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Left to Right: Kujou, Natsume, Saizou, Shu, Den-Hou, Enki, Kokou, Souketsu, and Tetsuzan.
History[]
Raizen's Friends are nine Upper S Class demons who used to have friendly fights with Raizen regularly, more than a thousand years before the show, before they shunned him for refusing to eat humans over a human woman. One of them, Kokou, was in love with Raizen, but resented him after he "cheated" on her with the woman who became Yusuke's ancestor. Sometime later, she married Enki, another one of Raizen's old sparring pals. Despite this, without Raizen, they lost the will to fight, and became out of practice for hundreds of years. After Raizen's death, they all went to pay their respects, at his grave. Despite abandoning him, every one of them regretted his passing.
Demon World Tournament[]
They were all very successful in the Demon World Tournament, because of their powers, which nearly rivaled those of the Three Kings themselves. Bar one, all of the finalists were Raizen's friends. This is whom most of them lost to:
- Kokou (弧光): Lost to Kujou in the fourth round.
- Enki (煙鬼): Champion of the D-block, went on to defeat Saizou and win the tournament.
- Kujou (九浄): Champion of the B-block, lost to Saizou in the semi-finals.
- Natsume (棗): Lost to Mukuro in the third round. She was on par with Mukuro for most of the fight, even if the latter was not fighting at her best.
- Saizou (才蔵): Champion of the A-block, lost to Enki in the final round.
- Tetsuzan (鉄山): Lost to Saizou in round two.
- Souketsu (痩傑): Defeated Shu in round two, and was defeated thereafter.
- Shu (周): Defeated by Souketsu in round two.
- Den-Hou (電鳳): Lost to someone, before the fifth round (most likely to Enki).
After the tournament had ended and Enki became the ruler of the Demon World, all of them had maintained their friendship with no hard feelings. Except for Enki and Kokou (a married couple), and Natsume and Kujou (siblings), the others went their separate ways.
Trivia[]
- Shu's height in the anime is far greater than in the manga, where he is easily the shortest of Raizen's friends.
- It was hinted that Raizen's friends in the past were stronger than Yomi and Mukuro, as Enki stated that they were rusty because they didn't train or fight for a long time. However, as Mukuro was weakened in her fight with Natsume due to losing hatred of the source of her power, she still defeated Natsume with only about half of her true power. This hints that Mukuro with her full power rivaled or exceeded Raizen’s friends before they became rusty.