User blog:DeltaHorizon020/PE Proposal: Kurenai Kougetsu

Hello darkness my old friend. Time to propose another candidate from Eden's Zero and this one...I admit that I regret that I didn't propose this person on TV Tropes and got a minor character to be proposed instead because this villain...Is actually my favorite type of villain: A hot sexy evil mother albeit her characterization isn't that stellar which is understandable given that she was meant to be a Hate Sink for the manga. Anyways, who's this character in question? Well let's find out!

What's The Work
To refresh your memory again regarding Eden's Zero, I'll copypaste the summary in Illeega EP:

"Eden's Zero is a manga created from the same creator as Fairy Tail in 2018. The story? I'll copy it from the TV Tropes summary:

Shiki, a boy with gravity powers from a bygone age, has spent most of his days Raised by Robots in an abandoned theme park on a forgotten island, dreaming of new places to explore and friends to make. His life takes a sharp turn when the park receives its first visitors in 100 years: a wannabe web celebrity named Rebecca and her familiar-looking (but totally different) blue cat, Happy. One devastating betrayal and newly forged friendship later, Rebecca helps Shiki ditch the island to show him the larger world by taking him with her and Happy on their boat—which suddenly rises from the water and blasts off into space!

So begins the tale of the boy whose name will one day echo throughout the universe. But it doesn't stop there, as Shiki quickly finds himself thrust into command of the Edens Zero, an interstellar warship left behind as inheritance from his adoptive robo-grandfather, the Demon King, who once used it in his search for Mother, the legendary Goddess of the Cosmos. What follows is a galactic adventure filled with cybernetic dragons, space pirates, existentialist androids, temporal anomalies, magical cyborg ninjas, and much more as Shiki vows to fulfill his late grandpa's dream of finding Mother—all while trying to make as many friends as he can along the way, whether they like it or not!"

Anyways, I successfully EP a candidate named Illeega, a bloated frog man who kept several innocent women as statues for him to play and yes, Eden's Zero had more keepers that I had anticipated. There's one villain that interest me the most and I damn regret didn't propose her right off the bat and instead proposing a minor villain. Anyways, before we get into the main villain, let me tell the recap of the story that she appears in as this villain is an arc villain: So Shiki and co. attempts to find a knight named Valkyrie who is the mentor of one of Shiki's friend, Homura Kougetsu (A true expy of Erza Scarlet with Japanese aesthetics written all over her) in a planet called "Sun Jewel". The planet itself is famous for its casino available for rich people. Except...The ruler of the planet is actually pretty ruthless and who is this ruler might be? Well let's find out!

Who is She/What Has She Done
Alright, our candidate today is named Kurenai Kougetsu, or better known as Scarlet Woman in English translations. Right, before we started to detail what she had done, let's tell the story before she raises the ranks into becoming the ruler of Sun Jewel. Basically, before that, she was actually a person who got addicted to gambling. This resulted on her getting into a massive debts and become a slave of the Baron who previously ruled the planet. However, Valkyrie tries to save her from trouble in which Kurenai repays Valkyrie by giving Homura under her wing and after she tries to settle the debt, Kurenai was seemingly indebted towards Valkyrie after all and was grateful towards her actions for saving her.

Except that wasn't the case at all...

You see, 2 years later after Valkyrie saved Kurenai from slavery? Kurenai repays her by discrediting her from her memory, abandoning Homura and become the tyrannical ruler of Sun Jewel after she murdered Baron Mordo in which she claims that she become rich because of her own power. After she becomes the brand new tyrannical ruler, she then sends all of her monsters to attack innocent people in the labor district in order to get more metal for her so that she could gain more money. This resulted on several innocent people, including Valkyrie, getting killed thanks to the attacks perpetrated by the Kurenai herself.

Several years later, yeah...She becomes a lot worse. If you commit a crime? Expect that Kurenai will sent you into the labor district as a brand new slave of hers to mine several priced rocks. This was proven when Shiki and Homura tried to fight against the criminal that were causing ruckus in the casino. And yeah, at the same time, Kurenai tries to make bullshit claims that she did this to protect the people of Sun Jewel from harm. In the meantime, Kurenai still enjoys her lavish life and one of her nastiest act is that when she was offered a good, looking young man, Kurenai's response is to burn her face because he is too inferior for her own taste and then kept him chained as a personal pet.

Oh yeah, living in Labor District at Sun Jewel is actually a hell itself because if you went in there, you need to wore a collar to show how many prized rocks that you mined and if the collar reaches zero, Kurenai will no doubt release you from the slavery....Hahahahaahahahahaha. Sorry if I'm slipped. Not really, when that collar reaches zero, it will be resetted and you will be a slave for Kurenai for the rest of your life while she basks herself in the lavish life because why not?

Taking an interest in Eden's Zero ship and suspecting that the miners attempt to perpetrate an uprising in the name of Valkyrie, Kurenai then decides to dispose them without a second thought by using her own KillSat named Oculus Kurenai to obliterate the labor district and the people in that without a second thought. When Shiki tries to stop her evil plans and when Oculus Kurenai was hacked by a man named Drakken Joe, she then uses a backup weapon which is a mecha to obliterate the labor district once and for all called "Crimson Steel Knight".

Fortunately however, Shiki manages to defeat Kurenai and then tries to bring her to the daughter, Homura, for reconciliation moment. Homura then responded by saying that she cut all ties with her considered her mother already abandoned her in the first place. Trying to run away from the angered citizens of the labor district, she then got captured by the same person who was made as a pet by Kurenai and as a payback, it was heavily implied that Kurenai ended up becoming a sex slave at the end of the day by said person. That's harsh but yeah...

Heinous Standard
Let's not beat around the bush. The heinous standard of Eden's Zero is fierce, I mean really really fierce. To show you how screwed up the standard of Edens Zero, there is a scientist who tricked a robot to blown up a planet and took a sadistic joy from all of it. And then you have Illeega with his nasty attitude on turning woman into stones for his personal toy and also Jamiloff who slaughter and torture several innocent people in digital world for fun. Oh! And the real Big Bad, Drakken Joe is responsible on turning Guilst into a wretched hellhole and also giving Jamiloff a taste for power which is a bad thing to begin with.

However, I'm gonna say that Kurenai? Passes at the end of the day in my books. She has a sizable bodycount with the likes of Jamiloff or Muller due to her trying to murder all of the innocent people in the labor district twice. However, disregarding that? The slavery and forced labor is really a unique aspect that she really had which gave her several edges that other villains doesn't have as a PE, at least in my books. So yeah, take that as you will in this one.

Freudian Excuse/Mitigating Factors
Alright, here's the thing that will get tricky and I understand why people will hesitate to vote on her given what happened with Malty Melromarc. Let's address the elephant in the room shall we. So yes, at the end of the day, it was implied that Kurenai ended up becoming a sex slave at the end of the day as her punishment for the atrocities she had done. Yeah, I can understand why this is uncomfortable to some people considered this is basically a Karmic Rape and I'm also not a big fan of this trope. However, I should give two notes on this incident: First is that, yes, Kurenai did several awful things that were severe enough to warrant her this trope and secondly, unlike Malty's punishment? The results of punishment wasn't shown...At all and it was just implicit rather than explicit. So yes, I can understand why you will feel uncomfortable with this one. Regardless, I think we can avoid the punishment that will happen to Kurenai later on as like I said, it was a rather implicit one.

Aside from that? Nothing really, her claims to be Well-Intentioned Extremist who tried to protect the people of Sun Jewel was revealed to be nothing but an utter horse manure considered the innocent people she oppresses in the labor district, her care of Homura was nonexistent at all and even when Homura ended up severing her ties towards her, she just dismissed her own daughter as a simple minded person and runs away and that's it really. If you ask me, she's hot though, ngl!

Final Verdict
Yes, I'll admit that Kurenai ticks nearly all of the boxes into becoming one of my personal favorite villains. She's a MILF, she's an attractive female lady and she's Pure Evil person with the exception of her characterization which is rather not so stellar. (I would prefer a villain with a complex characterization btw) However, at the same time, I can understand why several people will be uncomfortable voting for this candidate due to the things that I said on Mitigating Factors section. Until then, I'll let you guys decide on this one. Peace!