Emerl

Emerl

 Show... power... OR I sh...all ob...ey... Sha...ll conqu...er a...ll...
 — Emerl, *Sonic Battle*

**Emerl** is a fictional character from the *Sonic the Hedgehog* series. He is the most powerful Gizoid created by the Nocturnus Clan, but was left behind on Earth when the planet was split into 2, and when the Nocturnus Clan was pulled into the Twilight Cage not too long after. About 4,000 years later, Emerl was discovered by Gerald Robotnik, who classified him as a superweapon. Gerald attempted to nullify his destructive programming, but failed. In an attempt to curb it, he gave it the same qualities as his creation, Shadow the Hedgehog, a "soul" based on that of Gerald's granddaughter, Maria Robotnik.

## History

### Creation

Emerl was created as the finest and most powerful of the Gizoids more than 4,000 years prior to *Sonic Battle* by the Nocturnus Clan with the purpose of aiding the Nocturnus Clan in conquering the ancient world. During his brief time with the Nocturnus Clan, Emerl apparently befriended Nestor the Wise and acquired immense amounts of data on combat and the weaponry of that age.

With his creation, however, the Nocturnus Clan had become so powerful that they caught the attention of Argus who transported the entire Nocturnus Clan and the Gizoid army into the Twilight Cage. Emerl however, somehow avoided imprisonment and was the only one from the Nocturnus Clan to do so. While the Nocturnus Clan faded into legend, history came to regard Emerl as the one who destroyed his civilization, and Emerl himself was lost.

### Rediscovery and Reprogramming

About 50 years before *Sonic Battle*, Professor Gerald Robotnik found it in a warehouse and took it to the Space Colony ARK for research. He managed to create a Link with the Gizoid and figured out that it could learn how to do anything, and that it got stronger when absorbing Chaos Emeralds. He then started Project: Gizoid and equipped the robot with a "heart," a free-willed emotions-based AI. Unfortunately, the project was never finished as Gerald had to hand over the Gizoid to the government to buy more time for his Project Shadow, the research experiment to create the ultimate lifeform. However, the Gizoid soon absorbed a large number of weapons and decimated a large section of the ARK. The government then finally decided that Gerald's research was too dangerous to continue, canceled Project Shadow, and killed or imprisoned all that knew about it.

### *Sonic Battle*

#### Raising a Living Weapon

Gerald's grandson, Dr. Eggman later found the Gizoid, and brought it to one of his bases. While experimenting with the robot, Eggman gave the Gizoid a Chaos Emerald which it absorbed. As he couldn't retrieve the jewel, Eggman got angry at the robot and threw it away on a beach.

Later, Sonic the Hedgehog found the robot lying around on the beach and tried to communicate with it. The Gizoid only mumbled "Show... power... OR I sh...all ob...ey... Sha...ll conqu...r a...ll..." Sonic answered by showing off a few lightning quick moves. The Gizoid reacted to the moves, and created a Link with Sonic, without him knowing. Sonic, wondering what was up with the robot, decided to take it to Miles "Tails" Prower to ask him about it. However, he stumbled upon Shadow the Hedgehog who demanded that they gave the robot to him. Sonic fought him off and went to see Tails. He examined the robot and figured out that it could copy abilities and absorb Chaos Emeralds. Sonic and Tails then fought the Gizoid for a while, teaching him their moves and Sonic decides to (in a spectacular show of a lack of imagination) named it "Emerl" because it absorbs Chaos Emeralds. They then decided to give him a Chaos Emerald and went to visit Knuckles the Echidna to borrow the one he currently owned. On the way they met and fought both an E-121 Phi robot and a rebuilt E-102 Gamma, who both escaped. When they finally arrived, Knuckles attacked the Gizoid due to a misunderstanding, but the Gizoid defeated him and absorbed the Emerald. After his second Emerald, Emerl learned how to speak, but could only say words that he had already heard, and always repeated them twice.

After discovering how the Gizoid worked, Sonic started fighting the robot continually to teach him new attacks. Tails, who wanted to learn more about the mysterious robot, instead tried to take him to Central City to use an extensive database to figure out what he was. However, the data was forbidden, and guard robots attacked Tails and Emerl, who escaped. On the way home, they ran into Shadow, who again wanted to destroy Emerl. Tails and Emerl defeated him, and Rouge the Bat arrived to take the weakened Shadow away. He continued home, only to run into an angered Knuckles who again challenged Emerl, who won. E-102 then found them again, and they had to fight him off. After the fight, Tails finally got home to tell Sonic about the information he had discovered, namely that Emerl was a weapon. Sonic shrugged it off and started teaching Emerl more moves.

Three days before the game, the President ordered Rouge to find out all she could about the Gizoid. She went to the database and discovered that Dr. Eggman was already accessing the information. Upon being confronted, Eggman told Rouge that he had already thrown away the robot and then sent a Phi robot to attack her. Rouge destroyed it, kept the Emerald shard and left to find the Gizoid. She discovered it in the hands of Sonic and tricked him into letting Emerl listen to her. When Sonic was away, Rouge then swiped Emerl from Amy Rose, who spent time with the robot as she thought of him as a baby project between Sonic and herself. After fighting off the protective female hedgehog, Rouge took Emerl home, fighting Gamma on the way. Once home, Rouge told Emerl that he was to become the world's greatest thief robot. She trained Emerl for a while and then took him along to steal a Chaos Emerald. However, once she got her hands on the jewel, Emerl took it from her and absorbed it, much to her dismay. Sonic then arrived to take Emerl back, and Rouge left, saying that the immature robot could never become a master thief.

After this third Emerald, Emerl started to talk ordinarily, but could still only use words he had heard. Knuckles, interested in Emerl's connection to the Chaos Emeralds and doubting that Sonic could make him into a great warrior, later decided to spend some time with him. Upon arriving at Tails' lab, the two friends saw on TV that two Emerl-looking robots were out stealing jewelry. Knuckles decided to do something about it and took Emerl with him to destroy the copies. They ran into Gamma and beat him yet again. Rouge then appeared and told them that Eggman was trying to get his hands on Emerl. Knuckles and Emerl then proceeded to Night Babylon, where they asked around to where the fake Emerls were. However, Emerl was mistaken for one of the robber robots, and they were forced to fight several guard robots. Eventually, they ended up in Rouge's club, where they fought Rouge herself. After that, they quickly found two Phi robots, destroyed them, and took their shards. Rouge thanked them for stopping the Phis from attacking her club and gave them her own Emerald shard. The echidna and the robot then continued their search and ended up destroying two more robots and creating a fourth Emerald for Emerl.

On one of her usual trips searching for Sonic, Amy again scared the blue hero away and took it as a sign that he wanted her to take care of their "baby," Emerl. While Sonic's "decision" overjoyed Amy, Emerl ran off to fight two nearby Phi robots. Amy followed suit, and they ended up with two new Emerald shards. Deciding that Sonic would be very impressed if she gave Emerl a new Chaos Emerald, Amy went on a search for new Phi robots. She first decided to train some, though. Amy and Emerl went to Amy's apartment, where Cream the Rabbit and Cheese temporarily lived. Amy then taught Emerl about boxercising, which Cream disliked. The trio fought for a while until Emerl felt Chaos Emeralds nearby and ran off. Amy followed him to Night Babylon, where she found him insulting Rouge. After fighting the disdained bat, Amy started to explain only to be interrupted by two attacking Phi robots. After Amy and Emerl destroyed the robots and took their shards, Rouge gave them another shard as well, creating the fifth Chaos Emerald for Emerl to absorb.

Eggman finally decided to take matters into his own hands and captured Emerl, along with Cream and took them to the Gimme Shelter. While trying to escape, Emerl destroyed four Phi robots and got their shards, but was stopped by the shard-powered Gamma, as Emerl stopped fighting since it made Cream sad. After watching Emerl constantly getting smacked around, Cream decided that fighting can be good if it is used to protect someone, and out of the will to protect Emerl began to attack Gamma. However, it was shown while Cream and Emerl were hiding from view, Eggman was threatening Sonic with the aforementioned two as hostages, only nowhere to be seen. Along with Cream, Emerl quickly decided to plot an escape and managed to defeat Gamma and take its shard as well, creating a sixth Chaos Emerald. As Eggman came there to check up on things, Cream and Emerl managed to trap him and escape.

Before the game, Shadow had heard voices. Upon investigating, he found the Gizoid in Gimme Shelter. Rouge, who was also there, explained that it was The Ultimate Being (Ultimate Lifeform in the western versions) and that it was a weapon just like Shadow had been. Guard robots then attacked the duo. They fought back most of them, but Shadow got injured, and Rouge had to drag him home. Shadow had some disturbing nightmares and some flashbacks from certain characters' previous scenarios and decided that the weapon of mass destruction, the Gizoid, had to be destroyed before it got all the Chaos Emeralds. After a few attempts to take the robot by force (mentioned above), Shadow decided to tell Sonic his point of view simply. Sonic upon hearing so isn't convinced one bit into believing Emerl is a weapon alongside with Shadow being one as well, and out of intuition lets Emerl walk with the other hedgehog to discover their true selves. Rouge during Shadow's time alone with Emerl told him that Emerl could be made into a peaceful being by giving him all the Chaos Emeralds and saying "bring hope to humanity" as a programmed code left behind by Gerald Robotnik. Shadow then did just that, and instead of becoming an insane world-destroyer, Emerl continued to be his usual self. Impressed by the ultimate being, Shadow eventually channels his Chaos Control without his emerald, having two fierce battles with Emerl. He then decided to go all-out, and let Emerl train against all of his friends before fighting Shadow again, this time winning. After this Emerl got the chance to fight his friends anew, although Sonic claimed to be holding back and to rechallenge him later. Upon returning to Shadow, he also found Sonic, who wanted to fight Emerl again, this time with Shadow. Emerl managed to defeat the two hedgehogs, with Sonic spending time with him and Shadow putting on his usual rough and annoyed exterior and leaving out of the assumption of his time being wasted.

From there, Emerl had started living a regular life with his friends.

#### Final Goodbyes

That didn't last long, however, as Eggman was going over the current scenario on how Emerl has developed. However, he states that upon reading his grandfather's journals on the Gizoid, he had come up with a new plan, and had finished his Final Egg Blaster, placed on his newly rebuilt Death Egg threatening the Earth with it. Using a teleportation device built by Tails that could only transport one person at the time, Emerl traveled to the Death Egg and defeated Eggman, but also had a chance to train up with his friends before setting off.

Thinking that the doctor had learned his lesson, Emerl turned away to leave, as suddenly Eggman fired the Final Egg Blaster on some nearby stars, destroying them. This overwhelming power activated a part of Emerl's program that his friends did not know about: if the Gizoid is shown an extreme amount of new energy that trumps its current level, it will break its old Link to form a new one with the owner of the force.

However, it did not go as Eggman had planned due to a backfire, as not only did the the old Link break, but Emerl was shown too much power at once and captured the data of the Final Egg Blaster's power. Emerl strengthened himself to mimic the Final Egg Blaster's destructive power and it also caused his personality to be deleted, and allowed him to turn into the weapon of mass destruction that he was built to be. Emerl spouted out some binary (it should be noted that the binary doesn't mean anything), knocked Eggman out, and aimed the Final Egg Blaster at Earth, which was set to fire in sixty seconds. Thinking that Emerl could be stopped by negating the energy of the Chaos Emeralds, Sonic brought the timely-appearing Master Emerald to the Death Egg. However, Emerl got annoyed by the light the large jewel produced and shattered it. Meanwhile, Tails had devised a theory that Emerl's initial programming could be reversed again if he took enough damage, but this would most likely destroy Emerl's body, especially due to all of the mass energy he took in beforehand. As it was the only way out, Sonic and Emerl fight at astounding speeds (seeing as the Final Egg Blaster has only thirty seconds left to fire) and succeeded with the plan.

As Emerl started to break down, he reverted to his old personality and thanked Sonic for all the good times they had together. Sonic desperately tried to save his friend without accepting goodbye, but Emerl disappeared in a flash of light, leaving only the shards of the Chaos Emeralds behind.

#### Legacy

Sometime after Emerl's destruction, Eggman used Emerl's data and hardware to construct Gemerl, a reincarnation of Emerl, and took up residence in Mobotropolis.

## Personality

Emerl has no original personality: His tendency to copy all things he sees carries over into his personality and intelligence, which grows based on the number of Chaos Emeralds he has absorbed. This leads to interesting results, as he initially is childlike and is only capable of repeating a phrase he has only just heard (and he usually repeats it twice).

As the game progresses, he develops a sort of amalgam identity from every other character, incorporating each of their traits into himself and bringing them together. Despite this, he is said to be most similar to Sonic (which stands to reason, seeing as Emerl formed a bond with him and spent the most amount of time with him). Emerl also develops minor relationships with the people he meets. These are not real bonds, as with Sonic, but personal ones of friendship. For example, he refers to Amy as "Mom" because she instructed him to refer to her as his mother (she is under the assumption that Emerl is Sonic's practice "baby" for their future—a patently erroneous assumption no one dares to dispel). He sees Knuckles as a good friend and sparring buddy, Tails as a surrogate brother of sorts, Cream as a little sister, Rouge as a sort of aunt, and so on and so forth. His relationship with Shadow is more one of professional acquaintance, but maybe a kind of cold-hearted miserable Uncle (thanks largely to Shadow's recalcitrance and annoyance at Emerl's similarity to Sonic). Emerl does have one major flaw. He will immediately form a bond with the person who shows him the greatest power, especially one that trumps his current level that he has taken into his composition. Shadow attempted to circumvent this by using a passcode that should have disabled the needed programming but was apparently unsuccessful. This is exhibited when Doctor Eggman fires his newly reconstructed "Final Egg Blaster," a weapon of destructive power, far superior to the Space Colony ARK's Eclipse Cannon. This completely overwhelms Emerl and his personality, showing that too much power can be taken in by Emerl which will revert him to his "Gizoid" state and forcing him to attempt to use his newly acquired power to destroy the Earth itself, much to the surprise and dismay of the Doctor, who did not intend for that result. This leads to his destruction at the hands of Sonic, which ends the game.

Despite Emerl's apparent kindness and courtesy towards characters, it is heavily assumed that, during his previous life under the influence of the Nocturnus Clan, he was a power-hungry machine bent on doing his master's will. It is already quite obvious, as made evident by his will to kill everyone on Earth using the Final Egg Blaster at the end of *Sonic Battle*, that he was a blood-thirsty god of war. It was also stated by Nestor (a friend of Emerl) that he was one of the best Gizoids ever built by the Nocturnus, but *"always had such a temper".*

## Powers and abilities

Regarded as the most powerful Gizoid model created by the Nocturnus Clan with the sole purpose of being the ultimate military battle robot, Emerl is built for combat and is regarded as the ultimate weapon of mass destruction. Emerl's powers are both revered and legendary throughout the world and he can be considered one of the most powerful fighters in the series, even singlehandedly defeating Sonic and Shadow at the same time.

As the strongest Gizoid known, Emerl possesses strength, speed, and endurance far beyond that of the average Gizoid model and can potentially vanquish entire armies. One of the greatest mind of all time, Gerald Robotnik, even theorized that Emerl had the potential to destroy the entire Earth single-handedly.

Emerl's principal power is his ability to perfectly copy and mimic the powers and abilities of the things around him. In battle, Emerl can observe any combat techniques or even unique abilities, such as super speed, Chaos Powers, super strength, voices etc., store them as data and then execute them with unnerving accuracy and precision, allowing him to grow exponentially stronger after each battle he participates in. This apparently extends to all aspects of a target outside of its physical form, enabling Emerl to mimic running styles, jumping abilities, stances, voices, attacks, abilities and even coloration.

If Emerl himself is not physically capable of performing a technique, such as Tails' ability to fly with his twin tails or Chaos' attacks which are liquid and malleable, he mimics it in another way; in Tails' case, he spins his arms around his body like a helicopter to mimic Tails' twin tails or uses one of his limbs to imitate an attack with said tails, and in Chaos' case, he extends his arms outward with a cable-like cord to lengthen his reach.

Emerl's copying abilities are not only limited to the combat skills or special abilities of living beings, but also to all forms of weaponry and machinery as well, be it weapons from 4,000 years ago or the modern day technology, allowing him to manifest all kinds of technology. During Emerl's time on Space Colony ARK, Emerl was able to "absorb" weaponry and use it as his own. This ability literally make Emerl a shapeshifting weapon arsenal. Also, for those who rely on weapons or gadgets in melee combat, such as Amy's Piko Piko Hammer or Chaos Gamma's weapon arsenal, Emerl can manifest copies of such equipment and use them as if they were his own.

As seen so far, Emerl has not been shown to possess any upper limit for how many combat skills, special abilities or weapons that he is capable of learning. The process that Emerl uses to gain skill and weapons has no known limitation and will "continue to loop indefinitely". As an example, from the point of his creation, to just before his destruction by the hands of Sonic, Emerl had accumulated what was possibly worth 4,000 years of combat experience and weaponry as data, which sheer density would cause even the most advanced super computer to crash, and still Emerl was able to learn even more skills. These traits makes Emerl's combat potential, and the overall numbers of powers and abilities that he could obtain, virtually unlimited, though too much power shown to him at once will cause his current personality and current/subsequent links to overload and drive him insane.

At the peak of his power, which is known as Ultimate Emerl, Emerl can harness all of the combat data he has collected and put it all to use at once, which is referred to Emerl awakening his true skills and abilities. In this state he has the abilities of Sonic and his friends, 4,000 years worth of combat knowledge, the power to destroy multiple stars at once with his attacks, and all seven Chaos Emeralds, thus boasting enormous power. This process allows Emerl to create new techniques based on his old techniques, but they are instead vastly improved upon, with far greater power, range and effects, making Emerl a nearly unstoppable force. In this state, he is also able to amplify the special abilities of those he has copied, such as increasing the speed he has copied to the point where he can move several times the speed of sound and is thus at least several times faster than Sonic, though this is at the cost of trying to establish links and attempting to control him in anyway possible, as being driven insane towards this state would require one to inflict enough damage to him on order to put a stop to the robot. However due to the enormous amount of energy his body has absorbed he eventually overloads, resulting in his destruction.

Like Chaos, and a trait shared amongst the Gizoids, Emerl is able to absorb Chaos Emeralds and harness their chaos energy. For each Chaos Emerald Emerl gains, Emerl is able to grow stronger and smarter, allowing him to evolve from the state of an infant to that of a complete self-sufficient individual.

## Weakness

So far, Emerl is not known to possess any weakness. However, though Emerl has virtually unlimited fighting capabilities, if he were to copy too many abilities or absorb all seven Chaos Emeralds, a combination of those two, or more likely, witness a large amount of power all at once that trumps what he's taken in so far, it would cause his system to overload with power and Emerl himself would revert to his innate destructive programming, going on a complete rampage and losing all self-control.

## Variants

### E-121 Phi

*Main article: E-121 Phi*
The **E-121 Phi** were copies of Emerl, made by Eggman. Like Emerl, the Phis could copy fighting moves, but only the skillset of one person, and were powered by Chaos Emerald Shards. Fourteen Phis were produced, all of which were destroyed by Emerl and his allies to get their Emerald Shards.

### Gemerl

*Main article: Gemerl*
**Gemerl** was a robot built by Dr. Eggman from Emerl's data, and could "merge" with his mechs in addition to his combat skills. Like Emerl, Gemerl became destabilized and betrayed Eggman. After being beaten by Super Sonic and Eggman, G-merl was found by Cream and Vanilla, and taken to Tails who repaired him and gave him Emerl's friendly personality. Gemerl then became friends with Cream and is last seen living with her and Vanilla.

## Relationships

### Friends/allies

* Sonic the Hedgehog ("foster father")
* Miles "Tails" Prower
* Knuckles the Echidna (rival and fighting partner)
* Amy Rose ("foster mother")
* Cream the Rabbit
* Cheese the Chao
* Shadow the Hedgehog
* Rouge the Bat
* Professor Gerald Robotnik
* Maria Robotnik
* Chaos
* Nestor the Wise
* Nocturnus Clan (formerly)

### Rivals

* Knuckles the Echidna
* Shadow the Hedgehog
* Chaos

### Enemies

* Dr. Eggman
* Chaos Gamma (temporarily)

## Trivia

* In the Japanese version of *Sonic Battle*, all of Emerl's "spoken" text is written in katakana, a Japanese alphabet that is generally used for names and loanwords, instead of the ordinary hiragana; this is normally used for robot-speak in most forms of Japanese media.
* When Emerl gains the ability to speak, he addresses Sonic as "Metal", hinting that he has met (or at least heard of) Metal Sonic.
* In *Sonic Chronicles: The Dark Brotherhood*, Nestor the Wise makes references to a Gizoid he befriended prior to the Nocturnus Clan being pulled into the Twilight Cage, and says this Gizoid must not have been transported along with them. Nestor and Sonic then speculate that this was most likely Emerl.
* Emerl's name is based on the word "Emerald", referring to his power to absorb Chaos Emeralds.
* In *Sonic Battle*, it is said that the Gizoid was what caused the government to grow wary of the research performed on the ARK. However, in *Sonic Chronicles: The Dark Brotherhood*, it is said that Emerl was a side project that Prof. Gerald used to bribe the government and buy himself more time. It is possible that both are true; Gerald used Emerl to bribe the government, but because of the robot's power, they became wary of the happenings on the ARK.
* In *Sonic Chronicles: The Dark Brotherhood*, it was revealed that the Nocturnus Clan was pulled into the Twilight Cage. However, Gerald Robotnik wrote that Emerl had destroyed the civilization. Nestor states that he and the Gizoids did, in a way as he states that the creation of the Gizoids and especially Emerl, served as the breakthrough that lead to the Nocturnus Clan being whisked away to the Twilight Cage, due to the power they gave the Nocturnus Clan. In other words, Emerl *indirectly* destroyed their civilization.
* Emerl is considered one of the three strongest Gizoids, the others being Scylla and Charyb.
* Regardless of what skill cards Emerl has equipped, Emerl will perform the same blocking and healing animations, which are based on Sonic's respective skills.

## References

1. ↑ 1.0 1.1 1.2 Sonic Channel (Japanese). *Characters: Emerl*. Sega. Retrieved on 3 July 2015.