Maeda Toshiie

Maeda Toshiie, more commonly known by her nickname, Inuchiyo, or as Maeda Inuchiyo, is a retainer of Oda Nobuna, and the top spear wielder in Owari province.
 * One of Nobuna Oda's most loyal followers, she never questions her Daiymo's orders, no matter how strange they may be.


 * Inuchiyo is also a very good friend of Yoshiharu Sagara and often aids him during his tasks or plans.

Appearance
Like Nobuna, Inuchiyo seems to have a taste for flamboyant fashions, and dresses in a kabukimono style. Also like Nobuna, she wears a tiger skin in her normal attire. The reason Nobuna and Inuchiyo dress alike could be because Inuchiyo and Nobuna likely grew up with each other, therefore influencing each others style (the real-life Maeda Toshiie grew up with Oda Nobunaga as his servant, and both were supposedly delinquents, with similar tastes). Inuchiyo is a petite girl, with large silver-colored eyes, and small facial features. Her hair is indigo, and she wears mostly short, but leaving a large strand on each side, tied at the ends. Her young appearance and small stature contrast her fierce fighting ability; similar to how her quiet personality contrasts her outlandish fashion-sense.

Inuchiyo wears a ragged yellow top wrapped with a green bow, gray shorts, forearm armour, a white cape, and tabi, with zōri. She wears a tiger skin in her daily attire, similar to Nobuna, except Inuchiyo wears only the top part of the head, serving as headwear. In a kabuki style, she wears two marks of red facepaint on her face.

She is almost always seen holding a spear, even in formal situations.

In the Light novels, she changed her attire to the current well known appearance after her disappearance from the Oda clan in volume 1 and her later return, apparently the reason she now wears a tiger pelt and entertainer's makeup is due to "finding herself" while she was gone. Before than she wore a typical footsoldier's uniform. Her hair, however, has always been the same in both sets of clothing.

Personality
Inuchiyo is always quiet, and usually reserved. She speaks in a deadpan manner, and usually only gives brief sentences. She has a dry sense of humour, such as when she refers to Katsuie's breast as "fat", however she herself is revealed to want to grow up to have breasts on her level, enough to drink milk, which she hates, when Yoshiharu notes girls in his time did it when they wanted to grow in that area. At times she can be playful, like when she plays along with Yoshiharu as he uses a sweetfish as bait and pretends Inuchiyo is a fish, the LN expands on this, with Nobuna also doing so and treating her somewhat like a pet dog at the time. She constantly pinches Yoshiharu's cheeks too when he's being too loud or makes outrageous comments or otherwise finds ways to antagonise her. She seems to enjoy Yoshiharu's company, even though the two have different personalities. She accompanies him on most of his tasks, such as helping him launch a surprise attack on the Imagawa camp, and usually hangs around him, like when she follows him and Katsuie to the Owari market.

She is also a close friend of Nobuna's since childhood, such that Nobuna didn't want to kill her when Nobutatsu's retainers demanded it and was forced to rely on Yoshiharu's plan to banish her. She later returned to Yoshiharu after surviving in the wilderness for some time, though elaborates no further upon this.

Her brief time in the wild appears to have affected her fashion sense, as she now wears her trademark tiger skin and face paint afterwards, she has also developed into something of a survivalist and a scavenger and seems to have influenced her gluttonous personality even more due to the starvation she faced. her only response when asked what happens it: "I lost myself while trying to find myself" which Yoshiharu finds to be both a very straight but frustratingly empty reply.

Background
It is known that Inuchiyo has been a close friend of Nobuna since they were young and is as close to her as a younger sister, she is one of the few able to recognise her lord's intelligence, even if she cannot fathom her dreams, and understood the significance of her father and the unnamed missionary in Nobuna's heart.

Arrival in the Sengoku Period Arc

 * Main Article: Arrival in the Sengoku Period Arc

Invasion of Mino Arc

 * Main Article: Invasion of Mino Arc

Kyoto Arc

 * Main Article: Kyoto Arc

Retreat at Kanegasaki Arc

 * Main Article: Retreat at Kanegasaki Arc

Oda Nobuna
Inuchiyo is one of Nobuna's oldest companions, in fact it is noted that Nobuna perceives her somewhat as a younger sister. Nobuna did not want to have to execute Inuchiyo during the incident where she was forced to harm one of Nobukatsu's retainers and agreed with Yoshiharu's plan to have her run away. While Inuchiyo does, on occasions actually get fed by Nobuna, who affectionately compares her to a dog. She is unquestionably loyal to Nobuna, as she accepted the order to burn Mount Hiei without letting any personal feelings intervene or even reconsidering it, despite Nobuna's questionable state of mind at the time.

Yoshiharu Sagara
Inuchiyo was the one to provide Yoshiharu with his first dwelling in the Sengoku Era and defended him from the likes of Katsuie and Nobukatsu purely because of Nobuna's feelings towards him. Later however, she seems to develop her own feelings on the matter. Alongside Hanbei and Goemon, she is frequently seen in Yoshiharu's company, however, unlike those two, she is not his retainer. She displays frequent jealousy whenever his preference for well endowed women is in the open or whenever someone other than her, even if that someone is Nobuna, is close to him. Alongside Mitsuhide she and Motoyasu were the ones to go deep into enemy territory to rescue him during the retreat at Kanegasaki, and she bore witness to his "death", to this, either in disbelief or out of some hope to bring back a part of him for burial, she tried to reach out to the pieces that remained of his "Body". She is even visibly upset by his death and later quite relieved to find that he actually survived.

Goemon Hachisuka
Inuchiyo was, to say the least, surprised to see Goemon the first time she ever did, as Goemon, a shinobi with a high following herself, was serving a mere footsoldier, Yoshiharu, who basically summoned her with a word. She finds Goemon's habit of biting her tongue cute, which humiliates Goemon to the point of her accidentally increasing the frequency by which she does bite her tongue. The two co-operate well together, ultimately through Yoshiharu's leadership.

Trivia

 * She is based on the real-life historical figure Maeda Toshiie, who`s nickname was also Inuchiyo.
 * Maeda Toshiie, whom she is based on, was also known to have a flamboyant fashion sense.