Arcueid Brunestud (アルクェイド・ブリュンスタッド, Arukueido Buryunsutaddo?) is the main heroine of Tsukihime, being the eponymous Moon Princess (月姫, Tsukihime?).
Profile
Background
Arcueid's first encounter with Kishua Zelretch Schweinorg.
Arcueid Brunestud is the White Princess of the True Ancestors. The title of Brunestud was given to those True Ancestors capable of manifesting the Millennium Castle Brunestud, and has been likened to be the vampire royal family, although this is not strictly true. The True Ancestors were a race of beings copied from Type-Moon, the ultimate being of the moon, also known as the Crimson Moon. Long ago the will of the planet had no defense mechanism against humanity, nothing to keep them in check. Thus the Crimson Moon came down and offered to help the planet make a race of ultimate beings to rule over humanity, thus resulting in them being the "consciousness of the planet". True Ancestors are alike to occurrences such as earthquakes and typhoons rather than individuals as their actions, while evil and without justification, would come as naturally to her (Arcueid and other True Ancestors) as breathing. However the race was fundamentally flawed, they had a desire to drink blood that their original, the Crimson Moon, had. The True Ancestors needed to use a large portion of their power to suppress this impulse, but as there was no cure, and with passage of time the impulse grew, more and more True Ancestors fell and began drinking blood indiscriminately, while others most likely went into eternal sleep.
The True Ancestors didn't have a specific reason in creating Arcueid. They normally only mold new True Ancestors to fit specific needs. There was no need for a being as strong as her, but in the end, she originated from nothingness, simply as a product to realize the pointless goal of "the strongest True Ancestor."[3] They used her great strength to make her into a weapon, the executioner of the fallen True Ancestors and of the most powerful Dead Apostles. According to Ciel, this happened in the 12th century AD, when the number of fallen True Ancestors was very high. She was able to perform this duty splendidly, but she was nothing more than a tool. She was taught nothing beyond what she needed to know to hunt her targets, to the extent that she even ignored the fact that she was the same kind of creature as those she was supposed to destroy, and went to sleep after every kill, with her accumulated memories erased.[4][5]
As the executioner, she did not have any vampiric impulses, and the rest of the True Ancestors also believed she had none. A priest from the church seeking perfect immortality, Michael Roa Valdamjong, needed to become a Dead Apostle to continue his research as he had already reached the potential of his human body. Arcueid, ignorant of her nature as a vampire and the consequences of drinking blood, was easily tricked by Roa into drinking his and turned berserk, wiping out most of the True Ancestors, turning Roa into one of the strongest Dead Apostles and having a considerable portion of her power stolen by him, before she managed to regain her sanity long enough to chain herself to the throne and go to sleep. From then on she had to suppress her urge to drink blood like any other True Ancestors. The rest of the True Ancestors were wiped out either by Roa or the rest of the Dead Apostles, who made a game of trying to assassinate their creators.
Arcueid finally managed to destroy Roa's original body, although it took an alliance with the Burial Agency to do it. Roa was not killed however, as he had managed to master reincarnation, and constantly reincarnated into host bodies he chose before his deaths. These host bodies were chosen for a mix of social standing (rich families with influence) and the physical/magical potential of the body. After destroying Roa's original body, Arcueid went to sleep and awoke only to kill Roa's re-incarnations constantly, but was never able to destroy him and get her power back as he would simply re-incarnate each time. At the time of Tsukihime, Roa had re-incarnated 17 times, with his last re-incarnation being SHIKI Tohno.
Appearance
Arcueid is a woman with short blonde hair down to her neck, and bright red eyes. Her traditional outfit consists of a long sleeve white shirt, long purple skirt, and black boots.
- Phantas-Moon is a magical girl parody of Arcueid Brunestud that is detailed in Character Material.
-Foreign-VN-3028429.jpeg "Anime-Arcueid-Brunestud-Tsukihime(vn)-Foreign-VN-3028429.jpeg (191 KB)") Tsukihime Remake  J.C.StaffWP's character sheet of Arcueid in Tsukihime, Lunar Legend.  Lerche'sWP character sheet of Arcueid in Carnival Phantasm.  Arcueid's character select image in Melty Blood.  Arcueid in Chibichuki!, illustrated by Hanabana Tsubomi.  Fluffy Idol Morcueid illustrated by B-suke.  Phantas-Moon  Redesigned Shiki Tohno and Arcueid Brunestud's Illustration by Takashi Takeuchi. |
Personality
Arcueid is shown to be a whimsical individual who, although knowing the basics of the modern era, does not seem to know about social norms. Both Nasu and Takeuchi think of her "image color" as white because she is pure in terms of appearance and personality. Once, she shows up at Shiki's school and waves to him from the school rear courtyard, luckily for Shiki only Ciel spots her. Her behaviour is almost childlike, due to the lonely nature of her upbringing, although she is over 800 years old, she spent most of it asleep and knows nearly nothing about the world or how to interact with others. As she works together with Shiki to stop Roa, she gradually begins to enjoy life and starts to like Shiki as more than just a friend.
Arcueid does everything in her power not to drink Shiki's blood, which nearly occurs several times in game as he is practically the only human at night with her, and she has problems controlling her Vampiric Impulses (吸血衝動, kyuuketsu shoudou?) after being drastically weakened by Shiki's attack. She doesn't want to drink blood, as she doesn't want to become a monster that feeds on humans in order to survive.
Arcueid seems to thoroughly enjoy when Shiki cooks breakfast for her. In Melty Blood, Shiki threatens to stop doing this for her if she doesn't meet him in the park that night. When Sion questions whether such a threat would ever have any sort of effect on a True Ancestor, Shiki recounts to her a time that he managed to get Arcueid to immediately apologize to Akiha when she and her were arguing by making the same threat. Later that night, Arcueid does, in fact, meet Shiki and Sion in the park. She apparently cannot stand garlic. In a scene in Kagetsu Tohya, Arcueid eats instant noodles cooked by Shiki that had garlic in them, and becomes sick.
She was originally a being without emotions who never spoke. She only focused on her duties and then returned to sleep in an endless cycle. Shiki, by killing her, made her interested in something on her own for the first time and essentially "broke" her. The "airhead" version of her is something that shouldn't exist alongside her purpose as a weapon, but it was present in her foundation. She is not truly an airhead, but more childish and honest.[6]
She has a constant flow of income in the form of gold, so she has no issues with obtaining money. There is a special gold exchange shop for fugitives in the Mage's Association, and the owner of the shop gives her gold because he is a fan of her. She can be called rich, but she doesn't dress like it because she has no interest in clothing. She later changes to make Shiki happy.[6] She also receives help from Merem Solomon, who reveres her as a "Princess." He helps her travel around the world without much trouble, booking plane tickets and trading gold for money, but she does not know what to do with his unconditional affection.[7][8]
Arcueid shows up as Neco-Arc in Ciel-Sensei's lessons in Tsukihime and she randomly switches to that persona in some comedy scenes in Kagetsu Tohya, though Neco-Arc seems to be her own existence brought forth by Zelretch in the Melty Blood series.
When she lose control of her Vampiric Impulses, she is known as Red Arcueid.[9][10] When made aware of Dust of Orisis' plans, she mentioned that it was the same delusional idea that Goetia had.
Role
Tsukihime
Arcueid's route
Arcueid waiting for Shiki after he sliced her
Shiki Tohno will first meet Arcueid in one of the 2 "Near side of the moon" routes (Arcueid/Ciel's routes) after leaving school early one day because of an anemia attack, he spots Arcueid on the street and is consumed by an irresistible urge to kill her because of his Nanaya blood. The Nanaya were a family of killers that specialized in hunting down non-humans, and Arcueid as a vampire awoke his Nanaya blood. Skillfully trailing Arcueid back to her apartment, he rings the doorbell and in the instant the door opens, sneaks through the crack and slices her into 17 pieces in an instantaneous single strike with his knife and his Mystic Eyes Of Death Perception. Regaining his sanity and finding himself in front of her corpse, Shiki staggers to the park where he either collapses and is taken back to the mansion by Kohaku (Arcueid's route) or is found and taken care of by Ciel (Ciel's route).
The next day when heading to school, Shiki finds Arcueid waiting on a guard rail outside his school. Panicking, he runs, only to be chased into a dead alley and confronted by Arcueid. Their conversation is interrupted by one of Nrvnqsr's beasts, and Arcueid "convinces" Shiki to help her deal with the vampire in the town as she used up most of her power to re-form her body after Shiki killed her and will need time to regain the power she had lost.
Arcueid after failing to kill Roa
The two of them are partners against Nrvnqsr Chaos, with Shiki killing Nrvnqsr by striking his "death point". They decide to again be partners to take out Roa who Arcueid has been targeting. Over the course of her route she and Shiki begin to understand one another. Shiki shows Arcueid the various things she's unaware of, such as movies, which are things Arcueid can't comprehend as important. At several points she attempts to bite Shiki, though she manages to hold herself back in time, though usually she runs until her impulses have stopped. Eventually she and Shiki have fallen in love with one another, despite her slightly unstable nature and vampire lineage. However, she attempts to take out Roa by herself and is apparently killed in the process. Enraged and in grief, Shiki proceeds to destroy the walkway he and Roa are on as a distraction and utterly destroys Roa's point, thus nullifying his very existence and preventing him from ever reincarnating.
Arcueid's True Ending
In Arcueid's True Ending, Shiki waits in his classroom for her despite thinking she is dead. Arcueid surprisingly arrives, having regained the bit of power Roa stole from her. However she can no longer hold back her impulses and decides she should sleep from now on, dreaming of Shiki. Despite Shiki's pleas, even begging her to drink his blood, Arcueid says she cannot do so because she loves him and says farewell with Shiki greatly saddened, looking at the moon as he leaves the school. This ending was the basis for the ending used in the anime, although a few details were changed. In the manga, after Arcueid left, he goes on a search for her and they are finally reunited together. It is left unsure whether this is reality or a hypothetical "what-if" situation playing in Arcueid's mind as she sleeps. But it is most likely to be in the real world, not the world of dreams, as shown on the manga that Shiki was looking for clues, along with Ciel, where the castle of Arcueid stood.
In Arcueid's Good Ending, she spends an entire week suppressing her urges and meets Shiki on his way to school, exactly at the same point where he killed her at the beginning of the story. The two then go off to seemingly spend the day together.
Ciel's route
Arcueid's offer
She has the same role as in her route, fighting against Dead Apostles. However, since this is not her route, he is not in love with her (although he is slightly attracted to her). Arcueid falls in love with Shiki and wanted him for herself. After Shiki defeats Roa, however, he transfers the burden of his madness to him, causing Shiki to have murderous thoughts and strange dreams. Arcueid blames Ciel for it and offers to help Shiki if he obeys her.
Arcueid defeats Ciel.
In Ciel's True Ending, he declines the offer and slices the line of her neck in order to escape, causing Arcueid to threaten to kill him for real. Ciel appears and drags Shiki away before Arcueid recovers. Ciel fights against Arcueid, but she is quickly defeated. Shiki, realizing that Roa has overtook his body, tries to kill himself by slashing his throat, so Arcueid won’t have to finish him. After doing this, Arcueid returns to her senses and vanishes after saying farewell to Shiki.
In Ciel's Good Ending, Shiki accepts the offer and tells Arcueid that he is attracted to her. After his response, Arcueid kisses him as she tries to get him to drink her blood, but she is stopped by Ciel. Ciel believes that if Shiki kills Arcueid, Roa might get weaker. As both girls discuss how to get rid of Roa, he overtakes Shiki's body. In order to stop it, Shiki slashes his chest in order to kill Roa. After killing Roa, Arcueid decides to stay and Shiki is forced to "share" both her and Ciel much to Ciel's chagrin.
Akiha's route
She makes one appearance in Akiha's route when Shiki sees her walking down the street from behind and has an urge to kill her, however Shiki gets distracted by Satsuki.
Kagetsu Tohya
Before Kagetsu Tohya, she is one of a factor who cause an event indirectly because she's the one who call out Shiki when he get involved in an accident.
In Kagetsu Tohya, she stay most of her time in her apartment rather than going out in town like in Tsukihime. Arcueid accidently helps Shiki to point out a current event and also explains a thing about a famillar in a fine detail.
If Shiki goes to her apartment when is morning and lets her sleep near him, he will encounter Princess Arcueid in the Millenium Castle Brunestud, in a dream-like state. She doesn't seem to know Shiki, however, when he introduces himself, she shows a murderous killing intent towards him, dissecting him exactly in 18 pieces before he's aware of what's happening.
Melty Blood
Arcueid's role in the first Melty Blood is limited. She fights Shiki Tohno and Sion Eltnam Atlasia once while investigating the occurrence of the Night of Wallachia, though the Arcueid they fight may only be a manifestation of a rumor or not, depending on the path. Wallachia's main goal is to manifest as a True Ancestor to finally it obtain the Sixth, so he hopes that the rumors lead to him developing as Arcueid. Shiki's fears about Arcueid losing control over her vampiric impulses combined with the rumors of her traveling through town at night allows for him to manifest in her form if there are no more prevalent rumors.
This manifestation, called Red Arcueid, is a hypothetical Arcueid that has ceased restraining her blood lust and succumbed entirely. Much like Shiki Nanaya, Red Arcueid doesn't truly exist. She is the version of Arcueid who has given fully into her bloodlust and unlocking her full powers for fighting, making her lose all traces of humanity and morality in her soul and desiring to do nothing but kill all in their path for fun, which is the greatest fear of Arcueid. However, she is an illusion created by Wallachia, a manifestation of the fears inside Arcueid's heart.
The main route of Melty Blood has Wallachia materialize as her for his plans of obtain the Sixth, but this form is defeated. The true Arcueid shows up afterward, utilizing Marble Phantasm to allow him to be fully killed. Red Arcueid is able to still be manifested within the sequels under the TATARI of White Len and Dust of Osiris.
Melty Blood Actress Again introduces Archetype：Earth (真祖アルクェイド, Shinso Arukueido?, True Ancestor Arcueid), the princess-version of Arcueid Brunestud that follows the will of her Crimson Moon "personality" and has full access to her abilities. In her scenario, Archetype:Earth says she will borrow Arcueid's body for a while to experience the world of men for the first time after being in the subconscious mind of Arcueid for several years. In the ending of her scenario in Actress Again, she eventually decides to commit suicide like humans do to see what it is like, believing that to be human nature. In doing so, she will also kill everyone in the planet (with the exception of Shiki and Ciel, whom she promises to spare) and restore the world back to its natural state before the human race exists. Ciel challenges Archetype:Earth to protect the planet, but she is easily defeated. Just as Ciel is despairing, Arcueid appears and challenges Archetype:Earth inside her own mind, leaving a confused Ciel to cry out that no matter what kind of high-ranked model she becomes, Arcueid is still Arcueid and therefore an idiot. After the battle ends Archetype:Earth says she had a lot of fun, although their father would be disappointed by the result. Archetype:Earth then thanks her because she believes their future will not end up as he, Crimson Moon, would have wanted. Finally, Archetype:Earth tells her that she can go back to that world that she loves to babysit so much.
Carnival Phantasm
Arcueid has a large role in Carnival Phantasm as one of the heroines of Tsukihime. It largely plays on her whimsicalness and her constant fighting with Ciel. It also utilizes her Phantas-Moon persona for a number of small skits.
Other appearances
The Arcueid of the Fate/Extra world appears as a Servant, Berserker, under the command of Monji Gatou.
In Back Alley Satsuki, she is a gold heroine of sheep to protect the eighth temple and she is known as Fluffy Idol Morcueid (ふわふわアイドル モコクェイド, Fuwafuwa aidoru mokoku~eido?).
Abilities
Arcueid was developed with the purpose of becoming the strongest True Ancestor. While there are different levels of power in the True Ancestor hierarchy, Arcueid, as a sublimation on the level of the First True Ancestor, Crimson Moon, is beyond all of the other True Ancestors.[11] She is much like a God, a spirit in flesh.[6] She is considered as one of the top 3 strongest characters excluding Servants in the Nasuverse.[12]
Combat
Arcueid's most potent weapon is her Marble Phantasm, and she is very capable in close combat. She can move at tremendous speeds, and her physical strength is easily able to overwhelm opponents. She can form her hands into claws like other vampires, allowing her to easily shred opponents. Alongside the normal regeneration granted by her race, she has developed a resistance to most Conceptual Weapons and magecraft like Runes and Kabbalah. She states that she will only be vulnerable to those she has yet to experience, which she believes to be limited to the ancient Shinto magecraft of Japan and treasures from South America.[13]
She is hard to kill during the day, and she is almost invulnerable at night, her power reaching its peak during the full moon. During the night, she technically "has no death", so all of her lines and points of death disappear. It is possible to see them if she is weakened, and removing her connection with the planet by killing part of the world around her allows for Shiki to view them clearly even at night. She can regenerate most wounds rapidly, but her time during Tsukihime leaves her unable to do so while trying to hold back her bloodlust. She can normally even regain her form after being cut into pieces, but the Mystic Eyes of Death Perception leave her unable to regenerate. She can bypass it by creating an entirely new body, but the act costs eighty percent of her available energy and leaves her close to death unless she returns to her castle to rest.
She has Mystic Eyes that enable limited control over others, such as the ability to plant suggestions. The color of her eyes changes to gold when they are active, thus revealing her as possessing the Mystic Eyes of Enchantment.
Shall We Play Around Some? (少しばかり戯れようか??) is Arcueid's Last Arc. For just a second, it is possible to catch a glimpse of the vampire princess Arcueid's true power. The phantom that appears behind her back is her original form. Its appearance, abilities, and very thoughts could be called the Crimson Moon. The inspiration for this technique comes from Kagetsu Tohya. Specifically, the episode where Shiki strayed off into Arcueid's dream and received proper retribution for killing her. Because of that, when this technique is used on Shiki it hits eighteen times.[14]
Marble Phantasm
With her Marble Phantasm, which can literally change reality to create any naturally occurring effect and summon the Millennium Castle Brunestud, the ancestral home of the True Ancestors. The power of Marble Phantasm is such that even in her extreme weakened state, she was able to turn layers of the atmosphere into vacuum, slicing Roa's latest host body until reducing it to just the ankles.[15][16]
Without her limiter, she can likely materialize something the size of a small village in the mountains. She cannot do so normally in modern towns built up by the work of many people, so she would have to destroy in order to create anything there. It would require more time, so the Church would have enough time to locate her and start a battle with her. It is very hard to directly help humans utilizing the ability, but it is viable with other creatures.[6]
Backup
Arcueid receives backup from the planet as part of the Counter Force. She has the ability to increase her fighting power to one level above those she faces while drawing upon it, and it is said to be virtually unlimited. Overall, the strength available to her as of Tsukihime, thirty percent of her strength, is around that of four Servants.[17][18] She will very likely win when only faced with one Servant-level opponent in this state, but even with her power, she would still potentially be overwhelmed when faced with two opponents of that level. Due to an absolute order from her backup, the planet itself, her "output changes according to her opponent", so she is only allowed an output slightly stronger than her opponent like how the Counter Force deals with its problems. Against a Servant, the level of output would be approximately that of two Servants.
Her ability to deal with single opponents, "single entity ability", is roughly on the same level as Servants, so she has bad compatibility against those like Gilgamesh. Servants utilize Noble Phantasms, while she utilizes her backup, leading to differences depending on affinity. She can be called a "simple-is-best" fighter and an all rounder with high chances in most fights, but doesn't go well with those of high versatility. Gilgamesh has the "firepower" of over five Servants, but Arcueid is only able to draw strength based on "single entity ability." He has roughly the same statistics as her, but a large amount of weaponry to utilize against her, making her have horrible compatibility in such a fight.[19]
It is possible to cut her off from this power by killing the land around her or sealing her off from the world through a powerful Bounded Field that rewrites the world by switching the terrain effect with a different terrain effect or a Reality Marble that overwrites the current world. While her connection to nature can be interrupted by any such barrier, the ability to actually cut her off from the supply depends on what is being used as energy to hold up the barrier because the overwritten world generally has an even more colossal world seeping up from underneath it to return it to normal. She complains about White Len cutting off her backup with her dream barrier, but Arcueid could easily get serious, request backup from the planet, and blow away White Len along with the entire barrier if she so wished. Some form of alien deploying a Reality Marble may be able to cut her off from her energy source completely.[20]
Vampire
Bloodlust
She is the only True Ancestor able to suppress her Vampiric Impulses with pure willpower. As she drank Roa's blood in the past, Ciel states that, no longer how long she holds out, it is inevitable that she will drink it again.
Restriction
Before Shiki killed her, she was using 70% of her power to suppress her vampiric impulses at the beginning of Tsukihime, when she still had his portion of his power stolen by Roa who was stored inside soul and he always used this portion in order to be reincarnated in other bodies, but even then she was more than strong enough to destroy almost any Dead Apostle that got in her way. After Shiki Tohno killed Roa and its 'existence' at the end of Tsukihime, that portion of power stolen by Roa returned to Arcueid's soul and she used it to be able to revive herself. Believes that she is now using far less of its powers to suppress her vampiric impulses now as demonstrated in Kagetsu Tohya and Melty Blood Series, more or less about 50% of all their power is used for it now.
Unlike Arcueid, Archetype：Earth has full access to Arcueid's full power and more authority over the planet than she normally possesses. She is called an Ultimate One in this state, taking on her original appearance before losing her hair to Altrouge Brunestud, and the part of her in control is the subconscious Crimson Moon side of her. Normally limited to the Millennium Castle in their "dreams", this form is her awakening to experience the human world for the first time in Melty Blood Actress Again Current Code. Ciel believes that Arcueid managed to awaken her Origin, but Archetype denies this, declaring that they are intrinsically a single being. She simply has a very long waking period, as the basis of life for her is far too vast compared to the living organisms that live on the surface.
Shiki Ryougi recognizes an overwhelming aura flowing from her during their conversation, stating that she cannot see her death, going as far to say that she does not have a death, and that she is a monster. She is able to directly affect the entire planet. Ciel mentions the possibility of her melting the ice of the North and South poles, or even disrupting the axis of the earth.
Crimson Moon
Arcueid is one of two possible successors to the original Crimson Moon. The other is her "sister" Altrouge Brunestud, but she is generally considered too "unstable". Arcueid didn't cut her hair on her own, but it was taken away during a battle against Altrouge, and until she recovers it, it won't grow back. At her full power, her form, power, and even thinking can be said to be that of Crimson Moon. Her Last Arc in Melty Blood involves the ability used on Shiki in Kagetsu Touya, where she gives him payback for killing Arcueid when he stumbles into her dream. It is sure to hit eighteen times when used against Shiki to one up cutting her into seventeen pieces.[21]
Development
Creation and Conception
The model used as the basis for Arcueid's appearance.
During the original draft of the basis for Tsukihime, Arcueid was a cold stereotypical vampire compared to her cheerful self in Tsukihime. The tone of the story lacked any sort of loving tone, and not much of it remained in Tsukihime. Upon developing the story for Tsukihime, they pictured Arcueid as a cool and princess-like "Noble Vampire", but thought that it overlapped with Akiha's "Lady" character. All of the heroines spoke politely to the main character, so they figured that the only character who could fit the role of someone who didn't speak politely would be Arcueid. They eventually came up with the idea of a "pure white" vampire that developed her character very differently from the original version.
While the name bears a resemblance to "AlucardWP", a common name in vampire stories created by reversing DraculaWP's name, "Arcueid" is actually just a name they had planned to give to a different character in a different story. They used a model when creating her design. During college, Takeuchi Takashi saw a foreign model in a fashion magazine who left an impression on him. He wished to work her into one of his characters no matter how much trial and error even with only the one vague image.[6]
Reception
- In the First character popularity poll of Tsukihime, Arcueid was ranked 1st.
- In the Second character popularity poll of Tsukihime, Arcueid was ranked 1st.
- In the Third character popularity poll of Tsukihime, Arcueid was ranked 1st.
- In the Fourth character popularity poll in 2003, Arcueid was ranked 1st.
- In the Type-Moon's 10th Anniversary Character Poll, Arcueid was ranked 5th and the fourth most voted female character.
References
| |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||