Haru Okumura

Haru Okumura is a playable character from Persona 5. She is a wealthy girl who attends Shujin Academy, and is secretly a Phantom Thief. She is the only daughter of Kunikazu Okumura, the Thieves' fifth major target.

Appearances

 * Persona 5 / Royal: Playable Character; Empress Confidant
 * Persona 5: Mementos Mission: Major Character
 * Persona 5 The Animation: Major Character
 * Persona 5: Dancing in Starlight: Playable Character
 * Persona 3: Dancing in Moonlight: DLC support voice
 * Persona Q2: New Cinema Labyrinth: Playable Character
 * Persona Q2: New Cinema Labyrinth Roundabout Special

Design
Haru has chin-length curly light auburn hair and brown eyes. She is of average height, being taller than Futaba, but shorter than Ann and Makoto.

She wears her winter school's uniform modified to her taste; a pink turtleneck cardigan with short puffed sleeves and a long-sleeved white shirt underneath. The cardigan is zipped open up to her navel and has two large pockets on the front. She wears the standard black and red tartan skirt, white tights with a black flower pattern and black Mary Jane shoes.

Her summer school uniform retains her skirt and shoes, but she wears a light purple knitted sleeveless turtleneck sweater with a dark purple ribbon around her waist and white loose socks.

Her summer casual outfit is a transparent greenish white collar dress underneath the white tank top, white pantyhose and cream-colored pumps.

Her winter outfit is a white dress shirt with a dark blue ribbon, pale green fluffy coat, pink skirt, white tights and brown shoes.

Her Thief outfit consists of a dark purple cavalier hat with a feather plume tucked into a royal purple hatband, a long-sleeved pale pink blouse with a white neck jabot (held there by a red gem pin), a black corset vest with gold buttons, bloomers that match her hatband, black pantyhose, a holster belt carrying ammo and lace-up pumps. Her mask and gloves are black and violet, respectively.

In Persona 5: Dancing in Starlight, her outfit resembles that of a ballerina. It consists of a black corset with puffy bright pink short transparent sleeves, a white tutu under her Shujin Academy skirt, white tights and black ballet shoes with heels. She also wears black lace gloves with a matching choker and a red ribbon tied on top of her head.

Personality
Haru is generally very shy and reserved. At school, she is viewed as eccentric due to her tendency to keep to herself and avoid contact with others as much as possible. She has serious trust issues, finding it difficult to differentiate between who truly values her as a friend, and who merely wants to use her for her family's status. This is due to her past, where not only friends, but adults and teachers would be kind at her just to please her father and smiled at her for their own personal gain. Despite this, Haru is an incredibly kind-hearted girl; she becomes fast friends with all of the Phantom Thieves, and is the only member of the group Ryuji Sakamoto doesn't argue with on a regular basis. She can also be very awkward, as shown when she first introduces herself to the others as "Beauty Thief," and forgets parts of the script she has rehearsed with Morgana, to the point of saying "We will take the Treasure." twice in a row, much to Futaba Sakura's ire. She later explains that she was trying to be a "heroine of justice," having grown up admiring female superheroes she watched on TV. She loved them for always fighting to protect others and being happy, desiring to be just like them someday.

At first, Haru is reluctant to team up with the other Phantom Thieves, saying she can't cooperate with people who don't know what they want to do, and calls them out for turning their backs on their own teammate when their goal is supposed to be to help the weak. After her real desires are brought to light, however (namely, to get out of her arranged marriage with her abusive fiance), she changes her mind and decides to team up with the Thieves to change her father's heart. Despite this, she is initially still reluctant to oppose her father, and as a result hasn't fully awakened to her Persona, though this changes once she learns that her father has no illusions of the kind of man her fiance is, and declares that she is no longer his "subservient puppet." Afterwards, she decides on the codename "Noir" (the French word for "black"), to remind herself that she is operating on the darker side of the law despite her desire to be a heroine of justice. As such, she is rather surprised to discover that the others decided on their codenames based merely on how their outfits look, when she had created such an elaborate backstory for hers.

Initially, Haru acts and behaves very formally towards the group, believing that it's her responsibility as the newest member of the team. After being told that whether or not she's new doesn't matter to them, however, she loosens up and becomes much more casual; she calls Makoto "Mako-chan" because Makoto is the first friend of her own age she's ever had (this initially catches Makoto off-guard, but she soon considers it refreshing since Haru had been excessively formal early in the conversation). She calls Morgana "Mona-chan" both in and out of the Metaverse and uses affectionate honorifics for everyone (-kun for boys and -chan for girls). It goes both ways, as she dislikes the younger members of the group calling her "Senpai" and asks for them to just call her "Haru," a trait she shares with Makoto.

In her spare time, she enjoys tending to her garden, as well as growing vegetables on the roof of the school. She claims that vegetable-growing is the only thing she's honestly good at, and becomes delighted when she learns that her hobby can prove useful to the Phantom Thieves' activities. Besides gardening, she also enjoys horror movies. Despite her gentle personality, she admits she feels excited when Shadows beg for their lives, that cutting down enemies as they approach is a thrill, and that she sees combat as a form of stress relief, hinting she is somewhat sadistic. Also, after a battle, Haru may say something along the lines of, "Phew, I need more of that!" and despite saying that she gets nervous before combat, she always wants to do it again afterwards. Her sadistic streak is enough to freak out Makoto, who's well-known among the group for her vicious temper and tendency to take her anger out on Shadows. This sadistic side is further shown by the fact that if the protagonist cheats on her in Valentine's Day, she will express her anger with an eerie smile on her face, saying that he can enjoy her chocolate before she crushes it.

As someone who had her entire life planned out for her before the death of her father, Haru has grown to appreciate just about any freedom she can get, claiming that having the freedom to go out shopping, as opposed to just doing it online, is "a luxury in itself." Additionally, despite the fact that she has been forced to do whatever people wish of her, Haru is very empathetic and can easily see how easy her life is in comparison to the average person, and she really is luckier than everyone else to be born as rich as she is. As such, she shows prudence and an honest recognition of when she'd just get in the way.

Persona 5
Haru is a third year student in Shujin Academy and the daughter of the president of Okumura Foods. Haru has been forced into an arranged marriage with the son of a prospective associate of her father's, Sugimura, whom she despises for his controlling and abusive nature.

She is first seen inside of her car in an anime cutscene during the fireworks festival in summer.

Fifth Heist: Kunikazu Okumura
She first met Morgana by coincidence, seeing him wandering the street after his falling out with the Phantom Thieves. After approaching him, she was consequently dragged into her father's Palace, wherein she awakened to her Persona. However, her Persona lacked the power the Phantom Thieves' had. Not wanting to get married, she decided to work with Morgana to change her father's heart.

The Thieves encounter Haru within Okumura's Palace. Morgana introduces Haru as the "Beauty Thief," to which she plays along. She and Morgana then challenge the Phantom Thieves to a competition to see who can get the treasure first, which quickly ends disastrously with Haru experiencing stage fright the first time she meets the Phantom Thieves, and blundering into a room packed with alert Shadows. This leads to a petty chase in Mementos where she accidentally crashes Morgana.

The protagonist then meets Haru again at school, where Makoto Niijima confirms her identity as the Beauty Thief whom they met at Okumura's Palace earlier. Makoto tries to convince Haru to cooperate with them since they are also after her father, but Haru rejects her proposal, refusing to work with a group that does not know its own path and insists she will only work with Morgana since he gave her a means to make her father atone for his transgressions. However, when the party sees Sugimura grab her by the arm and kick Morgana, Haru finally reveals that the true reason she wants to change her father's heart is not to redeem him, but to escape the marriage he had arranged for her. Finally being honest with herself, she and Morgana decide to team up with the Phantom Thieves.

Haru accompanies the Phantom Thieves into her father's Palace, but Morgana warns her that her Persona has not yet taken full form, and she is thus not able to fight. During a confrontation with her father's Shadow, the cognitive version of Sugimura adds that he no longer desires Haru as his wife, only for Kunikazu to add that he may have Haru as his sexual plaything instead, so long as Kunikazu gets what he wants out of the deal. Outraged and betrayed, Haru's Persona Milady takes shape, and she defeats the cognitive version of her fiancé.

Proceeding further into the Palace forces Haru to realize how her father exploits his workers and even views the company itself as a means to an end. Despite this, when Haru confronts her father, he is able to manipulate her by pretending to apologize, luring all of the other Thieves besides her into a trap.

After the battle, Kunikazu apologizes and promises to make amends, including rescinding the marriage offer to Sugimura. He reveals that he hired someone else to carry out the mental shutdowns, but the group is forced to escape before he can say who. Once the true form of the Treasure is revealed to be a plastic model, Haru tells the group that her father's bitterness over his father's benevolent but misguided management of his business caused him to become ruthless.

Kunikazu holds a press conference apologizing for his misdeeds, but before he can reveal the identity of his associates in the conspiracy, he suffers a mental shutdown and dies, with his death being used by the Conspiracy to frame the Phantom Thieves.

After taking a few days off from school in order to mourn her father and deal with company-related business, Haru returns around the time of midterms, and reveals that Sae Niijima investigated the Okumura residence and Shujin Academy, finding a calling card for the principal in the latter location.

During the infiltration into Shido's Palace, Haru uses her connection to Kunikazu to convince the cognitive version of the president of a TV station to grant her his letter of introduction, and thus access to the treasure chamber. Unfortunately, when the president informs Haru that Kunikazu was killed because his misdeeds made him a liability to the conspiracy, and the president broadcasted the moment of Kunikazu's mental shutdown for higher ratings, Haru is enraged and demands an apology, leading to a battle.

After the battle with Goro Akechi, Haru tells Akechi that while she will never forgive him for killing her father, she can understand his feelings and tries to convince him to change Masayoshi Shido's heart together. After defeating Shido, Haru notes that she believes that she has avenged her father.

Like the rest of the party, Haru's spirit is nearly broken when she is briefly erased from existence, but she regains her resolve with the protagonist's support and helps him win in the end.

During the quest to free the protagonist, Haru offers to contact her father's associates to ask for their help in this endeavor. In the end, Haru asks the others for help on the behalf of a friend, likely someone outside the group.

If the protagonist does not complete Okumura's Palace in time, Haru will be forced to marry her fiancé, and the protagonist is arrested after the police receive an anonymous tip that he is the leader of the Phantom Thieves. As with the other "time-out" bad endings, it is revealed that this is a false recollection caused by the protagonist being heavily drugged during Sae's interrogation. She leaves to let him collect himself, at which point Akechi takes the opportunity to assassinate him.

Confidant

 * To check Haru's Confidant dialogue options and skill, see: Confidant/Haru Okumura

Haru's Confidant can be unlocked on October 30th. Starting her Confidant will allow the protagonist to harvest vegetables with her on the roof of Shujin Academy. However, the player needs maxed Proficiency to be able to advance the Confidant past rank 1. The vegetables grown are consumables that the party can use in dungeons to restore SP. Maxing this Confidant makes Milady evolve into Astarte and unlocks the fusion of Mother Harlot.

Haru's Confidant revolves around her trying to become more involved in Okumura Foods by developing ways to use the produce she grows in order to eventually create a café chain much like her grandfather once did. She brings her first batch to Sojiro Sakura who states that the vegetable quality is impressive for home grown produce, but hardly of quality suited for a business chain. It also deals with Haru having to deal with the fallout of her father's death, including people trying to take advantage of her as a large stakeholder for Okumura Foods as well as Sugimura who threatens her with their marriage agreement made with her father previously, which he states is still legally binding despite his death.

Near its climax, Haru grows her own coffee beans and vegetables and presents it to the new stand-in president Takakura. She makes it clear to him that her father's death as well as his schemes caused her to lose a lot of trust in the officials of the company, including Takakura himself. With the protagonist there when she presents her coffee to Takakura, she musters the courage to tell Takakura of what she intends to do with the company once she is able. Takakura comments that the coffee that she grew and brewed were similar to the one her grandfather once made, which is the reason why he joined the company in the first place. Takakura sees Haru's resolve and states that he wishes to turn Okumura Foods back the way it was before Kunikazu's changes, making it a company that customers and employees will both enjoy. He extends an invitation to Haru to come to the next company meeting as means of resolving issues of company trust among the administration, and to help be a guide in bringing Okumura Foods back on the right path. Haru accepts.

Takakura also brings up the matter of her marriage contract with Sugimura, stating that there is no formal legal deal requiring the two be wed if she does not desire it. Haru politely, but firmly, tells Takakura to annul the marriage agreement between the two, formally ending the prospect of her marriage to Sugimura. Haru's resolve strengthens from being able to speak her mind to President Takakura, and he even drops a comment that she must be close with the protagonist since she brought him along to tell him all this. Alone, the protagonist can choose whether he wishes to support her as a boyfriend or just as a close friend.

Regardless of the outcome of the protagonist's choice, during the final Confidant Rank, Haru reveals that she did attend the company meeting and was able to speak her mind to the administration. She reveals that she plans to attend college to get the skills necessary in order to open the café chain she dreams of. In the meantime, she resolves to remain a supporter of the protagonist's ambitions as a fellow Phantom Thief. With her resolve stated to the protagonist, Milady transforms into Astarte.

Haru's farewell gift after maxing her Confidant is the Dyed Hankerchief, allowing the protagonist access to Soil Improvement once her Confidant has been established in New Game+. If the protagonist pursues a romantic relationship with Haru, she will give the protagonist a Hat on Christmas, allowing the protagonist to earn more points when using an Empress Persona during their Confidant in NG+, and Haru's Chocolate on Valentines Day, which fully restores SP to one ally when consumed.

Persona 5 The Animation
Haru makes a brief appearance in the second and ninth episodes tending to the Shujin Academy’s garden.

She is soon made her full speaking and major debut in nineteenth episode, where she is briefly seen calling her teacher, Sadayo Kawakami, who was privately trying to show off her new swimsuits for their vacations in Hawaii. In the post-credit of the episode, at time after Haru trails Morgana into her father’s Palace, she rescued him after he was beaten up by two of her father’s robot minions.

Persona Q2: New Cinema Labyrinth
Haru, along with Makoto Niijima was a default member of the player's tutorial party and were kidnapped by Kamoshidaman via a F.O.E at the beginning of the game. Her level in the tutorial party is significantly higher than other party members. Kamoshidaman kidnapped them because they were criminals disrupting the order to Kamocity and they were prepared to be executed. The party frees the two girls after defeating Kamoshidaman and after they return to the cinema they join the party.

Quotes
Persona 5=

Trivia

 * Haru may be a historical reference to (平塚 明), a Japanese feminist in the early 1910s. This is further supported by Haru's last name "Okumura" which is the same as Hiratsuka's artist lover, Hiroshi Okumura (奥村 博史).
 * Her name also means "spring" in Japanese.
 * Haru's Personas specialize in Psy skills, which have not appeared in the franchise since Shin Megami Tensei: Devil Summoner.
 * Noir in the Japanese official site is given the title of "Phantom Thieves' Noble Daughter", implying she still acts like a wealthy lady during the heist.
 * The deadline for reforming Kunikazu is before Haru's marriage. In the Japanese version, this is written as "x days before Haru's body is sold" which almost looks like "prostitution".
 * Haru's English voice actress, Xanthe Huynh, cosplayed as Noir while attending Anime Expo 2017.
 * Haru and Makoto share the same Blood Type
 * Haru was originally supposed to be fragile like she's portrayed in her designs, similar to Fuuka Yamagishi.
 * Just like with Makoto Niijima, Goro Akechi, Ryuji Sakamoto, and Ann Takamaki before, the official twitter account for the Persona series posted a "Happy Birthday" message for Haru on December 5, 2017 JST.
 * Haru is left-handed.
 * However, in combat, she sometimes uses her grenade launchers with a right-handed stance.
 * Alongside Protagonist . Haru is the first phantom thieves to shown their midwinter outfit in Persona 5 Royal.

Appearances in Other Media

 * Chain Chronicle: Noir, Archers class. (Article in Chain Chronicle Wiki)
 * BanG Dream! Girls Band Party: Outfit for Hazawa Tsugumi
 * Catherine: Full Body: DLC NPC
 * Super Smash Bros. Ultimate: cameo appearance in the Mementos stage and as a spirit