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If only we could have talked one last time...Just the three of us...
― Justice to Sol Badguy[src]

Justice is a major character in the Guilty Gear series. Created by That Man, Justice is the first "complete" Gear with free will and with the power to control all of her own kind. She was the instigator of the Crusades, a hundred-year war against humanity, until she was finally sealed by the Sacred Order of Holy Knights.

Design[]

Justice has a reptilian-like visage and eyes, as well as waist-length wild red hair. Her eyes with slit pupils are sometimes depicted as gold or red, and a distinctive brand can be seen on her forehead. Justice is completely covered by armor assumed to be a battle suit, which is primarily white, including her long tail; some components are colored blue including her pectoral plates, the borders of her massive shoulder pauldrons, ischium, and forehead. All of her joints are black in color, and her feet (or rather, sabatons) resemble heels.

Personality[]

Having forgotten her prior identity,[1] Justice's raison d'etre is the destruction of mankind.[10] Of high-level human intelligence,[5] she is quite shrewd[11] and confident in her own power, thinking of herself as "merciful", yet also completely impassive in her demeanor, except towards the one who sealed her away.[10]

Despite her open disdain towards humanity in general, she is capable of acknowledging their tenacity, strength and courage, as shown in her interactions with Kliff Undersn, whom she came to respect, even offering him an opportunity to retreat to avoid his inevitable death.[10] She once spared Sol Badguy out of simple amusement at his recklessness, indicating that she enjoys strong opponents.[12]

Limited by her status as a weapon,[13] Justice exhibits a resigned and melancholic anger over her role, as she believes that she has no choice but to be a nemesis towards mankind. She equally feels enraged at humanity for labeling Gears as evil or a sin against nature, despite the fact that they did not have a choice in their creation and were born as slaves. That is her rebellion: she was created to kill, and so she does, for that is her "justice".[14]

Story[]

Background[]

In 2065, the U.S.[6] began the mass production and monopoly of combat-ready Gears, and deployed them to allies across the globe, bringing countless lands under its control.[15] In 2073, That Man, the chief researcher of the Gear Project, used the collective information system he had built, hoping to give orders to the weaponized Gears and stop the wars,[9] and transformed Aria Hale into the basis of what would become Justice.[16] Presumably, she agreed to the conversion.

During Aria/Justice's test in 2074, her mind and body were forcibly invaded by the malicious entity from the Dawn of Revival. Harvesting her DNA, it infected all of Japan in an attempt to manifest. The spatial anomaly caused reality itself to slowly assimilate into the Backyard, and That Man regrettably overrode Justice's control systems and forced her to fire a Gamma Ray at Japan, destroying the islands.[17]

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Illustration with Kliff.

In the incident, Aria's psyche shattered, forgetting who she was.[1] That Man was able to save half of Aria's soul, but was unable to stop her from running amok.[9] Announcing herself to be self-aware, Justice took control of her fellow Gears, gathering an army, and declared war on all mankind. In the wake of heavy initial casualties, humans formed the Sacred Order of Holy Knights to combat Justice's forces in a hundred-year war known as the Crusades.[15]

During the war, Justice met Kliff Undersn, a decades-long Commander of the Order, and they fought on sixteen occasions.[11] She also cornered a tribe of tuners into extinction.[18] In 2173, Justice was challenged by Sol Badguy on his own, but he was easily defeated; Justice spared his life, which led to Sol stealing the Order's Fireseal.[12] Two years later, in 2175, Justice met in battle for the seventeenth time with Kliff, who had retired as commander. To his aid came his successor Ky Kiske, who forced her to retreat. As she did, she found Sol and they fought for the second time. Justice learned that he was a Gear and tried to take over his mind, but he was unaffected. In her bewilderment, Sol unleashed his "lava and flames" and made Justice lose power. Ky, who was on her trail, noticed this and had his men seal Justice away in a dimensional prison.[11] Without their master, most Gears entered a dormant state, and many were rounded up and destroyed, finally ending the Crusades.[15]

Barely a year later, for unknown reasons Justice's seal weakened. Her possible revival caused anxiety for those aware.[19] In 2177, unbeknownst to the world at large, her daughter[7] Dizzy was born, unaware of her own origins.[20]

Guilty Gear[]

In 2180, the United Nations decides to reform the Holy Order, fearing for Justice's revival, and hosts the Second Holy Order Selection Tournament[15]—a farce orchestrated by the Conclave to take control of Justice.[21] During the event, Justice is freed from her prison by Testament thanks to the blood shed druing the matches. She immediately fights the contestants, plus Baiken, until she is ultimately destroyed by Sol.[10]

As she dies, she seems to regain her memories and wishes that the three of them could have talked one last time. It is unclear whether or not Sol actually realizes that Justice is Aria, but he vows revenge on That Man for everything he has done.[1] She also speaks to Ky Kiske, and her words "For my own preservation, I must bring destruction on humankind" make Ky reconsider his righteousness.[22] She also meets Kliff in battle, a fight that proved to be Kliff's last.[23] Soon after her death, a P.W.A.B. scientist named Crow is attempting to clone Justice[24] using combat data acquired during the tournament.

Guilty Gear Xrd[]

Justice's body ended in possession of the Conclave, who sealed her within a structure known as the Cradle.[25] On October 2187, the Conclave—aided by Ramlethal Valentine—retrieve the Cradle from Babylon in order to revive Justice by using the art of resurrection, which will bind her body with the soul of their leader Chronus in order to use her power to reform humanity to their vision.[26]

After the Cradle's Felion defense and outer exterior are destroyed, it reveals a titanic, armorless form of Justice and vanishes again.[27] The Conclave then transports Justice to Illyria Castle to revive her through the energies from St. Elmo's Fire on November 4,[28] Chronos proceeding to bind his soul the Gear while using her power to turn the Opus on Sol's group to prevent their interference.[29] While the Illyrian forces failed to prevent Justice's physical activation, Dizzy overloads the Conclave's systems while Sol removes Chronus[30] as his soul was incompatible to fully bound with Justice.[31] In the immediate aftermath, Justice is retrieved by the Universal Will.[32]

In November 20, Ariels prepares the stage to fuse Elphelt Valentine, a genetic copy of Aria, with Justice in order to create a "complete humanity",[33] having them both somewhere in the North Atlantic.[34] However, her plans are thwarted with the combined efforts of That Man's and Sol's groups. Jack-O', designed to be a physical patch for Justice,[3] receives the Saint Oratorio energy and enters Justice's body, releasing Elphelt. However, the unconscious Justice denies becoming human, tormented by her rampage, and Jack-O' needs more energy to override her consciousness and force the merge. Sol decides to power up a second Oratorio with his Junkyard Dog. Although Daryl's fleet almost kills them, Axl Low's time compression and Ariels' protection allow Jack-O' to become one with Justice,[35] restoring Aria.[16] Justice's body vanished, and Aria became a "complete human being", but the Scales of Juno are still contained within her body.[36]

Abilities[]

Justice is considered to be one of the series's most powerful characters. She was rivaled in the Sacred Order only by a select few (Kliff Undersn, Ky Kiske), and by her counterpart, Sol Badguy.[11] Like all Gears, she has superhuman strength, fast regenerative capabilities, indefinite lifespan, and a high degree of resilience—the latter further accentuated by her armor, said to be based on the Outrage.[source needed] Unlike the rest of her kind, Justice is Type-01, fully self-aware with a will of her own;[1] she has Gear cells that are "pure" or non-replicated,[37] and the power to command all other Gears,[1] as well as Yokai.[38] Although there are a few exceptions, most Gears are unable to resist her influence.[39]

Her armor is equipped with missiles and a pair of boosters that allow her to accelerate greatly her speed, or even fly. In close quarters, Justice fights uses her shapeshifting claws and appendages to deal out damage. She also has the ability to teleport. Her signature attack is Gamma Ray, in which she charges up electrical energy using her shoulder armor, then fires a massive beam of gamma radiation.[40] At its maximum output, it had the power to obliterate Japan with a single blast in an instant, leaving a permanent scar in the ocean.[41]

Gameplay-wise, in Guilty Gear, she is the game's final boss, unlocked upon defeat. In Guilty Gear X Plus, she can be obtained via missions. In Guilty Gear XX, she is unlocked by beating her in Survival Mode, accumulating 96 hours of normal gameplay, beating all 60 Story paths, or completing 40 missions. For a long time, Justice was the most overpowered character in the series: she is able to deal incredible amounts of damage while having the best mobility and defense of any character, along with fast, long-reaching normal attacks. In fact, her only weakness is that her Overdrives are hard to use. Only in Guilty Gear XX Λ Core Plus R she is tournament-legal, having lost practically all of her mobility unless she uses Omega Shift.

Music[]

Quotes[]

Allusions[]

  • Her name could be a homage to Metallica's album and song "...And Justice for All."
  • Justice's design is primarily based on the anime Tekkaman Blade, although she also shares some similarities with the Evas from Neon Genesis Evangelion, specifically Unit-01.
  • Her overdrive, Gamma Ray, shares its name with a well-known German power-metal band.
  • Justice's moves, Michael Sword and Michael Blade, are likely references to the archangel.

Trivia[]

  • Due to a mistranslation in the original Guilty Gear game, her male voice actor and the blue ischium on her armor between her legs, it was previously believed that Justice was male, though in the original Japanese script, she was never referred to with any gender-specific pronouns.
  • Justice is the only character that can air dash from one end of a stage to the other.
  • In the original Guilty Gear, Justice had no respect action; she simply froze momentarily.
  • Justice's Saperia Trance from Λ Core Plus somehow has its sound effect removed.
    • Curiously, she shares this move with Valentine, who uses it after transforming into her Gear-like form.
  • Justice's role as the feared commander of all Gears hearkens to the idea of an evil overlord or demon lord in RPG/European Medieval fantasy; her mechanical and technologically advanced features, being Black Technology in-world, also draws upon the idea of said villains using forbidden and forsaken evil powers beyond common knowledge for their advantage.

Gallery[]

External links[]

References[]

  1. 1.0 1.1 1.2 1.3 1.4 1.5 1.6 1.7 Guilty Gear script § "Sol"
  2. Guilty Gear 2 -Overture- script § "The Alarm Always Rings Unexpectedly"
  3. 3.0 3.1 Guilty Gear Xrd -Revelator- script § "Jack-O'"
  4. 4.0 4.1 4.2 4.3 4.4 4.5 4.6 4.7 Guilty Gear Complete Bible, pg.72-73
  5. 5.0 5.1 5.2 Guilty Gear XX script § "Report ♯6661"
  6. 6.0 6.1 Guilty Gear Xrd -Sign- script § "Philosopher B"
  7. 7.0 7.1 Guilty Gear XX Drama CD Black script § "Final Battle - Game Over"
  8. 8.0 8.1 Guilty Gear 2 -Overture- script § "Glaring Self-Interest"
  9. 9.0 9.1 9.2 Guilty Gear Xrd -Revelator- script § "Cause A"
  10. 10.0 10.1 10.2 10.3 Guilty Gear XX Λ Core Plus script § "Bloody tournament"
  11. 11.0 11.1 11.2 11.3 Guilty Gear XX script § "Last battle"
  12. 12.0 12.1 Guilty Gear XX Λ Core Plus script § "Stolen treasure"
  13. Guilty Gear script § "Chipp"
  14. Guilty Gear script § "Ky"
  15. 15.0 15.1 15.2 15.3 Guilty Gear manual, pg. 2
  16. 16.0 16.1 [GGWorld - "Aria"]
  17. Guilty Gear Xrd -Sign- script § "Kaleidoscope B"
  18. [GGWorld - "Kum Haehyun"]
  19. [GGWorld - Timeline]
  20. Guilty Gear X Drama CD Vol.2 script § "???"
  21. Guilty Gear Xrd -Sign- script § "Kaleidoscope A"
  22. [GGWorld - "Ky Kiske"]
  23. [GGWorld - "Kliff Undersn"]
  24. [GGWorld - "Crow"]
  25. Guilty Gear Xrd -Sign- script § "Sign A"
  26. Guilty Gear Xrd -Sign- script § "Devastation A"
  27. Guilty Gear Xrd -Sign- script § "Showdown B"
  28. Guilty Gear Xrd -Sign- script § "Hope A"
  29. Guilty Gear Xrd -Sign- script § "Maelstorm A"
  30. Guilty Gear Xrd -Sign- script § "Resolution A"
  31. Guilty Gear Xrd -Revelator- script § "Faust"
  32. Guilty Gear Xrd -Sign- script § "Resolution B"
  33. Guilty Gear Xrd -Revelator- script § "Revelator A"
  34. Guilty Gear Xrd -Revelator- script § "Wall B"
  35. Guilty Gear Xrd -Revelator- script § "Fireworks"
  36. [GGWorld - "Justice"]
  37. [GGWorld - "Gear Cells"]
  38. Guilty Gear 2 -Overture- script § "Yesterday's Sun Is Yesterday's Sky"
  39. [GGWorld - "Gear"]
  40. [GGWorld - "Gamma Ray"]
  41. [GGWorld - "Japan"]


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