Stock Light-Novel Calamity Princess

Wait, these are different people? ^note From top to bottom: Misora Whitale, Stella Vermillion, Julis-Alexia von Riessfeld, Mio Naruse and Claire Rouge

The "Calamity Princess" is a Stock Japanese Character mainly present in the Wizarding School and Hero Academy Sub-Genre of Light Novels and their adaptations. She is one of the most common female Love Interests for the Stock Light-Novel Hero.

The trope was codified by Rias Gremory from High School D×D in 2008, although there are other contributors to the archetype, including elements which predate Rias herself and some from the somewhat-later Claire Rouge of Bladedance of Elementalers.

She always exhibits these, or closely-related, traits:

1. Pluckiness: She has something to prove. Perhaps she is rejected, "stigmatized", stands out, or is considered an Inadequate Inheritor. Maybe it's because of her birth, some Dark Secret, her attitude or her destructive behavior. Maybe she is so powerful, famous, or beautiful that nobody understands her. Whatever the case, it leaves her with a clear goal, but precious few allies to rely on.
2. Color Motif: She has a striking color scheme/palette. While other colors like white or black are common, the majority will possess red, orange, or pink hair/clothes to signify a fiery personality, fiery or destructive powers, or simply because redheads are sexy. Conversely, her primary foil/rival will adorn violet/blue.
3. Pretty Princess Powerhouse: She is a princess, royalty, or from a prominent noble family. Her name is usually regal and "Western-sounding" or ridiculously long. Her appearance will be just as regal, and she may be known as one of The Beautiful Elite. On the surface, she exudes confidence or nobility, but that may be a mask to cover her weaknesses and insecurities.
4. Person of Mass Destruction: Her magical abilities are highly destructive, often manifesting as fire or destructive magic or a weapon like a Flaming Sword or a BFG. However, for all her power, she usually fails to accomplish her goals by herself. This may be due to inexperience, incompetence, or an unfair disadvantage, but is ultimately why she needs The Hero.
5. Love Interest: She is the protagonist's main love interest, or contending for that role as part of a harem. Most often, he becomes either an ally or the key to fulfilling her long-sought goal, and she desperately needs him. He may be the only person that is unaware of, looks past, accepts or perhaps even "fixes" whatever she is shunned for or insecure about.

Her hair may be really long and pigtailed. She may also have badass nicknames with colorful themes like "Crimson" or "Scarlet" and words like "Flames", "Ruin" or "Calamity" that may double as a Stealth Insult. A school or military setting will have her as a "genius" at the top of her class/unit and, in a Tournament Arc, she will either have to face The Hero or fight alongside him.

Since the source media is intended for male audiences, the character is a form of Wish-Fulfillment: Ecchi elements are common and she is often a Ms. Fanservice with large breasts. Sometimes, she's not only dependent on the hero but even magically bound to him, often involving a kiss. In keeping with the idea of Wish-Fulfillment, she is likely to rely on him for support and protection (sometimes to the degree that she never accomplishes anything on her own), which may involve either the motif or a literal version of Lady and Knight. There might also be a Rescue Arc, where the hero and his friends rescue her from something, which is likely related to whatever "stigmatized" her in the first place. It's also common for her to initially look down on the protagonist and thus be a tsundere toward them before turning into a Defrosting Ice Queen once she starts to admit her feelings.

Not to be confused with Apocalypse Maiden, though they may overlap.

Compare her older cousin, the Stock Shoujo Heroine, and contrast Rei Ayanami Expy.

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Examples:

Anime & Manga

• Asuna Kagurazaka from Negima! Magister Negi Magi may be the Ur-Example. She wears her long red hair in Girlish Pigtails, is a sweet Tsundere who warms to Negi after his bad first impression, and might be a main love interest—if Negi weren't Oblivious to Love. Asuna has superhuman physical traits and starts off Unskilled, but Strong. As part of her pactio with Negi, she receives the Ensis Exorcizans, which possesses offensive Anti-Magic to complement her own Anti-Magic and the Yin-Yang Bomb ability she learns. She is revealed to be a princess of the Kingdom of Ostia, known as the Imperial Princess of Twilight. She inherited the Magic of Creation and Destruction from her ancestor the Mage of the Beginning, who wants to use it to destroy and replace the Magical World.
• Princess Flare from Redo of Healer is a very, very dark subversion. She seems to fit every one of the criteria, although they all end up twisted and warped. She's a princess with a pink-and-white color motif, great destructive power, and Keyaru adores her when he first meets her. This only makes the fact that she's a sadistic monster all the more disturbing. Double subverted because she does end up becoming a straight example after her Heel–Face Brainwashing.

• Lilith Asami from Trinity Seven exchanges fire powers for firepower with her magic focused around destruction, often manifesting as a BFG. She has the long red hair, the position as demon princess, and the love interest focus in an ecchi harem. She was considered rather cold by other people prior to the start of the series and likewise felt different or isolated. This is revealed to be because she was born in an alternate world and sent to this one as part of an experiment. In fact, her own father is one of the major antagonists the heroes must defeat.

Fan Works

• The Night Unfurls: Olga Discordia, Queen of the Dark Elves, plays with this. She is a prideful, talented Lady of Black Magic that can manipulate flames hotter than Hellfire, but her Colour Motif is associated with dark colours rather than the more common red, as evidenced by her long midnight hair and dusky skin. In addition, while the male protagonist Kyril eventually becomes the key for Olga to confront her demons, Olga is the one that seeks his affections rather than the other way round, being a persistent suitor among his Unwanted Harem no less. Kyril, despite being the object of affection, is a Celibate Hero whose "care" for her is due to him giving his word to protect her from harm in the past and seeing her as a friend. Moreover, Olga certainly has the looks, but she is neither dependent on the man, nor magically bound to him.

Literature

• Accel World: The Student Council President, known only as "Kuroyukihime",^note "Princess Snow Black" is secretly Black Lotus, one of the Kings of Pure Color who rule the Accelerated World. After she was tricked into killing the first Red King, her Legion collapsed, and she went into hiding until meeting the protagonist and deciding to recruit him as the first member of a new Black Legion. While by far the strongest of the main characters (enough to function as a Mentor and Big Good), her position makes her vulnerable to being targeted by assassins, which limits the amount she can personally take to the field. Like all Burst Linkers, her avatar's powers are shaped by the user's personal complexes - in her case, this manifests as bladed limbs that inflict incurable wounds on the slightest touch, and gives her the Red Baron nickname of "World End". Her personal growth over the course of the story is mirrored by her attempts to reshape Lotus's limbs into simple hands instead.
• Miu "Myuu" Ousawa from Aesthetica of a Rogue Hero. She has significant magic affinity, sports pink hair in the twintails style, can utilize highly destructive magical power (specifically as "Dark Flames") is a demon princess, and serves as the main love interest in a harem ecchi fantasy. After her Demon King father was killed by The Hero, his dying request was for the hero to take him with her back to his world. However, her true identity must be kept secret, both so that she can live in peace and because both "heroes" and sinister forces from Myuu's old world want to kill her to ensure she can never claim her rightful inheritance as the new Demon Queen.
• Marie Quatre Argentina de Belgaria from Altina the Sword Princess is a disgraced princess whose descent from the ancient conqueror L'Empereur Flamme gives her both tremendous power and fiery red hair, and she charges into battle wielding an enormous sword forged from legendary "faerie steel". Being a Low Fantasy setting, whether her abilities are actually "magic" is left ambiguous, but she still has monstrous strength and stamina which allow her to wreak havoc on the battlefield (and by extension, throw politics across the continent into chaos). She's bound to the male protagonist both romantically and through a formal contract, though unusually he's a Non-Action Guy hired as her strategist. She sort of has a Red Baron title in the form of "Arrow-Sparrow Princess", but it's more of an Embarrassing Nickname.^note She received it because people thought that the teenage girl running around with a BFS belted to her waist looked like a little bird impaled on an arrow.
• Ouka Ootori from Anti Magic Academy The 35th Test Platoon. She has long 'sunset colored' hair, is a genius who graduated early, and is considered a screw-up, demoted for killing witches recklessly but still relentlessly pursues her goal to purge the world of witches. She's the adopted daughter of the President of the school, making her an Ojou. Her powers are extremely destructive, involving the use of guns. She is called "Crimson Princess Calamity".
• Julis-Alexia von Riessfeld from The Asterisk War, is a princess with pink hair in the half-up-half-down style. She starts as an Ice Queen, has fire powers, and is the main love interest in a fantasy harem story. She's of the more "aloof" variety. There are two main rivals, one of whom is blue-haired, with braids and no chest. She's referred to as a genius, and is called "Witch of the Resplendent Flames". She also participates in a Tournament Arc to enter a much higher level tournament and prove her abilities.
• Claire Rouge from Bladedance of Elementalers has red hair in the signature twin tail style, summons a fire elemental, is nobility, serves as one of the main love interests of the hero, and is often identified with her mysterious sister who is called the "Calamity Queen". As a child, her sister disgraced the family and brought destruction upon their lands, and Claire herself is stuck with the stigma of trying to live down her sister's actions. She considers the hero indebted to her and treats him like a servant at first, and the two have to participate in a Tournament Arc along with some of their friends and fellow harem members.
• Stella Vermillion from Chivalry of a Failed Knight is a princess with red half-up-half-down hair, noteworthy as a "genius" with powerful magic that manifests as fire, and is the main love interest. Lacking control in her abilities, she has prided herself on working harder than anyone else and is constantly seeking to prove her skills. Her rival does not have blue hair but does complete the Red Oni, Blue Oni duo by having water and ice powers. She becomes indebted to the hero through a bet and becomes his 'slave'. She also participates in a Tournament Arc as part of her plan to prove her mastery over her power. She is called "The Crimson Princess".
• Luna Elegant from Demon Lord, Retry! is the third Holy Maiden of the Kingdom of Holy Light, a position that places her within the line of succession to run the entire country. She also possesses pink hair and wears pink robes, and is stated to be the most destructive and powerful of the three Maidens...with the potential to grow into the most powerful one ever. However, she is also Powerful, but Incompetent: she is infamous for being a selfish brat, extremely incompetent, and easy to manipulate. In a comedic subversion, when she meets the protagonist Hakuto Kunai, she believes she tamed him with her "beauty and charm" when it's actually the other way around. He gives her a humiliating defeat (via spanking) and steals her money, but she begins to mellow out and see a Hidden Heart of Gold behind his Jerkass Façade. The two then enter a business partnership whereas she agrees to let him use her neglected and impoverished territory as a base of operations for his businesses under the agreement that his efforts will bring her greater respect and revenue. When others learn of their amicable relationship, they are stunned at how much Luna has seemingly matured and recognize that she's fallen in love with Kunai, which Luna vehemently denies
• Rias Gremory from High School D×D is the Trope Codifier. Heir to the Gremory devil clan and younger sister to one of the Four Great Satans, Rias is both beautiful and powerful, with striking long red hair that sometimes seems to glow in the light. With her sharp mind, and the Gremory bloodline's "Power of Destruction", she's earned the title of "Crimson-Haired Ruin Princess".^note Apparently inherited from her mother, who was known as the "Flaxen-Haired Ruin Princess". She enters a Magically-Binding Contract with The Hero Issei, becomes his girlfriend, and proceeds to be Ms. Fanservice, fighting alongside him as a team in a story that frequently features "Rating Games" against teams of other devils.
• Claire François in I'm In Love With the Villainess fits most of the traits. A prideful, bad-tempered noble heiress with bright golden hair, famed for her powerful fire magic that has earned her the title "The Crimson Queen", and a love interest for the protagonist. The twist is that she was supposed to be the protagonist's rival and chief antagonist, not her love interest, but Rae loves her and doesn't care for the intended male suitors.
• The Misfit of Demon King Academy has two said characters: twin sisters Sasha and Misha Necron. Sasha is a descendant of the prestigious Necron family of full-breed demons, called the Witch of Destruction for her extremely powerful eyes (although she has trouble controlling them). While blond, Sasha dresses in red and has a very haughty and fiery attitude. Misha, on the other hand, is a meek, demure white-haired girl who is looked down upon and bullied by everyone, including her own family and sister. Her hair is silver and she dresses in blue to contrast Misha. Despite being Sasha's twin, Misha isn't even considered a full-blooded demon. That's because Misha is actually a part of Sasha's soul that was split off when the two were extremely young, and is fated to die on her fifteenth birthday. The reason Sasha bullied her was part of a a plan to save Misha, that would require that Misha reject and hate Sasha, in order to die in her stead. When the protagonist Anos figures out their dilemma, he finds a way to split the girls into two fully separate people with their own "sources" so that neither girl has to die. After this, the two fully come to see each other as sisters (although the outsiders who bully Misha now also deride Sasha for defending her "half-breed" sister), and both fall completely in love with Anos.
• Aliceliese Lou Nebulis IX from Our Last Crusade or the Rise of a New World is the second princess of the Nebulis Sovereignty, whose great magical power has given her the nickname "Ice Calamity Witch". She is blond, dresses in elegant white and red gowns, and sports an impressive bust with extremely low necklines. While she turns the archetype on its head by using ice magic, her power is no less destructive and is capable of causing major damage. Her main goal is to Take Over the World for benevolent reasons: to bring peace to the two nations that have been locked in a Forever War. She meets the protagonist, Iska, after he is sent by the enemy nation to kill her, and the two fall in love both out of mutual respect for each other in battle and for their similar goals of ending the war and bringing peace.
• Misora Whitale from Sky Wizards Academy is the leader of Class E-601, a band of wizards considered Powerful, but Incompetent. She has long red hair with a sidetail and is in an ecchi harem with a fantasy setting. Misora is not a princess, but her mother was the strongest gunner of all time — the problem is that when wizards are killed by "Beetles", they become an Un-person, and Misora took up using her weapon to prove that her mother existed. However, said weapon is her primary character flaw, as it's not a weapon she's suited for and she would show faster and greater growth using something else. However, she refuses to give it up, because it's the only proof her mother existed, and her dream is to use it to defeat the Beetles attacking mankind and restore everyone's memories of the fallen.
• Lisara Restall from So, I Can't Play H!. She is a Fiery Redhead with Playing with Fire and a Flaming Sword, heir to of powerful Restall family that basically rules Grimwald, and a love interest in an ecchi harem fantasy. She is a "Death God" that takes her work very seriously due to her high status and seeks to preserve her high reputation. She makes a contract with the hero that encourages ecchi stuff to happen in the story.
• Mio Naruse from The Testament of Sister New Devil. She's a demon princess with half-up-half-down red hair and powerful magic that she usually uses as fire balls. Her love rival is blue-haired. She also enters a Magically-Binding Contract with the hero as his servant and they have to, er, strengthen their bonds, which of course means participating in ecchi and borderline hentai activities. She is a candidate to be one of the rulers, or at least major players, in the demon world and, when the series begins, seeks to avenge both her birth and adoptive parents after they were killed by the first arc's Big Bad.
• Torture Princess: Fremd Torturchen: Elisabeth Le Fanu, the eponymous Torture Princess, is what you get when the Calamity Princess is a Dark Action Girl. A haughty, black-clad young woman who summons the soul of murdered Japanese teenager Kaito Sena into a golem body, she was born Delicate and Sickly to an aristocratic family in an Überwald world and was fed the heart of a demon by her uncle Vlad. This healed her disease but caused her to be wracked with pain unless she tortured people to death in Blood Magic rituals, gaining the power to conjure torture devices as weapons. Ultimately slaughtering her entire town before turning on Vlad himself, she was finally captured by the Church in the aftermath and placed under a geas to slay the fourteen ranked demons before she herself is put to the stake—a fate she welcomes.
• Crown Princess Lisesharte of the New Kingdom of Atismata, from Undefeated Bahamut Chronicle, is nicknamed the "Scarlet War Princess" for her crimson-colored Humongous Mecha named Tiamat with great destructive power. Being an inexperienced princess of a brand new country, she is worried that she won't make a good ruler and is especially ashamed that during the coup de tat several years prior, she was taken prisoner by the former Empire and given a slave brand that she keeps hidden. Following an originally-frosty meeting with the protagonist, Lux Arcadia (who was formerly a prince of the Empire), she sees him as her opportunity to gain influence and confidence in her future rule, eventually making him her knight. Naturally, she also quickly falls in love with him and becomes extremely jealous when he attracts an Unwanted Harem of other women within the all-girls academy they attend. Particularly, her main rival is the blue-haired, emotionally-reserved Krulcifer.

Visual Novels

• Koiken Otome has Akane Yasukuni, who comes from a distinguished family of Douryoku wielders known for their war against the Kotona. Despite this, she is forced to work hard due to having average abilities, which makes her stubborn and hotheaded.

Video Games

• Raiden Mei in Honkai Impact 3rd is a complicated case. She's an Ojou coming from a wealthy family and a heiress to Massive Electric Corp. Its CEO and Mei's father was arrested for supposed criminal activities which caused other people to turn away from her. When she met Kiana, she was distant and didn't really have any friends. Mei is a Herrscher and gets saved by Kiana when she loses control of her powers. Afterwards, Kiana and Mei develop a deep, intimate bond (although the romance part, while always prevalent, is not made too explicit). These events are mostly pictured in the official manga, preceding the game's main story. In the latter, she's initially a Nice Girl without the pluckiness characteristic for a Calamity Princess. Things change in later arcs when she starts to get more focus. In Nagazora, the roles are reversed: Mei saves Kiana and swears to protect her life at any cost. She also fully awakens her Herrscher powers and adopts a black-and-red Color Motif. Despite Kiana's protests, she leaves Hyperion and joins a morally dubious organization World Serpent to fight Honkai and keep her most important person safe in her own way.

Western Animation

• Flame Princess from Adventure Time. She's a princess literally made of flame, giving her the appearance of having red hair. While normally sweet-natured, she has a Hair-Trigger Temper that leads to her inadvertently sending flames everywhere, nearly destroying Ooo on more than one occasion. Her fiery nature poses challenges for her relationship with Finn. They must rely on Indirect Kisses so Finn doesn't get injured, and he has to avoid inciting too strong emotions in her, lest she destroy things. Eventually this poses too much hardship and they break up so she can wrest control of her kingdom from her evil father.

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