Izayoi (The After Years)

Izayoi is one of the Eblan Four in Final Fantasy IV: The After Years, and is known as Izayoi of Water. She is a kunoichi who always views battle in a calm and collected manner. At times, she is known to make use of her other assets, though she views herself as a Ninja first, a woman second.

Appearance and personality
Izayoi wears a female-styled variant of traditional ninja garb, colored various shades of blue to reflect her elemental affinity for water. She wears a blue robe tied over her uniform with a large light blue bow, and blue boots. She has long brown hair tied in a ponytail and has blue eyes. While undercover in Troia as an Epopt trainee, Izayoi disguises herself in a pink dress.

Izayoi's desire is to be taken seriously as a ninja, and not to be looked down upon or treated differently due to her gender. When Edge expresses displeasure at the Eblan Four desiring to be trained in the ninja arts used as tools of war, Izayoi protests that their ninja training allows them to do more for the world than fight, and that as ninja it is their destiny to strive for the limits of human potential. In Eblan Castle, one of the citizens mentions Izayoi has spurred all of his advances and suspects that someone else may have captured her eye, but the game does not elaborate if Izayoi is simply not interested or if she has fallen for someone else.

Story
When Eblan receives word of Baron stealing Crystals from the other nations, the Eblan Four become eager to assist Edge, and they are sent on missions to gather information. Izayoi disguises herself as an Epopt trainee in Troia where she learns the Epopts have constructed a Tower of Trials to train their ranks into combat, and goes to investigate it. Izayoi returns to Eblan in the ship that brought Palom to Troia.

She reunites with Edge and the other Eblan Four within the Tower of Babil and after being forced to escape from the Mysterious Girl and Ifrit they fall to the Underworld and into the Falcon.

In the Gathering Tale, Izayoi watches over Leonora, Palom, and the other incapacitated characters below the Falcon's deck. During the ending, she is seen again impersonating an Epopt trainee, where she giggles at Leonora's upcoming announcement. In the end, she and the other Ninja Guard of Eblan renew their vows of loyalty to Edge, awaiting their next mission.

Stats
Similar to Edge, Izayoi has all-around average stats with high Speed. Although her Spirit is the highest of the Ninja characters, healing Ninjutsu is actually tied to Intelligence. Even so, dedicated White Mages have better varieties of healing spells.

Izayoi is well-suited to the back row with her variety of long-range weapons, as well as her lower HP and Stamina than other physical characters.

Abilities
Izayoi's ability is Illusions, which confuses an enemy and is not any more effective than the Confuse spell. She can use healing Ninjutsu skills and can perform Band abilities with the other Eblan ninjas and Leonora due to her time undercover in Troia, and is also able to take part in a handful of Bands focusing on the female party members.

Equipment
Izayoi can equip katanas, boomerangs, whips, and bows. However she is most effective with the latter two, as katanas and boomerangs are optimal only for the ambidextrous ninjas, Edge and Tsukinowa. Unfortunately, certain bows and whips decrease their user's mental stats, which lowers the effectiveness of her Ninjutsu.

Boss
Izayoi is fought as a boss, along with the remaining Eblan Four, at the beginning of Edge's Tale, as part of a training session.

Pictlogica Final Fantasy
Izayoi appears in Pictlogica Final Fantasy as a playable character.

Final Fantasy Trading Card Game
Izayoi appears in the Final Fantasy Trading Card Game.

Etymology
Like the other Eblan Four, Izayoi's name is related to the moon and means "sixteenth moon" in Japanese, which refers to the lunar phase known most commonly as the Full Moon.