Name-- Kanda Yuu
Fandom-- D. Gray-man
Canon Point-- Towards the end of chapter 182, just as he and Allen destroy the Level Four.
Age-- 18
Gender-- Masculine
Tattoo Position-- Inside of right forearm.
Personality-- Sometimes seen as D. Gray-man's archetypal angry young (swords)man with a veiled past, Kanda is an antisocial and often unpleasant young man. Described as ruthless and "a demon" (and that's by his allies), Kanda demonstrates on several occasions that he would rather fight than talk or sit by idly thinking, and he would rather fight on his own than be forced to concern himself with the wellbeing of others. This doesn't mean that he's dimwitted or unintelligent; however it does mean that he's not terribly dynamic. It would be fair to say, in fact, that he is single-minded to a fault.
Kanda seems to routinely mistake flexibility for weakness and rigidity for strength, which leads him to be static and unyielding. If he has a job to do, he will not deviate from its course. If he resolves to accomplish something he will not be dissuaded. If he makes a judgment he will not alter it. He is arrogant, aloof, and stubborn; he also has virtually no respect for the dead or the dying.
Arguably, all of this goes a long way to explaining his constant antagonism with DGM's main character, Allen Walker: their first encounter takes place when Allen is mistakenly identified as an akuma by the Black Order's Gate Keeper, and though Kanda is ordered to stand down-indeed, does stand down, and has subsequently fought at Allen's side-he seems perennially unable to reconcile himself with having had to reverse his initial position so dramatically. Kanda disdains the kind of paltry self-sacrificing grand gestures and noble naïveté that he sees someone like Allen as espousing, and considers it outright idiocy to try and care about the enemies that he kills.
In Kanda's view, the job of Exorcists is that of destroyers, not saviors. He has no interest in anyone's absolution, his own included, but he's also a person of his word, and he expects others to be the same. He cannot stand hypocrisy or people who do not follow through on what they say. By a similar token, his dogged personal work ethic (or, more accurately, somewhat peculiar code of honor) seems to drive Kanda's conviction that he cannot allow himself to die until he finds "that person"-a for-now mysterious individual from his past. He's set his mind to this fact, and thus means to make it so, by sheer force of will if necessary.
Kanda does appreciate quiet strength. It's grandstanding (or what he perceives as grandstanding) that irritates him the most, and he does have a short temper, especially when it comes to things he deems inappropriate or indecorous.
Despite the fact that he is an Exorcist and was raised by and in a religious Order, he apparently has no adherence to Catholicism or Christianity, nor any particular interest in the notion of God. He has his own justifications for why he fights and he doesn't bother sharing them with anyone-in fact he doesn't bother talking much at all unless he particularly needs to. He is used to keeping secrets after all: since his childhood he has been seeing lotus flowers that aren't really there, and in all that time, he has kept that secret unspoken and unshared with the world around him.
Strengths-- Kanda is an incredibly skilled swordsman, quick and capable in battle, which he seems to recognize as his forte. (Though that might be a self-fulfilling prophecy because it also seems that his prowess in battle is one of the few things he prides himself on.) He's also incredibly tenacious when he sets his mind to a task, which results in what might be understood as an especially intense loyalty (though few are likely to be able to make sense of it that way, more likely seeing standoffishness in the place of unswerving personal commitment.) He both excels at and prefers working alone.
Weaknesses-- Anything involving teamwork. Kanda's rigidity is probably his biggest weakness-he's amazingly stubborn, and his lack of empathy for people around him makes him seem perpetually aloof and sometimes cruel. He's not especially cerebral and will more likely stop at pragmatic solutions to problems than working out the intricacies of puzzles-he's not interested in higher meanings or "big picture" type questions of existence, knowledge, or truth. He also tends to be quite impatient, and his temper is very short.
History-- In many ways, Kanda's past remains so veiled that it's hard to summarize it at all-information about his history has only recently begun to be revealed and then the manga went on hiatus…
What we know for certain is that Kanda became General Tiedoll's pupil when he was nine years old and that he traveled around the world with him for a year before arriving at the Black Order Headquarters.
What happened to him before this, however, is open to interpretation: Asian Branch chief Bak Chan calls Kanda a "synthetic disciple," apologizing to him for the Order's ill judgment when they made him and, seemingly, others like him. Bak also speaks of a tragedy nine years ago-one that seemingly involved Kanda in some way, and which would have taken place when he was around the age when he first met Tiedoll.
These apologies come alongside the revelation of "Third Exorcists"-synthetic people of another sort who have been produced as human-akuma hybrids through the manipulation of akuma DNA. Kanda, seemingly, is the product of a project that came a generation before: Bak Chan and Renee Epstein's attempt to make a group of synthetically generated "Second Exorcists."
Because only those individuals who are compatible with Innocence may become accommodators for it, making their numbers necessarily small, the goal of the Second Exorcists project was to somehow create compatible users from scratch, thus swelling the ranks and gaining an advantage in the war against the Millennium Earl. The Order had already tired and failed to simply implant Innocence into incompatible users and force them to synch with it (the tests apparently resulted in at least one child's death), so it seems possible that the Second Exorcist project may have attempted to somehow manipulate genetic information from particular shards of Innocence in some way analogous to the process that later makes the Third Exorcists. (This is my reading-the manga has yet to specify any details.)
However it was accomplished, Kanda was the result. Insofar as he is a capable, dutiful fighter loyal to the Order, the project was a success. Not that there weren't glitches-for one, Kanda sees illusory flowers: a lotus that he keeps under glass in his room, and at times others as well, falling all around him like rain. But this seems a relatively minor concern for an organization fighting a war for human survival, and whatever "tragedy" Bak referenced to Kanda, it seems unlikely that a little boy seeing flowers that aren't really there would be enough to make them halt a project that could let them generate an army of elite fighters in place of the dozen or two they would have otherwise.
Something disastrous must have happened to result in Kanda being the only product of the Second Exorcist project. What the catastrophe was has yet to be revealed.
At any rate, it seems clear that Kanda has spent his entire life with the Order, that he was created to be an Exorcist, his sword, Mugen, crafted for him by Old Man Zho (seemingly a kind of confidant for him when he was a child-he was the one who first told Kanda to keep the illusionary vision of the lotus he sees everywhere a secret), and that he has never known any life but that of a warrior and Black Order member.
This does not mean, however, that Kanda reveres the Order or embraces the religious framing which they assign their conflict-he tells Bak that he doesn't give a damn about the Order and when a Vatican representative accuses him of being disrespectful to God, he tells the man to shut up. Whatever Kanda's motivation for fighting, it's more complicated and more personal than slavish obedience to the religious faith that made him.
Of the many foes he has faced in his life as an Exorcist, Kanda has managed the considerable feat of defeating a Noah-the supposedly-immortal clan who claim descent from the Biblical Noah himself-making him the only Exorcist to have accomplished such a task. This battle, which takes place on the Ark during its disintegration is won at great cost to Kanda: Mugen is shattered, his life force is deeply drained, and he doesn't escape the room before its collapse around his ears. However when Allen reconstructs the Ark before its final destruction, he also reconstructs the room from which Kanda had failed to escape, and the swordsman is thus effectively saved.
When Kanda subsequently finds himself without Mugen during an attack on the Order HQ, he uses whatever swords are available to him to fight the intruders, places his body as a shield to protect Supervisor Komui Lee from the Level Four's attack, and is willing to stand against the akuma even armed with only mundane weapons that will be useless to harm it.
Despite his constant antagonism with Allen Walker-the two have been like oil and water since their very first meeting-Kanda is willing to fight at Allen's side when needs must, as is the case when the two of them, along with Noise Marie, are sent on a mission together to investigate the detention of a group of Finders by local police. When they find themselves sealed into an orphanage with no way out and with another Level Four akuma to defeat, the two manage, finally to destroy their foe by both impaling it on their swords together.
In the course of the battle, however, Kanda and the others become privy to the knowledge that Allen's sword, which is supposed to only harm evil, does damage to him as well.
Appearance--
Though he is considerably less gender ambiguous in appearance now than he was in his youth, Kanda still retains a somewhat androgynous beauty. At age ten he was mistaken for a girl by Lenalee, but though he still wears his hair long, it would be surprising for anyone to take him for a girl now, especially if they have heard him speak or seen him move.
Powers--
Kanda's sword, Mugen ("Six Illusions") is his anti-akuma weapon through which he can activate several abilities. Technically these are powers "housed" in the sword, but they're not abilities of the sword's, per se. Kanda's Innocence (the substance that makes an anti-akuma weapon work) is an equipment-type, which means that Mugen was made for him and only he can activate it.
We've thus far seen Kanda use the following:
Kaichu Ichigen (or "First Illusion: Hell's Insects")-releases a swarm of a dozen or so small-ish supernatural insect-like creatures. This effectively gives Kanda a ranged attack, as they fly out from the sword in an arc, attacking once and then disappearing.
Nigentou (or "Double Illusion Blades")-encases Mugen in a sheath of light which is then mirrored as a second katana, made purely of energy, in Kanda's other hand.
Hakka Tourou (or "Eight Flowers Praying Mantis")-used in combination with Nigentou, this is a quick series of eight slices, with the resulting cuts resembling a flower.
Shouka (or "Sublimate")-it's not completely clear whether this is one of the abilities Kanda activates with Mugen, per se, or if it's more one that he activates in his body directly, but it certainly works with the abilities of his Innocence. Shouka seems to be an activation of Kanda's Om tattoo more than anything, and by doing it he can actively sublimate his life force, making it available as a sort of battery for combative strength.
Sangenshiki (or "Three Illusions")-increases Kanda's speed and strength dramatically by drawing on the life energy made available by Shouka.
Besides the abilities he can activate using Mugen, there's also the matter of Kanda's Om-it's the tattoo over his heart that seems responsible for (or perhaps simply an output gauge which meters) his increased healing abilities. Thanks to this, Kanda can withstand attacks that would kill a normal person outright-that akumas' virus doesn't affect him; he's been nearly cut in two and has healed from it (although it takes a couple days); he's even been shot in the face by an akuma and healed almost at once.
Kanda has said on a few occasions that he "can't die" until he finds "that person," an individual whose identity has yet to be revealed. It's unclear whether he means this literally (i.e. that there's some outside force/influence which would prevent him from dying before he finds this person) or simply as a statement of his determination not to die before he finds the person in question.
Third Person Sample (Kanda's arrival at The Tower)--
The blow Kanda landed to the back of the Level Four's head never faltered, his blade piercing bone and sinew at the base of its skull, through the steel of the gun barrel in its throat, and out of its open mouth, the sword tip sinking into the wall a scant inch from Walker's left ear.
Kanda's voice never faltered either, "IDIOT BEAN SPROUT!" It was, on some level, as much a demand as it was an accusation: even if Marie and Link weren't, Kanda was close enough to catch the subtle changes in the other Exorcists' face, the slight gleam of amber in his eyes, the way that muscle pulled at the corner of his mouth turning his grimace into something almost like a smirk.
They all knew what was inside of him, what he might become. And then he went and did something this careless, all but calling their enemy out to the battlefield now. Risking making himself into a liability so that he could play out his glorified self-sacrificing parody of heroism. The selfish little shit.
You had better damn well be YOU, Kanda's eyes said. I will wipe the fucking floor with you if you dare turn into a damn Noah now.
He didn't think of it at the time, but in a way his words were like a hailing, an order, one which Allen apparently obeyed-not because it was Kanda who gave it, surely, but maybe because the words were a reminder of who he was, what he was meant to be doing: when Kanda wrenched his blade down cutting the akuma in twain, Walker was right there with him, his own sword in his hand, his own thrust rending the deformed body crosswise, quartering it between them.
There was a spray of blood, red across his vision, and then black.
Kanda blinked.
He was in a room, sitting up on a bed where he'd been lying, fully clothed but uninjured. There was no akuma, no irritating bean sprout of an Exorcist facing him with a glimmer of evil behind his eyes, and no swords.
Jumping to his feet he rushed to the window, throwing back the curtain. "What the-?"
The landscape as far as he could see was the uniform blue-green of the sea, the horizon flat, and in the foreground the whitecaps churned up beneath the window, the sea spray splashing up over the rocks below.
Another trick of the barrier that had trapped them in the orphanage? They'd been cut off there, locked into a void of darkness, and Walker hadn't been able to open a gate or use the Ark. Was this because of something that idiot had done? Couldn't really escape the irony: the Ark of Noah and a flooded world.
But that was ridiculous. There had to be another explanation.
Kanda breathed an irritated hrmph, turned, and stalked towards the door. He wasn't about to stand around stuck here. He was going to find out what the hell this place was, and then he was going to find a way out.