Tsukumo Sana

Tsukumo Sana (九十九 佐命) was an English Virtual YouTuber associated with hololive. She debuted in 2021 as part of hololive -Council-, the second generation of members of hololive English, alongside Ceres Fauna, Ouro Kronii, Nanashi Mumei and Hakos Baelz.

Profile
A member of the Council and the Speaker of "Space," the very first concept created by the Gods.

After being materialized in the mortal realm, she began researching astrology in earnest for one particular reason. However, she soon stumbled unknowingly upon the Forbidden Truth, and was turned into an apostle for the Ancient Ones.

"Space" refers not only to this universe we live in, but all dimensions and matter to exist. It is a concept unbridled by definition, and one that continues to grow in scope limitlessly. As it is yet to be fully explored by man, her seemingly strange behavior and speech can be explained away with a simple, "Humanity simply isn't yet ready to understand."

As a side note, despite how she may look, she is quite chi... young.

Personality
Tsukumo Sana was enthusiastic and generally easy-going, with a curiosity that led her to seek secrets in games, and a stubbornness that made her never give up until she achieved what she set off to do. She had a light-hearted and sometimes childish attitude, and was always overflowing with bubbly enthusiasm no matter what she was doing. She had an interest in both astronomy and astrology, and often made references to space. Her sense of humor was, in a word, odd. She made puns and jokes that were just a little dirty, and yet were enough to throw other people off during collaborations even fellow pun enthusiast Ninomae Ina'nis had been thrown off by Sana's jokes and non-sequiturs. She was fond of her fellow hololive -Council- members, and constantly doted on them whenever she got the chance. Sana enjoyed sharing fun facts, particularly those with large numbers. She may also have had a tendency to exaggerate, as the age and unrestricted height she wrote in her debut were off by an order of magnitude.

She could be careless and had destroyed the planet Earth multiple times as a result.

At debut, Hakos Baelz described Sana as the ultimate "ドM" (masochist), having insane art skills and a heart as big as space. This was especially evident in her interactions with her genmates and fellow hololive members, where she always greeted them with overwhelming joy and kindness.

Sana was also, despite being the physical embodiment of space and the universe, grounded and down to earth. She recognized that not everything would go according to plan, and was transparent with her challenges to her Sanallites. While announcing a temporary hiatus due to the loss of her family pet, she reminded viewers that rushing to have fun would ultimately not be beneficial to anybody, once again demonstrating the mature and grounded aspect of her personality.

Background
Following the success of hololive English in 2020 and 2021, COVER Corporation announced auditions for a second batch of English members from 12 February to 26 March 2021. Twitter accounts for the five new members were created in June 2021 and YouTube accounts created on 26 July 2021.

Teaser videos for the new generation began on the official hololive English YouTube Channel in August 2021. On 1 August, "Prelude" revealed a story of gods creating the four concepts of space, nature, time, and civilization. On 14 August, "Omen" described the creation of avatars of those four concepts plus that of the primordial force of Chaos, revealing five silhouettes. On 17 August, "Council" revealed the five new hololive English members and announced a grand debut scheduled for the coming weekend. Although the traditional term "generation" was not officially used to refer to the new members, who had been referred to as "hololive English Generation 2" by fans, the new members nonetheless formed a group known as "-Council-".

Upon conclusion of the Council debut PV, all five new members' Twitter and YouTube accounts were revealed, and each made their first tweet.

On 17 August 2021, around 24 hours after the initial announcement, Tsukumo Sana reached 100,000 YouTube subscribers before her debut. However, YouTube soon removed around half of this number, possibly due to the sudden subscriber growth on a channel with no videos yet, which may have triggered a YouTube anti-bot algorithm. Her subscriber count was cut down yet again shortly after she reached 170,000 YouTube subscribers.

Debut
Tsukumo Sana's debut was scheduled for 22 August. However, the -Council- debuts were postponed for 24 hours due to unspecified technical issues, which members jokingly blamed on the "EN curse," a perceived tendency for hololive English members to suffer from unexpected technical problems. The debuts were rescheduled at the same time on Sunday 22 August (US/Europe time) or Monday 23 August (Japan time).

Sana's debut stream reached a peak viewership of over 84,000. During the stream, she removed her limiter and grew to her natural massive size, throwing Earth out of orbit. However, her viewers somehow survived, and she was still able to stream long enough to sing Seikan Hikou, a song from the popular science fiction anime Macross Frontier.

2021
On 5 September, her channel got approved for monetization.

On 22 September, a video that looked like a teaser for lore between Sana and Ina was uploaded to Ina's channel (but Sana made the video) in the end the video was used to announce Sana's first official collaboration with another member outside of her generation.

On 26 September, said collaboration took place on Ina'nis' channel, playing Super Bunny Man.

On 27 September, her channel became open for memberships.

On 13 October, Sana reached 200,000 subscribers.

On 20 December, Sana and hololive ENG collaborated on a cover song "The Twelve Days of Christmas" by Frederic Austin which was also her first official cover song.

2022
On 6 January, hololive's Twitter account announced that both Myth and Council members would get new year costumes.

On 15 January, Sana debuted her second 2D costume, a kimono to celebrate the new year. In this costume, Sana got a new hairstyle. She keeps her twintails, which are now partially braided. Her planet/dango hair ornaments are positioned lower on her twintails and the pink and blue planet have switched places. To the left of her face, Sana also has two locks of hair braided. The front lock of hair is a gradient from fuchsia to blue, while the second lock of hair is entirely blue. The upper portion of her kimono is mostly white. The neck of Sana's kimono is decorated with orange lines and circles in them, which might represent planets in their orbit. Sana's bunny and crab companions are also represented. The lower portion of her kimono is blue with a star pattern becoming larger as it goes down the kimono. The obi is blue, but turns into a ribbon, as the ends become fuchsia and and a lighter blue. Her obi also has a decorative golden belt with small planet ornaments in various colors and a golden Neighbula. Her kimono is complemented by a fuchsia and black haori with a flower pattern. In addition, Sana can wear a Neighbula mask.

Sana went on hiatus for most of the month of February, due to what would later be revealed as a back injury which made it difficult to sit up during streaming. Following her Pokémon Legends: Arceus stream on 1 February, the only stream on her channel that month was a Valentine's Day card stream on 14 February.

On 22 February, -Council- celebrated their 6 month anniversary on Mumei's channel. They also released a cover of the song "Hikaru Nara" after the stream.

On 8 March, Sana returned with a short stream, announcing her return to streaming as recovery allows.

On 10 March, Sana reached 300,000 subscribers on her YouTube channel.

On 11 June, Sana debuted her first original song: "Astrogirl."

Retirement
On 11 July, Sana announced that she would retire from her activities on 31 July, making her hololive's first English Virtual YouTuber to graduate. Both Sana and Cover Corp. stated that it was ultimately Sana's request for her graduation.

Prior to the announcement, Sana fans had hoped that it was related to NASA's release of photographs from the James Webb space telescope, which had coincidentally occurred on the same day. Later, she held a Twitter space discussing the telescope images, and was overwhelmed by an outpouring of support and well wishes by fans.

Sana scheduled a large number of collabs in July prior to her retirement, including a Bread Review with Watson Amelia, retro gaming with Anya Melfissa and Pavolia Reine, Power Wash Simulator with Kobo Kanaeru, Minecraft with Tsunomaki Watame, Mario Party Superstars with Hakos Baelz and "Australian" holomembers Akai Haato and Takanashi Kiara, a Marshmallow Q&A with Omaru Polka, an Aussie snacks tier list with Baelz, an anatomy review with Mori Calliope and Nanashi Mumei, Minecraft sauna renovation with Ceres Fauna, Clubhouse Games with Kaela Kovalskia, drawing with Vestia Zeta, Switch Sports with Yozora Mel, Minecraft with Ouro Kronii and Moona Hoshinova, and a Twitter space with Amane Kanata.

On 20 July, during a stream on Mumei's channel, -Council- and IRyS debuted "Beeg Smol" 3D models designed by Sana.

On 31 July, Sana retired from her activities in a graduation stream titled "Sana is ETERNAL!" The stream reached just over 99,000 viewers at its peak.

In the stream, she read messages and drawings from other hololive members. She removed her limiter and dropped it down to Earth while also telling her Sanallites that she didn't regret meeting them. The second segment was a concert with the first song featuring Bae, Mumei, and Kiara, showing various clips from her previous streams. The second song featured Fauna, IRyS, Calli, and Ina, displaying fan art of Sana. The third song featured Kronii, Gura, and Ame, along with Sana's Sanallite dog bread mascot. The fourth song featured every member of hololive English singing "Ochame Kinou." The fifth, and final, song featured IRyS and -Council- singing Sana's original song: "Astrogirl." The third segment of the stream was of Sana thanking her viewers while repeating a portion of her previous talk when she first announced her graduation from hololive.

Sana's last activity was on her Twitter account where she published the final picture featured in her graduation stream with the message: "I'm not alone and neither are you!" She then retweeted fan art of herself drawn by her character illustrator, pako.

Before graduating, Sana also prepared a prerecorded message for Nanashi Mumei's birthday on 4 August, which Mumei played during her birthday celebration stream. Given the timing of Sana's retirement, Mumei was the only member of -Council- and Project: HOPE who did not get to celebrate her birthday while Sana was active.

On 23 August, during -Council- first anniversary celebration, they debuted their first group original song: "Rise." with the music video premiering just after the stream ended. Sana is also featured in the song even after her retirement, likely recording before she graduated from her activities.

Discography

 * Main page: Tsukumo Sana/Discography

Events

 * On 26 October 2021, Anime NYC's announced that every holoCouncil member would appear in "Anime NYC."
 * On 12 May 2022, SMASH!'s Twitter announced that Tsukumo Sana and Hakos Baelz would appear in their event which would be held from 16 to 17 July.

Mascots and Fans

 * Her fanbase is officially called "Sanallite," portmanteau of "Sana" and "satellite." The latter refers to any body which orbits another in space. They are represented by hybrids between a dog and bread, and are designed by Sana.
 * Sana's mascot is Yatagarasu, a sun god in the form of a majestic three-legged crow. It takes its current cute form to prevent human minds from melting upon viewing it. It occasionally vomits out wishes, and appears to speak bird language.
 * It is inspired by the yatagarasu, a mythical three-legged crow appearing in Japanese, Chinese and Korean mythology.
 * Sana credited Yatagarasu for taking care of her during her February 2022 hiatus due to injury, referring to him as "mother." She also used him as a walking stick.
 * Sana also designed "Neighbula" a strange white unicorn with pink horsehair.

Relationships

 * Notable units and groups Sana was part of:
 * "-Council-," alongside Ceres Fauna, Ouro Kronii, Nanashi Mumei and Hakos Baelz.
 * "Sauna," alongside Ceres Fauna.
 * "SpaceTime," alongside Ouro Kronii.
 * "SanaWata," alongside Tsunomaki Watame.
 * "Astrobonk," alongside Kaela Kovalskia.
 * "SanaKana," alongside Amane Kanata.
 * "Tsukune," alongside Momosuzu Nene.
 * "HoshiStar," alongside Hoshimachi Suisei ("Hoshi" means "star", and comets are a recurring motif for Suisei), Moona Hoshinova (Moon) and Yozora Mel ("Yozora" means "night sky").
 * "HololiveAustralia," along with Akai Haato (has studied in Australia), Takanashi Kiara (actually Austrian, but frequently claims to be Australian as a running gag), and Hakos Baelz (fellow Australian).

Quotes

 * "Where does the difference lie between 0 and 1. The only way to save the void is to validate the existence of "Space."
 * "BIG HELLO! Sana has landed on earth!!!!!! Did you know that when you trip into a black hole you turn into spaghetti?"
 * "Sana is eternal. Sana is an all-present constant being that can never truly be lost."
 * "Do you think like KFP will one day become big enough to cultivate the universe and then harvest like egg yolks from baby stars?"
 * "I'm not alone!"

Name

 * The name "Tsukumo" is written 「九十九」, meaning "ninety-nine." It appears in the term tsukumogami, ninety-nine gods, referring to the belief that an object or spirit can acquire sentience by living a hundred years. Tsukumo is a Japanese surname, although it is not usually written with these kanji; however, it does appear so in the name of the character Yuma Tsukumo from the anime Yu-Gi-Oh! Zexal.
 * In the 9th century Japanese work The Tales of Ise, tsukumogami is also used to refer to white hair. This has a similarity to Shirakami Fubuki, whose name "shirakami" can also be taken to mean "white hair."
 * "Sana" is a Japanese female given name. It is written 「佐命」, although the name is not commonly written with these kanji. While the first kanji, read "sa", appears in one common spelling of the name Sana, the second is usually read "inochi," meaning "life," or "mei," as in "unmei," destiny.
 * Sana is also an anagram of NASA, the acronym for the National Aeronautics and Space Administration, a well-known organization whose duties involve the exploration of space. Fans quickly noticed that Sana follows NASA on Twitter. Her logo also resembles the NASA logo.
 * Sana reads her name in Western order, like Ouro Kronii, Hakos Baelz, Mori Calliope, and Watson Amelia.

Lore

 * Sana's connection to the Ancient Ones links her to Ninomae Ina'nis, a priestess of the Ancient Ones and a founding member of the original hololive English.
 * A further connection between Sana and Ina may be found in her introductory quote referencing the "void," as the name Ina'nis is Latin for "empty;" and the difference between 0 and 1, which may refer to Ninomae, meaning "one."
 * Sana is larger than Earth's Sun, but shrank down to human size in order to experience Earth. The antenna on her head was a limiter which prevented her height from increasing. If removed, her gravitational field would fling Earth out of orbit and kill the entire human race.
 * Although Sana described her true height at debut as approximately 1.7 trillion centimeters (17 million kilometers), the chart depicting her to scale next to Earth's Sun showed her to be only slightly larger. Since the Sun has a diameter of 1.4 million km, a height of 170 billion cm (1.7 million km) is likely to have been the intended figure.
 * Her restricted height of 169 cm still made her the tallest member of hololive English before Nerissa Ravencroft's debut.
 * At her debut, Sana noted that without her limiter, her chest size was approximately as large as Jupiter, the largest planet in Earth's solar system. Following her February 2022 hiatus due to back injury, fans jokingly blamed her large chest for causing her back problems.
 * Although she was 13.8 billion years old, she was only a toddler in galactic terms.
 * To date, Sana is the oldest hololive member who has an age stated as a number. Takanashi Kiara is older than humans have lived on Earth (at least two million years), Mori Calliope is the personification of an abstract concept and has no age, and Ouro Kronii's age is infinity as she was time itself.
 * In her debut stream, Sana wrote her age as 138 billion years, although this was likely another error. She read it as 13(.8) billion years old, consistent with the current estimates of the age of the universe.
 * Sana was the second member of hololive English to speak fluent bird language, after Takanashi Kiara. She uses it to speak with her mascot Yatagarasu.
 * Sana speculates that she was born from a stellar nursery, a type of nebula where new stars are formed.

Likes and dislikes

 * She likes pasta, macarons, and round things like baby seals and planet Earth.
 * Her favorite anime are Kyousougiga, Uchouten Kazoku, and Katanagatari.
 * Her favorite music is EDM (including Moeshop, Camellia, Snail's House), Go Shiina, YOASOBI, and Eve.
 * Her hobbies are astronomy, astrology, graphic design, drawing, traveling, hiking, snorkeling, camping, and eating.
 * Sana plans to do astrology streams (performing astrology with the hashtag #Holoscope) and Kuso Monday, where she plays rubbish games.
 * Her dreams are to get a telescope, try astrophotography, see her mascot Yatagarasu in 3D, collect the laughter and smiles from everyone, and last a year (i.e. until 23 August 2022) without destroying the Earth. However, she already failed the last goal by taking off her limiter during her debut.
 * Sana dislikes sneezing, as her sneezes may destroy the Earth. She believes that mosquitoes are "a mistake of the universe."
 * Her favorite games are cute, bad, and psychological games.
 * Sana was a die-hard Pokémon craver, and generally considered the biggest Pokémon fan in hololive English. Her enthusiasm for the series was especially notable in her streams of the games, which tend to occur back-to-back and last extremely long.
 * In Pokémon Brilliant Diamond/Shining Pearl, she was the first member of hololive English to complete the National Dex and acquire the Shiny Charm.
 * Although her Pokémon Legends: Arceus streams lasted nearly twelve hours each, her back injury in February 2022 prevented her from completing the game on stream before permissions lapsed at the end of that month.
 * Her favorite Pokémon generation was Gen 5 (Black, White, Black 2 and White 2).

Miscellaneous

 * Sana's birthday, 10 June, was the date of a solar eclipse in 2021.
 * Sana's hair ornaments in her original outfit resemble represent sanshoku dango, a traditional Japanese rice flour confection consisting of three spheres and often eaten during cherry blossom viewing. Such dango are usually pink, white, and green. Some fans used the dango emoji in chat during her debut.
 * Sana noted that her hair resembles the Milky Way, the horizontal plane of our galaxy visible as a river of stars in Earth's night sky.
 * Her companion Yatagarasu looks like an orange worm to humanity, because if humans could perceive their full form, their brains would melt.
 * Yatagarasu also grants wishes sometimes... By vomiting them out.
 * Sana has an Australian accent, and sometimes uses Australian slang words without even realizing it. She also uses Australian slang for brand names such as "Maccas" in place of McDonald's.
 * She was from Space Australia.
 * In addition to English, Sana was learning Japanese. However, she had difficulty reading certain kanji.
 * She shares her Live2D modeller with Yukihana Lamy, Shishiro Botan and Pavolia Reine. They also rigged updated models for various hololive-affiliated VTubers, several of which can be found here.
 * She was prolific at drawing.
 * She designed the hololive English -Council- debut tapestry, the Council's first piece of merchandise.
 * Sana designed the -Council- and IRyS version of the "smol" models calling them "Beeg Smol."
 * Sana helped IRyS design her mascots Bloom & Gloom.
 * Sana's limiter, the swirly antenna on her head, only appears when she is at human size, and is absent when she is full size. A common mistake by fanartists is to draw her with the antenna while at full size.
 * She had a pet dog named Taco who passed away on 11 October 2021.
 * Ninomae Ina'nis revealed they are longtime friends while reminiscing about a day when the two had battled each other in a Pokémon game. That day, Sana easily beat her up. Unfortunately for Ina, Sana doesn't seem to remember that occasion.
 * Without her limiter, Sana is so tall that it takes light 5.663 seconds to travel from her foot to her head. Walking from one end to the other would take approximately 48 years.
 * Sana appears in the fan game BEEG Sana, where she fishes in the galaxy for planets.
 * The kimono outfit Sana and Ina wear in their duet cover of Futariboshi are decorated with flowers that have special significance. Sana's include hydrangeas representing gratitude, plum blossoms representing perseverance, protection, and good health, and hemp leaf worn as a charm to grow healthy. The two also wears a scrunchie on their wrist of the other's color, representing their close friendship.
 * The reason Sana is always barefoot is that she doesn't want to wear shoes until functioning rocket shoes are invented.

Media

 * Tsukumo Sana Ch. hololive-EN - YouTube channel
 * Tsukumo Sana's corporate profile on hololive.hololivepro.com (EN)
 * @tsukumosana - Twitter account
 * @tsukumosana - Marshmallow account

Twitter hashtags

 * #SanaLanding - Stream tag
 * #galaxillust - Fan art
 * #Sanallite - Fan tag

Statistics

 * Tsukumo Sana Ch. hololive-EN - Social Blade YouTube stats

Further readings

 * 九十九佐命 - Nicovideo Encyclopedia
 * 九十九佐命 - Pixiv Encyclopedia
 * 九十九佐命 - Moegirl Encyclopedia
 * 츠쿠모 사나 - Namu Wiki
 * Tsukumo Sana - Hololive Fan Wiki