Fighting Spirit

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Zenkichi: [W]hat's with the chained-up knight thing?
Morgana: That's the rebel in your heart awakened: the power of your Persona.
Zenkichi: A rebel, huh... Hey, fine by me. I don't understand a damn thing, but if it can help me fight, I'll take it.

— Persona 5 Strikers

A Fighting Spirit is when a person's ki/mana/spirit/psychic power is manifested in a physical form that acts on its own. They don't need to lift a finger to punch you; their ki will do it for them. This usually resembles Summon Magic, except that it's an extension of the user rather than a separate entity. This can sometimes manifest as an Animal Battle Aura. See also Guardian Entity, Tulpa, Astral Projection and Shaping Your Attacks. Sub-Trope of Powers Do the Fighting.

For the other kind of Fighting Spirit, see Heroic Resolve.

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Examples

Anime and Manga

• The Trope Codifier for this trope in Japanese media are the Stands from JoJo's Bizarre Adventure. Introduced in the third installment, Stardust Crusaders, as a way of making Psychic Powers more visually interesting,^note Inspired by an X-Men storyline in which Xavier and the Shadow King sat at a table together, then projected their spirits out of their bodies and battled on the Astral Plane. they would prove to be so awesome that they would become the main powerset of all later installments. Their name comes from how they typically manifest as Invisible to Normals humanoid beings that stand behind their user and cannot move very far away, but they come in many stranger forms, some of which are less like this trope and more like Tulpas, Summon Magic or Magic Tools. A strong fighting spirit (or at the very least a lot of passion, as seen with Tonio in Part 4) is actually required to properly control a Stand; Jotaro's main reason for hunting DIO in Stardust Crusaders is because his mother is too gentle to control her forcibly-awakened Stand and it's slowly killing her.^* Though even that tenet of Stands ends up a case of Fridge Logic when later on, characters like Mannish Boy, an Enfant Terrible Brainy Baby and Bug-Eaten, a literal, if highly cunning and sadistic, rat also manifest and perfectly control Stands of their own.
• Possibly the first series to take after JoJo may have been an obscure, children's anime called Wrestler Gundan Galaxy-hen. The main characters could project psychic "Binds" which looked like swirling energy in the shape of humanoids or animals that held a target in place for their finishing move. Broadcasting less than 6 months after Stardust Crusaders debuted, it was either a massive coincidence or one shameless rush.
• Ah! My Goddess has symbiotic angels attached to each goddess. Since they mainly materialize to make casting spells look cooler, they're essentially this trope whenever conflict breaks out.
• Ayakashi Triangle:
  • Omokage are duplicates of people made from their Life Energy and manifesting their inner desires. Usually they're a Enemy Without the creator can't control that drains them to the point of injury or death. Suzu has enough energy to spare, and eventually learns to recreate and control hers at will, and even link their senses together.
  • Sosuke Hinojiki is himself a spirit, albeit one that looks human, but his Engulfing Shadow ability is a giant, spectral mouth that devours Life Energy. He can manifest in anywhere in sight, letting him attack from bizarre angles and blind spots, but the mouth itself is relatively fragile, and damage done to it carries over to his actual body.
• Bleach's transforming Zanpakuto are extensions of the wielder' souls. Most simply become other melee weapons but a few are more dramatic. Hitsugaya's forms parts of an ice dragon around him while Komamura's creates a giant, armored warrior to mirror his movements. The latter also shares its battle damage with Komamura in JoJo tradition, though it was only revealed so during the later half of the Winter War Arc, because until then, no one was able to even damage Komamura's Bankai.
• Bungou Stray Dogs: Some of the Gifts take the form of these. The most prominent in the story are Akutagawa's Rashoumon and Kyouka's Demon Snow.
• Dragon Ball Super: The climactic battle of the Galactic Patrol Prisoner Saga has Moro growing to giant size due to merging with the planet. Thanks to a power boost from Uub and the Grand Supreme Kai, Goku is able to manifest a giant blue avatar of himself which he uses to pin down Moro and shatter the crystal on the evil wizard's head that empowers him.
• Fate Series has its Heroic Spirits, who are mythological figures from across history, employ Noble Phantasms, which are aspects of their legend formed into tools for defense/offense. For instance, Gilgamesh, one of the earliest Heroes whose myth has him collect all the treasures of the world, has Gate of Babylon, a vault that contains every weapon ever made.
• Raoh from Fist of the North Star could use his Touki to attack an opponent without so much as flexing a single finger.
• Many of the Nen abilities from Hunter × Hunter qualify, such as Razor's 13 Devils.
  • Netero's 100-Type Guanyin Bodhisattva in particular fights like a giant Stand.
• Mashle: Magic and Muscles is set in a world of magic, where the most powerful magicians, known as Divine Visionaries, can shape their specific power into the form of deity-like figures. For instance, Ryoh Grantz, who wields light magic, can summon Hyperion the god of light.
• Arguably, Mobile Fighter G Gundam's Sekiha Tenkyoken, a Kamehame Hadoken that takes the form of a gigantic energy fist. Near the end of the series, Domon even uses this to perform a gigantic version of his Bakunetsu God Finger attack that grabs the opponent's entire body and not just their head.
  • During the final battle, Domon and Rain perform the Sekiha Love-Love Tenkyoken, which transforms into a giant, pissed-off King of Hearts.
• My Hero Academia: Tokoyami Fumikage's Quirk is a birdlike creature called Dark Shadow that grows more powerful in darkness and eventually gives him an Animal Battle Aura.
• Naruto:
  • Naruto's Fox Cloak can function as this, forming arms of chakra to attack independently of Naruto's movements and at its most powerful forming a gigantic Animal Battle Aura he controls from within.
  • The Susanoo technique of the Sharingan similarly creates a massive Energy Being around the user, its form evolving from a skeletal form into a yamabushi and then finally a Samurai as it increases in power.
  • Sakura's "Inner Sakura" is simply a visualization of her repressed feelings, but some of the video game portray it as an actual physical being she can fight with.
• In Puella Magi Madoka Magica The Movie: Rebellion Sayaka can now call forth Oktavia, her own Witch form, to fight alongside her.
  • This concept gets expanded to basically the whole cast of the series in Magia Record: Puella Magi Madoka Magica Side Story. By using a power known as Doppel, the Magi can summon their Witch form to fight for them.
• This is how spirits are materialized via Oversoul in Shaman King, in many ways similar to Stands.
• s-CRY-ed drew heavily from JoJo's Bizarre Adventure with its Alters. The main difference is that while Stands are mental constructs, Alters are physical in nature (and blow away small portions of the landscape for the material to form themselves). Additionally, only a few Alters are humanoid, with others becoming weapons, elements, or 'harmonius' armor, while Stands are the opposite - mostly humanoid, with a minority taking on other shapes or styles.
  • Special mention goes to Zetsuei, a humanoid Alter whose injuries reflect on its user, Ryuho.
• The Appetite Demons in Toriko are hulking, humanoid monsters that become more corporeal as their users' Gourmet Cells grow stronger.

Comic Books

• Agents of Atlas: Crescent's Mask of Power allows her to summon Io, a "half-moon" bear spirit that can aid her in battle.
• Batman: Minor villain Doctor Double X was a scientist specializing in auras that managed to supercharge his into a superpowered duplicate that can act independently of him. Its main weakness is requiring an external source of power to maintain itself.
• Diesel, a one-off comic by Joe Weltjens, is a transparent ripoff of JoJo's Bizarre Adventure: Stardust Crusaders, up to and including calling its examples of this trope "Stands."
• Green Lantern: The Green Lantern Corps and Lanterns of other colors sometimes use their constructs in this way. Karu-Sil of the Sinestro Corps especially is known for being accompanied by three constructs of the beasts that raised her, and all of the Orange Lanterns are constructs of people that Larfleeze has killed and assimilated.
• Justice League of America: The 2006 run featured a Canadian Mountie named Daniel Crow-Brings-Darkness who could transform his shadow into a crow.
• Teen Titans: Raven can manifest a bird made of black energy referred to as her "soul-self". It can travel long distances, become intangible, communicate telepathically and act as a shield.

Literature

• A variant appears in The Barsoom Project: The Gamers must fight an Inuit demon called a Paija. Because they themselves aren't fit to do so (this particular Game is called a "Fat Ripper Special" for good reason), shaman Snow Goose uses magic to summon their spirit-selves, which have their faces on healthy, strong, fit bodies. The spirit-selves then battle the Paija.

Live-Action TV

• Legends of Tomorrow: Amaya Jiwe can manifest spectral versions of animals to aid her in battle.
• In Power Rangers Jungle Fury, a common battle tactic of members of the Order of the Claw is to summon giant ki representations of the animal one's fighting style is based on. There's one awesome scene where the Big Bad and The Hero are fighting over here while at the same time their lion and tiger spirits (respectively) are fighting over there. This also exists in the Sentai version but done less often, due to that series focusing on martial arts. Of course, these spirit animals being giant and solid create the series' Humongous Mecha.
  • Later, the Ranger's Masters are kidnapped and forced to attack the Rangers in the form of "Spirit Rangers" that are controlled from back in the villains' base, mimicking the mind-controlled Masters' moves. After the Masters are freed, the Rangers learn to summon them in battle much like they do their animal spirits. In the final episode, the Masters fight alongside their own Ranger forms.

Mythology

• In The Saga of Hrolf Kraki: During the Battle of Hleidragard, a huge bear appears on the battlefield and fights for King Hrolf. Meanwhile, Hjalti goes looking for Bodvar Bjarki and finds him seemingly sleeping in his quarters. When Hjalti wakes him, Bodvar blames him, but goes with him to the battle where the bear has now disappeared; thus revealing to Hjalti that the bear was Bodvar's spirit.

Tabletop Games

• In Magic: The Gathering this is a favored tactic of the planeswalker Ajani, who has several cards involving him making avatars from his or other people's emotions. The most direct is Soul's Fire.
• Dungeons & Dragons: The sourcebook Tasha's Cauldron of Everything introduces the Way of the Astral Self subclass for monks, where monks can harness their ki to summon a spiritual representation of their being known as an astral self. Just from the way this subclass functions makes it appear like it was heavily inspired by Hamon and Stand users from JoJo's Bizarre Adventure.

Video Games

• BloodRayne: Rayne's "Ghost Feed" ability allows her to conjure a spectral entity in her own image that feeds on enemies without Rayne physically engaging them. This allows Rayne to recover health while fighting, but it cannot be used on large enemies and bosses.
• Amara from Borderlands 3 fights alongside with an astral projection of herself that she can manifest to send it charging at her foes, or as giant fists to either hold her opponents up in the air for her to shoot, smash them into the ground, or increase her reach and power when engaging in melee combat.
• The Aura Smash technique in the Breath of Fire series creates a giant image of the user to strike the enemy.
• Nero from Devil May Cry 4 manifests a Fighting Spirit version of Vergil when he uses Devil Trigger, in contrast to Dante and Vergil who simply transform into demons.
• One of the main gameplay mechanics in Fire Emblem Engage is that the characters are able to fight alongside the spirits of characters from previous installments of the franchise, called “Emblems.” The Emblems inhabit magical rings or bracelets. The Emblems give their user certain buffs and abilities, and can even merge with their user (called “Engaging”) for some exclusive attacks and abilities.
• This is what Keshins/Fighting Spirits are in Inazuma Eleven GO, they appear from the spiritual energy of their user once it is mastered, it also severely drains the stamina of their user after usage. While it is rare for normal players to have one, it is the opposite for SEEDs. Keshins/Fighting Spirits can be fused, such as Shuu/Tezcat and Hakuryuu/Bailong creating Sei Kishi Arthur/Holy Sword Paladin Arthur
  • Later in Chrono Stone, Keshins/Fighting Spirits are capable of becoming one with the users. This technique is called Keshin Armed/Armourified Fighting Spirit, where the Keshin/Fighting Spirit is worn like an armor. In the games, this allows the player to reduce their TP consumption.
• Ansem from Kingdom Hearts fights with a Living Shadow "Guardian" which floats behind him. The Guardian seems to be an ability of his, not a separate entity. Kingdom Hearts III reveals that it's effectively Terra's Heartless, and his Heart returns from it to retake his old body.
• Personas from the Persona series are mythology/history/literature-based representations of different sides of their user's personality, and are the basis of the game's magic system.
  • In Super Smash Bros. Ultimate, Joker can summon his initial Persona, Arsène, as a combination Limit Break Super Mode.
• Castlevania protagonists have gathered a wide range of powers and abilities over the years, some more JoJo-influenced than others.
  • Castlevania: Rondo of Blood: Maria Renard's Guardian Knuckle creates a warrior projection of herself to punch monsters.
  • Castlevania: Aria of Sorrow and Castlevania: Dawn of Sorrow: Soma Cruz's power lets him absorb the souls of enemies to gain their abilities. Many let him temporarily recreate their bodies to sic at targets, some with an accompanying "ORAORAORA!".
• Middle-earth: Shadow of Mordor: The Elf Wraith Celebrimbor functions like this to Talion. The wraith animates his corpse, though Talion still retains his own consciousness and will. The wraith has a life and will of his own, but talks to Talion and will occasionally come out to assist in combat, granting him supernatural abilities and Resurrective Immortality.
  • The sequel Middle-earth: Shadow of War expands on this by the end of the game during Celebrimbor's betrayal, Talion puts on a different Ring of Power and gains his own wraith clone to function the same way, albeit without a mind of its own. While Celebrimbor gives his ring to Eltariel and becomes her spirit fighter. In the Blade of Galadriel DLC, Eltariel gains her own wraith clone after Celebrimbor dies and drops his ring.
• Fatal Fury: Tung Fu Rue can temporarily Hulk out to various degrees or fire off oddly redundant Chi blasts shaped like himself Hulking out.
• The third unlockable Limit Break in Cuphead is called the Giant Ghost. It allows Cuphead and Mugman to summon a ghost from themselves that can be directed to throw spinning double punches at the enemy. After delivering enough punches, it vanishes, leaving behind a floating pink heart they can parry for the extra charge to their Super Meter.
• Shadows from Blue Dragon are like this, taking on the forms of various animals like dragons, sabertoothed tigers, and more. A deep enough bond with their wielder allows the Shadow to subsume their wielder, who essentially becomes a Puppeteer Parasite that can still control their actions. Unlike some instances of this, however, the Shadows are still fully sapient.
• In Dark Devotion, Sariandel, Prisoner of the Void has a ghostly figure which floats behind him and imitates his attacks. Since the figure is much larger than he is, its attacks have a much greater reach and area of effect.
• In Path of Exile with the exception of Sirus, the most powerful, the conquerors of the atlas manifest energy constructs that fight for them, with their bodies hanging limply from the projection. Sirus' fully separates from his body and he fights in concert with it, criticizing the others for being too reliant on them.

Visual Novels

• In Ayakashi, the titular creatures can be seen as a literal embodiment of their user's life force; the more their power is used, the closer their user comes to death.

Webcomics

• The God of High School's Charyeok fighters are somewhere between this and Summon Magic or Guardian Entity. The actual power comes from whatever god, monster, or spirit they've contracted, but almost everything about the power (from effectiveness, to form, to power level, to versatility) is determined by the user's skill, preferenecs, and Power Level.

Western Animation

• Young Justice season 2 introduced the character of Tye Longshadow who had the ability to manifest a spirit giant around his body.
• In the OK K.O.! Let's Be Heroes episode "Wisdom, Strength, and Charisma," Enid defeats her holographic opponent by summoning a large, humanoid, cat-eared apparition to land the killing blow. Since Enid is a huge manga fan and the show itself is heavily influenced by anime, it's a safe bet this was also a JoJo reference.

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