Arataka Reigen

Arataka Reigen is the self-proclaimed greatest psychic of the 21st century in Mob Psycho 100, a con-man exorcist running the Spirits and Such Consultation Office. He has no psychic ability whatsoever, yet he mentors Shigeo "Mob" Kageyama with shoulder massages, table salt and advice genuinely worth hearing.

Background

Reigen works out of a small rented room in Seasoning City, a one-man business built on flyers and a business card he clearly enjoyed designing. The series keeps his past deliberately thin: no tragedy, no training, just a young man who decided he could talk his way into a living. Everything changes when a quiet elementary schooler walks in asking for help controlling something he cannot switch off. Reigen improvises a lesson about breathing and self-control, and accidentally becomes the only adult that boy will ever listen to.

Skills & Methods

Reigen cannot see spirits, sense auras or bend a spoon. What he brings instead is a con artist's toolkit aimed at mostly decent ends: cold reading, brisk confident patter, and a knack for working out what a frightened client actually needs within seconds. His signature exorcism is a shoulder massage and a pinch of table salt, which works because most of his cases are stress, loneliness or a bad landlord rather than ghosts. When something genuinely supernatural turns up, he sends Mob in and narrates. He takes the non-spiritual jobs too: lost pets, pest control, whatever covers rent. His real skills are nerve, improvisation under pressure and an unnervingly accurate read on people.

Personality

His vanity is specific and funny: he poses for photographs, inflates his credentials without a flicker, and would sooner invent an answer than admit ignorance. He is also stubbornly principled where it counts, forbidding Mob from using his powers on other people, refusing jobs that would put him in danger, and breaking off mid-scam to give advice he genuinely believes. He panics almost constantly and lets none of it reach his face. Under the salesmanship is a man who treats a teenager's feelings as a serious problem worth solving.

Relationships

• Shigeo "Mob" Kageyama — boss and mentor on paper, and in practice the adult Mob brings every non-psychic problem to.
• Ekubo (Dimple) — a former evil spirit turned freeloader who mocks Reigen constantly and occasionally borrows his body.
• Teruki Hanazawa — an esper who starts out unimpressed and gradually works out that the fraud is the wisest person present.
• Ritsu Kageyama — Mob's younger brother, suspicious of the man employing him and won over only slowly.

Role in the Story

In a series about a boy who could flatten a city block, Reigen is the argument that power is not the point. He keeps insisting that being strong is just one trait among many, and that everything worth having comes from effort and decency. Comedically he is the engine. Dramatically, the show eventually turns its attention on Reigen himself and asks whether a man built on lies has earned the loyalty he receives.

Frequently asked

Does Arataka Reigen actually have psychic powers?

No. Reigen is an entirely ordinary man, and every technique he performs is theatre, misdirection or plain common sense. The rare uncanny moments around him come from someone else's power passing through, never his own.

Is Reigen a good mentor to Mob?

He is a fraud and a stingy boss, and he is still the best thing that happened to Mob. He gives him structure, company and a moral line he will not cross, which is more than any esper in the cast manages. Our Mob Psycho 100 character guide covers how he fits alongside the rest.