Paul Verlaine

**Paul Verlaine** (ポール・ヴェルレエヌ,, *Pōru Verurēnu*) is an ability-derived life-form created by the French researcher Pan, under whose servitude he was known as **Black No. 12** (黒 (くろ) の１２号 (ごう) ,, *Kuro no Jūni-gō*). He later becomes a spy for France as trained by his eventual partner, Arthur Rimbaud. Originally the host of the singularity beast Demonic Beast Guivre, Verlaine possesses a gravity-manipulation ability, which he prominently uses in his assassination missions as the notorious **King of Assassins** (暗 (あん) 殺 (さつ) 王 (おう) ,, *Ansatsu-ō*).

## Description

### Appearance

Verlaine is a tall, young man with a slim physique. He has dark brown eyes and blond hair which is braided along the hairline on the left side of his face, while his right eye is obscured by bangs. The braid is then tied with a ribbon with the rest of his hair in a long ponytail. He wears a three-piece suit comprising a dark sand-colored backless waistcoat, matching-colored trousers, and a light sand-colored coat that he typically leaves draped on his shoulders and that carries a brooch on its lapel. He also wears a black dress shirt whose sleeves are folded to his forearms, together with a cherry-colored tie tucked beneath his waistcoat. In addition, he dons white gloves, a black porkpie hat which was gifted to him by Rimbaud, and a pair of black dress shoes.

When he posed as a Port Mafia mailman, Verlaine wore a black suit and sunglasses together with his signature black hat. Later, when he visited Osamu Dazai in his shipping container, Verlaine wore a midnight sea-colored suit with his black hat.

### Personality

Verlaine was originally controlled by a series of codes programmed into him with his personality being artificial. After being freed from Pan's control he struggled with this fact along with the knowledge that he was not human, to which Rimbaud went to great lengths to help him cope.

He was able to empathize with Chūya Nakahara's situation as a clone and refused to go along with the mission to capture the boy and hand him over to the French government for further experimentation. This empathy ultimately won out over his care for Rimbaud, and he attempted to kill his only friend to free a boy he did not know.

Unfortunately, without Rimbaud, Verlaine's sanity declined as he was no longer able to deal with his origins as a man-made being. His beliefs became warped and he decided to kill those Chūya cared about to force the boy to N, demonstrating his now unhinged personality.

As described by Adam, Verlaine is a lone wolf and does not trust anyone. Moreover, as an assassin, he displayed an enigmatic and deadly nature, not immediately revealing his identity or goals with clarity. He once posed as a Mafia mailman to approach Chūya despite being the stronger of the two, and he was very deliberate about his targets to force Chūya to kill N. However, despite his planning, his downfall was that he did not expect Chūya to decide wanting revenge against Verlaine for killing the Flags more than he wanted revenge against N for experimenting on him.

## Powers and Abilities

### Gravity-Manipulation Ability

*Main article: Gravity-Manipulation Ability*
Verlaine possesses a gravity-manipulation ability, which allows him to manipulate the gravity vector and magnitude of anything and anyone he gets in contact with. His ability is also largely identical to Chūya's Upon the Tainted Sorrow, and it is considered a transcendental ability like those of Shakespeare, Goethe, and Rimbaud. Verlaine's prominent brand in his killings caused by his ability is the brutal fashion of assassination of his targets, which is seen either externally or unnoticeably.

As an artificial ability, Verlaine can tap into Guivre's powers and succumb to Brutalization. Following Guivre's rampage during the King of Assassins Incident, Verlaine loses most of his ability.

### Physical Prowess

Verlaine is an expert combatant in physical fights and battles, which he utilizes together with his powerful ability. Dazai also noted that there is no one in the world who can win against Verlaine in hand-to-hand combat alone. As a Transcendent, Verlaine was able to fight on equal footing with Rimbaud, who was a fellow Transcendent and the very spy who trained Verlaine himself. Even skilled fighters like Chūya and Adam Frankenstein, an android with a wide skill set himself, had considerable difficulty fighting him to an extent. Verlaine was also able to fend against Mafia guards on his own in complete silence in their own turf and brutally murder the Flags, who were all quite adept with their skills and capabilities.

### Intelligence

Verlaine is quite elusive, which makes him difficult to be caught even by Europole. Furthermore, he inputted a command sequence in Chūya to close his Gate upon contact, which therefore allowed Verlaine to deactivate Brutalization even without his consciousness. This eventually led him to regain said consciousness and avoid being poisoned at least for a brief moment. Verlaine possesses an unparalleled competitive edge in battle owing to his tactical intellect together with his combat skills.

### Mentoring Skills

After Verlaine loses most of his gravity-manipulating ability, Verlaine retains his espionage skills and knowledge in combat, which he used to train Kyōka Izumi, Gin Akutagawa, and countless others who became first-class assassins without exception.

## Etymology

* The name **Paul** is of Latin origin, meaning "humble".
* The surname **Verlaine** usually denotes that they come from the municipality of Verlaine, Belgium.

## Trivia

* The real-life Paul Verlaine was in a romantic relationship with the real-life Arthur Rimbaud.
	+ Verlaine shooting Rimbaud before Arahabaki's explosion in the military facility is a reference to the real-life Verlaine shooting Rimbaud in 1873. Though various sources differ in details, the so-called Brussels Affair saw Verlaine firing twice at Rimbaud in a hotel in the Belgium capital. This incident ended their two-year affair.