Mirai

Mirai (Japanese: ミライ Hepburn: Mirai), often referred to by her occupation Park Guide or simply Guide-san, is a recurring human character in the Kemono Friends multimedia franchise. She has appeared in most media of the series to date and is one of the series' most recognizable faces. She is a Park Guide of Japari Park.

Appearance
Mirai's most distinctive features are her mint-colored hair, tied together with a faded pink bow, and her white sun hat, adorned with two feather accessories — one blue, and one red. Mirai's eyes are blue, and she is always seen wearing a pair of rectangular-framed glasses. The lenses of these glasses turn red when their auxiliary functions are in use, such as when Mirai is using them to scan Celliens.

Mirai is usually depicted in Park Guide uniform, comprised of a white khaki jacket and matching cargo shorts, with blue camouflage cuffs (similar in hue to her eyes) on both her sleeves and pant legs and a matching fanny pack. She wears a scarf in this same pattern, and a black undershirt that covers all of the skin from her elbows to her white gloves. Finally, she wears black knee-high socks and navy blue outdoor boots

Personality
Mirai is a cheerful, natural caretaker with a warm personality and an abundance of love for animals and Friends alike. These traits have remained consistent in all media in which she has appeared thus far, and she seems to have no trouble connecting with Friends and humans of all varieties of backgrounds. She is patient and forgiving, demonstrating composure and maturity, although she is not without moments where she becomes flustered or stressed. She is also prone to gushing over cute animals and Friends, and this personality quirk is often played for comedic effect.

As a Park Guide, she is effective and competent, maintaining her cool during the many battles between Friends and Celliens during the original Kemono Friends mobile game. She provides detailed information on Friends and enemies alike, and even under pressure she puts the safety of Japari Park and its denizens above all else.

Backstory
Several years before the beginning of Kemono Friends, a young Mirai met the slightly older Kako at a zoo, and the two girls quickly hit it off, developing a close relationship in the coming years. Although Mirai already had a long-standing love for animals, her new friend and mentor would teach her a great many things about them. It was because of this friendship that Mirai would dream of following in Kako's footsteps to work at Japari Park; at some point before the events of the manga, she would succeed in doing so, as well as becoming a Park Guide.

Kemono Friends: "Welcome to Japari Park!" (Manga)
Mirai has become an established member of Japari Park's staff by the time of the Manga's setting, and serves as the boss of the protagonist, Nana. She appears only sporadically through the story, although it appears her responsibilities include assigning substitutes for absent staff members and directing physical aptitude examinations. During the second volume, she dreams of Japari Park as if it were an all-girls high school, although this segment of the story is merely in her imagination.

Kemono Friends (2015 Mobile Game)
Mirai accompanies the protagonist and their party through the game's adventure, providing all kinds of support to the player. She drives the Japari Bus, provides exposition and explanation of various Friends and in-game concepts, and gives detailed analyses of hostile Celliens using her high-tech glasses. Mirai was the one responsible for bringing the protagonist themselves to Japari Park, apparently at the request of Park's own founder, who believed them to have a special gift.

Note: Contradictory to her appearance in the manga, Mirai is presented as a fairly new Park Guide during the events of the 2015 Kemono Friends game, although it is possible that this was retconned.

Kemono Friends (2017 Anime)
Mirai does not appear physically in the anime's first season; her presence consists of several voice and hologrammatic recordings played back from Lucky, the first of which is played after the latter meets Serval and Kaban for the first time and misidentifies the feather accessory in Kaban's hat as belonging to Mirai.The robot then joins them on their journey to the library as a guide, with Mirai's recordings in tow. These range from narrations of park attractions to detailed research notes to conversations, and serve to provide the characters (and the audience) with snippets of information about the world around them.

The next recording is heard after the protagonists exit the Underground Labyrinth, where she announces the "opening" of the attraction, implying that she was present at the time of the giant maze's completion and public unveiling. It is at this point that Kaban first hears Mirai's voice, due to being asleep when Lucky played the first recording.

Mirai is then absent for the next several episodes until the protagonists reach the hot springs of the Snowy Mountains Area, which suddenly prompts Lucky to play back a lengthy recording. Unlike the two that came prior, this message concerns more urgent matters, as Mirai records her observations on the behavior of Celliens, particularly their penchant for stealing Sandstar. The Park Guide posits that they may be eating it and fears that, if a Friend is eaten by a Cerulean, she will be robbed of the forms and powers granted to her by Sandstar's properties. Mirai expresses her desire to protect them from danger and get to the bottom of this no matter what. At the end of her recording, another voice can be heard asking Mirai if the hot spring where the recording was made is the ocean; this question is strikingly similar to one Serval asked earlier in the episode, mistaking a geyser as the ocean. This is also the point where Serval and Kaban first learn Mirai's name. She appears extensively throughout Kaban and Serval's stay at Lodge Campo, and is mistaken for a "ghost" as Lucky begins to project holograms in her likeness for the first time. This misunderstanding becomes the mystery that forms the episode's focus, as the pair attempt to figure out the identity of the ghost with the help of the other residents of the lodge. More recordings are played as the episode progresses. Early on, Mirai first introduces the lodge (which, notably, is just called "the lodge" rather than the name given to it by Campo Flicker) and expresses that, while it can't be used by guests due to the Cellien outbreak, she and the rest of the staff are trying to deal with the problem so that the building, as well as the rest of the park, can be reopened soon. She remarks that the "Stop" button on Lucky's recording hardware was malfunctioning due to being exposed to rain, before signing off.

The following recording of Mirai's appears to have been made by accident, and Lucky plays it suddenly, scaring Kaban in the middle of the night as she investigates the mysterious monster haunting the lodge. It features a conversation between Mirai and the same unidentified voice heard at the hot spring as the two discuss a potential evacuation of Japari Park. Mirai is decidedly unwilling to go that far, but the other voice assures her that, if she and her friends (presumably the rest of the staff) evacuate, the Friends will be just fine. When Mirai realizes that Lucky had begun recording on its own, she remarks that she'll need to waterproof it later. The other voice apparently notices the robot and asks what it's used for, and Mirai explains that someday, it will be used as a Park Guide. An additional recording is played later into the investigation, with Mirai taking notes on Sandstar as a way to make the most of Lucky's malfunctioning recorder. She notes that Friends are the product of Sandstar coming into contact with living things or their remains, while Celliens are the result of Sandstar contacting inorganic matter. Furthermore, she hypothesizes based on other research that additional types of Sandstar may exist. Her memo ends at that point, and Kaban and Serval continue their investigation.

The following morning, the protagonists meet face to face with the faint hologram of Mirai once again. They are scared into fleeing at first, but upon gathering with the other residents of the lodge, Kaban is able to deduce that she has been triggering the appearance of the "ghost". When she returns to the "crime" scene to confront the hologram, Lucky-san responds by adjusting the focus so that its appearance can be viewed more clearly. A final recording plays, this time featuring a fully animated image of Mirai herself, where the Park Guide reports on the sad state of Japari Park. She describes mighty Celliens possessing regenerative properties that she and her companions have been unable to defeat, and regretfully informs her audience that if they're unable to finish it off within the next week, she'll be forced to evacuate the island. Suddenly, as Mirai is lamenting that she might need to leave Japari Park so soon, a Serval Friend appears in the recording, informing her that Caracal had spotted the big Cellien by the mountain and encourages her to come and join the fight. This Serval is revealed to have been the unidentified voice present in previous memos. Mirai responds hopefully, claiming that if they can just defeat that Cellien, the whole conflict will be resolved. Prior to ending the recording, the two describe how they'll defeat it with a "Pa-KAAAN!", a nod to Mirai's catchphrase from the original mobile game. In Episode 11 - Cellien, a recording is played when Serval and Kaban reach the peak of the mountain in the Restricted Area. Like the previous, it features a full hologram to accompany her voice. Speaking with a grave tone, Mirai notes that the staff's hypothesis that the black Cellien possesses a property which allows it to absorb Sandstar from the mountain has been proven correct. As a result, she explains, the filter needed to be re-affixed using the "Four Gods" to give them the best fighting chance to eliminate it. Mirai also mentions that all of the Friends on the island were safely evacuated, shedding a positive, if bittersweet light on the fate of the Japari Park at the time the message was recorded. Elaborating further on the black Cellien's properties, she explains that it continues to regenerate itself regardless of how much it is attacked, its movements follow the sun and it appears to dislike the ocean. Seeing that Caracal and Serval are ready to evacuate the area, she signs off, but only after delivering a final message: that the Four Gods are buried in the same place as the "valuable thing" she mentioned before. This information would prove invaluable in Kaban and Serval's gambit to defeat the black Celliens. At Kaban's party after the final battle, Raccoon explains that she had found Mirai's hat lying in the Savanna Area and was about to pick it up, but since it was hit directly by Sandstar as a result of the most recent eruption, a human form within it began to take shape and would soon become Kaban herself. Tsuchinoko theorizes that this is because of a reaction with hair inside the hat, which was indeed the case, meaning that Kaban is a human Friend formed by the interaction of Sandstar and a strand of Mirai's hair. This is further confirmed by her final recording, which plays when Kaban and Serval ride the amusement park's Ferris wheel together. In the recording, Mirai states that she "just had to ride [the Ferris wheel] one more time" and that, while she's sad that the park staff ultimately needed to evacuate the island, she's grateful for all the miracles she saw during her time there. Nevertheless, she expresses hope that she'll be back again someday, and bids her farewell to Lucky-san, whom she simply calls "Lucky". She promises it that she'll be back soon, at which point a strong gust of wind blows her signature sun hat off of her head, presumably reaching the Savanna Area at some point after her departure. The Serval Friend calls out to her one last time, and Mirai's final recording ends, leaving Kaban to ponder the world outside of the Kyōshū Region.

Kemono Friends 2
Domestic Dog discovers a drawing made by Kyururu, labeled "Park Friends". While the drawing features Kyururu, Serval, and Caracal, it also features Mirai with two other park employees and Domestic Dog. This indicates that Mirai and Kyururu both knew each other back when Japari Park was still active.

Current Whereabouts
Like all other humans who once inhabited Japari Park, Mirai's current whereabouts are a mystery, and the amount of time that has passed since the staff's evacuation of the Kyōshū Region is as-of-yet unknown.

Kako
Mirai and Kako have known and been friends with each-other from a young age, exhibiting a mentor and pupil relationship of sorts. It has been stated that much of Mirai's motivation to become a Park Guide was because of Kako's influence.

Although Kako herself has yet to comment on the matter (owing to her extremely limited number of appearances in canon), it would appear that Mirai thinks very highly of her, asserting that there is no one else who cares more about Japari Park.

Nana
During the events of the manga, Mirai was Nana’s supervisor and the two were very close, holding a strong bond and respect for one another. Mirai was fond enough of her to go as far as to insist on Nana calling her by her real name, rather than job title. The two worked together very often. It is possible that Mirai saw elements of Kako in her (being the latter's cousin), which could explain why Mirai took a particular shine to her and offered the same help and guidance that Kako did for Mirai. While it is unknown whether their relationship continued after the abrupt shut-down of Japari Park due to the Cellien outbreak, it can be inferred that they stayed in contact due to Nana and the manga’s many references in the direct sequel KF3.

Trivia

 * Mirai's name means "Future" in Japanese, much like how her mentor and dear friend Kako's name means "Past." This may be a reference to Mirai's great importance to the franchise's lore as a whole since her first appearance in the original Nexon Game, being a notable presence even in Season 1 (by which point she is no longer in the park).


 * Mirai is the only character to have canonically used and fired a firearm; she uses a starting pistol in Chapter 3, pages 40-41 and 43-44, in Volume 1 of the Kemono Friends: Welcome to Japari Park! Manga.


 * Mirai and Kaban share the same voice actors in English and Japanese: Aya Uchida and Suzie Yeung, respectively. This is likely a deliberate choice to represent Kaban being created in Mirai's image and essence. In addition, they also both voice Lucky, which is a nod (and foreshadowing) to his and Mirai's strong connection and how she would often speak through him via his recordings.