Characters / Soul Eater DWMA

Soul Eater Main Character Index
Spartoi | Witches | DWMA | Death Scythes | Other Meisters | Other | Not!

Expect lots of Badass Tropes.

Beware of Unmarked Spoilers!

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Death / Shinigami

Lord Death (Shinigami-sama)

Voiced by: Rikiya Koyama (Japanese), John Swasey (English), Oreste Baldini (Italian)

The Grim Reaper and head of the DWMA. Most of the time he behaves like a complete goofball, but he can be a terrifyingly powerful fighting force when things get serious. His soul wavelength is so large that it covers all of Death City. Spirit Albarn is his current partner, much to the latter's constant annoyance.

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• Anthropomorphic Personification: He an Eldritch Abomination that embodies the madness of order, created by Shinra Kusakabe is establish new rules in the reality he created. Upon his birth, Death stripped everyone of their ability to use pyrokinesis and removed Infernals.
• Barrier Maiden:
  • Limited to the foundations of the DWMA for the purposes of sealing the first Kishin. Asura got out, Death did not.
  • Has something of Barrier Warrior too, as he tries to crush Asura with a shield.
• Becoming the Mask: While Lord Death assumed a humanoid form years after his creation, he adopted his comedic appearance and behavior so as to not scare the children he would be training when he established the DWMA. Centuries of acting this way made it so it's become his true personality. Now he only reverts to his original, ruthless self when the kid gloves come off.
• Berserk Button: Asura's appearance is enough to make him change from being silly to claiming death threats.
• Beware the Silly Ones: His reaction to Asura's escape, after spending the series to date happily goofy and mostly harmless.
• Big Good: He runs the DWMA and assigns missions to his students to stop evil souls. He's also the only one who can defeat Asura.
• Brown Note Being: Like the other Great Old Ones, Lord Death's soul has a madness wavelength that, if left unchecked, can drive the whole world to madness. In his case, he induces the Madness of Order; a madness that erodes free will and the capacity to feel. Because Lord Death has faith in humanity's capacity for good, he chooses not to use it.
• Bumbling Dad: At least as a façade. However, Kid clearly respects him.
• Cloud Cuckoo Lander: "Mandolin?"
• Cowardice Callout: He calls Asura out on how the latter "hid[es] cowardice behind cunning" and has to lock up his fears and let them fester at the price of everyone else suffering, and to cap it off, Death declares that Asura isn't above sanity but simply doesn't have the belly for it.
• Crouching Moron, Hidden Badass: He's incredibly powerful, and hell, downright terrifying when he gets serious. However his playful side is genuine.
• The Death of Death: The moment his son's reaper powers awaken in the manga, his own life comes to an end due to there being only one Grim Reaper allowed to exist in the world at a time.
• Deity of Human Origin: The Stealth Prequel Fire Force revealed that Death is a creation of Shinra's, created so that the concept of "death" would still exist in the new world he made as well as enable humanity to freely interact with a god.
• Don't Fear the Reaper: Done deliberately so he could start a school without children being afraid of him.
• Eccentric Mentor: Paired with Trickster Mentor. He acts silly most of the time, but all of his advice and orders are delivered with the best of intentions and considerable foresight.
• Eldritch Abomination: As mentioned, he's one of the eight Great Old Ones.
• Face Death with Dignity: Once Kid begins connecting the Sanzu lines, he accepts his tenure as a shinigami is over quite gracefully, knowing that Kid will carry on his beliefs.
• A Form You Are Comfortable With: He didn't make too many changes, but yes, originally a lot meaner looking. Then he decided to raise a school; and that involved human children. So he came up with a goofy face and persona so that DEATH would not be scary.
• Good Is Not Soft: Despite putting on a happy-go-lucky persona, he can be utterly ruthless when he feels it's necessary and can be downright relentless when it comes to execution orders for enemies of the DWMA. He was even more vicious during his time as leader of the Great Old Ones and hunted witches without mercy.
• Good Parents: He does his best with Death the Kid and besides being bound to a city and sending his son on dangerous assignments, he's a good dad. Though with Asura, it's complicated.
• Grim Reaper: He's his world's version of Death complete with his various assortment of Weapons that serve as his "Scythes" to reap evil souls.
• Helping Would Be Kill Stealing: In the first episode, Maka and Soul are having trouble defeating Blair. He tells Spirit that he could defeat the magical cat "with a single reaper chop!" but that wouldn't help Maka and Soul develop as meister and weapon. He also could have used his Madness of Order to prevent the actions of many of the series antagonists, but choose not to since it would rob people of their free will.
• Hypocrite: He teaches that fear is the most important tool a fighter can have, that it keeps you sharp and strong, but several centuries ago, he literally ripped out his own fear and it became his first son, the Demon God Asura, who went on to become a Great Old One, representing Madness through Fear. However, it's implied that he learned this very lesson he now teaches as a result of what happened. He himself suggests the notion.
• Killed Off for Real: When Kid finally ascends as a true Grim Reaper, Lord Death happily passes on.
• Large Ham: Usually when performing the Shinigami Chop/Reaper Chop.
• Let's Get Dangerous!: When Asura is released, his dopey round eyes turn triangular and angry, and his comedic karate chop creates shockwaves and leaves a crater upon impact.
• Mind Control: One facet of his "Madness of Order" allows him to suppress free will across the planet, much like Asura's "Madness of Fear" induces insanity, with the offshoot of being able to neutralize the latter's influence. However, he does not, as he believes that Humans Are Special.
• Mirror Character:
  • To the Evangelist of Fire Force, both being deities created by humans who oversee the world and everyone on it. But while the Evangelist is an malevolent embodiment of despair that influenced events from behind the scenes to destroy the world, Death is a benevolent embodiment of order who directly interacted with humans and sought to protect the world.
  • Once the truth of Asura's origins is made clear, Death compares himself to Medusa for his treatment of Kid. As both Kid and Crona were raised/created for a specific purpose, this is not unjustified. There is, crucially, a world of difference between Death's approach to fatherhood and creating Kid in the image of his own creator compared to everything Medusa did to Crona.
• Mr. Exposition: Constantly at the beginning of the series.
• Obfuscating Stupidity: Depending on how far his current persona is a pretense. He might really have 'gotten used' to it.
• Odd Friendship: With Spirit.
• O.O.C. Is Serious Business: It's a Played With trope. First it's noted by Spirit in the anime when Death's starts making really scary threats towards Asura during their battle, stating he has never seen him "sounding so murderous before". Lord Death was quite dangerous, serious and menacing 800 years ago before creating his amicable and comical persona to be able to interact with children. However, it's clear he never lost his edge, so while he may seem OOC to most of everyone, to those who did know him centuries ago (like Excalibur or Asura), he is going back to his older more serious personality.
• Parental Neglect: Why is Asura such a fear-mongering wreck? Lord Death created him by putting all of his fears into a physical body.
• Pre-Asskicking One-Liner: "It's time for you to die again."
• Precision F-Strike: How do we know how kid-friendly he wasn't 800 years ago? There's what he called Arachne: "You whorish swine! I'll kill you as soon as I see you!"
• Putting the "Pal" in Principal: He is the founder and Dean of Shibusen and is respected and beloved by virtually everybody.
• Rank Scales with Asskicking: He defeated Asura in the past, and when he was released he is specifically stated to be the only one capable of beating him. Their second fight has Death dominate Asura for a while, with Asura choosing to flee rather than continuing the fight, whereas all the main cast couldn't even hope to defeat him. Even in their second battle against Asura in the anime, Death remains the only one shown to dominate Asura, so much so that Asura ultimately has to leverage Kid's life to defeat him and he leaves the Kishin so badly injured he's in a way partially responsible for the main cast's ability to defeat him
• Reality Warper: One facet of his "Madness of Order" allows him to alter the rules of a world. He used that power to remove humans' ability to use pryokenisis, removing Infernals as a threat. However, it left a void that would be later filled by Witches and various monsters..
• Reasonable Authority Figure: He doesn't fire Spirit for not staying by his side at all times and tells him to have more self-confidence. He also forgives Maka with what she did to her dad's special card and overall is an amicable boss who oversees the well-being of his staff and students even if they're witches if they're not malicious i.e. Kim and Angela believing in the next generation.
• Shinigami: He's much closer to the original western concept of The Grim Reaper than most uses of the trope, as he is a literal Anthropomorphic Personification of death rather than simply a spirit thereof.
• Shout-Out: There is no other reason his dub voice needs to sound so much like Potter Puppet Pals Dumbledore.
• So Proud of You: To Kid after Kid ascends to become a true Grim Reaper, Lord Death is filled with pride.
• Spared by the Adaptation: He lives in the anime since the whole rule of the Sanzu lines wasn't established in the manga yet.
• Tears of Joy: The crumbling eye-holes in his mask resemble tears of joy. When Kid finally becomes worthy as his successor, Shinigami's mask cracks up from the left eyes down before he turns into dust.
• Too Powerful to Live: He can't leave the academy, because he'd resolve the fights on his own.
• Truly Single Parent: Death the Kid and Asura are actually fragments of himself.
• Unwitting Instigator of Doom: He created Asura by removing his own fear, making him responsible for both the Kishin's existence and the reason the Kishin became such a fear-crazed villain in the first place.
• Vitriolic Best Buds: Him and Spirit. Teasing, arguments, impatience, odd moments of concern for one another. Pretty much like any other meister/Weapon pair, in fact.
• Wacky Parent, Serious Child: Zigzagged with him and Death the Kid, who used to be the page image for the trope. Shinigami often maintains his goofy attitude when Kid is serious, but can also be the Only Sane Man whenever Kid's obsessive compulsive kicks in. He was also more serious and dark when he was younger, but those aren't good qualities when dealing with youngsters, hence him becoming comical and goofy.
• The Wonka: He's effectively the principal of the DWMA and also highly unpredictable and eccentric, capable of switching between absurdly daft and effectively dangerous very quickly.
• World's Strongest Man: Stated by Word of God himself to be the most powerful being in the series, what we see of him show it's real. He is the only being capable of defeating Asura and is the leader of the godly Great Old Ones.
• Your Days Are Numbered: There can not be two Grim Reapers in existence, so when Kid gains his true Reaper powers, Lord Death dies. When questioned by Excalibur if he does not fear death, Lord Death responds that he gave all his fear away already.

Staff

Sid Barett

Sid Barett

Voiced by: Masafumi Kimura (Japanese), Kent Williams (English), Roberto Draghetti (Italian)

A zombie who was once a teacher and meister at DWMA. Post-mortem, he still serves Death faithfully, and he partners with Nygus in battle. He is named after Syd Barrett from Pink Floyd.

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• Back from the Dead: Already back to life as a zombie in the original series, but timeline wise following after Not!, it counts.
• Blade Enthusiast: He's a Knife Meister, but he can also use other weapons (including Azusa Yumi and his own tombstone) without trouble.
• Catchphrase:
  • "That's the kind of man I was."
  • The anime version even gives him a brief pre-zombification cameo where he says "That's the man I am," instead.
• Charles Atlas Superpower: Surprisingly strong even before he became a zombie. He ripped off a lamppost right from the ground.
• Dirty Old Man: In the manga, Black*Star lifts up Tsubaki's skirt in order to get Sid to talk, and he gets quite a kick out of this. It's never mentioned again, and their relationship is unaffected by it.
• Improbable Weapon User: Ordinarily battles with his Weapon, a knife type, but is just as handy wielding his own tombstone.
• I Would Say If I Could Say: His catch phrase counts for this frequently.
• Meaningful Name: His name is pronounced Shido in Japanese which can mean dead person.
• McNinja: Like most of the cast, his exact nation of origin is unknown, but given his name he's probably not Japanese.
• Ninja: He's BlackStar's teacher, making him a Ninja as well.
• Ninja Pirate Zombie Robot: An undead teacher ninja.
• Our Zombies Are Different: He's undead but retains his memories and personality. Overall, dying and then coming back as a Revenant Zombie hasn't changed his day-to-day life much. He also appears to have not decomposed since being zombified, rather, looks even bulkier than his human form.
• Power-Strain Blackout: He collapses after using his powers to assist the main trio, their weapons, and Stein to get outside the witch's trap before it closed.
• Promotion to Parent: He raised BlackStar after the death of his clan.
• Shout-Out: One of his attacks (which he oddly never pulls out again through the course of the series), Living End, creates a cross-shaped pillar of light.
• Stealth Mentor: In his first appearance, he pretended his zombification made him turn against the DWMA only to challenge his student's abilities. It's appropriate because he's, ya know, a Ninja.
• The Undead: He's a zombie. Apart from looking like a corpse and giving him a catchphrase it doesn't make much difference.
• Undeathly Pallor: When this was pointed out by Crona, he says to himself that he "used to have" an excellent skin tone.
• Undignified Death: He stated his death (and the hole in his head) came from being stabbed in the head by a miniature Statue of Liberty. It's implied that, despite his skills, he simply tripped and fell headfirst onto it. Although in Not!, we eventually find out Shaula caused it (and the statue was "miniature" in the sense that it was only about twenty feet tall).
• Visual Pun: Sid-sensei has a hole in his head. Before he died, he wore a bandanna with the Kanji for "hole" over his forehead.

Mira Nygus

Mira Nygus

Voiced by: Junko Noda (Japanese), Shay Moore (English)

Sid's Demon Weapon partner, who took over as the school nurse after Medusa left. In keeping with her partner's undead theme, she looks like an Egyptian mummy. Her weapon form is a combat knife. Is revealed to have met Sid by being the prize of a lottery for partner-less meister.

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• Adaptational Early Appearance: In the manga, she appears in her human form right after Arachne's revival, while in the anime she first appears with Sid as they go to check Medusa's lair.
• Booby Trap: Quite skilled at setting them, as Mifune found out.
• Hospital Hottie: She's the school nurse and she's actually quite pretty underneath the bandages.
• Icy Blue Eyes: Of the cold and piercing variety.
• Meaningful Name: Her name (pronounced as "mee-ruh") means "mummy" in Japanese.
• Spell My Name With An S: Nygus or Naigus? A certain sub rendered it as "Kniges", somewhat fitting given her weapon form.
• Talking Weapon: As with all weapons.

Franken Stein

Dr. Franken Stein

Voiced by: Yūya Uchida (Japanese), Mitsuru Miyamoto (Japanese - CD dramas), Chuck Huber (English), Christian Iansante (Italian)

Dr. Franken Stein is a teacher at the DWMA and the most powerful meister to ever graduate from the school. Memorable for being a textbook Mad Scientist, albeit a heroic one. He was Spirit Albarn's first meister, until Spirit was driven off by Stein's obsession with dissecting anything and everything, including Spirit himself.

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• Adaptational Villainy: In the manga he struggles with his madness and is suspected of a murder, but never betrays the DWMA. In the anime he actually pulls a Face–Heel Turn and joins Medusa, but comes back not too long after.
• Art Shift: Through the Eyes of Madness, things can get... trippy.
• Awesomeness by Analysis: Very intelligent and can focus his thoughts with the screw on his head.
• Ax-Crazy: Noted in chapter 93 when Spirit compares him to the Kishin.
• Babies Ever After: As of the last chapter, Marie is carrying his child, aka new guinea pig. Naturally, that proclamation makes Marie a bit uneasy...
• Badass Bookworm: As smart as he is powerful, he IS a Mad Scientist after all.
• Badass Labcoat: Comes with being a Mad Scientist. It does tend to come off during battle though.
• Beat Them at Their Own Game: Somewhat averted. He can master any weapon he comes across, but he usually has his own style of wielding compared to a different meister. Examples include his one handed defensive stance with Spirit whereas Maka focuses on two-handed offensive and utilized Jackie's chain as a means of blocking and her flames as a propulsion for his punches instead of using her as a flail or flamethrower like Kim.
• Boring, but Practical: His default fighting style with a weapon is to simply block and counter using his Soul Force. Despite this, he's very powerful and it's an effective combo.
• Broken Ace: He's known as the most talented and best Meister to ever graduate from the DWMA, has an intellect that matches Medusa Gorgon and is an accomplished scientist and doctor, is a prolific fighter who can use any Weapon he gets his hands on, and a capable teacher. However, he's also a reluctant case of a bloodthirsty sociopath who struggles with his own mental illness and tipping over into complete insanity. Without a Morality Chain, he'd go utterly berserk and he knows it, much to his shame.
• Bunny-Ears Lawyer: Very quirky and crazy (Spirit is actually afraid of him due to the latter), but is the best meister to ever graduate from the academy.
• Character Tic: Stein frequently turns the head of the bolt running through his own head, producing a ratcheting noise.
• Clark Kent Outfit: He is ripped under his sweater and lab coat.
• Clear My Name: Is accused of murdering Joe Buttataki and ends up disappearing for awhile as result.
• Combat Medic: Several years of cutting people up and studying him has made him very good at patching people up.
• Cool Teacher: Beneath his dissection-obsessed Mad Scientist exterior, he's a good man whose students love him.
• The Corruptible: In the anime, especially. The closest to insanity of all in the DWMA much to his shame, and the bad guys notice.
• Creepy Child: He is shown in flashbacks as a pale, tired-looking boy with an unsettling smile and, apparently, a tendency to beat up people who aren't targets of DWMA. Spirit had been his Morality Chain for a long time before Medusa came along.
  • His five years of working with Spirit was filled with Stein experimenting on him before Spirit's future wife informed him and causing Spirit to leave with her.
• Creepy Good: To put this into perspective, he routinely 'experiments on people' and told his partner he switched two of his toes when he was sleeping. He didn't; he was just screwing with him, but the fact that everyone found this a believable thing for him to have done really says it all.
• Creepy Monotone: In the English dub. It's subtle, but it's there.
• Dr. Fakenstein: Naturally. His general design is Frankenstein's Monster-based too.
• Expy: Bears a strong resemblance to Faust VIII, at least personality-wise.
  • He's a(n arguably) crazier, less visibly modified Karl Kroenen who's on the side of good... for now.
  • The pattern of his scars and skin grafts brings to mind Dr. Black Jack.
• Fatherly Scientist: Downplayed, but he certainly slips into this sometimes towards his students.
• First Guy Wins: Stein was apparently Marie's First Love, and much Ship Tease has abounded. He is now the father of her child.
• Foil: To Medusa: Shibusen researcher who enjoys skirting the rules, does amoral things For Science!, messes with others, mentors younger meisters, and doesn't quite understand "love." Except Stein cares about people anyway (especially those at Shibusen), keeps himself in check (or has others helping), and wants at least some order.
  • Also to Justin: Solo Weapon vs solo Meister, pure chaos vs some order, loses sanity through loneliness vs keeping sane-ish through Power of Friendship.
• Freudian Excuse: He claims he doesn't have one. He tells Medusa of the doctors who wanted to find out what traumatic event could have caused him to act so violently towards others (with a flashback to a young Stein beating up someone random for no clear reason), and Franken just wanted to cut them up.
• Glass Cannon: On his own, Stein can dish out good damage but without a weapon he cannot defend himself effectively.
• Good Old Fisticuffs: He doesn't need a weapon to kick ass.
• Guinea Pig Family: Stein declares his child will be another guinea pig for him. That baby's childhood is going to be... interesting.
• Heel–Face Revolving Door:
  • In the manga it's subverted. He's a good guy throughout even after Medusa's scheming nearly sends him insane.
  • In the anime it's played straight. He briefly switches to Medusa's side then back.
• Heroic Willpower: Has this in metric tons. All the times he nearly falls to madness, and the only time he does was specifically engineered by Medusa. He comes back, anyway.
• Hidden Depths: Obviously an unrepentant Mad Scientist, but clearly one of the most complex characters in the show.
• Hot Teacher: His female students seem to think so.
• Informed Flaw: He claims he does not understand any form of love or compassion. While he's certainly disturbed on an emotional level, it should be noted, less than an hour before he said it, he made the students he constantly goes out of his way to guide and protect promise him that they would not die. That's not even getting into Marie.
• Jack of All Trades: He's got an amazing balance of skills similar to those that make members of the main cast special. He's got high intelligence and soul perception, mastery in hand to hand combat, the ability to attack directly with his soul wavelength, and his being capable of using many different kinds of weapons.
• Ki Manipulation: One of the reasons he is so dangerous is his ability to use Soul Force without a weapon.
• Lack of Empathy: He's accused of it more than once and he himself admitted that he's not quite capable of love. However, he does show care to all his students and he managed to mend his friendship with Spirit. He said it himself, when rejecting Medusa's Love Confession. Not that his general actions back this up. Marie is carrying his newest guinea pig.
• Master of All: This is why he's so deadly. Stein can adapt to any Weapon he's given and be completely effective with it.
• More than Mind Control: In the anime, Medusa causing him to go mad also causes him to leave DWMA and join her.
• Mr. Fanservice: A sexy scientist of a Team Dad, complete with Shirtless Scenes and Ship Tease, and with his Reluctant Psycho thing he's basically living fuel for Hurt Comfort Fics. HE has fangirls.
• Noodle Incident: How exactly he got his screw and scars is unknown, but both are implied to be a result of Stein experimenting on himself.
• Official Couple: With Marie who already has a separate soul showing.
• Playing Drunk: In order to tap Medusa for info, back when she was still playing the role of the Shibusen nurse. It's hilariously believable.
• Power of Friendship: Backs up his Heroic Willpower with it, if the Brew, Murder Frame-up, and Moon Battle incidents are anything to go by.
  Stein: (reassuring Spirit) I won't give in to madness. I'm with you and Marie and my students, and everyone from Shibusen...
• The Prankster: As shown from time to time in the main story, and definitely in Soul Eater Not!, Stein really loves to mess with people.
• Punny Name: Obviously a Shout-Out to Frankenstein.
• Reluctant Psycho: He is trying to fight the Madness and sometimes he fails.
• Sadist Teacher: Stein really has no problem subjecting his students to physical and psychological punishment, and more often than not seems to enjoy putting them through taxing training just for laughs.
• Sanity Slippage: Exactly how tight can he wind that screw in his head?
• Seriously Scruffy: Inverted Trope. When his appearance is going downhill, it's usually a sign he's in no fit state to work.
• Ship Tease:
  • Gets quite a bit with Marie.
  • Medusa as well, but that's mostly in the anime.
• Shirtless Scene: Got an infamous one in episode 28.
• Sigil Spam: Not exactly a sigil, but those stitchings of his are on everything he owns.
• Smoking Is Cool: His signature imported cigarettes. In the finale chapter he mentions he's going to try and quit for his kid.
• Sociopathic Hero: Fits the Trope to a T in that he's actually diagnosed in-verse to be some form of psychopath with a boundless amount of aggression. He uses Moral Sociopathy to channel his brutal urges into helpful causes with the DWMA, but it's clear Stein struggles with his own Lack of Empathy, sociopathic view of people and desire to cut them open, and his own eccentric tendencies alienating most people.
• Stealth Pun:
  • He's got a screw loose.
  • Also, he's loose at the seams.
• Stern Teacher: He really does care, and his students really do know it but his lessons are something fierce.
• Stone Wall: When using Spirit, he focuses on defensive attacks and countering to win. Instead of actively attacking, he simply lets the enemy drop their guard after a attack to win.
• Swivel-Chair Antics: Initially on a swivel chair performing things for Rule of Funny. Oh, and curb-stomping Maka and Black*Star as well.
• Team Dad: He's accepted as such by Maka who frequently goes to him for advice and is very happy to see him when he returns in the manga.
• Through the Eyes of Madness: Presents! What can be inside?! Also, his fight with MorePsycho!Justin looks... interesting.
• Token Evil Teammate: He has a strong affinity for madness and a love for destruction that he keeps in check by worshipping Death. He's actually a fairly nice guy. However, his madness makes him vulnerable to Asura's insanity powers.
• Visual Pun: He's constantly tightening the screw in his head. Meaning he's got a screw loose.
• White Hair, Black Heart: Is definitely morally ambiguous.

Old Lady

Old Lady

An old lady who works as a receptionist at Shibusen and distributes mission requests.

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• Animal Motifs: Calls herself a "Gorilla."
• Bare-Fisted Monk: Apparently, Shinigami forbid her to carry a weapon, because she was already too dangerous by herself.
• Big Damn Heroes: For Kid while on the moon, complete with Dynamic Entry.

• Chekhov's Gunman: The first time we see her is when she gives Kilik and Ox their mission with the giant.

• Dropped a Bridge on Her: Sliced apart and then her soul is absorbed while on the moon. Goddammit, Justin.

• Heroic Sacrifice: Tries to blow Kaguya up with explosives. Subverted because it fails and both she and Kaguya survive. And then Justin shows up.

• Never Mess with Granny: Unless you want a boot to the face.

• We Hardly Knew Ye: Too good a character to last three chapters.

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