Minori

"You're right. It isn't... a problem. It just hurts. That's all&mdash;I haven't lost anything, and nothing's bad, and I haven't done anything. ...That's right. I haven't managed to do one single thing yet."

- Minori, Volume 5, Chapter 2

Minori is a Human Kannagi-Apprentice and among those trapped in the MMORPG Elder Tale.

She and her twin brother, Touya, were associates of Shiroe before the Catastrophe but ended up in the malicious guild Hamelin in the chaos afterwards. Because of their situation, Shiroe gains the motivation to change the situation in Akiba and take down Hamelin. Afterwards, both she and Touya join Log Horizon.

She was a member of the Shibuya Raid Team and the leader of the Akiba Guild Hall Raid Party.

In the real world, her name is Minori Housaki (鵬咲実里) and her birthday is on September 18.

Appearance
Minori is a cute young girl with short brown hair which she pulls into a one-sided pony tail. She usually wears a red and white traditional Japanese Miko costume or a red kimono-like robe when sleeping.

Personality
Minori is the elder twin (having been born just shortly before her brother). She is polite and well-mannered, and tends to look after her more impetuous brother.

Both siblings are in their second year of middle school, although as a result of Touya's disability, both are much more mature than regular middle schoolers. Shiroe notes in the light novel that they are quite young compared to most players, since the recommended age for playing Elder Tale is 15.

She harbors feelings for Shiroe and tries to get others to see more of his good points rather than his "Villain in Glasses" persona (although some of these attempts have the opposite effect). Despite being aware that she is rivaling Akatsuki for Shiroe's affections, she realizes that being jealous towards Akatsuki would bring about nothing.

Synopsis
When Minori and Touya first began playing Elder Tale, their early quests were a disaster. He would rush immediately at monsters and she would follow at his heels, but their levels were too low to succeed with this strategy alone.

Shiroe encountered them on their first day of playing, when they had only reached level six. He used the Elder Tales' "Teacher System," which allows high-level players to play with low-level players by dropping their level and stats to match those of the lower-level players. The system reduced his level to roughly one or two higher than the twins, an ideal level to act as their mentor. At the request of the twins, he accompanied them through the beginner level areas around Akiba. However, they were somehow separated during the Catastrophe despite having been questing together right beforehand.

The Catastrophe arc
Like other Elder Tale players, Minori and Touya discovered that they were trapped in the MMORPG. The two decided to explore the area and were approached by a group of shady players, who enticed them to join their guild by saying it was a guild that helped beginners. Ultimately, these shady players, members of the guild Hamelin, used Touya in its battle formations but kept Minori "hostage" at the guild house.

Summer Training arc
After Hamelin's disbandment, Minori decided to join Log Horizon along with Touya. She began training under the supervision of Shiroe after that, and started to develop a crude version of Full Control Encounter which allowed her to use 5% as a unit to observe allies' MP and forecast battles 10 seconds ahead.

Minori went along with the other new players to the Summer Training Camp held by the Round Table Alliance.

On the first day of the camp, she teamed up with Touya, Isuzu, Serara, and Rundelhaus Code. She attempted to establish a formation, but gave up when Rundelhaus and Touya became too fired up to pay any attention to her. When Touya attracted some Skeletons, she tried blocking their damage but timed it incorrectly, summoning a barrier after Touya had already sustained damage. Although Rundelhaus managed to defeat the other skeletons in the vicinity with his Orb of Lava and Isuzu's Harmony Carol, Touya immediately spotted more Skeletons and rushed after them before the group was prepared, causing him to take too much damage before Serara could heal him. When Rundelhaus attempted to help by diminishing the number of enemies going after Touya, he accidentally attracted all the monsters to himself, forcing the entire group to flee as the battle fell apart.

Four days after the initial failure, the group still hadn't improved their position, much to Rundelhaus' annoyance. Although he initially blamed the support players for the group's trouble, Touya called him out for it, so Rundelhaus instead bemoaned the fact that they were struggling against lower-leveled monsters. Minori could only watch in silence, too insecure to pull the group together.

Libra Festival arc
Training under Shiroe, whom she respected as her mentor and teacher, led her to discover that she had romantic feelings for him as well during the Libra Festival. She tried to suppress her feelings, but to no avail; when she confessed her predicament to Touya, he told her he had known about her feelings for Shiroe for a while, even before she realized them herself. Touya helped her realize that only thing she could do was to be true to herself.

Route 43 arc
Three months after The Gold of the Kunie, Minori has taken a part-time job with Calasin, who asked Shiroe if she could transfer to his guild (only for Isaac to start calling Calasin a lolicon for it). On the kids' side, they prepare to depart for Dazaneg's Magic Bag. Minori wanted to decorate the side of their caravan, but is physically restrained from doing so because of how bad her art skills are.

Along the way, they encounter Roe2, who has almost no knowledge about how this world works or about things like flavors and sauces. She saved them from monsters with her powerful summons, and decides to travel with them when they called her “onee-san”. She herself was setting off to change the bothersome Vampire subclass that her “onii-san” gave her. The scrubs notice that she resembles Shiroe, but don’t really question why. At Earthling villages, the scrubs (sans Rudy) would perform for them.

Before they get to the town of Saphir, they meet the Odysseia Knights and Dariella, a traveling Earthling writer. The Odysseia Knights possess a portable shrine, so if they die in battle they’ll simply revive at this shrine. It’s rather ominous. The scrubs decide to go along with the Knights for a bit when they arrive at Saphir.

When occurs the Wyverns' invasion, both the scrubs and the Knights go into action. However, as the battle turns south, the Knights reveal their mentality: they sacrificed not only themselves, but the Earthlings too. To them, Earthlings were still NPCs that didn’t have a history or emotions. The Knights recklessly kill themselves over and over, slaying Wyverns and each other in pandemonium. The Scrubs are horrified by this, but Roe2 only remarks how humans have such inefficient social structures that defied logic. She says that the Knights were willing to sacrifice “Empathium” for the Genius. As Touya, Serara, Isuzu, and Rudy charge into battle, Minori asks Roe2 who she really is.

Roe2 notes how ugly the fight is, and how chaotic and purposeless the battle was. She asks some heavy, serious questions to Minori, who responds that while she couldn't really respond satisfactorily, she was Shiroe’s apprentice, Roe2’s their onee-san, and they’re all in this together. Roe2 looks surprised, and for a moment looks like “someone Minori loves”.

Roe2 give a long explanation beyond Minori comprehension and mentions that the Alvs practically destroyed themselves with their desire for results rather than the means. She also mentioned that she is the first Traveler to side with the Adventurers, because she won’t forsake her little brothers and sisters who were her first friends in this world. Then, she summons a Sword Princess that nobody had ever seen before and enters battle with Minori.

After the battle, the kids decide to leave the day after. Rudy understood that some Earthlings would blame the Adventurers for what happened and for not protecting everyone, and didn’t want his friends to be hurt by those words. They bid farewell to both Roe2 and Dariella; Roe2 hands Minori a letter and asks a favor of her before leaving with a "See ya."

Noosphere arc
Like the other members of Log Horizon, Minori participates as a member of the Shibuya Raid Team.

Nightingale's Song arc
(Volume 13 spoilers) Along with the rest of the Log Horizon kids, Minori stumbles upon Lelia and Litka, bringing them back to the guild after rescuing them. After discovering about the threat of the Genius of Disappointment, Eirenus, Shiroe teaches her how to lead a raid in case it ever falls upon her to lead one. This proves to be a good decision when many of the higher-leveled players find themselves almost paralyzed by Eirenus' ability, which forcefully lowered those whose levels were above 65 all the way down to level 35, in a battle against level 65 monsters.

Minori is entrusted with leading the Akiba Guild Hall Raid Party, and they manage to clear the raid after some difficulty. Some days after the events occur, she confesses to Shiroe after giving her raid report, but is turned down.

Log Horizon: West Wind Brigade
Touya and Minori are first encountered by Isami when Hamelin first tries to recruit them. She thinks that the Hamelin men are bullying the children and tries to intervene. Magus, however, persuades her that Hamelin was only trying to help the kids, and succeeds in diverting Isami's suspicion and in recruiting the two kids into their guild.

However, soon afterwards, Magus uses Minori as a hostage when he encounters the West Wind Brigade again. Although Soujiro tries to rescue Minori, he is forced to stand down when Touya is revealed as another hostage.

Log Horizon: New Adventure Land
Minori, along with Touya, is a Rare recruitable character in the game. While she and Touya are the only members of Log Horizon to be Rare (the others are all Super Rare), they are also automatically added to your character roster along with TsugaruMUSIC♪.

Trivia

 * In the first popularity poll, Minori came in 4th place out of around 40 characters. In the second, she fell 3 places to 7th out of 86 characters.
 * This is her and Touya's first MMORPG, which they persuaded their parents to allow them to play to allow Touya to have some more normal interaction with others.
 * Her nickname, The Sorcerer's Apprentice, may be a reference to the poem, in which the titular apprentice is not well-trained enough to control a situation he started, and has to get rescued by the sorcerer. In a similar sense, Minori, Shiroe's apprentice, tries manipulating the situation like he does: both during the defense of Choushi and when trying to salvage Shiroe's reputation in Akiba. Both times, it goes awry; the first time, they take on stronger enemies than they expected, so Shiroe forms a contract with Rundelhaus to save him. The second time, Shiroe's reputation only worsens when Minori doesn't realize that going with both Shiroe and Akatsuki would worsen his reputation.
 * In the original kanji used for her Purple Cloud Fragment, 紫雲 [shi'un], refers to the cloud Amida Buddha rides to welcome the spirits of the dead.