Crona

"So many people here. I don't know how to deal with that...kill them? That's great!! That door only opens inside. That thing we did last night was real fun, wasn't it? i don't remember what it is, though. Oh, and...my blood is black."

- Crona

Crona is a tragic villain in the Soul Eater series, the abused child of Medusa. Though referred by others with male pronouns, Crona's actual sexual identity is unknown.

Appearance
Crona has an androgynous appearance, with a thin body and tall stature. The pink hair is badly cut with straight cut bangs ununiformly above the eyebrows with two longer pieces of hair extending from the bangs and hang low over Crona's face. Most of the time, Crona wears a long black tight fitting Purtian-like robe that ends at the mid-calf level with cuff-links at the ends of each sleeve and a tall white button-up collar at the neck. Black slipper-like shoes with a tall white cuff protruding out of the top are also worn.

For formal occasions, Crona wears a white suit: the suit is very plain, with long, un-detailed pants and a coat with long sleeves and a collar. The coat appears to fasten at the front and back.

As a child, Crona wore a black knee-high dress. The dress has a rugged cut-out at the bottom, laced with several white diamonds. Like the present-day clothing, the childhood design also has a white collar and cuffs. The shoes stay relatively the same, as well. Crona's hair is shorter and simpler in this stage, but overall the same design.

After being "re-shaped" by Medusa, Crona's attire changes to an all-black robe covered by thick folds of fabric covering the feet (slightly similar to Arachne's dress). When asborbing the Black Clown, Crona's clothes gain several steel/cloth plates covering the shoulders and the waist.

Personality
"I DON'T KNOW HOW TO DEAL WITH YOU!!! But that's okay, anything i can't deal with, I blast away with my scream."

- Crona, Episode 16

Having been abused at a young age, Crona is a very naive and submissive person who Medusa conditioned to kill by having the child torture small animals to remove all hesitation. This also makes Crona a bit of a pushover due to being bullied by Ragnarok and the child's inability to cope with anything good or bad. Having been conditioned to have the same mindset as Asura, Crona is prone to become dangerously unstable with the proper motivation, showing signs of insanity and aggression, spouting senseless comments and laughing at random moments. But after Maka befriended the child, Crona started to become self confident and begin to distinguish the difference between good and evil. But though Crona wants to interact with other, it is a slow process despite being touched by the kindness of the child's newfound friends. But only Maka, whose can see Crona's Soul Wavelength can understand the child. However, Crona is coerced back into working for Medusa and returned to her side with memory relating to Maka and others removed. However, Medusa's final actions were what cause Crona's descent into utter madness with almost no chance of redemption.

In the anime, Crona becomes more determined and courageous when he/she decides to go and defeat Medusa and rescue Stein alongside Marie and Maka. Although still nervous and unsettled by Medusa, Crona stands up to her and even risks his/her life for Maka. In the anime, Crona also seems to have a good sense of direction, being able to navigate both himself/herself and Marie through DWMA and Medusa's lair.

Gender
Crona is presented throughout the series as having an ambiguous sex, and although hints are given to identify the gender, nothing has ever stated it exactly. It is important to note that Crona refers to himself/herself with the masculine pronoun — Japanese for "I", which is used mainly by, but not exclusively, males. However, the term is becoming more popular with females and is not unheard of to be used by a girl, especially tomboys. This is seen in other anime such as Souseiseki in Rozen Maiden for example. Also, Medusa always calls crona as "my child", never refering something more specific as "son" or "daughter". Soul and Maka often refer to Crona as "him", when they are not using his/her name.

Abilities
Crona's blood has been entirely replaced with 'Black blood' which both protects Crona from physical harm and provides a degree of healing. Ragnarok, originally a normal weapon, was melted into the black blood before the transfusion, which causes their symbiotic nature. This also allows them to do attacks using the Black Blood exclusive to them. Since Medusa is Crona's mother, there may be potential for witchcraft, but nothing has been observed as of yet. In the anime, despite having no onscreen training, Crona successfully pulls off a Chain Resonance with Maka and Marie. Later in the manga version Crona dons two new appendages each armed with a different blade. It is interesting to note that, even if Ragnarock is fully part of Crona's body by being melted in his/her blood, they can separate, but only in the weapon/meister combination. The Bloody attacks put aside, it appears in Chapter 13 that Crona is able to throw the Demon Sword to an enemy (in this case, the Flying Dutchman). After killing medusa (and possibly, eating her soul), Crona gained the strange ability to manifest her shadow or generate black blood from her feets in a strange, spiky vines appearance, beeing fast enough to cut Maka's cheek without her even noticing it and resilient enough to completly block an attack from Black Star. Her black blood also allowed her to create wings for flying, possibily strong enough to take him/her to the moon.

Attacks
Like Maka does with soul, all of Crona's attack are used together with Ragnarok.
 * Screech Alpha: Same as the Screech Beta but launch at the enemy as a projectile with explosive results.
 * Screech Beta: A powerful slash in the form of a mouth
 * Screech Gamma: A multi-slashing attack that release sound waves in succession.
 * Screech Delta: Crona uses his/her three arms to fire numerous sound waves in all directions.
 * Black Dragon: A soul resonance when Ragnarok will absorb all human soul eggs and morph into a dragon-form. All of Crona's attacks are enhanced.
 * Bloody Needles: This attack can only be performed when Crona's blood has been spilled, transforming it into black needles that stab through the opponent if they get too close. After getting "re-shaped" by Medusa, Crona's bloody needles are almost whirlwind-like shaped and can follow the enemy even if they miss the first shot.
 * Bloody Slicer: Crona will cut his/her own wrist and then make a flinging motion with the arm, when this happens Ragnarok will change the blood into a blade for medium ranged attacks.
 * Bloody Lance: With his/her writs cut, she/he flings it in a circle and a huge black-blood thorn appears in his/her front launching itself like a dart towards the enemy, the effects were not seen, as Russia's Death scythe blocked it.
 * Bloody Cloak: With unseen ways Crona manifests black blood and creates a cloak-like shield with it (with the bottom colar shaped like arrows). It seems to be able to withstand substantial damage.
 * Mad Blood: Crona's lower half becomes bloated like a flower's bud with three kishin eyes on it. Its unknown how, but when hit, the target becomes trapped in a huge black-blood ball that emanates madness. As of Chapter 87, Crona confirmed that when hit by the attack, the victim "swallows madness, melts into madness, and hardens with madness". This attack can grow powerful enough to swallow entire cities, as shown at the end of Chapter 84.

Relationships

 * Ragnarok
 * Crona's weapon, as well as part of his/her blood. When Crona was a child, Medusa melted down Ragnarok, at that time a regular weapon, and combined him with black blood. She then injected this mixture into Crona's own blood, creating an unwilling symbiosis and permanently fusing Crona with Ragnarok.


 * Ragnarok is a playful character, and acts like an annoying older brother to Crona. He often gives the meister noogies, steals his/her food, plays with his/her nose, and even lifted up Crona's robe at one point, almost exposing the underwear. Whenever Ragnarok is angry with his meister, he will not hesitate to pop out of him/her and begin attacking Crona in an annoying, playful, but slightly violent way. He also uses Crona as a human shield at times, notably only for non-lethal attacks, like Maka Chop.


 * However, despite his teasing, Ragnarok does seem to care about Crona. He heals Crona whenever needed (although always pestering for a "thank you very much" afterword) and provides constant vocal motivation during battle. Ragnarok realizes that if Crona dies, he will die too, ultimately driving him to protect his meister as much as possible.


 * Maka Albarn
 * Holdinghands.png's first friend, they share a similar soul wavelength. It was during the Underground Shibusen battle in which the Kishin was revived where Maka and Crona became friends: after seeing into Crona's soul and realizing the emptiness and sadness of his/her past, Maka came to understand Crona on a deep level. Not long after, Maka gave Crona presumably his/her first loving physical contact when she hugged him/her and gave him/her a handshake.


 * After the Underground Battle, Maka and Crona become formidable friends. It is with Maka's help that the meister learns how to fit into Shibusen, and at first Crona won't even leave a room without Maka. Although the strong relationship seems to be one-sided at times (as Maka has many friends and often does not spend time on-screen with Crona) ultimatly Maka's love for Crona is shown when she decides to help Crona defeat Medusa rather then help Shibusen bring down the Kishin at Baba Yaga Castle. This choice would ultimately save Crona's life for the time being.


 * Medusa
 * Crona's blood mother, and the one who fused the black blood (containing Ragnarok) into Crona's blood. Medusa seems to act towards her child as if he/she were a servant and is overall less of a mother and more of an enemy. She, as of yet, has not displayed any definitive affection for Crona.


 * Medusa trained Crona in the hopes that he/she would one day rise to become the next Demon God. However, as it grows more and more apparent that Crona does not have the will to fulfil this task, Medusa speaks often of "throwing out" her unneeded child. Once Crona attends Shibusen, however, she forces Crona to be a spy and complete tasks for her.


 * In the anime, Medusa ultimately has no problem seemingly mortally wounding Crona, enticing Maka's fury. However, in the manga, she claims that Crona has been captured and that no parent wants their child to be sacrificed (though this turns out to be a ruse in order to manipulate Maka further).

History
As a toddler, Crona was subjected to Medusa's experiment involving a blood transfusion of a maddness inducing liquid called Black Blood. As a result, Crona entered a forced symbiosis with a weapon that was melted into the Black Blood, the Demon Sword Ragnarok. From there, from killing small animals to suffering various forms of torture, Crona is raised for Medusa's purpose to destroy the world by consuming enough souls to become a Kishin and then merge with the original Kishin Asura.

Eventually, while having Ragnarok devour the souls of a gang in Italy's Santa Maria Novella Basilica on Medusa's command, Crona is confronted by Maka Albern and her Weapon partner Soul Eater Evans. The two meisters quickly engage in battle with the fight ending in Crona's favor as Soul is mortally wounded with some the Black Blood making Ragnarok entering the Weapon's bloodstream. Luckily, Maka's father Spirit and his former Meister Franken Stein arrive and defeat Crona as his Soul Resonance with Ragnarok is failing to the point of internal damage. Luckily, Medusa made her presence known and takes her child to safety.

Crona's next confrontation with the DWMA was on the Nidhogg, confronted by Death the Kid as was investigating the ghost ship. Managing to escape by splitting the ship in half and flying off in Ragnarok's Black Dragon form, Crona obtained a large majority of souls from the ghosts that resided in the Nidhog. When Medusa enacts her plan to revive Asura, Crona is set up as a guard for a portion of the hallway leading to the Kishin's resting place to keep the DWMA from interfering.

Though Black Star was to fight Crona, Maka engages in battle instead for her previous encounter. But like before, Crona had the upper hand until the Black Blood inside Soul is activated with Maka getting a boost despite slowly descending into madness herself. This causes the fight to be a stalemate until Maka sees into Crona's soul and learns of the horror the child had suffered at Medusa's hand. This causes Maka to break free from her madness to purify Crona by offering the child her friendship.

Despite being welcomed by the DWMA and accepted as a student, Crona is placed in a tough situation when Medusa returns and drafts the child to serve as her spy and carry out her dirty work like bugging Marie with one of her snakes to intensify Stien's madness. Guilt ridden, and learning that Maka overheard the child's earlier discussion with Eruka, Crona leaves the DWMA without saying goodbye. Medusa uses that to her advantage by lying that Arachnophobia kidnapped Crona to serve as a sacrificial offering to trick the DWMA into helping her take Arachne's body. Once the deed is done, Medusa reveals that truth while telling an enraged Maka that she will never hand over Crona, whose memory of being in the DWMA is erased.

From there, Medusa begins to improve Crona's ability by clearing the Black Clown that would be compatible with Ragnarok and testing the child's new powers on Black Star yet is overpowered due to the youth causing Crona to remember Maka. When Justin Law appears with one of Asura's Clowns, Medusa has Mizune and Eruka retrieve Crona who is more confused than before. Given a new mission to kill off all Death Scythes, with his Black Blood evolved into Madness Blood, Crona takes the souls of Moscow's resident Death Scythe and Meister. Once home, Crona's confusion worsens when Medusa acts out of character and treat her child with love and affection. This, combined with both regained memories the realization that the child will never be stable, causes Crona to go insane as the child disembodies Medusa in blend of rage and confusion. It was only before dealing the deathblow that Crona learns that Medusa staged this event so the child can kill her and reach the potential that she envisioned.

Going into hiding at Santa Maria Novella Basilica, Crona is found by Maka who attempts to convince her friend to come back with her. However, Crona reveals to have killed Medusa and to no intention of returning out fearing of killing every other. After evading Black Star, Crona arrives to the moon and succeeds in assimilating Asura with the intention to fulfill the destiny Medusa prepare the child for: Destroying the world with madness.

However, while everyone else was teleported out of harm's way, only Maka, Black Star and Spirit on the moon. Despite calming to be beyond redemption, Maka vows to get the Crona she knows back as she and Black engage the Kishin who eventually uses the Rose Thorn Storm attack to negate the Meister's Soul Resonance before taking and Tsubaki to have a higher advantage. However, when Spirit joins Maka, the Rose Thorn Storm is unable to affect them due to their familiar ties. Being told that causes Crona to suffer a mental breakdown which enables Asura to make his presence within the child known. From there, Asura absorbs Crona from the inside with the child now within the Kishin's body.

Anime
Crona' story is the same up until the second half of the anime where the child ventures off with Marie to Medusa's base to retrieve Stein and finally defeat Medusa. When the two reach Medusa's lair, a battle is quickly started. As Medusa and Crona fight, the witch sends soul waves into Crona, disconnecting the link between Crona and Ragnorak which renders Crona's black blood useless until the soul waves wear off. Right before Medusa deals a final blow to her child, Maka comes and blocks the Vector Blade from slicing him/her. With Maka now in the fight, the three continue to try to defeat Medusa and Stein. However, Stein appears to be too strong, and easily blocks off all attacks. As Crona and the others rest, Medusa tries to use a Vector Arrow to kill Maka. Crona jumps in the way and takes the blow instead at the last second, getting gravely injured. The demon sword appears to be dead from loss of blood.

Maka, horrified over the death of Crona, becomes berserk with rage and almost loses herself to madness like she did the night the Kishin was revived. However, Marie calms both Maka and Stein; she then saves Stein from madness using the Wavelength of Redemption. With Stein acting as Marie's meister, a Chain Resonance between the remaining party occurs. While Stein distracts and leads Medusa, Maka unleashes her anti-demon wavelength's Majin Hunt, cutting off Medusa's soul from Rachael's body and slicing the soul in half, finally finishing off the witch for good.

After Stein reassures Maka that he will save Crona, she races off with Soul to go join the battle against the Kishin back at the Baba Yaba Castle. Crona turns out to be fine and sleeping soundly, but is out of the present battles against the Kishin until further notice.