Kobeni Higashiyama Explained: Her Strength, Devil Contract, and Survival in Chainsaw Man

Among all the girls who trick Denji, betray him, or try to kill him, every single one dies… except Kobeni Higashiyama.
Why is this anxious wreck the one who survives?

In this article I’ll break down:

• Why Kobeni is the only survivor among Denji’s “dangerous” love interests
• How strong she actually is in combat
• The main fan theories about her secret devil contract
• Why I think she survived from a meta (author) point of view
• And what might happen to her in Part 2

Spoiler warning: This article contains heavy spoilers for Chainsaw Man Part 1 and minor discussion of Part 2 (no detailed plot, but mentions a few characters and setups).

If you need a full refresher on Part 1 first, check my complete Chainsaw Man Part 1 recap & guide .

Why is Kobeni the Only Girl Who Survives?

If you look at Denji’s relationships in Part 1, there’s an ugly pattern:

• Girls who manipulate Denji
• Girls who betray him
• Girls who actively try to kill him

…almost all of them end up dead by the end of Part 1.

Reze, Makima, even people who genuinely care about Denji like Himeno — they all get swallowed by the violence of this world. Kobeni, meanwhile, is:

• Cowardly
• Mentally unstable
• Constantly insisting she wants to quit

And yet she walks away alive.

In-universe, you can chalk it up to her insane survival instincts and luck.
Out-of-universe, Kobeni surviving is funny in a very Fujimoto way: the most “normal” person, the one who hates this life the most, is the one forced to keep living with the trauma.

To understand why that works so well, we have to talk about her actual strength.

Kobeni’s Real Strength: Terrifying Human Combat Skills

A coward with S-tier reflexes

On paper, Kobeni is a terrible devil hunter:

• She’s terrified of devils
• She freezes up when something overwhelmingly strong appears
• She constantly says she wants to quit and go to college instead

But when she snaps, she turns into a close-combat monster.

Himeno even tells her “your movement is good,” and the manga backs that up: Kobeni’s agility, reactions, and precision are all way above a normal human’s.chainsaw-man.fandom.com

In the Special Division Assault arc, she:

• Dodges bullets and blades at close range
• Silently gets behind armed enemies
• Lands clean, lethal hits while sobbing and panicking

It feels almost comedic, but if you strip away the crying, her performance is on par with elite Public Safety hunters.

Built for close-quarters and gunfights

Kobeni shines the most in human-vs-human fights:

• She uses knives and guns with frightening accuracy
• She adapts quickly, using whatever weapon is available
• Her movements are so quick that enemies barely register she’s moved before she’s already behind them

She looks like a panicked civilian, but the moment survival instinct kicks in, she moves like she’s been trained since childhood — which, given her toxic parents, wouldn’t be surprising.

A strictly “conditional” fighter

The key to understanding her power is this:

Kobeni only fights well when she feels there’s a chance she can win.

Against devils or situations that feel truly hopeless (like the Darkness Devil), she collapses into raw panic and becomes dead weight. But when the enemy is human, or at least something she can imagine beating, her survival instinct flips on and she goes berserk.

Whether this is purely human talent or partly boosted by her devil contract is never made explicit. The manga never shows her using a flashy, supernatural ability — which is exactly why fans are obsessed with her secret.

What Is Kobeni’s Devil? Officially Unknown, But Fans Have Theories

Canonically, we only know two things:

1. Kobeni has a contract with a devil whose identity is never revealed.
2. When asked at the drinking party, she hesitates and says her contracted devil is “a secret.”chainsaw-man.fandom.com

That’s it. No name, no powers, no price.

Because of that, fans have built a whole ecosystem of theories. Let’s walk through three big ones — plus how they connect to your draft.

Theory 1: The Secret Devil

This is the most direct reading of her line:

“My contracted devil is… a secret.”

Taken literally, some fans argue she might actually be contracted with the Secret Devil — a devil that feeds on the fear of people’s secrets being exposed.

How would that fit?

• Kobeni often stumbles into situations where hidden enemies are exposed
• Assassins disguised as civilians or “normal” residents tend to get revealed when she’s around
• She survives by “accidentally” uncovering things other people want to hide

Under this theory, the devil’s ability isn’t a clean shōnen power like “summon a weapon” — it’s more like:

The world bends just enough that secrets around Kobeni are forced into the open.

It’s never clear what the trigger would be (fear? panic? touching something?), but it’s a neat way to explain why she keeps messing up plans in ways that benefit the main cast.

Theory 2: The Kitchen Knife Devil

The most grounded theory in your draft is the 包丁の悪魔（kitchen knife devil） hypothesis.

Points in its favor:

• Kobeni is almost always shown with knives, and specifically kitchen-style blades
• Public Safety professionals usually rely on more standard gear (guns, batons, Devil powers)
• Kishibe canonically has a contract with the Knife Devil, alongside the Claw and Needle Devils, so “blade-type” devils definitely exist in-universe.chainsaw-man.fandom.com+1

So if there’s a Knife Devil, it’s not hard to imagine a related devil like a Kitchen Knife Devil existing too — something minor, but still dangerous.

Under this theory, her contract might be something simple like:

• She can always produce or perfectly wield knives in combat
• Her reaction speed and precision with bladed weapons are boosted
• The cost could be constant bad luck or emotional instability

It fits her fighting style very well, and it doesn’t require any wild plot twists.

Theory 3: The Cockroach (Gokiburi) Devil

This is the funniest one — and honestly, kind of convincing.

Why a Cockroach Devil?

• Kobeni moves with creepy, silent, sudden speed, like an insect
• She shows absurd survivability, dodging death flags again and again
• Her “shibutosa” (persistence) is cockroach-tier — you crush everything around her, but she’s still there

There’s also a cultural angle: saying “my contract is with the Cockroach Devil” while everyone is drinking and eating in an izakaya would absolutely kill the mood. From that perspective, her saying:

“It’s… a secret.”

is just her being polite and reading the room in a very Japanese way.

Under this reading, Kobeni is literally “ゴキブリ並みにしぶとい” — cockroach-level hard to kill.

Other popular ideas: Luck or Misfortune Devils

Outside these three, a lot of Western fans like the idea that Kobeni is tied to a Misfortune Devil or Luck Devil:

• She personally survives
• But misfortune constantly rains down on everyone around her

That would explain why she keeps living while her coworkers meet horrible fates, and why any scene with her feels like bad slapstick karma.Reddit+1

However, there’s zero textual confirmation. At this point, every theory — including “Secret Devil,” “Kitchen Knife Devil,” and “Cockroach Devil” — is just fan speculation. Officially, her contract remains “Unknown Devil.”chainsaw-man.fandom.com

Too Lucky to Be Innocent? The “Kobeni Mastermind” Theory

Because Kobeni keeps escaping death in impossible ways, some fans have floated the “Kobeni is a secret mastermind” or even “hidden final boss” theory.

The arguments usually look like this:

• Death flags pile up around her, but never land
• She always just happens to be in the right (or wrong) place to change the flow of battle
• We still know almost nothing about her devil and her family history
• Her brother Nobana later ends up in a cult-like organization (the Chainsaw Man Church), which hints at a very messed-up family backgroundchainsaw-man.fandom.com+1

From a pure foreshadowing perspective, you could build something on that.

But personally, I don’t think Fujimoto is aiming for a 4D chess reveal with Kobeni. Her role works best as:

• A painfully normal person trapped in a nightmare world
• Someone whose suffering is both tragic and darkly comedic
• A mirror for the reader: “This is how you would actually react in this universe”

Which brings us to the real reason she’s still alive: author bias.

Why Kobeni Really Survived: Fujimoto’s Own Words

At Jump Festa, Tatsuki Fujimoto talked about a moment in the story where he couldn’t decide who to kill: Kobeni or the Angel Devil.

According to summaries of that talk:

• Fujimoto asked his editor, Shihei Lin: “Who’d you rather want dead, Kobeni or Angel Devil?”
• Lin answered that he’d rather Kobeni die — because he didn’t want Angel to suffer that fate.
• Fujimoto, being Fujimoto, took that as a sign that it would be more impactful (and crueler to the readers) to kill Angel instead and let Kobeni live.Reddit+1

In other words:

Kobeni didn’t survive because of a deep in-universe plan.
She survived because it was funnier and more painful for the audience.

That perfectly fits Fujimoto’s storytelling style. He often chooses the option that:

• Hurts the characters
• Hurts the readers
• And still makes him laugh behind the desk

So my read is the same as yours: Kobeni is a “lucky girl” mostly thanks to authorial trolling. Her survival enhances the series’ dark comedy and keeps one painfully human survivor around to remind us how awful this world is.

What About Part 2? Where Is Kobeni Now?

As of late 2025, here’s what we know from Part 2 (the Academy / School Arc):

• Kobeni herself has not appeared on-panel in Part 2 yet.Game Rant
• However, her younger brother Nobana Higashiyama is an important side character:
  • He’s a high school student and member of the Devil Hunter Club
  • He later becomes a tour guide and believer in the Chainsaw Man Church
  • He has a very similar anxious, sweaty energy to Kobenichainsaw-man.fandom.com+1
• The official materials still list Kobeni as alive, and there’s no mention of her death from Nobana or anyone else.chainsaw-man.fandom.com+1

This opens up a few interesting possibilities:

1. Kobeni’s parents and the church are connected.
   Both Kobeni and Nobana were pushed into dangerous devil-related careers “for the family’s sake,” which fits the vibes of a controlling, possibly cult-adjacent household.
2. Nobana could be our bridge back to Kobeni.
   Once the Chainsaw Man Church storyline and the Public Safety situation collide, it would be the perfect moment to reintroduce her — maybe as someone trying (and failing) to live a normal life.
3. “Actually she died off-screen” is very unlikely.
   Fujimoto loves shocking deaths on panel. Quietly killing Kobeni off-screen and only mentioning it feels out of character, especially for someone with her popularity.

For now, the safest conclusion is:

Kobeni is alive, off-screen, and one strong story beat away from returning — probably dragged back into hell by other people’s decisions, just like always.

Conclusion: Kobeni as Chainsaw Man’s Ultimate “Lucky Unlucky” Survivor

To wrap it up:

• In combat, Kobeni is one of the strongest pure humans in the series, with terrifying reflexes and close-quarters skill.
• Her devil contract is still officially unknown, spawning fan theories about a Secret Devil, Kitchen Knife Devil, Cockroach Devil, or some kind of Luck / Misfortune Devil.
• Her survival is largely explained by Fujimoto’s own comments: between her and Angel, he chose to kill Angel instead, partly to mess with reader expectations.
• In Part 2, she hasn’t appeared yet, but her brother Nobana’s presence and the Chainsaw Man Church arc keep the door wide open for a comeback.

For me, the most satisfying interpretation is:

Kobeni isn’t secretly a mastermind or a hidden final boss.
She’s a brutally realistic, unlucky-lucky person who just keeps surviving because this world refuses to let her rest.

And that, in a series full of devils and gods, might be the scariest fate of all.