Aran Hirano is a major character from Persona 5: The Phantom X.
Appearances[]
Design[]
Aran has a pink bob cut and freckles in the middle of her face. She wears a purple jacket with heart patterns over her Kiga school uniform and a choker with a pink heart. Aran also wears a pair of long black socks, and a pair of red platform shoes with black soles and silver star patterns.
Personality[]
Aran is an introverted but resolute person. She is passionate about drawing manga, and has a habit of drawing sketches of things that she is interested to on her notebook.
She is curious about the protagonist and his partners, even follows them and eavesdrops on their conversations. After she gets to know them, she also shows her supportive attitude to their actions.
Profile[]
Persona 5: The Phantom X[]
Aran is a first-year student at Kiga High School and a professional manga artist. She is the author of Phantom Thief Familia, a popular manga with sales of over 5 million copies.
"Chapter 2: Battle of Dreams & Flavor"[]
When the protagonist and Motoha Arai are on their way to Shinjuku to deliver Yamagoshi's message to Shun Kanou after he receives a challenge from Hiromu Miyazawa, Aran sees them on the train. She sees Lufel inside the protagonist's bag and is about to draw a sketch of him. However, when she is busy looking for her sketchbook, the two activate their Metaverse Navigator and disappear from the train, leaving her puzzled.
After the battle against Shadow Miyazawa in his palace and changing his heart, Aran is seen in Wonder's vision where she helps him design the Phantom Thief icon. Later in the real world, she is seen crossing the road and being confused with the strange app in her smartphone, where she almost gets hit by the bicycle rider rushing on the road.
"Chapter 3: Concert for Rulebreakers"[]
When the protagonist, Motoha, Shun and Riko Tanemura go to a bar in Shinjuku for a talk with Kumi Katayama, Aran encounters them and instantly recognizes the protagonist. Curious as to why they'd enter a bar like this, she pulls her notebook out of her bag and starts taking notes. When the four come out, Aran hides behind a wall across the street to observe them. The protagonist senses someone's eyes on him and looks back, but finds nothing as Aran quickly dodges back. She hears Metaverse and Palace from their conversation, but has no idea of what they mean.
Aran sees the protagonist again at Shibuya Square and follows him to the entrance, where he and the other three send Akashi a Calling Card through Magatsushin, hence confirms they are the Phantom Thieves. Later, when the four come back from changing Akashi's heart, Aran recognizes their Kokatsu school uniform and eavesdrops on them. She then checks on her calendar about the upcoming school festival in Kokatsu Academy, setting up a plan.
"Chapter 4: Melancholy of the Masked Actor"[]
Aran goes to Kokatsu Academy along with Shoki Ikenami and presidents of Kiga's drama club to discuss about the stage play collaboration in Kokatsu's school festival. Surprised to see the protagonist, Motoha, Shun, and Riko again, she insists on having them to perform on the stage play, since the play is based on her manga work, Phantom Thief Familia. Eventually, both sides have agreed to let Shoki be Kokatsu's helper for the stage play, with Aran being the scriptwriter.
Their collaboration goes smoothly. Aran comes to Kokatsu to join their practice as long as she doesn't have work on that day. She gets to make friends with the four, and points out that Shoki's acting doesn't express his true self, hence doesn't leave a strong impression, which helps Shoki realize what he truly lacks in his acting.
Aran and the other are shopping for prop supplies in Shibuya
A few days later, Aran mentions that she is going to have an interview at Shubunsha's building, as it is conducted by Comic Note, a manga information magazine associated with Shubunsha, same as Bakuro the gossip magazine Takami Shimotsuna works for. She also learns that the four are trying to investigate Shimotsuna, and agrees to have one of them go with her to Shubunsha, which is the protagonist. With Aran claiming the protagonist, in his casual wear, as the president of Kiga's news club who wants to write an article about her interview on the school blog, the protagonist manages to get information about Shimotsuna from the editor-in-chief of Comic Note. After the interview, when Motoha, Shun and Riko come to meet the protagonist at Shibuya Station, Aran directly asks them if the next target of Phantom Thieves is Shimotsuna, revealing that she knows they are the Phantom Thieves. While being questioned, Aran says she has no intention to uncover their true identities, and expresses her desire to support them in their actions if she can help, as she finds them interesting and a good source of inspiration for her manga work.
On the next day, Aran leaves practice early as she has to amend her manga storyboards. Not long after, Shimotsuna comes to Kokatsu pressure Ikenami into accepting Kokoro's offer to work in a web drama, which he refuses due to the demanding schedule. Later, she meets the four and Ikenami at Shibuya Station again after they come back from the Metaverse, in which Shoki had awakened his Persona. Aran accidentally drops her smartphone to the ground, which Riko picks up to return her and sees the Metaverse Navigator icon on it. After Aran leaves, Riko informs the others, which leads to them to suspect Aran as the one who activated the Metaverse Navigator at Kokatsu, which led them and Shoki to enter the Metaverse from the school. Though unable to reach a clear conclusion, the six agree to watch out on Aran, as they are at risk of being tracked down by the unknown enemy behind all "Phantom" incidents, concerned that Aran might be connected.
Gallery[]
Trivia[]
- In the first opening movie, Aran actually made an appearance at around 01:29-01:30, is shown predominantly in the second opening video, and upon beating Chapter 2, a cutscene shows the Metaverse Navigator appearing on her phone, suggesting that she may have a non-trivial role in the main story, despite only having a minor role in the story as of now.
- Similarly, her full name was not officially revealed in the main story due to her cameo appearance. However, in the camera mode from the third beta test, she was one of the selectable characters with the name 平井亚兰 in simplifiled Chinese tagged below her icon, indicating her full name.
- In the 1st anniversary livestreaming, the kanji of her full name were confirmed to be 平野亚兰, which are pronounced as Hirano Aran.