Zero Kiryu is one of the main characters of Vampire Knight. Born a hunter, he was turned into an ex-human vampire as a child when he was bitten by rouge pureblood Shizuka Hio. Zero fought his vampiric transformation for four years before finally succumbing when he was 17, which is also the age he is at the start of the series. Zero has a large, distinctive tattoo on the left side of his neck and sports multiple silver piercings in both ears.
Current age: 18
Height: 181cm / 5’11″
Hair: Silver / Gray
Eyes: Violet
Vampire Level: Technically either a Level D, but his circumstances and current power level are unique
Weapon: Hand gun – the Bloody Rose
Abilities:
» Enhanced speed, strength, sight, hearing, smell and regeneration.
» The ability to sense other vampires.
» When using the Bloody Rose, he is able to support it’s transformed state which engages a host of deadly thorned vine weapons that also connect to his body and appear to draw blood from him, perhaps as a power source.
Favorite Food: Ramen with salt broth
Hobbies: Eating, sleeping
Favorite Fashion: Whatever (like what Yuki chooses for him)
Taste in women: Cool older women (flat-chested women are out of the question)
Current Primary Residence: An apartment off-campus near Cross Academy
Romantic Interest: Yuki Kuran – although he is currently in denial and attempting to convince himself that he wishes to kill her.
Family: Mother and Father, deceased. Twin brother Ichiru, deceased. Semi-adopted father Kaien Cross, semi-adopted younger sister Yuki Kuran.
Known Friends or Associates: Toga Yagari, Kaito Takamiya, Kaien Cross, Yori Wakaba
Known Enemies: Shizuka Hio, Kaname Kuran, vampires in general and purebloods in particular
School Attended: Cross Academy
Class Affiliation: Day Class
Current Student Status: Attending, in his final year
Grades: Prodigiously good
Good At: Cooking, horseback riding, marksmanship
Japanese Anime Voice Actor: Mamoru Miyano
English Anime Voice Actor: Vic Mignogna
A gifted hunter, intelligent, athletic and good-hearted, Zero nevertheless has a difficult time thinking of himself or any vampire as anything but a monster. He struggles both with his desires for blood and lately, his equally strong desire to kill vampires. Because of all this, Zero can be very closed and sometimes difficult to understand or be close to, especially since he has a habit of not expressing his true feelings and hiding them behind a “tsundere” personality. He has a lot of attitude, is not at all impressed or easily controlled by higher class vampires and caries a positively burning hatred of all purebloods. He often acts as if he doesn’t care about anything in order to hide all the scars and hurts inside him that have nowhere to go. When not about his duties or in class, he can frequently be found in the Cross Academy stables with the fiery horse, Lily, with whom he seems to share a special affinity. He is also quite a good cook.
All character histories reflect the manga-verse history rather than the anime-verse history on any points where the two conflict. Please note that they also contain major spoilers for current manga events.
Born into a hunter family as the elder of a set of identical twins, Zero began demonstrating strong hunter skills and abilities since early childhood. It is unusual hunters to have twins. Because of their altered physiology, one of the twin embryos will usually devour the other within the womb before they are born, absorbing their twin’s power and life and producing some of the strongest hunters. Zero did not fully absorb his twin brother, Ichiru, but Ichiru was born weak and sickly and did not present Zero’s level of hunter ability, nor even enough hunter ability for his training to be considered worthwhile as time went on.
Zero loved and was fiercely devoted to his more frail brother, often taking a caretaker roll with him when they were together, but he did not realize the extent to which the differences between them and Ichiru’s growing feelings of isolation and frustration were hurting and beginning to change his twin.
Zero and Ichiru were both apprenticed to Toga Yagari and spent their childhood under his tutelage. At times they trained with an older hunter boy named Kaito Takamiya. Zero was a very kind-hearted, friendly boy and Ichiru wondered once if his brother would really be able to be a hunter who had to kill.
Zero held no animosity towards vampires at this time. To the contrary, he tried to protect an ex-human woman at his school from his teacher, Yagari, who had come to execute her. Zero knew her to be a good person, but he did not at that time understand the extent to which the fall into Level E madness could change anyone. The woman attacked and in protecting Zero, Yagari lost his right eye.
By the time Zero and Ichiru were beginning to enter their teen years, it had become obvious that Ichiru was not going to be able to keep up with the training any longer. Unbeknownst to Zero but overheard by Ichiru, the decision was made that Zero would continue alone.
It was around this same time that Zero and Ichiru first saw Shizuka Hio. Zero knew immediately that she was a vampire, although Ichiru couldn’t tell. Zero wouldn’t know until later that Ichiru would meet with Shizuka many more times after that in secret until the fateful night that would change all their lives.
On one of their missions, Zero’s parents had executed Shizuka Hio’s ex-human lover. He was not a Level E, but had been targeted because of his association with her, although the Kiryus didn’t know that. In revenge, Shizuka killed Zero’s parents and bit Zero, turning him into a vampire and effectively destroying the world he had always known. Ichiru was complicit in these actions and left with Shizuka afterwards.
That night changed everything for Zero and he developed a deep hatred for vampires, especially for purebloods like the woman who had murdered his family and taken his humanity. Kaien Cross took in the freshly orphaned Zero, raising him alongside his adopted daughter Yuki.
Zero gradually became close to Yuki despite his hurting, angry, withdrawn state. One thing he could not understand, however, was her affection towards Kaname Kuran and he did not like it when the pureblood would come to visit. The first time Kaname came over after Zero was living with Cross, no one apparently thought to warn him of what their visitor was and he reacted badly to the pureblood’s unexpected presence, snatching a knife off the table and attempting to attack the vampire.
Zero received the tattoo on his neck both in an effort to help retard his growing vampire nature and as a means of making him what the hunters consider a “tamed” vampire. If you have the appropriate counter-charm, such as the one that was in Yuki’s bracelet, tamed vampires can be stopped / controlled through the mark. That part of the tattoo’s properties were apparently not explained to Zero until some years later, however. Tamed vampires are also able to enter secure hunter areas inaccessible to normal vampires.
Zero gets very good grades and is considered one of the smartest students in the Day Class, but because attending High School at Cross Academy meant daily proximity to the Night Class vampires, he initially refused to attend, resulting in him being kept back a year. He finally consented to attend when Yuki began attending, resulting in he and Yuki being in the same class despite the age difference between them. At school, the fact that Zero was a vampire was initially known only to Headmaster Cross and Kaname Kuran. Yuki and the rest of the Night Class were unaware of Zero’s being an ex-human until his blood lust began to kick in full force during his 17th year.
Zero proved unable take blood tablets, suffering the bad reaction to them that sometimes happens with ex-humans. Only able to drink real blood, for a time Zero ended up drinking regularly from Yuki, at her insistence. His loathing of his need for blood combined with the fact that blood drinking is a very sensual act and that he was secretly in love with Yuki made the situation very complicated. Zero also drinks from Kaname once, which temporarily halts his decent towards Level E madness.
Shizuka Hio and Ichiru Kiryu cross paths with Zero again when Shizuka goes to Cross Academy in the body of Maria Kurenai. Later, in her own shape she bites Zero again and attempts to control. She is initially successful but Zero resists and shoots himself in the leg with the Bloody Rose, damaging the vampire side of him and allowing him to break free of her control. He shoots Shizuka several times before she gets away before being ended by Kaname. Zero finds her dying in Ichiru’s arms and everyone assumes he is to blame for her death.
Zero is later sentenced to death by the Vampire Council of Elders for having harmed a pureblood, but Kaname and the Night Class, under his direction, interfere and the matter is dropped.
Zero supports Yuki’s desire to get back her missing memories and find out about her past, but when she eventually does regain them and returns to her Pureblood state after being awakened by Kaname’s bite, Zero severs their friendship. He cannot accept that she has been a pureblood all along and feels betrayed.
He is imprisoned as a “dangerous vampire” on orders from the hunter’s association shortly before Rido awakens in his own body. His twin brother Ichiru sustains fatal wounds after attacking the re-awakened Rido and goes to Zero’s cell where he shoots Zero with the Bloody Rose and then convinces Zero to take the rest of his blood and his life in order to survive and to get stronger by rejoining the twins’ power, as had not fully happened in the womb. Ichiru (although human) had drunk Shizuka’s blood to make him stronger, and so through him Zero now also receives her blood and his vampiric state is stabilized.
The Bloody Rose now changes in Zero’s hands, able to generate large tangles of ferocious, thorny vines which appear to be able to cause a lot of damage to vampires. The vines connect to Zero and appear to “drink” his blood and draw power from him.
With this new weapon, Zero defeats Rido along with Yuki. Afterwards Zero says he intends to kill all purebloods, including Yuki. He points his gun at her but does not take any immediate action. Kaname gets between them and the two boys face off briefly. Zero takes off one of Kaname’s hands with his vines and the weapon appears to recognize Kaname’s blood. Yuki prevents the fight from going any further. The Bloody Rose seems reluctant to let go of Zero, but Yuki helps him disarm, alarmed when she realizes the weapon is feeding on him.
Zero acknowledges how he has always felt about Yuki, although still avowing that he will hunt her. Yuki says that she will keep running from him then, so he always has a reason to live and they part ways.
At the insistence of Cross and Yagari, Zero remains in school so he can graduate, although he is now also fulfilling the role of a full-fledged hunter. Because of this he is allowed to live off-campus in a private apartment rather than in the dorms. He becomes able to take blood tablets now that he has been stabilized, but his hunger continues to torment him and the only way he can keep it under control is by killing vampires. Zero has become very strong, since he has now received the blood of three purebloods and reabsorbed his twin. Because hunters prize strength, he is being groomed by Cross and Yagari for potentially becoming the Hunter Association president someday, despite dissent from some who aren’t sure about having a vampire in that role – including Zero himself.