Tamaki Amajiki

Tamaki Amajiki (天喰 環) is a third-year student at U.A. High and is part of The Big Three.

Appearance
Tamaki has dark, messy hair and pointy ears, and is often seen slouching. He wears the standard school uniform of U.A., but in a slovenly way.

His hero costume consists of a dark body armor with shoulder guards and a carrier vest over it. He wears a mask over his eyes, a removable mouth mask, and a cape with a hood.

Personality
Tamaki has a weak mentality. He gets anxious when speaking to a large audience, and will face away and lean into a wall if he is unable to keep going.

He seems to be rather socially awkward, as well as lack much confidence in his own abilities and has low self-esteem. It is said that while his physical abilities are above a professional Heroes level, and that his Quirk is extremely powerful, his mentality holds him back. He seems to also be rather sensitive, even to the point of becoming upset when a thug he is fighting insults him. He also seeks for confirmation when he had done a task, such as incapacitating a thug, indicating that he cannot recognize his own achievements. Tamaki also has some sort of victim complex, as he mistook praise from Fatgum as being taunted.

However, he is not without his more stern beliefs which he will uphold and vocalize. He highly dislikes the way the the Eight Expendables are perfectly willing to throw their lives away for someone who does not seem to care for them whatsoever, and is able to note the camaraderie between the three members he has fought. He has also shown a great deal of friendship with Mirio himself, understanding the struggles that he has gone through to make his Quirk as effective as it is. He admires Mirio for his persistence, and remembers his courage whenever he himself is in a stressful or dangerous situation.

History
Tamaki transferred to his new school during the spring, his first day as a third grader. Tamaki could not give a proper self-introduction and after the opening ceremony where they moved into the classrooms and formed groups, Tamaki was not able to insert himself into any group because he lacked the courage. Due to considering himself a boring person, Tamaki was not able to make any friends. Suddenly, Mirio Togata approached him after realizing that Tamaki was trying to say that he likes Heroes; it was this recognition that began the friendship between Tamaki and Mirio.

In middle school during a Quirk Education class, Tamaki tried manifesting something but only managed to manifest a tiny plant on his hand due to his nervousness. Meanwhile, Mirio tried phasing through a wall but only managed to phase his hands through it. Some of Mirio's classmates laughed at Mirio's struggles, but Mirio was not disheartened at all and resolved to pull off his phasing properly next time. While walking home, Tamaki praised Mirio's optimism while lamenting his own lack of self-esteem. Mirio cheered up Tamaki and said that he will shine brightly like the sun and the reason he can give it his all is due to Tamaki being there for him. Although he was nervous, Mirio praised Tamaki's resolve to never give up which inspired him to do the same. Despite Tamaki low opinion of himself, Mirio always thought of Tamaki as a talented person who is cool and super fun and sunny to be around with.

After middle school, Tamaki and Mirio entered U.A. High and they, along with Nejire Hado, eventually worked their way to the top, becoming The Big Three of U.A.

Synopsis
Tamaki is first introduced, along with Mirio Togata and Hadou Nejire as The Big Three who want to explain Class 1-A about the hero internships.

Shota asks them to introduce themselves, starting with Tamaki. Tamaki, however, is overcome with anxiety and struggles to imagine Class 1-A as potatoes. Eventually he gives up trying and turns around. As Mirio challenges the whole Class 1-A, Tamaki warns Mirio to hold back as to not completely frustrate his enemies when they lose.

As Class 1-A marvels at Mirio's quirk, Tamaki thinks to himself how inexperienced they are for not recognizing all the hard work Mirio needed to refine and master his quirk. Hadou points out to Tamaki that Mirio has gotten very strong, only for Tamaki to reply that he has been strong since he was a child but that he needs to learn to go easy on amatuers. After the battle, Class 1-A is frustrated because they didn't know how to fight his quirk. Hadou wants to explain how his quirk works but Tamaki tells her that it's Mirio's time to speak.

Quirk and Abilities
Manifest: Using his body, he can manifest the characteristics of the things he eats. He can make multiple transformations at once. This Quirk is not limited to merely animals or plants but also materialistic objects, like Hojo's crystal, so Tamaki can manifest the characteristics of anything he eats as long as he can consume it. However, this Quirk appears to have its limits as he has to eat the power he wants to use everyday. The proficiency of his abilities depend on how much he eats, an example is his octopus fingers that appear more powerful the more takoyaki he eats. He is also able to combine his manifestations. It also appears that any damage or removal of his manifestations have no permanent damage towards his actual body.

Over the course of two and a half years spent at U.A., he trained his Quirk to his absolute limit. The training allowed him for size variation, concurrent manifestations, feature selection, and mixed conflagration. Additionally, he is even able to use his Quirk with objects that are not typically food items, such as crystals. This training paid off in making his Quirk and himself incredibly powerful.


 * Chimera Kraken (キメラ・クラーケン): Tamaki's arms change into a pair of four incredibly large tentacles which he uses to thrash in a large area, hitting multiple opponents.

Overall Abilities: As a member U.A.'s Big Three, Tamaki is incredibly powerful. According to Fatgum, Tamaki's ability alone can outclass most pro Heroes. His strength is proven when he alone fought and defeated three villains whose Quirks and teamwork put him at a disadvantage. He has displayed mastery over his Quirk, being able to use its versatile applications to its fullest in tandem with his actions.

Tactical Intellect: Tamaki demonstrates incredible tactical judgments during fights. He acted quickly to disarm three villains at once in order to tip the favor to the heroes. When he was overwhelmed by three of the Eight Precept's Expendables, he managed to counter all three of their Quirks and used their advantage against them in order to win.

Mirio Togata
Tamaki has known Mirio since childhood when they first met in the third grade, saying Mirio and him had been friends ever since, and are on a first name basis with each other, indicating a level of closeness.

He was surprised at the sight of Mirio's sadden state after learning of Eri's situation, and Mirio showing visible concern after learning about the injury Tamaki received, asking very swiftly if he was okay.

Tamaki admires Mirio. He praised the techniques Mirio achieved from the hardships he went through. He told Kirishima he shines like the sun similarly to Mirio, something Tamaki himself feels a lack of confidence to achieve.

Mirio also admires Tamaki to some unknown degree, as seen in a flashback, Mirio commented he was able to give it his all because of his presence. This reciprocating admiration and his own admiration for Mirio's personality is a strong motivation for Tamaki to gather his assurance and courage to fight.

Nejire Hado
While they are not on a first name basis, the two have known each other during their time at U.A, and thus appear to be somewhat close. Nejire showed no visible sign of worry when discovering Tamaki had been injured in comparison to Mirio, the reason for this is unknown.

Fatgum
Fatgum scouted Tamaki to work for his office. Fatgum sees a lot of promise in Tamaki but constantly teases and demands Tamaki to make some change to his cruddy mentality.

Tamaki does not like Fatgum's teasing, claiming Fatgum only scouted him to torment him in what Tamaki calls 'workplace harassment'.

Since Fatgum is shown to be a man who eats a lot, this seems to complement with the requirements of Tamaki's Quirk.

Eijiro Kirishima
Tamaki is initially somewhat annoyed by Eijiro's optimism, but at the same time compliments him for it, and later compared him to Mirio. Eijiro has a lot of respect for Tamaki, due to him being his senior.

Trivia

 * His name contains the kanji for heaven (天), eating (喰), and ring/hoop (環).
 * According to Horikoshi, Tamaki's anxiety is inspired from his own experience when he attended the Jump Festa in 2017 and had to face an enormous crowd.
 * Tamaki's favorite things are butterflies.