Nu-13

**Nu-13** ( *Nyū-Sātīn*) is a Murakumo Unit said to be the **Sword of Izanami** ( *Izanami no Tsurugi*, Sword of Hades). She is a playable character in the BlazBlue series.

## Appearance

Nu-13’s design is wholly based on the Mecha Musume concept, a design motif that includes 'humanizing' machines or inanimate objects. In the case of Nu, hers is based on swords. When not in battle, she appears as a young girl with sunken red eyes and long silver hair tied into a braid held together by a single blade. She wears a bright jumpsuit and a long flowing cape with red-colored tape seals attached to the end. She wears a magic power regulatoreyepatch on her right eye and she is barefoot having blue nail polish on both fingers and toes.

When assuming battle position, she dons futuristic sword-themed armour that features a set of eight disembodied blades that float behind her in a wing-like formation. She now dons a visor with a singular eye and horns at the end.

In *BlazBlue: Calamity Trigger*, Noel Vermillion once saw a “younger” version of Nu. She wore a blue dress and had much longer, silver hair, resembling Noel physically. This version is also seen when Nu is affected by Amane’s Astral Heat, but she has her eyepatch in this occasion.[1]

When she shuffles Noel’s childhood memories, she wears a white patient uniform and her white hair is loose.

In the end of *BlazBlue: Centralfiction*, Nu wears an off-white dress, she no longer wears an eyepatch but has bandages on her right eye instead.

## Personality

Nu is shown to have a split personality; one that is an emotionless girl that follows orders without question and the other as a yandere who is in love with Ragna the Bloodedge.

Being a Prime Field, Nu’s emotions were sealed away, becoming little more than an emotionless machine who kills anyone that obstructs her programming or whomever she determines to be hostile. She was originally programmed to terminate anyone she deems hostile that came near the Gate. When conversing with anyone that isn’t or doesn’t mention Ragna, she speaks like a machine or in an emotionless tone and is only interested in her orders.

When around, hearing about or thinking about Ragna on the other hand, her personality changes to someone who is absolutely infatuated with him. In her mind, Nu must have Ragna to herself, and anyone who gets in her way must die, thus making her an obsessive yandere instead of an possessive one (possessive yanderes tend to kill their love interest to avoid losing them to someone else). Nu’s love for Ragna has also given her the habit of using the most sexual innuendo out of the entire cast in the *BlazBlue* series. This especially the case when around Ragna, as she is usually giving him a “naughty” smile when using innuendo around him. However, what makes Nu different to traditional yanderes is that while she changes to a person who is in love with Ragna, she doesn’t necessarily have a “deredere” side to her personality as she still tends to say dark and graphic things to others and may still act emotionless even in Ragna’s presence.

This unrequited love is due to a unique interpretation of what little of Saya’s memories of Ragna she possesses as a direct result of being a clone of his sister, which developed into a romantic affection and the belief that they were destined to be bound together by fate. However, Nu has a unique interpretation of showing affection to Ragna, which involves “killing” each other, knowing that neither herself nor Ragna can’t permanently stay dead due to the Life Link they share. This is because Ragna had destroyed two of Nu’s previous undeveloped bodies in the past before the events of *Calamity Trigger*which were unable to react let alone speak. This gave her the impression that “killing” each other is the best and only way to show affection to Ragna and it is because of this fact that despite loving Ragna a lot, she tends to still fight him in a rather brutal manner when they engage in battle.

Over time Nu’s yandere personality becomes more dominant over her emotionless weapon personality, mostly loosening Hazama’s control over her in the process. In *BlazBlue: Chronophantasma*, she seems to have acquired habits from the time her soul inhabited Lambda-11’s body, such as counting hits in German when performing **Sword Summoner,** like she used to do as Lambda. By *BlazBlue: Centralfiction* not only has she gone AWOL in search of Ragna and a way to merge with him, she shows a lot more emotion even when she’s engaged in emotionless speak. Many characters, such as Nine, have noticed that she’s beginning to act a lot more different than how she used to. As a result, she mostly speaks in a more “humanly” manner rather than the monotone, machine-like voice she had around others in the past. However, Nu’s personality is still largely dark, when put mildly; by this stage, she can be seen as cold, cruel and sadistic, enjoying the pain she inflicts on anyone and everyone that isn’t Ragna or that she thinks is getting in her way. An example of this includes her fight against Mu-12, where she constantly promises that she (i.e. Noel Vermillion) will pay for denying her wishes to be with Ragna and for killing her at the end of *BlazBlue: Calamity Trigger,* saying that she will force her to suffer what she had suffered as her soul wandered the Boundary for what felt like an eternity.

At heart, however, Nu is a sad and lonely girl who has endured roughly four years of nightmarish torture and experimentation by Control Organization’s science division, clinging to her memories of Ragna to give her hope. It is for this reason that she hates the world and wants to merge with Ragna to form the Black Beast. This hatred extends to Hazama due to the experimentation that he, along with the entire Control Organization science deivision, did on her, but has kept quiet about it throughout her time serving them until she breaks free form their control.

Despite being known to love Ragna very much, Nu can sometimes show anger against Ragna. The first time was in *BlazBlue: Chronophantasma* when he declares that he would “save” her, causing her much confusion turned frustration, turned murderous rage. Similarly, in The *Wheel of Fortune* Drama CD she becomes heartbroken and feels betrayed after a long string of confessions to Ragna lead him to attack her out of annoyance because she wouldn’t stop talking. This caused Nu to mentally snap before breaking out in maniacal laughter, beating Ragna into unconsciousness, brutally murdering an already incapacitated Tsubaki and forcing Ragna into the Kiln with her.

## Powers and Abilities

In battle, she summons numerous swords to keep pressure on her opponents from a distance. Her battle appearance even stems from an apparatus, resembling a large sword with a face, that breaks apart to become her armor and weapons.

Nu is a very lethal combatant on the battlefield. As a Murakumo Unit, Nu boasts abnormal fighting abilities. She can repair herself and fight in tip-top shape should she sustain enough damage, making her seem almost immortal. Her Drive ability, **Sword Summoner** (ソードサマナー *Sōdo Samanā*) comes in the form of controlling the very fabric of space. She can alter gravity, open up rifts, teleport, fly and summon swords to wipe out her opponents with ease. In combat, it is not uncommon to see a flurry of swords materializing out of thin air and disappearing just as quickly, flying and attacking rapidly from many angles at once. Her Overdrive is **Unlimited Drive** (ンリミテッドドライブ *Anrimiteddo Doraibu*), giving her the characteristics of her Unlimited form by summoning two swords per strike instead of one. Her method of finishing off opponents come in the form of combining her eight blades to create a dimensional rift that summons a gigantic sword to smash her opponents into oblivion.

Nu also shares a Life Link with Ragna, which makes her become unkillable by normal means unless Ragna and herself were to be killed at the same time, be killed by Izayoi’s Immortal Breaker, or be killed by Hakumen’s Time Killer technique.

## TMNT X Pokemon

Nu-13 cares about her friends but doesn't show it much. During missions, she shows no mercy until someone stops her from killing a person or herself

## Trivia

Naming
* Nu’s name comes from “ν” (*nu*), the thirteenth letter in the Greek Alphabet and serves as the beginning bit of her Murakumo serial number. “13” serves as the second half of her serial number and shows how Nu is the thirteenth Murakumo Unit. Like Mu-12, one half of Nu’s serial number, 13, also relates to death; in Tarot cards, the thirteenth card is the Death Arcana, as well as being widely considered the unluckiest number in most first world cultures.
* Many of Nu’s attacks have names referencing cars.
	+ True Impreza: Subaru Impreza
	+ Sickle Storm: Geo Storm
	+ Luminas Slave: Daihatsu Boon Luminas
	+ Crescent Saber: Honda Saber
	+ Supra Rage: Toyota Supra
	+ Act Pulsar: Nissan Pulsar
	+ Legacy Edge: Subaru Legacy
	+ Spike Chaser: Toyota Chaser
	+ Facelift: Automotive facelift

Appearance
* In early concept art, the blades which float behind Nu are identical to the white portion of Ragna’s sword.
* In the finalized concept art of Nu, her eyes are blue. They were, however, changed to red.

Other
* Nu’s birthday is New Year’s Eve, as well as being the last day of the year on the Gregorian calendar.
* In the Japanese official website for *Calamity Trigger*’s arcade version, Nu’s voice actress is listed as “????”.
* Nu uses sexual innuendos when speaking to Ragna. Such cases are:
	+ *“How would you like it? Gentle? Or a bit more rough perhaps?”*
	+ *“Don’t wanna talk, hm? Perhaps you’ll open up after something a bit more… physical?”*
	+ *“Let’s kill each other again… She can watch, if you want… or we can make it a threesome! She’ll have to go first though!”*
	+ *“Hehehehe… C’mon, Ragna …Let’s go as deep as possible this time!”*
	+ *“Come on, Ragna! I said more! You’re not going to satisfy me with just that…! Give me more of your delicious energy…”*
* Nu and Noel were featured in a montage of characters who were voiced by their current English voice actress, Cristina Valenzuela. The montage was drawn by Alex Ahad, art director from the fighting game *Skullgirls*.[3]
* In the English dub of *Chronophantasma*, Nu has been incorrectly referred to as the “Sword of Izanagi” in text, instead of “Sword of Izanami” in her arcade mode.

Appearances in other media
* Nu is featured as an Avatar in the game *Groove Coaster 2*. She is obtainable by purchasing the “ARC SYSTEM WORKS Pack”. This pack contains four songs: “CHRONOPHANTASMA”, “Rebellion”, “Catus Carnival”, and “Awakening The Chaos”.