Character list for Mousou Telepathy
open/close all folders
Ayako Nakano
Our heroine. Ever since she was a child, she has had the ability to read the minds of the people around her, which causes her no end of grief. Moreover, she seems to be the only person in the setting to have such an ability, isolating her further. Her current problem is her classmate Toda, who can't seem to get her out of his head.
- Ambiguously Bi: Given the eventual reveal that her telepathic powers are caused by Psychological Projection, rather than straight up reading the thoughts as they are, it certainly calls into question precisely why her imagination is just as lewd and vivid when someone is thinking of her with Mana as it is was Toda.
- Blessed with Suck: You would think having telepathy is a great power, but it often gets in the way of everything and sometimes overwhelms her if she's in a large crowd. Hearing everyone's true thoughts only makes her frustrated and even upset if they concern her...and we can't forget the embarrassment she feels from Toda's thoughts on her, though this vivid...imagery...that embarrassed her is actually from her own imagination, not Toda's.
- Covert Pervert: Realizes she's one when it's revealed that her powers only let her hear thoughts, not see them; all the images she gets with her power come completely from her own imagination.
- Cute Glasses Girl: The only one of the main cast.
- Facial Dialogue: Due to not having any friends she's never learnt to govern her facial expressions. She is very expressive, and has a tough time hiding her response to what other people are thinking, making her come off as strange to those around her. Ironically, this also makes it just as easy for other characters to also tell what she's thinking.
- Friendless Background: Due to her telepathic powers she had a lot of difficulty making friends, with Mana being her first one.
- Heroic BSoD: She has a big one in volume 5, where she realizes that her telepathy is only partly correct. She begins to have a huge existential crisis about the issue, coming to the conclusion that she made everything, including the world, up.
- I Am Not Pretty: Nakano refuses to really see herself as any sort of proper cute or pretty even though all that visualization of Toda's perverted mindset was really her own delusions, thus imagining herself sexier the entire time. It's also not helped by her rather plain taste in clothes to probably de-emphasize herself, to the point that if she's not in school uniform, someone's probably commenting on her lame fashion sense. Moments in-series subtly emphasize that if she actually was less self-loathing and more outgoing, she would likely be downright beautiful if given the opportunity.
- Kindhearted Cat Lover: Cares for a stray cat she found on the sidewalk, although she can't exactly keep it in her house.
- Psychological Projection: An interesting telepathic version of the trope. The thoughts are all there, but all of the images and scenarios that Nakano sees are her own to fill in the gaps. Meaning, for example, Nakano projects her own expectations and fantasies of sensual or sexy imagine spots onto others unknowingly.
- Shy Blue-Haired Girl: In real life, she was not very talkative or social before the plot kicked off, and still isn't to some extent. Part of it is due to her ability.
- Telepathy: The main source of conflict for her. Hearing everyone's thoughts before she can even talk to them allows her to pick up on the mood, but it also makes her more wary of them and she usually doesn't get to use it to her advantage. It also makes large crowds or busy trains to be hellishly overwhelming for her.
Hayato Toda
Nakano's stoic classmate, and one of the most attractive boys in her school. Handsome, good at sports, and a natural born leader, Toda gets all sorts of attention from both girls and boys alike. However, he only has one thing on his mind: Nakano, and he's very good at hiding it...from everyone except her.
- The Ace: The best soccer player in his high school, and considered the diamond in the rough along with Shimizu by the coach of one of the region's best soccer teams.
- Big Man on Campus: Toda is one, due to his handsome looks, athletics, intelligence, and cool demeanor. Nakano often tells herself that she'd be attracted to him as well, if only she didn't know what he was like on the inside. Though as it turns out she doesn't know him as well as she thinks she does.
- Chivalrous Pervert: There's a million things that he would like to do with Nakano, and often has wild and sexy fantasies about her. However, he's nothing short of helpful to her in life and keeps his distance. Downplayed later on however, as it turns out Nakano was projecting some of it.
- Crazy Jealous Guy: Downplayed - he actually doesn't truly display this to everyone else, but in his mind's eye, he's almost pathetically jealous at other people managing to associate with Nakano or depressed from not being able to go with her as he'd like. However, it's only his overactive thoughts that he'd never actually do.
- First Love: The subject of Mana's, although it goes unfulfilled.
- Frozen Face: As repeatedly mentioned, his face is permanently expressionless. His family has a history of a certain condition that makes them unable to emote.
- Girl on Girl Is Hot: He once imagined what it'd be like if he was a girl so he could approach Nakano more easily. Yep, you better believe it quickly turns into imagining his female self getting intimate with her. Though it turns out that this image may be Nayako's fault anyway.
- Hormone-Addled Teenager: He has his wants and needs as well, and especially gets bothered about Nakano. He just can't express it like other kids.
- Not So Stoic: Inverted. We start off with Nakano having to hear his variety of sexual fantasies of her and then later hear about just how stoic he seems to everyone else despite this. Turns out he practically has a Frozen Face.
- Oh, Crap!: In the epilogue special, he finally finds out about Nakano's powers. He then backtracks through all the perverted thoughts he's ever had about her and is quite embarrassed. Although it's not too serious since they're already a couple by that point.
- Redheads Are Ravishing: Toda is the Big Man on Campus and considered one of the best looking guys in school. Even Nakano eventually realizes that she's in love with him towards the end of the story.
- Single-Target Sexuality: Toda is only attracted to Nakano by the present day. When other men wonder what's happening on the girls' side in the hot spring, he's the only one who specifically imagines her. When Toda tries imagining himself paired with Mana, he finds himself not attracted to her at all. However, he did date another girl (she asked him) before ever being attracted to Nakano - but she broke it off with him because his impenetrable expression gave her the impression that he was constantly bored while with her.
- The Stoic: Though surprisingly, not by choice or personality; extras revealed that his face is stuck like that permanently. This even cost him his first girlfriend, who thought he was constantly bored while even with her. His inner self is much more expressive, but only his friends and Nakano can understand that.
- Strong Family Resemblance: His mother, sister, and cousin all share the same facial features and lack of expression, and his immediate family is all red haired.
Mana Azuma
Toda's childhood friend. She's social, loyal, and perceptive, but initially hostile to Nakano because she perceived her as a threat to her relationship with Toda. Her clinginess to him made her an object of scorn in class.
- A-Cup Angst: She's a little miffed about her cup size, especially when she compares herself to the busty Nakano.
- Birds of a Feather: She eventually ends up in a steady relationship with Sano, who is just as blunt, well meaning, and in the same social sphere as her.
- Bitch in Sheep's Clothing: While on the surface she's amiable and social, on the inside she hides some nasty and blunt thoughts. The twist here is that the whole class already knew, and they treat her like she's a big faker.
- Childhood Friend Romance: Of the "Unlucky" variety. They still remain friends, though.
- Cleaning Up Romantic Loose Ends: Eventually gets into a relationship with Sano.
- Clingy Jealous Girl: Starts out like this in an effort to protect Toda from being hurt romantically and because she likes him herself, and she was especially wary of Nakano. Deconstructed - since everyone already knew of Mana's crush, they think that any attempt to socialize or join in activities is a result of Toda.
- Embarrassing Nickname: An extra implies that, due to her wearing her hair in twin drills, she's been called "croissants" before. She of course, hate this. This ends up being used for a gag where Akira seeing Mana eat croissants and causes his headspace to think of this as cannibalism, which causes Nakano to do a Spit Take from reading his mind.
- Expository Hairstyle Change: After her initial arc, Mana stopped wearing her hair in twin drills and keeps her hair straightened.
- Friendless Background: Pretty much every other girl in class found Mana extremely annoying, due to her fake cutesy attitude and obvious clinginess to Toda, so she had absolutely no female friends until she starts to develop a bond with Nanako. It's because of this that she wants to remain friends with Nanako at all costs, regardless of what other feelings may come between them.
- The Gadfly: Mana becomes this to Sano, much to his frustration.
- Lady Looks Like a Dude: The extra comics revealed that she looked very boyish as a child, and she ended up befriending Toda when he initially mistook her for a boy.
- Oh, Crap!: After Mana is upset that Toda rejected her romantically and Nakano later tells Mana that she has telepathy, Mana gets up having a horrified realization about the nasty things she's thought about Nakano and profusely apologizes about them. Nakano for her part, is just too tired at this point in the night to even hear it.
- Secret-Keeper: Mana is the only friend from school that knows about Nakano's telepathy. Not even Toda knows about it once they hook up—Mana has to tell them about it first.
- Took a Level in Kindness: Her thoughts become less abrasive over the course of the story, and she did make strides to talk to others outside of her friends circle.
- Unrequited Love: In love with Toda for years, but he just can't see her that way, even after she confesses to him. She eventually gets over this.
Akira Yashira
A childhood friend of Toda's, and his classmate. Generally a friendly, laid-back fellow.
- Advertised Extra: He is emotionally divorced from most of the series' drama and barely appears in a meaningful context, but he is considered a main character and gets color illustrations.
- Cloudcuckoolander: He's a bit aloof like Toda, but can at least show expression - and loves to mess with others or do things his own way in a rather quirky fashion. It says a lot that his idea of a perfect dream involves a talking eagle declaring he's won a year's worth of eggplants for winning a Mt. Fuji biking competition.
- Official Couple: Has a girlfriend in college.
Kiyoshi Shimizu
An underclassman of Nakano and the gang, in his first year. Honest to a fault, with his inner and outer actions matching up most of the time. Attends soccer club with Toda as a goalie.
- Better as Friends: He eventually settles for being friends with Nakano at the end of his subplot with her. He's still in love with her, but it's not his main priority anymore.
- Brutal Honesty: Given the lack of filter, he tends to say what's on his mind a lot and unintentionally weird people out. He means no harm by it though, and they know as well.
- Color-Coded Characters: Purple.
- Demoted to Extra: While he did have some importance when he was first introduced (the strip titles even updated to include his character color among the others), he lost relevance after he realized his feelings for Nakano weren't going anywhere, and only makes occasional appearances afterwards.
- Foil: To Toda. Where Toda can't physically express himself in real life and comes of as cold, Shimizu has no filter between his brain and his mouth and comes off as pushy.
- Gentle Giant: Shimizu, goalie of the soccer team, is large enough to bump into most doors, and is a landmark for people in a crowd. But he's a downright kind and cheerful fellow who doesn't hesitate to help, and fell in love with Nakano because of her accepting to help a stray cat caught in the rain.
- Irony: He's introduced cooing at a stray cat caught in the rain and wishing he could help it - which he absolutely can't because he and his entire family are allergic to cats.
- Maybe Ever After: With Eto, a girl in his grade. Eto is in love with him and makes that fact known to him, but Shimizu at the time still nursed a crush on Nakano. The story concluded without them resolving either plot point, and while he does make mention of getting Valentine's chocolate from "his girlfriend", he is the only main character not explicitly paired up in the epilogue.
- Meaningful Echo: Toda once remembered about how he thought of Nakano as a goddess. Sometime after that, Shimizu appears and calls Nakano a goddess after being amazed at how she'd said she'd care for a stray cat in his stead...so yep, Shimizu also has a crush on Nakano as well. Nakano basically even saw this coming when it happened, remembering with some fear that Toda thought of her similarly so.
- Oblivious Guilt Slinging: His internal sadness and concern for the stray cat that he can't help causes Nakano to feel guilty about it and declare that she'll help it for a time, and his gushing about her kindness in doing it further causes her guilt since she only did it because hearing his thoughts unintentionally guilt-tripped her into doing it.
- Romantic Runner-Up: Although he is initially more straightforward about his affection for Nakano and is the only other guy in the series to harbor feelings for her, they ultimately do not feel the same way about each other, especially given Nakano likes Toda.
- Third Wheel: While he's not often around Nakano and Toda, he still sometimes imposes himself when it comes to their relationship and comes to think of himself like this near the end of the story.
- Unrequited Love: With Nakano.
