsume, Emi sees Maya as someone she must defeat (the manga offers readers a glimpse of a strange friendship, or at least, mutual respect).
Being a member of the rich Isuzu family, she works the family's traditional job as the Takayanagi family's inner guard. Two years ago, she served as Mana Kuzunoha's bodyguard and was often responsible for videotaping the various individuals that the Takayanagi family found interesting.
Synopsis[]
Anime and OVAs[]
Story Setup Arc[]
Emi sets up the attack at the bowling alley and fights Maya Natsume in the ladies rest room. She dislocates Maya's right shoulder but is nonetheless defeated. She used up most of her KI and was unable to maintain her slender form, returning to her fat form, she shoots blades like a fragmentation grenade further damaging Maya. Later she yells at Shinobu Kagurazaka, calling him a transvestite, when she finds out disregarded his duty by leaving Mitsuomi Takayanagi to fight the whole Juken club alone. She rushes to his assistance, but Bunshichi had already ended the fighting. She waits for Mitsuomi outside the men's restroom, until he is strong enough to get back up.
Flashback Arc[]
Emi was originally Mana Kuzunoha's bodyguard and videotaped Shin Natsume and the school’s various top fighters. Bunshichi Tawara, after seeing the videotape of Shin kill innocent people, decided to track down Shin. While doing so he spotted Emi videotaping him, figuring that she knew where Shin was, he confronted her. Scared after he reaches for her chest, she stabs him in the hand and a chase ensues. While Bunshichi is insisting that she hand over her body to him as payment for the damage to his hand, she grabs more of her blades and prepares to fight him. During the fight, she runs out of the way as a car driven some of the Takayanagi family’s men slams into Bunshichi, wrecking his motorcycle. As the car comes around for a second attempt to finish him off, Bunshichi's arms increase in size shredding his sleeves and he smashes the car. Later on, he uses an unconscious Emi to force a taxi to stop. Looking through her stuff, Bunshichi finds a GPS tracker and uses it to find Shin, as Mana has three trackers on him at all times.
After Bunshichi defeats Shin, Emi makes an appearance as one of Fu Chi'en's hostages while he tries to drive Shin insane. He assaults Maya Natsume, and leaves her on the floor with ripped clothes for Shin to see. As predicted, he starts to lose it and subsequently severely injures or kills all of Fu Chien's men. Emi cuts the rope binding her and attempts to attack Fu Chien believing his defeat may return Shin to normal. Shin defeats Fu Chien, but immediately goes after Emi afterward despite the fact she was only trying to help. He pins her to the ground with her own blades and as he is about to attack again Maya calls out to Shin calming him down. Mitsuomi Takayanagi burst in and rushes Shin, Maya calls out to him making Shin jealous. He blasts Mitsuomi with a large quantity of KI, leading to his heart condition. Emi is very grateful to Mitsuomi for attempting to save her and the incident is the start of her attraction to him.
As Mitsuomi becomes the head of the executive council, Emi becomes the Vice-President.
Manga[]
Emi is largely phased out later in the story becoming more of a supporting character since the bowling alley incident, likely because Mitsuomi Takayanagi ordered the executive council to not to attack the Juken club. She usually does not get involved.
F and Sohaku Arcs[]
Later, Emi tries to break up the fight between Bob Makihara and Madoka Mawari because they were disrupting the order of the school. During the fight, she starts to tell Bob about all the complimentary things Mitsuomi Takayanagi said about him, even starting to blush when she witnesses Bob's fighting potential. Madoka proves herself to be to powerful as it takes Masataka Takayanagi, Mitsuomi's younger brother, to step up and defeat her. During this fight Emi was injured enough to be spend time in the hospital, but not enough to lose her form in public. After being released from the hospital, she is seen sitting on a curb with Bunshichi, Masataka, and others waiting to see the outcome of Mitsuomi and Maya going to kill Sohaku Kago.
Tournament Arc[]
Recently, Emi noticed the addition of Mitsuiro Tokuan Shojo and Hirohiko Myouun Kabane to the executive council's roster, after noticing what appeared to be Mitsuomi Takayanagi training for over a half hour (where as the real Mitsuomi would die after 3 minutes). During the election tournament, she is seen using devious strategy to try to eliminate the Juken club. The reason for this is because she does not completely trust Bunshichi Tawara and Shinobu Kagurazaka, Emi also does not think that the Executive council can win with the other members. However, Shiro Tagami, who dislike less than honorable tactics, ruins one of her plots by showing a late Masataka a shortcut to the battlefield where the Juken club is going up against the Archery club.
Emi learns the plan to wipe out all the Red Feathers, is the reason Dogen Takayanagi and Mitsuomi have teamed up. While they plan to use it for different reasons, the two are working together for now. Mitsuomi seems to plan on dying while carrying out the plan, which greatly concerns Emi. She believes he was in a wheelchair earlier because he is near death, and Mitsuiro is to take his place after he dies. She becomes upset and hides behind Shiro as she cries.
As the election tournament continues it is believed that she will become much more involved in the storyline, since according to Tessen Ishiyumi, Tagami and Emi are Mitsuomi's "sword and spear", and along with Bob are considered by Mitsuomi to be his true wings.
Techniques & abilities[]
Emi is extremely strong as she has knowledge about martial arts and she used some Judo techniques vs Maya Natsume.
At first sight, Emi appears to be a drop-dead gorgeous girl and so popular with the male students that she is first on the list “Women by whom I would like to be stomped on by". However, she is not called "The Black Stiletto" for nothing and her most coveted secret is that she is extremely obese, which she does on purpose so she can use her ability to contort her body and fold her fat.
The Shadow Blade[]
Emi use her "spirit" to contort and fold fat within her body. In these folds, she can hide throwing knives and other various small objects if needed. Thus to the untrained eye when she is fighting, Emi seems to be able to pull knives out of nowhere, a technique called The Shadow Blade.
This secret is so well kept that only a few people know: Maya Natsume and a very shocked Shiro Tagami are the only known people that have been confirmed to have seen her true form when, during a fight with Maya, Emi's body inflated into her true form. although Shinobu Kagurazaka seems to know about her true body, going by his comments after her defeat by Madoka Mawari.
Etymology[]
- The name Emi means "picture, painting" (絵) (e) and "beautiful" (美) (mi).
- Emi's surname Isuzu means "fifty" (五十) (i) and "bell" (鈴) (suzu), which literally means "fifty bells pealing in harmony and celebrations" (possibly いすゞ) altogether.
Trivia[]
- Emi has different hair colors in the anime and the manga:
- In the anime, she is shown to have pink hair.
- In the manga, colored panels depict her with red hair.