Cygnus Hyoga

Infobox animanga character
name = Cygnus Hyoga
series = Saint Seiya


caption = Cygnus Hyoga with new's cloth as seen in a screenshot of anime
first = manga: chapter 4, vol.1 (shadowed), chapter 5, vol.2 (fully)
Anime: ep.1 (briefly)
Anime: ep.3 (fully)
creator = Masami Kurumada
voiced by = Hashimoto Kōichi
Satou Chie- as a child
Hiroaki Miura
age = 14cite book |title= Saint Seiya, Volume 13|year=2006|last= Kurumada |first= Masami |publisher= Viz Media |page=179|isbn= 1-4215-0236-4 ]
born = January 23
nationality = Russia
class = Athena Cygnus Bronze Saint
paux4 = East Siberia
paux4 name = Training

nihongo|Cygnus Hyoga|白鳥星座の氷河|Kigunasu no Hyōga|"Hyōga" meaning "glacier" is a main character in the manga series "Saint Seiya", authored by renowned manga-ka, Masami Kurumada, and later adapted to anime. Hyoga is cold and calm by nature, which complements his abilities as a saint. He was the third of the five main protagonists to be introduced.

In Japan, Hyoga is a popular character ranking at 2nd in the main character polls of the bronze saints ["Saint Seiya" Volume 3, Argentinian Edition, Japanese characters poll] .

Creation and conception

Character outline

The Saint of Cygnus

One of the main characters in the series, Hyoga appears calm, collected, and unemotional. Beneath the surface, however, he is passionate and devoted to his ideals. As a Saint born under the Cygnus constellation, Hyoga is able to control and manipulate ice and snow as he pleases, as he mastered the basis of the technique of the Saints of ice, stop the atoms of matter by the power of their Cosmo.

Power and abilities

By increasing his cosmos, Hyoga can freeze objects and people. In his fight against his master, Gold Saint Aquarius Camus, Hyoga awoke the 7th sense and used absolute zero air, being able even to freeze the Gold Cloths, surpassing his teacher. In the Hades Arc, Hyoga was able to use a variation of the Freezing Coffin of his teacher but it was not named.

The Cygnus Saint's favorite technique is nihongo|Diamond Dust|ダイヤモンドダスト|daiyamondo dasuto, a windy attack that blasts ice and snow at the opponent in a single, concentrated point. Hyoga has used this technique for other purposes, like creating a mirror that reflects certain attacks or performing this attack in the legs of the opponent.

Before learning Aurora Execution his most powerful technique is nihongo|Holodnyj Smerč|ホーロドニースメルチ|Hōrodonī sumeruchi|Cyrillic: холодный смерч, meaning "ice tornado"; renamed "Aurora Thunder Attack" in the anime. It is the a technique that captures his Cosmo into a single tornado, of which is unleashed via an uppercut. It is a move that, is in essence, a more powerful variation of "Diamond Dust." The "Aurora Thunder Attack" clasps both of Hyoga's hands together as he expels snow and ice at the opponent.

Hyoga learns nihongo|Aurora Execution|オーロラエクスキューション|ōrora ekusukyūshon directly from battling his master, Gold Saint Camus of the Aquarius. "Aurora Execution" is a Gold Saint level technique that enables the user to have control over absolute zero, a point where everything becomes frozen. "Aurora Execution" is similar to "Aurora Thunder Attack" in execution.

A minor technique Hyouga possesses is nihongo|Kol'tso|カリツォー|karitsō|Cyrillic:КОЛЬЦО, meaning "ring" in Russian, with which he creates an ice ring that surrounds and paralyzes the opponent.

Constellation and the Bronze Cloth of Cygnus

The Cygnus Cloth represents the constellation Cygnus, which is associated to various swans from greek mythology, included Zeus, disguised as a swan to seduce Leda, and Orpheus, that was transformed into a swan after his murder.The Cygnus constellation is also known as the Northern Cross, and it's the reason why Kurumada made Hyoga always carry a cross and rosary with him.While it is not as durable as the shield found on the Dragon Cloth, nor does it contain regenerative abilities like the Phoenix Cloth, the Cygnus Cloth is nevertheless revered as a premiere Bronze Cloth. Being that it had been encased in a frozen iceberg years prior, it naturally absorbed the Arctic properties of its surroundings. Thus, it is quite the feat for one to completely shatter it. Phoenix Ikki comments that it also had a "frost armor" effect, when he fought Hyoga and smashed a hole on Hyoga's chest guard, he felt his right wrist freeze.

The Bronze Cloth of Cygnus constantly evolves to expand its durability and power. In both the manga and the anime, it changes shape a total of three times:

*When it is revived with the blood of Gold Saint Milo of the Scorpio Constellation.
*When the fresh blood of Athena regenerates an otherwise unrepairable Cloth.
*When Hyoga is able to heighten his cosmos to evolve the shattered Cygnus Cloth to God Cloth level in the fight against Hypnos, the god of Sleep.

The Gold Cloth of Aquarius

After the war against Sanctuary had passed, Hyoga obtained the privilege to wear his master's Aquarius Gold Cloth during times of extreme crisis. He, along with Pegasus Seiya and Dragon Shiryu, don Gold Cloths in the final confrontation against Poseidon. Later in the Hades arc, Hyoga dons the Aquarius Gold Cloth once more when the five Bronze Saints battle Thanatos, the god of Death.

Notable people and events

The Bronze Saints

In the manga, Hyoga originally did not choose to participate in the Graude Foundation's Galaxian Wars until he received an order from Sanctuary to assassinate the other bronze saints. He originally accepted this due to his hatred for the Graude Foundation, being aware that Mitsumasa Kido was his father. As he became more familiar with his subjects, however, Hyoga grew indecisive about his mission. Once Silver saints began to target him along with the other bronze saints, however, he dropped his allegiance to Sanctuary. His rage towards Sanctuary boiled after his master Camus made an unexpected visit to Siberia to sent his mother's ship deep into the ocean's abyss.

Since the saints are only Mitsumasa Kido's protegés in the anime, this sub-plot isn't there; Hyoga competes with the same motivation as the other bronze saints -- to win the Gold Cloth of Sagittarius, although during the Sanctuary arc Camus "does" sink Hyoga's mother's ship as he did in the manga.

When the series began, Hyoga was depicted as cold and calculating, and he was often seen keeping distance from the other saints. During the battle with Phoenix Ikki, his tender side was revealed, and he slowly began to display his true personality. In the Sanctuary arc, Hyoga became extremely close to Andromeda Shun after his comrade displayed an act of selflessness in attempt to revive his cosmos from death, constantly referring to how he owed Shun his life. In the Hades arc, Hyoga paired with Dragon Shiryu as the saints of Athena waged war against the Underworld.

Hyoga's mother

The one person that forever lives in Hyoga mind is his deceased mother. She died when Hyoga was still very young, having drowned during the shipwreck of a doomed cruise. The ship sunk into the icy ocean, where the extreme cold kept Hyoga's mother from rigor mortis. Throughout the Sanctuary arc, Hyoga is shown to visit his mother periodically by diving into the waters. Later on, the ship is sent deep into the ocean's graves as part of a final lesson from Hyoga's master, Camus of the Aquarius constellation.

Hyoga and his mother are both Christians, or at least either put their faith in a deity different from the show's established Greek gods, or have the basic knowledge about Christianity. This does not distract Hyoga himself from serving Athena, however. Hyoga wears a cross necklace that his mother passed down before she left on her journey.

In the manga, her name is revealed to be Natasha.

Yakoff

A young child from the village where he and Hyoga lived, more exactly the chieftain's grandson. He appears both in the manga and the anime.He is an ordinary child, and hangs out with Hyoga whenever he returns to Siberia and keeps an eye on Natasha's ice tomb for him. In the anime, he was the one to relay news of the Crystal Saint's sudden change of personality to Hyoga and Seiya, since he was the only one able to escape from his grip.

The Crystal Saint

In the anime adaptation, Hyoga's master was the Crystal Saint, with Aquarius Camus being his master's sensei (thus, making the gold saint the equivalent of an idol in Hyoga's eyes). The Crystal Saint was a very gentle man with an extremely strong sense of justice, and his abilities hovered around silver saint level; Hyoga himself saw him as a surrogate father, more than a master.

The Crystal Saint was first introduced in the Sanctuary arc, where he openly opposed the Pope Ares's actions against Saori Kido and her bronze saints and actually went to the Sanctuary to face the Pope and ask him what was going on. But before the Crystal Saint could speak out further, the Pope used his Emperor Demon Fist—a technique that forced the victim to obey him against his will, practically brainwashing him. Unbeknownst to the Pope, Seiya's master Eagle Marin was a witness of this.

The Crystal Saint was then sent to assassinate Hyoga, using little Yakoff and the people of the village where he used to live as hostages. Seiya was warned of this by Marin and managed to reach Siberia in time to free Yakoff and the townspeople and tell Hyoga. A battle ensued between teacher and student anyway, with Hyoga reluctantly landing the final blow. The strike knocked the Crystal Saint out of Ares's grasp, but proved fatal as well; after mourning him, with Yakoff and Seiya's help Hyoga buried him in the Siberian ice.

After the Poseidon arc, the Crystal Saint progressively became a less prominent character, to the point of being retconned by Toei Animation when the Hades Arc from the manga was adapted to anime, to stay faithful to Kurumada's original manga. As Crystal Saint is now virtually removed from the continuity of the anime adaptation, Hyouga refers only to Camus as his master, and references to the Crystal Saint are non-existent.

Aquarius Camus

In the manga, Hyoga was trained directly by Camus, the Gold Saint of Aquarius. In contrast with the sweet-tempered yet still strict Crystal Saint, Camus had a more stoic and cold personality, and his methods sometimes unorthodox. In one instance, in order to force Hyoga to abandon his emotional ties with his mother and become closer to mastering absolute zero, Camus created whirlpools and typhoons in the ocean where Hyoga's mother lie. To Hyoga's dismay, the storm caused the ship to sink deep into a part of the ocean out of Hyoga's reach.

Hyoga and Camus later met face to face in the Temple of Libra after the gold saint intervened in the Gemini Saint's "Another Dimension" attack. Here, Camus confirmed Hyoga's suspicious that he was responsible for sinking the ship. Enraged, Hyoga attacked his master, but was defeated after Camus revealed that Hyoga's emotional ties to his mother are still unsevered. Camus then encased Hyoga in a block of ice with his "Freezing Coffin" technique, hoping that Hyoga would sleep until he actually understood his mission and was able to break the coffin himself.

With the aid of the other bronze saints, the Cygnus became free and once again challenged Camus when they reached the Temple of Aquarius. After an epic battle, Hyoga's cosmos finally reached its summit and he challenged Camus with his own patented technique -- the "Aurora Execution." Both sides unleash the ice move at each another, and Camus falls -- but not before displaying satisfaction that Hyoga had mastered absolute zero. After briefly crying for his master, Hyoga collapses.

In the Hades arc, Camus and Hyoga reunite once more after the gold saint was resurrected by Hades to do his bidding.

Natassia and Alexei

A side story from the manga. While in Siberia, Hyoga was invited to meet a group of warriors known as "The Blue Warriors." According to Camus, they were a formidable group with abilities rivaling the Saints. Alexei, the leader of this tribe, insisted that Hyoga help them in a plot to invade other parts of the world -- or face death. Hyoga, of course, refused on account of being one of Athena's saints, and a battle began. Unfortunately, Hyoga was doomed to lose, as he had not donned his Cygnus Cloth -- Alexei's "Blue Impulse" attack proved to be too much, and Hyoga was defeated. The Blue Glide then imprisoned the Cygnus Saint, with hopes that he would later reconsider.

Inside the dungeon of the Blue Warriors' castle, Hyoga awoke to meet a young woman caring for him. She introduced herself as Natassia, a name that caught Hyoga by surprise. Natassia then begged Hyoga to stop Alexei from assassinating her father. As it turns out, her father was a man of peace, and abhorred using violence to solve problems. Alexei believed in the exact opposite, and vowed to kill his own father in other to further his own ambitions. Natassia, visibly shaken, threatened to commit suicide if her father's blood is spilled.

Sadly, she could not stop Alexei in time -- the deed had been done as he sliced his own father in half. With the Cygnus Cloth at his disposal (sneaked inside by Yakoff), Hyoga proceeded to escape his prison and locate Alexei. It wasn't long before the two discovered each other, and a second battle ensued. This time, the Blue Glide leader was easily defeated, and he regained his senses. Right then, Yakoff rushed towards them with news of Natassia -- she had followed through with her promise, and was now sitting outside in the freezing ice storm, silently praying. A chunky layer of ice had formed on her body, and her body temperature lowered by the second. Hyoga quickly freed her with a punch, and Alexei picked up his sister as he repented for his deeds.

Grateful but curious, Alexei asked Hyoga why he saved his younger sister without hesitation. As he and Yakoff walked away, Hyoga revealed that Natassia shared the same name as his deceased mother.

Kraken Isaac

Isaac was Hyoga's long lost friend from his younger days in Siberia. The two met when Hyoga first began his training in Siberia with Camus (or the Crystal Saint in the anime). Whereas Hyoga's primary motivation for sainthood was the ability to visit his deceased mother beneath the oceans, Isaac aspired to become a saint in order to rid the world of injustice and evil.

When Isaac found out Hyoga's true intentions five years later, he was infuriated -- but nevertheless felt compassion for his friend. On his first attempt to dive into the seas, Hyoga was hit with unnaturally powerful whirlpools. As Hyoga lost control, Isaac was overwhelmed with an uneasy feeling, and immediately rushed into the seas to search for his friend. He soon discovered an unconscious Hyoga entangled on the ship's net. Isaac picked up his comrade and began to swim to the surface -- until he, too, was caught by a similar whirlpool. Losing control, Isaac slammed into a sharp, jagged iceberg face first, losing his left eye as a result. With Hyoga still in his grasp, Isaac punched an opening through the ice with all of his cosmos. Using the last bit of energy, he tossed Hyoga back to the surface. A second whirlpool then pulled Isaac away, and the young man was seemingly lost forever. On the surface, Hyoga and his mentor presumed that Isaac did not survive.

Isaac made his return in the Poseidon arc, to Hyoga's shock. However, the Isaac that stood before him was no longer the righteous young man he knew from his training days -- he was now Kraken Isaac, one of Poseidon's seven generals of the seas. A long and deep scar ran from his eyebrow to his chin on the left side of his face. Isaac displayed resentment towards Hyoga for the lost of his eye, and for the lost of the Cygnus Cloth. Hyoga sympathized, and offered Isaac his own left eye to compensate for the Kraken's misery. The sea general gladly accepted and damaged Hyoga's eye- although not to the extent of blinding it. From this point on, Hyoga's left eye would be bandaged for the remainder of the series.

Now that the reunion was out of the way, Isaac quickly challenged Hyoga to a final showdown. At first, the bronze saint refused to fight his old friend, but soon he realized that Isaac's cosmos had been corrupted by the very thing he had once sworn to rid the world of. After an intense back-and-forth battle with the Cygnus's "Diamond Dust" and the Kraken's "Aurora Borealis," Hyoga, with the spirit of Camus guiding him, finally unleashed the "Aurora Execution" attack on Isaac. The sea general was promptly defeated.

With his dying breath, Isaac commended Hyoga's power, and the two reverted back to being good friends once more.

aori Kido

The relationship between Hyoga and Saori Kido/Athena is platonic at best. In the manga, he was initially indifferent about Saori and the Graude Foundation, until she revealed herself to be the current reincarnation of the goddess Athena. Even then, he did not concern himself with matters of Sanctuary, until his master Camus directly challenged him in Siberia. From that point on, Hyoga decided to commit to his duty as one of Athena's 88 saints.

Notes

*As revealed by Masami Kurumada, the name of Hyoga's village is Kohoutek.

*Hyoga is the only character to whom Masami Kurumada dedicated an entire short story, in his manga. This story is contained in vol.13 and it is titled "Koori no Kuni no Natassia Hen" (Chapter of Natassia, from the Land of Ice). Although it was not included in the anime adaptation, it inspired the non-canonical and anime-only Asgard Hen, and the second Saint Seiya movie : Kamigami no Atsuki Tatakai, which includes elements taken directly from Kurumada's short story, with a few modifications.

*In Capcom's videogame Street Fighter 3 Third Strike, Kurumada and Hyoga received homage, in the ending sequence of the character Remy. In it, Remy swims to the depths of an icy sea to visit his deceased sister, who closely resembles Hyoga's mother Natassia.

*As Kurumada used christian elements for Hyoga's background, he also chose biblical and christian names as motif for three characters that had a close relationship with the Cygnus Saint, the boy Yakoff (Russian variation of the name Jacob), Hyoga's mother Natassia (Russian variation of the Latin name Natalia, which means "Christmas day") and Poseidon's Marina General, Kraken Isaac.

References