Kinji Hakari

Kinji Hakari is a character in the Jujutsu Kaisen series. He is a third-year student at Tokyo Jujutsu High who is currently suspended for clashing with authority. While away from the school, Kinji is running the Gachinko Fight Club, a venue for hand-to-hand combat between sorcerers for money.

Appearance
Kinji is a tall young man with tan skin and a muscular build. He has small magenta-colored eyes with thin slitted eyebrows and a thin mustache made of stubble. While at Jujutsu High, Hakari had black hair styled into short twisted locks with a fade below his brow line. His hair is currently dyed light purple and in the shape of a puffy, tapered afro that slicks back toward the rear of his head.

As the boss of Gachinko Fight Club, Kinji dressed the part of a bookie. He sported a white tank-top beneath his dark fur coat along with gray pants and light-colored boots. After agreeing to combat the Culling Game, Hakari sports a Jujutsu High uniform jacket with the same jeans and boots. Unlike Yuji Itadori's hooded jacket, Kinji's uniform's hood is entirely connected and the same color as the rest of his jacket.

Personality
Kinji is a very self-absorbed type of person who cares little for the rules and regulations of Jujutsu High. Yuta Okkotsu describes him as moody and apparently, all the other students that are around Kinji's age think of him as a good-for-nothing.

Kinji is an individual who enjoys watching people get lost in their passions. He describes this as people's "fever" burning hot. Kinji is clever and pours his own fever into manipulating others. He believes people are desperate to change their lives and an easy way of directing their fever is through gambling. He doesn't believe there is a single person that exists without the fever and his goal is to manipulate all of Japan's fever with his fight club.

According to Kirara Hoshi, Kinji's fever burns hottest when he's working as a sorcerer for jujutsu high. However, Kinji's attitude and modern cursed technique don't mesh well with the higher-ups. He was suspended for assaulting a conservative member and decided to act outside their regulations. Kinji is willing to take advantage of the chaos caused by the public reveal of curses to advance his fight club. Eventually, his goal is to get his club recognized by jujutsu officials for the coming changes in their regulations.

Kinji is only willing to put his life on the line with another sorcerer if they show him a proper fever. Initially, upon encountering Yuji, Kinji felt that the first-year's fever was weak because Yuji was sent to him on the recommendation of others. Yuji explained that he's just a cog in the system of jujutsu sorcerers, which Kinji thought was boring. However, Yuji proved he's a cog in fever, burning hot enough to gain Kinji's attention. Kinji agreed to cut a deal with Yuji and his allies simply because he believes the fever never lies.

Despite his brash disposition, Kinji is very grateful for those who took care of him. He was fairly distraught learning that Masamichi Yaga died and Satoru Gojo was sealed, claiming he hadn't been so bummed since his friend Yakul got shot in the butt with an arrow. Yuji, Megumi, and Panda found this comment strange and they assumed Kinji must live a relatively calm life.

Kinji agreed to help Megumi and his allies but clarified that this isn't a personal favor, but a deal between both parties. Panda asked what exactly Kinji wanted and "sea-urchin head" (Megumi) somewhat answered for him, annoying Hakari. He felt bad for Yaga and Gojo, but Hakari was even more surprised to learn Megumi was head of the Zenin clan. Almost instantly, Hakari was nicer to Megumi and asked him to be best buds in order to gain a close ally within the Big Three Families.

Kinji comes off as very selfish and rude, but he has a kind heart who respects other people's passions. Upon meeting Charles Bernard, a potential enemy, Hakari was willing to hear him out over the stress caused by the Culling Game. He put on a tough act and claimed to have felt weird about joining another guy on a ferris wheel and only did so to scout out the amusement park for a potential place to take a girl. Hakari was confident that Japan will return to normal while Charles believed his dreams could never be achieved under the circumstances. Charles needed to take out his rage and Hakari recognized that, so he provoked Charles by insulting his passion. After their fight, Hakari made sure to check up on Charles and even asked to read his manga. Hakari asked if Charles felt better after finding an avenue for his stress through fighting and encouraged him to keep pursuing his dreams once the Culling Game ended.

Fearsome Womb Arc
Maki mentions to Megumi and Nobara that the third year student has been suspended and can't participate in the Kyoto Goodwill Event.

Gojo mentions Hakari as one of his students that can rival him in the future.

Perfect Preparation Arc
Analysis of the culling game is done and Maki instructs Megumi, alongside Yuji, to rendezvous with Hakari as earlier planned between them.

Abilities and Powers
Overall Skill Level: Hakari is widely recognized as one of the most powerful students at Tokyo Jujutsu High. Satoru Gojo, the undisputed strongest sorcerer in the world, believes that Hakari and Yuta Okkotsu will have the potential to rival his power one day. As Yuji stated, all of his senpai have stated that Hakari is exceptionally strong. Yuta even believes Hakari is the stronger of the two of them when he's worked up.

Kinji is not only an elite close-quarters combatant who possesses serrated cursed energy but an extraordinary jujutsu specialist armed with a dynamic domain. He distinguished himself in the Culling Game by defeating Hajime Kashimo, not only one of the strongest players in the death game, but one of the most powerful sorcerers Kenjaku ever encountered in one thousand years.

Kinji's domain is unique and his luck is reliable, making for a combination capable of opposing any threat. Charles Bernard could see briefly into Kinji's future but he was instantly bested as soon as Kinji hit the jackpot of his domain. Kashimo nearly killed Kinji on several exchanges but he was able to repeatedly open his domain and successfully hit the jackpot to enter his unkillable mode. Kinji's strategic thinking and expert battle sense are ultimately what complemented his techniques best and allowed him to achieve victory against Kashimo.

Master Hand-to-Hand-Combatant: Kinji is an exceptionally capable hand-to-hand combatant, able to apply life-threatening pressure to Yuji, a very proficient taijutsu specialist. Yuji stopped resisting in order to win Kinji's approval and ended up suffering several blows that dealt serious damage to the first year.

While his fighting style is very direct, Kinji isn't just a brawler. He's a skillful martial artist with a wide range of physical attacks in his arsenal. He uses combinations of punches, kicks, knees, and elbows among other grappling moves and strikes to take out his opponent with maximum force.

Kinji's pure hand-to-hand combat skills were enough to put pressure on Charles even while the latter could see into his future. He was so confident in his abilities that Kinji began their fight with his hands in his pockets while only defending himself with kicks. Charles acknowledged that not for his cursed technique, Kinji would've defeated him right away with physical prowess alone.

The full extent of Kinji's close combat prowess was on display against Kashimo, who had even more superior taijutsu technique. While Kinji's base state couldn't challenge Kashimo's mastery of martial arts}, his close combat abilities shine the most when he's amped up by his jackpot's domain. Fueled with limitless cursed energy, Kinji's taijutsu skills were on full display, enabling him to overpower Kashimo in several exchanges. Up against cursed spirits, Kinji effortlessly tore a swarm of them apart with his bare hands.

High Tactical Intellect: Kinji doesn't present himself as a fighter with a plan because he's fearless and straightforward. That being said, Kinji is an experienced sorcerer with a high strategic battle sense and a knack for reading his opponents. Upon learning about Charles' ability to see the future, Kinji immediately attacked to confirm how it works and then quickly came up with the countermeasure. He knew Charles needed to see his target to use this ability and decided to attack Charles's blindspots with relentless pressure. Kinji also predicted that Charles would counter by attacking his own blindspots and acted accordingly by parrying his attempts. Even inside his domain, Kinji knew Charles still had a slight advantage and kept the pressure on to prevent him from focusing on the future.

While he is a relatively cerebral fighter, Kinji tends to recklessly abandon tactics when he's in his unkillable mode. He allowed himself to be hit by Kashimo during a surge of cursed energy because the assault barely hurt his reinforced body. Despite the lack of caution, Kinji's recklessness does often work in his favor. Immediately after his arm was dismembered by Kashimo's lightning, Kinki continued his own offense because he knew the unkillable mode would regenerate his arm. This took Kashimo off guard and allowed Kinji to retake the momentum of their duel. Kinji's unkillable mode comes is rooted in a fully automatic reverse cursed technique but he doesn't overly rely on the involuntary healing factor and knows how to best make use of it. When Kashimo attempted to destroy his head in one shot, Kinji voluntarily ejected his opponent's cursed energy while allowing his reverse cursed technique to heal him while he breaks.

After being hit by Kashimo's electric discharge twice, Kinji figured out there must be a trick to the attack and assumed his opponent couldn't launch it again. Acting on this assumption, Kinji decided to recklessly go full force on his offense and attempted to defeat Kashimo within the eight seconds before his unkillable state ceased. This backfired because Kashimo developed a loophole for his attack that Kinji was unaware of, nearly costing the latter his life. However, on the verge of death, Kinji was able to remain focused and did the only thing he could in order to survive, using all of his strength to bank on expanding his domain, a gamble that ultimately paid off.

As Kinji's fight with Kashimo began to draw out, he switched his approach from a straight-on brawl to a more tactical one. He shifted his domain over the ocean before the barrier dispelled and dropped Kashimo into it, correctly assuming that the water would forcibly draw out his electrified cursed energy. While fighting in the ocean, Kinji carefully considered his options of either returning to the surface or using his last five seconds of immortality to finish the fight. Kinji's recklessly decided to try to finish Kashimo off, only to end up on the receiving end of a steam explosion. He survived thanks to quick and clever thinking, using a last-second binding vow to sacrifice his left arm so the rest of him would be unharmed. Kinji knew Kashimo grabbed onto his arm before initiating the explosion in case he survived, which would've made Kinji unable to make the hand signs to cast his domain again. With this information, Kinji wisely decided to sacrifice his arm entirely and used the cursed energy reinforcing it to protect the rest of his body. As displayed at the end of their battle, Kinji's cleverness and forward thinking are what allowed him to best Kashimo in the end.

Immense Luck: While Kinji is an extremely gifted sorcerer, more so than any of his skills, he's extraordinarily lucky. He's as fortunate as he is talented and can comfortably rely on this to win fights. Kinji's domain is based on drawing a jackpot with only a 1/239 chance of doing so, yet he claims to have never needed to spin more than thirty times. It only took him two spins to hit the jackpot against Charles and he hit it twice in a row on the first try against Kashimo. The second time, Kinji was mere moments from death and needed an immediate jackpot in order to heal himself. His good fortune pulled through and even Kashimo was forced to admit that Kinji truly has incredible luck.

Trivia

 * Hakari ranked 54th place in the manga's 1st Character Popularity Poll with 101 votes.
 * According to Jujutsu Kaisen Official Fanbook:
 * He is a gambler.
 * He was present for the Night Parade of a Hundred Demons in Kyoto. (An event that took place during the Jujutsu Kaisen 0: Jujutsu High prequel series.) He had a disagreement with a conservative member of the jujutsu higher ups and beat them up. Kinji was suspended as a result.
 * Hakari's outfit as a bookie is directly inspired by the one worn by Tyler Durden in the movie, Fight Club.