VN Talk: My Sweet Bodyguard - Part 6: Mizuki

I left Mizuki for last, not out of a sense of saving the best (or second best) for last as I sometimes do, but because I didn't know what to make of him and sometimes seeing a character on someone else's route is what I need to pique my interest.

Unfortunately, I still didn't know what to make of him by the time he was the only one of the initial five routes left. We know from the prologue that he's a former pop star who decided to change careers and become a bodyguard, which is a little weird, and for someone who must have spent a lot of time in front of crowds and cameras, he comes off as a rather muted personality. If there was a vote for bodyguard most likely to fade into the background, the winner would be Mizuki.

He has no prior connection to the MC, he's not in the command chain, and he's not outgoing enough to make an impression. For much of the game he occupied a nebulous space in my mind as "that fifth guy" which made me a little hesitant to buy his route, but since the series was on sale I figured it would be roughly equivalent to losing $3 if I didn't like it, so I picked it up.

And Mizuki is initially weird... really weird. He immediately comes off as serious about his job, and directly tells the MC not to fall in love with him, but then he's also talking to animals like a fairy tale princess, which is probably one of the last things I'd expect of a crack bodyguard. (He says he can't really talk to animals because that would be silly, but even if he can't literally talk to them, he can get them to do some very non-instinctive things for him.)

I don't think he entirely moves past being an odd duck, even as the story progresses, but it's likely the result of his background, having entered the entertainment industry while he was still a child and having a decidedly not normal upbringing. It wasn't something he wanted for himself, but rather something he did because he realized it made the people around him happy. Eventually he decided to quit (because it was clear he wasn't happy) and signed up to be a police officer after seeing a recruitment poster.

Becoming a bodyguard shouldn't be a job you just fall into, but that's what Mizuki did, and he's clearly flattered by the MC choosing him.

Because the prime minister's security team catches a few bad guys early on in his route, the MC is allowed to go to her part-time job (an activity exclusive to this route) and Mizuki follows in plainclothes, which I have to say looks a heck of a lot better than that leisure suit look he normally has when on the job.

Though there are enough high alert moments to make it clear that they're not out of the woods and Mizuki's services are still very needed, this middle portion is mostly to flesh out what looks to be a one-sided relationship, as the MC falls for him pretty quickly, and for understandable reasons. Mizuki is good looking, good at his job, and surprisingly sweet. He smiles and laughs a lot on his own route, which he doesn't on any other. Though the MC has no way of noticing this change, it's a nice way to show the player how he behaves around people who are a part of his job versus someone whose company he enjoys on a personal level.

The middle section also deals with what is probably the closest thing to a main villain, which is his hanger-on, Kuh. He calls her a "fan." She says she's his girlfriend. And it's pretty apparent to anyone that he is not in love with Kuh, but likely tolerates her because he doesn't want to be a jerk.

We don't really know much of their history other than Kuh is more of an internet celebrity rather than one that came out of the established entertainment industry like Mizuki, but Kuh uses what celebrity she has like a cudgel to make it clear that she doesn't see the MC as worthy of Mizuki's attention. We've seen would-be girlfriends like her in other games, and I didn't like her any more than the others.

What I did like though, is that when she pushes her luck (by slapping the MC even knowing she's currently under Mizuki's protection as a bodyguard), Mizuki immediately gets angry and kicks her out of his apartment. I would have preferred arresting her for assaulting the prime minister's daughter, because that more than likely would have shut her up (and avoided the kidnapping that happens later in the route), but at least he makes it abundantly clear that what she did wasn't cool, unlike some more spineless love interests I've seen who would have attempted to keep the peace.

Kuh isn't the main villain though, or rather not quite. To my delight, we get some colorful bad guys for the final third of the game. And they are literally colorful, wearing nothing but bright green. They're a fringe nature cult that kidnap the MC to force the prime minister to free their guru, and it turns out they were able to track down the MC because Kuh hid a transmitter in the MC's shoe.

This tells me that Kuh has to know who the MC is, and she's totally fine in aiding the kidnapping of the prime minister's daughter just so she can torment the MC into thinking Mizuki doesn't like her and she can get Mizuki herself. Unsurprisingly, her poorly thought out plan works poorly, Mizuki rejects her, and a lot of other stuff happens with the cultists making demands, threatening to kill the MC, and Ishigami disguises himself as a cultist… oh my! (Seriously, it was really weird. I already knew Ishigami from the other routes, but the first time he shows up on Mizuki's route is when he tosses off the costume to show he's been working undercover.)

Though the finale is mostly a team effort, I am glad that they let Mizuki be a badass and shoot his gun, because he makes it clear he has one earlier in the route, but for some reason he doesn't use it in the scene he first mentions it, and even tosses it away at one point. Each of the bodyguards seems to have a preferred way they operate, but Mizuki largely felt all over the place (he's actually a very bad bodyguard in some ways, especially once it becomes apparent his feelings are conflicting with the job). If you raise Chekhov's gun you need to shoot it. I want to see the chosen love interest do what he's supposedly good at.

In the end all the cultists who are in on the plot are arrested, but the uninvolved ones are left free to do their nature thing, which, in what was probably supposed to be a comedic moment, now includes Kuh. (Mizuki says she was always impressionable when they spot her with them.) It felt more like the game didn't want to send her to jail as an accomplice since she didn't directly try to harm the MC (aside from slapping her), but she still enabled the kidnapping of the prime minister's daughter, and unlike Karen in Katsuragi's route we have no reason to sympathize with her.

As with Sora's ending, Mizuki's makes it clear that his job protecting the MC will shortly be over, but now they can have a more normal relationship.

Despite a couple numbskull moments, such as the hotel swimming pool scene where Mizuki is clearly failing as a bodyguard because he's messing around in the water instead of guarding the MC, I ended up liking his route and his character much more than expected. Admittedly, he won a lot of points for kicking Kuh out of his apartment, but ultimately I found I just liked his quirky personality and weird mix of sharpshooter and animal whisperer that I'm just unlikely to find in any other sort of game.