Persona 5 Shimeji

[Shari Alvine]

WARNING: Every SINGLE one of these character pages are a Walking Spoiler by default, making it impossible to talk about them without revealing major plot spoilers. You Have Been Warned. These are the most spoilery characters of the manga that even talking about who they are will ruin a reader's experience.

"I finally found you. So you did this. You're the one who's been making a mess of the town."A mysterious and rather complex entity with a rather unknown motive. She is the member of an unknown race known as The Gardeners, a mysterious race, hence her nickname as such.

• Anti-Hero: Her imposed restrictions of the simulation, while seen as means to keep her idealistic utopia in check, is not without the questionable decisions she makes, including the lack of deaths that happens in West Yomogi. She even becomes an antagonistic threat towards Big Sis in Chapter 30, warning her that it is just a "warning shot" and any interference is not tolerated.
• Berserk Button: Everything that does not align rationally well in West Yomogi would be enough to put her into a hammy and sometimes vitriolic fit. On a more serious note, however, when Sis was dead-set in ruining West Yomogi, The Gardener exhibits a more murderous personality when her creation was in danger, almost to the point of initiating a huge battle between her and Sis.
• Beware the Silly Ones: The Gardener may be a comedic goddess with a Large Ham personality, but she can go into a Rage Breaking Point whenever her creations are harmed.
• Crazy-Prepared: After the destruction of the original West Yomogi from Sis, Chapter 34 reveals that she created yet another copy of the town, albeit miniaturised, which is hidden from anyone else.
• Gold and White Are Divine: A partial subversion. While The Gardener is a deity who is cladded in white dress, as well as having a white hair, there is nothing gold around her.
• Hero Antagonist: While her views of natural order within the simulation borders to antagonistic approaches like attacking Big Sis for her attempts of dismantling it, she only does it to prevent any damages to the simulation. Not that her actions started a red flag in the first place.
• The Idealist: An extreme, very Deconstructed case. While the Gardener idealises her world as a Utopia, being free of deaths, she's actually keeping it under her watchful eyes with restrictions, to the point that Sis has become well-aware of it. While the Gardener is a God who represents order, by all means, the Gardener's form of idealism are questionable and heavy-handed.
• Idealist vs. Pragmatist: Of the Idealist scale. Not only she created the town of West Yomogi, but she also made it sure that no one dies under her watch. This kind of rule-bending alone unfortunately did not go well, when her plans were put under the radar of Big Sis, who seeks to end it all.
• I'm a Doctor, Not a Placeholder: In one instance, she hates being mistakenly compared to a police officer.Shijima: Are you an officer?The Gardener: Do I look like one?
• It's Personal: Being the fact that she has finally known all too well about Sis' plans to alter West Yomogi, when she later finds out in Chapter 30, it later culminates into an almost destructive stand-off.
• Knight of Cerebus: Her first appearance is mostly downplayed, since she was seen as a comic relief character. That changes in Chapter 30, where she suddenly attacks Big Sis, showing that she has known her true intentions of the town from the beginning, leading to a near-destructive stand-off and with Sis completing her goal of destroying the town's illusion. Her actions set off the Wham Episode, as the manga becomes slightly darker and less comedic, though there's still some shades of comedy seen.
• Large Ham: Her rather bizarre sense of overseeing order within the town tends to border into this.
• The Maker: She is the true creator of West Yomogi, or at the very least she's the one who oversees it.
• Mind over Matter: She has the power of psychokinesis, which she exhibits it when she throws various vehicles towards Sis.
• Mystical White Hair: Her long, white hair is befitting for her status as the mysterious deity of Shijima's world.
• Nobody Can Die: Played Straight. Being the creator of West Yomogi, that would mean that anyone under The Gardener's watch would never be killed through any means, including accidents. Judging from the dialogue Sis mentioned regarding her doing it from years prior to it, it's assumed that she's been doing it for years.
• Only Known By Her Nickname: Her so-called "name", "The Gardener", is a nickname.
• Out-of-Character Moment: The Gardener has some hammy moments as the deity of West Yomogi, and would point out any bizarre inconsistencies as "a mess". During Chapter 30, she breaks character and goes into Serious Business mode. She turns from a comic relief goddess into a murderous maniac when Big Sis initiated her own plans to alter the town.
• Pint-Sized Powerhouse: Her height is comparable to a fourth-grader student but she is a powerful deity with psychokinetic powers, who is able to square on against Big Sis.
• Prongs of Poseidon: A bident variant, where she is always seen equipping a bident with her.
• Really 700 Years Old: Being a deity, she is possibly much older than anyone else, in spite of her rather childlike appearance.
• The Reveal: Not only The Gardener is later revealed to be the one overseeing West Yomogi, but there are no reported deaths under her watch, when later deduced by Big Sis in Chapter 30. This is also revealed that West Yomogi was a simulated creation by the Gardener.
• Token Mini-Moe: She is the smallest of the cast, and the only one who looks like a child. Inverted, when she is the oldest of the cast, as well.
• Utopia Justifies the Means: Plucking the meaning of death in her own world, so that nobody will be dead from all forms of accidents and life-threatening situations under her watch. Though her rather extreme actions of committing to it put her on Sis' radar, who priorly warned that everything she does to West Yomogi is simply a "calculation" and a "Papier-mch".
• Walking Spoiler: Her appearance in West Yomogi suggests more to her motivations than just a simple bystander.
• The Watcher:
• She is the overseer of West Yomogi. Her intentions are rather mysterious for the first few chapters, until it reached within the manga's Wham Episode, Chapter 30, when Sis knew about her motives.
• Chapter 34 has this, when Shijima and Majime later arrive at another city that is miniaturized in nature. Turns out that she has created another copy of West Yomogi, except in the middle of nowhere and is in charge of watching it, presumably to protect it against Reality Warpers like Sis.
• What Happened to the Mouse?: The Gardener is largely absent after the events of Chapter 40, despite being a major character. The only last appearance she makes is reduced to a cameo in Chapter 48.

Where did we see them before?Shijima's neighbours who live in the same Danchi (apartment) complex as Shijima and her sister.

• Ascended Extra: The blonde-haired girl started off as a cameo in Chapter 7 and the black-haired girl and a Nuko-esque cat appeared as cameos in Chapter 14. They later become recurring characters after the latter chapter.
• Contrasting Replacement Character: Despite being Expies to Chito and Yuuri, they are the opposite replacements to both of them from Girls' Last Tour and they bear opposite traits to their predecessors, which Foreshadows their true nature as them not being the same to Chito and Yuuri that Shijima encountered in Chapter 48.
• In general, unlike Chito and Yuuri who are dressed in their military clothing in their entire appearance as well as living in an empty world, the neighbours are dressed in a more casual clothing and are obviously living in a more populated environment.
• The black-haired neighbour is this to Chito. While Chito is a stone-faced, level-headed stoic who is a quiet girl, the black-haired neighbour is neither of those.
• The blonde-haired neighbour is this to Yuuri. Despite both being similar in personality, their main difference is their appearance. Unlike Yuuri where she flows her hair freely, the blonde-haired neighbour often wears her hair in a ponytail.
• Expy: Of Chito, Yuuri and Nuko from Girls' Last Tour, which happens to be made by the same author. They also have the same appearance, as well. Averted as they are not the same as the ones that Shijima saw in the Afterlife Express, who are more so closely resembling to both Chito and Yuuri from tkmiz's previous work, as their simulation counterparts embody a vastly different characterisation.
• Everyone Calls Him "Barkeep": They are both referred to as "neighbours" by Shijima as they don't have names.
• Tomato Surprise: It is revealed in Chapter 48 that the "neighbours" that Shijima saw in the train are not the same when they do not know about her at all. The Plot Twist is that they are not the same as the neighbours, but they are Chito and Yuuri as souls inside the train.
• Walking Spoiler: It is hard to talk about them without revealing the fact that they are not the same, both in character and in appearance, to Chito and Yuuri that Shijima met inside the train, as their consciousnesses from their previous lives after Girls' Last Tour's final chapter have been uploaded into the simulation.HintBoth were Shijima's neighbours who all know about the danchis and with memories of them being their next-door neigbours; Chito and Yuuri from the train, contrastingly, do not have any memories of Shijima and with them being one to her in the danchis due to them being completely different to the neighbours, which is already a spoilery detail. The train Yuuri's signature hairstyle from GLT is also a dead giveaway as it contrasts to the blonde-haired neighbour who sports a vastly different hairstyle often tied up in ponytail.

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