Hiroto Sakurai (桜井 弘斗, Sakurai Hiroto) is a young boy brought to the Gantz room after he died in the Shinjuku massacre.
Appearance[]
Hiroto is a boy of medium height (smaller than Kei) with orange hair.
Personality[]
When he and Kenzo Sakata witness Izumi's Shinjuku massacre, he insists in trying to stop Izumi and convinces Sakata to join him, arguing that it is a good opportunity to redeem themselves for the murders they committed themselves. While they do put up a good fight, Izumi still does manage to kill both, leading them to Gantz.
Background[]
He has a nickname, Gantz calls him "Cherry", taken from the Japanese Sakura and which is his online handle. He is a psychic who receives instructions on how to unlock his latent powers from Sakata after attempting suicide. He is then encouraged by Sakata to kill his bullies who sexually abused him with the use of his powers, which he does. However, he later regrets it, realizing how it feels to be a murderer.
Gantz no longer refers to him as "Cherry", when Reika asks what it means Sakurai blushes and quickly replies "N-Nothing!...Nothing at all"
Plot[]
Upon hearing the news from Nishi that the world might be destroyed in a week's time he decides to spend time with Tonkotsu. He has been seen at the meetings with the Tokyo Gantz team about the end of the world.
After narrowly surviving the Italian mission, Sakurai is sent back to the room. Gantz releases him along with the others and he believes that its all finally over. In chapter 303, Sakurai is seen talking on the phone with Tonkotsu saying he wants to see her no matter what.
In one of the latest issues after Gantz released everyone days late Sakurai sends a text message to Kei saying he got a CT scan of his head and that the bomb Gantz had placed in his head was removed.
In chapter 306 he is seen with Tonkotsu in a crowd. They witness a family trying to surrender to the aliens but end up getting killed. Later, he and Tonkotsu avoid several attacks when the aliens began to slaughter everyone around. In chapter 307 through 309, Sakurai fights off many of the aliens. In chapter 310, as happened with Kaze and Katou, Sakurai is seen being cheered by a mass of people which start to follow him and Tonkotsu. Sakurai is sent to a different location where there are countless Gantz hunters everywhere. Sakurai manages to group up with Kei and the others. He looks around to see another Kei which confuses and shocks him. He is then transferred to another place where the alien invaders are. After they get transferred to the area, Sakurai is a little confused. When the alien invaders notice them and begin attacking them, he fights back. The battle seems to be going well for them until more aliens turn up in powerful suits and attack also. In the confusion of the battle, Sakurai gets his arm sliced off. The transfer occurs when one of the leaders captures an alien and Sakurai appears to have survived.
He gets transferred to a random area and finds Tonkotsu dead. He is deeply upset and swears he'll take revenge on the ones responsible for her death.
In chapter 327 he is seen with Tonkotsu on his back, walking around Tokyo swearing revenge. He comes across a group of aliens that are eating humans and yells at them. They attack him with what appears to be lightning shooting from their hands, but he blocks all attacks with a psychic barrier he puts up. He then starts slaughtering the aliens with his powers. Once he slaughters them all, he walks around Tokyo reveling in his victory over the aliens. A voice in his head tells him that they don't like seeing him in this state and that he must be in a lot of pain. He tries to drown it out. The voice suggests that he rests for a little bit but he refuses to. He ends up screaming at the voice, telling it to just shut up. Later on, Hiroto enters the colony ship in order to slaughter more of the giants. He kills a few but stops at a grandmother giant with her grandchild. They try to feed him but he ends up walking away, crying. Hiroto stops in the middle of a sidewalk and looks up at the sky with tears streaming down his face. The voice continues to try and calm down Hiroto by telling him that he'll regret it if he continues to kill. Hiroto tells it to shut up, grasps his head, then releases a powerful burst of his power which ends up killing every giant in the area. Hiroto walks on, finding the dead bodies of the grandmother and child alien giants.
Sakurai, along with many other Hunters including Kurono, had been transported inside the Mechs by the Zaibatsu group. They are forced to pilot them toward the Space Compression Facility in order to destroy it. Sakurai displays powerful telekinetic powers such as fully stopping attacks, phasing and teleportation. He phases the bomb inside of his head, out. Sakurai hallucinates Tonkotsu and Sakataa who both want him to stop and calm down. He shouts them away and continues his attack. Beam cannons from the facility begin to mow down the Mechs until one finally hits his Mech.
He wakes up and believes that he is okay. The lower half of his body and both his arms were destroyed in the explosion. He cries and knows that he will die. In his last few moments he sees his master and girlfriend again along with two giant kids belonging to the alien race. He saves them from falling debris. Tonkotsu and Sakata asks Sakurai to come with them which he finally does.
Abilities and Skills[]
Upon learning the psychic powers from Sakata he uses them on the bullies who were abusing him in the Pharmacy college and kills them, though later he regrets it deeply and wishes to redeem himself and his sensei by stopping Izumi's massacre in Shinjuku. Sakurai, like Sakata, are both amazed by Kurono's bravery and leadership and begins to fully trust Kurono. Like Sakata, Sakurai uses his psychic powers on the dinosaur aliens on their first mission, and then learning that using it too much can cause health problems, relies on the Gantz guns instead. After those he cares about die in catastrophe, he begins using his power to kill the giant aliens, at which point his powers are so great he rips apart giant robots taller then sky scrappers.
A phenomenal learner, he masters his abilities rather quickly. He dies in the fight against the Flame Oni, but is revived by Sakata. He has a girlfriend named Tonkotsu who he first met after he murdered the people who abused him. He is also somewhat conflicted with Sakata's comments to Kato about not reviving others, since after all Sakurai himself was recently revived by Sakata.
In the final fight against the Nurarihyon, Sakurai use range attacks, like a sniper.
At the end of the Osaka arc Sakurai received a total of 0 points.
However the ability strains the mind and to much pressure causes the user to bleed from the nose, this side effect is only the more obvious one as Sakata, his teacher, seems to be rapidly over running his body getting close to organ failure before his death. Sakurai seems much more powerful than his teacher meaning he is probably already developing the starting signs, given how much strain he has to put on the power just to survive the missions that happen every few months. However, the reconstructive properties of GANTZ teleportation seem to have delayed, if not stopped, the degenerative effects of overuse, allowing him develop his power to the point of destroying giant robots by himself.
References[]