Ai Hayasaka

Ai is a beautiful young girl with blonde hair that is usually tied up at the left side of her head with a blue scrunchie and blue-eyes. She changes her appearance and choice of clothing to suit different roles and carries out her duties as Kaguya's maid.

She wears a maid outfit when tending to the Shinomiya household. As a student at Shuchi'in Academy, she wears a modified high school uniform to match up with kogal fashion and a sweater wrapped around her waist. As Haysaca-chan, she dresses up in a Firis Girls' High sailor uniform with her hair down and a small braid tied on the right side, while as Haysaca-kun, she sports a butler uniform and a short, black hair wig.

During the class trip, she cuts off her ponytail to prevent one of Un'yo Shinomiya's men from continuing to hold on to it. She ends up styling it into a bob with a star and crescent moon hairpin on the left side, her old scrunchie now being used as a wristband on her left hand.

Ai Hayasaka is currently alive. She is an 18-year-old girl with blue eyes and blond hair, standing at exactly 162 cm tall. Her birthday is April 2, making her zodiac sign Aries, and her blood type is AB. She lives in Sengaku-ji, Minato Ward. She has several nicknames, including Smithee A, Herthaka-chan (given by Miyuki Shirogane), Herthaka-kun (given by Chika Fujiwara), and Rat (mockingly used by Un'yo Shinomiya). Although she is female, she is capable of acting convincingly as a male when using her “Herthaka-kun” persona. Ai is a senior student in class 3-A, but she has also lived a double life for years. She has worked as a Shinomiya Group employee, serving as Kaguya Shinomiya's personal valet, while also acting as a bodyguard. In the present, she is technically a NEET, although her skills and experience far exceed those of an ordinary unemployed person. Her parents are Nao Hayasaka (mother) and Masato Hayasaka (father). Despite her sharp tongue and composed professionalism, Ai holds complicated feelings toward Kaguya Shinomiya, once confessing: "Did you know, Kaguya-sama? You've always been so incredibly dear to me. It made me happy that you depended on me. It pained me to see you hurt. And I was so glad to see how much fun you were having after you joined the student council. So for me to have betrayed you for the last ten years..."

Despite her young age, Ai can quickly shift to different types of personalities to suit various kinds of situations and scenarios. She has four distinct personas which, aside from having a specific purpose, has its own unique background and upbringing.

As a maid, she is level-headed who carries out duties flawlessly and while she occasionally gives her mistress grief over her absurd demands, she still loves her deeply. In her school camouflage version, she is a fashion-conscious schoolgirl with a charm for rule-breaking and her liveliness is her trademark. The anti-Miyuki version, Haysaca-chan, is a doe-eyed maneater who picks up men in Roppongi and Azabu and leads them around by the nose. Haysaca-kun exists to counter the unpredictable Chika Fujiwara and has the backstory of an Irish orphan who later graduated at Harvard then ended up as a butler who became a crybaby when remembering his past.

In reality, she is just a kind girl who deeply loves her mistress, whom she considers a sister and is willing to go against the Shinomiya house within reason like sneaking Kaguya out of the main house to see the summer fireworks.

She is also known to be very sensitive about the fact that she has never had any experience of dating a guy.

Since the Kyoto class trip, Hayasaka seems to have dropped her gyaru persona around her friends, who now see her as somewhat distant and harsh. They interpret this as a sign of heartbreak.

The Hayasaka family was once prominent, but lost their conflict to the Shinomiya family and, noted for their outstanding bloodline, were absorbed into it. Ai was born in the Shinomiya family's main house as a thoroughbred servant and was given a special education. She was born into and grew up in an isolated world like Kaguya Shinomiya was, but Ai is less sheltered.

Ai's father was Kaguya's godfather, and her mother was Kaguya's wet nurse. They were raised together for a short period after their births. Still, Kaguya was moved to the Shinomiya main house on her second birthday, and they were only reunited at the age of seven when their status as master and servant was made official. Their master/servant relationship is only on the surface. However, their actual relationship more resembles that of inseparable sisters. Kaguya gave Ai a scrunchie while asking to be her friend. While Ai refused, she did use the hair tie, and it was the main accessory of hers.

After her traitorous loyalty to Kaguya's older brother is revealed, Kaguya tries to forgive for the first time, due to the positive change the SC has had on her and her closeness to Ai. Currently, the servant-master relationship between Ai and Kaguya was severed, and the former is now free after forcefully resigning from her post.

As the omake chapter epilogue shows, after graduating from high school and gaining complete freedom, Ai has effectively turned into a NEET and Fujiwara's freeloader (originally, she wanted to temporarily settle in Kaguya's house, but she was kicked out after 3 days due to laziness), lazily spending all day watching short videos and complaining about her lack of motivation to look for a job. If we consider the chapter with the flashforward to be completely canon, then Fujiwara, in desperation, even calls her a big child. However, the chapter implies that in the end, Ai simply stayed in the teenage phase a bit longer than her friends, since unlike them, she never had the opportunity to enjoy

The name Ai means "love, affection" (愛). Ai's surname Hayasaka means "already, now, fast, early" (早) (haya) and "slope, hill" (坂) (saka).

Ai puts a deck chair in the bath when soaking.

Ai is shown to have a wide array of technical knowledge, such as being able to build her computer and being up to date with the specs of the latest smartphones, able to build devices into her beret and other clothing.

Ai is said to enjoy "hydraulic press" videos.

Ai is the second person to describe Miyuki's singing like a sea cucumber's intestines.

Ai is the daughter of Shinomiya's group manager.

Ai is one-quarter (25%) Irish.

Ai wears corrective contact lenses.

Ai has a notebook full of fantasies.

Nao Hayasaka is Ai's mother. The two of them are shown to have a close relationship, although Ai is often annoyed by her mother's job keeping them from spending much time together.

Masato Hayasaka is Ai's father.

Kaguya Shinomiya is Hayasaka's former master, but since they have been together since childhood they fully understand each other's strengths and flaws. Despite the differences in standing they treat each other as sisters. She is Kaguya's close confidante and frequently offers advice (and sometimes even takes action herself) to help progress Kaguya's relationship with Shirogane.

Hayasaka was secretly jealous of Kaguya, feeling that she wasn't fully appreciated for all the support she gave, and that she hadn't been able to enjoy her own high school life due to her job working for the Shinomiyas. This comes to a head when she pretends to seduce Shirogane at a mixer to tease Kaguya, when in reality she was explaining her situation to him; this eventually results in Shirogane encouraging her to take off her public persona and show weakness (through a rap battle). She is then able to put her feelings into words and speak to Kaguya about her frustrations honestly. Kaguya manages to lessen her workload and the two stay close as ever.

It is later revealed that Hayasaka was placed to work under Kaguya on orders by Oko Shinomiya, with the intention to spy on Kaguya and have Hayasaka report her every movement, for an unknown purpose. Hayasaka has gone to great lengths to deceive her superiors but is ultimately afraid of the secrets she knows. Because her relationship with Kaguya was initially constructed with sinister purposes, Hayasaka feels tremendous guilt towards Kaguya.

Oko was Hayasaka's true employer, who assigned her to spy on Kaguya. They are never shown interacting beyond this capacity and it is unknown what has become of their relationship since her retirement from serving the Shinomiya family.

Hayasaka and Shirogane become texting buddies after meeting up at a mixer, where Hayasaka reveals that she was an employee of the Shinomiya family. Their philosophies differed on whether humans could be loved for their truly flawed selves, rather than for the perfect 'masks' one wears in public. In an attempt to show vulnerability and prove his point, Shirogane attempted to rap, which led to her being traumatized. Shirogane would later call him onto campus to rap once more, admitting that he wears a mask in public but strives to make that false, perfect identity into his true self. This has a profound effect on Hayasaka, who is finally able to speak (through rap) her true feelings for Kaguya. She gave him chocolates on Valentine's Day and befriended him once again as Ai Hayasaka, not Hasaka A Smithee.

Hayasaka is one of the few people to call Shirogane by his given name. Their relationship is strictly platonic, and she admitted to Kaguya that she has zero interest in pursuing a romantic relationship with him.

Hayasaka is shown to immensely enjoy teasing Shirogane, both while under her Smithee guise and as her real self. After she and Shirogane talk about his bad eyesight and needing glasses or contacts, she leaves teasing him about Kaguya having an eyeball licking fetish, to which Kaguya herself was very open to. Un'yo was able to easily deduce that Shirogane was extremely important to Haysaka and would assign her to be Shirogane's bodyguard against the Shinomiya Family to prevent him from being taken hostage. Taking countermeasures and would constantly watch over him outside of Shuchi'in Academy.

Due to Chika's close relationship with Kaguya, she has interacted with Hayasaka (and her alter-egos) on multiple occasions. Hayasaka considers Chika to be a "natural disaster" whose behavior is absolutely unpredictable, and capable of causing chaos simply by being present. Chika has foiled so many missions that she has her own special designation: Subject F. the record versus Fujiwara is 17 battles, 9 wins and 8 losses.

Hayasaka in her 'Gal Mode' appears to be on friendly terms with Chika, greeting each other naturally and speaking casually with one another. However, being in Gal Mode for extended periods of time is quite stressful and makes her unable to hold back retorts to Chika's nonsensical actions.

As Hayasaka relies on this persona at school, she cannot use it at home and risks blowing her cover when Chika comes to visit. In such cases, she cross-dresses as a male butler ("Haysaca-kun"), who Fujiwara considers to be quite attractive. When asked if 'he' and Kaguya were involved romantically, Haysaca-kun truthfully discloses that 'he' is attracted to men. This further complicates things when Shirogane asks to meet Hayasaka (who comes in disguise) at school to rap, with Fujiwara misconstruing the two as having a homosexual relationship.

The two eventually become good friends, even working together to help Kaguya avoid her family's plans. In one scene, Chika even being pleasantly impressed by Ai's masculinity and confidence, extremely embarrassedly states that she won't mind if "Hayasaka kisses her, but only once", still thinking that Ai might have some kind of crush on her. Anyway, at the end of the arc, you can see that Chika stood around for almost the entire scene peeking out from behind Ai, thus showing that she trusts him enough as a friend and protector.

The alleged flashword in Hayasaka's last chapter and her page in the latest manga omake imply that Ai eventually becomes an unemployed freeloader in Fujiwara's household, who spends all her time watching short videos and generally acts like a spoiled teenager. Although this seems to irritate Fujiwara unusually, who gets annoyed at the abuse of her hospitality (Ai previously tried to temporarily stay at Kaguya's house, but was kicked out of there due to laziness) and even at some point shouts "someone, take this big baby!", the epilogue implies that by staying in the teenage phase a little longer than her friends, Ai is simply enjoying the teenage time she never had before, and so those around her look sympathetically with understanding at her behavior.

Hayasaka initially meets Ishigami through Maki and Shirogane when the four of them hang out after school at a batting cage. The two quickly bond over a mutual interest in technology, and Hayasaka gives him advice on how to study undistracted by electronics. Their Relationship continued to Blossom over the years and they are now on first name Terms.

Hayasaka regularly hangs out with both of them during school hours but they rarely meet up at any other time due to her work as Kaguya's valet (they are under the impression that she has a part-time job). They both consider her to be a close friend and refuse to spread rumors about her behind her back. What makes Hayasaka exclaim in surprise "what?!"

Karen and Erika are Kaguya fangirls that Hayasaka befriended and joined their unofficial club in order to keep an eye on them. Both are convinced that she is a fellow Kaguya fangirl. After retiring as Kaguya's maid, she would also leave their club but they would remain friends and would ask her for insights on Kaguya.

As a member of the Shinomiya family, Maki Shijo's was one of the only people in Shuchi'in Academy aware of Hayasaka's status as Kaguya's valet prior to her retirement. Hayasaka and Maki are not very close, only interacting when Miyuki or Kaguya bring them together, but they display strong respect for each other.