Chiaki Nanami

"It doesn't make a difference whether you have a talent or not. I mean, that isn't the end goal. You have greater freedom than we do. All I have are games. But you can go anywhere and become anything." - Chiaki Nanami to Hajime Hinata, Danganronpa 3: The End of Hope's Peak Academy.

Chiaki Nanami (七海千秋 Nanami Chiaki) is one of the characters featured in Danganronpa 3: The End of Hope's Peak Academy - Side: Despair.

Chiaki has the title Ultimate Gamer (超高校級の「ゲーマー」chō kōkō kyū no “gēmā” lit. Super High School Level Gamer) and is enrolled in Hope's Peak Academy's Class 77-B. She served as the class representative in the Student Council.

Chiaki was executed by Junko Enoshima, her death effectively managing to drive all her classmates from Class 77-B into the Ultimate Despair.

During the Neo World Program, it was revealed that the AI created as the observer of the program took the form of Chiaki, as the Remnants of Despair wanted to see their class representative again. While they appear similar in some ways, it's been stated multiple times that the two are not the same person and have differences in memories and personality.

Personality

Chiaki is a calm and quiet individual. She seems, at first, to be a little asocial, but eventually opens up, and becomes a lot more talkative when discussing games. She is quite analytical and enjoys learning new things, leading her to ask questions often. Chiaki seems to not be fully aware of her surroundings while playing video games, as seen when she bumped into Hajime Hinata, and usually puts so much focus on them, that she almost never takes her eyes off of the screen. Even the classroom being destroyed around her didn't warrant her attention when she was playing.

Chiaki doesn't think much of her talent. In fact, she seems to dislike it, believing that her love for gaming will not help her gain any friends. When her teacher Chisa Yukizome tells her that she can make friends by playing her games with them, Chiaki opens up more to those around her and starts taking part in group activities. Chiaki is even chosen her class's representative after helping her classmates bond, though she appears quite hesitant about it at first and only seems to take the role because everyone would be so happy about it. She learns to care for all her classmates despite their own faults, and can be very protective of them. According to her classmates, Chiaki is a very industrious and reliable person, as she plans several group activities daily (including Chisa's return party), and even convinces Fuyuhiko Kuzuryu to join them. Even self-deprecating Nagito Komaeda understands that Chiaki would always invite him even if no one else would. However, Chiaki doesn't think that highly of herself, claiming that she likes to help her classmates simply because she likes them all.

Many of Chiaki's beliefs have actually been influenced by her teacher, Chisa. Chiaki comes to understand Chisa's belief that talent is not all there is to life and that doing more important things, such as creating memories with others, creates hope. Chiaki often shares these thoughts with Hajime in the hopes of building up his self-confidence. She is very optimistic and idealistic, sometimes to the point of naivete; even after he is gone for a year she still believes Hajime will someday return, as she is shown still waiting for him at their meeting spots. She also genuinely feels that with all her classmates working together, they can rescue Chisa, despite having seen the poor odds they faced.

Chiaki has some notable differences with her AI counterpart, such as her speech being more natural sounding and her appearing much less sleepy. Being a human, she has a wider emotional range, being much more visibly shocked and up crying desperately in immense pain during her last moments, in stark contrast to her AI self who appeared notably calm and unfazed during her execution albeit having a few expressions of distress.

Legends of the Multi-Unvierse: Armageddon

LOTM: Weirdmageddon

Relationships

Class 77-B

Class 77-B is Chiaki's class at Hope's Peak. Although she does not attempt to get along with them at first, Chiaki helps them bond after Chisa offers her advice, and ends up being their class representative. Chiaki visibly cares about each and every one of them and is willing to protect them. She does her best to keep her class together and loves them all for who they are. In return, her classmates think of her as amazing and quite hard working. They all have a deep sense of respect for her, often giving her praise or credit for getting them all together. They describe Chiaki as the heart of their class.

However, when Mikan and Chisa, who were brainwashed by Junko, betray Chiaki, she is forced into her execution, leaving the rest of her classmates horrified and only able to helplessly watch. Despite these hopeless circumstances, Chiaki was determined to make it back to her class, even to Chisa and Mikan, who had betrayed her. They served as the fuel for her hope but were in the end, her downfall. Junko uses illusions of Class 77-B and Chisa welcoming Chiaki to lure her into a trap, ending with her being killed by several spears. Chiaki's death resulted in her classmates being brainwashed by Junko, who used Chiaki's execution to envelope her class in despair.

When the entire class was captured and sent to the Neo World Program, their collective consciousness all desired to see Chiaki again, so the AI program took her form.

Hajime Hinata/Izuru Kamukura

Hajime was Chiaki's first, and closest friend at Hope's Peak Academy. The two first met at a water fountain near the school, in a scene which Kodaka described as being pleased with how beautiful it turned out to be[2], when Chiaki bumped into Hajime while playing a game. Since then the two started meeting with each other after school at that water fountain. Chiaki would usually ask Hajime to play games with her, often forcing him to play her favorite game multiple times. Although Hajime is sometimes annoyed by the fact that she would always beat him, even wondering why he was someone Chiaki would want to play with, Chiaki both enjoys and cherishes their time together, openly stating that she has fun playing with him.

Chiaki always comforts Hajime when he feels upset about not having a talent. She constantly tells him there's more to life than talent, and that together they could make memories. She also says to him that unlike her, who only has games, Hajime isn’t restricted by talent, and so he can go on and do anything. Interestingly, this happens to be the one thing that didn’t change after Hajime’s transformation into Izuru Kamukura, as Izuru possessed every talent so that he wouldn’t be limited to focusing on just one. All of Chiaki's words comfort Hajime, although his obsession with having a talent doesn't lessen. Hajime calls Chiaki his friend, and wants to one day tell her he has a talent with pride.

They appear to have romantic feelings for each other, as they often blush when speaking to each other, complimenting each other, or when Chiaki grabs his hand. However, after the deaths of Natsumi Kuzuryu and Sato, his classmates, Hajime pushes Chiaki away from him and stops meeting with her after school, which disappoints her. Still, Chiaki always waited outside the Reserve Course building in the hopes that Hajime would change his mind and come out for her, even though he doesn't for a year. She worries about him constantly and even asks Chisa about his well being multiple times in order to ensure that he was doing fine. During the Reserve Course students' riot, a fearful Chiaki whispers Hajime's name.

When Chiaki and Nagito find an entrance to an underground room, Chiaki encounters a man with red eyes and long black hair and, after taking a good look at his face recognizes him as Hajime. Upon realizing this, Chiaki quickly tries to start a conversation with him, inquiring him about his hair. She was visibly surprised and confused when he asked who she was, however. This is due to the fact that she did not know of the experiments that had been performed on Hajime, which converted him into Izuru Kamukura by erasing his old personality. Despite this, she believes that he is in trouble because he's with Junko, and sought to save both him and her teacher from her.

Following her execution, during her final moments, Chiaki is confronted by Izuru. While she understood that Izuru didn’t remember anything about his past life, she still made a desperate last attempt to make him remember. She fails, however, and laments her uselessness, stating that she didn’t want to die. Chiaki then lets out her final wishes to Izuru, wanting to not only see her classmates but also play games with Hajime again, before passing away. Upon dying, Chiaki’s hair clip fell to the ground and was picked up by Izuru. After looking at it, he then silently begins to cry, implying that her death was able to trigger some memories from Izuru’s past life, particularly those from the time that Hajime spent with Chiaki.

In Ultimate Talent Development Plan, Chiaki has a similar relationship with Hajime like she did in Danganronpa 3, with her playing different video games with him and even giving him the same advice about talent not being the goal. Hajime considered her a very reliable class rep, though Chiaki believed that Hajime can be very reliable and close with the aforementioned class as well (seemingly foreshadowing the fact that Hajime much later takes the leader role among the class). In their third year, she extended him an invitation to her class's Christmas party, and he accepts. With their graduation getting closer, Hajime asks her if she's free on New Year's, and explains that his friends are planning a party because it will also be Hajime's birthday. Chiaki appears a bit surprised that she can come too, but she then eagerly agrees and offers to extend the invitation to the rest of her class.

Teacher

Chisa Yukizome

During her time at Hope's Peak Academy, Chiaki grows quite close to her teacher, Chisa Yukizome. She is shown to have a big influence on Chiaki, who later learns to share many of Chisa's beliefs. For example, Chisa encouraged Chiaki to use her gaming talent to make friends, as Chiaki had previously thought she couldn’t do. Chiaki took Chisa’s advice and was able to bring her entire class together, as they all bonded over games. She also began to regularly hang out with Hajime for this reason. After Chisa sees Chiaki help her classmates bond, she instantly takes a liking to Chiaki and selects her as the class's representative.

Chiaki was very upset upon learning that Chisa was being transferred to the Reserve Course. However, she promised to Chisa that she will protect her class as the class representative, demonstrating the trust they have in one another. When she hears that Chisa was coming back to her class after 6 months, Chiaki plans a big party for her arrival with the help of her classmates. Chiaki seems to think of Chisa as a great role model and teacher; in turn, Chisa sees Chiaki as the heart of the class that draws and holds their bonds together.

When Chisa let herself be captured by Junko to give Chiaki and Nagito time to escape, Chiaki rallies together her class in order to save Chisa. Unfortunately, they are too late, as Chisa has already been corrupted by Junko. Not knowing this, Chiaki unsuspectingly follows Chisa, who leads Chiaki to her own execution. Although shocked by Chisa's betrayal, Chiaki still cares for her beloved teacher and still believes that it wasn't Chisa's fault to blame which, unfortunately, was her downfall, as Junko used an illusion of Chisa welcoming Chiaki to lure her into the trap that ultimately killed her.

Classmates

Nagito Komaeda

Chiaki, along with Chisa, was the only one who genuinely cared about Nagito and thought of him as a friend, as the rest of her class didn't approve of him. Chiaki is the only one out of her classmates who greeted Nagito when he came back after being expelled for about a year. Despite all of this, Chiaki did not agree with his way of looking at things.

Later, Nagito put Chiaki's life in danger when he showed her a secret entrance to a room underground, where Junko, Ryota, and Izuru were hiding. Chiaki tried to stop Nagito from killing Junko, and was shocked when he is shot by Izuru first. She proceeds to hold him in a protective manner while he is unconscious, eventually carrying him back to her classroom. When Nagito failed to get up due to the impact of the bullet, Chiaki worriedly went over to him.

Ultimately, Nagito viewed Chiaki as the hope of his class, and as a rare reaction he cried over her death and thought it was horrible. However, he then begun to laugh madly while simultaneously crying, viewing her as a stepping stone for their hope upon her death.

In Ultimate Talent Development Plan, Chiaki is described as a person who would always invite Nagito to the group activities, with even Nagito understanding this despite his constant self-deprecation. When the graduation gets closer, Chiaki shows consideration towards him as she sees him alone in the corner and goes to ask him if he's having fun. Nagito claims that of course he's having fun and then talks about everyone's hopes, with Chiaki saying that's fine, though her face appears a bit sad and disappointed seemingly because of him still talking like that. Chiaki admits that she still doesn't really understand him after all the years together, but she says that she knows hope is really important to him. Nagito explains to her that everyone wants hope, not just him, but he just thinks about it more than others. Nagito admits that he's a bit disappointed that nothing big happened to make hope stronger, but Chiaki thinks it's a good thing and that everyone can spend time together happily in the future.

Sonia Nevermind

Sonia was a close friend of Chiaki's. Sonia always complimented Chiaki for her accomplishments, and appeared to enjoy hugging her. Chiaki also taught Sonia how to play games. Sonia was always close to her and admired her in Chiaki's efforts to bring the class together. Chiaki was shown to take a liking to Sonia to, as they were together a lot.

Class 78th

Junko Enoshima

Junko was actually the one who executed Chiaki. Her initial plan was to let Chiaki watch the Despair video, but upon realizing how much Class 77-B loved her, she decided to kill Chiaki in order to throw them all into despair. Even while being executed, Chiaki absolutely refused to give up to Junko, her class fueling her hope and determination to win, something Junko found amusing. Junko taunted Chiaki the entire time during her execution, ultimately succeeded in killing her when Chiaki falls for one of Junko's traps.

Reserve Course

Chiaki is shown to be slightly curious about the Reserve Course after finding out that Hajime was a part of it, instead of being a Main Course student like herself. After learning about it from Chisa, Chiaki believes that the students, being talentless, have greater freedom than students like her, who can only focus on their own specified talent. From then on, however, virtually all of her concerns with the Reserve Course are derived from her friendship with and affection for Hajime.

Kiritsugu Emiya

Chiaki respects Kiritsugu but she knows about his past as Magus Killer. With that in mind, she tends to show him what being a hero of justice is really about.

Jeremie Belpois

She and Jeremie work together as they defeated X.A.N.A who are trying to take over the real world as well as Lyoko. Chiaki has a bit of a crush but hides it very well.