Yuki Kuran

Yuki Cross / Yuki Kuran (黒主 優姫 / 玖蘭 優姫 Kurosu Yūki / Kuran Yūki) is the protagonist of the series, she begins the series as a 15 year old first-year student at Cross Academy, towards the climax of the first arc, Yuki is revealed to be a Pureblood Vampire and also a member of the Kuran family and Kaname's younger sister.

Character concept
Yuki was the first character designed and the first to have her personality defined, though with the intention of maturing later and being further defined. Matsuri Hino wanted to create a character different from her previous main character Airi from MeruPeri, she described Yuki as the character who possesses her justice side and that Yuki has the forgiving and nurturing that she wants. Amongst dark and gloomy characters, Yuki is meant to be the healing and soothing character.

Name

 * Yūki is a combination of yū, meaning "tender" or "kind", and ki, meaning "princess". Interestingly enough another meaning of yūki ( 勇気, yūki) is "courage", whereas Yuki can also mean (雪, yuki) "snow" as well.
 * Officially romanized as "Yuki" in Viz media publications and Chuang yi publications. Fan translations use the accurately use "Yuuki" as the romanji.
 * Yuki's last name, Kurosu is the Japanese pronounciation of the English word "cross." However, kanji has a different meaning, kuro meas "black" and su means "master": "black master."
 * The kanji of her real surname Kuran, is a combination of the old fashioned way of writing ku, meaning "nine," and ran, meaning "orchid": "nine orchids".
 * Kaien Cross knew Yuki's name beforehand. He says to Yuki that Kaname told him that all girls are princesses and thus will name her Yuki and she is Kaien's 'gentle princess.'

Appearance
She has large brown eyes and as her years as a human, has short dark brown hair. When she is awakened as a pureblood vampire, her hair grows out to be more than twice as long as it previously was and she possesses a more mature look.

Personality
Yuki is generally a cheerful and comedic girl. She is considered a poor student because she dislikes studying and falls asleep in class, reason being she stays up all night monitoring the school grounds and night students. She exhibits a strong attachment to her close friends. Her indecisive nature and reticence can be attributed to her insecurity regarding her missing history. As a human, she feared all vampires (because of a vampire that attacked her when she was little) except for Kaname Kuran, because of this fear she rarely left the Cross Academy grounds on her own. Yuki doesn't like to reveal her fears and disguises it with a smile over her face.

Following her re-awakening as a pureblood vampire, Yuki shed the fears she once retained, when a situation asks, she can put in an authoritative face as is expected for a pureblood princess. Yuki's overwhelming fault is the tendency to burden herself with guilt over her ignorance when she learns the sufferings of other characters that they have kept secret. Yuki had never conciously chosen to drink blood from anyone's neck until the 73rd Night where she is shown to lean in to Zero's neck.

Yuki's favorite subject is Physical Education and her favorite foods are the ginger pork stir fry set and parfaits.

Story background
Yuki was approximately 5 years old when Rido Kuran attacked the Kuran family seeking to take Yuki. To protect her daughter, Juri sacrificed herself to seal Yuki's vampire side and erased her daughter's memory. Yuki's first memory is that of Kaname saving her from a level E vampire devouring her blood. Yuki grew up as a human in the care of Kaien Cross, who also adopted her. Kaname stayed as a presence in Yuki's life whom she constantly looked forward to seeing and missed leaving, falling in love with him.

Yuki, as a child, had troubled nightmares nightly until Zero Kiryu joined their household and Yuki formed a strong attachment to the boy. Yuki's relationship with Kaname became distant after she witnessed his vampire nature as he fed on a vampire classmate (Ruka) and also as a human, Yuki believed she had no chance with Kaname and began to distance herself from him, but her admiration and longing for him remained and chose to believe that his interest in her was the result of seeing her as a pet or similar.

Zero Kiryu
Yuki and Zero became childhood friends after he went to live with Kaien after the massacre by Shizuka on his family.

Kaname Kuran
Kaname is Yuki's admired savior, her older brother, her ancestor and her fiance.

Sayori Wakaba
Sayori Wakaba is Yuki's best friend and Yuki often calls her Yori-chan. Yori often worries about Yuki and her duties, telling her she needs to rest and jokes about her being a vampire. Yori knows that Zero has feelings for Yuki and ask her about them, but Yuki most of the time has no idea what she's talking about. When Yuki is reawakened as a vampire and vanishes, Yori is worried and tells Yuki that no matter what they will always be best friends.

Hanabusa Aido
Aido is Yuki's antagonist elder classman who is jealous of her relationship with Kaname. After Yuki is revealed to be a Pureblood vampire, Aido ends up becoming her tutor and minder.

Powers
Yuki posseses uncontrolled telekinetic powers, breaking windows on a few occasions when experiencing strong emotions. She possesses the ability of flight using a pair of wings on her back made of blood that resemble butterfly wings. Yuki has the ability to interfere with memory blocking through touch and includes breaking memory spells on herself. Yuki has immortality and the ability to heal from anything with the exception of anti-vampire weapons to her heart or cutting off her head. Yuki is also able to wield anti-vampire weapons both as a human and as a vampire and transforms the Artemis rod into its scythe form, like her mother did.

Manga

 * "I want to change things and that means I've got to do something." - 58th Night, Pg5 (Chuang Yi ed.)
 * (To Zero Kiryu) "(Then) I'll keep running away from you if having an enemy gives you a reason to live." - 46th Night and 47th Night.

Anime

 * "It's my duty as a guardian to protect Cross Academy, Day and Night" - 2nd Episode "Memories of Blood"
 * "You can hate me along with the vampires, But I won't let you give up on everything Zero!" - Episode 6 "Their Choices"
 * "I was thinking, if I could become someone that Zero needs, then I could say goodbye to the 'me without a past." - Vampire Knight Guilty episode 7  [The Thorny Kiss] '
 * "I am a pureblood vampire, the one thing Zero despises, but I can't help that I still want to see him" - Vampire Knight Guilty Episode 8 "Spiralling Recollections"