Todd Fang

Todd Fang (トッド・ファング) is a soldier in the Sacred Vollachia Empire who holds the rank of a Private First-Class and Katya Aurélie's fiancé. Debuting in Volume 26, Todd, alongside Jamal Aurélie, originally played a supporting role at the start of Arc 7, until he became Subaru's bitter enemy. Later, after rescuing Arakiya from imprisonment in Guaral, he was appointed as her sole subordinate.

Appearance
Todd is a young man, with short, bright, and spiky orange hair he keeps in place with a headband. Without the headband, his hair is in a bowl cut. He is noted to likely be a bit older than Subaru. As per all Imperial Soldiers, Todd can be seen sporting Vollachia's standard military uniform. His head is adorned with a headband of the same colour pallet as the rest of his attire. On his left side, Todd also straps a small battle axe, which he uses instead of a standard sword.

Personality
Todd initially presented himself as a very friendly and open individual, who faithfully follows orders and is extremely kind, friendly, and outgoing towards people around him. However, it soon turned out that Todd was a far more ruthless, sinister, and twisted individual than he appeared. He will manipulate or order everyone to get what he wants and needs, including from Jamal, who he has a close relationship with, and Arakiya, a superior who outclasses him in both rank and power. He is observant and meticulous, going as far as to stab Subaru in the shoulder because he didn't like Subaru's gaze and correctly concluded Subaru was trying to deceive him. Even though he originally acted very kindly towards Subaru, it was revealed that Todd was in fact always suspicious of Subaru from the very second the two met. Todd is also prepared to extreme lengths in order to get his way as seen when he tested if a slaughtered Demon Beast was poisonous enough to kill someone and giving it to the other soldiers after mixing it in water, killing said soldiers in order to avoid repercussions, and brutally slaughtering numerous innocent civilians in the fortified Imperial City of Guaral while targeting Subaru's life in numerous failed loops.

Todd has personally admitted to Subaru that some degree of his actions are based out of fear. If Todd finds himself in an unfavorable position, then he will often run away out of cowardice or choose not to act, such as when he initially attempted to escape from Guaral after its seizure. However, even if Todd is internally frightened, he will attempt to appear externally stronger in order to match the way of the Empire. Subaru has appraised Todd as scum comparable to the Witch Cult's Sin Archbishops. His main goal is to safely return home to his fiancée, Katya, who he believes is the one thing he cannot risk losing. Todd does not wish to neglect Katya, yet he finds her to be a flawed and loveable "item".

History
Five years before the start of the main story, Todd was a bandit in the Fortified City of Garkla. After the destruction of the city resulting from the Sin Archbishop of Greed ten years prior, numerous factions of bandits came into the city under one union and interfered with the rebuilding process. Todd, being one of their leaders, wanted to quit being a bandit and join the Imperial Army as a respected soldier from the very start of his tenure by gathering all of the other bandit leaders and turning them in. However, Jamal Aurélie, a soldier who was stationed in Garkla at that time, ended up slaying one of the other leaders, causing the bandits to lose their morale and end their assault on Garkla. Todd, having quit being a bandit after his plan was foiled, later met Jamal. At some point in the future, Todd was introduced to Jamal's younger sister, Katya, and she became his fiancée a year later.

Roughly about two to three months before the start of the main story, Todd and Jamal were talking about the revolt started at that point in time by Yorna Mishigure, the 7th ranking Diving General. During this conversation, Jamal talked about how he heard a rumor about testing people in the subjugation of Yorna's rebellion in order to see who would take the place of the former 9th ranking Divine General. After Jamal was asked about his source, he revealed that he had heard it from a few people who fled from a fortress that Yorna had attacked. After taking the time to gather more information, the two later captured the fled soldiers to turn them in as prisoners and helped to bring an end to the rebellion, though they received no reward for their contributions.

Abilities
Keen Intellect: The ability that makes Todd so dangerous, is unmistakably his intellect. He is extremely attentive and calculative, always being two steps ahead of both his enemies and allies, which allows him to devise deadly traps and strategies to dispatch his foes without being forced to personally cross weapons with them. One should also mention his mentality as an Imperial soldier–depending on the target's threat, Todd isn't afraid of causing collateral damage. During one failed loop, he sent a rogue dragon carriage zooming down the streets, killing tens of innocents as well as Subaru. In the following loop, he set a pub ablaze, once again killing innocents, just so he could kill Subaru.
 * Keen Orientation: Todd has been mentioned to easily be able to memorize a place or building's layout and geography by simply being there once. With this skill, Todd is very proficient at infiltrating places he's already been to, and planning ambushes on his own soil.

Beastification: As a result of his half-wolfman lineage, Todd has the ability to transform himself into a large orange wolf beast.

Enhanced Senses: Todd has displayed above average proficiency with multiple bodily sensations presumably because of his half-wolfman blood.
 * Enhanced Vision: Todd possesses extremely enhanced eyesight. When Subaru was burning the Imperial flag after having captured Guaral, Todd was able to pick out his face from the other side of the city and see through his crossdressing disguise to determine that the Imperial Soldiers have been taken in by the “dancers” by using his unique ability. Todd also seems to use this ability when hunting Subaru prior to the siege on Guaral, as if he is able to see and track Subaru consistently from completely out of sight.
 * Enhanced Smelling: Todd possesses an extremely advanced sense of smell. Although Todd is not able to smell miasma, he possesses the ability to pinpoint someone's specific body odor. He has been able to use this in order to pinpoint an individual who he believed was related to Subaru at the time despite not knowing the two were one and the same.

Equipment
 * Battle Axe: Todd can usually be seen wielding a short battle axe and is stated to be very skilled with it, more-so than the average Imperial Soldier. With it, he is able to swiftly dispatch foes with deadly accuracy and surprising amount of force. Despite perhaps not appearing as menacing as some other soldiers, Todd's proficiency in killing others with his axe is not to be underestimated.
 * Throwing knives: As demonstrated during the Demon Beast ambush, Todd is capable of quickly and accurately throwing knives, even when under heavy pressure.

Trivia

 * Todd was only introduced with his forename at first. However, in a side story released with Volume 27, his surname was revealed.
 * Originally, Todd's rank in the Imperial Army was lower than lower than the Jamal held. However, Todd's rank was later changed to be a Private First-Class, the same as Jamal's.
 * Todd has his own named chapter in Arc 8 of the Web Novel, which is also the shortest chapter written to date. In the Light Novel, it was adapted as an interlude, though it was not listed on Volume 34's table of contents.