Character · Bleach
Kenpachi Zaraki
He wears an eyepatch that eats his own power, because winning quickly would waste the fight.
In Otakana the clue reads: Battle-mad captain with bells in his hair
- Type
- Character
- Series
- Bleach
- Letters
- 8 · Normal
Kenpachi is a title before it is a name. It goes to the strongest fighter of a generation, and the man holding it took it the way the rules allow, by killing the previous holder. He had no family name either, so he borrowed Zaraki from the district he grew up in, the eightieth and worst quarter of the Rukongai, where children fight over food and nobody writes anything down.
As captain of the eleventh division he runs a squad that refuses to learn healing or kido, on the grounds that swords are sufficient. The eyepatch is a device made by the Soul Society's research arm that steadily devours his spiritual pressure, and he wears it for the same reason he fights one-handed and lets opponents cut him first. Ending a fight early is the only outcome he considers a loss.
Under the noise there is a small girl on his shoulder. Yachiru rides along, names things badly, and is the one person he handles gently, which Tite Kubo uses to keep a character built entirely out of appetite from flattening into a joke.
Spelling KENPACHI
KENPACHI is the answer, eight letters, and the trap is the N. Older Hepburn romanisation turns N into M before a P, so Kempachi looks correct and appears in plenty of fan writing. The tiles want N. The kanji is 剣八, sword and eight, which is the title rather than a birth name. Family name Zaraki is not what the game is after here.