Mandragora

The Mandragora is an enemy in the Castlevania series. It is a mythical plant that is said to inflict madness and death to those that uproot it and hear its scream.
Depending on the game, they may appear either as enemies, items, abilities, or a combination of these. This article includes all variants.
==Origins==
The Mandragora enemies seen in the Castlevania series, and how they are described to induce madness to those who hear their scream, has its origins on the real life mandrake root.
This plant has hallucinogenic and narcotic properties, and its shape often resembles a human figure. These characteristics eventually leaded them to be associated with having magical powers, be used as aphrodisiacs and amulets, and to originate fantastic stories around them.
In one superstition, people who dared to pull up this root would supposedly be condemned to Hell, and the mandrake root would scream as it was pulled from the ground, killing anyone who heard it. Therefore, in the past, people tied these roots to animals and used them to pull the roots from the soil.
==Appearances==
===Castlevania (N64)/Castlevania: Legacy of Darkness===
The Mandragora is an important item found in the torture chamber within the Castle Center, its roots contained inside of a vial. Placing it nearby a Magical Nitro makes it to cause a delayed explosion, enough to destroy a large wall in the chamber of the Mammoth Bull Demon while giving the hero barely enough time to seek shelter.
===Castlevania: Circle of the Moon===
While the Mandragora enemy does not appear in this game, it does so in the form of a DSS Attribute Card representing the Plant element, and thus producing many plant-like effects when combined with other Action Cards.
When the Uranus card is obtained, the Mandragora itself can be summoned, doing massive Plant damage to anything that happens to be onscreen.
===Castlevania: Aria of Sorrow===
The Mandragora is a harmless plant when burrowed in the ground, but when uprooted by a Skeleton it screams, severely damaging Soma Cruz if nearby.
Gaining dominance over its soul grants Soma the Last Scream ability, which allows him to kill enemies with a screen-wide damaging blast scream.
In order to obtain the Mandragora's soul, the player must wait until the skeleton uproots it completely and then attack it. If done correctly, the enemy's name will appear at the bottom-right corner of the screen, indicating that the kill was registered; otherwise, the kill will be completely in vain, giving the Mandragora no chance to drop its soul.
===Castlevania: Dawn of Sorrow===
The Mandragora uproots itself this time around and does less damage than what it did in Aria of Sorrow.
Gaining dominance over its soul, once again grants Soma Cruz the Last Scream ability, although he actually tosses a Mandragora in a manner similar to that of a hand grenade this time around, and then the plant screams and explodes, unleashing a very powerful area-of-effect attack. The soul is also very easy to collect early in the game, as there's a room near the beginning of the Garden of Madness inhabited by four Mandragoras next to each other.
Even if Last Scream can be considered to be plant based, it cannot be boosted by the Skeleton Farmer soul and it also cannot be leveled up.
On the other hand, Last Scream provides the only way of obtaining the Flying Humanoid's soul later in the game, by casting it in the room before Zephyr's boss room at the top of the Cursed Clock Tower.
===Castlevania: Portrait of Ruin===
The Mandragora in Portrait of Ruin attacks exactly the same way as in Dawn of Sorrow, only without dropping a soul this time around.
===Castlevania: Order of Ecclesia===
The Mandragora only appears in the Argila Swamp. It drops the Mandrake Root, which is one of the items required in order to complete Abram's "Mandrake is the Best Medicine" quest. The drop is very rare, though, which is worsened by the fact that Mandragoras are generally found hidden in deep water, where mobility is heavily constrained. There is a room near the middle of the level where three of them spawn together, with only an Owl Knight blocking the way. A constant and ranged attack like that of Nitesco will allow Shanoa to dispose of all three of them with little effort.
==Item Data==
==Gallery==
AoS 080.png|Mandragora enemy list entry from Aria of Sorrow.
==See also==
*Mandragora (DSS card)
*Summon Mandragora
de:Mandragora
Category:Plant Monsters
Category:Aria of Sorrow Enemies
Category:Castlevania 64 Items
Category:Dawn of Sorrow Enemies
Category:Legacy of Darkness Items
Category:Moonlight Rhapsody Enemies
Category:Order of Ecclesia Enemies
Category:Order of Ecclesia Items
Category:Portrait of Ruin Enemies
Category:European Mythology