Akuma

Akuma
Akuma (アクマ, Akuma? lit. demon) take up the majority of the Earl's army and serve as the "foot soldiers". When one is mourning for a lost relative or friend, the Earl appears offering to resurrect that member for them. However, the raised soul becomes the power source for the Earl's weapon and must obey his orders. In contrast, a Akuma "converted" by Cross can resist orders from the Earl for a limited amount of time. Akuma "wear" the skin of the one who resurrected them. They use this to blend in, as Exorcists cannot tell Akuma from human with the exception of Allen. The Akuma share a metal core made of dark matter that resembles a simplified human skeleton. Their blood also contains a blood virus, which rapidly travels through the victim's body, marking it with pentacles. The virus can be spread by blood bullets of a high caliber shot by the level one Akuma. Eventually, the body crumbles into dust and gives off a poisonous gas. The Akuma also evolve into higher levels, gaining strength as they do so, with level four being the highest seen so far. Each level Akuma becomes more humanoid than the level before it. As its evolution continues, the embedded soul deteriorates. An Akuma-producing plant, referred to as an "egg", is required to create Akuma. It has been destroyed. There is a special significance to the evolution of an Akuma. If destroyed by a force other than Innocence, the soul is consumed by dark matter and is destroyed.

Level 0
Level 0 is the Akuma right after being created. It is only the metal skeleton which is presented similarly to a model kit format when still unoccupied by a soul. The human soul is the dominant personality, but it is still bound to the Earl's control. The ends of the arms varies from Akuma to Akuma. The separate 'bones' are not connected in any way, but rather hover near where they would be connected. After a soul occupies the skeleton, a pentagon along with its host's name below it will be inscribed on the forehead of the skeletal structure. No matter how inhuman an Akuma becomes upon reaching level 2, the level 0 form remains as its skeleton.

Level 1
Level 1 consists of a floating ball shaped creature with dozens of gun barrels protruding from it that fire enlarged 5.56 x 45 mm NATO-like rounds. The gun barrels are flexible and can be bent to face any desired angle without affecting its firing capabilities. The bullets made of the blood of the Akuma is deadly to the human flesh, leaving black star marks, cracking and corroding the human's body. Only those with a parasitic Innocence like Allen Walker, Arystar Krory or Suman Dark can heal the virus, sucking the virus out with his teeth (for Allen, his Innocence just cures him of the akuma poison. Krory can also suck the virus out of other humans that were hit by an akuma blood bullet), from these bullets. The souls inside a Level 1 Akuma have the bodies and clothes of their original forms. However, their faces are rather distorted and there is a chain around their necks expressing intense pain and sadness of the trapped soul. Level 1 akuma exhibit somewhat a transition from deteriorating human personality to an evil personality for level 2 later on as observed in their increasing obsession to simply kill and may, hence, show zombie like behaviour in their human form. A Level 1 Akuma will advance to a Level 2 once it has fulfilled a substantial quota of kills of humans and exorcist.

Blood Bullet: The bullets shot by the Akuma contain a poisonous virus. The moment the bullet hits someone, the virus rapidly spreads throughout their body in the form of pentacles (dark purple stars), and they soon crumble to pieces.

Level 1.5
Level 1.5 is not an actual level per se, it is more of a mid-way point for a Level 1 Akuma. The only difference is that the Akuma becomes rounder and more spherical, with the ends of the barrels on the surface. Their facial expressions appears to show more instances of emotions closing in to a personality as of a level 2(In the anime, a level 1.5 akuma grins like a maniac when it successfully anticipates and counters Allen Walkers attack from behind a building.) Their bullets can also penetrate barriers that normal Level 1 Akuma bullets can't.

Level 2
Level 2 produces a dramatic change. They develop a unique ability and a sense of self. Level 2 Akuma are capable of intelligent thought and are largely independent, though they still maintain unquestionable loyalty to the Millennium Earl and the Clan of Noah. The souls of Level 2 Akuma seem to become more deteriorated. The souls inside of these Akuma can't seem to be identified at all and are in a fetal position, wrapped from head to toe in bandages. Level 2 Akuma come in all shapes and sizes (some have even appeared simply as a gas, fire, a demonic court jester, or even a playing card) and they have no common appearance. Thus far, Level 2 is the only state in evolution where appearance is varied as 1, 3, and 4 all maintain the same shape with only subtle differences. They also have different powers, such as copying a person's appearance (mirror image), emitting "ice fire" which hurts worse than normal fire, creating blades of air, emitting destructive sound waves, and creating bubbles that absorb water from everything they touch. Some Level 2 Akuma even carry modern day weaponry such as homing missiles and varios types of firearms that resemble machine guns and so on, as observed in the mangas. After murdering enough people, it can evolve to Level 3.

Level 3
Level 3 brings perhaps the most terrifying changes of any previous stage. Regardless of their appearance in Level 2, all level 3 Akuma become bipedal, roughly 8 to 9 feet tall, with sharp jagged teeth, and wear what looks like medieval armor that covers most of their bodies. In addition to this, they receive a massive power boost. A Level 3 Akuma is easily capable of standing up to multiple Exorcists in combat and usually has an extremely powerful ability in addition to its greatly improved strength and speed. Their abilities seem to revolve around the use of Dark Matter, the polar opposite of Innocence. The souls embedded in the Level 3 Akuma are near gone and appear as a floating dark mass with eyes. Before Edo, the appearance of a Level 3 was rare with most of them being stationed in Edo and isolated from the rest of the world. As the Exorcists grew stronger though, the Earl was forced to turn to more powerful Akuma to bring them down.

Giant Akuma
During the fight at Edo, The Earl revealed that a mass number of Level 3's can fuse together to create Giant Akuma. Due to their gigantic size they are slow but have long arms and legs to attack directly but their moment is awkward and easy to dodge if paying attention. Their skin is also very durable making it hard for an average Exorcist to do any damage to them. They can also preform and attack known as Evil Star Grita which fires rapid beams at any and all directions. While still a high risk opponent they seem to lack much of any ability to think for themselves and are generally seen taking orders from the Earl or a Noah. Bookman has commented on this and upon seeing them fuse at Edo has stated that "The idiot machines have simply combined to make a bigger idiot machine".

Level 4
Level 4 is the most powerful and destructive Akuma known to the Exorcists so far, surpassing even the strength of the Noahs. After the attack on headquarters, within the dead body of a giant akuma, emerged a sort of womb which devoured many of the victims of Lulu Bell's attack. From this womb a Level 4 Akuma was born. Prior to this encounter, no Akuma above a level 3 had been seen. The Akuma takes the form a child-like creature with a bloated stomach. There is a black star on the akuma stomach and a lit, closed-ring, "halo-like" oval above its head. A Level 4 akuma has a great amount of speed and power, far superior to the Level 3 Akumas. The Level 4 has been seen to create great balls of energy from its hands and is able to block attacks using it hands and fore arms. The Level 4 which attacked headquarters was able to fend off attacks from multiple General-level Exorcists before finally being defeated by the combined efforts of Cross Marian, Allen Walker, and Lenalee Lee. Recently, a second Level 4 Akuma has appeared in the manga and attacked Allen, Kanda, and Marie to keep them distracted while the weaker Akuma capture a young boy named Timothy. This Level 4 has the ability to morph it's arms into powerful gatling-guns which fire the same poisonous bullets that Levels 1 and 2 use.

Eshii
Eshii was the first Level 3 shown in the series and one of the few Akuma to give a name. This Akuma wore crimson armor and featured long orange hair. Eshii attacked Lenalee and the other Exorcists as they made their way to Edo in an attempt to locate General Cross Marian. When it became apparent that the others were no match for Eshii, Lenalee lead him away from the ship in an attempt to spare her friends. However, while he battled Lenalee, he left a trio of Level 2 Akuma to assault the ship from afar. His ability allowed him to use Dark Matter chains to affect gravity and even overpowered Miranda's Time Record abilities. With these chains, he was able to drag Lenalee and the ship down into the ocean. This ability proved to be his undoing as Lenalee used the Dark Matter chains to increase the weight and speed of her own final attack against him. Eshii explains that in a previous life he was an artist, hence his habit of making a frame with his hands prior to an attack and proclaiming "TITLE!" before naming the scene in front of him.

Chomesuke
Chomesuke was a modified Level 2 Akuma that worked for General Cross Marian after he refined her. She retrieved Lenalee from the ocean after her battle with Eshii left her protected in the cyrstalline shell of her own Innocence. She was sent by Cross Marian to warn the group that Edo was extremely dangerous and that they had better not come if they were just going to get in his way, however they refused to turn back. From there, she acted as the group's guide once they arrived in Japan and lead them safely to Edo. Chomesuke reveals her human form at this point to be a beautiful woman named Sachiko - much to Lavi's delight. When referred to by this name she makes it clear that she prefers "Chomesuke" the name Lavi designated for her back on the ship. When in her human form, Sachiko wears a traditional pink Japanese kimono and wears her hair up in samilar style. Her Akuma form is gold like Timcanpy, and resembles a bipedal fish with a orb-shaped face in it's mouth. During the Earl's summoning of all Akuma in Japan to Edo, she reveals that she can no longer fight the Akuma programming and will soon revert to her former ways and try to kill the Exorcists. Never the less, she helps her new friends until the very end, even leaving pints of her blood behind for Krory. She is killed when helping Lavi, Krory, and Bookman attack a Giant Akuma. She reveals earlier that she would have died anyway as Cross Marian had equipped her and every other demon he modified with a special fail-safe feature. In the event that their murderous intentions programmed by the Earl were to take over, she would self-destruct. Because she did not die at the hands of an Anti-Akuma Weapon, it is likely that the soul within her was lost.