Saya Otonashi

''This article is not about a character from BLOOD+. For the original movie, see BLOOD: The Last Vampire (Anime).''

The main protagonist of the series, Saya Otonashi is a seemingly ordinary teenage girl who was adopted a year before the start of the series by a Okinawan-American veteran who fought in the Vietnam War. She suffers from amnesia and has to receive regular blood transfusions to remain healthy.

Appearance
Black-haired, small, and lithe, Saya is about 5'2" (157 cm) and 89 lbs (40.4 kg), having the appearance of a teenage girl. She looks very similar to Diva, though Saya is slightly tanner and has a different hairstyle and eye color.

Though Saya has long hair while staying at the Zoo, she has a very short, boyish haircut by the time of the Russian Revolution, which she retains as a school-girl in Japan. Through the series her hair slowly grows out to her chin. In the last episode, Kai trims her hair to resemble her Season 1 appearance.

Saya's eyes are a dull shade of red which glow intensely when her chiropteran instincts are triggered or when she feeds on blood.

The Zoo
In 1833, the first Joel Goldschmidt and Amshel find a chiropteran mummy they call "Saya" and cut two cocoon-like objects from its body. The cocoons cannot be opened by force but "hatch" once they are bled upon, revealing two seemingly human infants. Intrigued, Joel and Amshel devise a social experiment: they separate the babies and confine one of the infants to a tower to perform tests upon, while Joel names her sister Saya after their mummified mother and raises her as if she were his daughter.

Saya is routinely given "medicine" to drink (secretly, blood) and is unknowingly studied by her adopted father, who makes notes about her and her sister in his diary and is the first to discover that the sisters' blood crystallize when mixed, which would later become the primary method of killing chiropteran.

In 1863, Saya follows the sound of her sister's song and finds her locked at the top of a tower, but does not realize that they are sisters. Because the other girl does not have a name Saya names her Diva for her amazing ability to sing and they become friends, with Saya secretly paying visits to Diva and talking to her in the following years. When she learns that Diva wants to get out of the tower, Saya promises to free her.

In 1870, Amshel purchases a twelve-year-old boy named Haji from his parents. Though Saya believes it is to be her friend, Amshel's true intentions are to see if she will mate with Haji and produce children. Due to her self-centered personality and Haji's unhappiness at being taken from his family, they are antagonistic towards each other. Eventually Saya recognizes his grief and comforts him, which allows them to become friends. At around this time, she first teaches him how to play the cello, which he uses to soothe her in the future.

Saya overhears a conversation Haji has with Joel in which her father reveals that her "medicine" is actually blood and that she requires it to survive.

On Joel's birthday in 1883, Saya finally finds the key to Diva's tower and releases her so that she can sing for Joel. She leaves to accompany Haji, who is searching for her, to go find Joel's favorite flower as a birthday present. While Haji is trying to get the flower, he falls off a cliff and is mortally injured. A horrified Saya tries to help him. Remembering Haji's earlier conversation with Joel and misunderstanding it, she feeds Haji some of her own blood, which triggers his transformation into a chevalier. Saya returns to the Goldschmidt house for help and finds instead that Diva has slaughtered everyone, including Saya's father. Recognizing her mistake in freeing Diva, Saya and Haji devote themselves to hunting Diva down and exterminating chiropterans, with that mission becoming Saya's only reason for living. They are aided in their goal by the Red Shield, an organization formed by Joel's surviving descendents.

In Vietnam
Saya was deep in hibernation when the Red Shield was in need of her blood to slay Chiropterans during the Vietnam war. She was taken from the coffin Haji had placed her in to sleep and was cut out of her hibernation cocoon. Being given an injection of human blood to awaken, Saya's consciousness did not return; instead her subconscious was in control. Killing the Red Shield operatives that had forced her awake, Saya heard Diva's singing and ran to find her. This led her to an empty container, which had presumably contained Diva, surrounded by chiropterans. Here she engaged Carl in combat with Haji who had come to assist her. She managed to cut off Carl's forearm with her blood soaked sword, forcing him to tear off the rest of his arm so that the crystalizing reaction would not spread to the rest of his body. Carl then fled the battle leading Saya toward a small village. Saya, still in a frenzied rage, cut off Haji's arm when he tried to stop her and then proceeded to slaughter the villagers. Once the battle had ended Saya fell back into her hibernation period. It was then that the dying David entrusted Saya to George Miyagusuku.

In Japan
In 2005, Saya Otonashi (音無 小夜, Otonashi Saya) is a high school girl living in Okinawa who was adopted a year ago by George Miyagusuku after waking from her hibernation cycle with no memory of her identity or past. Though she appears to be a normal teenager, any injuries she sustains heal almost instantly and she must receive regular blood transfusions to remain healthy. When a chiropteran attacks her school, she finds her life turned upside down. She is reunited with her chevalier Haji, though she doesn't remember him, and learns that her blood can kill the chiropterans. She is approached by David, from the Red Shield, who tells her it is her duty to kill chiropterans because she is the only one who can. Neither David nor Haji will tell her the truth about her past, telling her she must remember on her own. Though at first Saya is reluctant to fight and afraid of who she might be, she slowly comes to accept her duty and regain her memories.

After Riku's Death
After Riku's death, Saya confronts Diva in a final duel at the Metropolitan Opera House, which ends as they simultaneously pierce each other with their blood-coated swords. Saya is unaffected by Diva's blood, because it lost its potency when she became pregnant. Diva, however, begins to crystallize, and Saya cries for her and tries to hold her shattering pieces together. With Diva dead, Saya turns to kill the babies and herself fearing that if they lived, they would be forced to become military weapons. Kai pleads with her to live, promising to protect her and the babies and make anyone afraid of her understand. Haji disobeys Saya for the only time in his life, taking her sword and confessing he has loved her from the moment they met. Saya tearfully admits she wishes to live as she kisses Haji. She and Kai escape the opera house with the babies as Haji battles a returned Amshel and the US military begins bombing the building.

A month later, back in Okinawa, Saya finally goes into her next thirty-year hibernation period. At her request, Kai puts her back in the Miyagusuku family crypt to sleep, and he watches over her with Diva's children. Several years later, a fresh pink rose with Haji's blue ribbon is left at the crypt.

Abilities

 * Saya uses a special katana with an edge she can cut her finger or hand on, that has grooves running down it's length designed especially to allow her blood, which is poisonous for chiropterans, to spread through the entire blade. After breaking it in a fight with Amshel she receives a new one from David.
 * Any injuries Saya sustains heals almost instantly.
 * She has all natural abilities of a Chiropteran, but due to her aversion to drinking human blood, her powers are barely above human level
 * Saya also possess a sixth sense when sensing Diva and possibly other Chiropterans, similar to Irene and Riku's sense, although hers is "colored" red and Irene's is green.

Weaponry
also see Saya's Sword

Saya's trademark weapon is a long sword with a groove that begins at the upper base of the blade and then slopes downward to follow the length of the blade, branching out to the edge along the way. This allows Saya to cut her thumb on the top of the blade and let her blood flow into the channel, where it is distributed along the length. Once loaded with her blood, it is a deadly weapon against Diva and any chiropteran created from Diva's blood. After Saya's first blade is broken, David gives her a new one that has a red crystal at the base of its blade, symbolizing her membership in the Red Shield organization. The crystal is a piece of her adoptive father's body, which crystallized when she killed him with her own blood in order to spare him the fate of turning into a chiropteran.

Family
Diva - Sister (deceased)

Diva's daughters - Nieces

Riku - Adoptive brother (deceased)

Kai - Adoptive older brother

George - Adoptive father (deceased)

Manga Version
In the volume 4, she has a new hair style.