Name: Imai Nobume Gender: Female Race: Human Height:166cm Eye Color: Dark Crimson Hair Color: Dark Blue Date of Birth: 2 Oct/Libra Titles: Mukuro (former name),Nobutasu Also Known As: Watchdog Child of Shinigami Professional Status Affiliation(s): Mimawarigumi (former), Tenshouin Naraku (formerly) Occupation(s): Chief of Police, Mimawarigumi Vice Captain (formerly) Strong Point(s): Loves donuts

Background: Although not much is known about Nobume's origins, it is revealed that she was an orphan taken in and trained by the Tenshouin Naraku in order to be a professional assassin. At the time, her name was Mukuro. When Yoshida Shouyou was in jail during the Joui Wars, Mukuro was his guard, and during this time Shouyou taught her about knowledge and emotions, traits that she was lacking at the time. Afterward, she became known as one of the Naraku's "Three Feathers" for being a prodigy.

Four years before the start of the series, Mukuro met Sasaki Isaburou in a temple, together with other Naraku trained children. They were actually going to be used to assassinate the Hitotsubashi family. Sasaki attempted to thwart the assassination and succeeded, an act witnessed by Oboro. As a result, his punishment for the betrayal was the death of both his wife and his just born-child, and after that, Sasaki himself. Sasaki arrived at the death scene to find Mukuro standing on top of his wife's palanquin among a pile of corpses, all evidence pointing to her as the murderer. In truth, Mukuro came too late to save Sakaki's family but killed some of the Naraku assassins behind the murder. He himself realized this but did not tell her till years later.

In a fit of rage, he disarmed and cornered her easily. Pointing a sword at her, he asks why she doesn't strike back, and the reason for her tears. Mukuro says she is not fit to kill him, because she wanted to fight her own weakness and her fragile self, a lesson she learned from Shouyou back when she was his jailer. Although Mukuro was ready to accept her punishment, Sasaki lowered his sword, denying her wish to be killed. He then took Mukuro in, and later changing her given name from "Mukuro" to "Nobume", a name he wanted to give his daughter. He instructs her that until the time his goal will be in reach, he would have her to kill him, claiming that would be his revenge against himself for his lack of power for not being able to save his own family.

Appearance: Nobume is a young woman with a triangular face and dull red eyes. She has long dark blue hair, evenly trimmed bangs, and two shorter, rectangular strands falling on her face. Nobume has a Yatagarasu tattoo behind her neck, which is constantly covered by her long hair.

She is normally seen wearing a typical Mimawarigumi uniform. Under the neck has a white long scarf draped white suit with a collar, decorated with gold buttons on her shoulders, and the front rectangular brackets folded cuffs. Her uniform coat is a long trench coat extending to her ankles, while below was cut in half. She is also wearing a black colored belt with a silver buckle. She is seen wearing blue half-thigh shorts rather than the typical Mimawarigumi's long pants, she also wears the same colored socks decorated with white thread which form two X's on each side. She also wears the Mimawariguri uniformed boots.

During her childhood she had the same trimmed hair as in the present albeit much shorter. She's also seen wearing a kimono and the Yatagarasu's uniform. After she was picked up by Sasaki she wore an outfit similar to the one of Katsura when he was a child, and tied her hair up into a ponytail.

Her eyes were initially pupil-less and had a "murderous-like" look to them due to her past, being raised as a cold-blooded assassin by the Naraku. After Sasaki Isaburo's death, she renewed her ideals, with pupils full of life appearing in her eyes.

Personality: As a result of having been trained by the Naraku faction to be a professional assassin, Nobume is shown to be an emotionless person in both expression and speech. She appears to be sadistic and likes to cut down people (in the literal sense). According to Sasaki Isaburo, once she switches into her assassin mode, she annihilates everyone in her way. Although she seems to be quiet, she is surprisingly talkative. As shown during the Ikkoku Keisei arc, she thinks that it is better to cut down people that are knocked unconscious instead of leaving them alive, believing it is faster to cut them up in order to not get into trouble, with Gintoki and Tsukuyo trying to stop her. Despite her lack of showing emotions and serious attitude, she has been shown to be quite childish as she enjoyed it when she, Kagura and Soyo played a prank on the guards, and playing kick the can.

Nobume loves eating donuts and will often behave in an animalistic manner to get them. When Sasaki rewarded her with a donut for her good work, she immediately bit down on his hand before he even had a chance to hand it over and wouldn't let go to the extent that Sasaki had to shake her around to get his hand free and ended up dislocating it in the process. Sasaki was also able to "fish" her out of a collapsed building by attaching a donut to a fishing rod and dangling it over the ruins. In addition, she is antagonised whenever someone tries to tease her by eating donuts in front of her and turns violent as Sougo learned the hard way, resulting in him almost getting castrated.

Despite her loyalty towards Sasaki Isaburo, she shows some good conscience to go against his orders. For example, she allowed Rotten Maizou to go to Yoshiwara, despite Sasaki's orders, and when he was promoted, Nobume stated that with both allies and enemies gone and them standing on the top of a pile of corpses, that didn't mean that they could call their jobs done. Also, when she was offered to seat in the commander's chair she stated that she would rather grovel on the dirt instead of sitting there. She has also shown to bear animosity towards the Tendoshu as she insulted them when they arrived to retrieve Nobu Nobu, and later she told Oboro that she will never serve them again. In short, she detests people who selfishly abuse authority power.

It is revealed later on in the series that Nobume is not emotionless but rather just hiding it, as shown when she cried after remembering that she has the mission to kill Sasaki, showing that she is not actually willing to do that, and she also cried for Sasaki after seeing him in a near-death state, and is shown mourning his death.

She later becomes independent, declaring to Utsuro that she will only kill people for herself and not for neither the Tendoushu nor the Mimawarigumi. Despite looking unemotional, Nobume has a strong sense of justice, like when she kills the assassins that killed Isaburo's wife, although she was too late.

Strength & Abilities: Master Swordmanship Specialist: Because she was raised as an assassin from a very young age, Nobume is very powerful even by Tenshouin Naraku stantards. At a very young age, she is said to be immensely talented in assassination and was the best among the children and was named as one of the Naraku three when she was just a child. Even as a child she was able to successfully kill multiple adult Tendoushu assassins at the same time without sustaining any injuries. Her sword appears to be a Nodachi but it turned out to be a regular sized Katana while a small tantō concealed at the end of her scabbard. She uses a 2 sword fighting style. Kondo Isao has compared her to the grim reaper, as every strike she makes are lethal and capable of killing anyone if it hits.

Immense Endurance: Nobume appears to have a very high endurance, as she survived having a building crashing down with her in it with only minor scratches. Also, when Utsuro threw his sword and stabbed her in the stomach she still had enough strength to keep fighting him along with Kagura and Sougo. She was also able to avoid a point blank would-be lethal blow from Utsuro and hold him in place long enough for Gintoki to come in for a surprise attack.

Nobume is very skilled in imitating people's voices, as seen when she was voicing the Shogun during the Courtesan of a Nation Arc, and she also seems to be a good judge of character. Despite Sougo's cute appearance, she was able to tell that he is a sadistic murderer just by looking at his eyes. She was also able to see the sorrow in Gintoki's and Takasugi's eyes.