Haiyore! Nyaruko-san

Haiyore! Nyaruko-san
Cover of first light novel volume featuring the protagonist, Nyaruko
這いよれ! ニャル子さん
Genre	Comedy, Romance, Satire
Light novel
Written by	Manta Aisora
Illustrated by	Koin
Published by	SoftBank Creative
Demographic	Male
Imprint	GA Bunko
Magazine	GA Magazine
Original run	April 15, 2009 – ongoing
Volumes	11
Original video animation
Haiyoru! Nyaruani
Directed by	Azuma Tani
Written by	Manta Aisora
Studio	DLE
Released	October 23, 2009 – March 15, 2010
Episodes	9
Anime television series
Haiyoru! Nyaruani: Remember My Mr. Lovecraft
Directed by	Azuma Tani
Written by	Azuma Tani, Manta Aisora
Studio	DLE
Original run	December 10, 2010 – February 25, 2011
Episodes	12
Manga
Written by	Manta Aisora
Illustrated by	Kei Okazaki
Published by	Shueisha
Demographic	Seinen
Magazine	Miracle Jump
Original run	May 6, 2011 – ongoing
Volumes	2
Manga
Haiyore! Super Nyaruko-chan Time
Written by	Manta Aisora
Illustrated by	Sōichirō Hoshino
Published by	Flex Comix
Demographic	Shōnen
Magazine	Flex Comix Blood
Original run	October 5, 2011 – ongoing
Volumes	3
Anime television series
Nyarko-san: Another Crawling Chaos
Directed by	Tsuyoshi Nagasawa
Written by	Noboru Kimura
Music by	MONACA
Studio	Xebec
Licensed by	NA Crunchyroll
Network	AT-X, TV Tokyo
Original run	April 9, 2012 – June 25, 2012
Episodes	12
Anime television series
Haiyore! Nyaruko-san W
Directed by	Tsuyoshi Nagasawa
Written by	Noboru Kimura
Music by	MONACA
Studio	Xebec
Licensed by	NA Crunchyroll
Network	AT-X, TV Tokyo
Original run	April 8, 2013 – ongoing
Episodes	12
Game
Haiyore! Nyaruko-san: Meijō shigatai Game no you na mono
Developer	5pb.
Publisher	5pb.
Genre	Adventure
Rating	CERO: C
Platform	PlayStation Vita
Released	May 30, 2013

Haiyore! Nyaruko-san (這いよれ! ニャル子さん, lit. Crawling Up! Nyarlko-san) is a Japanese light novel series written by Manta Aisora and illustrated by Koin. It was inspired by H. P. Lovecraft's Cthulhu mythos. Soft Bank Creative has published ten volumes under their GA Bunko imprint. A Flash original video animation (OVA) by DLE titled Haiyoru! Nyaruani was published in between October 2009 and March 2010. A Flash anime television series by DLE, Haiyoru! Nyaruani: Remember My Mr. Lovecraft, aired in Japan between December 2010 and February 2011. An anime television series by Xebec aired in Japan between April and June 2012. A second season is currently airing. Two manga adaptations have been produced.

Plot

The story of Haiyore! Nyaruko-san centers around Nyaruko, a formless Cthulhu-deity of chaos (Nyarlathotep) who can take on the shape of a seemingly ordinary silver-haired girl. Mahiro Yasaka is a normal high school boy who is being chased by a fearsome black alien one night, until Nyaruko saves him. She explains that the creatures from H. P. Lovecraft's works are actually races of aliens, and that she has been sent to Earth to protect him from being kidnapped by an alien trafficker. Eventually, Nyaruko and two other Lovecraft-creatures, Cthugha and Hastur, end up being freeloaders at Mahiro's place.

Characters

Humans

Mahiro Yasaka (八坂 真尋, Yasaka Mahiro)

Voiced by: Eri Kitamura

A human boy who reluctantly finds himself under the protection of Nyaruko. He tends to attack aliens by stabbing or throwing forks whenever they make him angry. He appears to attack so fast that currently no alien has been able to dodge yet. At first he dislikes aliens and wants to kick them out, but as the story progresses he starts to become more tolerant toward their actions. He is attracted to Nyaruko (in her human form), but is put off by her aggressive advances at the same time. According to Nyaruko and Kūko, Mahiro's appearance is strangely attractive to aliens, which explains why Nyaruko falls in love with him after only looking at his profile, as well as why alien criminals wanted to kidnap him.

Yoriko Yasaka (八坂 頼子, Yasaka Yoriko)

Voiced by: Kikuko Inoue (drama CD), Aya Hisakawa (anime)

Mahiro's mother, a real monster hunter who started her career during college. She has a young appearance that makes it hard to believe that she has a son in high school. She conceals her true job from her son until returning home during the plot. She is kind to friendly aliens, accepting Nyaruko, Kūko, and Hasuta living in the house, and their actions to pursue Mahiro. She advises Nyaruko to take her relationship with Mahiro a bit slower at first, but permits their relationship later after they rescued her. Just like her son, she uses throwing forks as her weapon in hunting monsters, and appears to be better skilled and can carry more forks than him. She is obsessed with video games, buying different game machines whenever she returns home from hunting. She also has a habit of hugging Mahiro, claiming she's replenishing her "son-onium".

Takehiko Yoichi (余市 健彦, Yoichi Takehiko)

Voiced by: Wataru Hatano

Class representative of Mahiro, Nyaruko, Kūko, and Hasuta's class. A friend to Mahiro, often giving him advice in school.

Tamao Kurei (暮井 珠緒, Kurei Tamao)

Voiced by: Yuka Ōtsubo

Mahiro, Nyaruko, Kūko, and Hasuta's classmate. Nicknamed "Walking Speaker". Very talkative, likes to gather and spread gossip among the class. She became a close friend to Nyaruko and often gives advise for her to pursue Mahiro, despite often feeling depressed as her plans fail. She actually has feelings toward Mahiro, but decided to give up and support Nyaruko since she feels that she is no match with the latter.

Aliens

Nyarlathotep (ニャルラトホテプ, Nyaruratohotepu) / Nyaruko (ニャル子)

Voiced by: Kana Asumi

A Nyarlathotepan (alien from Nyarlathotep) who is sent by the Space Defence Agency to Earth to protect Mahiro Yasaka and ends up falling in love with him. She takes a human form of a girl with long, silver-colored hair. She is always friendly to Mahiro, eager to pursue him, but often shows abusive and brutal habits to any hostile aliens. She is also obsessed with otaku culture. She takes the name Nyaruko Yasaka as Mahiro's cousin when staying at Mahiro's house and attending his school. Her actual age is unknown since she and Kūko always stop Mahiro whenever he becomes curious or questions her age, although she states that she has already graduated from space college. She happens to be smart and self-confident, as she graduated from one of the best universities at the top of her class, and entered the Space Defense Agency after her exam. She is also quite wealthy, capable of spending a lot on otaku-related products. As a top agent, she mainly uses space CQC to fight (note that the definition of "space CQC" is defined by the user and is not restricted to close quarter combat weapons). She claims to be one of the best fighters on Earth, as she states that her combat level is 530,000, while a normal farmer armed with a hunting rifle is 5 (a parody of Dragonball Z). Despite this, she is always unsuccessful when dodging Mahiro's fork attacks. Her power form is a set of black armor that covers her entire body.

Cthugha (クトゥグア, Kutugua) / Kūko (クー子)

Voiced by: Miyu Matsuki

A female Cthughan (alien from Cthugha). She takes the form of a slender, red-haired girl. She is in love with Nyaruko despite that her race is the archnemesis of Nyarlathotepians, and appears to be clingy that she is hostile toward Mahiro and threats him to stay away from Nyaruko in the beginning of the story. As the story progress, she becomes more friendly, and changed her goal to consist of a family with both Mahiro and Nyaruko. She transfers to Mahiro's school and takes the name Kūko Yasaka, Nyaruko's "wife". She is also obsessed with otaku culture and video games. Kūko was Nyaruko and Hasuta's space elementary school classmate and appears to at the same age as them, although she became a NEET after graduating from high school, and become a Space Defense Agency agent and colleague to Nyaruko later by using the relationship of her uncle who is an employee in the human resource department of the Space Defence Agency. She concealed her feelings for Nyaruko from her family and lied to them that Mahiro is her fiance, as love between Nyarlathotep and Cthugha are considered a shame of the family among Cthughans. She possess the power of fire, able to control fireballs, heat, or drones that fire lasers; she refers to them as space CQC - Cthugha version. Her strength in combat is about the same as Nyaruko. Her combat form is covering her lower body with red fire patterns.

Hastur (ハスター, Hasutā) / Hasuta (ハス太)

Voiced by: Rie Kugimiya

A male Hasturan (alien from Hastur) who was the space elementary school classmate of Nyaruko and Kūko. He is the son of the owner of CCE (parody of Sony Computer Entertainment), a famous video game company in space. He was first sent to get intel of Earth's entertainment from Yoriko, but he failed and decided to stay on Earth, and was later hired as an agent of the Space Defense Agency and colleague to Nyaruko and Kūko. He has feelings for Mahiro and enrolls in Mahiro's school under the name Hasuta Yasaka. He possesses the power of air, fights by creating strong wind, vacuum blades, or forming nearby vacuum areas around enemies. He is known to be stronger than both Nyaruko and Kūko, since he is the one who always stopped their fights during space elementary school. His normal form appears to be obedient and shy, but when switched to power form he will change to a more mature personality and appearance.

Kūne (クー音)

Voiced by: Ryōka Yuzuki

Kūne is a Cthugan and Kūko's cousin (the daughter of Kūko's uncle in HR). Her appearance resembles Kūko's despite being taller and has better body figure. Her personality is described as vulgar by Mahiro. She introduces herself as a member of the Galactic Defense Force tasked with overseeing her cousin's job, while her true intend is to buy otaku-related products. She has feeling toward Kūko, and is also clingy that she treats Kūko similar to how Kūko treats Nyaruko. In order to stop her persuit, Kūko lied to her that she is in live with Mahiro and they are already engaged, which made her very depressed. She looks down on Mahiro as he is not as powerful as aliens, as well as act hostile toward Nyaruko as their races are arch-nemesis. She is also a friend of Luhy Distone.

Shantak-kun (シャンタッ君, Shantakkun)

Voiced by: Tomoko Kaneda (drama CD), Satomi Arai (anime)

Nyaruko's pet. A female shantak (monster in Cthulhu mythos; a bird with a horse's head and a bat's wings). Has many different forms including sizes tall like stories high or small like a dog. Can also turn into different vehicles. According to Nyaruko, the eggs of shantaks are precious and expensive food in space, though Mahiro never accepts to eat them anyway. Nyaruko arrived on Earth by taking a spaceship transformed from Shantak-kun.

Luhy Distone (ルーヒー・ジストーン, Rūhī Jisutōn)

Voiced by: Mariko Kouda

Luhy Distone is a Cthulhi (クトゥルヒ, Kuturuhi), also known as the star-spawn of Cthulhu, who was working in the Cthulhu company, a space company that produces video games and other entertainment that rivals that of CCE. Like Hasuta, she tried to get intel of Earth's entertainment from Yoriko, while preparing to show the new developed video game platform. The video game platform turns out to be a disaster, and is destroyed by Kūko. Luhy then decided to quit Cthulhu and become a vendor selling Takoyaki. She starts to have feeling toward Hasuta in the latter of the story and declared to Mahiro that she will become his opponent.

Atko (アト子, Atoko)

Voiced by: Azusa Kataoka

First appears in the 1st season of the anime. An Atlach-Nachan. Her character design resembles Hatsune Hirasaka from the visual novel Atlach-Nacha; an outfit with a spider motif. (It is named after Clark Ashton Smith's creation Atlach-Nacha, the spider-god from the Cthulhu Mythos.) She has an appearance that is more mature than Nyaruko, Kūko and Hasuta, despite they are all around the same age.

Atko appears in the 10th light novel. Her family owes the largest Textile manufacturing company in space and she is on a trip to earth to do a research on a new material, and decided to stay in Mahiro's house. She was Nyaruko's classmate and friend in high school, and also Kūko's online friend that makes pillow with Nyaruko printing for her. Since high school, she has a bad habit of seducing other girls' boyfriends, as she felt pleasure when doing so, but dumped them once they are separated from their girlfriends. In novel she deliberately hugged Hasuta in front of Luhy to get pleasure from the latter's jealousy. She also states that she will support Nyaruko's pursuit toward Mahiro, and seduce him after they become couple so the guilt of robbing best friend's lover can bring more pleasure to herself. According to her, she can smell the scent of falling in love, and Mahiro has that scent, despite latter's denial. She fights with her own spider silk, web, and poison; according to Nyaruko, she is not as strong as them, but dealing with her attack is troubling.

Ghutatan (グタタン, Gutatan)

Voiced by: Shiori Mikami

Only appears in the 2012 anime, Ghutatan comes to Earth from the planet Ghatanothoa for Mahiro to take care of her as if he were babysitting her. She is kind of childish for an alien, as seen in episode 11 when the Nyarlathotepian trio chases Mahiro for her. She has a butler named Roy Fooger the Lloigor. It was revealed that in episode 12 that Lloigor has been using Mahiro so he can bring all of Earth's adult games into space, as Ghutatan has completed her purpose on Earth. After Lloigor is destroyed, Mahiro and the Nyarlathotepian trio wish Ghutatan goodbye as she departs for Ghatanothoa.

Antagonists

Nodens (ノーデンス, Nōdensu)

Voiced by: Bin Shimada

A space smuggler. He attempted to kidnap Mahiro, planning to use him to star in a Yaoi film. He sends nightgaunts to attack Mahiro while hiring Kūko as a bodyguard. After he was defeated and reveals his true plan, Mahiro orders Nyaruko to "destroy" him. Note that the name "Nodens" include any alien from Nodens, while this space smuggler is one of them.

Nyaruo (ニャル夫)

Voiced by: Takeshi Kusao

Nyaruko's older brother. He has great hatred and jealousy toward Nyaruko since she graduated from one of the best colleges in space as the best of her year, while he dropped out of a third-class college. To seek revenge, he arrived on Earth and killed the gods in Dreamlands. He is defeated by Nyaruko with Shantak-kun in her motorcycle form; in the novel he was run over multiple times in Dreamlands and later taken into custody by the Space Defence Agency; in the anime he is bumped on the leg and sent flying. Nyaruko looks down on him as she calls him a "wild Nyarlathotep" rather than her brother in the story.

Lloigor (ロイガー, Roigā)

Voiced by: Jōji Nakata

Ghutatan's butler who takes the alias of Roy Fogger. He arrived on Earth for Mahiro to look after Ghutatan, but was later revealed that he was the one who hurt Ghutatan so Nyaruko can fight the monsters. It is also revealed that he blocked the communication between Mahiro and Ghutatan, as seen in episode 11 of the 2012 anime. He then turned out to be an evil monster as of the finale. He wanted to bring all of Earth's entertainment, including eroge, but was unsuccessful and was defeated by Nyaruko.

Media

Light novels

Haiyore! Nyaruko-san began as a light novel series written by Manta Aisora with illustrations by Koin. Since April 15, 2009, eleven volumes have been published by Soft Bank Creative under their GA Bunko imprint. Short stories have been published in Soft Bank Creative's GA Magazine.

Anime

See also: List of Haiyore! Nyaruko-san episodes

A Flash original video animation titled Haiyoru! Nyaruani (這いよる!ニャルアニ) was produced by DLE and directed by Azuma Tani. The first episode was streamed on October 23, 2009. Further episodes were published on December 19, 2010 on DVD as part of the GA Magazine Vol. 3. All 9 episodes were released on March 15, 2010 as part of the Haiyore! Nyaruko-san 4: Special Box (這いよれ!ニャル子さん4 スペシャルボックス, ISBN 978-4-7973-5782-0). The first eight episodes are about one to two minutes in length, while the final episode is about six minutes long. Another anime series titled Haiyoru! Nyaruani: Remember My Mr. Lovecraft (這いよる!ニャルアニ リメンバー・マイ・ラブ（クラフト先生）, Hayoru! Nyaruani: Rimenbā Mai Rabu(kurafuto-sensei)), also produced by DLE and directed by Azuma Tani, aired 11 episodes on television between December 10, 2010 and February 25, 2011. Each episode is about four minutes long, whereas the first half with the main content is rendered in Flash and the second half with the ending is regularly animated. The twelfth episode was released as an original video animation included with the Haiyoru! Nyaruani 1&2 Perfect Box, a DVD compilation containing both Flash anime series. An anime television series produced by Xebec aired in Japan between April 9, 2012 and June 25, 2012. Crunchyroll streamed the series outside of Asia, along with the two Flash series, under the name Nyarko-san: Another Crawling Chaos. A DVD containing a short original video animation based on the short story "Easy Way to Kill Enemies" (やさしい敵の仕留め方, Yasashii Teki no Shitome-kata) was offered to those who purchased all the BD/DVD volumes of the first season. A second season called Haiyore! Nyaruko-san W (這いよれ！ニャル子さんW) premiered in Japan on April 8, 2013. It is also being streamed with English subtitles by Crunchyroll.

The ending theme for Haiyoru! Nyaruani is "Suki, Suki, Daisuki." (好き、好き、大好き。, Like, Like, Love.) by Kana Asumi. The ending theme for Haiyoru! Nyaruani: Remember My Mr. Lovecraft is "Koisuru Otome no Catharsis" (恋する乙女のカタルシス, Loving Maiden's Catharsis) by Lisp, a group made up of Asumi, Azusa Kataoka and Sayuri Hara. For the 2012 anime television series, the opening theme is "Taiyō Iwaku Moeyo Chaos" (太陽曰く燃えよカオス, The Sun Says "Burn, Chaos") by Ushiro kara Haiyori-tai G (Asumi, Miyu Matsuki and Yuka Ōtsubo), the ending theme for the first 11 episodes is "Zutto Be With You" (ずっと Be with you, Always Be with you) by RAMM ni Haiyoru Nyaruko-san (Asumi), and the ending theme for the final twelfth episode is "Magamagashiku mo Seinaru kana" (禍々しくも聖なるかな) by Ushiro kara Haiyori-tai (Asumi, Matsuki, and Ōtsubo). The second season features one opening theme, "Koi wa Chaos no Shimobenari" (恋は渾沌の隷也, Love is a Servant of Chaos) by Ushiro kara Haiyori-tai G, and five ending themes, the first four of which are "Yotte S.O.S." (よってS.O.S) by RAMM ni Haiyoru Nyaruko-san, "Wonder Nanda? Kataomoi" (Wonderナンダ？片思い) by RAMM ni Haiyoru Jashin-san (Asumi, Matsuki, and Rie Kugimiya), "Kiraina Wake Lychee" (嫌いなワケLychee) by RAMM ni Haiyoru Tamao-san (Ōtsubo) and "Sister, Friend, Lover" by RAMM ni Haiyoru Kūko-san to Kūne-san (Matsuki and Ryōka Yuzuki). The fifth song's name is yet to be announced.

Manga

A manga adaptation titled Haiyore! Nyaruko-san illustrated by Kei Okazaki began serialization in Shueisha's Miracle Jump magazine on May 6, 2011. A four-panel comic strip manga titled Haiyore! Super Nyaruko-chan Time (這いよれ！スーパーニャル子ちゃんタイム) illustrated by Sōichirō Hoshino began serialization in Flex Comix' Flex Comix Blood on October 5, 2011.

See also

• Call of Cthulhu (role-playing game) - The major source of gags, characters from R'lyeh Antique Replays books also appear in this series.

External links

• Light novel official website (Japanese)
• Flash anime official website (Japanese)
• Anime official website (Japanese)
• Haiyoru! Nyaruani (anime) at Anime News Network's Encyclopedia
• Haiyore! Nyaruko-san (anime) at Anime News Network's Encyclopedia
• Haiyore! Nyaruko-san W (anime) at Anime News Network's Encyclopedia