Characters / Arknights Defenders A To M

Arknights Characters
Operators: Vanguards (A-M | N-Z) | Snipers (A-M | N-Z) | Guards (A-H | I-Q | R-Z) | Defenders (A-M | N-Z) | Casters (A-G | H-M | N-Z) | Medics (A-M | N-Z) | Supporters (A-M | N-Z) | Specialists (A-M | N-Z)
Factions: Rhodes Island | The Reunion Movement | Dublinn | The Military Commission of Kazdel | Allied Factions | Enemy Factions | Miscellaneous factions & characters | Nation States (A-M | N-Z) | Enemy Units Index

Asbestos

Asbestos

Introduced: Contingency Contract Pyrite
Voiced by: Kei Shindō (Japanese), Rose (Mandarin Chinese), TBA (English), Chong Yu-mi (Korean)
Artist: TEAM EXPANDR

Don't read too much into things. She doesn't hate anyone, but naturally, she doesn't like anyone either.

^{Click to see Elite 2 appearance.}

^{Click to see her 0011/Tempest: Glen Sonata skin.}

Asbestos, contracted explorer to Rhodes Island, is very reluctant to serve under you.

Rarity: ★★★★★

ID: No. 378

Subclass: Arts Protector

Tags: DPS, Defense

Skills: Resilient Mode, Thermal Power Mode

Talents: Moist Skin

Affiliation: RIM Billiton

Race: Savra

Birthday: July 30

Height: 156cm

"Even though out exploring for a better portion of the year, you still plan to have me on the payroll and even assign me a dorm? And you seriously want an operator like that? ...Oh, you do? Huh? Tsk, something wrong with your head?"

A former explorer with a belligerent personality, stationed at Rhodes for treatment at Magallan's recommendation.

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• Animal Motifs: Fire salamanders. In fact, asbestos was thought to be made out of fire salamander skin due to its extreme heat-resistant properties.
• Face Death with Dignity: Asbestos is aware of the severity of her Oripathy, however she also expresses no desire to be treated. Her preferred way to go is to keep traveling the planet until it takes her. Rhodes Island would do their best to not let her have her way.
• Foil: Asbestos is frequently compared to Magallan in her bio.
  • While both are intrepid explorers, Magallan is a trained professional who does so under the funding and auspices of Rhine Labs, and only seems to long for the Northern arctics, where her fellow penguins live. Asbestos on the other hand likes to travel the world on her own volition, with no formal training, and is mostly self-taught.
  • Both she and Magallan are solitary by nature, though whereas Magallan copes with her isolation by holding on to the hopes that someone is waiting for her to return, Asbestos finds comfort in doing the things she likes, and usually doesn't want company.
  • Magallan is naive, cheerful and friendly, and is loved by basically everyone she meets, while Asbestos is cynical, abrasive, rude, and likes being a jerk to everyone.
• Improbable Weapon User: Her shield is actually a door, and not even the heavily-reinforced kind like that of Gummy. Downplayed in that, while it started out as a mere door, the many functionalities that Asbestos added to it later do make it more suitable as a weapon, albeit defensively.
• Insult Backfire: Calling Magallan "Shrimpy" is not everyone considers a compliment, and is, in-fact, meant to be an insult towards her. However Magallan, being Magallan, doesn't take issue with it.
• Ironic Name: She's named after the highly heat-resistant mineral, while Asbestos herself attacks by spewing fire from her shield.
• I Work Alone: Due to the solitary nature of her profession, Asbestos has gotten used to doing everything herself, and doesn't seek the company of anyone else. She has a surprising degree of autonomy as an explorer, and doesn't like it when forced to do things according to rules and regulations, as evident by her constant complaints when set as team leader and deployed onto the field.
• Jerkass: Asbestos is constantly rude, confrontational, and dismissive, even at maximum Trust, and she seems to be deliberately going out of her way to be as obnoxious as possible. While her profile states that she can be friendly and approachable if she wants to, the main issue is that she doesn't, and isn't too bothered with people potentially seeing her as The Friend Nobody Likes. According to her own words, it is her "life goal" to be "an absolute jerk" to everyone at Rhodes Island, friends be damned - she doesn't even spare her best friend, Magallan, the insults she receives from Asbestos (if her calling the latter "Shrimpy" is any indication).
• Lady Drunk: Her profile mentions Asbestos occasionally forcing the Doctor to drink alcohol with her.
• The Millstone: She has the same basic RIIC skill as Popukar, albeit under a different name (Maverick). Putting Asbestos in a Factory will result in a massive productivity loss, manifested by the reduced storage capacity and increased morale drain for herself. Considering her Jerkass attitude towards Rhodes Island, it's more than likely that Asbestos is deliberately sabotaging the job for kicks. It's amazing that she even manages to boost the production rate (by 25%) at all. However, if she is promoted to Elite 2, Asbestos gains an additional RIIC skill, Explorer, which not only counteracts the ramped up morale drain but also improves the Factory's storage capacity by 4 points.
• More Teeth than the Osmond Family: She possesses rows of jagged, shark-like teeth.
• Noodle Incident: Asbestos mentions getting to know Magallan at something called the "Black Flow", which she describes as being the "the wildest, craziest adventure" she's ever been on.
• Not So Stoic: Asbestos usually puts up a "tough girl" external, and for the most part she does seem that way. However, if someone touch her tail, she will let out an uncharacteristically high-pitched squeal, and threaten to get physical to "help" that person forget about her blunder.
• No Social Skills: Invoked. As a self-proclaimed Jerkass, she exhibits anti-social behavior, insults everyone she meets, and she lacks any form of social grace and tact in conversations. She doesn't even mind being hated at Rhodes Island, because she likes it that way.
• Playing with Fire: While her Thermal Power Mode skill is active, Asbestos launches fireballs out of her shield, dealing AOE Arts damage.
• Power Glows: It can be a bit hard to tell due to the small size of the screen, depending on which device you're playing on, but Asbestos' tail gains a bright orange glow when she's using her skill, in the colorful pattern that the animal she was designed after is known for in real life.
• Prehensile Tail: Asbestos has one, which she uses to carry her lantern.
• Rock Theme Naming: The mineral she's named after is known to be toxic, perhaps mirroring how Asbestos constantly acts in a toxic manner to everyone around her.
• Sensual Spandex: Asbestos wears a form-fitting bodysuit underneath that bulky coat of hers.
• Situational Sword: Asbestos has mostly the same niche as Matterhorn, being geared mainly to deal with enemies who inflict a lot of Arts damage. Her talent, Moist Skin, is perhaps one of the most niche and potentially useless in the game outside of its element, since if there are no Arts enemies around to hit her, Asbestos cannot take advantage of it to quickly gain SP, which both of her skill demand a considerable amount of to activate.
• Tsundere: It's implied that her abrasive demeanor is a means for Asbestos to cope with the loneliness she feels as an explorer. Through observations noted in her file, she seems to have taken a shine to the Doctor, who by their profession has to establish a good rapport with her. While she's still very rude to them, it's clear that Asbestos likes to hang around the Doctor, and it's implied that she trusts them enough to invite them to join her in her favorite activities that she usually enjoys alone, such as drinking and going spelunking. Not that she would ever admit it to their face, however.
• Walking the Earth: Asbestos is a natural explorer and outdoorswoman. She likes to wander around Terra and has a preference for exploring caves, all of which are done on her own accord. It was during such an expedition that she contracted Oripathy in the first place.

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Ashlock

Ashlock / Greynuty Kaliska

Introduced: Maria Nearl (First Appearance), Pinus Sylvestris (Playable Debut)
Voiced by: Hitomi Ueda (Japanese), D.QQ (Mandarin Chinese), Diana Bermudez (English), Lee Ji-young (Korean)
Artist: NoriZC

Opponents must choose between being ground beneath a shield or being laid low by cannon fire.

^{Click to see Elite 2 appearance.}

^{Click to see her Epoque Passe: Lances of the Kaliska skin.}

'Ashlock' Knight Greynuty stands ready to face any challenge.

Rarity: ★★★★★

ID: No. 431

Subclass: Fortress

Tags: DPS, Defense

Skills: ATK Up γ, Focused Bombardment

Talents: Bombardment Studies

Affiliation: Pinus Sylvestris Knightclub - Kazimierz

Race: Zalak

Birthday: March 20

Height: 164cm

"I'm 'Ashlock' Greynuty of Pinus Sylvestris Knightclub. Thank you for taking us in."

An infected knight who founded Pinus Sylvestris alongside Flametail after being expelled from her family due to her infection.

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• Affectionate Nickname: Flametail calls her "Ashley," presumably as a corruption of her knight title. The other members of Pinus Sylvestris have picked up on this and banter over whether they can refer to her as Ashley as well.
• Ancestral Weapon: Her mortar lance is a family heirloom passed down to her by her grandmother. She is notably the first family member to be a cannonlancer after a very long time. It's also pointed out that the thing is very much Awesome, but Impractical (it's a long-range artillery weapon meant for battlefields and not the enclosed arenas competition knights fight in, and the heavy equipment prevents her from truly exploiting the superior agility being a Zalak should grant her) but she actively refuses to switch it out for anything else, out of sentimental value.
• Animal Motif: Grey squirrels.
• Aristocrats Are Evil: Not herself, but this is her opinion of the the Kazimierz nobility, who she absolutely despises especially as all the other knight families of her generation specifically snubbed her for being Infected. Ingra the Brassrust Knight in particular became a target for all her grievances about the corrupt noble knights, particularly due to his habit of bribing judges to get out of punishment for his tendency to maim opponents in the arena.
• Berserk Button: Losing Sona, as Roy learned the hard way when trying to get rid of Flametail Knight. Ashlock went ballistic the moment she thought Sona was gone, chasing after Roy and caring not for escaping or even her own safety, firing shells point blank in an attempt to avenge her friend. Roy himself is shocked by this, as it appeared she was willing to go down with him if she had to. Even though it turned out to be a ruse on Flametail and Ashlock's parts, Ashlock played her part convincingly by imagining how she would have responded had Flametail actually fallen.
• Bottomless Magazines: Averted in-story. In every battle, Ashlock can only carry a limited amount of ammunition for her lance, so she has to keep careful track of how many shells she uses lest she be left a sitting duck. However, Gameplay and Story Segregation is in effect, as in game she can fire as many shells as she wants.
• Clothing Damage: Her E2 art shows most of her armor having been taken or fallen off.
• Early-Bird Cameo: She first appeared in the "Maria Nearl" event as a rival knight.
• Impoverished Patrician: She not only doesn't have much access to funds due to being disowned, but also her family's fortunes have declined drastically due to mismanagement.
• It's All My Fault: Though she's not personally at fault, Ashlock does feel a little guilty that it's her family's inaction that caused Flametail to get Infected.
• La Résistance: She helps lead a knightclub exclusively made up of Infected who are secretly working to resist the oppression of the Kazimierz government.
• Luckily, My Shield Will Protect Me: Carries around a transparent shield, which she uses to Shield Bash .
• Mechanically Unusual Fighter: As the first Fortress Defender, Ashlock has a default long ranged AOE attack whenever she's not blocking an enemy.
• Mix-and-Match Weapon: Her lance doubles as a portable mortar cannon.
• Off Screen Moment Of Awesome: After Maria sent Ingra to the hospital in their bout, he decides to get in another competition as soon as he's allowed back. Ashlock immediately hospitalizes him again out of disgust for his bloodthirst. Pinus Sylvestris does away with the "offscreen" part.
• Parental Abandonment: Much of her distaste towards the nobility stems from her being essentially disowned by her own family after she got Infected. Even her own parents voted to kick her out, though it's said they were blackmailed into it.
• Tranquil Fury: Displayed this in her match against the Brassrust Knight, where even though she hated his guts, she was able to control her anger enough to outsmart him despite his constant taunts.
• Those Two Girls: She's always seen with Flametail. The two specifically teamed up because they're both Infected Zalaks.

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Aurora

Aurora / Lara

Introduced: Break the Ice
Voiced by: Satomi Akesaka (Japanese), Jingxia Liu (Mandarin Chinese), Sarah Burke (English), Yu Yeong (Korean)
Artist: LAL!ROLE

The fiercer the blizzard, the warmer her hands.

^{Click to see Elite 2 appearance.}

^{Click to see her Bloodline of Combat: Polar Catcher skin.}

Defender Operator Aurora will always be at your side in times of need.

Rarity: ★★★★★

ID: No. 422

Subclass: Duelist

Tags: DPS, Defense

Skills: Homeland Protector, Artificial Snowfall

Talents: Frigid Respite

Affiliation: Kjerag

Race: Ursus

Birthday: December 20

Height: 169cm

"Doctor, I'm Aurora. My boss Closure talks about you a lot. I promised her I'd protect you."

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• Animal Motif: Polar Bear. Her boots even resemble bear paws, and her shield even looks like a larger paw.
• Cleavage Window: Her top in her regular artwork is unzipped. Her Elite 2 costume still retains the window, framing it between the top of her jacket and her tank top underneath. Once again, this is absent in her skin.
• Exposed to the Elements: She doesn't seem to mind having her midriff exposed to Kjerag's frigid temperatures. Her skin averts this, however.
• Healing Factor: Aurora's talent, Frigid Respite, can allow her to regenerate health if her skill is inactive and she has half or less of the SP needed to activate it, although healing like this will make her stop attacking.
• Hoist by Her Own Petard: After factoring in her talent and the Duelist Defender's trait, if Aurora's block count gets permanently reduced to 0 due to certain challenge mode conditions, expect to see her stand around doing nothing except allowing enemies to waltz by her without even attempting to stop them, due to her talent backfiring against her by disabling her attacks while her SP meter is at half or less (and cannot generate the SP needed to reenable attacks). This can be avoided if she's using her S2 and it's at least Mastery 1, since her initial SP will be more than half the maximum, allowing her to use her normal attacks.
• An Ice Person: Her second skill lets her use Ice arts that can chill, then freeze enemies, and once frozen, their RES to Arts damage decreases. She also does increased damage to enemies while they are frozen.
• Mechanically Unusual Fighter: She is the first non-Sniper operator who has a skill that uses an ammunition system^note when activating a skill, the operator gains a set amount of ammo, which is consumed for each attack; the skill ends when all ammo is depleted, or the player manually deactivates their skill), which is present in her S2.
• Token Good Teammate: In a weird way. None of the Kjerag operators are really evil per se, but SilverAsh, who has ties to or directly employs most of them, is manipulative, calculating and ambitious. In her operator files, Dobermann outright says that in case of disagreement between Rhodes Island and the Silverash clan, Aurora is the only one she fully trusts to put her moral compass over loyalty to Enciodas. "Break The Ice" ends up almost proving her right, as Matterhorn and Courier put their weight behind SilverAsh's coup while Aurora stays on the Rhodes side even as it puts her at odds with her own family. (The "almost" part being Cliffheart, who also opposes her brother.)
• Wolverine Claws: An interesting variation; she does not possess any herself, but the shield she carries has three sharp spikes at the bottom, which she uses to tear apart enemies while her S2 is active. Though given that they use ammo, it's likely that they work like a Pile Bunker.

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Bassline

Bassline / Michael Wolfgang

Introduced: Zwillingstürme Im Herbst (Playable Debut)
Voiced by: Aki Kanada (Japanese), Hong Haitian (Mandarin Chinese), TBA (English)
Artist: Jiǔrì jiǔhào

Zwillingstürme Special Officer Michael is stationed in Rhodes Island. Considering his status, frequency of travels and classified information, every itinerary has to be kept confidential.

^{Click to see Elite 2 appearance.}

Defender Operator Bassline, came here under the order of the Empress.

Rarity: ★★★★★

ID: 4109

Subclass: Guardian

Tags: Defense, Healing

Skills: First Aid, Mind-Soothing Subharmonics

Talents: Magisterium

Affiliation: Leithanien

Race: Lupo

Birthday: July 16

Height: 160 cm

"Doctor, I come here at the behest of Her Majesty the Empresses of Leithanien, Hildegard, with the hope of maintaining friendly communication with you. I can serve as your messenger or your musician."

An envoy of one of the Twin Empresses of Leithanien, sent to Rhodes Island as a messenger.

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• Anti-Magic: His first talent grants him bonus RES that increases further if he has allies within his surrounding tiles, and his second skill can temporarily confer Arts Barriers to allies he heals. Upgrading his Module increases the RES buff and also lets him confer a part of it to any allies next to him. This is notable because other than him, only Nightingale can do this.
• Instrument of Murder: Downplayed on the 'Murder' part, due to his class, but the 'Instrument' part is very much on point.

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Beagle

Beagle

Introduced: Game Launch
Voiced by: Nana Harumura (Japanese), Cheddar (Mandarin Chinese), Claire Morgan (English), Lee Hyeon-jin (Korean)
Artist: Xiàyě Hóng Míng

Try to encourage her more.

^{Click to see her Bloodline of Combat: Dreadnaught skin.}

Beagle, Defender Operator of Rhodes Island, will provide a solid defense for the squad.

Rarity: ★★★

ID: No. 122

Subclass: Protector

Tags: Defense

Skills: DEF Up α

Talents: DEF Up

Affiliation: Reserve Op Team A1 - Rhodes Island

Race: Perro

Birthday: March 2

Height: 154cm

"My codename is Beagle! I know I didn't do very well on my assessment, but I'll still do my best at my internship!"

The caring defender of Reserve Team A1 who transferred to Rhodes Island alongside Fang and Kroos.

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• Ambiguous Situation: Who is Real reveals that something went down with Beagle during a Rhodes Island operation in Bolivar, which was bad enough that it gives Kroos severe emotional distress, but it's never specified what exactly happened there. The flavor text for her Bloodline of Combat skin ominously states that the Great March of Bolivar was her "final test."
• Animal Motifs: Dogs. In particular, her name references the breed itself.
• Archaic Weapon for an Advanced Age: In a setting where everyone wields modern weapons or at least modernized versions of archaic weapons, Beagle wields a medieval longsword.
• Art Evolution: Her "Bloodline of Combat: Dreadnaught" skin shows some improvements over her base version's artworks, such as a more detailed hair with glossy shading.
• Com Mon: Beagle is the Com Mon of the Defender class. If you roll a Defender via Recruitment, without the Senior or Top Operator tags, 9 times out of 10 the result will be Beagle.
• Conditioned to Accept Horror: She doesn't mind her infection anymore.
  My Oripathy? It doesn't bother me all that much, I'm used to it. I just want to be with the people I care about until my disease has been cured... Ughh...
• Curtains Match the Window: Beagle has orange hair to match with her orange eyes.
• Doomed by Canon: Possibly. Something is going to happen to her in the very near future, and whatever it is, it's bad enough to emotionally shatter Lava and Kroos.
• Embarrassing Nickname: "The Rookiest Rookie in the Rookieverse", if her Promotion quote is anything to go by.
• Face Doodling: Implied in her idle quote, where she thinks on doing this to the Doctor.
• Future Badass: An implication of her Dreadnaught skin. It depicts a version of Beagle who is an elite operator deployed in an operation that has yet to happen, showing that at the very least, she could go that long a way from being the reserve ops' "Rookiest Rookie in the Rookieverse."
• The Heart: She's the kind, gentle one among the original trio of herself, Kroos, and Fang.
• Overshadowed by Awesome: Beagle is immediately rendered obsolete once the player acquires Cuora, made especially easy during the first couple of months in the game's lifetime when Cuora can be bought from the shop, and Cuora is simply a better Defender than Beagle in all aspects.
• True Companions: With Fang and Kroos.
• You Are Better Than You Think You Are: Beagle fell into deep depression after her Oripathy infection, but the combined efforts of Fang and Kroos managed to cheer her up and restore her sense of self-worth. She is now indebted to them.

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Bison

Bison

Introduced: Code of Brawl
Voiced by: Junko Minagawa (Japanese), Lu Xiaotong (Mandarin Chinese), TBA (English), Bae Jeong-mi (Korean)
Artist: Ryuzakiichi

Still questions whether a Messenger really needs to master so many combat skills.

^{Click to see Elite 2 appearance.}

^{Click to see his appearance in So Long, Adele.}

Messenger Bison is proof that stability does not always follow age.

Rarity: ★★★★★

ID: No. 325

Subclass: Protector

Tags: Defense

Skills: DEF Up γ, Intensified Defense

Talents: Interlocked Shield

Affiliation: Great Lungmen

Race: Forte

Birthday: October 15

Height: 163cm

"Pleased to meet you, Doctor. My name is Bison. According to the terms of our contract, I will now also be a member of Rhodes Island. I look forward to working with you."

A young Messenger associated with Penguin Logistics and the heir to MountainDash Logistics, his journey has brought him to work with Rhodes Island in his quest to see the world.

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• Adorably Precocious Child: He is an adolescent Forte who seem to be younger than Amiya and Rosmontis, but he is mature enough to become one of the messengers. During his stay on Penguin Logistics, he is also the Only Sane Man in a quirky and colorful company (that commits lots of wanton property damage and penchant for getting into fights with rival gangs).
• Animal Motifs: His case is just bizarre. While Bison himself has upwards-facing horns like actual bisons, the animal depicted in his E2 art seems to be a gaur (also known as Indian Bison), with appropriately forwards-facing horns.
• Consummate Professional: This was how Bison was raised and how he is viewed by many in the logistics industry. The only thing that seems to be able to crack his professionalism is hanging out with Penguin Logistics.
• Distressed Dude: Was briefly captured by the Mafioso group after having been accidentally left behind by Penguin Logistics. Fortunately, upon Mostima showing up, the Mafioso let him go when he wasn't going to cooperate with their plans.
• Draw Aggro: Bison stops attacking enemies and hunkers down when Intensified Defense is active, while raising his own targeting threshold, so nearby enemies will be more inclined to wail on him instead of his allies.
• Horned Humanoid: He has short bull-like horns.
• Let's Get Dangerous!: He spends most of Code of Brawl confused and severely out of his element, but when Penguin Logistics are ambushed by the Rat King's goons during the Sauin festival, he joins the fight and fends them off with just his shield, along with support fire from Eurill's butler.
• Loophole Abuse: His talent Interlocked Shield grants a defensive buff to a Guard or Vanguard behind him. There's nothing saying he has to be facing the enemies for this to work though, meaning Bison is often deployed facing backwards to buff a Glass Cannon frontliner without getting in the way of their attacks.
• Naïve Newcomer: He serves as this for Penguin Logistics, as he's very unsure of how to adjust to their very laissez-faire attitudes to pretty much everything.
• Not Completely Useless: Intensified Defense's secondary effect of Drawing Aggro isn't usually very helpful as most enemies will focus on attacking the most recently deployed operator in their range, meaning you can achieve the same effect without waiting for a skill cooldown by just placing Bison down after the operators you want him to protect. Despite that, it does have a niche when dealing with the few enemies who have their own targeting priorities such as the Mudrock Matterllurgists in Twilight of Wolumonde, as they're harder to manage aggro for using deployment order alone.
• Only Sane Man: He's the only person to try to apply any sort of logic to the events occurring in Code of Brawl while he is assigned to Penguin Logisitics. Compared to him, even The Stoic Texas proves to be Not So Above It All.
• Situational Sword: Bison's talent Interlocked Shield lets him provide the same DEF buff it gives him to one ally who's placed immediately behind him, provided they're a Vanguard or Guard.
  • While this sounds cool on paper, it basically limits his utility to either protecting a DP battery like Myrtle, or as a stop gap to limit the amount of enemies attacking special Vanguards like Siege or other DP-on-Kill operators.
  • Alternatively, Bison could be providing cover for a Guard whose range is greater than one, who can attack over him while he defends them, though considering the relative rarity of those Guards, who are already strong to begin with, players who do field Bison do so because of the greater utility provided by his S2 instead of his talent.
• Sixth Ranger: Though not a permanent employee of Penguin Logistics, they treat him as one of their own during his entire contract, and go out of their way to beat up some thugs in revenge for Bison getting injured by them at the end of Code of Brawl.
• Temporary Online Content: Bison is only available for the duration of the Code of Brawl event.

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Blemishine

Blemishine / Maria Nearl

Introduced: Maria Nearl
Voiced by: Kana Hanazawa (Japanese), Cheddar (Mandarin Chinese), TBA (English)
Artist: Ryuzakiichi

If unable to find her, please ask the operators of the Engineering Department.

^{Click to see Elite 2 appearance.}

^{Click to see her Witch Feast: Moon Catastrborn skin.}:

Blemishine, Kazimierz knight, is the light of glory about to bloom.

Rarity: ★★★★★★

ID: No. 423

Subclass: Guardian

Tags: Defense, Healing, DPS

Skills: Surging Brilliance, Deterring Radiance, Divine Avatar

Talents: Knight of Sword and Shield, Mercy

Affiliation: Kazimierz

Race: Kuranta (Pegasus)

Birthday: July 15

Height: 165cm

"Kazimierz knight, codename 'Blemishine.' Hehe, I've heard all about you from my sister, Doctor. You can just call me Maria if you want~"

Idealistic, justice-loving youngest sister of the Nearl family, who stepped up to take the role of their Knight Primus after Margaret Nearl was exiled, and participated in the Kazimierz Major to save her family's reputation.

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• Awesomeness by Analysis: During her fight with Plastic Knight, Blemishine managed to analyze the flaw in his prototype armor's cooling system and won by exploiting said weakness. While to a lesser extent than her fight with Plastic Knight, each of her subsequent battles also shows that she always analyzes her opponent with her "Pegasian Sight" to eke out a win against vastly stronger and more experienced opponents.
• Badass Adorable: Do not let her cute, youthful looks and idealistic personality fool you- Blemishine is admirably determined, a capable engineer (to the point Mechanist, who is a highly skilled engineer in his own right, praised the quality of her work), and powerful enough in combat to be considered a 6-star operator.
• Bash Sisters: Not story related, but she's often used to support Mudrock as the pairs abilities represent some of the strongest synergy in the game.
• Big Sister Worship: Since she was a child, Blemishine revered her older sister Nearl as being The Paragon of knightly virtues and is a large reason why she decided to take on the mantle of knighthood herself. Since joining Rhodes, she will often accompany Nearl on sorties. Several of her voiced lines have her outright quoting her sister.
• Character Title:
  • On CN servers, the name of her debut Headhunting banner is simply and literally named Blemishine, no joke. Subverted on Global/EN servers, where her debut banner is instead named "Fractured Light".
  • Her event on both servers is titled after her real name, Maria Nearl.
• Combat Medic: As a Guardian Defender, this comes with the package, but Blemishine is notable for being highly specialized in offense among them. Not only do all of her skills give her significant firepower boosts (especially her third skill), all of them except for her second skill actually need her to be hitting something in order to heal her allies (and, in her S1's case, potentially herself).
• The Determinator: Even more than Awesomeness by Analysis, this is how Maria wins (or at least survives) all her fights in the run-up to the Kazimierz Major. She essentially spends all of each match getting pummeled by a vastly superior opponent — her fight with Left-Hand Knight in particular lasts for more than an hour, with Maria basically being humiliated and not managing to counter or strike him back the entire time — but she simply refuses to give up, and ultimately manages to outlast her opponent and strike the moment he slips up and leaves an opening.
• Deface of the Moon: The lore behind her Moon Catastrborn skin is that the character whose role she plays when donning the costume is infamous for cleaving the moon in two.
• Early-Bird Cameo: Her artwork was coded in the game after the event "Darknights' Memoir" was released. After 7 months since the event's release, she's now a playable operator.
• The Engineer: She has a profound love of machinery and is a talented engineer and mechanic by her own right, to the point where she was destined to become a repair woman if she hadn't taken up her knighthood.
  • Following her joining Rhodes Island, she is frequently found in the Engineering Department where she became fast friends with fellow engineers Vulcan and Closure. She is often so engrossed in her work that she is sometimes marked as MIA. This manifests in her Workshop RIIC skills.
    • Careful Planning reduces the LMD costs of all Elite Materials she processes.
    • Passionate Tinker increases the byproduct rate of all Elite Materials she processes by 40%, and decreases the Morale consumption by 4 if it consumes 8 Morale.
  • During Near Light, her engineering skills came to the forefront, as she helped Margaret maintain and repair her equipment, and contributed to the forging of her new sword-spear. Her sister's operator files also show that she continues to make improved armor while working with Rhodes Island.
• Family Honor: Following Nearl's departure, the Nearl household began to decay without the presence of a head knight to the point that the family began selling its possessions to stay afloat. To prevent the family from sinking into bankruptcy and subsequently losing its noble status, Blemishine opts to participate in the Kazimierz Major despite lacking the skill and prestige of her older sister.
• Forced Sleep: Her second skill Deterring Radiance forcibly puts all enemies on her tile to sleep for a few seconds. Sleeping enemies are immobilized and pacified, but cannot be attacked...but Blemishine's talent allows her to bend those rules to attack, prioritize and deal extra damage to those enemies.
• Image Song: “Stay Gold”.
• Kick Them While They Are Down: Because of her unique Talent, Blemishine is capable of damaging enemies under the effects of Forced Sleep, and in fact gains increased ATK when doing so and will actively attack them first. The name of said talent? "Mercy".
• Laser Blade: Her sword manifests a brightly glowing edge whenever she attacks, or whenever her third skill is active.
• Magic Knight: While her S3 Divine Avatar is active, Blemishine's attacks will each deal an additional burst of Arts damage proportional to her attack, which both synergizes with the skill's ATK buff to let her deal some serious damage while letting her damage even DEF-stacking enemies that'd normally laugh at her.
• Meaningful Name: Maria chooses "Blemishine" because her light, unlike Margaret and Zofia, is still immature. It's implied that she got the idea for the name when Mlynar calls her attempt to join the Major as, "...blemishing (their) family's name."
• Mechanically Unusual Fighter:
  • Despite being part of an archetype that normally has zero range and can only attack enemies that walk onto their tile, Blemishine is able to attack the tile directly in front of her just like Vanguards and non-ranged Guards, sharing this trait with Hoshiguma and Nian. This seems to be to make it easier to exploit Blemishine's speciality against sleeping enemies.
  • Because of her extended range and highly damage-oriented skillset, Blemishine plays much more aggressively than a more standard Guardian like Nearl or Saria, and sometimes functions more like a very bulky Guard with healing abilities. Exacerbating this is that while other healing defenders can heal on command and will have to interrupt their attacks to do so, Blemishine actually needs to be attacking to heal unless she's using her second skill, and is only able to charge her second and third skills if she's either attacking or being attacked.
  • Her first talent causes all Operators with a defensive recovery skill to gain SP when attacking as well, effectively giving them properties of offensive recovery skills on top of the original.
  • Her second talent makes her one of a few units able to attack sleeping enemies, who are usually untargetable. Not only that, she actively prioritizes them and deals bonus damage to them.
  • Blemishine's third skill is the only skill on a Guardian Defender that cannot heal the user themselves.
• Mythical Motifs: Appropriate for her heritage, Pegasus.
• Naïve Newcomer: When Maria first steps into the Kazimierz Major arena, she's quickly overwhelmed by the sheer dissonance between the commercial knight competition with the courtly chivalry novels she read when she was younger. It is noted that Margaret, who also once competed for the first time, is less ignorant than her when it comes to the corruption of Kazimierz's knightly values.
• Odd Name Out: Blemishine is the only member of her family to avert Real Name as an Alias. Her sister and aunt are identified by their last names and her uncle uses his first name, instead of using a commissioned callsign.
• The Paladin: Much like her older sister, her design embodies this trope to a tee. While Nearl wields a warhammer and wears armor that somewhat resembles modern tactical gear, Blemishine is a traditional "sword and board" paladin with more overtly fantasy-styled armor and equipment.
• Parental Abandonment: It's revealed in "Near Light" and Nearl's module description that when Blemishine was just an infant, their parents left home on an urgent assignment and never returned.
• Power Gives You Wings: Manifests a Battle Aura resembling an array of glowing gold wings behind her once she activates her S2 or S3, which is also seen in her E2 art.
• Rage Within the Machine: She is not happy with how corporate and commercialized the Knights have become, especially in the Kazimierz Major where they prioritize winning over chivalry. However, this has only strengthened her resolve to become the ideal knight.
• Situational Sword:
  • Her talent allows her to attack sleeping enemies for bonus damage, but as of her introduction the only other Operators able to inflict sleep are Sora, Kafka and Iris; later updates added Erato, Blacknight, and the Terra Research Commission. Even her own sleep is situational, since it only affects anyone who is on her tile at the time of the skill's activation (and of course, she'll usually be the only one that can hit them).
  • Her third skill is very powerful, giving her an ATK/DEF steroid, making her attacks hit for additional Arts damage, and healing a nearby ally for a significant portion of her ATK with each blow. With her reasonable attack rate and gigantic ATK in this state, she'll be able to shrug off blows and demolish enemies while healing her allies for such absurd amounts of health that it'd make even top-tier medics green with envy. However, the catch is that she's unable to heal herself with the skill (leaving her with no ways to heal herself, period), leaving her vulnerable once enemies start doing serious damage to her.
• Support Party Member: Blemishine's talent Knight of Sword and Shield makes it such that any Operator with a Defensive SP recovery skill will also gain 1 SP when attacking.
• True Craftsman: She is actually a very skilled engineer, and is commonly seen visiting the workshop. This is embodied in her very powerful workshop skills. If she hadn't chosen to participate in the Kazimierz Major, she likely would have chosen to become a mechanic.
• The Unchosen One: Maria isn't destined to be a Knight Primus, because she's so far down of House Nearl's succession. However, when Margaret and Zofia got severely injured/infected while Mlynar fervently refuses to take up the title, Maria becomes a knight to restore House Nearl's honor and chivalry ideals. If the circumstances don't go that way, Maria will happily follow her true calling to be an engineer.
• Why Don't You Just Shoot Him?: Maria is constantly benefiting from this trope throughout the Kazimierz Major qualifiers. It's repeatedly stated that any one of the Plastic, Brassrust, and Left-Hand Knights could have easily taken her out if they had simply fought at full strength from the beginning, but for one reason or another all of them dragged the fight out and ultimately gave Maria an opening to score a win or draw against them. Notably, her final opponents (the Withered and Corrupted Knights) do not grant her this courtesy, and the only reason Maria even survives that fight is because her sister Margaret comes to her rescue.
• You Are in Command Now: Due to Nearl contracting Oripathy (Or so it seemed until "Near Light"), Blemishine was forced to step up to take her place as the Nearl family's head knight.

---

Bubble

Bubble

Introduced: Maria Nearl
Voiced by: Hikaru Akao (Japanese), Misty (Mandarin Chinese), TBA (English)
Artist: Cenm0

Well, she's a little scared of getting yelled at.

^{Click to see Elite 2 appearance.}

Defender Operator Bubble isn't scared of anything.

Rarity: ★★★★

ID: No. 381

Subclass: Protector

Tags: Defense

Skills: DEF Up β, "Beaten Up"

Talents: Spiked Shield

Affiliation: Sargon

Race: Cerato

Birthday: March 19

Height: 135cm

"You're the boss of this training camp? And they call you the Doctor? Hrm... But you don't look strong... Whatever. I'm Bubble. I may be the weakest in my tribe right now, but you're gonna train me until I'm the second strongest."

A young Cerato sent to Rhodes for her treatment by her father, under the pretense that she's stationed there for combat training.

---

• Animal Motifs: Rhinoceros. Also, her species name is based on the latter part of the word, meaning "horn".
• Attack Reflector: Anyone that attacks Bubble will temporarily get their ATK reduced due to her talent. Her second skill also causes her to stop attacking and Draw Aggro to herself, while all enemies that attack her take recoil damage scaling with Bubble's DEF.
• Big Sister Worship: Towards Gavial, despite them not being related. After witnessing Gavial's strength firsthand, Bubble became so impressed that she considered her to be equal to her father in terms of might.
• Child Soldier: She is a child, who's under the care of Rhodes Island due to her Oripathy infection. Unlike Ceobe, Bubble's stature accurately reflects her age.
• Draw Aggro: Bubble's S2 causes her to stop attacking, but nearby enemies are taunted into prioritizing her instead of her allies and those who hit her receive damage back equal to a percentage of her DEF. While this may seem insignificant at first blush, it should be noted that the skill itself also significantly buffs her DEF at high levels while also reflecting back effectively half of this value at maximum, giving her surprisingly decent damage output if raised correctly.
• Does Not Know Her Own Strength: Bubble is surprisingly durable and destructive, given her playful and active nature. Known among Rhodes Island staff as a "Bubble Crisis", it usually involves her crashing through walls and destroying equipment while incurring no damage to herself. The best way to handle such an event would be to lock her into a training room, or lead her to a treadmill to exhaust her stamina before she can cause damage.
• Friend to All Children: Due to her own playful and extroverted (if childish) personality, Bubble is very popular among children. Her best friend in Rhodes Island is Ceobe, who's basically an oversized child, and their usual banter sounds exactly like one would imagine two kids would have with each other.
• Gigantic Adults, Tiny Babies: Bubble's father is over 2 meters tall, while she's 135 cm tall. She apparently believes that she's going to grow up as large as him, mentioning that her massive spiked shield will become her pauldron or greave when she's older.
• Hero-Worshipper: She goes from dismissing Gavial in her E1 talk into claiming that she's Gavial biggest fan in her E2 talk because Gavial can beats her up. Gavial is pretty much the only doctor who can treat her because she can wrestle Bubble to give her shots.
• The Millstone: Due to her Leeroy Jenkins approach to combat and inability to gauge her own powers, Bubble is considered to be something of a liability until she can be further examined, and is recommended in her bio to be limited to lower-threat missions for the time being for her own good.
• My Dad Can Beat Up Your Dad: Her rivalry with Ceobe was apparently started when Bubble claimed that her father is stronger than Vulcan.
• Pint-Sized Powerhouse: Bubble is a surprisingly tanky Defender, and is capable of respectable damage output for her class, despite her small stature. To put it into perspective, Bubble is merely 3 centimeters taller than Durin.
• Situational Sword: She found some popularity in usage during CC Dawnseeker, as she could bait the Corrosion damage from the hidden sniper enemies, and her counterdamage bypassing their invisibility in the dark.
• The Storyteller: Her exaggerated boasting of her adventures are really popular among Rhodes' children. Even those who know that her stories are embellished still think that her chest-puffing sessions are very entertaining.
• Trauma Button Ending: In Sideroca's Operator Record, Bubble comes to regret accepting a two-hour training session with Sideroca after coming out of it utterly exhausted. When offered to continue the training, Bubble makes a break for it, and only manages to lose her by hiding behind Suzuran's tails. By the time she's checked up on by Dur-nar and Dobermann later that night, Bubble has been holing up in her room, leaving only to shower, with her dinner being brought by her roommate.
  Dur-nar: My guess is that just hearing the name Sideroca is going to send her shivering to no end for a good while.

---

Cardigan

Cardigan / Merry

Introduced: Game Launch
Voiced by: Azumi Asakura (Japanese), Z (Mandarin Chinese), Anjali Kunapaneni (English), Lee Jae-hyun (Korean)
Artist: Yī Lì Lǐzi

If only she could quiet down for a while...

^{Click to see her Icefield Messenger: Cheerful Guardian skin.}

^{Click to see her Epoque: Sunny Day skin.}

Cardigan, Defender Operator of Rhodes Island, will run to the battlefield to provide reliable defense for the squad.

Rarity: ★★★

ID: No. 209

Subclass: Protector

Tags: Defense

Skills: Regeneration α

Talents: Max HP Up

Affiliation: Reserve Op Team A4 - Rhodes Island

Race: Perro

Birthday: August 2

Height: 156cm

"Heeellooo! I've never been in such a huge mobile facility before! I'm so excited! Merry of the Cardigan here. Are you the Doctor?"

A hyperactive Perro and former traveler from Leithanien, now stationed at Reserve Team A4 as its Defender.

---

• A Dog Named "Dog": A literal dog in her case. "Cardigan" is the name of her Perro subspecies, and it's actually a family tradition of sorts for her and her relatives to use it as a codename.
• Animal Motifs: Dogs. Additionally, her name is a reference to the Cardigan corgi.
• Baguette Beatdown: For her Sunny Day skin, she takes out a baguette to smack people with instead of her usual weapon.
• Blade Below the Shoulder: Cardigan attacks with a bladed tonfa strapped to her forearm.
• Commonplace Rare: Unusually for a 3-star Operator, she can only be attained through the use of a Headhunting gacha and, as of 2024, is not part of the Recruitment roster.
• Exposed to the Elements: In her skin. Especially jarring since it's a winter skin. Subverted that the description lampshades it by saying that it's not cold-resistant at all despite its thematics.
• Friend to All Children: Having younger siblings (consisting of brothers and sisters) herself, she enjoys playing with children.
• Genki Girl: Cardigan always seems to be running at 200% capacity, much to Ansel's chagrin (or really, to anyone else's in her team). This fits with her dog Animal Motifs. Her hyperactivity often results in destruction of furniture or other base facilities, typically leading to detention and salary cuts for herself and the team leader Melantha. One of Steward's line when added to the squad is reminding her to analyze the situation first before acting.
  Steward: Cardigan, always read the situation before you act.
• Heal Thyself: Cardigan's ability is to instantly heal herself for a significant portion of her max HP when activated.
• Irony: She favors speed and maneuverability as her combat doctrine and dismisses "hold the line" as an outdated concept.... except, her role is specifically that, and doesn't have a talent that enables fast redeployment like Executor and Merchant Specialists (and, to a lesser extent, Yato).
• Mechanically Unusual Fighter: Her combat style makes her technically a "Survival" type Operator despite lacking such tag; to wit, her skill enables her to restore a good portion of her HP, which enable her to last much longer in holding a line when compared to the other Defenders of her archetype.
• The Nose Knows: Like actual canines, Cardigan can recognize people based on their scents. Melantha has a distinct smell to her.
• Online Alias: Her Obsgram username is "Cardi".
• Perpetual Smiler: Cardigan always smiles, even in her "death" animation.
• Stealth Pun: Her getting a Christmas-themed winter skin. Merry Christmas, if you want.
• The Team Normal: She is one of the only two members of Reserve Op Team A4 to be completely "clean". The other is Ansel.
• Walking Techbane: This is mostly to do with her being such a hyperactive Genki Girl that no technological equipment are 100% safe from her. Steward's voice line when assigned to a facility has him frantically trying to stop Cardigan before another equipment bites the dust.
  Steward: [When assigned to a facility] (nervously) Is that you, Cardi- (panicked) WAI-WAIT! WAIT!, don't touch the equipment!

---

Cement

Cement / Shana Moleman

Introduced: Episode 12: All Quiet Under the Thunder
Voiced by: Yuuki Kozue (Japanese), Cai Haiting (Mandarin Chinese), Dani Chambers (English), Seo Eun-bi (Korean)
Artist: 科学

Digging up the nutrients of the lands for distant prosperity; forging foundations for towering buildings.

^{Click to see Elite 2 appearance.}

^{Click to see her Epoque: New Business skin.}

Defender Operator Cement hopes to become your first pick for construction subcontracting.

Rarity: ★★★★★

ID: 464

Subclass: Duelist

Tags: Defense

Skills: Stratum Groundbreaker, Structural Support

Talents: Blueprint Corrections

Affiliation: Rim Billiton

Race: Zalak

Birthday: October 25

Height: 155cm

"Oh, so you're the Doctor everyone's talking about! I'm a new operator with the Engineering Department, and foreman of Shana's Construction Crew out of Rim Billiton! Here's my business card."

The leader of Shana's Construction Crew, a Rim Billiton-based construction company with an emphasis on safety and caution while building.

---

• Achilles' Heel: Because her second skill's ungodly bulk depends on her maintaining stacks that go down by one each time she takes a hit, it can completely neuter Mighty Glaciers, but will almost instantly fall apart against foes that attack fast enough to shred through them. Her entire kit is also completely focused on soaking physical damage, but does nothing to protect against enemies that deal Arts damage instead.
• Ascended Meme: Since her release on CN servers, Cement has been heavily associated with the "Das Conk Kreet Baybee" meme in the fandom. Come her release on Global servers and her English dubbed voice line pronounces "That's concrete baby" as the meme name.
  Trust Tap: Doccy, can you hold this shield for me? Careful now, it's heavy. The inside there? Das Con Kreet Baybee.
• Animal Motifs: Moles, especially considering one shows up in her regular art, and several more show up in her Elite 2 art. She's a construction worker associated with drills and digging underground, and also has a very keen sense of smell.
• Hidden Depths: Her Promotion Record reveals that she's written at least one novel for Rim Billiton magazines, and that it's a pretty good read despite her naive writing style.
• The Nose Knows: Her sense of smell is considered to be extraordinary, to the point where during her onboarding, she was able to instantly identify the presence and position of a spoiled bag of cookies that had been forgotten in the room. This earned the interest of a lot of recreational groups aboard the landship, but Cement has also put this sense to practical use by using it to detect potentially dangerous stratum abnormalities underground.
• Pint-Sized Powerhouse: Her being a tiny 155 cm doesn't stop her from soaking up damage like no tomorrow, not to mention her wielding a power drill and concrete shield nearly as tall as she is in each hand. The shield in particular is said to be so heavy that even Gavial had to use both hands to lift it.
• Stone Wall: Although she doesn't do a lot of damage, her talent grants her physical damage reduction, which doubles after a certain amount of time. Combined with her second skill which gives her up to 20 layers of a stacking DEF buff, she can achieve some of the highest physical bulk in the entire game.^note A fully optimized Cement will have 38% physical DR and a whopping +420% DEF with a fully stacked S2, scaling off of 815 base defense to give her 4238 DEF at peak performance, the highest achievable by an operator without external buffs as of her release.
• This Is a Drill: Carries a drill as her weapon, and her Elite 2 art features a giant drill.

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Croissant

Croissant

Introduced: Game Launch
Voiced by: Yurika Kubo (Japanese), Wen Liu (Mandarin Chinese), Risa Mei (English), Yang Jung-hwa (Korean)
Artist: 幻象黑兔

Business is like a war without bullets! All the training and hard work has lead to this day!

^{Click to see Elite 2 appearance.}

^{Click to see her Seven AM (KFC collab) skin.}

^{Click to see her Coral Coast: Seeker SK03 skin.}

Croissant, special agent of Penguin Logistics, is willing to provide reliable defensive power for Rhodes Island as a Defender Operator.

Rarity: ★★★★★

ID: No. 201

Subclass: Protector

Tags: Defense, Shift

Skills: Auto Defense, Magnetic Hammer

Talents: Miracle Field

Affiliation: Penguin Logistics

Race: Forte

Birthday: September 29

Height: 163cm

"My name's Croissant, and by golly yer in luck, Baws! Ya won't find many as good at their trade as I am! I'm strong, last forever, 'n if ya hire me right now, ya get a 20% discount!"

A carefree member of Penguin Logistics with extreme strength and an affinity for making quick cash through side businesses.

---

• Animal Motifs: Buffaloes, due to the shape of her horns.
• Big Eater: Code of Brawl reveals that she's written an extensive guide on what's a good eat in Lungmen and several other cities, which has become a popular tourist item for its comprehension, even covering very local businesses like Tung's finball stall.
• Blown Across the Room: The knockback of her S2 Magnetic Hammer pushes nearby enemies in all four cardinal directions, which can let her fill in for Push-type Specialists if needed. But don't use it if there's an enemy attacking her from behind, though, as the knockback can inadvertently nudge them into your own base and foiling an otherwise perfect run.
• Funetik Aksent: The English translation, and voicelines, renders her Kansai accent as stereotypical Southern accent.
• Horned Humanoid: She has short bull-like horns typical of her Forte race.
• Money Fetish: Her lines are generally centered around making money, and her profile mentions she likes making money so she can live a very carefree consumerist lifestyle.
• Online Alias: Her Obsgram username is "Croissant@DM me for business".
• Punny Name: Her codename refers to the cultural image of croissants in many countries, where their curved shape is often compared to that of bull or buffalo horns.
• Shorttank: Other than her jacket, she dresses for part with a fitting tomboyish personality.
• Super-Strength: Her bio notes that she's unusually strong, even for a Forte (a race known to be notoriously strong). This is reflected by her second skill, Magnetic Hammer, which gives a very high damage multiplier to her next attack, as well as stunning the poor sap it hit for several seconds.
• Visual Pun: Her horns look like croissants.
• Walking Swimsuit Scene: Her swimsuit skin would invert this, as it's just her normal "outdoorsy outfit" worn to the beach - only it doesn't exactly cover any more than the actual bikinis worn by the others. Her character image has her wearing it while biking in the middle of the desert, which pretty much plays it straight.

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Cuora

Cuora

Introduced: Game Launch
Voiced by: Ayaka Suwa (Japanese), Gelin Tian (Mandarin Chinese), Xanthe Huynh (English), Jung Hye-won (Korean)
Artist: Skade

Yeah, it's time to get sturdy. Real sturdy.

^{Click to see Elite 2 appearance.}

^{Click to see her Vitafield Rewilder: Quadrangle skin.}

Cuora, Defender Operator of Rhodes Island, will provide reliable defense for the squad.

Rarity: ★★★★

ID: No. 150

Subclass: Protector

Tags: Defense

Skills: DEF Up β, Shell Defense

Talents: Defense Specialist

Affiliation: Columbia

Race: Petram

Birthday: Unknown

Height: 148cm

"Hm? Where am I? Who am I?"

A baseball-obsessed girl with a mysterious past who currently works for Rhodes Island as an operator.

---

• Accidental Misnaming: Calls the Doctor as "Sir Rhodes Island".
• Animal Motif: Tortoises/turtles. Like many operators, it is hard to see at first without promoting her to Elite 2, but the most prominent clue to this is the hexagonal decorative pattern of her backpack, that which she wears like a shell in her character CG. The name of her exact animal (Cuora flavomarginata) is also printed on her baseball bat.
• Animal Theme Naming: Named after the Asian box turtles genus, Cuora.
• Apparently Human Merfolk: While she have a sea turtle motif, she lacks any physical characteristics of a turtle like scales ^note She does have turtle shell but as her backpack and not a physical part of her body , and appears very human-like.
• Batter Up!: Befitting her love of baseball, she uses a baseball bat to clobber enemies.
• Book Dumb: She had to be taught how to write and sign her own name, but she shows remarkable ease in understanding complex tactics and battle plans.
• Boring, but Practical: Cuora can be likened to the equivalent of Melantha for defense - Cuora lacks the utility of many other Protectors, with her entire kit being about blocking and soaking up physical threats, and increasing her defenses to become even more of a tank. Her skills just grant her more DEF and block along with healing, her Talent just gives her free DEF, and her Module just gives her even more DEF. This is all she needs to be one of the most powerful physical walls the game has to offer, capable of such absurd tanking that even higher rarity Defenders struggle to match her.
• Cute Bruiser: Being a teeny girl (148cm, for our American readers, puts her just a hair over four feet ten inches) doesn't stop her from absorbing tremendous amounts of damage like other Defenders.
• The Cutie: Her bio notes that she's so sweet and lovable that no one has the heart to scold her whenever she breaks a window while playing baseball.
• Disc-One Nuke: Cuora could formerly be bought in the shop for certificates (before being replaced by Ethan) and is a common drop from both recruitment and headhunting, which makes her an enticing option for players who haven't been able to roll a high quality Defender. She has very good stats, with an absurdly high defense rating that outmatches many higher star Defenders. What really makes her powerful though is her second skill, which massively boosts her defense, heals herself over time, and increases her block rating to 4 at the cost of not being able to attack. This makes her one of the most cost effective Defenders in the game. Her late game potential is so powerful that Cuora is considered one of the absolute priorities for anyone to Elite 2 — while other 4* Operators have 5* or 6* counterparts that can outperform them, nobody currently does what Cuora does. The closest are Vulcan with skill 1, who is unable to be healed and has lower defense, Nian with skill 2, who lacks self-regeneration (but has ability to deal retaliation damage instead), and Hoshiguma, who relies on a chance-based dodge to tank damage.
• Expy: Cuora has a lot of similarities with Kiana Kaslana from Honkai Impact 3rd. Both have the same hairstyle (twin braids plus the nearly-identical crescent Idiot Hair), are similarly cheerful, light-hearted and ditzy. Kiana also used a baseball bat before, such as in this animated short. But the striking resemblance is that Cuora's outfit resembles Kiana's "Prodigal Girl" garb albeit with a different color palette.
• I Know Madden Kombat: Invoked. Cuora encourages other Rhodes Island operators to play baseball with her, as it trains their body and helps build teamwork.
• Improbable Sports Skills: In her Operator Record, Cuora goes to a batting range where the operator keeps ramping up the power and difficulty of the pitching machine. However, despite the pitching machine throwing out near impossible pitches, Cuora still hits homeruns every single time. The flabbergasted operator compares Cuora's performance to a legendary professional baseball player shortly before the pitching machine overloads and explodes.
• Improbable Weapon User: Using a baseball bat as a weapon is not unheard of, but a backpack as a shield? It certainly helps that both items are made from extremely strong materials.
• Mysterious Past: No one knows how she got into Rhodes Island. She just showed up at the upper deck one day after Rhodes Island had completed a delivery to a small Columbian town. Cuora herself barely remembers anything about herself or her past. However, there are clues suggesting that she is related to Aegir. First, her bat and backpack are constructed out of highly advanced materials none of the Rhodes Island researchers have ever seen before. Second, her Elite 2 art reveals her animal motif as a sea turtle, which is an aquatic animal similar to the Abyssal Hunter operators. Third, her memory loss may be a symptom of her Oripathy infection, since it is consistent with Specter's Oripathy-induced amnesia. It's later revealed in Terra: A Journey that her race is considered rare and enigmatic, but they have a very close relationship with Aegir. They also possess a superior understanding of craftmanship and material engineering compared to other land civilizations, implied to be the result of their constant contact with Aegir, explaining why her bat and backpack are so durable.
• Passionate Sports Girl: She absolutely loves baseball and takes every opportunity to play it or rope her friends into playing with her.
• Shorttank: Just like Croissant, she wears a top that exposes her midriff.
• Stone Wall: This is the general job for Defenders, but Cuora takes this to an extreme. All of her skills are solely focused on defense, with 0 regard for offense, her talent is just a bonus to her base DEF, her module is another bonus to her DEF if she's blocking, and her second skill makes her stop attacking. However, because her attack stat is so poor, it's an easy sacrifice for an extra block count and regenerating health.

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Czerny

William Fichte Czerny

Introduced: Lingering Echoes
Voiced by: Hiroki Yasumoto (Japanese), Qd (Mandarin Chinese), Gunnar Cauthery (English), Lee Hyun (Korean), Lukas Wurm (German)
Artist: 九日九号

From his fingertips flow an endless stream of light and hope.

^{Click to see Elite 2 appearance.}

^{Click to see his Vitafield Rewilder: Freeland Tuneseeker skin.}

Czerny, musician from the Afterglow, journeying with the rhythm.

Rarity: ★★★★★

ID: No. 4047

Subclass: Arts Protector

Tags: Defense, DPS

Skills: Fingerfertigkeit, Meisterwerk

Talents: Reverberation

Affiliation: Leithanien

Race: Elafia

Birthday: September 10

Height: 185cm

"Greetings, Doctor, my name is Czerny. Any charm or taste I may have had has been poured entirely into my compositions. And as for myself, I am no more than a run-of-the-mill performer. That's all the introduction you need."

A renowned musician from Leithanien who joined Rhodes Island after the Vyseheim incident.

---

• Animal Motifs: The European fallow deer, from the shape of his antlers. One appears in his Elite 2 artwork.
• Anti-Magic: His talent buffs his RES, and his first skill also gives him a temporary RES increase for its duration - letting him absorb Arts damage that would kill other operators with no RES.
• Attack Reflector:
  • His talent Reverberation inflicts a percentage of his ATK stat as Arts damage to an enemy when he receives Arts attacks. Both of his skills buff his ATK, which will also increase the damage dealt by his talent.
  • His second skill increases his ATK by up to 30% each time he is attacked up to a cap of 10 times, giving him a total of 300% ATK maximum, which feeds into the Arts damage of his area of effect attack he deals at the end of the skill's duration.
• Badass Biker: His Freeland Tuneseeker skin dresses him up as one.
• Blood from the Mouth: In "Lingering Echoes", he coughs up blood from inhaling toxic fumes released by the provoked sewer Originium slugs - which affects the Infected more than the uninfected - then exposed to the Voice of Terra when playing music with Ebenholz and Kreide.
• Body Horror: He has visible Oripathy lesions on his neck that goes down his collar.
• Busman's Vocabulary: He talks about combat like performing in a concert.
  Compared to my piano, my ability with a baton actually fares quite well. (if assigned as squad leader)
  I've finished tuning. I may perform now. (operation start)
  Drawing the final barline here is perfect. I hardly want any movement of mine to approach tedium. (3-star victory)
• Determinator: Nothing can keep this man from his music. He repeatedly ignores warnings from the Rhodes Island medical department to take care of himself properly in favor of composing day and night, and in "Lingering Echoes" even breathing in poison emitted from the Originium slugs in Vyseheim and suffering injuries caused by the Voice of Terra grievous enough to make him cough blood isn't enough to stop him from finishing his composition and playing it at his concert.
• Draw Aggro: His second skill makes him more likely to be attacked by enemies, which he needs for said skill.
• Foregone Conclusion: In "Lingering Echoes", his plan to deal with the Witch King's revival is to take the Voices of Terra from Ebenholz and Kreide into himself, even though it would cost him his life. However, since Czerny and Ebenholz are playable Operators and Kreide is not, it is easily deduced that Kreide would end up making the sacrifice instead.
• Friend to All Children: He donated the royalties from his new music pieces to helping Leithanien children orphaned by Oripathy, and his 200 trust profile entry is him petitioning Kal'tsit and the Doctor to fund his music class that also doubles as Arts training for younger operators.
• The Gift: His unusually long fingers are mentioned to be a factor in his proficiency with the piano, allowing him to span 11ths with ease. Incidentally, this makes his piano compositions more difficult to perform for his admirers, though they still practice them with enthusiasm.
• Gratuitous German: Prolific in his skill names^note "Dexterity" and "Masterpiece", the names of his works in "Lingering Echoes"^note "Morgen und Abend" and "Licht und Schatten" - "Morning and Evening" and "Light and Shadow" and some of his voice lines.
  Auf eure plätze.^note To your seats
  Silence, sofort!^note Immediately
• Hair-Trigger Temper: Czerny can get easily angered, and his voice lines in battle have him sound increasingly angry.
  "Silence, sofort!"
  "Listen or leave!"
  "SHUT UP, OR ELSE!"
  "GET OUT! RIGHT NOW!"
• Horned Humanoid: Has the deer antlers characteristic of an Elafia.
• Impoverished Patrician: Czerny did come from a fairly well off background until he contracted Oripathy and was banished to the Afterglow, where he lived in poverty until he developed his musical skills. Even as a famous musician, he still lives barely above the poverty line due to his tendency to donate most of his wealth to charity, and he outright admits that he's struggling financially in his Elite 1 promotion voice line.
• Jerk with a Heart of Gold: He is a caring and sincere man beneath the Stern Teacher facade.
  • During "Lingering Echoes" he used his works as collateral to secure medical care for the Infected civilians of the Afterglow after many are hospitalized from exposure to the Originium slug fumes, heedless of the dangers to himself.
  • Later during said event, he wrote a score to take the Voice of Terra inside Ebenholz and Kreide into himself to save their lives.
  • In his profile, one of the Rhodes Island operators takes an extreme dislike to him due to his tendency to ignore all of his advice, until Hibiscus politely drops the fact that Czerny donates almost all the royalties from his music to charity.
• Loophole Abuse: Aak shooting him counts for his damage boost stacks, meaning all of them can be triggered instantly with him without any drawback as Czerny has over 500 DEF to tank Aak's shots.
• The Lost Lenore: The piece Czerny initially assigned to Ebenholz and Kreide in "Lingering Echoes" was dedicated to the daughter of his piano teacher and his soulmate, who passed away from Oripathy before the piece was complete.
• Magic Music: Uses music to cast Originium Arts, most notably in "Lingering Echoes" his score was able to draw out the Voice of Terra from Ebenholz and Kreide.
• Named After Somebody Famous: He's named after Carl Czerny, an Austrian composer who had many students like Liszt. The event he is introduced in also makes several references to his namesake's works.
• One-Steve Limit: Downplayed. A major antagonist of "Maria Nearl" was Spokesman Czarny.
• Ornamental Weapon: He doesn't actually use his sword even though he holds it in his hand during his second skill and his Elite 2 artwork, instead opting to bash enemies' faces in with his shield during combat.
• Stern Teacher: Outright calls himself as such in his voicelines, when he mentions teaching the children piano lessons. "Lingering Echoes" saw him being very hard on Ebenholz and Kreide as they practiced for his retirement concert.
• Unskilled, but Strong: Czerny is classified as an Arts Protector due to his music being capable of manipulating Originium Arts rather than any actual serious pursuit into studying Arts like most Casters, as he admitted in his Elite 2 promotion line.
• We Used to Be Friends: With Gertrude Strollo, who was formerly his sponsor and helped making his music popular. Czerny severed the relationship after it became evident that Gertrude was just using him.
• Workaholic: His archive notes reveal he is known to be unhealthily obsessed with composing, having on multiple instances been found in his room on the landship in a practically half-dead state, forgoing food and rest with mugs of coffee and sheet music strewn all over the floor, much to the chagrin of the medical department.

---

Dur-Nar

Dur-Nar / Makayla Springthunder

Introduced: Golden Autumn (CN), Heart of Surging Flame (Global)
Voiced by: Nanako Mori (Japanese), Thea (Mandarin Chinese), Triya Leong (English)
Artist: Xiàyě Hóng Míng

Those foolhardy enough to try to overcome her shield soon find themselves eating dirt.

^{Click to see Elite 2 appearance.}

Dur-nar, Defender of Rhodes Island, vows to stop all rioters with her shield.

Rarity: ★★★★

ID: No. 260

Subclass: Arts Protector

Tags: DPS, Defense

Skills: ATK Up β, Shielded Counterattack

Talents: Sword and Shield

Affiliation: Rhodes Island

Race: Vulpo

Birthday: August 11

Height: 160cm

"Hard as rock and lethal as lightning... That's me, Dur-nar. Nice to meet you, Doctor."

A former Columbian military woman who was discharged from the military. She helps with the training of Defenders at Rhodes Island as an instructor, as shown in Gummy's side story from Children of Ursus.

---

• Animal Motifs: Foxes, due to her Vulpo race. It is supported by her Elite 2 artwork as well, with a black fox visible on the left side.
• Cloudcuckoolander's Minder: She's specifically noted to be the one who has to keep an eye on Ceobe and Sesa for their Monthly Squad story in "Crimson Solitaire" as without her, the two might just run off somewhere with no inhibitions.
• Disappeared Dad: Her dad died while she was doing mercenary work for a convoy in Columbia.
• Dual Wielding: She was historically known for dual wielding electric blades in combat, compared to her sword-and-shield combo used in Rhodes; she abandoned this fighting style in order to help train and protect the rookies under her command. The "abandoned electric blade" that serves as her Token is implied to be her old second sword.
• Friendly Enemy: Dur-Nar describes Frostleaf as an old enemy of sorts from an unspecified battle during her stint in the Columbian Army. She's surprised at how much Frostleaf has changed since joining Rhodes, but is relieved to see that it has helped her live a happier life.
• Glass Cannon: Dur-Nar has one of the highest ATK values among the Defenders, and her S2 lets her make great use of it. At the same time, she has one of the lowest DEF comparably, with only her talent granting her a slight boost to it.
• Magic Knight: While she has a skill active, she does Arts damage instead of physical.
• Mechanically Unusual Fighter: Because of her Shielded Counterattack skill, Dur-nar gets the ability to attack all blocked enemies for the duration (along with a 20% ATK boost at Skill Level 1), allowing her to fill in for a AoE Guard when necessary.
• Military Maverick: Dur-nar hated following orders, so her higher-ups promoted her to a lieutenant in charge of new recruits. It seemed to have worked, until her squad was sent to a suicide mission, which resulted in her assaulting a superior officer, and getting discharged from the army soon after.
• Nervous Wreck: Curiously, which contrasts her general behavior (and not something that you expect from an instructor), her off-combat animations depict her as something of a neurotic and worrywart person — she walks cautiously compared to the other operators and tapping her will even cause her to duck and cover her head, with an expression that implies that she is shrieking, only regaining her composure when there is no trouble around.
• Red Baron: She's known as "Patrick's Spring" in Columbia, due to her actions in a battle called the Springtime Offensive.
• Retired Badass: She was formerly a lieutenant of the Columbian Army before she was discharged for unknown reasons. She later signed on with Rhodes Island as a drill instructor and a defensive operator.
• The Scrounger: She created a snack network for new operators who would have trouble getting them otherwise due to restrictions made by the medical unit and Dobermann.
  "I've met with the logistic staff. From now on, they will write "Industrial Material" on the packaging of all snacks. Then it's up to you to sign off on it, Doctor."
• Shock Stick: Her weapon is an electric blade.

---

Eunectes

Eunectes / Zumama

Introduced: Gavial: The Great Chief Returns
Voiced by: Houko Kuwashima (Japanese), Bean Z (Mandarin Chinese), TBA (English)
Artist: Liduke

She prefers to use machines to solve her problems instead of using her fists.

^{Click to see Elite 2 appearance.}

^{Click to see her Bloodline of Combat: Forgemaster skin.}

Eunectes, Gavial's rival, steps onto the battlefield along with "Irritable Ironhide."

Rarity: ★★★★★★

ID: No. 416

Subclass: Duelist

Tags: DPS, Defense, Survival

Skills: Tomahawk, Menacing Slash, Iron Will

Talents: Peerless Bravery, Resilience

Affiliation: Sargon

Race: Pythia

Birthday: October 30

Height: 171cm

"I passed all the exams, so that means I can stay here, right? I want to learn how to build a talking robot like Lancet-2... Oh, codename? My name is Zumama. Can't I use that as my codename?"

The chief of one of Acuhalla's major tribes and an aspiring engineer with an affinity for machinery. Sought to become the Great Chief and overturn Acuhalla's traditions, bringing about a new age of mechanization.

---

• Action Pet: Eunectes is accompanied by The High Priest from "Gavial The Great Chief Returns" in her Elite 2 art. He is summoned in her third skill, where it controls a mecha in her stead.
• Arc Villainess: While she's never fought gameplay-wise, she's the main villain in the event "Gavial: The Great Chief Returns", although how evil she is is in the story is debatable.
• Animal Motifs: Anacondas. In fact, "Eunectes" is the scientific name for the genus of large, semi-aquatic snakes that anacondas belong to.
• The Coup: Staged one with the Big Ugly to destroy the temple where the festival was being held and become the Great Chief.
• Cycle of Hurting: Eunectes' S2, Menacing Slash, effectively stunlocks the enemy she's currently blocking. As her Trait allows her to gain SP while blocking, this basically lets her spam her stun with relative impunity.
• Defeat Means Friendship: Joins Rhodes Island alongside the High Priest, after they destroy the Big Ugly. This is where she adopts the codename "Eunectes".
• Genius Bruiser: Her passion and talent for engineering is so impressive that Closure thinks that with some training, she might not only be a prime candidate if she ever needs a successor as the head of Rhodes Island R&D (with her skin showing this exact scenario happening) but even become a world-class champion of technological advancement. Yet, where most geniuses and scientists usually stick to support or ranged warfare, Eunectes also happens to be a monstrously strong brawler whose weapon of choice is a battleaxe.
• Goggles Do Nothing: Wears a pair on her head.
• Grappling-Hook Pistol: She uses this to temporarily "leave" the battlefield upon activating her third skill.
• Grease Monkey: Eunectes has an affinity for machinery, and is fascinated by Lancet-2's design. She aspires to one day create her own sentient robots.
• Image Song: "Evolutionary Mechanization".
• The Knights Who Say "Squee!": Eunectes was immensely excited when she first met Lancet-2, the very first sentient robot she had met in her life that can talk and move on its own. Just a few lines into the conversation, she was reduced to squeeing and asking Lancet-2 for permission to hug right after.
• Mechanically Unusual Fighter: Eunectes is the first Defender to only be able to block 1 enemy regardless of Elite status, combined with her quirk that only lets her charge SP while blocking. She behaves more like a defensive Guard than anything. This can make her very useful if dealing with a map condition which restricts or removes Guards.
• Mini-Mecha: Eunectes' S3 has her dropping a Powered Armor into her spot, with her companion macaw The High Priest at the helm. The mecha inherits Eunectes' stats on top of its own, giving it higher block and staying power, while Eunectes heals off-screen.
• Mirror Match: Why, yes, you can actually deploy Eunectes in RI-8 and face off against Big Ugly with... Big Ugly by activating her S3, despite the fact that the one-of-a-kind mech is going berserk storywise.
• Necessary Drawback:
  • Even for a 6*, her S3, Iron Will, is extremely powerful, giving her an insane ATK and DEF steroid while granting her increased block and potent health regen. When this skill is active, Eunectes hits stats that most operators can only dream of, capable of dominating hordes of enemies and even powerful bosses by herself. However, not only is it gated by a large SP cost, it will stun her for 5 seconds after the skill ends.
  • In general, her entire skillset (except for her rather vanilla S1, Tomahawk), revolves around this, being very strong, but are not only gated by high SP costs, but are additionally crimped by the requirement of having Eunectes block enemies in order to charge SP. And before you ask, no, you cannot circumvent this via SP batteries if she is not blocking enemies...unless she happens to wear her X Module, which allows her to do so.
  • In addition to the above, due to her extreme power, she is also the most expensive Defender in terms of DP cost, equalling Artilleryman Snipers and Splash Casters.
• Nubile Savage: Her design seems to be based on this trope. It's the clearest in her E2 art.
• Stance System: Her first talent causes her attacks to do bonus damage when she's above half health. However, when she's below half health, she loses the offense boost and enters a defensive stance that reduces all damage taken by a percentage.
• Stripperiffic: Eunectes' outfit leaves very little to imagination, being fashioned out of cloth scraps and straps that are fastened haphazardly onto her exposed thighs and midriff. Even her yellow "dress", which is also semi-transparent, doesn't even properly cover her. This is to be expected given her Nubile Savage theme.
• Token Minority: Although she's from the same geographic region as Gavial and Tomimi, Eunectes seems to have been based on large snakes instead of crocodilians. In fact, she's the first Pythia character introduced so far^note technically second, since Faust has been confirmed to be a Pythia as well, but Eunectes was introduced before this revelation was made.

---

Firewhistle

Firewhistle / Agni

Introduced: Where Vernal Winds Will Never Blow
Voiced by: Eriko Matsui (Japanese), Luttefair (Mandarin Chinese), Jennifer Losi (English), Kim So-hee (Korean)
Artist: IRIS_口艺

Rhodes Island's Fire Department was on edge for a while after she came, but luckily, she's learned a thing or two about putting out fires in all her time lighting them.

^{Click to see Elite 2 appearance.}

Defender Operator Firewhistle, at your service!

Rarity: ★★★★★

ID: No. 493

Subclass: Fortress

Tags: DPS, Defense

Skills: Wildfire, Scorched Earth

Talents: Unbound Fighter

Affiliation: Rim Billiton

Race: Liberi

Birthday: May 6

Height: 166cm

"Thank you for choosing Firewhistle Security Services! My name is... huh? Codename? Umm, just call me Firewhistle. Yup, that's the key to raising brand awareness!"

A former security officer who is now the owner of her own Rim Billiton security company, joining up with Rhodes Island as part of an agreement to try and save her company from bankruptcy.

---

• All for Nothing: Her operator record begins with her and a group of fellow university students building a school in a remote Rim Billiton village. The village headman, clinging to the old style of life and hating mining companies for putting villagers out of business with cheaper and better goods, is however dismissive of her goal of giving their children better future through education. While she manages to stay as a teacher and teach local children basic writing and mathematics, her father ultimately comes pick her up from the village ahead of the end of the term she wants to teach, the headman once again rebuffs her and her notion of a better life when he learns that Firewhistle is the daughter of a mining company owner and the school collapses from vibrations caused by a nearby mining platform.
• Animal Motifs: The whistling kite (Haliastur sphenurus). The genus name is written on her crop top and shoes, the subfamily name is on her name card, the word "vieillot" on her shield refers to the French ornithologist that proposed whistling kite's binomial name and a silhouette of the bird can be seen in the fire in her Elite 2 art. Whistling kites are known to help spread bushfires for hunting, fitting with her tendency to spread fire.
• Benevolent Boss: Also overlaps with A Mother To Her Men. She treats the Infected in her company fairly - this is the main reason why her company is going under, because people are afraid to hire the Infected. Her contract with Rhodes Island is mainly to seek medical care for her employees first, and saving her company second.
• BFG: Lugs around a cannon as her ranged weapon.
• Clothing Damage: Her clothes are visibly burning away in her Elite 2 art.
• Consummate Professional: Despite her easygoing personality, Firewhistle quickly becomes deadly serioius when actual combat occurs, eliminating threats to her client with cold and calculated efficiency.
• Defector from Decadence: Her profile reveals that she initially worked under another company, but chose to leave and found her own security company because she was disgusted with how her superiors were treating her Infected comrades.
• Dramatic Shattering: In her operator record, she comes carrying a bottle of champagne as a gift for the village headman when she and her friends finish building a school. As the headman doesn't want to drink it, she decides to at least keep it stored in his home until she finishes teaching a term, after which the bottle would be popped for celebration. Once her father, a mining company owner, comes pick her up ahead of the term's end, the headman gives her the champagne back, and when a mining platform destroys the school before her eyes, she smashes the bottle on the ground.
• Fashionable Asymmetry: Wears a full length stocking on her left leg but only a knee guard on the right.
• Hard-Drinking Party Girl: Her Elite 2 promotion record is of her losing a fist fight with Gavial while on vacation in Rhodes Island, and fell asleep clutching a cocktail one of her employees put into her hand.
• Honest Corporate Executive: She makes no secret that she has Infected employees, which has greatly hurt her potential business opportunities. However, this also means she prioritzes the well being of her employees and will never betray them for her own personal gain like their previous employer.
• Misplaced Wildlife: Subverted for once; Firewhistle's alliance is put as being RIM Billiton in her files, the equivalent of the bird's real-life habitat, Australia.
• Playing with Fire: Her skills both light enemies on fire, causing them to take Arts damage equal to a percentage of her attack stat over time.
• Pyromaniac: Her primary weapon is a cannon that shoots incendiary shells. She also has a reputation for spreading fires, which makes the Rhodes Island fire department (especially Shaw) nervous when they hear news of her arrival. Even one of her lines has her jokingly mention she can start a fire with all of the paper in the Doctor's office.
• Rebellious Princess: She is actually the heiress to a large and successful mining corpration. However, after she witnesses the deep class divide between the mine owners and their employees, she decides not to inherit the family business and instead go her own way by joining a PMC.
• Religious and Mythological Theme Naming: Agni is the Hindu deity of fire. The god to be precise.
• Signed Up for the Dental: She specifically sought out a partnership with Rhodes Island not only to stave off bankruptcy, but also because Rhodes Island was in the best position to provide her mostly Infected workforce badly needed healthcare.
• Stripperiffic: She wears a small tube top and a single legged Painted-On Pants, showing off alot of skin.
• The Uriah Gambit: She left her previous employer after they ordered her to send sick and Infected soldiers on suicide missions just so they wouldn't have to pay out healthcare compensation to them.

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Friston-3 (Unmarked Spoilers)

Friston-3 / Trevor Friston, the Preserver

Introduced: Lone Trail (First Appearance), Pinch-Out Experimental Operation (Playable Debut)
Voiced by: Shūichi Ikeda (Japanese), Dong Shengzhang (Mandarin Chinese), John Kassir (English), Im Chae-bin (Korean)
Artist: 过失帝国

He doesn't think of himself as a robot.

Rhodes Island Defender Robot Friston-3, deployed to the battlefield by Engineer Closure to participate in combat operations.

Rarity: ★

ID: No. 4093

Subclass: Protector

Tags: Robot, Defense

Skills: N/A

Talents: Persevere

Affiliation: Rhodes Island

Height: 145cm

"Hello there, I am Friston. That's right, just "Friston", not "Friston-3" or whatever. I am not a replica, and very much less a reproduction of a replica. I hope you understand."

A mechanical operation platform constructed by Closure and the first one to be entirely built by Rhodes Island's engineers. In truth, Friston-3's AI is the last remnant of Trevor Friston, whose Preserver AI was salvaged from destruction and offered to Rhodes Island by Ho'olheyak as a bargaining chip.

---

• Camera Fiend: His potential token mentions that he has a habit of photographing anything that has research value.
• Cruel Mercy: When Kal'tsit approaches Closure with the plan to rebuild him, Closure questions her decision, as Friston would be revived as an amnesiac in a totally alien world, and with no guarantee that he would be mentally stable given how advanced his original personality module was compared to current technology, with the implication that they should maybe let his Mercy Kill stick. Kal'tsit acknowledges this but urges her to do it anyways, as the information Friston holds from the previous era is simply too valuable to give up for her.
• Damage Reduction: Friston's Persevere talent causes allies in his surrounding tiles to take up to 75 less damage for 10 seconds after his deployment.
• Death of Personality: The previous instance of him that functioned as "the Preserver" of the Preservation Project facility, due to the sheer length of time functioning with an actual human consciousness, ended up leaving him incredibly despondent and seeking an end from the torture of being trapped in such a state; this leads him to asking the Doctor and Kal'tsit to terminate him via a memory deletion protocol before scuttling the facility once he answers all of their questions so he can finally experience the lost joy of being human once more by facing mortality. The only reason this stops from being a full on Killed Off for Real is because of Ho'olheyak finding the newly factory-reset Friston's data within the facility before it was all completely lost, leading to the creation of Friston-3 from the recovered memory module, akin to Friston from before he became a Preserver.
• Despair Event Horizon: During the long time after he was converted into the Preserver, Friston constantly sent messages to outer space in the hopes of contacting possible Precursor colonies in other planets, all without success. This combined with the moment he realized that the Precursors in the Hall of Stasis were dying, and his attempts to revive them all failed had caused him to fall into a state of despair that led to his current-day apathy.
• Disappeared Dad: He had a wife and child prior to his conversion into the Preserver, as well as an AI he created prior to his conversion that he christened Mark Max. Said AI went on to become the President of Columbia, and in "Lone Trail" he called Friston his father when addressing the Doctor and Kal'tsit.
• Do Not Call Me "Paul": Downplayed, his recruitment line has him very insistent on only being called Friston, not Friston-3.
• Gameplay and Story Integration: His relationship with Kal'tsit is carried over into his RIIC skill "Pleasant Conversation" where he increases the drone recharge rate by another 5% if he is assigned to a Power Plant while Kal'tsit is assigned to the Control Center.
• Insufferable Genius: As a former scientist of a hyper-advanced species alien to Terra, Friston has a vast knowledge on virtually every scientific field imaginable, including knowledge that nobody in the current era has access to nor the understanding of. However, he often expresses disappointment and displeasure at the state of the current era of humanity, and considers himself far more technologically and intellectually advanced.
  Weedy: "He's not easy to talk to, though. He's pretty prejudiced, overly aggressive, a perfectionist, wants full control over his scientific research, and doubts the basic models academics currently use to verify their experimental data. And most of the time, you can't convince him otherwise. Though fortunately for us, he's equally curious about how our various technological fields are developing, so we can still manage some form of effective communication. But you know how the smarter the scientist, the harder they are to get along with... so it isn't that surprising for a scientist robot to be a little eccentric."
• Logic Bomb: Invoked; he's repeatedly tried to force-feed the other robot Operators lectures about self-awareness and philosophy, to the point where Lancet-3 was physically unable to process it and overloaded her cognitive module three separate times.
• Mysterious Backer: Friston as Preserver was the one who provided assistance to Kristen to help see her Horizon Arc Project to fruition.
• Outliving One's Offspring: Technically. His wife and child were part of the Precursors preserved in the Hall of Stasis, and were part of the casualties when Friston chose to give up on the Preservation Project after he was unable to revive them.
• Promoted to Playable: He first appears in "Lone Trail" (technically, when Ho'olheyak finds him), then becomes playable in "Pinch-Out Experimental Operation".
• The Resenter: Friston is this towards Kal'tsit while he was "The Preserver", admitting to that fact as his thousands of years at his post over the Conversation Project has driven him past the Cynicism Catalyst and into an apathetic state of wishing his own demise due to the fact he was based on an actual human consciousness over being a pure AI yet Kal'tsit, a lowly "servant machine" to the Doctor, was afforded the privilege of having an actual human body that allowed her to experience being alive. He plainly states his envy towards Kal'tsit, but his longing for his own death has made Friston ignore most of his disdain for Kal'tsit beyond an air of passive aggressiveness towards her.
• Robot Buddy: He's the fifth robot Operator in the game. He is also this to the Doctor alongside Kal'tsit as one of their oldest companions over the last ten thousand years as "The Preserver", having a rapport with the both of them.
• Special Person, Normal Name: The AI known as the Preserver turns out to have the very mundane name of Trevor.
• Wetware CPU: Unlike the other robots, Friston-3 is built off a human consciousness and mind over being purely program not unlike Kal'tsit — this allows Friston-3 a lot more autonomy and agency than the usual machine that allows him the ability to handle a program like the Preservation Project at his discretion, even scuttling the surviving Precursors when hope of reviving them is made null due to lacking the sufficient energy to preserve them. To the general population of Rhodes Island, he's just considered a Ridiculously Human Robot.
• Who Wants to Live Forever?: Being based on an actual person's consciousness while put into a mechanical, unfeeling body has done a number on his willpower over the centuries. He admits that he envies Kal'tsit for her human-like body allowing her the freedom to feel as he once had when he was alive, but he's grown to ultimately covet the idea of dying as a way to re-experience his lost humanity. The Doctor and Kal'tsit grant his wish by invoking a Death of Personality on him after he answers their questions.
• You Are Number 6: The -3 in his name denotes the fact that he is technically the third Friston, after both the original Trevor and his Ghost Memory AI Preserver. After Kal'tsit triggered Preserver's memory deletion protocol at his request and left with the Doctor, Ho'olheyak happened to find the post-amnesiac Preserver before he was destroyed by his pre-amnesiac self, and used her Arts to salvage his memories and bring him to Rhodes Island (as part of her plan to gain amnesty from Columbia by boarding Rhodes Island herself).

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Gummy (Гум)

Gummy (Гум) / Lada (Paдa)

Introduced: Game Launch
Voiced by: Natsumi Takamori (Japanese), Winter (Mandarin Chinese), Cristina Valenzuela (English), Kim Chae-ha (Korean), Varvara Sarantzev (Russian)
Artist: Skade

She whips up an absolutely scrumptious breakfast.

^{Click to see Elite 2 appearance.}

^{Click here to see her Coral Coast: Summer Flowers FA011 skin.}

Gummy, Defender Operator of Rhodes Island, will heal her teammates while protecting them.

Rarity: ★★★★

ID: No. 196

Subclass: Guardian

Tags: Defense, Healing

Skills: Provisions, Cooking

Talents: Frying Pan Specialist

Affiliation: U.S.S.G - Empire of Ursus

Race: Ursus

Birthday: October 2

Height: 155cm

"My name's Gummy! You must be the Doctor. Thank you and everyone from Rhodes Island for helping us! I don't have any special skills, but I'll do what I can as good as I can!"

A chipper Ursus student and a proficient cook, as well as one of the survivors of the Chernobog uprising.

---

• Action Survivor: Gummy's usage of just her Youth Scout experience and cooking skills went a long way to helping her survive the fall of Chernobog.
• Animal Motifs: Sun bears. Not only are her asset files named as such, but the explicit name of the bear species is even printed on her coat.
• Boring, but Practical: Compared to her fellow support Defenders, Gummy lacks most of their flair or sheer utility. In return, she's currently the only one in her subclass with an unconditional S1 heal, allowing Gummy to replenish the health of an ally instantly without having to wait for them to dip below 50% HP, whereas as her stronger counterparts Nearl and Saria must (albeit Saria doesn't need to in her second and third skills). As long as someone's hurt, no matter how badly, Gummy will always be able to provide instant healing whenever it is needed.
• Casting Gag: Gummy's Russian VA, Varvara Sarantzev, was also the voice of another cheerful young Russian girl named Masha from Masha and the Bear. In other words, Gummy is essentially Masha the Bear.
• Character Tic: Outside of her Elite 2 CG, Gummy is always seen with her tongue sticking out of one side of her mouth, even when fighting. She's also almost always depicted as winking in her CGs, though this is not present in her chibi sprites.
• Chef of Iron: One that both kicks ass and can whip up a nutritious meal to heal everyone around her. Her Elite skill is literally her taking a break from smacking enemies to cook for her team, and manifests in her skillset.
  • Her first skill Provisions automatically heals a nearby ally for a portion of Gummy's attack in her next attack, and can store one charge.
  • Her second skill Cooking has her stop attacking for 10 seconds while buffing her DEF by 50%; after that, she focuses on healing nearby allies for a portion of her ATK.
  • Her Frying Pan Specialist talent gives her a 13% chance to increase the damage her next attack by 150% and stun her target for .5 seconds, which increases at Elite 2 for a 15% chance to proc 200% more damage on her next attack and stun her target for 1 second.
• Combat Medic: Best way to sum her up; she's able heal any nearby ally, and being a Defender, she's durable...not to mention the possibility that she can stun enemies she hits with her frying pan.
• Concealment Equals Cover: Her Summer Flowers FA011 outfit trades her metallic vault door to a wooden signboard to carry as a shield, this doesn't stop the signboard from being just as durable as a vault door, despite being made of wood.
• Cross-Popping Veins: She gains this on her battle sprite whenever she's whacking a baddie with her frying pan.
• Disc-One Nuke: She can be this, if the player chooses to buy the Starter pack from the store, which immediately unlocks her. As a Defender, Gummy is strong enough for her cost to last the player a while before she needs to be promoted, and has good team sustain due to her heals. She remains a viable pick up until the mid-to-late game, even further if she's properly fed, but generally she's more or less relegated to Crutch Character status by that point.
• Dub Name Change: The EN release extends her name to "Gummy". Originally, she was just called "Gum", written in Cyrillic script, which can still be seen in small font above her new name.
• Foreshadowing: It's mentioned that Gummy has three odd "habits" which are: always slicing her cutting board in half if she chops three times, not brushing her teeth until she sucks every last bit of toothpaste out of the tube, and biting anything, including other people if she gets hungry. Now, by themselves, it seems innocuous, but put together and in context of what she experienced during the fall of Chernobog, it quickly becomes evident that said habits are leftover behaviors from having to resort to cannibalism. Putting all your power into your third chop is a common method to cut through bone, sucking toothpaste out of the tube is similar to sucking bone marrow out of the bone, and biting other people shows how she is accustomed to tasting human flesh.
• Frying Pan of Doom: This is her weapon and also her primary cooking utensil.
• Gameplay and Story Integration: The aforementioned talent mirrors her having a habit in hitting something too hard and break it she hits more than twice. It has been pointed out how this is a method in cutting bones.
• Gratuitous Foreign Language:
  • Gummy's original name, Gum, can be seen rendered in small font Cyrillic script above her new name in the EN version. Thing is, that's only swapping the English alphabet letters to Cyrillic ones instead of being actual Russian, since "[chewing] gum" in Russian is "zhevatel'naya rezinka/жевательная резинка", rather than "gum/ГУМ" (and "gummy bear", which is where her name probably comes from and is the actual joke, is "Мармеладные мишки").^note What may have happened is that Hypergryph saw that the song "Gummibär" is indeed spelled "Гуммибер" and simply extrapolated the joke from there, thinking that "Гуммибер" was the standard spelling for "gummy bear" in Russian.
  • Some of her English voiced dialogues are occasionally peppered in Russian.
• The Heart: She's the most caring of her three-man team and the one who keeps their spirits up.
• Hidden Depths: On the outside, Gummy is a kind-hearted, sociable gal. But according to a hypothesis from her psychological counselors, she socializes in order to manage her anxiety. Children of Ursus implied that she might have had to resort to cannibalism during the fall of Chernobog due to the lack of food where she was kept. She likely hasn't managed to get over it just yet, if her biting Dur-Nar is any indication.
• Horror Hunger: Children of Ursus reveals that when she's especially hungry, Gummy doesn't discriminate between the things she can chew on, whether it's a cooked steak, a biscuit, or someone else's body. It is a lasting consequence of Gummy having to endure hunger and eat whatever she could get her hands on during the fall of Chernobog in order to survive. Gummy basically becomes feral whenever she's hungry enough, and the cravings become even worse in the dark, which horrifies herself to the point of reducing her to a crying wreck, and she has to keep the lights on at night as a result.
• Hyperactive Metabolism: Her healing skills basically bestow this upon anyone she heals, including herself. Somehow, the healing's recipient is able to chow down on the meal she cooked for them and instantly convert the nutrition into health.
• Improbable Weapon User:
  • Among a plethora of swords, clubs, or machetes, Gummy's weapon of choice is...a frying pan.
  • While using a vault door as a shield is unusual, it is not completely illogical. Then comes her summer outfit from "Obsidian Festival", where she replaces that vault door with a wooden standee.
• Kawaiiko: She is incredibly cute, endearing, and likable thanks to her can-do, peppy attitude and desire to help people. This is a bit notable, as her Cast Herd stable-mates are Zima (who is a punk delinquent clearly struggling with PTSD from the fall of Chernobog) and Istina (who is a highly-rational top student), making her a marked contrast to them both. "Children of Ursus" implies she has just as much PTSD as the rest of her group, but she's a lot better at hiding it.
• Odd Name Out: Out of all three Ursus students, Gummy is the only one without an overtly-Russian codename; the Gratuitous Foreign Language entry describes what's going on with her name.
• Primal Fear: Gummy is afraid of darkness and has to sleep with the lights on, due to reasons explained under Horror Hunger.
• Punny Name: Yes, the "Gum/Gummy" part of her name is supposed to be a reference to "gummy bear".
• Sailor Fuku: Hers is similar to Zima's, but in a different color.
• Stronger Than They Look:
  • Despite her small stature, Gummy is still one of the stronger Heal tanks in the game with respectable ATK. It's especially notable as her weapon is a small, blunt Frying Pan of Doom, rather than the large hammers or bladed weapons wielded by other Defenders, but it still smashes Reunion heads all the same. It's somewhat understandable, however, due to her hailing from the Empire of Ursus, where Mother Russia Makes You Strong.
  • To showcase her race's natural Super-Strength, her shield is actually a freaking vault door. Nevermind where she got it from in the first place, a security vault door would obviously weigh significantly more than a personal shield of comparable size, and yet she hefts it around like no big deal.
  • Additional backstories revealed during Children of Ursus describe how Gummy has to be very ginger when preparing food. She can only chop anything twice, as the third slice will bisect the cutting board and the counter it's on.
• Third-Person Person: In Chinese and Japanese (including JP voiceover), Gummy refers to herself like this. The trait is largely absent in the English script.
• You Can't Go Home Again: With her home city of Chernobog under control of Reunion and her family presumably dead, Gummy joined Rhodes Island along with Zima and Istina.

---

Heavyrain

Heavyrain

Introduced: A Walk in the Dust
Voiced by: Kaori Ishihara (Japanese), Cotton Candy (Mandarin Chinese), TBA (English)
Artist: aZLing4

She has a lot of to say, but she doesn't know how to say it.

^{Click to see Elite 2 appearance.}

^{Click to see her Vitafield Foruiner: Tranquil Moss skin.}

Heavyrain, Defender Operator, works hard.

Rarity: ★★★★★

ID: No. 304

Subclass: Protector

Tags: Defense, Support

Skills: Emergency Camouflage, Group Camouflage

Talents: Striped Camouflage

Affiliation: Rhodes Island

Race: Kuranta

Birthday: March 3

Height: 159cm

"(Looks like a kind person, but is this guy really going to be as easy to get along with as Amiya said...?) Uh, um, I'm sorry, I-I was spacing out. Operator codename Heavyrain, reporting in."

A quiet Sargon soldier who was betrayed by her allies and left for dead before being saved by Kal'tsit. Spot once lent her some comic books, which sparked her fondness for reading. A record from Preluding Light reveals that Pallas once saved her after she crossed the border from Sargon to Minos.

---

• Animal Motifs: Zebras, as can be seen in her E2 art.
• Because You Were Nice to Me: Due to her insecurity about her communication issues, Heavyrain is quick to consider anybody that shows her kindness or acknowledgement as a close friend of hers.
• Berserk Button: Seeing her allies getting hurt in battle can cause her to lose her cool and become highly aggressive.
• Beware the Quiet Ones: While shy and quiet in normal situations, Heavyrain demonstrates her skills as a professional soldier during missions.
• But for Me, It Was Tuesday: She actually crossed paths with fellow Defender Spot in the past, where he lent her one of his comic books when he observed that she was alone. While this is an important encounter for Heavyrain, Spot doesn't remember it at all.
• Early-Bird Cameo: She first appears in "Operational Intelligence" as a fresh Rhodes Island recruit but doesn't actually become an obtainable operator until the "A Walk in the Dust" event.
• Shellshocked Veteran: While she has had a long and honorable service record as a soldier, Heavyrain is traumatized from an event where her best friend betrayed her to defect to an enemy army, causing the death of nearly her entire squad and almost getting her executed as a scapegoat.
• Shrinking Violet: She's generally seen as shy and introverted, mainly because she has trouble expressing herself to others.
• Stealth Expert: She can camouflage herself and nearby allies, effectively making them immune to ranged attacks.

---

Horn (Unmarked Spoilers)

Horn / Rita Skamandros

Introduced: Episode 9: Stormwatch (First Appearance), Episode 10: Shatterpoint (Playable Debut)
Voiced by: Megumi Toyoguchi (Japanese), Yuan Weng (Mandarin Chinese), Anna Burnett (English), Sung Hye-won (Korean)
Artist: m9nokuro

Shells swift as wind storm, shield stiff as steel wall.

^{Click to see Elite 2 appearance.}

^{Click to see her Epoque: To Effloresce Whitely skin.}

^{Click to see her initial appearance in Chapter 10: Shatterpoint}

Horn, Soldier of Victoria, here with you to face the crisis.

Rarity: ★★★★★★

ID: No. 4039

Subclass: Fortress

Tags: DPS, Defense

Skills: Flare Grenade, Tempest Command, Ultimate Line of Defense

Talents: Military Fortress, Bloodbath

Affiliation: Victorian Empire

Race: Lupo

Birthday: November 1

Height: 168cm

"Tempest Platoon Leader Horn reporting in, Doctor of Rhodes Island. I've already borne witness to your own tactics, and the fighting spirit of Rhodes Island's operators. Under our ensuing cooperation, I and my troops will heed your orders."

The commander of Bagpipe's Victorian Army unit when she was still a soldier.

---

• Animal Motifs: Wolves. Three of them are seen in the background of her Elite 2 art. This also makes her one of the few non-Siracusan born Lupos.
• Badass in Distress: Episode 10 reveals that she was captured by Mandragora following their duel at the end of Episode 9. She gets saved by a Rhodes Island team led by Misery at some point before the start of Episode 10.
• Blinded by the Light: Her first skill makes her next attack deal bonus damage and, if it's a ranged attack, throw a flash bomb that reveals all invisible enemies in its radius.
• Boring, but Practical: Compared to the raw firepower of her third skill, her first and second skills are this, due to not heavily consuming her HP (unless you choose to with the second skill), not incentivizing her Critical Status Buff as much, operating on charges or ammo to avoid wasted skill duration, and her second skill allowing her to fight more effectively at close range, along with each skill's unique niches of stealth removal and instant burst respectively.
• Cast From Hitpoints: When her second skill is in its "Overdrive" mode (with half of its ammo used up), deactivating it will instead have Horn fire all of her remaining shots at once at the cost of 60% of her maximum HP. Her third skill similarly has an Overdrive mode, where its damage buff will increase when half of the skill's duration is used up, but will also cause Horn to lose an increasingly severe amount of HP per second.
• The Chains of Commanding: Her profile notes that even though she has extremely strong mental fortitude, the burden of responsibility weighs very heavy on her mind and the author hopes that the Doctor will be able to help her come to terms with it.
• Daddy's Girl: While Horn doesn't respect her father much, it's very heavily implied that he still loves her a great deal, and the main reason he remains neutral in Victoria's politics is to protect her and the rest of their family from reprisal by the Skamandros family's many enemies. He also keeps close enough tabs on her that he already knows she's joined Rhodes Island before HR has even sent official notice of her employment to anyone.
• Death Seeker: While not immediately apparent, her experiences County Hillock and as Dublinn's prisoner have left deep marks on Horn's psyche. She's haunted by the deaths of her squad and the horrors of war, and she constantly throws herself into danger to protect others even at the cost of her own life. When she attempt to sacrifice herself to buy time for Misery and Robben to escape with the Corps fighters, she smiles at the thought of finally escaping the nightmares and endless fighting by dying in battle
• Determinator: As best exemplified by her second Talent, Horn's resilience and willpower are extremely high, able to power through mortal injury and keep going without losing any significant combat strength, and in gameplay terms actually getting stronger once knocked down the first time in a deployment.
• Difficult, but Awesome: Like Ashlock before her, Horn being a Fortress Defender makes her play very differently from the average Defender - her archetype makes her a Defender who shouldn't actually be blocking enemies to leverage her ranged Area of Effect damage, and this ranged damage in turn requires proper positioning due to the archetype's Arbitrary Weapon Range, which can quickly get awkward on some stages. And due to her reduced max HP when her second passive is active and the self-damage from two of her three skills, Horn is also easy to knock out. However, when you find the right spot to deploy her, and can keep her alive while her skills are active, Horn does fantastic damage that can destroy just about anything, even more so when utilizing her Critical Status Buff. Horn is also highly versatile due to her three skills' varied effects, allowing her to remove stealth, instantly burst dangerous targets, or deal immense consistent damage depending on the situation.
• The Dreaded: Horn is the latest descendant of the greatly feared White Wolf lineage, who are capable of insanely devastating battlefield feats. For example, there is a story where a previous White Wolf was able to kill a Vampire by literally ripping him apart with his bare hands. Episode 12 verifies the truth of this story - Lucia Skamandros was a previous White Wolf and a Knight of the Tower who battled in the siege of Kazdel and personally slew a Vampire prince and multiple Nachzehrer elites.
• Flaming Sword: When her second skill enters Overdrive, her sword visibly catches fire.
• Fling a Light into the Future: At the end of Episode 9, she orders Bagpipe to escape from County Hillock to ensure at least one person who is aware of the true events that occurred in the city survives to tell the tale.
• Glass Cannon: Her second talent, Bloodbath, is an Auto-Revive that turns her into this, increasing her ASPD and DEF, but halving her maximum HP. With her second or third skill equipped, Horn can blast out some tremendous damage output, but using them until Overdrive consumes her HP quite quickly, making her surprisingly fragile for a Defender if she isn't supported by a Medic.
• Glowing Eyes of Doom: After her second talent triggers, one of Horn's eyes will emit a bright orange glow to indicate that it's active.
• Hair of Gold, Heart of Gold: Has a head of long, blonde hair and is a brave, loyal, and kindhearted soldier who is always mindful of her comrades' well-beings.
• Hates Their Parent: Her profile mentions that she doesn't have the greatest respect for her father, who failed to prevent the Aslan royal family from being overthrown and subsequently remained neutral in the political squabbling between the Victorian nobility and even Theresis' occupation of Londinium.
• Heroic Lineage: Horn is part of the Skamandros family, a decorated noble family with a prestigious military history, and she was born to the "White Wolf Count," the current head of the family who even the current Draco leaders of Victoria are wary of. Furthermore, her family's ancestors are the "White Wolves" of ages past, who were legendary Lupo warriors whose names have been immortalized for hundreds, if not thousands of years for their deeds in battle.
• Heroic RRoD: During particularly intense or desperate battles, Horn can tap into her White Wolf lineage to obtain significantly increased combat prowess. However, the Rhodes Island medics note that use of her White Wolf abilities takes a massive toll on her body, and recommend minimizing its use as much as possible.
• Heroic Second Wind: At Elite 2, she gains a second talent which will let her survive a lethal blow and fully revive herself with increased DEF and ASPD, albeit with only half of her original maximum health. Naturally, this only works once per deployment.
• Heroic Spirit: Misery notes that despite losing almost her entire platoon and subsequently getting captured and humiliated by Dublinn for months, Horn shows zero signs of crossing the Despair Event Horizon and keeps looking for ways to escape and re-enter the fight. This gives even the heavily nihilistic Misery some restored faith in humanity and he decides to help Horn escape.
• Hoist by Her Own Petard: It's possible for the self-damage from her second and third skills to knock herself out, necessitating the use of a healer to avoid this. At the same time, it's actually encouraged she does this at first to trigger her second talent and gain more attack speed for more damage, though she really does require a healer afterwards to survive more skill activations, especially when using her third skill.
• Image Song: "March On!"
• In the Blood: Befitting the daughter of a prominent military family, Horn is a highly skilled soldier and commander, already at the rank of lieutenant in one of Victoria's battalions and in charge of her own platoon despite her young age. Her ancestors being the White Wolves also makes her an even more fearsome opponent when consumed by Unstoppable Rage.
• Jack of All Trades: All of Horn's skills are very versatile and can be used reliably depending on the player's needs, with powerful sustained AoE damage using S1, massive burst damage with S3, and a mix of both with some melee capability thrown in using S2, making her one of the most ideal candidates for fully mastering every skill (or "M9". Of course, this also makes her very expensive to fully raise compared to other operators.
• Mix-and-Match Weapon: Horn's signature weapon is a large, customized shield that houses a cannon on the inside, allowing it act as a BFG or a regular shield as required. She also carries a smaller shield that holds spare ammo for it.
• A Mother to Her Men: She cares very much for the soldiers under her command and always orders to them to come back safely. Naturally, she's devastated when many of them wind up dying to Dublinn's invasion.
• Musical Theme Naming: Horn and all her squadmates have codenames based on musical instruments, with Bagpipe being one such example.
• Nerves of Steel: Upon discovering her held hostage by Dublinn, Misery was impressed by how she was somehow still sane and willing to live despite almost all her comrades being slaughtered in front of her and then being taken prisoner, and was compelled to help her escape as a result.
• Non-Indicative Name: Despite her connection with the 'White Wolf', her own hair, wolf ears and wolf tail are sandy-colored, obscuring this connection.
• Obfuscating Insanity: Her Operator Record reveals that part of her escape from captivity from Dublinn was by pretending to hallucinate her dead squad and lure the enemy into a sense of complacency.
• Officer and a Gentleman: She is a Victorian Army officer and is also descended from a well-renowned noble family.
• One-Handed Zweihänder: Along with her shields, Horn also carries a large one-handed broadsword, which can deal exploding strikes and be set on fire.
• Red Baron: Like her father and ancestors before her, Horn too has the moniker of "White Wolf," though this is more based around rumors on account of her occasional Unstoppable Rage in battle, and she only really goes by her codename Horn.
• Shield Bash: How she usually fights at melee range.
• Status Buff: She gives all Defenders bonus ATK when deployed.
• Stuff Blowing Up: Her second skill causes all of her attacks to explode on impact, even the melee hits from her sword. Once she's used up half her ammo, the remaining explosions will also deal bonus Arts damage.
• Uncertain Doom: Horn's last scene in Episode 9 is her holding off Mandragora alone to give Bagpipe time to escape County Hillock. While Horn surviving the battle appears unlikely, Bagpipe is convinced that she is being held prisoner by Dublinn and wants to rescue her. The announcement for Episode 10 reveals that Horn is playable, thus revealing that she survives.
• Unstoppable Rage: Like her White Wolf ancestors, Horn can enter a frenzy during particularly difficult battles where her speed and ferocity are dialed up a notch, and seemingly makes her hair go white and her eyes start glowing. When asked about it, Horn will apologize to the Doctor about losing control of herself. This is reflected in-game with the activation of her second talent, where one of her eyes starts glowing and she gains DEF and ASPD after her Heroic Second Wind.
• Walking Spoiler: The fact that she joins Rhodes Island spoils her fate after Episode 9, specifically, the fact that Horn survives from Dublinn's takeover of County Hillock.
• Wrench Wench: While she is a soldier first, Horn is proficient enough with technology that she can comfortably disassemble Victorian weaponry, which she learned through both her military experience and the Royal Guard Academy teaching its students mechanical engineering. This is remarkable given Victoria's ordnance is so advanced that Rhodes Island had difficulty taking it apart for repairs, and not even Closure is sure how she could further upgrade them. This is in stark contrast to her subordinate Bagpipe. In-game, this is referenced by her aptly named "Military Engineering" base passive, which reduces her morale costs in the Workshop when creating certain Elite materials.
• You Shall Not Pass!: Despite knowing she has no way of winning against Mandragora at the end of Episode 9, Horn holds her off as Bagpipe escapes from County Hillock. Her reveal as a playable Operator in Episode 10 confirms that she survives, subverting this trope.

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Hoshiguma

Hoshiguma

Introduced: Game Launch
Voiced by: Kiyono Yasuno (Japanese), X. Chai (Mandarin Chinese), Shixin Peng (Cantonese), Meaghan Martin (English), Lee Sae-byeok (Korean)
Artist: Infukun

Stand by her side when you are scared. It really helps.

^{Click to see Elite 2 appearance.}

^{Click to see her 0011/Tempest: Patrolling Ronin skin.}

^{Click to see her Dossoles Holiday appearance.}

Hoshiguma, member of the Special Service of Lungmen Guard Department, is awaiting your orders.

Rarity: ★★★★★★

ID: No. 136

Subclass: Protector

Tags: DPS, Defense

Skills: Warpath, Thorns, Saw of Strength

Talents: Tactical Armor, Special Operation Strategy

Affiliation: L.G.D. - Great Lungmen

Race: Oni

Birthday: January 20

Height: 184cm

"Hoshiguma, Defender Operator. I'll be your shield, your blade, your fortress. Very glad to meet you, Doctor."

An imposing ex-gang member who eventually became an elite in the Lungmen Guard Department's special operations squad. She serves as a close colleague to Ch'en, her superior.

---

• Attack Reflector: Her second skill Thorns is a passive that gives her bonus DEF and automatically deals up to 80% (100% at Mastery 3) of her ATK as physical damage to attackers every time they land a hit on her.
• Badass Biker: In Chapter 5, Ch'en mentions she owns a whole collection of motorcycles. Beyond Here features her taking one of them out for a spin on her day off, burning rubber along a track on the outskirts of Lungmen and challenging Fumizuki to an impromptu race once she shows up.
• Berserk Button: Hurt her friends, and she'll smash you with her shield.
  • Manifested somewhat in her Warpath skill, which ups her DEF and ATK by 35% and 10% respectively for its duration at Skill Level 1.
• Boring, but Practical: Skillset-wise, she's pretty vanilla compared to other 6-star Defenders, with her playstyle just revolving around tanking really well and dealing some decent damage in return. But those skills make her one of the toughest Defenders to take down, and if the Random Number God is benevolent enough, she can shrug off multiple One Hit Kills that'll fell other Defenders.
• Counter-Attack: With her Y Module, she'll gain a temporary ATK boost each time she successfully blocks an attack with her first Talent.
• Curb-Stomp Battle: By herself alone, Hoshiguma took all of the Reunion members guarding a warehouse in Chapter 5, even if Ch'en nor their L.G.D. agents didn't even start their attack yet.
• Dark and Troubled Past: Implied in her profile, as Wei ominously discloses that despite how reasonable she appears, you don't know the real her until she tells you how she obtained her shield. In Chapter 7, Hoshiguma expresses her many regrets from the past for killing her family and friends over and over again until she was the only one left standing, to the point she sees herself as undeserving of life.
• Gameplay and Story Segregation: Having her shield partially destroyed by Ch'en in a recent story development doesn't change a thing gameplay-wise and you can still deploy her like normal. Her combat sprite's shield doesn't even look the least bit scuffed. This is all caused due to her playable version being set before all of the aforementioned things happen, and it would cause premature spoilers for the player who happens to get her before even getting to this point in the story.
• Genius Bruiser: Not only she is monstrously strong in combat, she also possess great knowledge about Lungmen's criminal underworld, law enforcement, politics, economics, education, and foreign policy (among other topics).
• Hidden Depths:
  • According to Wei, Hoshiguma is hiding some aspect of her personality from others, which is related to how exactly she obtained her shield.
  • In Chapter 5, Ch'en brings up Hoshiguma's "countless motorbikes" when they are reminiscing about their favorite brands or shops in the recently-abandoned and wrecked Paci Plaza.
• Horned Humanoid: She has one horn protruding from her forehead. Unlike her fellow Oni operators, however, Hoshiguma's horn sprouts directly out of her forehead and has the same color as her skin, whereas those of the others are drawn like black horn-shaped headbands instead.
• Image Song: “Daydaydream”. Shares with Ch’en.
• In-Series Nickname: In Chapter 5, the L.G.D. informant Phal (or codenamed XR02) calls his boss Hoshiguma as "Madam Oni". According to Ch'en, this is what people in Lungmen likes to affectionally call her.
• Lightning Bruiser: Her base DEF is the second-highest among all Defenders (second only to Nian) and can be further buffed by all of her skills, but she further enhances this with her talents, which let her outright negate damage at a 25-35% chance and buff her own DEF further, respectively. However, her skills also boost both her ATK and DEF instead of just the latter (especially her S3 that also significantly increases her attack rate while giving her area attacks), making her one of few offensively-oriented Defenders that can kill as effectively as she can tank.
• Mechanically Unusual Fighter: She is among one of the very few Defenders that have an attack range of one tile in front of them by default, common to that of Vanguards and non-ranged Guards.
• My Master, Right or Wrong: She's very much aware of Wei's shadiness despite her loyalty to him, but she understands his motives rather well as she knows that Wei will likely sacrifice himself to prevent Lungmen from going into war with Ursus and therefore, tries to convince Ch'en to stay behind as being his descendant, she can take over his position once he dies and solve the problems in the city.
• Mythical Motifs: Obviously, it's Oni from her race, which represent Japanese demons. A green oni also appears in her Elite 2 artwork.
• Named Weapons: Her shield is named "Hannya", after the jealous she-demons in Noh theater. It is also embedded with a Hannya mask on its front, as her Elite 2 artwork shows.
• Never Gets Drunk: Implied. Hoshiguma is often seen drinking, but no one has ever actually seen her drunk. She did lose a drinking match against Ch'en according to the Ancient Forge in-universe movie, much to her disbelief, but seeing as the entire thing was an exaggerated and dramatized plot, this remains dubious.
• Nice Girl: Despite her fairly imposing figure, Hoshiguma is a friendly and understanding woman.
• No-Sell: Upon reaching Elite 1, she gains the Tactical Armor talent, which gives her a 12% (25% at Elite 2, up to 35% with her Module and Potentials) chance to completely negate an instance of damage.
• Only Sane Woman: She is the most reasonable and sensible between her fellow ranking L.G.D. officers Ch'en and Swire, essentially being the one person that's keeping them from murdering each other.
• Ornamental Weapon: Hoshiguma's shown with multiple katanas in her "0011: Early Spring" skin. While she does swing one around in her idle base animation, she doesn't use them in her attack animations.
• Reasonable Authority Figure: Unlike her fellow L.G.D. operator Ch'en, Hoshiguma is more personable and understanding, and willing to listen to others' stories and issues.
• Red Oni, Blue Oni: The Blue to Ch'en's Red, who's Hot-Blooded and belligerent. Pun probably unintentional, however.
• Reformed Criminal: Prior to serving in the L.G.D., she was a notorious figure in Lungmen's criminal underworld. L.G.D. records shows that she held a code of honor even back then, never preying on the weak and acting righteous when given the chance.
• Religious and Mythological Theme Naming: Named after one of Shuten-Douji's oni subordinates, Hoshiguma Douji.
• Remember the New Girl?: Operation 3-2's cutscene reveals that Hoshiguma belongs to the group that was escorting Misha but got ambushed by W in the previous chapter's cliffhanger, even if Chapter 2 did not make any mentions of, nor show any on-screen appearances of Hoshiguma at all.
• Smoke In: A puff of smoke appears when Hoshiguma is deployed while wearing her "0011: Early Spring" skin.
• Sole Survivor: By Chapter 5, it is revealed that Hoshiguma is the last surviving member of her old gang.
• Spectacular Spinning: Hoshiguma's Saw of Strength skill lets her spin her entire shield as a buzzsaw, mulching everything within one tile in front of her.
• Statuesque Stunner: Even by most "normal" standards, Hoshi qualifies; she stands a good solid 184cm, or just a hair over an even six feet, which leaves her towering over nearly every other member of the cast. She's even around 10 cm ahead of the already tall Saria. She was the tallest female operator in the game for quite a while until the release of Valarqvin, who's 4 cm taller than her.
• The Strategist: Implied with her Elite 2 talent Special Operation Strategy, which (without increasing her potentials) buffs the DEF of all allied Defenders by 6%.
• Super-Strength: Befittingly of an oni, she's physically strong enough to hold up a building collapsing on her and Ch'en long enough for the pair to escape to safety. Even Ch'en was surprised at this feat. Unfortunately, Hoshiguma had to stay behind to rest and recover from her sustained injuries.
• Token Heroic Orc: She seems to like stories where these guys are the protagonists, as her potential token is an old manga where the main character is a heroic oni. Technically speaking, she can be considered one herself, being a reformed criminal who's naturally noble and caring.
• What the Hell, Hero?: In an attempt to stop Ch'en from leaving Lungmen in Chapter 7, she tells her not to throw away her life for the sake of justice, as she has lost many friends in the past because of it, and wants to stop Ch'en from repeating the same mistake as her and dying a pointless death in the process.
  Hoshiguma: Sticking to what's right and wrong, and stepping out because of that... is the dumbest thing you can do in your life.
• You Are in Command Now: After the various shenanigans of Chapter 8, Ch'en steps down as the chief Superintendent of the Lungmen Guard and formally joins Rhodes Island as a field agent. Hoshiguma, being Ch'en's Number Two, is promoted to fill the gap in the chain of command as a result.

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Hung

Hung / Ko Hei-sing

Introduced: Ancient Forge
Voiced by: Satoshi Hino (Japanese), Lü Shuqun (Mandarin Chinese), Lu Bin (Cantonese), Greg Chun (English), Choi Na-kyoon (Korean)
Artist: KuroBlood

There's no need to speculate. His fur feels very nice to the touch.

^{Click to see Elite 2 appearance.}

^{Click to see his 0011 Series: Just a Driver skin.}

Hung, Defender Operator of Rhodes Island, will protect all the Operators on the front lines.

Rarity: ★★★★★

ID: No. 226

Subclass: Guardian

Tags: Defense, Healing

Skills: Treatment Countermeasure, Medical Mode Countermeasure

Talents: Gatekeeper

Affiliation: Lee's Detective Agency - Great Lungmen

Race: Perro

Birthday: July 1

Height: 183cm

"You must be the doctor that Mr. Lee talked about. The name's Hung, it's a pleasure to meet you. My fields of expertise are security and repairing machinery. If you ever need a bodyguard for a public appearance, or if your TV or fridge break down, then be sure to give me a holler!"

A friendly bodyguard with notable culinary skills, employed at Lee's Detective Agency.

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• Achilles' Heel: Not getting hit. This might sound strange at first, but considering the fact that both of his skills are charged upon Hung taking damage, it starts making sense. If he's not getting hit, he's not getting SP, which is very bad for a Healing Defender, since he won't be able to heal anyone if he can't use his skills. As a result, you can't just casually park him somewhere out of the way and have him heal his allies like you could with other Healing Defenders, since he won't activate his skills if he's not getting hit enough to charge them. And that is before getting to the fact that the healing could be wasted to heal his own injuries instead of his allies.
• All Your Powers Combined: Acts like a hybrid between Saria and Gummy, as a healing defender. His second skill Medical Mode Countermeasure makes him stop attacking like Gummy, but restores SP like Saria's second talent.
• The Big Guy: He's the most physically-imposing member of Lee's Detective Agency, and accordingly serves as their muscle.
• Chronic Hero Syndrome: Having been raised with a strong sense of justice, Hung can't help but get involved in matters where it looks like an innocent is in trouble. This has gotten him into hot water many times though, especially in a cutthroat environment like Lungmen.
• Damage Reduction: Hung's Gatekeeper talent gives him an extra 6% DEF at Elite 1.
• Handy Man: Besides being a combat Operator, he also knows how to repair appliances.
• Inconsistent Spelling: While he's called "Hung" in the English localization, his actual and non-westernized name is "吽", denoting an "un" sound. Together with Aak, whose real name is '阿', they form the A-un, also while considering the animals in their E2 art. (The ungyo in Hung's case, since its mouth is closed.)
• Interspecies Adoption: For lack of a better word, Hung "adopted" Aak as his younger brother after saving him from that one Noodle Incident in his past. Likewise, he considers Waai Fu his sister. Lee also considers him a surrogate son.
• Mythical Motifs: Komainu, which is appropriate considering Hung's Defender role.
  • Rather oddly, Hung and Aak follow the classical Japanese depiction of the creatures, known as the A-un, despite them hailing from an in-universe equivalent of Hong Kong. Whereas Aak is the a-gyo, Hung represents the un-gyo, which is the more dog-like one of the two, and sports a single horn on its head, which he prominently features. In other cultures, even modern Japanese, the komainu pairs are identical in design, with the only difference being the shape of their mouths (i.e. the a-gyo has an open mouth, while the un-gyo has it closed).
• Nice Guy: One of the defining features everybody describes him with is that he's one of the nicest people they've ever met.
• Non-Standard Character Design: As with other characters designed by KuroBlood, Hung looks a lot more like an anthropomorphic dog than a human with canine features.
• Supreme Chef: He's described as a very skilled chef, which he credits to having learned from Lee.
• Team Mom: He shares aspects of this with fellow Defender Matterhorn.
  • Hung is caring and protective of his (adoptive) siblings in a nurturing, almost motherly way, and frequently does the housework around the agency. Also like Matterhorn, Hung is a skilled cook and provides meals for Aak and Waai Fu.
  • He also takes care of Luo Xiaohei in "It's Been A While", by providing food and shelter to Xiaohei and (unsuccessfully) tried to argue with Lee on giving Xiaohei a job with the Agency.

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Jessica the Liberated

Jessica Brynley

Introduced: Come Catastrophes or Wakes of Vultures
Voiced by: Ryō Hirohashi (Japanese), Fifi (Mandarin Chinese), Rebecca LaChance/Yuuki Luna (English), Kim Ha-young (Korean)
Artist: Cenm0

Trudging back from a brimstone warzone to stop by a campfire and rest her head.

^{Click to see Elite 2 appearance.}

Defender Operator Jessica, currently serving as sheriff of a li'l ol' Pioneer camp.

Rarity: ★★★★★★

ID: 1034

Subclass: Sentinel Protector

Tags: Defense, Survival, DPS

Skills: Hold the Line, Covered Defense, Saturation Burst

Talents: Adaptable, Charge and Release

Affiliation: Blacksteel Worldwide

Race: Feline

Birthday: March 3

Height: 149 cm

"It's been a long time, Doctor. I'm glad to still be working for you. Yes, I have changed a lot. If I have the time, I'd really like to talk to you......"

An alternate version of Jessica following her training and growth under Blacksteel Worldwide, and her subsequent leave of the company following the Davistown incident.

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• Ascended Meme: Before her alternate version's release, Jessica is often associated with the sad cat meme as her initial version's sprite expression had a sad look similar to the meme. When Jessica the Liberated is released, one of her base idle animations when touched has Jessica give a sad expression that is exactly identical to the sad cat meme.
• Badass Adorable: She's a walking armory capable of mass destruction and superb defense, but she's still the same shy and cute Jessica we all know and love.
• Barrier Warrior: With her first talent, Jessica is able to temporarily deploy a passive but extremely tanky Mobile Riot Shield in her adjacent tiles to obstruct enemies and draw fire for up to 50 seconds (1 minute with a maxed Module), with a cooldown of 30 seconds from when it's retreated. While the Shield is down, Jessica will turn to face it, and will buff the DEF of herself and the unit directly behind her.
  • At Elite 2, Charge and Release gives her a 50% chance to regain 1 SP each time the Shield takes damage.
  • Her first skill Hold the Line is a permanent buff that buffs Jessica's ATK, gives both Jessica and the Shield more DEF, and makes the shield last up to 30 seconds longer.
  • Her third skill Saturation Burst loads 20 ammo for slower but longer ranged attacks, buffs her DEF, and massively increases her ATK and the DEF of the Shield. In addition, whenever she deploys the Shield during the skill, Jessica will immediately fire a straight shot from her cannon to inflict massive physical damage and a stun. Since the cannon shot is tied to her Shield, if Jessica holds on to some ammo by the time the Shield comes online again (particularly if she withdraws the Shield early to save some redeployment time), she can fire a second time, and possibly even more depending on the level.
• Charles Atlas Superpower: Carrying so many weapons around at once and her harsh life in the Columbian barrenlands has tremendously increased her physical strength. In her files, an unknown Operator, who claims to be able to bench-press 200 kilograms, is shown to have been soundly defeated by Jessica in 47 consecutive arm-wrestling matches.
• Chronic Hero Syndrome: Ever since a mission gone wrong in Victoria, Cliff has noted that Jessica has now picked up the habit of prioritizing the safety of innocents at the risk of jeopardizing her current mission, something that he does not approve of and even directly asks her why she even became a mercenary if she insists on being so idealistic.
• Defector from Decadence: Left Blacksteel after coming into conflict with them due to irreconcilable moral differences, and even rejected support from her family to live a harsh exile as a Pioneer, as a way to truly decide her own life for the first time without the influence of Blacksteel or the Brynley family.
• Draw Aggro: Her Mobile Riot Shield can taunt enemies into attacking it, letting it put its hefty bulk to good use.
• I Just Want to Be Free: Fitting for her new title, Jessica confides in the Doctor that her new, harsh life as a pioneer was a way to truly live for herself for the first time, liberated from the influence of both Blacksteel and her family background.
  That's correct, Doctor. I participated in an armed robbery on the Davistown bank. That's just a fact, and I have nothing to dispute.
  However, I'm not on the frontier to serve out a sentence. I wasn't charged with any crime.
  Not because I was motivated by wanting to help the locals being extorted by the bank, but rather because... I'm not allowed to be guilty. Because Blacksteel operators cannot be guilty. Because members of the Brynley family cannot be guilty...
  ...You want to know if I plan to stay out here forever?
  Umm... I think I do. Because here, every choice I make belongs not to Jessica of Blacksteel, or to Jessica of the Brynley family.
  They belong to me alone.
• Image Song: "Water Quench".
• It's All My Fault: Averted. In a marked departure from her original self, instead of frantically apologizing whenever a mission fails with her in the squad, she simply promises to make up for the failure next time.
  Jessica: Requesting medevac! I dragged everybody down... it's all my fault! Sorry! I'm sorry!
  Jessica the Liberated: Doctor, an apology doesn't even begin to cut it... I'll try to make up for this failure on subsequent operations.
• Jack of All Stats: Jessica compensates her lack of raw DEF or HP for utility: she has possibly one of the most versatile kits of any defender, with her base kit offering tanking, decent damage at an extended range, anti-air (making her one of the very few Defenders with this luxury, even though she does not prioritize aerial targets), and a very bulky summon that blocks enemies, draws aggro, and lets her change direction at will. All of her skills also have unique uses: her first skill turns her into an AFK laneholder, her second allows for burst DPS over an extended range (which is particularly good for aforementioned aerial targets) and turns her into a dodge tank, and her third skill allows her to do massive damage and crowd-control. Due to her range and various ways to extend it, she can also handle weird map layouts, and she isn't even that expensive DP-wise for a six-star Defender. With her Module, she even gets to passively reveal invisibility.
  • In Integrated Strategies, she also has various synergies with a lot of collectibles due to this: with "Spinach"-type relics she boosts the cannon shot of her third skill, and said cannonshot can have its stun duration extended by relics, or deal extra Arts damage with relics like Children’s Puppet. Being a melee unit with extra range means Scout's Scope works on her for both her second and third skill, while her second skill having 75% Arts and Phys dodge means she can take advantage of dodge-related collectibles too. As her Mobile Shield is a summon, collectibles that boost summons can boost her shield, and Integrated Strategies #4 has a collectible that boosts an operator’s ATK when their summon is deployed too.
• Loophole Abuse: With her third skill, if the Mobile Riot Shield is deployed but retreated before it can land, Jessica will fire her cannon in her original direction, potentially letting her fire in a direction that normally wouldn't be possible to deploy a Shield in.
• Mechanically Unusual Fighter: With her talent causing her to always face the direction that her Portable Shield is deployed in, Jessica is the first operator that can change the direction of her deployment without redeploying.
• More Dakka: Her second skill has her draw her assault rifle to spray bullets at her enemies, while her third skill has her hunker down and unload every weapon she has at the same time.
• My Greatest Failure: She's particularly traumatized by a mission gone wrong in Victoria, where she was forced to abandoned countless Victorian citizens to their fate at the hands of Sarkaz attackers so that her squad could safely evacuate without alerting Victorian authorities.
• Screw the Rules, I Have Money!: Subverted in "Come Catastrophes or Wakes of Vultures" when she tries to use her personal wealth to buy out Davistown's debt. However, even someone as individually rich as her cannot hope to pay the massive 28 million gold certificates just to pay off the first three months of payments. The bank manager then scoffs at Jessica for being naive enough to think that being a trust fund heiress meant she could just solve all her problems with money.
• Shrinking Violet: Downplayed after her Character Development: she's still somewhat shy and prone to tears, but the main difference is that although she'll still get anxious and self-deprecating easily, she doesn't stop because of it, resiliently powering through danger and adversity without being held back by her insecurities. In her dialogue, she discusses how she still has a soft heart and cries easily, but no longer feels shame in it.
• Super-Reflexes: If the 75% Physical and Arts dodge she gains from her second skill is any indication.
• Took a Level in Badass: Jessica goes from a very shy and fragile 4-star Marksman Sniper wielding a simple handgun to an incredibly resilient 6-star Sentinel Defender wielding an entire arsenal of firearms with ease.
• To Be Lawful or Good: Her ultimate conflict in Come Catastrophes or Wakes of Vultures. Faced with a job bodyguarding a corrupt banking organization who is extorting their helpless populace and trying to force BSW to use lethal force against any protestors, and with her boss Cliff coldly writing it off as just part of the job of a mercenary, Jessica ultimately makes the choice to help the citizens rob the bank to support themselves. She is caught and tried by Blacksteel, and even though her father attempts to help her get off with an easy sentence, she refuses and accepts her exile, becoming a sheriff for the town she helped save.
• Unprocessed Resignation: Despite handing in her resignation from Blacksteel, Cliff never formally accepted it, so Jessica is still officially a Blacksteel mercenary, if only on paper.
• Unwitting Instigator of Doom: When she convinces Leone to sell off his shares to Davistown's mines to pay off his debt to the bank, she's unaware that this is exactly what the bank was waiting for. Once they secure full rights to the mines, they immediately begin foreclosing on all of their other debits in order to force out the remaining population of Davistown.
• Walking Armory: Carries a handgun (she now carries what appears to be a TTI-customized Glock for her main arm instead of her Beretta 92), assault rifle (an AR15-platform rifle), anti-materiel cannon, and shield(s), although the handgun is her main weapon similar to her Sniper version. She uses the rifle for her second skill, and with her third skill, Jessica is able to open fire with all of her weapons simultaneously, dropping her shield to dual-wield her pistol and rifle while firing the cannon from a mount attached to her hip.^note Humorously, her attacks are still counted as single hit despite her unloading an entire barrage into her target, with only the first shot from her handgun visually dealing damage.

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Liskarm

Liskarm

Introduced: Game Launch
Voiced by: Yui Ishikawa (Japanese), Ruoyu Zhang (Mandarin Chinese), Megan Maczko (English), Yi Sae-ah (Korean)
Artist: TOKI, Cenm0^note Raythean Striker

Her spear-like lightning will pierce all enemies in front of her.

^{Click to see Elite 2 appearance.}

^{Click to see her 0011 Series: Spring Vouivre skin.}

^{Click to see her Raythean Striker: Overload skin.}

Liskarm, Defender Operator of B.P.R.S. of Blacksteel, possesses both a solid shield and a sharp spear.

Rarity: ★★★★★

ID: No. 107

Subclass: Sentinel Protector

Tags: DPS, Defense

Skills: Charged Defense, Counter Arc

Talents: Tactical Defense, Thunder Resistance

Affiliation: Blacksteel International

Race: Vouivre

Birthday: May 18

Height: 156cm

"Defender Liskarm, awaiting orders. I've been involved in multiple special operations like VIP protection, assaulting fortified positions, rescuing hostages, and clearing out threats.Your safety is my mission, and I will use every tool at my disposal to guarantee it."

An employee at Blacksteel known for her professionalism and electrifying Arts.

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• Beleaguered Assistant: Being Franka's Number Two, Liskarm is constantly exasperated by her captain's lax attitude and weird antics. She takes her stress out on a targeting dummy with Franka's face on it, which is available as an unlockable piece of decor.
• Blinded by the Light: Her ballistic shield is affixed with lamps that can emit over 54,000,000 lumen of intense light, giving her a chance to stun enemies while Counter Shock is active.
• By-the-Book Cop: This is written almost word-for-word in the archive file that describes Liskarm.
• Damage Reduction: At Elite 2, Liskarm gets the Thunder Resistance talent, which increases her RES by 10.
• Drill Sergeant Nasty: Acted as this to Jessica in "Records of Originium - Blacksteel", to the point Franka had to step in to mediate the situation.
• Easy Level Trick: Liskarm herself became one during the "Code of Brawl" event, where her talent Tactical Defense synergizes obscenely well with the new Brawler enemies, essentially giving herself and any ally within the four cardinal directions of her unlimited SP, letting them spam their skills all day. Park a Vanguard with an auto skill next to Liskarm and watch as the green points flood in quicker than you can burn them, allowing you to slap down more operators much more quickly than you could otherwise.
• Everyone Has Standards: In "Come Catastrophes or Wakes of Vultures", Liskarm is ordered by a bank manager to open fire on a group of peaceful protestors singing outside the bank. Liskarm flatly refuses the order despite the bank being Blacksteel's client, pointing out their only job is to keep the protestors out of the bank.
• Expy: Her pistol and flash shield combo invited many comparisons with Attack operator Blitz of Rainbow Six Siege, though their class purposes are opposites to one another.
• Expy Coexistence: Thanks to the Intercontinuity Crossover Operation Originium Dust, it is completely possible to have Liskarm and Blitz fighting alongside each other.
• The Gadfly: Liskarm has a fair share of quips and playful insults at Franka. The two just enjoy bickering at each other that much.
• Gadgeteer Genius: In "Operation Originium Dust" she applied a temporary fix to Blitz's broken shield to help get him back into the fight, as well as repairing the communications equipment at Watchpoint 33 with her Arts.
• Gameplay and Story Integration: Her "Counter Arc" skill pretty much summarizes her Originium Arts. While her unique abilities are devastating, they drain a lot of energy from Liksarm, exhausting her. This is the reason why she is paired with another melee operator, so that they could protect her while she recovers. Gameplay-wise, "Counter Arc" leaves her stunned after being cast.
• Gameplay and Story Segregation: In the files it is stated that when her "Counter Arc" skill is active, her horns glow turquoise. In the game, she simply gets very subtle glowing little orbs around her (although this is changed in her skin where they do◊). It also says that she is frequently fielded together with Franka, but in practice, Liskarm is much more used than Franka is.
• Handguns: Carries what appears to be a Glock variant with tritium night sights.
• Height Angst: Downplayed. She is quite short compared to her fellow Vouivres Saria and Vanilla, yet she rarely complains about it.
• Heroic RRoD: Using her Arts tend to severely exhaust Liskarm, which is why she is often paired with a melee Operator. In game, this is represented by her self-stun after "Counter Shock" ends.
• Horned Humanoid: She has blue horns on her head.
• Human Shield: Moreso than anyone else in this class in fact, due to her first talent, which gives 1 SP to a random teammate within the four tiles in cardinal directions around her when she's hit. As a result, Liskarm is typically used as an SP slave more than an actual Defender, with her getting hit as much as possible to proc her first talent constantly, while babysitting other operators whose skills demand a lot of SP to activate, such as Flamebringer.
• It's All My Fault: Initially, she blamed herself for Franka getting Infected due to her being unable to participate in the operation that resulted in Franka's Oripathy.
• Mechanically Unusual Fighter: Liskarm is a rarity among Defenders due to her ability to deal ranged damage with her pistol. This allows her to engage airborne enemies as well. Blitz is also capable of doing this, however, and apparently this trait was supposed to be an archetype judging from an earlier anniversary stream but it was ultimately not imported. The release of An Obscure Wanderer eventually added Liskarm and Blitz from Protector to the intended archetype, now known as Sentinel Protector.
• Mythical Motifs: Wyverns, due to her Vouivre race.
• Power Glows: Whenever she uses her powers, Liskarm's horns glow a luminescent turquoise.
• Punny Name: Her Chinese name means literally "thunder snake", fitting for an operator who's based on a wyvern with lightning-based attacks.
• Red Oni, Blue Oni: The Blue Oni to Franka's Red, Liskarm is both calmer and more pragmatic than her partner.
• Shock and Awe: Liskarm's Originium Arts talent manifests in her ability to generate electricity, which she channels using her Flash Shield (not unlike how a wizard uses a magic staff) in a five meter radius and her Tactical Defense talent, which allows her to recharge teammates' skill points. It also manifests in her base ability to improve drone recharge.
• Starter Mon: She's one of the four free 5-star operators that the player could pick after creating a new account around the game's launch as a gift for the game reaching 1 million pre-registration. The other options were Silence, Pramanix, and Projekt Red.
• Those Two Girls: She is Franka's partner and is often depicted alongside her.
• Vitriolic Best Buds: With Franka. As much as she is annoyed by the latter constantly teasing her and her combat tactics, Liskarm immediately requests transfer to Rhodes Island upon learning that Franka is infected and sent there for treatment.
• Winged Humanoid: Invoked as her Elite 2 artwork depicts her with wings, likely as an allusion to the Wyverns that are represented by the Vouivre race. Curiously enough, this makes her the only E2-able Vouivre without a wyvern in their E2 art.

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Lutonada

Lutonada

Introduced: Babel
Voiced by: Kumi Takaragi (Japanese), Song Yuanyuan (Mandarin Chinese)
Artist: 水滴鱼

It was also her hands that gently closed so many pair of eyes.

^{Click to see Elite 2 appearance.}

Child of Bolívar, Lutonada, searches the rubble for something useful with her hands.

Rarity: ★★★★

ID:

Subclass: Juggernaut

Tags:

Skills:

Talents:

Affiliation: Bolívar

Race: Zalak

Birthday: Unknown

Height: 159cm

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Matterhorn

Matterhorn Yek

Introduced: Game Launch
Voiced by: Shunsuke Takeuchi (Japanese), Yuxuan Liu (Mandarin Chinese), Adam Diggle (English), Jang Min-hyuck (Korean)
Artist: Ryuzakiichi

The reliable shield of Kjerag.

^{Click to see Elite 2 appearance.}

^{Click to see his Coral Coast: Beach Guard skin.}

Matterhorn, Defender of Karlan Trade CO.,LTD, is at your service as a Defender Operator.

Rarity: ★★★★

ID: No. 199

Subclass: Protector

Tags: Defense

Skills: Stamina Enhancement, Cold Resistance

Talents: Snowfield Guard

Affiliation: Karlan Trade Co., Ltd - Kjerag

Race: Forte

Birthday: May 19

Height: 182cm

"Ally, I salute you in true Snow Realm fashion. I am codename Matterhorn, one of the guards dispatched here by Master SilverAsh."

The imposing personal bodyguard of SilverAsh and a renowned cook in Kjerag.

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• Animal Motifs: Yak, due to the alpine theme of his skills, his greater physical fortitude compared to the SilverAsh family, and his resistance to cold.
• Anti-Magic: His Snowfield Guard talent gives him anywhere between 7-20 bonus RES depending on his upgrades, and his second skill Cold Resistance can up to double his RES, making him one of a rare few units specialized in tanking Arts damage.
• Barrier Warrior: Matterhorn can erect a Beehive Barrier around himself using his second skill.
• Berserk Button: He's generally laid back and won't interfere in other people's business, but god forbid you try eating without properly washing your hands in front of him.
• The Big Guy: He's the muscle of Karlan Trade and the most physically-imposing, though he's still shorter than SilverAsh by 10cm.
• Bodyguarding a Badass: Matterhorn is the bodyguard of SilverAsh. You know, his 192cm tall, muscular, Razor Wind-spamming boss.
• Conflicting Loyalty: Matterhorn is both a Rhodes Island Operator subordinate to the Doctor, and a loyal retainer of the Silverash family. During the "Break the Ice" event, this becomes a problem when the Doctor's actions begin to clash with Enciodes Silverash's agenda.
• Crippling Overspecialization: Matterhorn's hyper-focus on buffing his RES makes him a tempting pick when fighting enemy Casters, or those who deal primarily Arts damage. Outside of this, his beefy HP can only do so well considering the decidedly lackluster focus on DEF-buffing, which limits his usefulness when tackling high-difficulty maps where the enemy deals a lot of Physical ATK as damage. It is recommended to pair him with a DEF-buffing Medic like Shining for this reason.
• Healing Factor: His first skill lets him regenerate HP over time.
• Horned Humanoid: He has white bull-like horns.
• Kukris Are Kool: His melee weapon of choice is a large kukri machete, unless he's in his Coral Coast outfit wherin he trades his machete for a small axe.
• Location Theme Naming: He's named after a mountain in the Swiss Alps.
• Ma'am Shock: Or at least a close male equivalent. He's taken aback whenever the younger operators call him "uncle".
• Meaningful Name: In-universe he's named after a mountain in Kjerag, which Cliffheart tells the Doctor during their train ride in Break the Ice.
• Praetorian Guard: He was trained to be SilverAsh's bodyguard, just like how his parents were also guards for SilverAsh's family.
• Supreme Chef: Matterhorn is noted to be a surprisingly good cook, especially in the resource-poor land of Kjerag where its people usually eat only plain meals made from what little they could find. Such is his culinary skill that the SilverAsh estate became the unofficial meeting area of Kjerag's political figures, who came both to discuss business matters as well as to enjoy Matterhorn's cooking.
• Team Mom: Rare male example. When he's not the Battle Butler, Matterhorn is more like the team nanny for the entire Karlan Trade crew, and yes, that includes SilverAsh as well. He cooks for them, listens to their stories, and serves as The Heart that brings them together. Stories of Afternoon hammers this home further, with him lecturing Ethan on properly washing his hands before eating.
• Walking Shirtless Scene: His Coral Coast skin showcases his impressive figure and chiseled abs.

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Mudrock (Unmarked Spoilers)

Mudrock

Introduced: Grani and the Knights' Treasure (First Appearance), Episode 8: Roaring Flare (Playable Debut)
Voiced by: Maaya Uchida (Japanese), Duduru (Mandarin Chinese), TBA (English), Kim Ye-rim (Korean)
Artist: m9nokuro

Many people are astonished by her true appearance, and we're all no different.

^{Click to see Elite 2 appearance.}

^{Click to see her Coral Coast: Silent Night DN06 skin.}

^{Click to see her Ambience Synesthesia: Obsidian skin.}

Mudrock, Sarkaz mercenary, old friend of the fertile soil and stone.

Rarity: ★★★★★★

ID: No. 311

Subclass: Juggernaut

Tags: Defense, DPS, Survival

Skills: DEF Up γ, Crag Splitter, Bloodline of Desecrated Earth

Talents: Ward of the Fertile Soil, Unshakable Solidarity

Affiliation: Rhodes Island

Race: Sarkaz (Gargoyle)

Birthday: September 21

Height: 163cm

"Sarkaz mercenary, Mudrock... You're the Doctor, then. Rhodes Island has saved me many times, and now, I'd like you to let me return the favor."

An ex-Reunion Sarkaz mercenary and friend of Big Bob who wandered the world with her loyal squad after defecting. After participating in the Wolumonde uprising and losing countless allies in the constant fighting, she joined Rhodes Island after being rescued by Elite Operator Logos.

For tropes related to her boss version (and her appearances in Twilight of Wolumonde and Rewinding Breeze), see Arknights - The Reunion Movement.

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• 24-Hour Armor: Unlike her Elite 2 CG, Mudrock never removes her armor at any point during actual gameplay, regardless of whether she's in battle or resting in the dorms. Subverted if equipped with one of her skins, which traded the armor for a swimsuit or cocktail dress.
• Achilles' Heel: Too many enemies that attack quickly or deal Arts damage attacking her can prove to be trouble for Mudrock, as they'll tear through her shields too quickly for her to regenerate them in time if she can't kill them quickly. This is in contrast to her fellow 6-star Juggernaut Penance, who wants plenty of enemies to attack her so she can consistently generate her barrier.
• Armor Is Useless: She kicks as much ass even when not wearing her bulky hazmat armor.
• Badass Adorable: Beneath that bulky and imposing suit of armor is a cute and beautiful young woman who's no less of a badass even without her armor.
• Barrier Warrior: Aside from Nian and Penance, Mudrock is the only Defender that doesn't carry a shield with her and instead uses Originium Arts to create a stone barrier around herself.
• Biblical Motifs:
  • By zooming into Mudrock's hammer in both of her regular portraits, one may notice that there is writing engraved in it, but the resolution is too low to tell what is written, that is, unless one were to check the Roaring Flare trailer in which there is a frame zooming in on her hammer. The text is "For evil men will be cut off" which can be cross-referenced with her in-game art to be the same text. It is a shortened version of Psalm 37:9, which says "For evildoers shall be cut off; But those who wait on the Lord, They shall inherit the earth."
  • Her Silent Night swimsuit has her holding a bright red apple, a clear symbol of the temptation of the original Forbidden Fruit. Her idle animation in base has her offering the apple towards the viewer.
• Brutish Character, Brutish Weapon: Subverted. Mudrock initially appears to be a physically imposing person with her bulky armor and wields a large sledgehammer to match, but she's a petite woman behind her armor.
• Combat Stilettos: Wears heels in her Obsidian skin, and still kicks ass just fine if the "Phenomenal Agent" short was anything to go by.
• Deflector Shield: Mudrock's first talent Ward of the Fertile Soil allows her to passively generate a shield layer immediately upon deployment, and additional ones once every 9 seconds afterwards, to nullify one hit of damage. Her shields can stack up to three times, with each hit consuming a stack and restoring 15% health at Elite 1 (20% health at Elite 2), and that's before her potentials are maxed out^note 17% at Elite 1, 22% at Elite 2.
• The Determinator: Manifests in her RIIC Workshop skill Perserverance wherein she only consumes 2 morale every time she processes elite materials.
• Difficult, but Awesome: Bloodline of Desecrated Earth will turn Mudrock into a Lightning Bruiser, but it requires timing to use well. Activating it will prevent her from attacking or taking damage for 10 seconds...this is where perfect timing is a necessity here, as using it while she's blocking could potentially mean that a Zerg Rush will pass by her without taking any damage. That said, it's still a very useful tool in her kit due to the fact that while she's not attacking, enemies around her will be slowed until the eventual explosion; in that time, it could give her a breather if she's low on health, and the 10-second damage prevention will give her plenty of time for Ward of the Fertile Soil to give her a free barrier. When using this skill, it is recommended to pair Mudrock with a Decel Binder in order to stall enemies until the eventual explosion.
• Gameplay and Story Integration: Her default armor includes a facemask that muffles her voice, giving it a reverberating effect and obscures her identity. Her skins exchange her armor with a bikini or a dress, which obviously does not include her mask, and thus removes the reverberating effect from her voice.
• Herd-Hitting Attack: Between Crag Splitter and the explosion and multi-hit granted by Bloodline of Desecrated Earth, this practically sums up Mudrock's playstyle in a nutshell, as most of her skills enable her to hit multiple enemies around her, which makes her helpful for stonewalling a Zerg Rush.
• Image Song: “Lithos”.
• Kicking Ass in All Her Finery: Her skins exchange her armor for a bikini or a dress. She kicks ass just as well in those.
• Life Drain: Mudrock's Spin Attack skill Crag Splitter will heal her for a small percent of her health when hitting enemies, in addition to potentially stunning them.
• Lightning Bruiser: Mudrock's third skill Bloodline of Desecrated Earth transforms her into this. After a 10-second charging period, Mudrock gains a large boost to defense, a huge boost to attack, a much faster attack speed, and ability to hit three enemies at once.
• Luckily, My Shield Will Protect Me: Played with. While she is the only Defender who doesn't carry a physical shield around, her shields are protective layers created with her own Arts instead. It also shows up on her E2 art.
• Mirror Match: The playable Mudrock can fight her boss counterpart in Twilight of Wolumonde and Operation: Lead Seal.
• Ms. Fanservice: In her Silent Night and Obsidian skins, Mudrock removes her armored suit in exchange for a bikini or a cocktail dress with heels much more flattering to her figure. Equipping either skin even changes her voice recordings, removing the muffling effect of her mask from her voiced lines.
• Our Gargoyles Rock: Is revealed to hail from the Gargoyle clan, who are Sarkaz with an affinity for earth manipulation.
• Powered Armor: Downplayed. If you look closer on her armored artwork, it's evident that she attaches a powered exoskeleton on her bulky hazmat suit, making it this.
• Promoted to Playable: Joins Rhodes Island so she and her squad can get place to rest, and fight for a better cause. You can thank Logos for that!
• Redemption Demotion:
  • Despite being able to summon Mudrock Golems in "Twilight of Wolumonde", Mudrock is no longer capable of this as an operator, possibly because her comrades and the medic that taken care of her advised her against doing so. That said, she does have a few more abilities that her boss form didn't have, such as her Spin Attack Crag Splitter and the ability to heal herself.
  • It's mostly an In-Universe example. In terms of gameplay, the appearance and number of Mudrock Golems are a factor of the stage just like any normal enemy unit in any stage, rather than an ability or summon of a Mudrock enemy unit.
• Samus Is a Girl: Due to their bulky outfit, many players believed that Mudrock was a guy. Her Archive Files also reveal that her faceplate made her voice sound so thick and small that Rhodes Human Resources staff couldn't determine her gender until she removed her suit; even some of her own squad mates were surprised to find out that Mudrock was a girl. Apparently, some of them had even seen her out of her armor before, but since it was always so late at night they'd just assumed they were dreaming.
• Sarashi: Close inspection in her Elite 2 CG shows that she wears bandages underneath her top.
• Signed Up for the Dental: She decided to join Rhodes Island in return for the rest of her squad getting the medical treatment they needed. Slightly subverted in that Rhodes Island was planning on treating them anyway, but weren't about to refuse her offer of assistance.
• Significant Birth Date: Her birthday is International Peace Day, reflecting how she, ultimately, strives for peace despite what it may have looked like.
• Situational Sword:
  • Her second talent Unshakable Solidarity reduces damage taken from Sarkaz units, which can be handy against the few encountered in some stages such as Contingency Contract or certain Integrated Strategies stages, but is otherwise not useful elsewhere. However, they have been cropping up a lot in the main story lately, and as they tend to be Demonic Spiders, this makes her particularly cut out for those chapters.
  • While her normal RIIC Workshop skill Perserverance is more versatile, her Elite 2 Workshop skill DIY Orirock makes it such that she gets a 90% chance of getting byproducts when processing with Orirock-type products^note Orirock Cube, Orirock Cluster, or Orirock Concentration.
• Spin Attack: Mudrock's second skill Crag Splitter has her perform this to hit any enemies that are adjacent to her, healing her and dealing massive damage with a chance to stun.
• Walking Spoiler: The fact that she joins Rhodes Island spoils both "Twilight of Wolumonde" and her side story in "Rewinding Breeze".

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