Computer
When a man named Professor Nemuro entered Ohtori Academy to begin research, he was a rather unassuming man. He completed the work given without questions, even when the secrecy of the project prevented anyone from knowing what even the next group over was doing.
Nemuro was a brilliant man, although his age barely separated him from the hundred youths contracted to research under his direction. It was his very genius and attitude that made a student remark "the man himself is quite dry" and earn him the nickname of computer-like man. Although, even at this time, I believe he realized the pointlessness of his uninspired work, making the comment "machines themselves hold no purpose."
Back in those days, Nemuro seemed to truly be a computer or robot, unfeeling and uncaring. As C-ko points out in her shadow play, "a robot does not worry, a robot is not lonely." He even seems to have a distaste for the research, wondering if You-Know-Who is trying to make something as impossible as a perpetual motion machine, and thinking they should humbly give thanks to God, rather than grasp for eternity.
Family Man
It is the arrival of Chida Tokiko that heralds a change in Nemuro. She is sent in to direct the research at Ohtori (possibly by Akio himself?) and soon begins a friendship with Professor Nemuro. When Nemuro begins to open up to Tokiko's friendship, he realizes what has been missing in his life - family. To her younger ailing brother (Mamiya), Nemuro plays a surrogate father, and it soon becomes obvious he is in love with Tokiko herself. However, it is unclear of whether she reciprocates his feelings, I do not believe so myself. Although she does ask him if he has ever been in love (and even muses that people known as geniuses cannot feel love), I think this may have been out of curiosity or friendship. No matter what Tokiko's feelings, Nemuro's were engaged, and it led him to a revolution or rebirth of sorts.
Once the "family unit" of the Chida's and Nemuro is in place, he breaks out of his shell, no longer the dry, computer man of before. He throws himself headlong into the research, for the sake of Mamiya, and therefore Tokiko. Because of the boy's sickness, his sister started the project, hoping to gain eternity for her loved one, before the illness takes him. When Nemuro sees her distress, he sees a point in the research he did not before. Instead of mindlessly fumbling towards something eternal, he is now driven towards it, by desire to make Tokiko happy through saving Mamiya.
It is during these days that I believe all three are at their happiest. Nemuro has found a point to live and do his research; he has learned to love and gained a family. Tokiko is still with her brother and has found friendship with Nemuro. And Mamiya seems to get along well with the professor, even seemingly making attempts to place Nemuro in his sister's favor, saying "I'll be sure to tell my sister that you're worried about me" when the latter stopped by to see him one day.
Pawn
As Professor Nemuro finds an awakening or rebirth through his newfound "family" in Tokiko and Mamiya, plans are being carried out by You-Know-Who, or End of the World. This man turns out to be Ohtori Akio, the junior chairman of Ohtori. It is his manipulation that placed Nemuro in the academy in the first place, and gave him the push to his revolution. The dry Nemuro could not have found eternity, much like the grieving Utena was stuck in her coffin. But, when Akio showed Nemuro the chance to live and love, he left the coffin and passionately sought out something that will last forever. (Perhaps so that he could keep his love for Tokiko forever as well?) Akio used this desire, and twisted it to his own needs. He needed someone to open up the path to the castle which holds eternity, and chose Nemuro to do so, but not as Nemuro, perhaps.
Akio came up to Nemuro in his office and placed a ring, a rose signet, in the empty teacup sitting on the desk, Nemuro's "indirect kiss" from Tokiko, whose lip-mark was still on the cup. He explained the ring is a symbol of the contract he held with the hundred youths working on the research, and invited Nemuro to do the same, saying "the way before you has been prepared" as he disappears into the hallway. Nemuro picks up the ring and tries to follow Akio. After going around a little while, he peers into a cracked doorway, where he sees Tokiko embraced by, and kissing, Akio himself. It is at this moment, as another coffin is being wheeled by a youth behind him, that Nemuro places the signet on his finger, a final break from his past happiness, as Akio pulls him deeper into his game.
Sacrifice
The infamous fire that burned down Nemuro Memorial Hall is a legend at Ohtori during Mikage's time in the academy. (However, after his "graduation" it is another strangely forgotten aspect of life there.) Shortly after Nemuro witnessed Tokiko's "betrayal" and he placed the signet on his finger, there was another strange occurrence. Mamiya came to him, finally telling him that he wants eternity. Up until this point, Mamiya wanted to live and die as naturally as he could. He felt that the flowers his sister dried were unnatural, musing to Nemuro "But I wonder if the flowers themselves are happy, being forced to last so long." Once he insisted upon wanting them to reach eternity for him, Nemuro is reenergized in his quest, but this time finds more than just research necessary, this time a sacrifice is required.
The sacrifice placed before him by Akio is the deaths of the hundred youths, trapped inside the burning building. It is the manipulations of this mysterious person that leads Nemuro to what he does and becomes. But, why does Akio require this sacrifice, and why does Nemuro have to carry it out? These answers are intertwined. Although Nemuro sees the coming sacrifice as necessary to grasp eternity by opening the road to the castle, or by having the Duel Arena appear, it is not so. The sacrifice becomes not only on the hundred unwitting youths, but also on Nemuro himself, as he is required to light the fire in order to test his devotion to Mamiya, since Akio needs a pawn with an idea they need to desperately latch onto. It is this very devotion to Mamiya, and vicariously Tokiko, that leads Mikage into believing Anthy truly is his Mamiya. Also, by lighting the fire, Nemuro sacrifices himself, his past and memories, and is reborn into the image Akio desired in the first place - Souji Mikage.
Memories
From the indeterminate time before when the fire burnt down Nemuro Memorial Hall, until the present time, Nemuro lived as Mikage, the "imaginary living being" devised by Akio. But, at the end, he is once again Professor Nemuro, but there are none to remember him anymore. During his duel with Utena, Mikage sees an image of Mamiya/Anthy who tells him "you're going to lose now" at which point he looks clearly around him. All of his delusions and false memories, cherished for so long, are stripped away. The photograph in the frame of every desk in the duel area becomes real, and Mamiya looks like Tokiko's brother, rather than a male Anthy. The illusions vanish as Nemuro is confronted with his real memories, thus losing the duel.
The last scene in "Qualifications of a Duelist" is when Akio answers the phone, Nemuro on the other end. Nemuro seems to have his memories back, but calls desperately seeking a denial from what he knows is true. However, Akio assures him "The period where you hid the possibility in your heart, not growing up, was useful."
"Memory is strange thing... I remember you."
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