Kogasa Tatara
Image from Touhou Gouyoku Ibun ~ Sunken Fossil World (video game, 2021)
The Cheery Forgotten Umbrella
Water/Wind Type
Original Media: Touhou Seirensen ~ Undefined Fantastic Object (video game, 2009)
Story
Kogasa is a karakasa-obake, an umbrella that became a youkai after 100 years. While it may seem like her being is tied more to either the umbrella or the girl, they’re both parts of the one mind of Kogasa. She can’t put her umbrella down, though; it always sticks to her like a magnet, whether it’s in her hands or on her back.
Kogasa loves trying to surprise people. While this can sometimes show itself in mundane (and generally ineffective) forms such as peeking out from hiding and yelling “Boo”, it can be intricate enough to surprise people from beyond the fourth wall. Think she’s just gonna be a one-and-done because she was the boss of Stage 2? Surprise, she’s the mini-boss of the secret stage!
If her love of surprises didn’t tip you off, Kogasa is a playful gal. Even in a low-stakes fight, she’ll tend to slip in quips and jokes. At the same time, though, she’s not afraid to get serious. Sometimes she has to take matters into her own hands, and she’ll make sure things are handled right. This can go as far as controlling my biases against certain fictional characters by breaking the fourth wall. That said, Kogasa struggles with her self-esteem, and she can fall into a funk if she finds her surprises not being taken seriously, or if she devotes too much time to meta-fictional intervention.
Abilities
Umbrella Sign “Flurry Travelers”
A Spell Card where Kogasa summons a barrage of rain and umbrellas that fly forward.
Water/Weapons, Water/Wind Type
Image is from Double Spoiler ~ Touhou Bunkachou (video game, 2010).
Monster Train “Spare Umbrella Express Night Carnival”
A Spell Card where dozens of flying umbrellas appear, charging into the opponent and firing magical blue and cyan bullets all over the place.
Wind/Weapons, Wind/Impact Type
Halo “Karakasa Surprising Flash”
A Spell Card where Kogasa uses her umbrella half to fire lasers of light in all directions.
Shine/Weapons, Laser/Explode Type
Above two images are from Undefined Fantastic Object.
Tornado Blow KGS
Kogasa summons a flurry of small tornadoes that fly upwards, dealing damage and blowing away opponents who are too close.
Wind Type
Image is edited from Mega Man 9 (video game, 2008).
Rain Flare
Kogasa summons a stormcloud, which rains down on the opponent…more specifically, rains down flames, thanks to Kogasa’s Fire magic.
Water/Flame Type
Didn’t expect the umbrella girl to have Fire magic, did you? As Kogasa herself would say: Surprise!
Voice
General Description
Teenager/Young Adult; typically bubbly, though she can be playfully sarcastic during minor arguments; speaks more straightforwardly in intense conflicts, and speaks more quietly and tiredly when sad
Example Voice
Source: Xenoblade Chronicles X (video game, 2015)
Original Context: One of 14 voices that can be chosen for a custom character. In-game, this voice is considered a “female” voice, and is described as “peppy”.
Behind the Scenes
As far back as my teenage years, Kogasa has been one of my favorite Touhou characters; not only do I find her upbeat attitude and fun design endearing, I’m amused by the idea of her surprises being less successful in her own world, and yet working like a charm in the real world (Not only is that tidbit about her being a surprise bonus miniboss true, but she’s on the disc art of her game of origin despite not being a plot-crucial character). When introducing Rika in The Chaos Zone began to snowball into a surge of Touhou characters entering the scene, I was eager to be the one writing Kogasa.
Kogasa’s significance has fluctuated a lot in the narrative. Back when the characters were a more tightly-knit group, Kogasa was a common sight as just one of the many members of the team, but she also kept dipping into story elements where she knew something about how the story itself functioned that others didn’t. The most intense example of this was when another writer introduced someone who (at the time) was my least favorite Touhou character by a large margin, to the point of despising said character and enjoying any idea of them being killed or even destroyed. I started inserting this into my writing by exaggerating my hatred of that other character into a bloodlust that influenced how other characters acted, with Kogasa being the only one who could be a voice of reason, whether I had her take over as the narrator or I had her enter the “real world” to “write” the story instead of me.
Eventually, I realized having Kogasa be such a governing force over this fictionalized version of me took away what I really liked about her, and I eventually reflected this in the story by showing that even Kogasa herself disliked having to intervene in the ways she did, eventually deciding to focus more on what she truly enjoyed as a character in the story, with the exaggerated “character hatred” conflict being abandoned.
Even if I don’t get to write Kogasa often these days, she’s still tons of fun, and my enjoyment of her outside Chaos Zone has translated to much of the same within it.
Images
Brash Buster 