Kuon Kotonami

Kuon Kotonami (琴南 久音, Kotonami Kuon) is one of the three main protagonists of Durarara!! SH. He is Nozomi Kotonami's younger brother and the founder of Snake Hands. Like Aoba, he is akin to a younger version of Izaya Orihara.

Appearance
Kuon has dyed green hair with black roots. He wears a pink button-up shirt with his tie undone and blazer open. He styles his hair back, causing it to stick up, and wears several earrings in each ear.

Background
Kuon and his sister, Nozomi, were orphaned at a young age. Their foster family abused them terribly and they were often denied basic necessities such as adequate food and clothing. At some point, the two catch the attention of Izaya Orihara and he ruins the abusive family, teaching the siblings how to survive on their own. After Nozomi suffers a breakdown after Izaya leaves, he decides to become the new Izaya.

Serial Kidnapping Arc
While hanging out with Aoba and another Blue Squares member Yoshikiri, Kuon is introduced to Mairu and Kururi. Mairu is impressed by his eye-catching appearance and quickly reaches the conclusion that he must be a twisted person since he hangs out with Aoba. However, Aoba is quick to explain Kuon is simply eccentric and that he is a major source of income for the Blue Squares—he helps by making money off the Headless Rider’s existence.

A few days later, Kuon’s interest is piqued when he hears Yahiro’s self-introduction and after school, approaches him at the gates. Kuon invites him to go and search for the Headless Rider but Yahiro is reluctant, so he instead takes him to Rakuei Gym where they meet Mairu and Akane. Conversation soon turns to the disappearance of Izaya, causing Kuon to openly insinuate it has something to do with his connection to the Headless Rider. But Akane insists Celty is innocent and when Kuon presses her for more information, they find out that Akane’s senior, Ai Tatsugami, who was a massive fan of the Headless Rider, has gone missing. Both Kuon and Yahiro immediately realize this person may be in some way to related to their classmate Himeka Tatsugami. Later that night, Kuon divulges the day’s events to an unknown caller, who tells him Horada has been released from jail.

The next day, Kuon approaches Yahiro while he is speaking with Himeka. He is surprised to learn not only had Himeka’s younger sister Ai disappeared, but her older sister Aya, too. On top of this, on the day the two disappeared, they claimed to be going to interview the Headless Rider's lover.

Later, they head out to find more information on the Headless Rider. However Kuon soon finds himself on the receiving end of Shizuo’s rage after deliberately badmouthing Celty. Even when he is approached by an enraged Shizuo, Kuon only ends up provoking and enraging him further. It is not long before Kuon is violently flung through the air. Only when Yahiro picks a fight with Shizuo does the attack on Kuon end.

The next day Kuon delivers the news to Yahiro and Himeka that the Headless Rider has returned to Ikebukuro.

Some time later, Kuon, Himeka and Yahiro are approached by Aoba, who inquires about Yahiro’s injuries. Kuon helps Yahiro lie about getting the injuries by falling and after Aoba leaves, Kuon warns Yahiro and Himeka to stay away from him.

After school, the three meet up in front of Tokyo Hands in order to discuss their plan of action, but it is not long before they are approached by Celty, who is keen to clear her name. A short time later, a biker gang arrive onto the scene and Kuon recognizes them as Dragon Zombie. When the gang’s leader, Li-pei Ei, starts a fight with Yahiro in order to test him, Celty manages to stop it while Kuon attempts to calm Yahiro down. In the meantime Horada, who had identified Kuon by his green hair thanks to the footage of Yahiro and Shizuo's fight, observes the trio from a distance.

After Li-pei offers to help with the investigation into the disappearances in return for a future favour from Celty and Yahiro, Kuon takes this opportunity to ask for Celty’s contact details and get a photo taken with her, asking if it is okay to put it on his blog. Afterwards, Kuon heads home claiming he has errands to run. Later, a blog entry including the photo is posted online and removed shortly afterwards, leaving people to speculate about another potential disappearance.

Kuon does not turn up to school the next day, leaving Himeka and Yahiro wonder if it is something to do with the Headless Rider. Though they find out from a group of girls that the photo of Kuon and Celty was on the news. After school they head to Kuon's home after Aoba gives them his home address.

They find out from Kuon’s sister, Nozomi, that the blog entry never existed and it was all a charade courtesy of her website IkeNEW. She also mentions that while she does not know if Kuon safe, she seems confident that he has his own plans and confirms he got himself kidnapped on purpose.

Meanwhile, Kuon is dropped off by three men into a basement, where Shiki is already being held. He calls for Ai and Aya, but is violently silenced by one of his captors with a kick to the stomach. After spending half a day being held in the basement, Himeka is the next to be dropped off by their captors. It soon transpires that both Kuon and Himeka know that Aya is the true culprit, and the supposed kidnappings were in fact Celty fanatics who had gone into hiding to create the illusion of a serial kidnapping. Some time later, thanks to Shiki, they manage to escape while Yahiro, Celty and Aoba head to their location.

After Yahiro and Celty work together to suppress the cultists, Kuon speaks to Nozomi on the phone, where she tells him how worried Yahiro seemed to be for him despite knowing Kuon thought of him as nothing but a pawn. In spite of this, Kuon expresses his hatred for humans.

Slugger Arc
In the aftermath of the kidnappings, Kuon creates an organization named “Snake Hands”, which offers services such as exacting revenge, finding missing persons and taking on bodyguard duties. With this, Kuon and Yahiro meet Erika and Walker to discuss Snake Hands’ first case—an investigation into the Slugger, a serial attacker who has been bludgeoning unsuspecting victims while dressed up as a character named Dark Owl from a series named "Owl of the Peeping Dead". After their meeting, Kuon becomes agitated when Yahiro does not seem angry about being used by him or for revealing his identity. After Yahiro admits he does not have the ability to tell if a person is good or bad, Kuon is left wishing Yahiro was a villain like Izaya, because it would make it easier to use him.

As Yahiro sets out to investigate the Slugger, Kuon plans his next moves alone. Nozomi soon calls him and during their conversation, Kuon thinks back on the encounter he had a year ago with Namie Yagiri, who he had met in order to find out more about Izaya. After the call, Kuon resolves to do things even Izaya would not. That evening, he sends a text to Celty to let her know they would be capturing the Slugger that night, and asks her to meet him outside his apartment.

With Celty’s help, Kuon manages to apprehend the Slugger, a man named Ajimura, making sure to record the whole thing. He had managed to find out his true identity thanks to Nozomi, who noticed Ajimura had posted on some of her "Owl of the Peeping Dead" related sites. After calling Erika to let her know he has apprehended the Slugger, he is shocked to hear from her that Yahiro is fighting with another Slugger as they speak. It is not long before he receives a call from Himeka who lets him know about the commotion online—there are many reports of Dark Owls appearing all over the city.

That night, Kuon despairs over the fact nothing went according to plan. He is particularly ruffled about the appearance of all the Dark Owls, thinking it to be something orchestrated by the Underrars. He also regrets not making more use of the Slugger. However, his thoughts are soon interrupted by Yahiro, who reveals the extra Dark Owls were actually members of the Blue Squares, who simply wanted to make a fool out of Kuon. It soon turns out Kuon knew the identity of the original Slugger even before Erika and Walker commissioned Snake Hands, all thanks to Nozomi. He began to influence who Ajimura would attack next by posting about them online. It was ultimately a test to see if he could be like Izaya.

However, his plans had gone awry thanks to the copycat Sluggers, who had also managed to influence Ajimura’s actions. From then he decided to simply observe, but his plans went even further off the rails when Ajimura went on to attack Tom instead of Shizuo, since Kuon was counting on Shizuo’s counterattack to ultimately end the assaults. It was only when he concluded it was impossible to control Ajimura that he asked for Celty’s help.

Unfazed by what he has been told, Yahiro tells him to become someone greater than Izaya to save his sister, and Kuon seems to take it to heart. He then asks Yahiro to punch him. Yahiro does so and ends up knocking him unconscious.

The next day, Kuon approaches Shizuo and Tom, telling them that he was the one who got Ajimura to attack Tom. He again finds himself on the receiving end of Shizuo’s rage after divulging the entire story, however it is Tom who punches him before Shizuo gets a chance to. Kuon ultimately believed this was the only way to take responsibility for involving Tom, who was only an innocent bystander.

Etymology

 * The name Kuon means "long time" (久) (ku) and "sound" (音) (on).
 * Kuon's surname Kotonami means "Japanese harp" (琴) (koto) and "south" (南) (nami).

Trivia

 * Kuon was originally chosen to represent the first-years in the opening ceremony for Raira as he scored the highest in the entrance exam. However, due to his changing his appearance they had to select another student.
 * Kuon is one of three characters attempting to become like Izaya. The other two are Himari and Haruto.