Tonpa

Tonpa (トンパ, Tonpa) is the self-proclaimed Rookie Crusher of the Hunter Exam. Tonpa was Examinee #16 in the 287th Hunter Examination and Examinee #36 in the 288th Hunter Examination.

Appearance


Tonpa is a short, fat man with tan skin, brown hair, and thick eyebrows. He wears a large, blue v-neck shirt, with a white symbol resembling a lowercase "i" on its right side, over a matching pair of light, blue-grey sweats. He often carries a satchel.

Personality
After attempting to pass the cruel Hunter Exam several times, Tonpa began to enjoy the failures of newbies, to the point he actively began to try and crush their ambitions at the cost of never passing the exam himself. He is so fascinated by his hobby that he does not hesitate to put the candidates in potentially lethal situations, although he seemed to be slightly worried when Killua drank what he thought to be a lethal dose of laxative. He puts up a friendly facade to earn the trust of rookies and then deceive them.

Background
Tonpa is nicknamed the "Rookie Crusher" by other candidates with more experience taking the exam. Tonpa has taken the exam for 34 terms, but has never passed due to his goal of ruining the dreams of others. He often brags of his experience to those taking the Hunter Exam for the first time and then offers them a helping hand. Of course, this is merely subterfuge as he takes a perverse pleasure in sabotaging their attempts to get the license. Tonpa first took the Hunter Exam when he was ten years old. Despite the fact that he is incredibly arrogant, Leorio points out that failing the exam 34 times isn't exactly something to be proud of.

Hunter Exam arc


Tonpa introduces himself to Gon, Kurapika and Leorio as well as other rookie applicants in the underground tunnel. He acts nice in order to gain their trust, only to sabotage their chances of passing the exam. Before the exam begins, he hands out soft drinks to other examinees, with laxatives in them, so the participants have to forfeit before even starting. He gives one to Gon, Kurapika, and Leorio, but Gon tastes it and thinks the drink has gone bad, to which Kurapika dumps it unceremoniously and Leorio spits it out. He also gives one to Killua, who is unaffected by the laxative due to his resistance to poisons and other things of that nature and one to Nicole, who looks up the database on his computer and refuses on grounds of his subterfuge.

In the third phase of the Hunter exam, he is teamed up with Gon, Killua, Kurapika and Leorio. He tries to make them fail the exam by attempting to maneuver them against each other, playing especially on Leorio's failures and insecurity, and by surrendering in his battle against Bendot, but fails to do so and reaches to 4th phase hoping to make someone fail; Killua even notes that Tonpa's surrender against Bendot was more helpful than it was meant to be, as Bendot would have crushed Tonpa's throat to keep him from surrendering and then would have prolonged the battle for all of 72 hours, thus forcing them to fail. On Zevil Island, Tonpa maneuvers Sommy to steal Leorio's badge by claiming sickness, but fails when Kurapika intercepts him and Sommy and takes both their badges and returns Leorio's badge.

Greed Island arc


Tonpa is seen participating in the 288th Hunter Examination holding the same soft drinks he spiked during the Hunter Exam Arc, and he very nervously avoids Killua in the crowd due to recognizing him from the previous exam. After the 288th Hunter Exam's 1st Phase Examiner's speech, he's quickly eliminated by being knocked out by Killua, along with the rest of the applicants.

Abilities & Powers
According to Nicole, Tonpa's performances in the Hunter Exams are rather impressive, and he would have already passed it if that were his real objective. Combining his intuition and skills in deceit with great survival skills, Tonpa has managed to survive more than thirty Hunter Exams, which cause the death of many applicants every year. Tonpa is a master of subterfuge. He is adept at making other applicants trust him and then "crush" them. He is aided in this personal crusade by his ability to figure out what someone is thinking and use that information to manipulate them. Despite his unfit appearance, Tonpa managed to finish the terrible run of the first phase of the 287th Hunter Exam, kill a Great Stamp and retrieve the egg of a Spider Eagle.

Trivia

 * By the time of the 287th Hunter Exam, he had participated to 35 Hunter Exams; despite this, he ranked only second in the examinees' record. However, he already held the first place in the number of successive participations, which amounted to 30.
 * In the 1999 anime, instead of offering laxative juice, Tonpa "crushes" applicants in the first phase by taking them to a tunnel with cedar that produces a smell that makes people hallucinate.