Death/Anime

Manga Anime

Name	Death
Kanji	死神
Romaji	Desu
Alias	Lord Death (死神様, Shinigami-sama)
Epithet	Grim Reaper (死神, Shinigami; also "Reaper") Lord of Death
Debut	Episode 1
Voice actor	John Swasey (English) Rikya Koyama (Japanese)
Physical information
Sex	Male
Age	Age 800+
Species	Grim Reaper
Personal information
Relatives	Death the Kid (son) Asura (son)
Students	Asura (former student)
Compatible with	Any magic weapon (Spirit Albarn, Azusa Yumi, Soul Eater)
Biographical information
Residence	Death City, Nevada
Status	Alive
Professional information
Affiliation	Death Weapon Meister Academy DWMA faculty and staff Especially Advantaged Talent Class Death's family
Former Affiliation	Eight Guardians of Death
Occupation	Family patriarch DWMA school headmaster Grim Reaper Weapon meister
Former Occupation	Leader of the Eight Guardians of Death
Family	Death's family }
Rank	(high-ranking meister)
Title	Lord (-sama honorific)
Meister information
Meister Type	Scythe meister (main) Gun-type
Weapon Partner	Spirit Albarn (main) Azusa Yumi & other Death Scythes
Abilities information
Magic	Powers of a Grim Reaper
Fighting Style	Combat Arts
List of appearances | Gallery

“	Now, now. There's nothing wrong with being addicted to peace. In fact, lets get more and more addicted. After all, that would mean the world is all the more peaceful. Which is why we can't afford to ruin this peace.	”
—Death to Kilik, Episode 18

Death (デス, Desu), known as Lord Death (死神様, Shinigami-sama) and the Grim Reaper (死神, Shinigami), is a god whom is the current headmaster of Death Weapon Meister Academy, is the meister partner of Spirit Albarn, and is the father of Death the Kid.

Eight centuries ago, Death acted as leader of a group of meisters and weapons, including a personal guard known as Death's Eight Guardians , and worked to preserve world order and prevent the uprising of a kishin. However, his strongest guardian, Asura, betrayed the cause and turned himself into a kishin. Confronting him, he defeated and sealed him away under Death City, rooting his soul and founding Death Weapon Meister Academy.

Personality

One of Death's eccentricies includes a tendency to ramble during his explainations, making it difficult for others to follow him.

Appearance

Death in the present appears as a being covered in a tattered piece of pitch black cloth with many jagged edges, decorated with a cartoony skull mask, which seems to serve the sole purpose of imitating an otherwise absent face—a means of rendering Death more humanoid and thus making it more comfortable for humans (particularly children) to communicate. In the manga, close-ups of Death seem to show a single white circular light behind the holes of the mask. Occasionally, he also appears with large, foam gloved hands from his side, in which seemingly materialize.

In the past, Death sported a much more intimidating look. He wore a grim-looking skull mask. He also had black claws instead of hands with his signature “Death” written on the right forearm, and a deep, menacing voice. He has been shown to have skeleton hands during the scene of flaying of Asura. He also additionally possessed more, human-like large gloves.

Death also sports the largest seen soul within the series, spanning to be as large as the entirety of Death City. His soul is a pale yellow colored that has three spikes emerging from the top right, in which resembles that of his own mask.

Lord Death's full body appearance and face shot in the anime

Death's appearance 800 years ago in the anime.

Death's soul in the anime.

Power

Anime

Sid Barrett speculated that an all out battle between himself and Asura could destroy all of Death City.

Arachne also claimed that Asura feared Death, mentioning others having come to the same conclusion.

Official statements from guidebooks

Lord Death possesses great power (強大な力, Kyōdaina chikara) and a ridiculously huge soul (とんでもなく大きい魂, Tondemonaku Ōkī tamashī)

Special Abilities

• Magic (魔法, Mahō): As a grim reaper, Death possess vast amount of magical powers and has a plethora of abilities derived from it; some of these abilities include spontaneously materializing objects. One unnamed sort of skill enables him to interact with mirrors and magical-like mirror mediums like his own mirror, choosing the reside within it, hold conversations towards another, or use as a surveillance device similar to a witch's crystal ball.
  • Powers of a Grim Reaper (死神の力, Shinigami no Chikara): Death's brunt of magical abilities that he possesses following the skull motif theme of a grim reaper and originate from the Lines of Sanzu.
  • Flight (フライト, Furaito): Death is capable of freely levitating off the ground and flying at high speeds even without his jets.
  • Barrier (結界, Kekka): Death is able to create a barrier capable of trapping Kishin Asura in the Death Room. Arachne Gorgon stated that her power could do nothing to dispel it.
• Wavelength Control (波長コントロール, Hachō Kontorōru): As a weapon meister, Death possess advanced skills in controlling his own wavelength; his skills are advanced enough to be compatible with any magic weapons.

Death attacking Asura using Spirit's form.

• Combat Arts (体術(たいじゆつ), Taijutsu): In close combat, Death is a very formidable fighter whom uses both knowledge in hand-to-hand combat and his powers to overwhelm his opponents. These combat skills enabled him to once gain the upperhand on Asura.
  • Karate (空手, Karate): Death possess some level of skill in the usage of karate, his signature ability being a karate chop attack.
  • Meister Techniques (職人の技, Shokunin no Waza): Death is a extremely powerful meister capable of using various magic weapons, his weapon partners including that of Death Scythes. As a scythemeister, Death is at his most powerful using Spirit Albarn's weapon form, able to gain the upperhand in his battle with Asura.
• Marksmanship (銃撃技, Jūgeki Waza): With a gun-type magic weapon like Azusa Yumi's weapon form on hand, he is an accomplished marksman and his wavelength allows for bullets capable of destroying Arachnophobia's Madness Cannon in a single shot.
• Robot Pilot: While using the Death City Robot, even without having operated one before, Death displayed immense skill in piloting the robot, controlling it so effectively that he swiftly defeated Arachnophobia's mech piloted by Mosquito.

List of techniques

Wavelength Control techniques

• Soul Resonance (魂の共鳴, Tamashī no Kyōmei): Death is capable of sending his wavelength to his magic weapon, having it amplify it before sending it back to him (and repeat the process over). Additionally, he is advanced enough to perform this process almost instantaneously with Death Scythe as his weapon.
• Wavelength Release (波長放, Hachō Hō): A simple technique in which Death expands his wavelength enough to release the cap on his power, allowing him to perform more of his special techniques or ultimate. It can also act offensively and push those close to him away.

Powers of a Grim Reaper techniques

Powered up Witch Hunter techniques

• Kishin Hunter (鬼神狩り, Kishingari): A more powerful variant of the Genie Hunter technique of; Using his own wavelength instead of the Anti-Magic Wavelength, this technique acts as not only as a bane to the preceding beings affected by the previous attacks but is powerful enough to slay a Kishin; Death was capable and cutting off Asura's arm.

Equipment

Partnered with Spirit Albarn

Death brandishing Death Scythe.

Magic Scythe (魔鎌, Magama): A scythe-meister, Death is capable of using Spirit's weapon transformation in battle with great levels of profiency, enough that he was able to not only engage in battle with Asura equally, but he was also capable of even gaining the upper hand during their battle, holding the potential to kill him with the weapon and only being defeated due to Asura leveraging the lives of his son and allies. According to Azusa, Death is at his most powerful with the weapon on-hand.

Partnered with Azusa Yumi

Death brandishes the bowgun-type rifle.

Bowgun-Type Rifle (ボウガン型のライフル, Bougan-Gata no Raifuru): Specializing in long-distance targeting, he is capable of sending compress shots made up of his own wavelength.

• Pinpoint Shooting (高精度射撃, Kō Seido Satsuei): While using Azusa's bowgun-type rile form, Death is capable of making shots at least up to six miles (or 10 km) with a less-than-an-inch margin of error.

Synopsis

Operation Capture Baba Yaga Castle arc

Death agrees to let Medusa go along with her associates and in returns, reveals the location of the Kishin. From this point on, he had Joe Buttataki put together a mech for Death City that'll be connected to BREW, in which Medusa gave to DWMA in an effort to gain an audience with Death. He would periodically ask Kid to gather the Demon Tools such as the Eternal Spring and the key. His son, however, becomes suspicions of his actions.

He oversees the operation of the DWMA launching the attack on Arachnophobia. When his son returned with the Key, he revealed his plans to use BREW to turn the tide of the battle after the unveiling of Arachnophobia's new Weapon. He would then create The Death City Robot and battle Arachnophobia's Spider mech. He would defeat their mech, capturing Asura and sending him into the Death Room.

Kishin Battle arc

He would later battle against Asura with Spirit at hand, exchanging various philosophies and gaining the upper hand with Asura until he fired a shot aimed at Death the Kid and Azusa Yumi and he took the blast. He was gravely injured. He later recovered, being one of the staff waiting outside the Death Room for the result of the Battle between Death the Kid with Liz and Patti, Black*Star with Tsubaki, and Maka with Soul against Asura.

He was seen burying Asura's soul within the Death Room and praying.

Trivia

• In the non-canonical Adventure Mode, Death's duties as headmaster also includes making him an combat instructor of a special class.
• Death once revealed himself that his mirror only serves as a means of communication; he isn't really inside.