#character sorting

Kamado Tanjiro: Badger/Badger

(You may have caught my rough draft notes about Tanjiro’s primary in this post.)

Tanjiro’s loyalty is first and foremost to humanity, and if he sees (or smells) humanity in someone, even a demon, he will fight for that person and show them compassion, no matter what their past crimes were. This even goes for demons. As Tamayo notes during their first meeting, Tanjiro still refers to demons as people (Ch 14). During his Final Selection Exam, he recognizes that the hand demon is lonely as he dies, so Tanjiro holds his hand despite knowing that the demon killed Sabito and Makomo (Ch 8). Before that, Tanjiro hesitates to kill a demon, one that had just attacked him and Nezuko, because he couldn’t figure out how to give the demon a quick death (Ch 3). The thought of the demon suffering was too disturbing to Tanjiro, and he later gives the mercy of a painless death to the mother spider demon when he understood that she was suffering and welcomed death (Ch 31). He says it directly to Tomioka, after Tomioka berates him for showing Rui pity as the demon died, that he refuses to belittle any demon that shows regret because he recognizes demons were once humans and believes they should be pitied, not hated, for their demonic status (Ch 43). Badgers have a tendency to humanize even those considered enemies or monsters. On the flipside of this, when he meets someone who shows they enjoy hurting others, Tanjiro becomes truly enraged, like when he is outraged by the idea Rui’s idea of forging bonds through fear (Ch 38) or when Daki shows no remorse for all the civilians she killed in the entertainment district (Ch 81).

Like many other Badger Primaries, Tanjiro also has a self-sacrificial streak, a belief that those depending on him need to come before his own well-being. As the eldest son in his family, he felt a deep responsibility to stay strong for his family, which he believes made him resilient even when dealing with pain (Ch 24). His desire to protect people is what keeps him going, even when facing Daki while exhausted, injured, and all by himself (Ch 78), or when he tells Inosuke to save the train passengers when the train derails, despite also being injured and in need of help (Ch 62). As Tanjiro’s little brother, Takeo, says in a flashback, those who get angry for the sake of others, tend to not worry about themselves (Ch 83).

As for his Secondary, Tanjiro shows a penchant for hard work. While Inosuke and Zenitsu quit after a few days, Tanjiro is the only one willing to continue undergoing the intense rehabilitation training at the Butterfly Mansion, and he is immediately willing to train to use Total Concentration: Constant, despite recognizing how difficult that will be to achieve (Ch 49). And when he does struggle with the continuous breathing technique, he gets through it by referring back to what has worked for him in the past and telling himself that hard work will help build his strength little by little (Ch 50). After Rengoku’s death, he reaffirms this belief when he speaks to Senjuro about how there is no shortcut to gaining strength, only by training day after day can he achieve it (Ch 69). During battle, he improvises, but he does so like a Badger Secondary, always thinking back to his training and how he can apply it to the current situation. Also, on a more humorous note, Tanjiro proves himself to be a horrible liar because he is unpracticed in being anything but honest (Ch 72). He also exceeds at housework to the point that he overwhelms the lady in charge of the brothel he’s undercover in with his eagerness to do chores (Ch 72, 73 Taisho Rumors).

Hashibira Inosuke: Lion/Lion

When we first meet Inosuke, he is literally charging around haphazardly, looking for a demon to fight (Ch 21). He lives in the moment. When he fights with Tanjiro over attacking Zenitsu and Nezuko’s box, he doesn’t care about his broken rib or any further damage he might cause to it. He only cares about the pleasure of the fight (Ch 26). Anything that delays action only serves to irritate him. In the spider demons’ forest, he punches a fellow demon slayer, Murata, when Murata takes too long to explain the situation (Ch 28). Then, in the entertainment district, he doesn’t understand why Tanjiro wants to wait to go after the demon in House Ogimoto (Ch 75). For Inosuke, it’s obvious what they should do: they know where it is, so they should attack it right away. When Tanjiro is late to their meeting that evening, Inosuke jumps into action to go after the demon on his own (Ch 76). And once he’s in battle, Inosuke does best when he’s acting on instinct. During his fight with the father spider demon, he struggles until he stops thinking and goes back to trusting his gut reactions (Ch 36). His trust in his gut instinct keeps him safe in many situations, like when he listens to his sense of danger that he should stay out of the fight between Rengoku and Akaza (Ch 64). Or, when fighting the obi piece of Daki, she notes that it’s his instincts that allow him to sense and dodge her attacks (Ch 79).

While finally giving a proper introduction of himself to Tanjiro and Zenitsu, Inosuke claims that his only goal in life is to match his strength against others (Ch 27). That is why he immediately tries to fight Tomioka when he sees how strong Tomioka is (Ch 38), and why he is frustrated by how amazing he deems Rengoku (Ch 60). During the battle with Kyogai in the Tsuzumi mansion, he doesn’t care when he steps on Tanjiro and Teruko; all he cares about is proving his strength (Ch 22). As an immature Lion Primary, being strong and in charge is his cause. The idealized dream the train demon, Enmu, shows him is one where he is the boss of the group (Ch 55), and he grows frustrated when Tanjiro takes the lead, like during the fight against the mother spider’s puppets (Ch 29-31) or when attacking Enmu’s neck (Ch 61). Thankfully, as a Badger Primary, Tanjiro doesn’t mind being in a support role if that’s how best to serve the group, leaving Inosuke to happily rush in and prove his strength.

Agatsuma Zenitsu: Snake/Burnt Badger

Zenitsu’s intense fear and anxiety often keep him paralyzed and unable to take action. When he does find the strength to engage, his strength is driven by his friends and his master. He refuses to let Inosuke touch the box Nezuko is in, even though he can hear a demon inside, because Tanjiro had said he values what was inside more than his life (Ch 25). Later, Zenitsu only enters the forest full of spider demons when he realizes that Nezuko is inside (Ch 27). And what motivates him in the final arc is what he feels he owes to his master (Ch 146).

He dreams of helping the weak because that’s what his master expected of him (Ch 34). His master was the first person to believe in him, something Zenitsu finds a great deal of his strength in. In fact, much of his lack of confidence he attributes to the lack of positive relationships in his life (Ch 34). As soon as he would get scared, people would abandon him, saying he was no good, until eventually Zenitsu believed it too. He just wants someone to encourage him, like when he thinks he would have gone into the forest of the spider demons if Tanjiro and Inosuke had reassured him first (Ch 29). But Zenitsu has no faith in himself which presents as a Burnt Secondary; he tries to do a good job but gets scared and runs away (Ch 33). At times, he is shown rushing in, like a Lion Secondary, except that these moments are always when he’s experiencing high emotions, like panic or envy. He is shown regretting some of these moments, like when he charges into the forest full of spider demons (Ch 29). He promises to work hard if the spider demons around him are just a nightmare, an indicator of what his Secondary is under all that burning, a Badger Secondary (Ch 32). He used to practice on his own, trying to make his master proud, only stopping and resisting training because he didn’t see any results (Ch 33). After Rengoku’s death, Zenitsu expresses a Straightforward Secondary way of thinking, telling himself that there is no hiding from pain and that people have to push through it (Ch 67). Most telling, however, comes in the final arc, when his response to the news he receives is to work hard until he is strong enough to do what he must (Ch 136). He even thinks to himself that what he respected most about Kaigaku was Kaigaku’s commitment to working hard (Ch 145).

Kamado Nezuko: Badger/Badger? + Lion model (while a demon)

Nezuko is difficult to sort because she is asleep for a majority of the story and when she is awake, being a demon has reduced her to a child-like state. That said, we do know she shares her Primary with her brother, mostly through Tanjiro's flashbacks. She gets the same, fierce anger when she sees someone hurt. Whether it's a child hurt by an adult or strangers killed by a demon, that anger is enough to transform her while facing Daki during the Entertainment District arc (Ch 83). She also showed a tendency to sacrifice for the group, like when Tanjiro recalls her refusing the idea of buying a nicer kimono because she would rather use what little money they have to see their entire family happy (Ch 3). She also is generally shown to be working or taking care of her younger siblings in these flashbacks, which may suggest she also has a Badger Secondary, but we don't see enough of her problem solving to know for sure. While she is a demon, however, she reacts like a Lion Secondary, rushing in to help protect her brother, like during the fight with Yahaba and Susamaru (Ch 17-18), and using her demon blood artes instinctively, like when she burns Rui's threads (Ch 40). It's unclear if this is anything but a model though since it is clearly driven by her status as a demon.

Kocho Shinobu: Snake/Bird

In flashbacks, Shinobu is shown to have been blunt in her youth, calling out the truth exactly as she sees it (Bonus Chapter 59). By the time Tanjiro meets her, she has been deeply affected by her sister’s death. She has dedicated her life to carrying on her sister’s dream while keeping a cheerful demeanor like her sister (Ch 50). But much of that cheerfulness is a performance by her Actor Bird, masking her true anger (Ch 50, 143). She knows just what to say to get others to do what she wants, like when manipulates Inosuke and Zenitsu into training (Ch 51) or when she distracts Tomioka when they fight over whether to kill Nezuko (Ch 44). She uses poisons and hidden blades to get around the fact she isn’t physically strong enough to kill a demon through conventional means. Her sorting is reaffirmed in the final arc, when it is shown how far ahead she is able to anticipate and plan, all for a chance that she could avenge her sister (Ch 162).

Rengoku Kyojuro: Lion/Lion

Rengoku views his purpose in life, his cause, as protecting the weak (Ch 64). He tells Akaza that physical strength is not what makes a person strong because Rengoku considers a strong heart to be true strength (Ch 63). While any Primary could value the same, Rengoku uses his final moments to relay a message to his brother, Senjuro, to follow his heart (Ch 66). It’s advice typical of a Lion Primary. Add to that the idealized dream Enmu provides Rengoku, a dream in which Rengoku proves his strength and gains the admiration of Tanjiro and the others, and it seems, even with his limited character development, Rengoku is likely a Lion Primary (Ch 54). His Secondary, however, is much more obvious. He is a bold, earnest, and quick to act. He serves as an effective inspiration to Tanjiro and the others because of his straightforward, unwavering Lion Secondary.

Uzui Tengen: Snake/Bird