Aoyagi, Ritsuka

青柳立夏

He is twelve years old and serves as the story's protagonist. His "true name" is Loveless. Two years ago, he experienced an abrupt personality shift, becoming the opposite of his former self. Previously, he was a popular student with average grades; now, he does not get along with his classmates, yet he achieves perfect scores. Alongside this personality change, he suffered a total loss of memory. The cause of these drastic changes remains unknown, although he attends regular therapy sessions to determine the reason.
On his first day at his new school, Ritsuka meets Soubi Agatsuma for the first time. Soubi confuses him with sudden intimacy and puzzling claims that he was Seimei's fighter. As Ritsuka discovers, Seimei's impromptu will dictates that Soubi shall "become Ritsuka's" upon his death. Ritsuka had deeply admired and idolized Seimei, so discovering that many things had been kept secret came as a great shock. This further poisoned his difficulty in trusting others, particularly Soubi.
Despite his young age and inexperience due to his amnesia, Ritsuka is very intelligent and approaches things with startling maturity. The circumstances of his life encourage his lack of innocence; however, there have been notable incidents that bare his still-strong naivety, particularly regarding sexual love and dating. Despite this, he maintains firm opinions and unrelenting ideas about those subjects. It is these opinions that clash dramatically with adults and authority figures around him, most notably Soubi. Ritsuka is a pacifist and strongly opposes violence under any circumstance. Soubi has remained fairly silent on the issue; however, he seemingly does not object to pain and punishment under certain circumstances.
Love is an uncomfortable subject for Ritsuka. He is wary of compliments and dislikes hearing phrases such as "I like you." Early in the series, Soubi frequently says "I love you," which Ritsuka does not believe is true. Because of Ritsuka's cynical reaction, Soubi stops saying it altogether after volume 2 of the manga. Still, Ritsuka's inner conflict over whether he believes what Soubi says becomes a source of great tension and bitterness in their relationship.

Spoiler

}