Tomoe Enjou

"I wish this spiral was a paradox."

- Tomoe Enjou

Tomoe Enjou (臙条巴) is a protagonist of the fifth chapter of Kara no Kyoukai.

Background
His earliest and happiest memories was when his father gave a spare house key to Tomoe when he was younger and told him to protect his family. This happiness was short-lived as his father would later cause the death of someone in a drunk driving accident.

This incident caused his family's downfall and hatred from others. This resulted in his father to lose his job and struggle to find work, leading him to have drinking problems. His mother was forced to work full time in the super market to support the family as well. Tomoe also becomes frequently bullied at school, which forced him to quit the track and field team at his school. His family had to move several times due to harassment as rumours keep appearing about his father's incident until they moved into the Ogawa apartment complex.

Unbeknownst to the Enjou family, the Ogawa Apartment Complex had been designed by Souren Araya to cause people to go into depression leading them to become insane thus driving them to their deaths. One day, Tomoe came back from work. Ignoring his mother as she tries to greet him, he goes and sleeps in his room. Due to being fed up with their situation, his mother killed his father while he was drinking and she eventually kills Tomoe in his sleep. His mother committed suicide afterwards.

Souren Araya surgically removed his brain from his body for his experiments. The experiment involved controlling the brain that was still functioning and implant their the thought processes into the replica puppets that Cornelius Alba provided. He created the Apartment Complex to create a cyclical loop in which the puppet residents repeat their last day before death as a means to discover an access to the Spiral of Origin.

The continuous loop slowly caused each of the new Tomoe puppets to have dreams recollecting the original Tomoe's memory of his death. In October 1998, one of the puppets was able to escape from the loop by killing his mother and running away. Before leaving the spiral complex, Araya supposedly implanted an unconscious imprinting in this puppet to have an interest in Shiki Ryougi.

Personality
Tomoe is a head-strong individual that had grown disillusioned by his experiences. He had originally loved sport, as he was particularly fond of sprinting, but complications surrounding his family drastically changed his outlook on life. His family's reputation led him to being bullied at school. Due to this, Tomoe had grown to become more apathetic towards his loved ones, simply carrying out his daily routine with nary a care in the world surrounding him. After supposedly murdering his parents, Tomoe recognizes his guilty actions, going so far as even anticipating his cruel punishment. His interactions with Shiki demonstrates his tendency to adhere to societal norms, initially finding Shiki's habits to be rather odd.

Due to his father giving him a spare key in his childhood, he has developed an attachment for keys and locks; developing a principle under the notion of being protective of one's home. He has stated that he despises the notion of romance and love based on his bad experience with his past girlfriend. Tomoe would go on to become close friends with Shiki Ryougi, being able to talk about himself and his experiences to her unlike any other person he has ever met. It is hinted that his attachment to Shiki is caused by Tomoe's ability to relate to Shiki's continued impression of her SHIKI personality. He cares about this deep friendship enough that when he admitted his love for her, he disliked the idea of ruining such a relationship by simply labelling it under the notion of "love". While he claims that he is willing enough to die for Shiki, this lowered sense of self-worth is prompted by his feeling of hopelessness, due to having already "killed" his parents.

While initially brash in his reactions towards Mikiya, he grows to respect him. He later understands Shiki's attachment to him, remarking that people like Shiki and himself truly need someone like Mikiya to keep them sane. Upon remembering his past memories with his family, he empathizes with his family and their situation. Finally gaining self-respect, Tomoe finds his resolve to fight for himself and his love for his family. When Araya reveals the true nature of the current Tomoe Enjou's identity and the supposed fabrication of his attachment for Shiki, Tomoe strives to believe that his feelings are true. In his final moments, he expresses his empathy for his family's situation as well as sympathizing their deaths caused by Araya, until finally remarking the legitimacy of his existence.

Chapter 5: Paradox Spiral
In the middle of October 1998, Tomoe kills his parents, having succumbed to his fears brought on by his nightmares of him and his father's death at the hands of his mother. Running away from home, he gets chased and attacked by bullies from his old school until he was saved by Shiki Ryougi. He asked her to hide him at her place as he claims to be a murderer, upon which Shiki remarks that she is the same thus agreeing to let him stay in her apartment room.

Shiki and Tomoe would go on to have a cyclical routine in which Tomoe goes outside by day, awaiting the news of his parents' murder while Shiki goes outside for her nightly strolls. Tomoe develops a close friendship with Shiki, talking to her about his past experiences. At some point, Tomoe sees Shiki walking by outside noticing that she is being followed by a strange-looking foreigner (later revealed to be Cornelius Alba). The foreigner maliciously stares back at him, and within the next moment, mysteriously vanishes before Tomoe's eyes.

Returning back to Shiki's apartment Tomoe expresses his worry for Shiki's safety. Shiki's insistence in asking for Tomoe's reason for being so anxious causes Tomoe to confess his love for her (although Shiki only reacted by laughing at the notion). In the next moment, Shiki playfully threatens him to die for his love of her, in which Tomoe declares his consent, admiting that he has nothing left having already killed his parents. Shiki dismisses his desire to die by her hand remarking that Tomoe should re-discover his true home. As Shiki goes out for one of her nightly strolls, Tomoe decides to stop staying in her apartment. Tomoe continues to wait for the news about the murder of his parents, but a lack of any report causes him to grow more paranoid. During this point, he recognizes his mother in a crowd, shocked at the revelation that she is possibly alive.

Tomoe returns to Shiki's apartment explaining how he saw that his mother was somehow alive. With hopes of uncovering the truth behind this mystery, Shiki and Tomoe went to the Ogawa Apartment Complex to investigate. When they arrived at Tomoe's apartment in room 405, they enter without ringing the doorbell, finding that his parents were alive as they witness a reenactment of his family's last moments, including his own. Shiki recognizes that the apartment complex already had some abnormalities. They venture on to find Tomoe and his parent's corpses in apartment room 410 where they were already dead since half a year ago.

They would encounter reanimated corpses of the aparment's residents, in which Shiki was able to destroy them in combat. Araya Souren reveals himself before them explaining the true nature of his plans, including the construction of the Ogawa Apartment Complex, and the continuous cycle of life and death in which the puppet imitations of the residents are undergoing. Shiki fights Araya but is easily overpowered. When Shiki is captured, Tomoe first flees back to her apartment, and meets Mikiya. Initially he wishes to recklessly confront Araya but Mikiya's persuasion leads them back to Tomoe's old house. Tomoe reflects on his past memories and the sad nature of his family's situation that led them to their deaths. Having re-discovering his love for his family, they both decide to go save Shiki.

They both separate as Tomoe plans to bring Shiki's knife and katana to her. He discovers Araya's underground lair beneath the Ogawa Apartment Complex. He finds multiple jars containing the brains of the residents of the apartment, including his own. As his arm falls off to reveal multiple gears inside, he finally deduces that he is merely an artificial puppet of the original Tomoe Enjou. He is confronted by Araya, who tells him of his origin as a puppet. Araya tells him that he supposedly let him escape as he planned to use Tomoe to lure Shiki out. Araya claims that Tomoe's love for Shiki is merely fabricated and that he simply imprinted such a desire in Tomoe's mind. Tomoe affirms his belief of his feelings being real despite his existence as a copy of the original Tomoe Enjou. Nonetheless, he considers the possibility that everything about his current identity is truly fabricated, thus defiantly thanking Araya for granting him such a chance of realization in his life. Araya taunts to Tomoe to confront him as Tomoe heads for the elevator. Inside the elevator, Tomoe drops Shiki's katana, opting to use her knife instead.

Exiting the elevator on the tenth floor, Tomoe finds Araya standing before him. He confirms his determination to kill Araya for his sake and his parents' death, claiming that they weren't sinful enough to die in such a cruel way. He charges head-on but Araya uses his bounded field to stall him. Tomoe's limbs are slowly torn away as he manages to stab Araya in the chest. He is eventually killed by Araya's power, commanding Tomoe's body to cease existence. Tomoe's body dissolves into dust, shedding a tear as he expresses his final words.

Due to having left behind her katana, which has the ability to break barriers, inside the Ogawa Apartment's elevator, Shiki is able to easily break free upon finally gaining consciousness, and confront and outmatch Araya in battle. After Araya's defeat at the hands of Shiki, Touko expresses that his downfall was caused by Tomoe's love for his family as well as his breaking out of the cycle created by Araya.

During her sleep, Shiki has a mysterious dream in which she encounters Tomoe one last time inside a diner. As they both enjoy their time in the diner, the two are suddenly called away, finally bidding each other farewell.

Abilities
Having joined a track and field team in one of his schools, Tomoe is hinted to be rather athletic due to his fondness for sprint running. Despite being chased by bullies, he was able to easily outrun them until he was cornered in a dead-end. He doesn't possess any special abilites however the origin that he has is "worthlessness".