Soul Eater
Shinigami (死神; Literally meaning "death god"), referred to with the suffix -sama as a term of respect, and formerly known as "Death" (デス, Desu) is the Shinigami himself (the Grim Reaper in Western legends). He is also called 'honorable father' (父上, chichiue) by his son, Death the Kid. Shinigami sealed the first Kishin Asura under Shibusen and rooted his own soul to Death City to keep him sealed, which is why he cannot leave Death City.
Shinigami sports probably the most eccentric appearance among the Soul Eater characters. He appears as a tattered piece of pitch black cloth with many jagged edges, decorated with a cartoonish skull mask, which seems to serve the sole purpose of imitating an otherwise absent face—a means of rendering Shinigami more humanoid and thus making it more comfortable for humans to communicate with him. It has not been shown what he looks like without the mask on, but since his son appears as a human, Shinigami may also have a human appearance. This possibility is supported by Mosquito′s comments in chapter 53 regarding the Lines of Sanzu. However, the very shape of the black cloth and the spectacular properties of his arms and hands suggest a non-human nature of his physical host. Shinigami′s mask has broken on several occasions during his battles with Asura, however, rather than revealing his actual face, it merely appears that what is behind the mask is the same black cloth. The shape of the mask changes to convey his current mood, e.g. round eye sockets become triangular at moments of anger or seriousness. Also, Shinigami is arguably among the tallest characters.
Shinigami′s soul is vast enough to surround whole Death City, and is of pale yellow color. Its orb features three prominent spikes set off-center, resembling the shape of his current mask.
Shinigami's Old AppearanceIn the past, Shinigami sported a much more intimidating look. He wore a grim-looking skull mask, which he had to abandon after the establishment of Death Weapon Meister Academy in favor of children, who were scared of it and would flee on sight. He also had black claws instead of hands with his signature “Death” written on the right forearm, and a deep, menacing voice. He has been shown to have skeleton hands during the scene of flaying of Asura.
“ If you don't shut up I'm going to use my Reaper Chop to split your head open! ” --Shinigami
In most cases, Shinigami comes off as a bit of a joker with a cheerful demeanor. He also prefers to be optimistic and treats every situation as such. He also has a great sense of humor.
He has a special move called a "Direct Noggin Shinigami Chop" (which is normally shown when Shinigami shows his large flat four-fingered hand appearing from his robe; often called Shinigami Chop for short). This move is normally administered on Spirit whenever Shinigami refuses to put up with the Death Scythe's antics when it comes to Maka or her progress. He has a habit of giving warnings to people about to be punished with it after the punishment was carried out. He also seems to take on a more playful attitude when talking with his son (he says the stripes in his son's hair are cute), but at the same time thinks he can be quite the handful and is glad that Patti and Liz look after him.
Death accidently scaring children with his old appearanceAdded by Consus, the Erudite God As the headmaster of Shibusen, he is highly respected by teachers as well as students, not only because of his great power, but for his desire for peace in the world. It is for this reason, that Shibusen was created. Despite his past and his powerful position in the school, he tends to be kiddish and joyful as to not scare the children. In the past, Shinigami spoke in a deeper and far scarier tone and was far more violent than he is today. This can be seen when he was fighting Asura. Also, his new personality is the complete opposite of his own son
800 years prior to the start of the series, the Shinigami wore a normal skull mask, black claws, with his signature written on one, and had a deep, menacing voice.
At an unknown time, Shinigami had visited the Lost Island, an area witches had used as a construction facility for demon tools. As it turns out, Shinigami was lured to the island by witch Arachne. After she had obtained Eibon's blueprints, she planned to blow up the facility along with everything related to Brew and presumably kill Shinigami. Somehow, Shinigami survived/escaped the explosion.
800 years before the main storyline, Shinigami fought and hunted Arachne after she had killed a member of her kind and used the soul to join a human and weapon together to create the first Demon Weapon. Arachne escaped by separating herself into small spiders and spread across the lands.
Before the start of the series, Shinigami lead a group of 8 meister and weapon partners, known as the Eight Powerful Warriors, to hunt down witches and prevent kishin from being born. Among the group was a man by the name Asura. He was regarded as the strongest, as well as the most feared and suspicious, of the group. Overwhelmed by fear, Asura became addicted to power and followed the path of the kishin, leading him to consume his own weapon and numerous pure souls without regard. This ultimately led to Shinigami ripping all of his skin off and sealing Asura away inside a bag made of it. The process of sealing Asura forced Shinigami to root his own Soul to the ground ultimately preventing him from leaving the general radius of the spot. Afterward, he built what is now known as Shibusen to prevent the birth of another Kishin.
Post Kishin's Sealing Under his rule, there are currently 8 active Death Scythes in the world. 7 of 8 are normally stationed in different parts of the world, as Shinigami's eyes, ears, and if need be, on call support weapon for himself or a highly trained meister. The strongest Death scythe (ironically the only one that is an actual scythe other than Soul) stays with him at Shibusen. That Death Scythe being Spirit, Maka's Father.
Spirit is Shinigami's Weapon partner, the current Death Scythe. Shinigami is disapproving of Spirit's flirtatious behavior and occasionally reprimands him by way of a Shinigami Chop. They do seem to share a sense of humor however, shown during their meeting with Medusa in which they ignored the witch - much to her distaste - in favor of discussing children's underwear. When Spirit was panicking about being fired following Asura's escape, Shinigami told him he needed to have more confidence in himself.
Death the Kid Death the Kid is Shinigami's son and heir. There are few scenes between the two, but Shinigami seems to get along well with Kid and encourages him and his partners to succeed. Shinigami is confused by Kid's obsessions, but tends to ignore them. Shinigami is confident enough of his son's skills to - if a little reluctantly - assign a three-star mission to him at the start of the series. When Brew causes one of Kid's Sanzu Lines to connect, Shinigami seems genuinely pleased at his son's progress. (Even if it does seem to affect his health in a negative way. See: Part of the story: =Operation: Capture Baba Yaga's Castle=):He also seems to care for his son greatly since in the anime he threw himself in front of Asura's attack to protect Kid.
Eight Powerful Warriors Asura “ You filthy, unforgivable swine! That's it, I'M GOING TO SKIN YOU ALIVE AGAIN!!! ” --Shinigami, To Asura
Shinigami has a very powerful hatred towards Asura, and the two treat each other as mortal enemies. Originally, however, the two were once great comrades, and Asura has even recounted a friendship between them prior to Kishinizing. Shinigami valued Asura as a very valuable part of his personal guard and saw him as the most skilled and powerful out of all the 8 Powerful Warriors. However, he also acknowledged him as the most frightened one as well, and the one most obsessed with power. When Asura succeeded in becoming the first Kishin, Shinigami hunted him down and defeated him without hesitation. When Asura is revived, the two do not actually jump into battle immediately, and Shinigami decides to first have a friendly conversation with the Kishin. Even Asura participates for a short time. However, Shinigami then cuts the politeness and engages Asura. When in battle with Asura, Shinigami completely drops his usual demeanor, uses his real voice, and looks at Asura with a fiercely angry expression on his mask. The only time Shinigami has ever been shown to be so enraged that he actually becomes frightening is when he is in battle with Asura. When referring to Asura, Shinigami still believes that he is a coward and knows that he is reluctant to do any damage individually. The two also have completely opposite opinions of humanity, peace, and how the world should function. When Asura believes that mankind's greatest weakness is their imagination, Shinigami believes that it is their greatest strength, for example. Shinigami's opinion towards Asura's view of these ideals is that of believing that they would drown mankind in despair, and that they are of useless nonsense of no other significant outcome to following them but destruction, recklessness, and even more fear. Ultimately the two are complete opposites, and Shinigami feels nothing but disgust and betrayal from Asura.
Eibon Shinigami and Eibon have only ever been shown acting formally and friendly to one another. Shinigami is familiar with a lot of Eibon's past, and seems to acknowledge that he has been through much unhappiness. In the past, Shinigami seemed to be concerned for Eibon, and pleaded with him to not try to achieve immortality for his dying wife, and that even if he did so that he would find nothing but grief and sorrow after his triumphal over death. Eibon then ignored Shinigami and found as much, and forever resented not taking his advice. The two still appear to share a friendship, and Eibon even assists Shinigami in trying to stop Asura. Shinigami seems to be very secretive about his relationship with Eibon, and usually avoids speaking about it. It is possible that he does this in an effort to not have others find out that he befriended someone who is commonly viewed as an ally of Witches.
Excalibur Shinigami does not actually see Excalibur as very annoying as others do, rather, as an old ally and acquaintance. This is probably because Excalibur acts substantially more seriously and rationally around Shinigami.
Maka Albarn Maka and Shinigami seem to get along well and trusts her with highly important tasks. However he is not beyond punishing her once she has done something wrong, such as when Maka takes a level four book from the library to research Medusa and the black blood. Maka's chop is similar to Lord Death's Chop.
He is by far one of the most powerful characters in the series — with Asura and Mabaa being the only other characters that could possibly match him in power, and among those two, only Asura could actually defeat him in combat (anime only; it is important to note, that Shinigami's defeat was due to Asura attack on Death the Kid. Shinigami used his own body to shield his son from Asura's blast, which led to his defeat) and he really believes that he is the most powerful character. In the second battle with the Kishin, when it was about to attack, Shinigami said "What? Seriously? You seriously believe you can beat me? It's a shame but, the battle was decided the moment that you were brought here."
Shinigami "Jets" Skills
- Shinigami Jets: This has yet to be confirmed to be an ability for Shinigami or just an item at his disposal. Either way, it has been shown to give Shinigami the ability to fly.
- Change in mass/Stretch: Shinigami is also seen with the ability to change his size and shape. This is seen when he is damaged by Asura and is left with holes in him. It is also seen in his second fight in the anime with Asura when he uses numerous punches from afar, and also enlarges the palm of his left hand to block an attack from Asura.
- Konso: Grim Reapers like Death The Kid & Shinigami can store Souls within themselves without actually consuming them. Shinigami-sama can also confiscate souls from others, though it hasn't been shown how he can do so.
- Madness (発狂, Hakkyō): As the former leader and founder of the Great Old Ones, Lord Death is a tremendously powerful god-like entity that presides over one of the pursuits that drives men towards madness, which in his particular case is the quest for "Order".
- Reaper Chop: Unlike his "Direct Noggin Shinigami Chop" this chop is used for battle, not punishing people's silly antics. This attack had enough power to hit Asura into the ground and cause a small crater upon impact.
- Shockwaves: Shinigami used a blast of energy to counter one of Asura's attacks. After stopping the attack, shockwaves traveled down Asura's skin scarfs and attacked him directly. Asura called this shockwaves, or he may have been referring to the nature of the attack.
- Shadow Skull Arms: Shinigami calls out four shadowy claws from his body, with black skulls at the end of them. The nature of this attack is unknown since it failed to connect. It can be assumed that the attack probably slashes or grabs an opponent. Before Shinigami used this attack, he said he would rip off Asura's skin again, suggesting this may have been the attack he used to rip off Asura's skin in the first place.
- Punch: As opposed to chopping, he can throw a straight punch. He has incredible range with this because he can extend his arms to very long distances.
- Skull Shield: Shinigami creates a shield that resembles his mask to protect himself. He can also use the shield offensively, as he used it to try and crush Asura in his fight with him.
- Hands: Shinigami's hands are very strong and are able to deflect Asura's energy blasts. He normally does not display hands, they appear at his sides when he is attacking or defending with them. He can alter their size to make them large enough to cover his entire body. He is also able to hold up a hand behind his skull shield, strengthening it's defensive capabilities and serving as a backup defense for if it is breached.
- Hand hole: He is able to open a void in his hand which is able to swallow energy blasts. As he demonstrates this ability while wielding Spirit in the other hand, and not in the original battle, it may be that he requires a weapon partner to do this, or adequate preparation for the blast to open it, which he was not able to do when caught by surprise by Asura's first attack.
- Barrier: As revealed by Arachne, Death has the ability to put up a barrier to keep anyone he wishes trapped and to keep out outsiders from helping.
- Kishin Hunter: He can perform this with Spirit.
- Sniping: He demonstrated the ability to fire a sniper bullet so powerful it could destroy a massive turret, compared to when Sid shot it and it could not even obliterate Mosquito.
- Death City: As he has linked his soul to the city, he shares a special bond with it which he can manifest in special ways.
- Coffee Table Flip: Using Death City he is able to flip large objects as shown in his fight with Mosquito.
- Eye Poke : Using Death City, Shinigami-sama is able to perform the martial art move when one uses two fingers & pokes one in both of the eyes.