Hiei stands at just 4 feet 10 inches tall—one of the shortest characters in the series, not counting his spiky hair. He's instantly recognizable: black hair with a blue tint, white highlights swept across the front, and a white headband that hides his most distinctive feature, the Jagan Eye embedded in his forehead. That eye has a purple iris and sets him apart immediately. His own eyes are large, reddish-tinted, and slightly slanted, which gave him an genuinely menacing appearance early on. He typically dresses in a black cloak-like jacket and pants over a black undershirt (sometimes blue), and carries a sword he's skilled enough to use both as a weapon and as a conduit for the dark flames he rarely taps into—he finds them too barbaric. Despite his small frame, Hiei is built lean and muscular with incredible speed, accuracy, and precision.
Born a male fire demon to a race of female ice demons, Hiei was abandoned as an infant by his mother, Hina, since koorime law forbids male children. Raised by a group of thieves, he learned to kill before he learned much else. The only thing keeping him sane through his brutal childhood was a necklace made from his mother's hiruiseki—a stone formed from frozen tears. He lost it in battle, which drove him to acquire the Jagan Eye specifically so he could track it down. What he discovered instead was far darker: his mother had taken her own life out of grief. The search also revealed he had a twin sister, Yukina, missing from their village—a realization that gave him a new purpose.
Hiei comes across as aloof and misanthropic, regularly dismissing humans and their emotions as beneath him. He's not exactly chatty, and he bickers constantly with his teammates, especially Kuwabara. Still, there's real respect there beneath the surface—on both sides. He respects all of them, though he's closest to Kurama and Yusuke. He'd rather operate independently and has earned a feared reputation in Demon World as a killer, even back when he was just D-Class. But underneath the loner act is someone genuinely hungry for real friendship and connection. Whatever else he is, Hiei is honorable—his word is absolute.
Content compiled by AnimeList.moe from publicly available sources.
