Asagi Minori (浅葱 みのり) is a side character introduced in The Day After 02, complete with the distinction of being the first âge character in the entire Muv-Luv multiverse to be seen only in flashbacks. She was a close friend and fellow pilot to Hibiki and Yuzuka, being with them prior to and directly after Operation Babylon. Asagi was a very confident and outgoing person and was someone Hibiki greatly admired to the point of developing romantic feelings for her.
The Day After[]
Hailing from the same squadron of F-15Js as Yuzuka and Hibiki, she was sociable with the both of them and the American troops they were stationed with. While she had no compunctions about killing enemy pilots, the squadron's defeat and escape into the wilderness between the USA and French/Canadian battle lines where they were beset by cannibals and enemy troops took their toll on her psyche, slowly eroded her willpower. Her main pillar of support was the squadron leader, a person affectionately referred to as the 'Captain' by his men; despite the terrors they came across, somehow the Captain managed to keep the unit together. Asagi maintained a journal of their travels through the wilderness in an effort to stay sane.
Eventually, only Hibiki, Yuzuka, and Asagi remain alive out of the original squadron of twelve. Despite Hibiki's best efforts to keep her calm, she pined for her family to the extent of crying hysterically when talking about them, adding more mental stress to herself by worrying about whether they managed to make it onto one of the Wasp-class ships sent to evacuate Japan. In the aftermath of witnessing their comrades dying one by one, along with their superior's suicide, Asagi no longer had the willpower to actively take care of herself and became mostly unresponsive.
Prior to Asagi's breakdown, she took Yuzuka aside to talk in private. She entrusted Yuzuka with the duty of protecting Hibiki should anything happen to herself. Asagi had noticed that despite everything they had faced, Yuzuka was able to remain strong as long as Hibiki was still alive. She recognized that as long as the both of them remained alive, neither one of them would break under the stress. Before they parted, Asagi also entrusted to Yuzuka her journal so that she could eventually give it to Hibiki, in case he ever needed to remember the truth.
Eventually, Asagi fully broke down and begged her comrades to kill her. Hibiki tries to calm her down but she wouldn't stop asking to die, even begging that they commit suicide with her. After a while, they managed to calm her down and took refuge in an abandoned cabin for the night. The next day, Asagi's instability finally took her over the edge and she attempted to kill Hibiki with her combat knife. The following events were recalled differently by the two survivors, and Hibiki was particularly scarred by the experience given his personal feelings for Asagi.
According to Hibiki, after Asagi had pinned him down, she had prepared to stab him when Yuzuka tried to get her to stop. Annoyed by her interference, Asagi removed herself from Hibiki to attack Yuzuka. Now free to move, Hibiki readied his service weapon and begged Asagi to stop before she could hurt Yuzuka. When she refused, Hibiki shot her as Asagi came at him with the knife. In his memories, Hibiki remembered Asagi looked remarkably calm immediately after he shot her, as if she were relieved to finally die. These events were what Hibiki relayed to his superiors after being rescued and returned to Seattle, after going through multiple therapy sessions with the use of drugs to help him remember.
Much later, Yuzuka decided to reveal the truth to Hibiki of what happened that night. She was afraid that if she waited much longer, future battles might stop her from ever telling Hibiki what really happened. Yuzuka told Hibiki of her promise to Asagi that she would protect Hibiki, and that it was what led to Yuzuka's actions the night that Asagi tried to kill them. After Asagi had pinned Hibiki down, Yuzuka begged her to stop as the stunned Hibiki was unable to resist. The crazed pilot refused to listen and brought her knife up above her head to stab Hibiki, forcing Yuzuka to use a fire axe she found in the cabin to hit Asagi in the back of the head with the blunt side. Now bleeding profusely from the back of the head but still conscious, Asagi turned on Yuzuka, who loudly proclaimed she would keep her promise and protect Hibiki. Asagi taunted Yuzuka and said she couldn't protect anyone, readying her knife to stab her.
Swept up by her emotions and fearful of dying, Yuzuka swung her axe once and then a second time, both times connecting with Asagi's neck which led to her decapitation. Shocked by the events that transpired, Hibiki fainted, and his mind locked away the traumatic memories and developed the fabricated events that he would later remember. After retelling the story, Asagi's journal was then given to him by Yuzuka since she knew that Asagi would have wanted him to have it.
She also appeared as an apparition before Hibiki during the final moments of his march through the desolate wasteland between the USA and Canada, the memories of her more rational moments serving as a catalyst for his last burst of willpower.
Asagi's final appearance was in Hibiki's dreams where she and the Captain wished him good luck and bid farewell to him as they finally decide to "move on". This came after Hibiki learned the truth of Asagi's actions and despite his desire to see her stay, Hibiki tearfully watched as she and the rest of his former squadron left him behind.
The dream signified that he had finally come to terms with his past and became stronger for it. This also marked the end of his feelings for Asagi as he fully dedicated himself to Yuzuka, the girl that had been by his side the entire time.
Etymology[]
- Asagi means "shallow" (浅) (asa) and "onion/spring onion" (葱) (gi).
- Minori is written in hiragana (みのり), which has no special meaning. However, when written in kanji (穣), it could possibly mean "abundant".
