Mao Shirase is a supporting character in the 1993 OVA series Moldiver. She is a high school student living in Tokyo in the year 2045. Within the story, Mao serves as a close friend of the protagonist, Mirai Ozora, frequently spending time with her and sharing interests in fashion, shopping, and modeling. She also acts as a friendly rival to Mirai in beauty pageants, having competed against her in events such as the ZIC race queen contest. Mao harbors a strong romantic interest in Kaoru Misaki, an astronaut and the older brother of Mirai's brother Hiroshi, a fact that occasionally creates lighthearted tension between the two girls. Her personality is generally cheerful and sociable, though she can be competitive when it comes to her ambitions. Mao does not possess any superhuman abilities and does not take part in the heroic or villainous conflicts of the series; instead, her role is primarily that of a civilian friend and love interest, grounding the story's more fantastical elements in everyday teenage life. She appears in multiple episodes of the OVA, but her character does not undergo significant development over the course of the narrative, remaining a consistent supporting presence.