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Sphinx is a major antagonist in the 2014 Japanese dark fantasy light novel series Re:Zero − Starting Life in Another World and the main antagonist of The Love Song of the Sword Devil, the second volume of the 2015 spin-off light novel prequel series Re:Zero − Starting Life in Another World Ex, and its 2018-2021 manga series adaptation of the same name.
Sphinx was a replica of a half-elven girl named Ryuzu Meyer created through magical methods over four hundred years ago by the Witch of Greed Echidna. Echidna had sought to gain immortality by transferring her soul into the body of one of Ryuzu Meyer's replicas, and, as Sphinx was the first replica created, it was her whom Echidna attempted to possess. However, unfortunately for the Witch of Greed, her soul was too large for the body of Sphinx to contain.
Ultimately, Sphinx was only able to absorb a portion of Echidna's memories, resulting in a replica whose mental state was severely distorted. Sphinx was abandoned by Echidna, who continued to experiment on Ryuzu Meyer by making many more replicas. With no purpose, Sphinx began wandering the world in the hopes of becoming complete like her creator. Fortunately for her, the replica of Ryuzu did inherit a large portion of her creator's knowledge on magic, making Sphinx a potent mage.
Centuries after her creation, Sphinx became one of the three leaders of the Demi-Human Alliance alongside Libre Fermi and Valga Cromwell. The Demi-Human Alliance was am enormous insurrectionist force comprised entirely of demi-humans hellbent on the destruction of the Kingdom of Lugunica. The brutal civil war between the Alliance and Imperial Knights of Lugunica raged on for years and engulfed the entire Kingdom. Seven years into the Demi-Human War, Sphinx, Fermi, and Cromwell were defeated during an incursion in the Lugunican Royal Palace. However, unbeknownst to the forces of Lugunica, both Sphinx and Cromwell survived.
Appearance[]
Despite being around four hundred years old, Sphinx perpetually maintained the body of a girl roughly ten to twelve years of age. Her dark cyan eyes and charming face usually proffered an emotionless expression befitting of her mental state. As a half-elf/half-human hybrid, Sphinx's ears were distinctively pointed. She had long fluffy light-pink hair that curved outwards at its ends and trailed down to her hips. As a replica of Ryuzu Meyer, she was physically identical to the original and all of the other copies.
The only thing Sphinx wore over her body was a long white robe. Even her feet were left completely bare. Despite her innocent physical appearance, Sphinx radiated a massive aura of malignance and malintent that indicated her existence as abominable. Her demeanour of evil was so powerful that Sphinx had no way of hiding it.
After her brush with death during her encounter with the Emperor of Volakia, Sphinx was finally able to become the Witch of Greed. In doing so, her physical appearance changed to match that of her creator. In her new form, she stood at five feet and five inches tall and had a slim physique. She had black eyes and long, straight white hair that reached down to her hips. Considered exceptionally beautiful, her light skin appeared porcelain-like and was so pale that it seemed pure white.
History[]
Ryuzu Meyer was a young half-elven girl around twelve years of age that became indebted to the Witch of Greed Echidna. The Witch, with Ryuzu's permission, began experimenting on Meyer in a secret laboratory. Echidna sought to unlock immortality by cloning Meyer and transferring her consciousness to the clone, meaning she could live for ever through a long line of different clone bodies. She was able to create the first five clones of Ryuzu, the first of which she decided to transfer her conscious into. However, the quantity of information contained within Echidna's soul proved too much for the clone body to handle, resulting in an emotionless girl with a fractured mind who possessed a vast amount of magical knowledge and power, albeit not close to the level of Echidna herself.
The girl left the laboratory and journeyed into the world with the hopes of gaining a full mind. For the next few centuries the rogue clone, now known as Sphinx, travelled the world in relative obscurity. Around three hundred and fifty years later, Sphinx became involved with the Demi-Human Alliance, a large insurrectionist force based within the Kingdom of Lugunica. The Alliance, made up entirely of the marginalized demi-human races, sought to reap the blood of their oppressors, starting a civil war as a result. Alongside the giant strategic mastermind Valga Cromwell and the master duellist Libre Fermi, Sphinx was considered one of the heads of the Alliance, although her involvement was kept relatively secretive.
Two years into the civil conflict known as the Demi-Human War, Sphinx planted numerous magical circles around Castour Field (the site of an upcoming battle) at the behest of Valga Cromwell. These magic circles exploded when triggered by a person walking over them much like a landmine. During the Battle of Castour Field as it became known, Sphinx's magic circles worked with brutal efficiency, laying waste to the Lugunican army and contributing to the Demi-Human Alliance's subsequent victory.
Roughly forty years after the end of the Demi-Human War, Sphinx was mentioned by Ryuzu Bilma, one of the other four original clones of Ryuzu Meyer. Bilma, like the other four, had remained in the territory surrounding the laboratory for the last four centuries. One night, she indirectly mentioned Sphinx to the Japanese teenager Subaru Natsuki whilst explaining the origins of Ryuzu's various clones. Bilma also mentioned Sphinx's apparent death at the hands of Roswaal J. Mathers.
Powers & Abilities[]
Powers[]
- Artificial Half-Elf Physiology: Sphinx was an artificial lifeform created by the Witch of Greed Echidna based on the biological information of the young half-elf girl Ryuzu Meyer.
- Magic
- Explosion Creation: Sphinx was able to create a type of magic circle that detonated upon activation, causing an explosion of magical energy capable of decimating opponents and causing tremors. By setting up numerous magic circles in an area in preparation for a confrontation, Sphinx could create a minefield to surprise an enemy force with.
- Flight: Sphinx was one of the rare few mages capable of employing flying magic, a complex spell that allowed its user to travel through the air unaided at high speeds via controlled levitation. Flying magic was achieved by combining the earth, wind, and light magical elements.
- Forcefield Creation
- Light Manipulation: Using light magic, Sphinx was able to conjure and manipulate visible light into beams of scorching heat that laid waste to whatever object stood in its way. Offensive light magic was Sphinx's preferred method of combat. Like most spells, there were four levels of offensive light magic that increased in intensity and amount depending on the level. The most basic offensive light spell was "Ziwald" that allowed the caster to project a single beam of concentrated light out of a finger that was so fast that even the trained human eye could barely register it. Sphinx could also use the ultimate version of the Ziwald spell—"Al Ziwald." Al Ziwald, which was the most powerful offensive spell in Sphinx's arsenal, consisted of a single ray of light projected from the Witch's entire palm. The spell was much faster and larger in scale than any of the other Ziwald variations and was easily the most destructive, usually annihilating anything in its path. That being said, the soldier Grimm Fauzen was still able to deflect Al Ziwald with his shield.
- Reanimation: Sphinx was able to use the "Sacrament of the Immortal King," an ancient curse that used water magic to revive the dead. In its complete form, the Sacrament was said to be able to completely return an individual to how they had originally been in life, though mages of the modern era, Sphinx included, did not have the knowledge necessary to make full use of the Sacrament. The fully-fledged curse functioned by reanimating a corpse and then summoning its soul and returning it to the revived body. Though Sphinx was able to reanimate corpses and call forth deceased souls, she was unable to complete both procedures consecutively in the manner that was required for a full resurrection. Reanimated bodies that didn't contain souls were only able to operate as mindless undead that followed the commands of whomever revived them in the first place until they fully decayed or were destroyed. As a result, the incomplete Sacrament that Sphinx could use was still highly useful as it allowed her to create armies of corpse soldiers loyal to her.
- Restoration: Sphinx was capable of using restoration magic, an exceedingly rare magical technique that consisted of using the light magical element to restore a damaged or destroyed item to its original condition. By using restoration magic on a soul-infused corebug, Sphinx was able to use nearby earth to reconstruct the soul's original physical body around the core. Undead constructed via the combination of the Sacrament of the Immortal King and restoration magic retained the skills and mental faculties they possessed in life and could only be felled if their corebug was destroyed.
- Temperature Manipulation: Contrary to its name, fire magic consisted of manipulating the temperature of the surrounding atmosphere rather than simply generating fire. By raising or lowering the atmosphere's temperature using fire magic spells, Sphinx could conjure and telekinetically manipulate powerful fire and piercing sheets of ice.
- Water Manipulation
Gallery[]
List of Appearances[]
| Anime Adaptation |
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Trivia[]
- Like some other figures related to Witch Factor bearers, Sphinx received her namesake from a celestial body. The name Sphinx was derived from "896 Sphinx," a background asteroid located in the inner regions of the Solar System's asteroid belt. 896 Sphinx was itself named after the "Sphinx," a mythical creature featured most prominently in the Greek and Eqyptian mythologies. In Greek tradition, the Sphinx was depicted as a knowledgeable yet treacherous being with the head of a woman, the haunches of a lion, and the wings of a bird that asked those she encountered a riddle and devoured them if they failed to answer correctly. The Greek writers Hesiod, Apollodorus, and Lassus all listed Echidna, the mother of many monsters in Greek mythology, as being a probable parent of the Sphinx.
- Sphinx's first appearance in The Love Song of the Sword Devil predated the initial appearances of the original Ryuzu Meyer and any of her other replicas by roughly ten months.
- There are visual inconsistences between the description of Sphinx provided in The Love Song of the Sword Devil and the colored illustrations that accompanied it. Within the light novel, Sphinx's robe was referred to as white, yet a colored illustration displayed it as black. Additionally, the manga adaptation presented the robe as black.
External Links[]
- Sphinx on the Re:Zero Wiki
[]
 Villains
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| Witch Cult |
| Capella Emerada Lugunica · Louis Arneb · Lye Batenkaitos · Pandora · Petelgeuse Romanée-Conti · Regulus Corneas · Roy Alphard · Sirius · Stride Volakia |
| Witches of Sin |
| Carmilla · Daphne · Echidna · Hector · Minerva · Pandora · Satella · Sekhmet · Typhon |
| Mabeasts |
| Black Serpent · Great Rabbit · White Whale |
| Gusteko Assassin Organization |
| Elsa Granhiert · Mama · Meili Portroute |
| Others |
| Balleroy Temeglyph · Bean Argyle · Eugard Volakia · Heinkel Astrea · Kurgan · Melaquera · Miles · Reid Astrea · Roswaal Mathers · Sphinx · Ton, Chin, and Kan · Todd Fang |