Shūji Ikutsuki serves as chairman of Gekkoukan High School's board and the official adviser to the Specialized Extracurricular Execution Squad (SEES), which combats Shadows during the Dark Hour. He presents a polite, sophisticated facade, frequently delivering unfunny puns and jokes while maintaining a friendly yet detached demeanor that prevents genuine connection with SEES members. Despite lacking a Persona, he navigates the Dark Hour and acts as the group's primary information source, offering strategic guidance on Shadows and Tartarus. Ikutsuki possesses extensive background involvement in the Kirijo Group's shadow experiments. As a partner to Kouetsu Kirijo, Mitsuru Kirijo's grandfather, he actively supported instigating "The Fall," an apocalyptic event where Nyx would eradicate humanity. Ten years prior to the main events, he orchestrated unethical experiments to create artificial Persona users, kidnapping over 100 children and subjecting them to torturous procedures. Only three subjects survived, later forming Strega; the others perished or endured reduced lifespans and severe mental trauma. Ikutsuki also doctored evidence, notably altering a video by Yukari Takeba's father to mislead SEES into believing destroying the twelve Arcana Shadows would end the Dark Hour. His manipulation drives SEES to eliminate the Arcana Shadows, unknowingly fusing them into the thirteenth Arcana, Death, which summons Nyx. After the final Shadow's defeat, Ikutsuki enacts his betrayal. He reprograms the android Aigis to sacrifice SEES members atop Tartarus and captures Takeharu Kirijo. When Aigis resists due to her bond with the protagonist, Ikutsuki dismisses her as a "defective machine." He shoots Takeharu during the confrontation but suffers a fatal wound in return. After Koromaru disarms his remote control for Aigis, Ikutsuki leaps from Tartarus, committing suicide while lamenting his failed plan to rule a post-apocalyptic world. Ikutsuki's influence persists beyond his death. His past is further exposed, revealing he adopted Sho Minazuki as a child and made him a test subject, implanting a Plume of Dusk to induce a Persona. This experiment fractured Sho into a primary personality and the aggressive alter ego "Minazuki." After Minazuki attempted to kill Ikutsuki for endangering Sho, Ikutsuki tried to erase Minazuki, triggering Sho's coma. Ikutsuki then abandoned Sho in a hospital, funding indefinite medical care. Sho later creates illusions of Ikutsuki to torment former SEES members, mimicking his penchant for puns. Ikutsuki's nihilistic worldview stemmed from solitude and a twisted acceptance of death as deliverance. He sought global annihilation not for salvation like Strega, but to become a god-like ruler of a new world. This ambition starkly contrasted his benign public persona, revealed as a calculated façade.