Character Profile: Shura

Shura is supposedly Yomi's son. Shura was made from an artificial womb that was created to make a clone of Yomi. So Shura's basically just Yomi's clone.

Personally, Shura's a little off for his age. He's a child growing up with the heart of a baby, the power of Urameshi Yusuke, and the open mind of a Maikai king! This all makes growing up for this kid hard. He's a prince, son, and occasionally Yomi's sparring partner.

Confusing as it sounds, Raizen's territory (the deserts of Maikai) goes to Shura after the Maikai Tournament (er, Yuske's tournament for Raizen's territory).

After the Maikai tournaments, Shura STILL dislikes the Kitsune Kurama, which kinda sucks, but then kids are kids. Originally, Kurama was the essential enemy of Shura. Kurama was SUPPOSED to take the throne AFTER Yomi... you can imagine Shura's anger at this.

Shura was made to fight. His ENTIRE life was made for fighting. It's Shura's SOUL and heart... Yomi is evil, making kids grow up on fighting like that!

The above description of Shura indicates that Yomi was cruel since he made a child who existed only for fighting. However, I disagree. In the Makai Tournament Yusuke and Yomi have a friendly competition because it's not just about who's going to be King of Hell, they want to test themselves to see how strong they really. That is what Shura wants. He wants to win the tournament when he grows up to test himself, but also to become the king himself. Anyway Yomi does really care for him otherwise why would he have created him in an artificial womb. Also I think that's how Yomi's race reproduces since I didn't see any females from his race.... maybe he's the only one of his kind.

The cheering that Shura gives his father during his match with Yusuke should indicate that he cares about Yomi as well. I'm pretty sure both Yomi and Shura want Shura to surpass Yomi one day, as it is a common theme in shonen anime where both father and son dream of how the son will one day surpass the father (like the way Ryoma wants to surpass his father's tennis skills in Prince of Tennis).

Also, I think Shura is potentially the most powerful character in Yu Yu Hakusho. He is only a kid yet he was somewhat able to keep up with Yomi during their fight. One can only imagine how powerful he'll be once he's an adult. The anime seems to imply that he'll be the true king of Makai one day because he's a child who's left to train to reach his full potential while people like Kurama, Hiei, Mukuro, Yusuke, and Yomi have already reached their full potential. And besides, we saw in the second to last episode how Yusuke and Yomi's power levels had shocked everyone. And since Shura was specially created by Yomi to one day surpass him in power, he's definitely going to have it all one day.