Honoka Maki

Honoka Maki (牧 穂乃香 Maki Honoka) is a main character in the Kiznaiver series and one of the seven main Kiznaivers.

She resembles the sin of Pride. In modern Japan, she is known as the 'High-and-Mighty'.

Appearance
Honoka is a bespectacled character who has a slim figure. She has dirty blonde hair which she wears in a side braid. She is usually seen wearing her uniform with black pantyhose and brown shoes, but she uses a blue-grey sleeveless sweater instead of the usual black vest. She appears to be around 172 cm (5'8").

Background
Honoka met a girl named Ruru, whom she shared an interest in writing and drawing manga with. They decided to create a manga together, under the false moniker "Charles de Macking". The name comes from a combination of both Ruru and Maki's names.

The manga is about a middle school-aged girl who falls in love with her female teacher. The protagonist decides to date a boy as a way to cope with internalized lesbophobia (a hatred, fear and disgust towards lesbians) and possibly self harm. The manga got published and even became popular among middle school girls.

Maki has been haunted by Ruru ever since her sudden death. She blames herself for Ruru's death, saying that she killed her; though all she actually did was grow apart from her because she was afraid she'd become too romantically close to her and when Ruru would die it would hurt even more. Her argument against this is that, by distancing herself from Ruru, she "killed" who Ruru was.

Plot
Maki is first introduced along with the other main cast after Noriko Sonozaki confronts Katsuhira Agata about the Kizna Project. Her sin is revealed to be "Pride". She, along with the other Kiznaivers are then abducted by the Gomorin and has her senses connected together.

After Sonozaki leaves the newly formed Kiznaivers in the hospital, Maki is quick to separate from the group amidst the dismay caused by the Gomorin. She finds her way to the morgue where a mysterious voice calls out to her causing her to panic.

After Katsuhira and Chidori Takashiro reveal their "introduction", Maki appears before the rest of them and tells hers, stating that she "killed" someone.

After the events at the hospital end, Maki attempts to distance herself from the others to avoid unnecessary stress, even with the insistence of Tsuguhito Yuta. She reveals that she covered up her scar on her wrist with concealer to him when questioned.

When tasked with finding Yoshiharu Hisomu, she defeatedly joins the others to assist. Maki is one of the first to come to the conclusion that Yoshiharu is a masochist, which greatly disturbs her.

During the Summer Camp trip, Maki forces herself on him- most likely because she is tired of his intrusion though her true reason for this action was not confirmed. He refuses which makes her want him more. Before they could go any further they are interrupted by the others, who have come to the realization that Chidori is missing. Maki helps fend off the Gomorin whilst Katsuhira and Hajime Tenga save Chidori.

Nico Niiyama attempts to become friends with Maki, noticing how she is always alone, but Maki rejects Nico's advances, saying that none of the Kiznaivers are her friends. Now that the Kiznaivers are able to share emotions, the others become aware of Maki's internal pain, feeling guilty over the death of her childhood friend Ruru. She overhears some middle school girls reading the manga she and Ruru wrote together, further reminding her of the past. Both Nico and Yuta continue to make attempts to help Maki. Mutsumi Urushibara and Kazunao Yamada, fellow members of the Kizna Project, employ a producing company to harass Maki over rights to make the manga into a movie. Even though she refuses to allow them to film it, and Yuta kicking the director in the groin, the film crew arrives at school the next day insisting on an interview with Maki. This causes a mass of unwanted attention on her, which leads to Maki breaking down in front of everyone. The other Kiznaivers soon after arrive and scare away the film crew via Yoshiharu recording them harassing Maki and posting it online. Tenga accidentally reveals that saving her was their mission, which causes Maki to run off and lock herself in her room.

The Kiznaivers visit Ruru's family and use their gathered information in an attempt to sway Maki into coming out of her room. Nico eventually reaches her with her words, but Maki instead sneaks out, only to be stopped by Yuta. Yuta forces Maki to read the last chapter of her manga and reveals that Ruru, to whom Maki believed hated her in the end, actually had forgiven her. The two join up with the rest of the Kiznaivers and Maki jokingly tells them to go swimming in the rain, to which they all actually do, causing her to laugh.

Now finally a part of the group, she joins them after school for a meeting scheduled by Sonozaki. A typhoon hits, locking them inside. Mutsumi and Yamada use the Gomorin to separate the group based on a Love Chart, Maki ending up with Yuta and Yoshiharu. Maki asks Yoshiharu about his past, wondering what happened in his life that made him so masochistic, to which Yoshiharu responds by bringing up Maki's past with Ruru, stating that not everyone has a messed up past like hers. Insulted, Maki runs off, but is stopped by Yuta who attempts to console her.

Relationships
Honoka's relationships seem to be lacking thus far in the series, seeing those she has linked with as "common acquaintances" - much to the dismay of Nico. It is also noted that her personality is considered "terrible" as she is very blunt and cold towards everyone.

However, as of episode 7, her most frequent interactions are between her and Nico Niiyama and Tsuguhito Yuta; who appears to be the most intrusive, expressing attraction towards her despite her cold attitude. They also both share a suspicion towards Sonozaki and a like-mind in slyness, which often leads to one-on-one interactions to discuss current events or plans. Nico, on the other hand, is the most open to Honoka and tries very hard to be friends with her.

Episode 7 confirms that Honoka and Ruru's relationship wasn't strictly platonic - they both had feelings, because they were close friends and would usually act out romance scenes in the manga. Honoka refused to progress into a romantic relationship with Ruru because she feared that it will hurt more if she loses Ruru to her disease. Until recently, she was certain that Ruru cursed her so that she could never love anyone else. However, this is proven to be wrong as Ruru's actual goodbye - written as the last chapter of their shared manga - was a peaceful one, telling Honoka it's okay to forget about her, because Ruru loved Honoka's smile. With the help of Yuta and the other Kiznaivers, Honoka finally expressed her true emotions and finally had a chance to get over Ruru's death.

In episode 8, she is shown to still have feelings for her close friend Ruru. When Hisomu bothered her about the trauma she had to deal with because of her feelings for Ruru, she became angry and left. Moments later, Yuta tries to comfort her by trying to give her a hug; she rejects him, but Maki accounts that Yuta has feelings for her and she responds with a smile.

In episode 12, it is revealed that as much as Honoka wants to deny it, she has become friends with all of the Kiznaivers. After the whole incident, she is shown having food with Yuta, eating one bite then offering it to him. When Yuta questions as to why she did that, she says that she wants him to get fat so people will not follow him everywhere because of his good looks. Yuta gets flustered because this shows that Honoka is interested in Yuta and that she is finally moving on from Ruru.

Noriko Sonozaki
Among the rest of the Kiznaivers, Maki loathed Noriko and Maki was indifferent to Noriko. In the last episode, she also initially refused to help her, stating that Noriko is the one who brought them all into this mess.

Quotes
- "Who are you calling friends?" - Maki to Nico Niiyama (Episode 3)

- "There's nothing more expensive than something free." - Maki to Tsuguhito Yuta (Episode 3)

Trivia

 * The name Honoka means "grain" (穂) (ho), "from" (乃) (no) and "fragrance, fragrant" (香) (ka).
 * Honoka's surname Maki means "shepherd, tend cattle" (牧).
 * Maki is said to have a terrible personality by some of the other characters.
 * Maki said that she doesn't like whipped cream