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Protagonists
Elle Ragu
Elle Ragu aka: "Shadow Skill"
Voiced by: Megumi Hayashibara (Japanese), Luci Christian (English), JoAnna MacInenes (OAV) (English)
- Adaptation Dye-Job: Her hair changes from orange in the TV series to blonde in the OVA.
- Ash Face: In the first episode, Elle gets engulfed in the flames of a fire attack and is left charred black, only to shake it off and complain about her hair being ruined.
- Berserk Button: Whenever someone she cares for is threatened or injured.
- Big Brother Instinct: Somewhat inverted in Elle to Gau, played straight with actual siblings Diaz and Elle.
- Big Brother Worship: To Diaz.
- Broke Episode: Elle manages to drink away most of her money.
- The Determinator: Manages to Ascend to a Higher Plane of Existence, becoming a Deity of Human Origin as the reward for being such.
- Hard-Drinking Party Girl: It's also the reason why she's in such deep debt.
- Kick Chick: Most of her strongest moves involve kicks. The OVA explains this by revealing that the "shadow skills" of Kuruda martial arts were created by female slaves who constantly had their hands chained, meaning they had to use their legs to fight.
- Wife Husbandry: A gender-inverted example with Elle to her adopted younger brother Gau when they take a Relationship Upgrade after her real older brother Diaz dies, since they're Not Blood Siblings after all.
- My Sibling Will Live Through Me: Elle's motivation for becoming a martial artist in the first place, to repay her brother for his sacrifices on her behalf.
- Promotion to Parent: To the orphaned Gau.
- Serial Escalation: Gau and Elle both strive for this with varying levels of success.
Gau Ban
Gau Ban aka: "Black Howling"
Voiced by: Akio Matsuoka (Japanese), Greg Ayres (English)
- Berserk Button: Whenever someone he cares for is threatened or injured.
- Big Brother Worship: Somewhat inverted in regards to Elle. Played with with towards Scar Face, since he isn't aware that the latter is his older brother.
- Brother–Sister Incest: The inverted Wife Husbandry of Elle to her adopted younger brother Gau when they take a Relationship Upgrade after her real older brother Diaz dies, since they're Not Blood Siblings after all.
- Heroic Second Wind: A fair number of Gau’s one-on-one battles seem to involve him getting utterly pummeled by his opponent, only for someone/something to inspire him to get up and end the fight in a single blow.
- The One Guy: Gau in the central ensemble. Note that there are FAR more males than females in the series overall, but within the band, Gau is the only male.
- Serial Escalation: Gau and Elle both strive for this with varying levels of success.
- This Is Something He's Got to Do Himself: Subverted in the TV series finale, in as Gau is only able to both overcome his phobia of dying and defeat Ren Fuuma with the moral support and emotional encouragement of the rest of the main cast.
- Took a Level in Badass: Successively goes from being the weakest fighter at the start of the TV series to arguably the most powerful (via his unprecedented mastery of Cannon) by its end.
- Upbringing Makes the Hero: Subverted. Ironically, Gau's happy life with Elle is what's said to have caused Gau to weaken as a warrior. Played straight in later arcs in the manga, where it's revealed the infant Gau was secretly placed with his foster parents, who were simple farmers, to prevent him from becoming evil like his biological father, Shere Kahn.
Fia Arcana
Faury "Fia" Arcana aka: "Plasmatizer"
Voiced by: Yuko Mizutani (Japanese), Christine Auten (English)
- Card Games: Faury's magic style is Yu-Gi-Oh!-style summoning and spell-casting.
- Spell My Name With An S: Faury/Folli/Folly.
Kyuo Lyu
Kyuo Lyu
Voiced by: Ikue Otani (Japanese), Hilary Haag (English)
- Redhead In Green: All she needed was an Irish accent...
- Rings of Death: Her chulinks.
Supporting characters
Diaz Ragu
Diaz Ragu aka: "Black Wing"
Voiced by: Mitsuru Miyamoto (Japanese), Jason Douglas (English)
- Berserk Button: Whenever someone he cares for is threatened or injured.
- Big Brother Instinct: Played straight with actual siblings Diaz and Elle.
- The Determinator: Used as the role model by the other such deities to inspire the main hero to transcend his limits and fulfill his potential.
- Died Standing Up
- Dying Moment of Awesome: Diaz's last stand against Darkness, the immortal, beyond-superhuman embodiment of humanity's fear of death, as well as his corresponding posthumous award of the highest honor of the title of Sword of Ashliana which results in being resurrected and transformed into an unkillable immortal just like Darkness.
- Incurable Cough of Death
- Missed the Call: Subverted with Diaz, who sacrificed his sure-shot at being Sevalle to become a highly-paid mercenary to be able to cure his sister's fatal disease, even if he ended up a diseased cripple.
- Papa Wolf: To his younger sister Elle and surrogate younger brother Gau.
- Promotion to Parent: To Elle.
- You Leave Him Alone!: Diaz to Scar Face over Gau, as Diaz opposes Scar Face's tough-love shock-therapy approach to Gau's martial education.
Vy Low
Vy Low "Scarface"
Voiced by: Yasunori Matsumoto (Japanese), John Swasey (English)
- Authority Equals Asskicking
- Mysterious Protector / Sink or Swim Mentor
- Staking the Loved One: When he was forced to stop his best friend G from killing Hawk Eyes.
- Teach Him Anger: Scar Face's strategy for secretly training Gau. Subverted in that it is revealed that Gau was actually more powerful as a child when he was newly-orphaned and full of Unstoppable Rage over the murder of his parents by bandits. Ironically, being with Elle has thoroughly mellowed him out to be too much of a Nice Guy, to the point where Lowe and even Elle calls him out on it.
Scrib Lowengren
Scrib Lowengren aka: "White Lightning"
Voiced by: Kappei Yamaguchi (Japanese), Illich Guardiola (English)
- The Rival: To Gau, they even have corresponding battle names, White Lightning and Black Howling, respectively.
Kain Phalanx
Kain Phalanx aka: "G"
Voiced by: Kouji Tsujitani (Japanese), Jay Hickman (English)
- Death Equals Redemption: Was finally restored to sanity after he was forced to fight Gau in a lucid state, when Gau managed to survive his G's seven-part killing attack, which should have killed him, as Gau managed to evade a single strike, so the technique was not completed on him, but even then, he was already beaten to within an inch of his life.
- Fallen Hero: The disgraced 58th Sevalle and Elle's immediate predecessor. A Child Prodigy who was potentially even more powerful than Scar Face, he gradually degenerated into an braggart who finally went rogue and tried to short-cut the formal process of royal succession by attempting to assassinate Hawk Eyes.
- Power Born of Madness: His Start of Darkness.
- "Well Done, Son" Guy: To Gau, when he comes back as a ghost to help against Ren in the tv series finale.
Kai Shinks
Eva Stolla
Eva Stolla aka: "Hawk Eyes"
Voiced by: Masaharu Satou (Japanese), Marty Fleck (English)
- Informed Ability: Is the king of Kuruda, but the only time we see him in battle he gets winded from one attack from Ren Fuuma.
Juliannes
Ashubal
Rirubelt
Glad Di
Faulstis Low
Four Divas
Gian Deez
Gian Deez
Voiced by: Kyoko Tsuruno (Japanese), Kayla Crenshaw (English)
Sai Oh
Kaira La Luka
Kaira La Luka
Voiced by: Chinami Nishimura (Japanese), Kira Vincent-Davis (English)
- Cute Monster Girl: The Holy kingdom of Likitoa is a forest nation of Cat Folk, as exemplified by their champion, Kyla Lu Luka.
