Wiki Wednesday #126 - usa-utauの轡 / KUTSUWA

I set my computer to hibernate last night so that I could just jump back into the articles. I woke up wanting to play Stardew Valley, but I also want to get started on Forgotten Friday articles like Yesterday, because I do love writing. I can't even do more Wiki Wednesday on Google Docs until I finish this batch, because I don't even know who I've written about by now!

Wiki Wednesday #126 - usa-utauの轡 / KUTSUWA

Kutsuwa means mouthpiece, or the bit you put in a horse's mouth. "猿轡" means gag. The last one looks like it fits the design more, but who am I to judge?

Who is Kutsuwa?

Official Art from Bank

Kutsuwa is an anti-virus zombie with an electric cable sticking out of her heel. I think she wears traditional Chinese clothes? Her design is strange.

Okay so I'm just trusting Google translate on this one, because I want to believe it. It says that the voice provider recorded this by making a shrill voice resembling that of a child and biting their finger. Of all the things to use as a gag, they used their finger! What's up with that?!

So, basically, there was this lady who was an antivirus program. A hacker showed up and killed her. She was revived as a zombie, but has no memories and is gagged. She can speak… just not well.

Who attacked her is a mystery, and she puts all of her effort into solving that mystery. She herself is mysterious, though. Even if she knew who she was or why all this happened, she wouldn't tell anyone. She's kind of a jerk, but I probably would be in her situation too. Apparently, though, she is kind to the mystery person, but she also hates the mystery person?

I think she has a super power that lets her freeze people and make them stop moving. Or not. I don't know, usa-utau is always confusing.

When there's not much to say, I usually describe the design in detail. The thing stopping me is just that I don't have the vocabulary. Her skin is grey, and her eyes are red with yellow accents inside. Her hair is the same yellow as the accents on her red traditional Asian outerwear. She has white bloomers and brown shoes that match what looks like to be a harness? Also, it looks like she has some kind of holster on her thigh. I believe it holds her iron fan.

Now, I have no idea what an iron fan was, so I googled it. Hers specifically is a Tessen. It is a fan made of iron. It folds like a normal fan so that samurai could take it anywhere with them, even when weapons were banned. So, if someone is bold enough, literally anything is a weapon. It seems like the main use of the iron fan was as a shield. Wikipedia mentions that people got killed by them, and I was confused until I remembered that any heavy, blunt object can do that. A master at Tessenjutsu can actually defend themselves from a sword attack. Gunsen are called war fans just like tessen, but they literally were just fans soldiers cooled themselves off with.

I did find this silly little vandalization on the Wikipedia page, though.

Other than the tessen and the one people just used to cool off, there was the gunbai. The gunbai is way less dope than the tessen. Because it is iron and only iron, it cannot fold like a traditional fan and more closely resembles the cardboard on Popsicle sticks that women in church fan themselves with in the south. Sometimes they look more like violins. However, the obviously were better shields and weapons due to not having any weak parts that aren't iron. It's just not as romantic, you know?

How is Kutsuwa's bank?

She just has a one pitch CV bank. It's meant to be a voice that makes you imagine a young girl. However, like, as well as it does that, the consonants are just missing. If you like that kind of adorable to the point that it's not even understandable, this bank is for you!

Where can I download Kutsuwa?

You can find the download link on her distribution page. I usually have a conclusion, but not today.