Why Arcueid is the most overrated TM character

Let’s settle this once and for all. The truth is: Arcueid is nowhere near as untouchable as people think. She's flashy, strong, but outclassed by several characters.

Let’s break it down.

30% Arcueid is not the strongest character in Tsukihime.

Yes, you heard that right. Despite what some fans like to claim, 30% Arcueid does not automatically beat everyone in her setting. The hype around her is wildly exaggerated.

Before we get into characters who rival or surpass her, we need to clear up a basic misconception about how her power actually works.

Arcueid doesn’t begin a fight at full output. Her power scales gradually, adjusting just enough to overcome her opponent without overexerting. It’s not about dominating instantly, it’s about matching and then exceeding the threat level over time.

Take this example from Ciel’s route:

“It's not like Senpai moves with Arcueid's amazing speed. But she accurately deflects Arcueid's blazing attacks while standing on the ground. As a third person looking on, their strengths are equal. However, just like Senpai said, Arcueid's power seems limitless. No matter how amazing Senpai is, her power is not something that goes beyond a certain point. In contrast, Arcueid seems limitless. In the beginning, Senpai was overwhelming her, but Arcueid matches her quickly and is now easily surpassing her powers.”

— Tsukihime: Near Side – Ciel’s Route, Bow in the Sky I

This quote shows it clearly: she adapts in real time to meet the opponent’s level, but she doesn't start out at that level, and she doesn’t instantly blow past it either.

Against someone like Ciel, whose power is fixed, this eventually gives Arcueid the upper hand. But that strategy doesn’t help against opponents who:

• Have conceptual or non-physical abilities
• Can kill before she has time to scale up
• Cannot be overpowered through raw strength alone

And this already dismantles the idea that 30% Arcueid is "untouchable." Now let’s talk about characters within Tsukihime who are already serious threats.

30% Arcueid is seriously threatened by Nrvnqsr Chaos:

Despite being a pure brute-force Dead Apostle with no metaphysical hax, he still poses a serious threat to 30% Arcueid:

"Not a chance. Nrvnqsr was special. He was a pure, supreme vampire that would be difficult to defeat even with my full power. - Tsukihime - Near Side: - Arcueid's Route 6/Eyes of Death Perception I

This isn’t fan interpretation, it’s Arcueid herself saying that even at full power, Nrvnqsr would be “difficult to defeat.”

And here’s confirmation from the Melty Blood: Act Cadenza PS2 manual:

The factors of 666 beasts are swirling around within his body, but it’s probably alright just to think of it as him being equipped with 666 familiars. Because this is essentially like having 666 lives, properly speaking he’s a Dead Apostle that even a serious Arcueid wouldn’t be able to kill. - Melty Blood Act Cadenza PS2 Manual - Nrvnqsr Chaos [person/dead apostle]

“But she just said he’s hard to kill, not impossible!”

Sure, but that alone is telling. It's still an explicit admission that she can't deal with him easily, even at full power. That’s a huge crack in the idea that Arcueid is untouchable.

And it gets worse: side materials confirm that even a serious Arcueid wouldn’t be able to kill Nrvnqsr. This isn’t just her own cautious humility: it’s an objective, third-party statement, which carries even more weight than her in-story dialogue.

That tells us a lot about how her power functions: Arcueid adapts only just enough to overwhelm her opponent. She doesn’t leap straight to maximum output unless absolutely necessary, and even then, that output is not guaranteed to be enough if her opponent's nature renders brute force ineffective.

Yes, she’d eventually outmatch Nrvnqsr in speed and strength, but that doesn’t help when his very composition (666 beasts, chaotic structure, absurd regeneration) makes him practically unkillable by normal means.

And if someone like that is already a wall for her, what chance does she stand against enemies with true conceptual or metaphysical hax, who can bypass physical stats altogether?

Akiha Might Be Above Arcueid Altogether:

This may surprise some, but Akiha at full power is explicitly stated to potentially exceed a rampaging Arcueid:

“In one of the routes, she ended up inverting and demonstrating her power to its fullest extent. That dreadful form, with its fluttering vermillion hair, is probably capable of exceeding even a rampaging Arcueid.”

— Tsukihime Plus Period - Akiha Tohno [Person]

The keyword here is “rampaging.” That’s not just poetic flair, it’s the same term repeatedly used to describe Berserk Arcueid, a form where she stops regulating her power and unleashes her full True Ancestor might.

Let’s break that down. According to multiple sources:

Arcueid after going into a wild frenzy and becoming totally indiscriminate with her rage. “Evil” Arcueid. You can catch a glimpse of this in the Ciel Route, though it seems she still had enough composure to recognize Shiki. The Tatari Arcueid in Melty Blood is technically more akin to Arcueid in this state than to the Crimson Moon. Her attacks have become more monstrous due to her personality, and she revels in cruelty. - Tsukihime Plus Period - Warcueid [Person/Nickname]

Arcueid after she has succumbed to her vampiric impulse and lost her ability to reason. Though regarded as equivalent to the Crimson Moon, she is a completely different entity. You could say she’s the materialized form of Arcueid’s overflowing vampiric impulse. When Berserk Arcueid appears, Arcueid herself is freed from her desire to drink blood.

…That’s a complete and utter lie, of course. Unlike Arcueid, she enjoys trampling on her enemies with overwhelming force. Because as a True Ancestor Arcueid does not (cannot) do useless things, she always regulates her fighting ability to match her opponent’s. However, Berserk Arcueid will use her power mercilessly even against normal humans. Incidentally, her over the top speech and behavior is really amusing. - Melty Blood Act Cadenza PS2 Manual - Arcueid Brunestud [Person/True Ancestor]

Berserk Arcueid is Arcueid with no limiters, a manifestation of her full 100% output, no longer restraining her vampiric instincts. Arcueid normally uses only 30% of her power, while the remaining 70% is spent suppressing her bloodlust. When she goes berserk, that suppression drops, and we see her true potential unleashed.

So when Plus Period says Akiha inverted is “probably capable of exceeding even a rampaging Arcueid,” it’s not just saying she might be stronger than 30% Arc, it’s implying she could surpass Arcueid at 100%, fully unshackled and consumed by her primal True Ancestor nature.

In other words:

Akiha at her peak may be more dangerous than Arcueid at her absolute limit.

‘But the raws for that Plus Period quote just say “Arcueid”! So Akiha only surpasses 30% Arcueid!’

Not really, this is actually a case of people getting it backwards. The original quote in Data Collection explicitly uses “Warcueid” in the raw text, which makes it undeniable that it refers to Arcueid losing control and going berserk. However, Plus Period later dropped the ‘Warcueid’ nickname in favor of simply ‘Arcueid’.

Why? Because while ‘Warcueid’ does refer to the concept of Arcueid’s berserk rampage (first glimpsed in the Ciel Route), it is also the exact state her Tatari version is based on in Melty Blood. That version is the rumor form humans can imagine, but as Wallachia notes, it is limited to about 30% of her theoretical True Ancestor output, since her nature is unsuited to his phenomenon. So using ‘Warcueid’ ties the statement to a form that is inherently restricted by the limits of the rumor.

By removing ‘Warcueid’ and just saying ‘Arcueid’, while still describing Akiha inverting, with her ‘fluttering crimson hair’, the revised line actually clarifies that she’s meant to rival Arcueid herself, not just the rumor-based Tatari variant. This means she matches Arcueid in her rampaging state, where she drops all self-restraint and taps into her full True Ancestor power.

That’s exactly why the English translation still keeps the ‘rampaging’ term: it signals that Akiha’s peak is always meant to be compared to the real Arcueid losing control, not the Tatari version stuck at 30%. So ironically, the change in wording makes Akiha’s feat even stronger, not weaker.

“But it said Origami is less effective against Arcueid, to the point it would just be a distraction!”

Wrong. That only applies to the Origami cage function, not to Akiha’s actual plundering ability.

Origami is just the max output of Akiha’s plundering threads, meant to physically bind or trap. But plundering itself is a separate effect. As described in Tsukihime:

"I see now----that's what it does." There is no way to escape this red hair. When she sees me, it is already wrapped around me. It is wrong to imagine dodging it or avoiding it. If it's there, it's there. If it's not, it's not. Like the air touching my skin, the red hair is already wrapped around me. Therefore, there was no way to escape from that attack. If there is anything I can do, it is---before Akiha steals something from me, I have to cut that pipeline...... that red hair of hers. The interval between her seeing something and stealing from it is only an instant. But if the target isn't clear in her vision, there is a small time before she actually steals from me. Before she can steal too much from me, I cut the hair to avoid a fatal wound - Tsukihime - Far Side: Kohaku Route - 10/Locks of Hair

Nanaya makes it clear: the hair is 'omnipresent' like the very air in the atmosphere, something you can’t dodge, and the plundering happens almost instantly when Akiha sees you.

Origami simply enhances those hair to trap the environment:

"At their maximum output, these threads are capable of covering not just the target, but the entire environment the target is in, making escape impossible – thus the name Origami, or 'Caging Hair.'

Against somebody like Arcueid whose spiritual rank is on a whole other level, it would merely be a hindrance similar to the world being filled with spider webs.- Tsukihime Dokuhon Plus Period - Caging Hair [Unusual talent],

Yes, Arcueid resists being physically bound. But the drain still happens. Here is a clearer statement for confirmation:

Akiha is a demon hybrid that "plunders" the heat of any living being that she is able to visually confirm, and Origami is the name for the maximum output state of this ability. Though the plundering is based on sight, if somebody with spiritual vision were to observe it, they would see it as something similar to red threads twining around and consuming the target in a fiery aura. -Tsukihime Dokuhon Plus Period- Caging Hair [Unusual talent],

As clearly stated, Akiha’s plundering is triggered by her line of sight. Though normally invisible, it manifests, when perceived spiritually, as red threads engulfing the target in a fiery aura, matching Nanaya’s description. Origami represents the maximum output of this ability, where the threads become semi-physical and capable of restricting movement or blocking escape routes. However, this enhancement is purely supplementary; the core plundering effect remains independent of Origami and activates regardless of physical restraint.

Akiha's actual plundering affects the very concept of an opponent:

So it's not something that can be resisted arbitrarily. This is an existential drain. Defending against it requires specific, conceptual-level countermeasures, which Arcueid lacks.

To summarize: Akiha is stated to potentially surpass Arcueid at full power, meaning she would match her physically while retaining her conceptual plundering. This ability allows her to absorb Arcueid’s energy and even her properties (including powers), and it’s far faster than anything Red Arcueid could feasibly deploy in real-time combat.

Arcueid’s backup ramps up gradually, but Akiha’s plundering activates instantly with just a glance. Even Nanaya Shiki, who moved faster than Akiha could track, was partially plundered in the brief moment he entered her awareness. You’d need to remain completely outside her perception to avoid it, something Arcueid demonstrably cannot do.

Kishima Kouma would beat the shit out of Arcueid:

This continues directly from the previous point about Akiha. We’ve already established that full-power Akiha likely surpasses even Red/Berserker Arcueid. So why is this important for Kouma?

Because Kouma is also a Crimson Red Vermillion, just like Akiha:

The name for when those with inhuman heritage have drawn out their sleeping blood to the maximum possible extent.

The name Crimson Red Vermillion is unique to the families ruled over by the Tohno household. Elsewhere, it is known as Ancestral Return.

As one with particularly tainted blood, the possibility that Akiha will become a Crimson Red Vermillion is high.

You can catch a glimpse of this during Tohno Akiha and Kishima Kouma’s Arc Drives. Also, though Kouma is the closest to attaining it at the current stage, Akiha is actually the one with more aptitude for it. - MB Act Cadenza PS2 manual - Crimson Red Vermillion [Term]

As a result, in terms of sheer power, Kouma surpasses Arcueid, and like Akiha, his abilities function on a conceptual level.

Akiha's plundering is derived from an "ancient origin" that grants her abnormal potential. Similarly, the CRV state, also known as Ancestral Return, is described as the emergence of a transcendental self that overwrites the original ego entirely:

A scarlet deeper than red.

A name for that has been passed down in the Nanaya oral tradition.

Crimson Red Vermillion.

A name that points to an existence that has awakened to the nonhuman blood of its ancestors.

It describes a person whose ego is subsumed by a transcendental self and loses all sanity.

It is said that the red Evil Eye is a sign of being possessed.

Like a mirage, something shimmers behind it.

Laughing around aimlessly as if insane.

It doesn't look like it's having any fun.

With the reed warbler's cry, its body becomes hazy. - Tsukihime - Far Side: Kohaku Route - 10/Locks of Hair

This implies that the older and purer the nonhuman lineage, the more powerful the CRV transformation becomes.

Kouma’s lineage fulfills this perfectly: his clan interbred with pure demons, Ogres, and he alone preserved the "desired purity" of that bloodline. His power was so extreme that his own people feared him. Yet even as a child, Kouma displayed remarkable potential, able to suppress his impulses better than most:

If Akiha’s ancestral demonic powers operate on a conceptual level, then Kouma’s must as well, and to an even greater degree. His lineage traces back to a more ancient and purer source, being descended from true demons (Ogres) rather than diluted hybrid blood. This is significant, because while Akiha plunders, Kouma obliterates through Hellfire. This means he can completely erase Arcueid from existence with his flames, regardless of her defenses. Just as Akiha's plundering targets the concept of the victim and cannot be blocked or resisted by conventional means, Kouma’s Hellfire consumes the target’s fundamental nature. This aligns with the Buddhist symbolism in his Melty Blood moveset, where his attacks evoke Yama, the god of death and judgment, a force not of combat, but of finality.

Nanaya Shiki would slaughter Arcueid:

Nanaya is consistently portrayed as the most overpowered character in Tsukihime. His strength fluctuates when Shiki resists or suppresses his true nature, but when Nanaya fully takes over as the dominant personality, he becomes a force far beyond even Arcueid.

He isn’t just a skilled assassin, he’s described as a transcendental killer, someone who defies normal limitations through pure instinct and talent.

Though Shiki doesn’t remember it, he had received basic training before Makihisa’s attack.

This training was responsible for turning Shiki into a transcendent killer every time he was backed into a corner duringTsukihime… somehow. - Tsukihime Data Collection - Nanaya Shiki [Person]

We see this right from the start of the VN: Nanaya outright kills Arcueid in an instant:

"But he took her by surprise! Shiki said he wouldn't be able to pull it off in a direct fight!"

But that line of thinking misses the deeper truth: Shiki has no real awareness of his full capabilities. Time and again, he’s surprised at what he manages to pull off when backed into a corner. He consistently emphasizes that his body moves on its own, as if guided by something inhuman, a killer instinct beyond his conscious mind:

“My body is moving by itself?”

No, that’s not it. All my arms are doing is seeking out the lines and points I can see in the darkness with my glasses off...

In other words, it’s not that I’m defending myself—he’s defending himself from me.

— Tsukihime, Near Side: Arcueid’s route - 7/Eyes of Death Perception II

“My arms move as if they belonged to someone else... My eyes persistently, accurately look at just his ‘lines’... My entire body burns. My brain feels like it is on fire.”

— Tsukihime, Near Side: Ciel’s route - 9/Cast-Off Cicada Shell

Even against Akiha, he notes that the level of speed and reaction he displayed shouldn’t be physically possible. And yet, he instinctively moved out of her sight range in an instant, purely on reflex:

This is the Nanaya inside him taking over, a transcendental killer that bypasses logic, physical limits, or hesitation. That’s why SHIKI (with far superior physical specs) still backs off from a confrontation. He understands that in a true deathmatch, Nanaya’s efficiency is too absolute. It’s not about brute strength; it’s about inevitability.

"-----Ahh, it really was a lot of fun."

He stands up.

And----with empty eyes, he looks down at me.

"---Well. We don't need two of us in this town, right? Two lions in a cage this small won't even be able to mark their own territory."

He looks like he is going for his knife.

The inorganic reek of murder.

He really does want a fight to the death.

"You shouldn't."

I say quite naturally.

"Why?"

"Well, as a living creature, you're stronger than me, but..."

----If it's a fight to the death.

"I'm superior to you."

"------,------"

He grinds his teeth.

After a twitching smile,

"Ha...... aha, aahahhaha......!!"

He laughs extremely loudly.

"I guess this is a good opportunity. Now that someone like you is here, I should probably leave town."

"...... I don't really intend to take your place."

"No, no, it's useless. You got hooked tonight, right? Then it'll be the same tomorrow. You won't be able to endure, even for a day.

Well, I hope we won't meet again."

Raising a hand, he disappears. - Tsukihime - Far Side: Kohaku Route - 4/Cradle Garden

And let’s not forget: Arcueid was looking directly at Shiki when this happened. She wasn’t blindsided from behind or caught off-guard in a moment of complete vulnerability. She was standing at the door, staring at him, and yet she couldn’t react to seventeen precise dissections delivered in less than a second. Even if she was “relaxed,” there's no plausible way someone of her caliber should get utterly dissected by a “fodder human”… unless that human is something else entirely.

But if any doubt remains, we get an undeniable demonstration of Nanaya’s superiority over Arcueid during the fight with Nrvnqsr:

Here, Nrvnqsr has shifted into his strongest beast, achieving speeds on par with Arcueid, yet Nanaya dodges his killing blow and slashes his line of death. And this isn’t a mid-fight skirmish: Nanaya had just taken over Shiki’s near-dead body, which had been mauled nearly to death by the horde of beasts moments prior:

He outright says that simply moving his body consumes all of his remaining strength, and he doesn't even have the energy left to speak. And yet, he still reacts to and defeats an Arcueid-tier threat in a single strike.

Later, when Nrvnqsr attacks again, his speed is described with even more emphasis:

This suggests that Nrvnqsr’s final charge may have even surpassed Arcueid’s prior speed, yet it still wasn’t enough.

And what does Arcueid say when watching all of this unfold?

She outright states that Nanaya would kill her too if she tried to interfere. That’s not an exaggeration or a joke: she says it with complete certainty, LOL.

You want even more proof? By all means. Remember how Akiha is stated to potentially exceed Red Arcueid at her full power? Nanaya was able to move faster than she could visually track, to the point he could avoid her plundering ability:

“In one of the routes, she ended up inverting and demonstrating her power to its fullest extent. That dreadful form, with its fluttering vermillion hair, is probably capable of exceeding even a rampaging Arcueid.”

— Tsukihime Plus Period - Akiha Tohno [Person]

Afterwards, Nanaya is able to kill this same Akiha despite rapidly losing his lifeforce as a result of Kohaku being incapacitated, who was sharing her life with him:

Notice how he explicitly says he can feel his power returning to his body after Akiha is dead. That is because he is getting his life force back.

So a dying Nanaya could behead a Red Arcueid-tier opponent before she could affect him with a near-instantaneous, sight-based ability. No wonder she admitted she'd be dead if she got in his way...

Moving on to Melty Blood: Even in a weakened state as a Tatari manifestation, the Nanaya version of Shiki (distorted by Wallachia’s influence, which imposed theatrical mannerisms and dulled his assassin’s edge) effortlessly overwhelms a serious Arcueid. He mocks her strikes as “half-assed,” brushing off her attacks with casual precision. This version of Nanaya was massively out of sync with his Origin and fighting style: his movements no longer perfectly efficient, his mindset tainted by unnecessary flair, yet he still dominated her:

Arcueid then does something surprising, which is summon her power as Archetype-Earth to kill Nanaya.

It’s clear that Arcueid wouldn’t have stood a chance without AE the moment Nanaya decided to actually attack. This is yet another clear example of Arcueid being helpless against the real deal: she couldn't even land a hit on a massively weakened shadow.

To be fair, Red Arcueid could theoretically defeat the characters mentioned if she manages to unleash an unrestricted Marble Phantasm, which lets her rewrite Gaia’s natural laws at will. But here’s the catch: those opponents are more than capable of killing her before she even gets the chance to activate it properly.

And that assumes she even opens with the Marble Phantasm, which is unlikely given her erratic, berserk nature in that state. Tactical restraint isn’t exactly her strong suit.

Just to clarify: this is 100% Arcueid we’re talking about.

Now, what about 30% Arcueid, the version often hyped as “the strongest in the setting”?

Let’s be honest. She’d get destroyed by any of those three with ease.

This isn’t to say Arcueid is weak. Far from it. Rather, it’s to debunk the absurd idea that 30% Arcueid is untouchable and to remind people that even her full power faces real competition, especially from characters who transcend Gaia’s natural laws.

Some fans cite vague lines to claim Arcueid is Tsukihime’s strongest character. For example:

“One of the heroines in Tsukihime, and probably the strongest, most incorrigible character in the story.”

— Tsukihime Plus Period, Arcueid Brunestud [Person/True Ancestor]

At first glance, this sounds definitive; but in context, it’s a general character description. It likely refers to Arcueid as a whole, including her berserk form and Archetype Earth, her most complete aspect. However, we know from the source material that even at her strongest, she is surpassed by Prime Roa and inferior to Nanaya Shiki when he fully manifests. Even her 100% non-Archetype form is rivaled by Altrouge, who demonstrates greater reality-warping feats on Crimson Moon’s level.

This leads to the next section:

Arcueid's big sister is indeed a bigger deal than her current self:

Altrouge is just as powerful as Arcueid, excluding her Archetype Earth form. This isn’t just speculation. The very title of Brunestud is reserved for those whose power nears that of the Crimson Moon:

Another name for the organism that was used as the template for the True Ancestors. Also known as the Crimson Moon Brunestud.

After he vanished, individuals close to him in power started being honored with the title of Brunestud.

However, in the long history of the True Ancestors, only two have ever received the name. - Melty Blood Act Cadenza PS2 Manual

Some fans cite a statement Roa makes in KT to argue Altrouge isn’t Crimson Moon-tier, but they often miss the point:

Roa doesn't deny her power; in fact, he outright says she could surpass even Crimson Moon with Primate Murder’s help. His issue isn’t with raw strength, but stability. Altrouge's power is unstable; she can't maintain it for long and often has to seal herself in a weaker form, relying on her guardians for protection. The very fact that she’s considered a successor candidate for the Crimson Moon shows that her power is in the right tier, just not ideal for embodying a celestial will cleanly.

Most importantly, Altrouge has feats to back it up. She transformed Dead Apostle Zepia into the abstract phenomenon of Tatari, a metaphysical concept that did not previously exist in Gaia's reality:

He made a contract with Altrouge of the Crimson Moon entailing that he would turn into TATARI until the next Night of the Crimson Moon in 1000 years, but… - Melty Blood Official Strategy Guide

A member of the 27 Dead Apostle Ancestors. One who tried to embody eternity not as a living being, but as a phenomenon. Tatari. - Melty Blood Act Cadenza PS2 Manual

This goes far beyond what even an unsealed True Ancestor or Demon Lord can accomplish. Normally, their power is limited to manipulating natural phenomena through probability, things that already exist within Gaia:

③ The user directly connects and imposes their will on the world which creates an interference that transforms the world as they see fit (as they imagine). They make reality an illusion (something impossible in reality).

④ More specifically a marble phantasm is thought to be realized when a multitude of phenomena are interfered with probability-wise, forcibly invoking the impossible.

⑤ What can be materialized is not limited to material objects, anything can be created as long as it’s a possible result of an interference in the probability of (natural) phenomena.

⑥ In the world of Tsukihime, a Marble Phantasm is the materialization of a part of an alien world that exists on top of the normal world, the fantasy world born from the imagination of elemental spirits. Therefore, it is possible for regular humans to wander into a Marble Phantasm.

The effects of world transformation are not directly applied to the target. - Colorful MOON Tsukihime

But Altrouge didn’t manipulate existing phenomena: she invented a new one. She redefined Zepia’s entire nature and transformed urban legend, a human concept, into a universal law of reality. That is Ultimate One tier: the authority to determine what concepts are valid on a planetary scale.

Now yes, Arcueid at her full power is also a Brunestud and holds the same authority as Crimson Moon:

However, Arcueid lost her original potential as his perfect vessel after being tainted by Roa’s blood. This introduced the flaw of bloodlust, something she was originally free from due to being created as a pure, emotionless weapon with no excess function. That stillness made her the ideal receptacle for a celestial will. But after Roa’s corruption, her 100% power triggers a berserk, instinct-driven state. She no longer acts with clarity or authority; functionally, she becomes just another powerful Demon Lord.

This conceptual decline mirrors Ryougi Shiki’s path: the closer she gets to the Void, the more she sheds her identity. In contrast, Arcueid is blocked from accessing her original alignment precisely because she’s now bound by the impulses she once lacked. Her power is still massive, but it’s disordered and lacks the purity needed to channel celestial will.

Meanwhile, Altrouge, while unstable, never fell in this way. She retains her alignment, and her inability to maintain full power is a 'stamina' issue (for lack of a better term), not a distortion of essence. She has to seal herself away for practicality, but conceptually she’s intact.

In short: Arcueid today is functionally a high-level Demon Lord. Altrouge, by contrast, remains a Crimson Moon-tier threat who can temporarily reach the true peak of celestial authority. The power gap between them is real; and it’s not in Arcueid’s favor.

So, the phrase “probably the strongest” doesn’t carry much weight when the narrative directly provides multiple counters. At best, “in the story” could refer only to the Tsukihime visual novel timeframe, ignoring characters outside of that context and disregarding post-VN developments like Tsukihime 2’s Nanaya. Even then, that interpretation is weak, especially considering that peak Akiha is also explicitly noted to probably surpass Arcueid.

Ultimately, the only way this quote holds is if one assumes it includes Archetype Earth and restricts the comparison strictly to characters who directly act within the Tsukihime VN’s timeframe. In that case, it’s far from a mind-blowing claim: just a contextual note, not an objective ranking.

Her more extreme supporters certainly don't help her case; a certain moron once sent around a scan claiming that “30% Arcueid is the strongest in Tsukihime.” Naturally, no actual translation was provided, just the raw Japanese. I translated it myself, and unsurprisingly, there’s no mention of 30% anywhere. In fact, the line explicitly refers to her as “one of the strongest beings in Tsukihime,” not the strongest. That kind of baseless hype is just laughable.

Yes, Arcueid is among the most powerful characters in the setting. But that doesn’t make her unbeatable, especially not at 30%. Even at full strength, she faces serious rivals.

And don’t think Archetype Earth will magically reclaim undisputed supremacy...

No, even Archetype Earth is not the strongest character:

Yeah, no. Let’s clear this up: Types are not the ultimate ceiling of the setting, and Archetype Earth, while undeniably powerful, is far from the strongest character. There are entities that completely outclass her, and they all come from Kara no Kyoukai, which represents the true peak of power in the Type-Moon universe.

And even within Tsukihime, there are at least 3 characters who surpass her.

God's Word would waste Archetype:

Satsuki Kurogiri (Also known as God's Word) wields the Unified Language, a primordial tongue that speaks directly to the world’s records, the ontological blueprint of reality. This isn’t metaphorical: his words literally alter existence. He doesn’t bend natural law; he rewrites it.

"Isn't that useless then? What's the point of it all if no one can even reply to him?"

"If it were just a normal language, then yes. The fact that he can communicate with beasts and rocks doesn't mean that he's speaking to them directly. Instead, he speaks to the world itself. Think of it like an ontological hierarchy. As long as 'I' exist, there will always be an Aozaki Touko above me that exists within the world itself. If he were to use the Unified Language on me, I would have no way of resisting. If I were to reject his words, that'd be equal to denying the fact that I exist in this world. The very words he utter become an irreversible truth. God's Word is capable of placing all of creation under complete hypnosis. The memories that we humans possess, are also recorded by the world itself. It's a similar concept to the Akashic Records, but this is a wave phenomenon that exists on a lower level than it. You see, one of the possible methods of deciphering it is the Unified Language. That's why Kurogiri's able to gather memories that have already been forgotten. He isn't drawing their forgotten memories out of their brains, but rather from the record the world stores of the past. In the present day and age, he's the only person capable of accessing the various recordings of the past that our world has kept in store. - Kara no Kyoukai Chapter 6

Let that sink in. He doesn’t pull memories from minds; he reads the world’s own archive, like accessing the Akashic Records’ debug logs. Forgotten memories? Concepts? Names? If they were ever recorded by reality, he can retrieve or overwrite them.

This leaves Archetype Earth completely helpless. Her power is rooted in Gaia, the planetary system, but Kurogiri speaks above that. He can simply declare “Archetype Earth does not exist,” and reality adjusts to fit that command.

But it gets deeper than that.

"It was God's Word that proved all of them wrong. He showed that it wasn't only our planet that was more powerful in the Age of Gods, but also our language. If God confused the languages of man, then what was it like before that? Indeed, mankind had but a single language of communication back then. Could a language truly give meaning to and speak of every single phenomenon in our world? If it truly existed, then it would have to be a formless language. It would not be a language used to communicate with fellow men, but a language that derived its meaning through a dialogue with the world itself. God feared the word of man, so he confused our tongues and granted us a language with form. We thought we were being granted wisdom, but we were only robbed of the truth instead. That lost truth is what God's Word has learned, the original language that was shared among all who dwelled in this world before the Tower of Babel. We call this the Unified Language, and God's Word is the only mage capable of replicating it. The Master of Babel. The ability to communicate with every single being that lives is none other than a gate to the Fount, to God himself. If you trace its etymology, the word Babel once meant the gate of God. Then again, God's Word doesn't possess any other ability as a mage, so he'll never be able to pass through that gate himself. - Kara no Kyoukai Chapter 6"

Kurogiri's Unified Language isn’t just a weird magical gimmick: it’s the primordial tongue that predates all creation myths, all magecraft systems, and even divine punishment. It's what humanity once possessed before God, fearing their power, fractured their ability to communicate with existence. This language is fundamentally true, cosmically binding, and ontologically absolute.

"but Archetype is the world's soul, so she can control the records!"

This confuses planetary authority with ontological authority.

Archetype Earth governs Gaia’s internal systems, the will of the planet, but she has no access to the deeper metaphysical layer that defines those systems to begin with.

God’s Word, through the Unified Language, speaks to that deeper layer: the world’s own records: the source code that defines identity, existence, and memory. As Touko explains, resisting it would be denying your own right to exist. AE is powerful, yes, but she’s still part of the record. Kurogiri can simply locate the entry for “Archetype Earth” and declare she never existed.

The world won’t resist. It will comply, because he’s not battling her power, he’s editing the very framework her power runs on.

Kurogiri’s power isn’t limited by scale or domain, he literally operates on everything that exists, at the very foundation of existence itself. No matter how vast or cosmic the scope of a being’s power, planetary, stellar, or beyond, if that being’s existence is recorded in the world’s fundamental “source code,” Kurogiri’s Unified Language can alter, erase, or rewrite it.

Archetype controls the system of Gaia, but the very fact that Archetype exists and controls it is something recorded by the deeper ‘records’ too. This isn’t just a planetary domain: it’s a foundational layer of reality that automatically registers every ‘fact’ of existence. The very notion that Archetype embodies Gaia, holds her authority, and can exercise that power is itself something ‘made official’ by the records. This layer cannot be resisted or countered by simply having domain authority, because God’s Word with Unified Language, can just access those records and rewrite them. If it declares that Gaia’s entire concept is now dormant in a puppy, that becomes true at the deepest level. It’s the ultimate reality-altering mechanism below the Fount, which means even Archetype Earth’s defining power becomes irrelevant if its basis is overwritten.

Ryougi Shiki would waste Archetype:

Ryougi's Mystic Eyes of Death Perception can kill things that shouldn’t be killable: concepts, rules, identities, and abstract constructs.

She doesn’t just end life: she removes existence by cutting the flaws in reality itself. Her power reaches into structures of meaning:

And with that she planted her knife in the floor. Out of the three circles the mage possessed, she had just 'killed' the outermost circle.

"--- Ignorance."

In an anxious manner the mage came forward. Another step, even though he approaches Shiki there is no change in Shiki.... The man's talismans have just shrunk from three to two. The mage clicks his tongue in exasperation. He hadn't considered the possibility that Shiki's Mystic Eyes of Death Perception would be so powerful. To think that she could kill a concept like a ward which had no form, or life, that kind of absolute power ---.- Kara no Kyoukai: Chapter 05

Surely Ryougi Shiki, who saw death, was an unusual existence. However, there were many people in the world who had the ability to kill people. If it were just about killing living creatures, there was no way to beat the various modern weapons that civilization has produced.

That’s right. What makes Ryougi Shiki’s nature so different from Magi like them, was definitely not something like that. Her real nature is the ultimate nothingness that kills things that can’t be killed, even formless concepts.

“The thing that causes death.” That is the ability of Ryougi Shiki.

No weapon could interfere with a sealed world where the space was chained together infinitely with no exit. Because it had no shape, physical weapons that can only interact with physical objects couldn’t clash with it. But, Ryougi Shiki’s power was precisely one that targeted such formless things. - Kara no Kyoukai Chapter 5

This is not metaphor. She literally kills formless laws, like Araya’s bounded fields, which are reified rules imposed on space. It’s like killing the idea that “grass is green.”

She even kills Araya’s infinite dimension:

Infinity is not 「 」. For infinity to remain infinite, the finite has to be defined. Without the finite there cannot exist infinity. Because things have an end, we can observe the thing called infinity.

Ryougi Shiki had been cast into infinity, she saw the impossible finite and cut through it.

Of course, there is no finite inside of the infinite. You can’t slash through what doesn’t exist, so escape from such a cage is impossible. But, if there is no finite then there is no infinite. Whether finite walls exist or not, an endless world holds no meaning before Ryougi Shiki.

If there really is no finite, then it’s not infinite but 「 」. If the finite can be comprehended, Shiki could detect and slash through it.

... The black hole that should have been absolute was just a small dark room to his opponent. The Magus felt ashamed of himself. - Kara no Kyoukai Chapter 5 Kara no Kyoukai Chapter 5

This passage explains that even infinity is a concept: a label the mind gives to the absence of limits. But anything that can be defined is beneath “[ ]”, the void that is the source of Ryougi’s eyes.

“[ ]” is the primordial nothingness that predates all creation, containing all possibilities. To define it is to distort it:

The swirl of the Root is a "place" where all causalities interlace, where all things are in potential, and therefore where nothing is whatsoever.— Kara no Kyoukai Epilogue

If you really wished to pronounce this term, call it “Kara.”Its meaning varied depending on each individual’s understanding. To put it in simple terms, it was the Spiral of Origin. However, since the Spiral of Origin was called the Spiral of Origin, it was no longer “ ”.To properly express this term was a source of headache during the production of the drama CDs. -Garden of sinners Pamphlet: Kara no Kyoukai Settings Glossary

Ryougi is connected to this void, a state beyond form, name, or understanding. Everything we know is flawed compared to it. And she sees those flaws.

That means she can kill anything the human mind can conceptualize: immortality, invulnerability, even infinity.

The claim that “Archetype Earth has no concept of death” mainly applies to typical MEoDP users like Tohno, whose understanding of death evolves gradually from the physical to the conceptual. Ryougi, as a fully realized wielder, goes beyond simply killing: she erases the very concept of existence itself, transcending the usual limits of MEoDP:

“If the finite can be comprehended, Shiki can detect and slash through it.”

— Kara no Kyoukai Chapter 5

Even the concept of lacking death can be cut, because it's still a concept, a mental structure. Ryougi kills the very idea that “this cannot die.”

Void explains it best:

—All that time she was floating there in that ocean which others call the "swirl of the Root." Shipwrecked all alone in the midst of " ".Yes, indeed. If nihil is her origin, then most likely she wills to bring all things to nought. Shiki is able to kill anything without exception, for that reason alone. The personality, Shiki, strives to negate. Why? Because that is the original pattern of her soul. The inclination to nihil, which ardently wishes the death of all creation.

—That is Shiki's capability. Much like Asagami Fujino, she perceives a unique channel in which things unseen by others become visible. When she "looks" at them, she is seeing a glimpse of the architect's floor-plan for all reality. That is the "swirl of the Root." - Kara no Kyoukai Epilogue

Remember how God’s Word accesses the records of reality? Ryougi’s eyes operate at the same level:

"Hm... It appears the effect is weaker on you. Your connection to the Fountplaces you on the same rank as my words. But that's been accounted for. Here,even Ryougi Shiki cannot perceive death. Though, of course, I can't seeanything here either." - Kara no Kyoukai Chapter 6

So while God’s Word accesses the record of “Archetype Earth” and speaks her out of existence, Ryougi simply deletes it, as if it was never there. You can’t resist that with “lol no concept of death,” because even the idea of your existence, including the idea that you lack death, is something Ryougi can perceive and erase.

Furthermore, beyond her feat of killing infinity, Ryougi has a direct achievement of defeating a reality warper even stronger than Archetype:

"You." "Cannot." "See Me."

The mage's voice echoed, resonating directly in my mind. Its truth was undeniable. In an instant, I lost sight of him, and my swung knife cleaved empty air.

"Wha..."

I scanned my surroundings. There was no one else in the chapel, only the presence of another person transmitted to my skin. Kurogiri was indeed right in front of me, yet his form remained unseen.

"...That was dangerous. I underestimated your ability to act faster than I could speak. As a result, I lost an arm. It's no wonder Araya was defeated. You possess a remarkable aptitude for killing."

The voice came from right in front of me. I suppressed my urge to attack, focusing my consciousness on my immediate vicinity. If I couldn't see him, I only needed to perceive his lines of death...

"You cannot defeat me," the voice echoed directly in my thoughts.

But before it finished, his death lines materialised before my eyes.

"Found you."

This time, I wouldn't let him escape. Once again, I charged towards the mage.

But... I lost sight of him again.

"This Place." "Inhibits." "Sight."

The voice reverberated through the chapel, which had now plunged into complete darkness. With a single word, the world turned invisible, devoid of light.

"Hm... It appears the effect is weaker on you. Your connection to the Fount places you on the same rank as my words. But that's been accounted for. Here, even Ryougi Shiki cannot perceive death. Though, of course, I can't see anything here either." - Kara no Kyoukai Chapter 6

"This is futile. I already explained, you cannot defeat me. Even you, who can kill anything, cannot vanquish words."

It was a truth I'd never contemplated. Words were the one enemy beyond my reach.

"However, that doesn't grant me the power to kill you either. This is the extent of my abilities. Any closer, and you could overpower me with ease. There will be no exchange of lives. I am no warrior. My role is simply to fulfil your desires." - Kara no Kyoukai Chapter 6

Here, Ryougi is able to outright attack God's Word before he can fully rewrite reality with his Unified Language. He notes that his power is less effective on Shiki due to her connection to Akasha being comparable to his words as an ontological truth. This allows her to resist his reality warping or strike with MEoDP before his commands fully takes effect.

His only option was to remove the concept of sight from the area, even for himself. This meant Shiki couldn’t perceive lines of death. Yet, even that created only a stalemate, he admitted that if he got any closer, she could have easily killed him. He only removed sight, not other senses, which Shiki could use to perceive and apply death if he attacked or issued another command. So he decided to end the fight and retreat.

In other words, Shiki literally made a reality warper above Archetype run away from her and resisted all his rewritten laws. People claiming Archetype can survive her are coping hard.

----

"Well, Ryougi is just a human girl, so Archetype can kill her before she can cut her lines of death!"

Nope. That’s a long-running misconception repeated by people who clearly haven't read Kara no Kyoukai carefully.

The idea that Ryougi Shiki is physically ‘normal’ is laughable. She is closer to a living program, a being built to execute any task with perfect precision. At her core are hundreds of personalities, each like a separate software module capable of mastering a specific skill to its absolute limit:

‘The Ryougi family is a dynasty, like the Asagami and Fujou families. They strive to create humans beyond human, using various methods to ensure the birth of an heir who can carry their family’s ‘inheritance.’

‘They devised a supernatural ability that lets them appear as normal humans. No matter how perfect a body or natural aptitude, a person can only master one talent at the top. The Ryougi family solved this by imbuing one body with countless personalities—like a computer running hundreds of specialized programs. That’s why her name is Shiki—the kanji relates to “shikigami” (a spirit) and mathematical formulas: a program fulfilling any task perfectly. An empty doll with countless identities, modifiable with new personalities possessing different morals, thought patterns, even senses.’

— Kara no Kyoukai Chapter 5

Her fighting style is no preset choreography. She reconstructs her body and mindset anew each battle:

‘I train by taking down everything using that as my premise… We aren’t of that school. And it’s originally a self-created style as well.’

— Kara no Kyoukai Chapter 5

‘You remake your body. From your breathing to foot placement, awareness, thoughts—everything changes to suit combat. Even muscle use changes, so it might feel like you become a different person.’

I suppose tensing your body and mind as a fight starts, and while you are fighting, is the foundation of all martial arts. However, we followed only that too much, and as a result our path went too far." - Kara no Kyoukai Chapter 5

— Kara no Kyoukai Chapter 5

The Ryougi family’s principle is to go beyond fixed forms, to become whatever form is best suited to kill. This is why Shiki’s combat style is so fluid and unpredictable: she adapts completely to each fight, never bound by fixed techniques.

This is empowered by Shiki’s Origin, a primordial vector predating even the soul, a cosmic force setting the direction of all existence:

"The direction of everything that arose from fundamental cause. The α that enabled the existence of α, the absolute order that existed at the very core. For instance, something with the Origin of 'taboo,' regardless of being born as a human, animal, or plant, would always exist to go against the morals established by the collective. It was the idea that, independent of the process of reincarnation, humans acquired bodies and wisdom from the directional force at the point of origin, and acquired personalities that were only slightly different from their prior lives. Individuals who awakened their Origins would be consumed. This was due to 'personality' being something merely on the magnitude of one hundred years; it would be overwritten by the directional force born from the origin. However, humans (human bodies) who were overwritten by their Origins would acquire great powers. Araya Souren learned the technique to awaken Origins during his research into the root of humanity. Of course, he only awakened the Origin of one person." - Garden of Sinners Pamphlet - [Other] : Origin

"Kokutou, do you believe in past lives?"

"You mean like, living as an animal before being born as a human? Hm, I suppose it'd be a maybe. While I can't deny it, it's not like I approve of it either."

"I couldn't think of an answer more befitting of you. Well, for the sake of discussion, let's hypothesise that they do exist. Even when speaking scientifically, there are grounds for believing in reincarnation. Every particle that exists in the universe eventually changes forms, right? So long as you don't factor in concepts like our minds and souls, everything will eventually be reincarnated as something else.

An Origin is a means of retracing that orderless rule. There are some mages who allow themselves to be possessed by their past lives in order to use their abilities. Basically, it's an attempt to bring the abilities you possessed before being born into the present. An Origin is a similar concept, but it exists on an even higher plane than that. If we possessed lives before our current ones, then it'd only make sense for that life to also have one previous to it. Even if you weren't born as a human in your past life, and even if you weren't a living being in the life before that, there lies a thread of existence that ties it all together. For every one of us, there exists a beginning of our soulsーa birthplace of our existences. However, the concept of living beings does not exist there.

All that exists is a genesis, a direction for causality to move in. Within the fount where all originates, an orientation toward something is born in a flash of lightning. That prerogative toward a certain something begins to flow, eventually taking a form suitable to it. Sometimes, it just so happens to be the form of a human being. Perhaps you could call it a driving force that emerged at the beginning of all things. It's an inescapable impulse to accomplish something born from within the chaos of the Fount of Origination. An absolute imperative for all that have been given form to fulfil their purpose. That impulse is what we mages refer to as an Origin. - Kara no Kyoukai Chapter 7

When someone awakens their Origin, like Shiki did, and align with their instincts in combat, their body undergoes an internal shift that makes them return to this original form:

"When those instincts surface, they also bring a slight change to the physical body. Not in terms of appearance, but its internal makeup. Apparently, it's some sort of return to our original forms. The point is, people don’t even realize it’s happening until it’s over." — Kara no Kyoukai, Chapter 7

This means that awakened Origin users, when in the right mindset during combat, are no longer limited by ordinary biology or physics. Instead, they become a living embodiment of their Origin, an abstract, metaphysical force beyond reincarnation and physical form. Their body’s internal structure shifts subtly to express this cosmic power.

Therefore, whether Shiki appears as a “human” or a young girl is irrelevant in battle. What she truly becomes is the living embodiment of a fundamental cosmic principle, her Origin. What is her Origin? It is Nothingness:

"Nothingness is itself your murder impulse, your origin.--- Look upon that darkness. And remember your name." - Kara no Kyoukai Chapter 5

By the way, Shiki constantly seeks death becauseher Origin is Emptiness, and the reason why Azaka refuses to be bound by rulesis because hers is Taboo. Shiki's being driven by that impulse because she's tooclose, but Azaka's pretty much a normal girl, right? An Origin is only a cause,meaning it isn't ordinarily something that rules over an individual. - Kara no Kyoukai Chapter 7

—But not only did they keep me alive, they woke me up. They did not implant some readymade personality into me. They awakened the " " which is my origin. The outside world was thrust upon me. - Kara no Kyoukai Epilogue

—My origin is nihil. From nihil I originated, the flesh that I am, the corpse in the womb to which life was somehow given. That is why Shiki can perceive death. For two years, in her comatose state, she was unable to view the outside world, and could do nothing but gaze into the nihil that Ryougi Shiki "is." More than simply seeing, she felt death. - Kara no Kyoukai Epilogue

“Nothingness” refers to the primordial void before creation, where everything exists only in potential, and thus, “nothing” is. Her very name symbolizes the division of this void into Yin and Yang, the dualities that give rise to all existence:

Taiji [Others]

A philosophy originated in ancient China, a graphical representation of the Yin-Yang theory. It attempts to capture the essence of everything on a conceptual level: those that are active are defined as Yang (white), and the opposite are defined as Yin (black).

The Taiji symbolizes opposing concepts such as day and night, light and darkness, male and female. At the same time, you may also call it a condensed version of the ever-changing, dynamic World.

Furthermore, there is a dot of Yin in Yang, and conversely a dot of Yang in Yin. This indicates that the distinction between Yin and Yang is not absolute. There is darkness even in light.

Taiji is the "one" at the beginning, the Yin and Yang that divide the "one" are called Liangyi (Ryougi). - Kara no Kyoukai Special Pamphlet - Encyclopedia: Taiji

In other words, when Shiki fights, she is not just a “superhuman girl.” She is the embodiment of the Nothingness before form, which allows her to automatically take the form most suited to defeat her opponent, unconstrained by the physical limitations of the world.

Some examples? Here is Shiki dodging a sight-based spatial distortion, something normally unavoidable because it manipulates space itself, in the very instant she perceives its effect:

The stack of materials Shiki is hiding behind is instantly smashed. At that instant... a white figure streaks out of the wreckage - Kara no Kyoukai Chapter 3

Fujino's eyes glimmer. The left eye for a rotation to the left. The right eye for a rotation to the right. Taking Shiki's head and left leg as the fulcrums, she twists. A strange sensation occurs instantaneously. The moment Shiki feels the invisible power upon her, she jumps explosively to one side. But the power on Shiki does not weaken. Fujino's power is not a projectile weapon. Even if one gets away from one round, it is impossible to get completely away from it whilst in her vision....... Damn......!! Shiki realizes Fujino's power is stronger than she thought. She runs. As if to escape from her vision, Shiki runs in a circle around Fujino.

"Do you think you can get awa-"Fujino murmurs, but then is astonished. Shiki did get away! Unbelievably, Shiki has jumped off the bridge down to the ocean. The sound of a window being broken is heard. What athletic ability... Shiki went off the bridge and into the parking lot right underneath it. - Kara no Kyoukai Chapter 3

Here is Shiki killing a being who surpasses the physical limits of any living creature despite being severely injured, faster than he can even comprehend:

"Who..."

"...Huh?" The monster couldn't comprehend it. Ryougi Shiki's actions, executed with an impassive face and only her blue eyes gleaming, were imperceptible to him. Her movements, as swift as a predator stalking its prey, were beyond the human eye's capacity to perceive. Even with the monster's heightened senses, he couldn't track her movements. The knife that had severed his arm was now aimed at his neck.

"...the hell did you say you'll kill?" - Kara no Kyoukai Chapter 7

The third time, her leg was torn. A sickening squelch followed as concrete soaked with blood. The claws, embedded deep in her bone, stained her foot and the floor, making even standing excruciating. Indeed, merely standing brought agony.

Blood loss clouded her vision, her body teetering on the brink of collapse.

The end was shockingly abrupt. As Lio's arm lunged for her neck, she severedit. Without hesitation, she then severed both his legs. With a swift, mercilessmotion, she plunged her knife into his body, which momentarily floated like aballoon, before slamming him to the ground. The knife, a cruel tombstone,pierced his heart. He gasped once, a final breath, and then it was over. Lio's faceremained frozen in shock, too stunned to comprehend the fate that had befallenhim as his life functions ceased. - Kara no Kyoukai Chapter 7

Lio's corpse showed no bleeding; the vibrant crimson staining the warehouse floor was solely hers. With limbs torn and flesh ripped, her life would likely be measured in mere minutes. Or perhaps, as Ryougi Shiki, she could potentially extend that time until help arrived. But she made no move. A sigh escaped her lips as she relinquished the knife, collapsing onto the cold floor.- Kara no Kyoukai Chapter 7

Shiki demonstrates impossible knife trajectories:

-- Even that, is too slow. "Still in that crouched position, Shiki puts her hand behind her. Inside the belt that tightens the kimono is the second knife. As soon as she pulled the knife out to the side from her belt, she immediately threw it at the mage.

The knife blade penetrates the two-fold ward. Like a stone skimming the water the knife bounced twice off the top of the circle, and flew towards the mage's forehead. At the speed of a bullet.

"---?!"

The mage nimbly evades. The knife nicks the edge of his ear and disappears into the corridor, and the ear which had appeared to have evaded the attack has been carved off. Flesh, blood, broken bone. Brain fluid leaks out of the wound.

"--- Ugh."

Here she is able to attack God’s Word before he can complete his reality-warping commands:

"You." "Cannot." "See Me."

The mage's voice echoed, resonating directly in my mind. Its truth was undeniable. In an instant, I lost sight of him, and my swung knife cleaved empty air.

"Wha..."

I scanned my surroundings. There was no one else in the chapel, only the presence of another person transmitted to my skin. Kurogiri was indeed right in front of me, yet his form remained unseen.

"...That was dangerous. I underestimated your ability to act faster than I could speak. As a result, I lost an arm. It's no wonder Araya was defeated. You possess a remarkable aptitude for killing."

The voice came from right in front of me. I suppressed my urge to attack, focusing my consciousness on my immediate vicinity. If I couldn't see him, I only needed to perceive his lines of death...

"You cannot defeat me," the voice echoed directly in my thoughts.

But before it finished, his death lines materialised before my eyes.

"Found you."

This time, I wouldn't let him escape. Once again, I charged towards the mage.

But... I lost sight of him again.

"This Place." "Inhibits." "Sight."

The voice reverberated through the chapel, which had now plunged into complete darkness. With a single word, the world turned invisible, devoid of light.

"Hm... It appears the effect is weaker on you. Your connection to the Fount places you on the same rank as my words. But that's been accounted for. Here, even Ryougi Shiki cannot perceive death. Though, of course, I can't see anything here either." - Kara no Kyoukai Chapter 6

Ryougi can literally act faster than reality can be rewritten. That's more than enough close the distance with Archetype and slaughter her. God's Word clarifies that her very existence is on par with his words due to her connection to the Fount (The Root). This means her Origin is a fundamental truth, much like his statements that can alter the blueprints of reality. This is crucial: since her strength, speed, and MEoDP all derive from her Origin, it's a mistake to treat those powers as separate categories. In reality, Shiki's speed is directly connected to her MEoDP: her brain perceives flaws, then, as she stated, she uses her mind to reconfigure her body, and her Origin makes her fast and strong enough to eliminate threats and bring about their end, ignoring physical laws and conventional limits because Origins are abstract ideas preceding physical matter.

This is why God's Word’s statement is important: if Shiki's Origin equals the foundational truth of Unified Language, then her speed and strength draw directly from that same truth, which, in her case, is the void before form. She is an "undefined" presence no phenomena can attack, manifesting Yin and Yang forces to grant herself the necessary power to deal with any enemy.

"B-but in the fight with Asagami it said her speed needs 3 seconds to close ten meters!"

Yeah, sure. She was just running and closing the distance on Asagami, who was standing still doing nothing. Like I showed above, Shiki's speed isn’t fixed: it varies by situation. Running up to a defenseless target doesn’t require her Origin to kick in hard. But even so, she moved that fast despite a violent storm around her. Even though her actual speed didn’t need to be incredible, her Origin still made it possible despite the hazards. And once Asagami starts using her distortion? Ryougi instinctively senses it and dodges instantly, defying a space manipulation ability. Add all other examples together, and it’s clear Shiki’s speed becomes metaphysical when needed.

"B-but in the fight with Araya it said her body was that of a young girl and therefore she couldn't withstand a strike that could bring down a concrete wall!"

Do you know the word context? If she were really just a normal girl physically, she wouldn’t have survived a supposedly wall-level attack. The quote simply means her body is biologically human and has natural limits. Since Araya’s Origin of Stillness enforces his will with absolute certainty, his attacks collapse any structure he targets, including Shiki’s body. That’s why, even if Shiki’s durability is superhuman, she couldn’t withstand a strike from Araya that metaphysically ensures its intended effect. It’s like saying, “Even if Shiki’s body were as tough as a tank, Araya’s punch was a wrecking ball that would break through it.”

This is just a desperate attempt to downplay her.

“But planets govern the cycle of life and death, so they control Origins!”

Not quite. Planets don’t govern Origins themselves; they only govern how those concepts express themselves within their realities. An awakened Origin, however, is not just an expression: it’s the concept itself made manifest.

Think of it like music and speakers: planets are like the speakers that play a song: they shape how the music sounds in their environment. But the Origin is the song itself, existing independently of any speaker. No matter how good or bad the speaker is, the song remains unchanged.

Since an awakened Origin draws power directly from the pure concept, it exists beyond any planetary influence. No reality can deny or suppress it.

In short, planets set the stage for how concepts appear and act, but the Origin is the fundamental truth behind those concepts: the source from which all expressions flow. It is absolute and transcendent.

-----

In short, what have we learned?

1. Ryougi in combat embodies a cosmic force, making her body fluid and able to automatically become fast and strong enough to kill any target.
2. Her MEoDP can kill abstract concepts, laws, and realities, anything that can be expressed in words can be ended. This includes the very existence of Archetype Earth and the concepts that define her being, such as the absence of a concept of death.
3. Shiki can resist even the Unified Language thanks to her Origin, forcing a reality warper stronger than Archetype Earth to retreat.

Let that sink in: Ryougi has two feats of defeating beings that surpass Archetype Earth in both invulnerability (infinity itself) and reality warping (God’s Word).

Self-Hypnosis Ryougi Shiki blinks Archetype:

We’ve already seen that normal Ryougi Shiki surpasses Archetype Earth by feats and statements. But for completeness, here’s why her Self-Hypnosis state curbstomps her even harder.

Self-Hypnosis is a technique that fully reconfigures the user’s body and mind to become one with their weapon, erasing all unnecessary functions:

Long ago, when the Samurai drew their swords, they naturally accepted that they would kill and be killed. It was not because they were prepared for it as warriors. From the moment they gripped the handles of their swords, they were awakened.

As a result their bodies were only suited for killing, as a result their minds were only focused on survival.

It was not just about getting in the right mindset before a match. When they drew their swords their brains changed functions. It wasn’t that their bodies switched over to combat mode. It was that their brains changed their bodies for combat.

Thus, the muscles are used in ways no living creature should ever use them, the blood vessels would change the route of circulation they took and and they would even cease breathing normally... Yes, all human functions that were useless in battle would be eliminated, and all parts of them would switch into combat mode.

“That stance. I’m surprised at your transformation through self-suggestion.”

The Magus in pain muttered, and the woman in the kimono replied “Yes.”

... The moment Shiki opened her eyes, Araya understood the true nature of the anxiety that ran through him. The Magus cursed his own ignorance. He didn’t think that there was a family that had passed down this technique to the present day. - Kara no Kyoukai Chapter 5

The technique erases all unnecessary functions, that includes personality, identity, ego. What remains isn’t a person. It’s a function. That state of pure function without self is extremely close to "nothing." It’s a blank vessel acting with total efficiency.

Because of this, the user becomes "Nothing", no longer human but a living weapon, embodying the nature of combat itself. Humans are flawed, hesitant, and full of contradictions. The Self-Hypnotized state discards all that.

Shiki takes this principle to its highest extent due to her awakened Origin, already aligned with Nothingness. Self-Hypnosis, then, isn’t just a technique for her. It’s Shiki aligning her body with her soul’s true nature. This makes SH Shiki the literal embodiment of " " (the Void) in combat. While normal Shiki dynamically reconstructs herself, SH synchronizes her perfectly with combat art, eliminating flaws and limits.

Araya Souren even noted that she ceased to be Shiki and glimpsed Void Shiki, the sentient will of " " or the Root:

Now, what was with this woman’s response?

What is this vessel here?

This opponent, when did she stop being Shiki?

“I see... I’ve finally met you...!”

Holding his wound above his shoulder with his remaining left arm, the Magus roared. - Kara no Kyoukai Chapter 5

Now, here is her performance against Araya:

Araya saw it.

Strangely to Araya’s sight, the girl who was initially moving slower than his shout was now acting faster than his yell.

Both arms holding her katana jumped up. It was so fast it gave the illusion of a flash of light.

The katana she raised overhead then swung down with even greater speed.

The shout of Shuku was bisected by the sound of her blade, zan.

The distortion of space right in front of her should have crushed Shiki, but the entire distortion was “killed.”

— Kara no Kyoukai Chapter 5

The Magus put strength into his arm again.

All he had to do was open the palm of his hand and clasp it again. That was all, but...

It was too late; before he could, Ryougi Shiki had already started sprinting.

“–––”

Araya made no sound and couldn’t think in time. He accepted the blow.

Ryougi Shiki had literally shot forth like a bullet.

She drew near to the Magus to land a blow, staying in the stance she had while cutting through the distortion.

Her katana cleaved in a straight horizontal line before she took a step forward.

The Bounded Field the Magus relied on dispersed.

...If it were only the outer perimeter, Araya was ready to let it be killed in one blow. Even if she got close, he intended to use the moment when Shiki was focused on killing the second layer to decide the match.

However, with just one swing, she simultaneously annihilated two Bounded Fields outside her range. She took another step forward.

If her katana swung at such extreme speed, what must the speed of her footwork be?

— Kara no Kyoukai Chapter 5

With only one step, Ryougi Shiki reduced the distance between them from four meters to zero.

Her body flowed. The first step she took was simultaneously a step forward and a step toward unleashing a deadly slash. Her body was so quick, it felt more like time was rewinding rather than stopping.

The deadly slash rushed at him.

The Magus jumped backward.

— Kara no Kyoukai Chapter 5

The Magus’s right arm fell off as he jumped away. No, not just his arm—everything diagonally from the top of his shoulder to his chest had been cut off and fell to the floor.

He had jumped back after being completely cut through. It didn’t even register to him that he had been cut.

— Kara no Kyoukai Chapter 5

...That blow surely would have been fatal. If Shiki’s second deadly slash had killed three Bounded Fields instead of two, Araya’s body would have been bisected at the torso.

Fugu, the Magus’s first Bounded Field, protected the most immediate surroundings. Its protection forced her steps to be slightly shallower, allowing the Magus to escape a fatal wound.

No, that wasn’t the surprising part.

Shiki was completely different from last night.

— Kara no Kyoukai Chapter 5

Shiki in this state moves and fights in seemingly impossible ways. She ignores physical distances, makes time feel not just stopped but outright rewound, and even a supernatural being like Araya cannot fully comprehend her movement. His Bounded Fields, reality-shaping rules, are barely enough to slow her, and she acts without delay between actions.

Araya further confirms what she is doing compares to ancient samurai who mastered combat so completely that physical distances became meaningless:

It dawned on Araya. For the old style of swordsmen who existed in the past, a distance of just five and a half meters was practically nothing. It was likely this Shiki could have closed about nine meters in a single step.

— Kara no Kyoukai Chapter 5

So what is really going on here?

Well, since Shiki is fully embodying " " (the Root) here, her combat style carries the same undefined, perfect nature as the Root: naming it would only reduce its perfection. Her swordsmanship in this state is so flawless and whole that her actions transcend reality itself, allowing her to ignore space, time, perception, and conventional causality. It's as if reality is unable to comprehend her perfect swordmanship, making her unbound from its logical framework.

I don’t think I need to explain why she absolutely folds Archetype Earth. She would be dead before she could even realize it.

The only reason Araya lasted as long as he did is that Shiki was literally dying during this fight, yet already this strong:

Even if Ryougi Shiki were to awaken, there is nothing she could do. Monitoring her is unnecessary. Besides, given her injuries, even standing would be difficult. Even if she wakes, her body will be incapable of moving properly.

— Kara no Kyoukai Chapter 5

Ryougi Shiki looked at the Magus with her sword still in mid-swing. A single line of fresh blood spilled from her lips. She had not received a new wound-just the reopening of injuries from last night. Her body had several broken ribs and some organ damage; just walking caused blood to flow out of her mouth. Even with such wounds, she unveiled an impressive dance with her blade.

— Kara no Kyoukai Chapter 5

Coughing, drops of blood escaped her mouth. If it weren’t for the wounds from last night, she might have slashed the Magus without pause and severed his head.

— Kara no Kyoukai Chapter 5

Not only that, but Araya is more powerful than Archetype Earth and the conceptual opposite of Shiki’s powers, making him uniquely suited to fight her on top of that.

Araya Souren blinks Archetype:

Araya Souren is arguably the most gaslighted character in Type-Moon, not because of any intentional oversight maybe, but simply because too few have truly read and understood his story. He is one of the most absurdly overpowered antagonists in all of Type-Moon’s lore, yet the most common comparisons you’ll find online pit him against Kirei or Yumizuka… which is laughably reductive.

Some dismiss him as “just a magus,” as if that alone defines his limits. But that is equally ignorant. Araya is explicitly:

1. A being who has existed since the dawn of humanity, maintaining his existence by restoring his decaying body through sheer force of will.
2. The supreme hand-to-hand combatant of the modern era, forged in an age before weapons, shaped by battles lost to time, and wielding a primordial style refined across the rise and fall of civilizations.
3. The physical manifestation of Hell itself.

... Hellish. What I mean by saying that, Kokuto, is that if the idea of Hell was to gain a will and take the form of a man, my hypothesis is that it would be something like him. To the degree that he couldn't accept others, he was just absorbing misery. His ability as a mage was full of flaws, but his strong ego surpassed everything.

--- It was a coarse guy like that who I fell for." - Kara no Kyoukai Chapter 5

“Indeed. In fact, it’s been two years since we met like this.”

A heavy voice that almost seized the listener’s brain.

—Kara no Kyoukai, Chapter 5

The door—through which no visitor should have come—opened.

Silent, yet accompanied by a presence unlike any other, a man entered. He was tall, broad-shouldered, his grim face cloaked in shadow like a philosopher eternally pondering an unsolvable question. He looked as if he had always been this way.

His gaze was stern and sincere, but carried a sense of finality so intense it bordered on terror. The atmosphere grew so stifling it felt like the room had become a vacuum. Even she, who did not fear death—only the brevity of life—found herself sensing death’s presence in this man.

—Kara no Kyoukai, Chapter 5

"Therefore, the way that Araya had to eliminate Touko was to engage her in hand-to-hand combat after closing the distance. Araya was a man who had survived turbulent times. In terms of fighting with his body as a weapon, someone from the modern era couldn’t hope to oppose him." - Kara no Kyoukai, Chapter 5

"What came to mind was only a vast, burned wasteland. No matter how many steps I took, there were only endless corpses. The gravel spread along the riverbank was not stone but fragments of bone. The stench of death carried by the wind sought to fill all of existence; never ceasing. It was an age of conflict. A time before weapons were invented, where those who lived only today would fight with their own hands." -Kara no Kyoukai, Chapter 5

Araya Souren was not like some Puppeteer who had died after preparing a completely identical copy. He still had not experienced death. His body had rotted away several times over the years, each time this happened he maintained his consciousness and so far continued to live on. Araya Souren was only one person. If this body perished, there would be no refuge next time. Things had to be handled carefully.- Kara no Kyoukai Chapter 5

Dude just negs the collective willpower of humanity while he is at it:

That Counter Force is the consciousness of every human being on earth. Do you really think you can win against the will of nearly six billion people all by yourself?”

“I will win.”

Without any hesitation and without exaggeration, the Magus replied immediately.

A living hell that had collected the deaths of many people. The Magus had imagined each person’s history and the future that should have existed beyond their actual end. No matter how meaningless the death was, he lived as if it were his own.

Touko thought it was an extreme ego, forged like steel, that would win; even if it meant making all of humanity into his enemy.

Araya Souren possessed that. Whether it was true or not wasn’t really an issue, what mattered was his unshakable will to assert it as truth. When he asked this question, Araya Souren must have clearly imagined having to confront the dignity of six billion people; one by one.

Araya had answered that he would win. He imagined the struggle as if it were reality, even after realizing how painful it would be. This strength of will was the strength of the Magus. - Kara no Kyoukai Chapter 5

Like Shiki, Araya Souren awakened his own Origin. That Origin being Stillness:

The mage's discourse continues. "As a reference, I do not die. My origin is 'suspension'. Someone who has woken to their origin becomes ruled by that origin itself. Someone who has already stopped - how can you kill him?" Shiki doesn't reply. - Kara no Kyoukai Chapter 5

“Those who have their Origin awakened are bound by their Origin, huh? I see; my impulse was ‘stillness’.”

The Magus spoke sarcastically, not for anyone else to hear. - Kara no Kyoukai Chapter 5

This Origin, true to its name, is the absolute halt of all change and motion, severing Araya's personal will from reality’s flow, to the point that even Death cannot claim him, since he exists entirely apart:

Although Araya is average as a magus, his talents relating to Bound Field construction is exceptional.

A bound field divides what is inside from the outside. In order to construct a complete world from his own body, first Araya must complete himself.

Araya, who has no exceptional talents, is able to become a first-class bound field master by completing himself through the accumulation of ages and sheer determination.

That which divides the inside from the outside, Kara no Kyoukai is his story.

Araya symbolizes the paradoxical spiral, the most important event in this tale.

Talking about the impossible, what Araya accomplished is like achieving the pinnacle within a field while being completely oblivious of even the name of this subject field. - Garden of sinners Pamphlet: Kara no Kyoukai Settings Glossary

Stillness is the core of this separation. It divides the “inside” (Araya’s will and vision) from the “outside” (reality and other beings). This lets him build “complete worlds from his own body” that overwrite the natural order within the bounds of his Bounded Fields. His only limitation is that he must “complete himself”: he has to fully comprehend how reality works to internalize it into his vision. Anything he fails to grasp remains "outside", beyond his control.

This means the more he understands, the more complex and stable the worlds he can construct become. That is exactly what he did in Paradox Spiral:

What’s important is not the quantity of death. It is the quality of death. Tracing back to the source, the forms a death can take can be categorized into broader distinctions. Dissecting the possibilities of death into every possible route, I arrived at the sixty-four possibilities present here. Here I have gathered the people who shoulder those varieties of death. Therefore, this place is a microcosm of the whole world. By experiencing their suffering, I am able to comprehend their suffering. I am able to simplify the eight divine signs into four simple forms and arrive at Ryougi, the Two Forms.” - Kara no Kyoukai Chapter 5

By observing all possible ways a person can die and cycling them endlessly through Alba’s puppets, Araya gained a deep understanding of how possibility and interaction eventually lead to nothingness. Each death inside the building added depth and weight to his comprehension, revealing unique archetypes behind each form:

Within this building that repeats the spiral of daily life, the original form of all the deaths that humans experience is swirling around. The records that the physical body called Araya Souren contained until now, this building has succeeded him as their container. This place was him, his will itself.

... So, that meant that she was inside his body.

Touko observed the atmosphere filling the lobby as she muttered to herself. The strained air wasn't for Araya's benefit. Rather, it was the soundless hatred of all the residents who had been murdered by this building.

This amount of hatred that threatens to crush even her, day by day, Araya keeps expanding it. To borrow his words it wasn't the amount he was increasing but the quality. Since in the end, all those hundreds of deaths were but one identical way of dying.

Murder born from love, in other words family, lover, mother, father, child.

Murder born of hatred, in other words family, lover, friend, upperclassman, stranger.

Various ways of dying for various reasons.

Repeated everyday, a conclusion that keeps getting clearer.

--- Death, becoming denser.- Kara no Kyoukai Chapter 5

Through this spiral, Araya learned how to seal every interaction and all of its resulting phenomena within Stillness. He distilled these interactions into broader principles like the “eight divine signs,” following the Yin-Yang (Taiji) framework, a structure for how the Root’s boundless potential unfolds.

This is a continuation on the subject of the Taiji, but the division of the chaotic 「　」 into two is Ryougi. In order to further stabilize this, and in order to increase the number of classes available, they divide it into four phenomena. They then further increase the complexity by cutting it into eight trigrams. Like this, they keep dividing by a base of two. - Kara no Kyoukai Chapter 5

Taiji [Others]

A philosophy originated in ancient China, a graphical representation of the Yin-Yang theory. It attempts to capture the essence of everything on a conceptual level: those that are active are defined as Yang (white), and the opposite are defined as Yin (black).

The Taiji symbolizes opposing concepts such as day and night, light and darkness, male and female. At the same time, you may also call it a condensed version of the ever-changing, dynamic World.

Furthermore, there is a dot of Yin in Yang, and conversely a dot of Yang in Yin. This indicates that the distinction between Yin and Yang is not absolute. There is darkness even in light.

Taiji is the "one" at the beginning, the Yin and Yang that divide the "one" are called Liangyi (Ryougi). - Kara no Kyoukai Special Pamphlet - Encyclopedia: Taiji

By fully replicating how Yin and Yang, light and darkness, interact to produce life and death through his experiment, Araya turned the apartment complex into a microcosm of the universe: a perfect mirror of the Taiji, containing every causal law and form of suffering within its walls:

“Wait Araya. I have one question. The original purpose of this apartment complex is to represent the Taiji in order to take in the Taiji, wasn’t it?”

“Indeed. I created this alien world to completely cut off Ryougi Shiki from the outside world. The other various functions are just accessories.” — Kara no Kyoukai, Chapter 5

A temple of Taiji. It could be called the artificial manifestation of the inner landscape of Araya Souren, who did not have a Reality Marble. - Garden of sinners Pamphlet: Kara no Kyoukai Settings Glossary

The building explicitly became a temple of the Taiji, a self-contained universe that sealed all its phenomena within. Remember: Araya’s Origin of Stillness allows him to sever his internal vision from the outside world. Once he fully internalized how the Taiji operates, the fundamental Yin-Yang dualities that govern all phenomena, his Origin projected his inner world outward as a closed, personal microcosm of the Taiji.

Because the Taiji governs how every possible phenomenon in the universe can interact, the apartment complex itself became an extension of Araya’s being: a complete world that unfolds exactly according to his comprehension. This mastery evolved his bounded fields into an extraordinary form known as “disconnection of space,” which Touko explicitly says is a miracle on the level of True Magic:

“Sure, you didn’t make a mistake. For you as a Magus, this is the best solution. But, what if the assumption itself is a mistake? You isolated Shiki? Not in a room somewhere in this apartment complex, but you isolated her in this apartment complex itself? A Bounded Field that achieves spacial isolation is already on the level of Magic. It’s a miracle that only a Bounded Field expert like you could create. - Kara no Kyoukai Chapter 5

"Try listening to what someone is saying. A ward itself does no harm. That word, it originates from Buddhism. A ward is always something that isolates an area from the outside world, although it has somehow come to represent technique by which a magician protects his or her body.

Understand? I said this just before, but the best wards don't feel weird to a normal person. Let's call it "an idea which forces itself on the unconscious mind". The best of the best reach the stage of "disconnection of space"; but to go that far you are looking at magicians rather than sorcerers. Currently there's only one magician in this country, so basically that kind of ward just can't be formed. - Kara no Kyoukai Chapter 4

This building is a spell. An altar constructed to solidify Araya Soren's will. In order to carry out magecraft of a grand scale you needed not only an incantation and your own prana, but also the sacrifice of other lives and the strength of the land itself.

No, it wasn't magecraft. A mystery that used a twisted dimension of this level was already no longer on the level of magecraft.

This was --- that was right, a mystery of a province unreachable with today's knowledge. There was no doubt that this was an act of absolute power that human hands could not reach, magic. - Kara no Kyoukai Chapter 5

This is not just flowery exaggeration: Touko even indirectly compares Araya’s feat to the True Magic of Aoko Aozaki, the “only other magician in Japan” at the time, emphasizing that a Bounded Field achieving true spatial disconnection is the hallmark of a True Magician. The entire structure defies modern knowledge and operates at a level beyond what ordinary magecraft can reach. His realm could even open a pathway to the Root itself:

If you use this building a path will definitely open. Since its the realization of the Taeguekdo, a hole would certainly appear. - Kara no Kyoukai Chapter 5

True Magic, by definition, is not bound by the usual frameworks of magecraft. It grants its wielder unparalleled power, including the ability to challenge or defeat entities on the level of Types or cosmic forces. For instance, Zelretch, was able to overcome Type-Moon itself:

Also note is that magic doesn’t follow the rules of magecraft, a big reason Crimson Moon lost to Zelretch is due to not fully grasping this. - Colorful MOON Tsukihime

And Aoko used it to win over the sentient will of the cosmos and override the natural order with her own:

Given this context, it logically follows that Araya, having achieved True Magic, is more than capable of contending with Types or equivalent forces.

His spatial isolation technique is an evolved Bounded Field that doesn’t just compete with reality: it replaces it entirely with his personal universe. Unlike a typical Reality Marble, which is projected and must fight against the world’s natural laws, Araya’s domain is permanently divided from the outside, rendering external interference irrelevant.

In other word, this is ORT's Crystal Valley on steroids. Araya's domain is in fact described as a fully independent universe, completely separated from the laws of physics:

“A twisted dimension of this level should be completely separated from the physical laws of the outside world.”(Kara no KyoukaiChapter 5)

The laws of physics govern all reality and are the foundation of Archetype Earth’s power. Yet, inside Araya’s realm, these laws are irrelevant because the universe obeys his own rules. This makes him effectively a god capable of creating any reality or law at will.

This is reinforced by his domain’s nature as a closed loop, a Möbius Ring, embodying Stillness itself: the absolute denial of change:

“Sure, you didn’t make a mistake. For you as a Magus, this is the best solution. But, what if the assumption itself is a mistake? You isolated Shiki? Not in a room somewhere in this apartment complex, but you isolated her in this apartment complex itself? A Bounded Field that achieves spatial isolation is already on the level of Magic. It’s a miracle that only a Bounded Field expert like you could create.

Those who are trapped by the sealed space of a Möbius Ring can never get out from the inside. A closed world that’s enclosed by walls can’t be destroyed by physical impacts — it’s a cage that’s impossible to escape from. You slapped Shiki in there, which gave you peace of mind.”

— Kara no Kyoukai, Chapter 5

The primary purpose of this distorted alien world was to create a closed loop. By no means, no matter the method or the impact, could one escape from the darkness of Mugen. Even if Ryougi Shiki were to awaken, there is nothing she could do. Monitoring her is unnecessary. Besides, given her injuries, even standing would be difficult. Even if she wakes, her body will be incapable of moving properly.” - Kara no Kyoukai Chapter 5

No weapon could interfere with a sealed world where the space was chained together infinitely with no exit. Because it had no shape, physical weapons that can only interact with physical objects couldn’t clash with it. But, Ryougi Shiki’s power was precisely one that targeted such formless things. - Kara no Kyoukai Chapter 5

A Möbius Ring is a conceptual structure where inside and outside collapse into a single, endless circuit, no matter where you move, you always return to the starting point. In Araya’s domain, this manifests as a closed loop that resets any phenomenon back to his desired origin, ensuring total control and inescapability. Touko herself confirms that the loop’s abstract boundaries cannot be broken by any physical force.

Even if Archetype Earth attempted to rewrite reality, any alteration she makes is already encompassed by the Taiji. the dualities Araya has internalized and encoded into his realm as unchanging laws bound by Stillness. Any deviation is automatically invalid within his closed system.

Most impressively, Araya imposed this conceptual loop on Mugen, an infinite dimension bridging the material world and the Otherworld:

“There is no need for concern. I have not imprisoned her in a room within the apartment complex. I have thrown her into Mugen, the infinite void, that connects the material world to the otherworld.

The primary purpose of this distorted alien world was to create a closed loop. By no means, no matter the method or the impact, could one escape from the darkness of Mugen. Even if Ryougi Shiki were to awaken, there is nothing she could do. Monitoring her is unnecessary. Besides, given her injuries, even standing would be difficult. Even if she wakes, her body will be incapable of moving properly.” - Kara no Kyoukai Chapter 5

No weapon could interfere with a sealed world where the space was chained together infinitely with no exit. Because it had no shape, physical weapons that can only interact with physical objects couldn’t clash with it. But, Ryougi Shiki’s power was precisely one that targeted such formless things. - Kara no Kyoukai Chapter 5

Some mistakenly equate the infinity of the space with the Möbius Ring itself, but this is a misconception. The Möbius Ring represents Araya’s entire realm: the apartment complex, Mugen, and all realities contained within. Mugen alone is specifically described as an infinite void that bridges the material world and the Otherworld. If it were a literal Möbius Ring, it wouldn’t function as a bridge; it would be a sealed loop with no external connections. But because Mugen exists within Araya’s domain, it remains subject to his closed-loop control.

Paradoxically, Araya transforms this infinite space into an endless loop, a kind of downward spiral that continually resets itself no matter what happens. Escape is impossible unless one can sever the very concept of infinity itself, something only Ryougi Shiki, with her unique Mystic Eyes of Death Perception, can do.

In other words, Araya has bent infinity itself to his will. Let that sink in. What could Archetype possibly do in this context?

Because this void is empty and endless, it paradoxically holds infinite potential, lacking any inherent structure or rules. Yet Araya binds that limitless potential to the closed loop of his personal world, meaning even an infinite array of phenomena cannot break free of his boundaries.

As a result, Araya is effectively near-omnipotent within his domain, able to use his True Magic to override external reality with a self-contained universe that is endlessly self-referential.

Outside of his reality-warping capabilities, even Araya’s basic powers within his evolved bounded field are devastating, including teleportation, spatial compression, and erasure of existence itself:

The man looks at the woman below him. With just that, the air in the lobby changed dramatically.

Was this what they meant when they said "the air froze over"?

The tranquil atmosphere disappears. As if the building itself was getting tense after welcoming its true owner.

The air in the lobby becomes tense.

A pressure that makes you wonder if space itself is not responding to the mage's killing intent and crumpling into itself.- Kara no Kyoukai Chapter 5

“Yeah, I still haven’t changed my theory. But this is amazing. I forgot, this place is inside your body isn’t it? Not just the building, but even the air itself is infused with your magical energy. It that’s the case then you can easily crush the space within. So I’ve already walked into a large spell. Hmph, if you were so prepared, why were you cornered and brought to the brink of death by Shiki?” - Kara no Kyoukai Chapter 5

Even though Touko herself had said it, she had failed to understand the meaning to the very end.

This apartment complex was Araya Souren himself. The walls, the floors, common sense regarding buildings did not apply to Araya. - Kara no Kyoukai Chapter 5

Just as the Magus’s consciousness controlled his own body, he had also attuned the activity of the apartment complex with his own consciousness.

This building was inside of his body. The electric wiring was like his nerves, and the water piping was an equivalent to his blood vessels. The pain from his body being cleanly cut inside was not something he could ignore. - Kara no Kyoukai Chapter 5

He could exist in any location within the apartment complex and could manipulate any space within at will. This place was an alien world that embodied Araya Souren. Within the confines of this property, he could instantaneously teleport anywhere. - Kara no Kyoukai Chapter 5

-The magus, with his black coat, was disappearing. Shiki didn't think of stopping him.

The woman he was fighting - at the instant the magus had connected space from the mansion to the garden and moved - had jumped without hesitation from the hallway of the 10th floor. The magus' form still remained on the 10th floor, but she had jumped off to get to Araya Souren at the garden when he hadn't yet existed there. - Kara no Kyoukai Chapter 5

The Magus swung his arm.

The body in the form of Enjou Tomoe was completely annihilated with that one swing.

It was shattered into pieces, not even the head remained. As if it had been that way from the beginning, in the same way the Magus had said it, worthless, it turned into dust and disappeared into the void. - Kara no Kyoukai Chapter 5

Crushing space here means crushing all expression of existence within it, physical, spiritual, and conceptual, by enforcing Stillness as the absolute cessation of change and presence. Araya achieves this through the technique Shuku, compressing space with a mere gesture:

“... Silence.”

A short murmur.

The Magus’s open palm clenched tightly.

It was a motion like crushing something in the palm of one’s hand.

Simultaneously, Touko’s body shook with a violent impact. Her coat, which blocked all forms of magical interference with her Magic Circuits, was shredded to pieces and fell to the floor.

There had been an attack, it was an invisible impact.

Struck equally across her body from every direction, she then fell to her knees.

Touko instantly understood what the impact had been.

... Araya crushed the space in which Touko had been standing. It was as if her entire body had been pressed down upon.

Touko’s tongue was silenced in disbelief. She had no knowledge of what Magecraft enabled such a small gesture to manipulate space.

“... I got hit. Dammit, how many ribs did he break?”

Swallowing the blood pooling in her mouth, Touko assessed the damage to her body. Unlike Shiki,

Touko had no physical training, she had no way of knowing how many of her bones were broken.

All she understood was the fact that her coat had saved her.

If she were to take a hit like that again, she would certainly be crushed. - Kara no Kyoukai Chapter 5

“What?”

With a faint look of surprise, Araya turned around in an instant. Without hesitation, he spread his outstretched palm and clenched it tightly once more.

Onn, a sound like a tremor could be heard.

Touko saw it, the space in front of Araya was collapsing further and further inward. The black cat leaped upward before it could be compressed. As if gravity had reversed, the cat landed on the ceiling and then glared at the Magus below.

“That’s enough.”

From beneath the black coat another arm extended, the fist tightly clenching.

The black cat and the spot on the ceiling on which it rested were crushed.

Bang, one corner of the ceiling caved in and the black cat was crushed, compressed beyond recognition, and disappeared. - Kara no Kyoukai Chapter 5

This is not mundane spatial manipulation like Asagami’s. It is a fundamental power that shrinks space omnidirectionally inward. Anything caught within is compressed until it ceases to exist: body, spirit, and any abstract laws or abilities protecting or defining that space are crushed by Araya’s invisible boundaries. We see this clearly when Araya uses Shuku to compress Touko’s shadow familiar “beyond recognition,” causing it to disappear entirely, despite it being a non-physical shadow made of Ether, designed to ignore conventional attacks and the normal laws of physics:

“A shadow-puppet familiar is it? I see. That would explain why it could nullify all attacks. Even if the ether body projected into the atmosphere was destroyed, as long as the projector, the true body, kept running, it could revive endlessly... It’s a shame, I have to remove such a genius.” - Kara no Kyoukai Chapter 5

Instantly, the black cat starts running.

Crossing the marble floor as if it were sliding along, it runs up the stairs. ...Even so, the cat's feet do not move. Only its eye moves as its sitting shadow races towards the red coated human.

Sucking dry all the oxygen in the lobby in an instant, the sea of flame instantly erased the black cat from the world. That was only to be expected, too. These thaumatergical flames that were well over a 1000 degrees Celsius. Any animal that entered them would soon be melted like butter and turn from a solid to a gas. Passing through the liquid stage wouldn't have taken the time required for a comma.

But Alba saw it.

The impossible shape of the black cat, suddenly appearing once all the flames had burned themselves out.

"--- That can't be right."

Blue eyes stare at the stairs.

The black cat licked its thin black body as if it that last spell had been unsatisfactory, then shifted its gaze to the red mage.

Shuku doesn’t attack the familiar itself; it targets the total space it inhabits and shrinks it into non-being, erasing any conditions that allow the familiar to exist. Once the space is gone, there is no “room” left for the familiar’s existence to express itself, so it vanishes as if it never was.

In this way, Shuku functions as conceptual erasure rather than simple spatial distortion: it denies the very conditions for existence to persist, severing being at its source.

This means Araya need not even bother warping reality against Archetype; he can simply compress the space hosting her existence until it dissolves into nothingness, erasing her and restoring his domain’s terrain as if she were never there.

To sum it up: Araya is a literal walking creation. His evolved bounded fields have ascended to True Magic, allowing him to forge his own universe where all opposing forces are endlessly looped into silence. Even the concept of infinity becomes an extension of his will, having transformed an infinite nothingness connecting different spaces into a recursive containment realm with no escape.

Thus, it is laughable when Araya is merely labeled a “mage tier” character. He genuinely has the most impressive feats in the entire verse outside of Ryougi herself.

"But didn't Araya said he could not defeat a counter guardian if he opened a hole to the Root in his realm?"

Yes, and you already answered your own question:

But, how? Even if you don't set out a magical ward to testify that you aren't a mage, you can't fool the will of the dominant race. The only ones you can fool by using a technological ward are other mages. If you use this building a path will definitely open. Since its the realization of the Taeguekdo, a hole would certainly appear. But the first thing to come out of that hole will be a Counter Guardian. As long as we are who we are, there is no way we can stand up to that." - Kara no Kyoukai Chapter 5

The answer is straightforward: Araya’s power relies on total isolation from the outside world. His True Magic severs a space from causality and external interference, turning it into a self-contained world governed solely by his will. However, opening a hole to the Root undoes this isolation. The moment a connection to the Root is forced open, the realm is no longer closed; and the Counter Force, the world’s automatic immune system, floods in and annihilates the anomaly. This is why Araya needs Ryougi: she can reach the Root without opening a path. She carries the potential within her, bypassing the very flaw that would otherwise undo his entire system. This is not something that would come up in a normal fight.

Ah, and in case it wasn't already obvious, Souren's True Magic is not limited to the apartment complex. The building is just one vessel: a localized expression of his will. His True Magic is in fact an ontological dominion over an entire defined land:

“The Magus escaped from the apartment complex within his own body, to the garden outside of his body.

A green lawn enclosed the apartment complex’s garden; it was within the Bounded Field but not a part of the apartment complex itself. Even if the building was destroyed, this was the only place that would remain unaffected by the impact.” - Kara no Kyoukai Chapter 5

Even as Araya abandons the building that acts as his "body" and prepares to destroy it in a last-ditch effort to eliminate Ryougi, the garden outside, the broader bounded field, remains untouched. That outer space is still part of his isolated realm. It proves that Araya’s domain is layered: he doesn’t just construct a basic barrier. He stops the flow of cause and effect across a chosen area of land, creating a Still World, a disconnected metaphysical zone immune to interference from the outside world, including even the Counter Force. Within that world, he becomes the law.

What’s more, he can designate smaller zones within the larger field, buildings, alleyways, objects, and convert them into personal universes or vessels of his internal world. These vessels act as extensions of his being, each representing a facet of his will or observation. Even if one vessel, like the apartment complex, is destroyed, the overarching field remains untouched. He can either transfer his control to another internal space or manifest a new one from the raw stillness of the surrounding area. His system isn’t just durable: it’s modular, adaptive, and self-replicating. Like a god administering a layered multiverse, he can discard or rebuild individual realms without ever compromising the underlying framework.

In essence, Araya partitions his bounded field into recursive sub-realities, each tailored for a specific function yet governed by his unified will, a cosmic operating system with fail-safes and backups.

Honestly? Archetype Earth got completely outmaneuvered at her own cosmic embodiment game. Pity.

Even Base Araya wastes Archetype:

Even before obtaining True Magic, Araya would still curbstomp Archetype. As discussed in the Ryougi section, Origin-awakened beings embody primordial concepts in combat. In Araya’s case, his Origin of Stillness manifests as an absolute authority that enforces his will without contradiction.

A striking example is how his speed is described as fundamentally different from Ryougi’s, so incredible that it’s impossible to perceive:

"The mage moves. If Shiki left an afterimage of a white kimono in the darkness of the night as she ran, the man melted into the night as he approached his prey. A demon-like speed that didn't even let you grasp the process of him approaching. He stops, next to the immobile Shiki the mage's black coat flaps in the air. Shiki was unable to respond to the mage's unfelt approach. She had been looking --- she had been looking at the man advance towards her, but she can't perceive that the man is standing right next to her ---."— Kara no Kyoukai, Chapter 5

Essentially, Araya uses Stillness to impose his movements over reality itself, placing all opposing forces, even those that would reveal his presence, into complete stasis.

Meanwhile, Shiki herself is already fast enough to potentially kill God’s Word, who surpasses even Archetype Earth, before he can complete his reality-warping commands. Yet even she cannot remotely grasp Araya’s speed, which outright rewrites reality to make it so he already exists at his destination. This means Araya can effectively speedblitz AE before she can activate her powers, enveloping her in his mobile bounded fields; abstract laws that extend across planes, dimensions, and spaces, halting any motion or activity within their range:

Touko had already seen through the fact that Araya had constructed three Bounded Fields arrayed around himself.

Fugu, Kongou, Dakatsu, Taiten, Chiyougiyou, Ouken.

Threads of the Magus’s web stretched across the ground and space, between planes and dimensions.

Any living thing, touching those circular lines would would have its power stopped.

... Normally, a Bounded Field was a stationary construct; a boundary that protected something immovable. Instead the enemy was performing something monstrous, carrying them with him; centered around himself as he moved. For that reason they were visible but gave off no detectable presence. In close-quarters combat, Araya Souren could be said to be invincible. - Kara no Kyoukai Chapter 5

In an anxious manner the mage came forward. Another step, even though he approaches Shiki there is no change in Shiki.... The man's talismans have just shrunk from three to two. The mage clicks his tongue in exasperation. He hadn't considered the possibility that Shiki's Mystic Eyes of Death Perception would be so powerful. To think that she could kill a concept like a ward which had no form, or life, that kind of absolute power ---.- Kara no Kyoukai: Chapter 05

These fields are not passive deterrents: they are proactive seals that prevent movement or the use of any ability. Dakatsu alone can immobilize even someone of Shiki’s caliber:

"Dakatsu"

All movement is being cut off around the mage.

Shiki saw it.

The three circular shapes stretching out from under the black man's feet.

--- Her body, was heavy... ?

The three circles that protected the mage, they resembled a diagram displaying the orbital path of a star. Three thin and long circles are overlapping each other as they rise up from the floor to the air. - Kara no Kyoukai Chapter 5

If an attack somehow bypasses this, Araya can retroactively negate it entirely. With Taiten, even wounds already inflicted vanish without a trace:

At the moment the tips of the mage's fingers touch her face, Shiki twisted her head as if recoiling from them. Just like that she shifts her body to the side and stabs the mage's arm with her knife. Tung, the knife made a dull noise as it severed the mage's left wrist.

"Taiten"

The mage pronounces. The knife blade definitely passed through the mage's wrist, but it doesn't fall from the arm. The edge passed through it cleanly as if cutting a turnip, but the mage's hand doesn't even have a wound upon it. - Kara no Kyoukai Chapter 5

All the while, he erodes the target’s will with Chougyou, a suffocating, almost metaphysical despair that collapses mental and spiritual resistance:

"Chougyou"

His right hand moves. The right hand that he pushed forward in anticipation of Shiki's movements after she escaped his left hand, it has a solid grasp upon her. Grabbing the girl's face with one hand, the mage lifts Shiki's body into the air. Even if Shiki was a girl he looked like a ghost or a monster as he lifted up a human with one arm.

"Ah ---."

Shiki's voice was shaking. There is no awareness in that moan-like sound. All that can be felt from this man's hand is a crushing despair. That lanced through her flesh to reach her brain, and from there it rode down her spine to invade her whole body. - Kara no Kyoukai Chapter 5

Moreover, Araya’s strongest bounded field, Ouken, imposes absolute stasis so complete that he can reach inside a target’s body without resistance:

"Ouken”

Suddenly, a short rhyme was sung out.

The cat completely stopped its devouring of Alba’s body.

Even Touko, who had been watching from the sidelines, reacted to the voice.

From behind Alba there was a man.

He bore a facial expression that was filled with anguish and wore a black overcoat.

Though no trace had given away his existence prior, he appeared so naturally it was like he had been there the entire time.

The man in black grabbed Alba with both hands and effortlessly pulled him from the jaws of the cat and dumped him on the floor. The cat was caught in one of the three Bounded Fields that the man in black was carrying with him and thus could no longer move. - Kara no Kyoukai Chapter 5

The familiar Araya paralyzed here was a non-physical shadow-being that ignored conventional laws and shrugged off material attacks, its body serving as a gateway to a planar space of consumption where its prey was held:

Instantly, the black cat starts running.

Crossing the marble floor as if it were sliding along, it runs up the stairs. ...Even so, the cat's feet do not move. Only its eye moves as its sitting shadow races towards the red coated human.

Sucking dry all the oxygen in the lobby in an instant, the sea of flame instantly erased the black cat from the world. That was only to be expected, too. These thaumatergical flames that were well over a 1000 degrees Celsius. Any animal that entered them would soon be melted like butter and turn from a solid to a gas. Passing through the liquid stage wouldn't have taken the time required for a comma.

But Alba saw it.

The impossible shape of the black cat, suddenly appearing once all the flames had burned themselves out.

"--- That can't be right."

Blue eyes stare at the stairs.

The black cat licked its thin black body as if it that last spell had been unsatisfactory, then shifted its gaze to the red mage.

The black monster resumes its charge.

Inside of the flat, planar cat, the corpses of the protoplasmic creatures it had swallowed earlier are pasted like mud.

Alba realized only then. That this thing was only taking the shape of a cat, and that it was an organism that had only a mouth.

“A shadow-puppet familiar is it? I see. That would explain why it could nullify all attacks. Even if the ether body projected into the atmosphere was destroyed, as long as the projector, the true body, kept running, it could revive endlessly... It’s a shame, I have to remove such a genius.” - Kara no Kyoukai Chapter 5

Yet Araya “paused” it and pulled Alba out from that inner domain as if the target’s defining properties had been nullified, frozen into inert data he could remove or rewrite at will. In the same way, he could “suspend” Archetype Earth from the flow of reality, reducing her to pure potential, then reshape that potential into something as trivial as a dancing monkey for his amusement.

Archetype Earth has long been hyped for her “lack of a concept of death,” seen as a game-changing loophole against death-based powers. But now, she is facing something far beyond that: three superior “no concept of change” states embodied by Araya Souren’s bounded fields.

Archetype Earth’s only realistic path to victory against Araya would be to dismantle his bounded fields, much like Ryougi Shiki does with her Mystic Eyes of Death Perception. Yet this is essentially impossible. Araya’s barriers are not mere physical or magical shields; they are conceptual constructs representing the absolute cessation of all change. They enforce Stillness on every plane of existence: physical, metaphysical, and conceptual alike.

No matter how potent Archetype Earth’s reality warping is, it cannot destroy these barriers, because they are not simply effects subject to alteration. They are the fundamental stasis that prevents alteration itself. Trying to warp or rewrite these laws is like attempting to rewrite the principle of “no change,” a logical contradiction that renders her power ineffective within Araya’s domain.

In short, the very thing Types boast about, evading death, is rendered meaningless here, facing an opponent who embodies the negation of all change itself.

The only scenario where Archetype Earth could dismantle the barriers is if Araya voluntarily disables them, which would be an extraordinary concession on his part.

And even then, most hilariously, Archetype Earth would still lose instantly. Araya's Origin, Suspension, renders him immune to conceptual alterations, in the same way Shiki’s Origin shields her from external influence, such as Kirie’s subconscious manipulation or the language of God’s Word. Not even the Mystic Eyes of Death Perception can kill Araya directly:

"As a reference, I do not die. My origin is 'suspension'. Someone who has woken to their origin becomes ruled by that origin itself. Someone who has already stopped - how can you kill him?" – Kara no Kyoukai Chapter 5

“This body is at its limit.”

“Starting over again? How many times has it been? You never learn.”

That was the spiral. Araya’s sour look didn’t break down until the very end. Touko had a clear look of disdain aimed towards him; she threw away the cigarette she had pinched between her fingers. In the end, she had lit the cigarette but hadn’t brought it to her mouth even once. Though she had disdain for him, she did not hate this Magus, who had become more of a concept. If she had made one wrong step. No, if she had not made a wrong step she surely would have ended up like this too. Neither a human nor a living being, but merely the embodiment of a theory resulting in a phenomenon. Now that she thought that, it was sad.

“Gaha”, Araya vomited blood. The body, starting from the left side had begun to disappear and turn to ashes. “I didn’t make any spare bodies. If we are to meet again, it will be in the next generation.”

“There will be no such thing as a Magus by then. There won’t be a reunion. You will be alone in the end. Even so, you won’t stop?”

“Of course, I won’t accept defeat." - Kara no Kyoukai Chapter 5

His soul is completely immune to any change he does not acknowledge, making him eternal. Just as God's Word noted that Ryougi exists as an ontological truth that even divine language cannot rewrite, Araya stands as a self-contained absolute. He is immune to non-local alterations of his existence. The only part of him that can be destroyed is his physical body, because it retains a thread of interaction with the world, a necessary point of motion that can be severed:

“Even if I am a stopped organism, as long I exist like this there is a thread that permits my existence. If that is cut I would definitely die.” - Kara no Kyoukai Chapter 5

But even those vulnerabilities are so faint that Ryougi, with her Mystic Eyes, had to overheat her brain and lose partial consciousness just to see the death of Araya’s body:

“Her brain may have overheated, because she observed the opponent till a portion of her consciousness went white, only then could she see it…. In the center of his body, she can see a hole in the middle of his chest.” - Kara no Kyoukai Chapter 5

And even if Archetype could perceive those weak points, she would still need to deliver a physical attack infused with abstract force to exploit them. That is far easier said than done, because Araya’s Stillness also enhances his physical parameters, allowing him to overwhelm an opponent in a single, imperceptible movement.

We have already seen above how Araya’s movement bypasses perception entirely, allowing him to appear directly at the target location without any detectable transition. Mikiya experiences this firsthand in Chapter 7, describing how running alongside Araya felt less like physical motion and more like gliding, as if Araya were phasing through space-time itself. Even during what seemed to be a casual dash to rescue him from Shiki, the sensation was otherworldly:

He took my hand and burst forth in a dash, while Shiki trailed behind us. However, his legs moved so fast that it felt like we were gliding through the air. As soon as we exited the grounds of the Ryougi estate, he let go of my hand. I realised I would be able to return home safely if I left without any second thought. - kara no kyyoukai chapter 7

Complementing this blinding speed is a striking method that does not rely on brute force alone. Araya’s blows impose cessation by collapsing the very structure of what they hit; whether a living body, a reinforced wall, or a metaphysically protected form. His strikes target the underlying logic that sustains a thing’s existence and nullify it entirely:

His tightly clenched fist drives into Shiki's stomach. Receiving a blow that could break through a large tree, Shiki's body rises up into the air. With just that one attack Shiki spews out just as much blood as the mage who has had his chest and neck stabbed. With a grating noise, her insides and the bones that were protecting them break.

"---."

Shiki faints. No matter how great a physique she had, her body is still that of a young girl. Even if half the power had been held back, there was no way she could withstand Araya's attack which could break concrete walls. Grabbing hold of her belly with one hand the mage lifts the girl up, and throws her at the mansion wall. It was a brutal action that looked like it should break every bone in Shiki's body, but that too turned into an unnatural event. ... Having been thrown onto the wall Shiki's body was sucked in as if she was sinking into water. Only when the mansion wall had finishing gulping Shiki down, did the mage lower his arm. - Kara no Kyoukai Chapter 5

This is not simply breaking bones or pulverizing matter; it is the erasure of a thing’s functional identity. The text’s references to large trees and concrete walls are not feats of raw power for their own sake, but illustrations of how Stillness, a metaphysical law Araya embodies, dissolves the order and coherence of whatever it touches. He doesn’t just destroy an object; he renders it into pure nullity, stripping away the principles that allow it to exist. Any being or structure that depends on rules, form, or internal order can be unmade at its conceptual root.

Even Archetype Earth, for all her cosmic scale, possesses a body tied to physical form and structural law. A single precise blow from Araya would not merely damage her; it would unravel the framework that sustains her vessel’s existence.

For contrast, Self-Hypnosis Shiki nullifies spatial distance and physical limitation by embodying the "Void", pure negation that ignores the world’s logic. Araya’s Stillness is the opposite in approach but equal in absoluteness: he enforces his own law directly onto reality, overriding its existing structure.

His movements are instantaneous and absolute, honed through centuries of survival in a brutal, weaponless age where death could come at any moment. That life forged his body and mind into pure killing intent, with every motion optimized to end life with finality:

"What came to mind was only a vast, burned wasteland. No matter how many steps I took, there were only endless corpses. The gravel spread along the riverbank was not stone but fragments of bone. The stench of death carried by the wind sought to fill all of existence; never ceasing. It was an age of conflict. A time before weapons were invented, where those who lived only today would fight with their own hands." -Kara no Kyoukai, Chapter 5

"Wherever I went, there was conflict, and the bodies of the dead were, without exception, discarded in cruel abandon. The weak in villages were commonly slaughtered by flocks of strong humans. It didn’t matter who killed whom. On the battlefield, good and evil held no meaning. All that mattered was how many had died and how many could not be saved." -Kara no Kyoukai, Chapter 5

But this is only the physical layer. The true lethality of his strikes is conceptually magnified by his Origin, Stillness, an actual law that refuses to interact with or be bound by the world’s external rules and limitations. Araya doesn’t merely fight; he embodies the concept of combat as an absolute act of cessation and imposed order, erasing motion, intent, and resistance at their root.

But wait, you want to be even more generous to Arcueid? By all means: let’s say Araya doesn’t just lower his barriers, but actually stands there doing nothing, waiting for Arcueid to make the first move. Since his Origin shields him from all conceptual alterations, Arcueid’s only way to harm him would be a direct physical attack. Yet Araya still holds one last ace: the Sarira, a Buddha’s relic embedded in his left hand. This is his ultimate defense against those few who manage to breach his shields and strike his physical body:

“Still inexperienced. I've embedded a Buddha's remains in this left hand. There are no places where you can easily kill it, not even with the Mystic Eyes of Death Perception.” - Kara no Kyoukai Chapter 5

This relic transcends physical law, as it originates from a Buddha, a saint that surpassed the created world and entered the realm of pure abstraction. It negates all forms and concepts conceivable within creation, as all such phenomena are merely reflections of the abstract truths the Sarira embodies. As a result, Araya’s arm becomes virtually impervious to both physical and conceptual attacks, including the Mystic Eyes of Death Perception.

Unless one can directly strike the relic’s physical form with an abstract property precisely attuned to bypass the Sarira’s transcendence (Like Self-Hypnosis Ryougi), it remains invulnerable.

“Even Ryougi Shiki cannot easily cut the protection of a saint.” - Kara no Kyoukai Chapter 5.

Meanwhile, Araya can strike Archetype Earth directly, bypassing her laws and metaphysical protections. The Sarira carries the sanctified essence of Buddha; a principle that exists outside the foundational rules of reality. Because it embodies ultimate spiritual purity and enlightenment, it nullifies any localized law or conceptual safeguard the target may possess.

In essence, the Sarira relic represents transcendence from reality’s structure itself. Araya channels this principle directly through his hand when engaging with physical matter. This allows him to forcibly sever an object’s internal laws or metaphysical attributes, overriding even the most complex forms of protection by invoking the primordial abstraction from which they originate.

Bottom line: Araya utterly obliterates Archetype Earth with his Bounded Fields alone. These fields passively rewrite the laws of reality, reducing all phenomena, including her cosmic authority, into inert, silent data under his control. But even if he deactivates them, his hand-to-hand combat is enough to overwhelm her: Araya is the living embodiment of lethal intent imposed directly onto reality, moving with such conceptual force that opposition becomes meaningless. And should he merely stand still, unmoving, his isolated essence renders all forms of reality warping null, while physical strikes are entirely negated by the Sarira relic. This divine bone allows him to grasp Archetype Earth by the throat and crush her with ease, silencing her utterly with the transcendent weight of Buddha’s enlightenment. She is left powerless before the pure abstraction her entire power stems from in the first place.

Let that sink in: Araya Souren is so far above Archetype Earth that he can dominate her while holding back, not even bothering to activate his Bounded Fields. LOL.

Kirie Fujou probably wastes Archetype:

Indeed, yet another criminally underrated Kara no Kyoukai conceptual powerhouse, Kirie Fujou stands as a dark reflection of Ryougi Shiki herself.

While Ryougi severs the external fabric of existence, erasing phenomena from reality, Kirie dissolves the internal structures that grant meaning and coherence to those phenomena, effectively inviting the void into the mind.

Kirie’s ability works by directly overriding the boundary between conscious will and the unconscious mind. Instead of merely hypnotizing someone or creating an illusion, she implants a belief so absolute that the victim’s mind and body accept it as reality, for example, the conviction that “you can fly.” This bypasses ordinary resistance because it doesn’t rely on logic, perception, or external control; it forces the target’s own mind to act out its buried impulses as if they were true:

"That makes sense. But why weren't you happy with just imagining the outside world? I don't think there was a need to let those girls fall."

Those girls...? Oh, I see, the girls I was jealous of. They were unfortunate. But I did not do anything, because the girls fell on their own.

"The you at the Fujiyoh building was more like a will. You used that, huh? Those girls were able to fly from the beginning, right? Even if it was just an image in their head, or if they really had the power to fly. People flying in their sleep isn't rare, but it never gets to be a problem. Why? Because they only do so in their sleep and they never even think about flying when they are awake. Since they are unconscious, they have no evil will when they are flying.

“Those girls were special even in that case. We're not talking Peter Pan, but it's easier to fly when you're small. Maybe one or two might have actually floated, but most of them should have floated only in their dreams.

“But you made them think about it. You gave them the impression they had while they were dreaming when they were awake.

“As a result, they found out they could fly. Yes, they can fly... but only unconsciously. Flight with only human power is difficult. Even I cannot fly without a broom. The chance of flight under consciousness is about thirty percent. The girls tried to fly as usual, and fell as they were supposed to."

Yes, they were flying around me. I thought they could be my friends. But all they did was float around me like fishes without noticing me.

It was shortly after that I found out they had no consciousness. I just thought they would notice me if they had consciousness. That was the only reason, so why... - Kara no Kyoukai Chapter 1

In essence, Kirie makes the unconscious take command of the conscious. The victim’s repressed drives, especially the human urge to escape limitation or return to stillness (the death drive), become physically enacted, leading them to “fly” and fall to their death. Her power is irresistible precisely because it turns a person’s own psyche against itself; the compulsion arises from within, not from an external source that can be fought or denied.

Only beings with severed or sealed inner worlds can resist:

• Ryougi, whose Origin is literal Void, her inner world is empty.
• Araya, whose concept of Stillness nullifies all external interference, even death itself.

This passage further confirms that Kirie Fujou’s abilities go far beyond mere hypnosis: she fundamentally alters how reality is perceived and sustained:

“So in other words, time there is not working properly. It's not like there's only one way for time to pass by. The time it takes for something to rot away is unfairly different for everything. Then, it should follow that a human individual and its memory take different times to disappear. When someone dies, does that person's memory disappear? It doesn't, right? As long as there are observers, ones to remember, nothing disappears instantly, but gradually fades away.

“Memories, or rather, 'records'. If an observer happens to be in the environment around that person, people like those girls will be preserved by their memories and walk the earth as 'illusions' even after their deaths. This is part of the phenomenon which we know as 'ghosts.' The only ones who see these projections are the ones that share the memories with these ghosts, namely their parents and friends. Shiki, however, is an exception.

"Of course, the passage of time does affect these 'records,' but at the top of that building, it seems to occur at a much slower rate. The girls' memories from when they were alive have not caught up to their true state yet

"As a result, the memories stay alive. What can be seen there are the actions and the existences of those girls whose time happens to be passing by slowly.” — Kara no Kyoukai Chapter 1

Normally, ghosts are fading mental impressions, fragments of memory that linger and can only be perceived by those who shared a bond with the deceased. But Kirie distorts this principle. She preserves those memories unnaturally, transforming abstract remnants into tangible projections visible even to strangers like Shiki. In doing so, she materializes thought, regret, and impulse, while warping the flow of time so that these illusions never fade.

This makes her terrifying in combat: she manipulates time, memory, and perception itself. She doesn’t overpower reality; she destabilizes the logic that defines it.

These powers stem from Kirie’s Origin, a metaphysical truth that transcends physical and spiritual boundaries. Origins express the deepest essence of existence, and Kirie’s allows her to act directly upon the interpretive layer of reality itself. She does not touch matter or spirit; she rewrites the meaning that holds them together.

Every being that exists contains not only the impulse to persist but also its opposite: the latent drive toward cessation, the death drive. This duality is metaphysically unavoidable. Just as all things have “death lines”, the seams in their existence that mark the potential end of form, every sentient being carries a subconscious desire for release, the hidden wish to return to stillness once the strain of existence becomes too heavy. It isn’t moral or emotional, but structural. To exist is to be finite, and to be finite is to have the possibility and eventual inevitability of ceasing.

Kirie’s ability makes this unconscious polarity explicit. Normally, the death drive remains buried beneath awareness, balanced by the will to live. It’s what gives rise to entropy, exhaustion, and the fading of phenomena over time. But Kirie alters the laws that mediate this tension. She doesn’t erase or impose life and death directly; she inverts the process by translating subconscious impulses into physical reality. When the dead girls’ wish to “fly” beyond physical limits became the governing principle of their perception, Kirie’s ability turned that wish into law. Their subconscious yearning to remain unbound, to keep existing as dreams, was externalized, and so their ghosts were frozen in an endless loop where even the natural pull toward death no longer functioned.

This principle applies universally. Whether human, divine, or cosmic, any being that possesses will or awareness also possesses the inverse of that will; the potential to not be. Kirie’s interference reveals and amplifies that duality. By reshaping the interpretive boundary between perception and existence, she can turn the death drive into either a conscious act or a fixed physical law. If the subconscious wish is to endure, she makes it eternal; if it is to rest, she manifests cessation. Even something as vast as Archetype Earth, who embodies the planet’s cycles of birth and extinction, carries that dual impulse. Her will to sustain life inherently includes the wish for silence, the planet’s dream of ending. Kirie’s power would simply bring that hidden truth to the surface and make it real.

And finally, Kirie cannot be harmed by Archetype to begin with. She exists as a pure mind, a vessel born from her Origin’s existential void. Cosmic forces act through structure, but Kirie has none. Her presence unravels coherence, distorts perception, and melts certainty into ambiguity. Gaia cannot strike what has no definition.

She does not confront reality; she erodes the need for it. When meaning collapses, power collapses with it. Her Origin inherently shields her from all alteration, much like Ryougi’s or Araya’s, and her mind-formed nature frees her from concern with physical laws or conventional existence.

Void Shiki blinks Archetype:

No introductions needed. Void is Ryougi's original personality, the personification of "Nothingness ", shaped entirely by its nature in every fiber of her being:

—The simple truth is that I was born dead. Perhaps brain-dead would be more accurate. Normally a newborn will have an infant's body, and this body in turn will be quickened by the first stirring of what's to become its intellect. I did not have that; I was born with nothing whatsoever. By rights I should have died immediately. That which is near to " " simply must not be born bodily into the world. You heard this from Touko, didn't you? The world itself wards off anything that might disrupt it. Ordinarily, indeed, I should not have been born at all.

—Ordinarily a creature whose being is poured out straight from " " simply dies in its mother's womb. That was my case. But the Ryougi clan possessed a technique for keeping such a thing alive.

—So I was born, alive, but without so much as a stirring of intellect. " " is utter nullity, and thus an intellectual nullity as well. I should simply have "lived" with no cognition of the outside world.

—But not only did they keep me alive, they woke me up. They did not implant some readymade personality into me. They awakened the " " which is my origin. The outside world was thrust upon me.

I - the void and vacant "I" - was forced to look at it. I found it an eyesore. I found it altogether too troublesome. So I in turn thrust it upon those two.

—It was only natural. The outside world, if you could call it that, was the most wearisome thing imaginable. Because it was, all of it, down to the last of its innumerable atoms, "already known" to me.

—But you do have a will. She seemed to him then such a tragic figure that he had to say it. Again she nodded.

—I do, after a fashion. A personality of the flesh as such arises in every human, but ordinarily it does not come to any kind of self-awareness. Usually, before that can happen, the intellect stirs to life. From out of the body, more precisely the brain, the intellect is produced.

—The intellect borne out of the brain's activity becomes a personality and gains executive function over the fleshly body. At that point any personality which dwelt in the flesh becomes meaningless.

—It's because of this that the intellect tends to treat the brain which gave birth to it as if it were something specially set apart from the rest of the fleshly body, even though it is just one part of the whole.

—Software is useless without hardware, but hardware can't function without software. The personality borne of the intellect forgets this truth: it forgets that it is the body's product, and it imagines that it is the creator of this fleshly, embodied "I" which it finds itself to be. That is the ordinary case. I am different only in that the order in which these things happened was different for me.

—Even so, the fact that I'm here, now, talking to you is entirely due to the personality of Shiki. If she wasn't here, I wouldn't even have language. I am, after all, nothing but flesh.

—I think I get it, he said. Your ability to "know" or "perceive" the outside world is dependent on Shiki's personality.

—Correct. I am simply an unpowered piece of hardware. Without the requisite software I am just an inert box.

—I am a hollow container which only gazes inward, which communes solely with death - in other words with what Magi call the "Root", though I see no value in it whatsoever.

—Mind you, right now I think there might be a little value to it after all. I could heal a wound like this, for instance. I could come to your aid. Disturb the universe a little. But you don't wish for any of that, do you?

—No, he answered. Shiki's specialty is breaking things. It would be asking too much. I'd be afraid for myself. How serious, that reply? He gave a light smile. Like a butterfly scattered in the afternoon light, her gaze left him in a moment. She lowered her hand, softly as the snowfall.

—Quite right. Shiki can only destroy. And to you, after all, I suppose I am she.

—Shiki?

A long pause.

—My origin is nihil. From nihil I originated, the flesh that I am, the corpse in the womb to which life was somehow given. That is why Shiki can perceive death. For two years, in her comatose state, she was unable to view the outside world, and could do nothing but gaze into the nihil that Ryougi Shiki "is." More than simply seeing, she felt death.

—All that time she was floating there in that ocean which others call the "swirl of the Root." Shipwrecked all alone in the midst of " ".Yes, indeed. If nihil is her origin, then most likely she wills to bring all things to nought. Shiki is able to kill anything without exception, for that reason alone. The personality, Shiki, strives to negate. Why? Because that is the original pattern of her soul. The inclination to nihil, which ardently wishes the death of all creation.

—That is Shiki's capability. Much like Asagami Fujino, she perceives a unique channel in which things unseen by others become visible. When she "looks" at them, she is seeing a glimpse of the architect's floor-plan for all reality. That is the "swirl of the Root."

—But I can see much further than that. No, rather - I may well be that "swirl" myself.

She was looking him right in the eye, but her tone of voice was insecure, uncertain. As if to let slip, between moments, an utterly incommunicable loneliness.

—The swirl of the Root is a "place" where all causalities interlace, where all things are in potential, and therefore where nothing is whatsoever. That is my true shape. Though I am merely bound to it, I am nonetheless a part of it. And the part and the whole of a nothingness are the same, wouldn't you say?

—So I can do - whatever. Recompose the the laws of nature, revert living beings to their evolutionary forebears. To overturn the system of the world, there's simply nothing to it. It's not a remaking. I simply crush the old one with the new world in its place.

She was faintly smiling as she said that. There was a wry twist to her mouth, as if she was mocking how ridiculous she sounded.

—But it's all so pointless, isn't it? Such a tiresome thing. Such nonsense, you might as well dream it up. As indeed I do. Without seeing, without thinking, without even dreaming

- I dream. - Kara no Kyoukai Epilogue

While normal Ryougi glimpses into " " with MEoDP, Void is so deeply connected to it that she can be seen as one and the same with it. She is essentially what the Root would be like if it gained a sentient will. This grants her near-omnipotence: the power to alter the fundamental laws of the world or to destroy and remake all of creation.

Yet to her, such power is trivial. She compares it to the act of dreaming, as effortless and detached as breathing. Void sees existence itself as dull and tedious, a consequence of her constant communion with " ", where all possibilities exist in perfect unity, beyond the grasp of any finite concept.

These are not vague metaphors or speculative headcanon, they are explicit, undeniable facts.

So how do Arcueid fanboys cope with this? Simple: they deny reality and claim she’s “bluffing.”

Despite the fact that normal Ryougi already demonstrates top-tier feats with only a fraction of her power, despite Araya specifically wanting her body because it was uniquely and directly connected to Akasha, so much so that he didn’t even need to risk opening a pathway to access it, and despite her characterization as a being so detached and perfect that nothing in existence can compare, all this is dismissed. Why? Because some random fans believe Void Shiki just hyped herself up, ignoring her apathy and the very fact she appeared solely to grant Mikiya a wish.

There’s not much more to say here.

Oh, and speaking of denying reality:

-Archetype already canonically died to normal Ryougi:

Yep, in Melty Blood Actress Again, Ryougi in her base form faced off against Archetype Earth. While the game leaves the outcome ambiguous, the official guidebook clearly implies Ryougi won by stating that her destiny was to become a god killer:

Of course, people coped in the most pathetic ways imaginable. “It just says she’s going to fight her!” even though it explicitly says killing a god. Or “it’s ambiguous,” despite the use of the word destiny and how it frames this as a natural step in her journey. They twisted English itself to fit their agenda. It’s clear these people don’t care about accuracy, only their own narrative.

The funny part? As we’ve already seen, Ryougi is already above AE without even factoring in Melty Blood, and she’s fought far stronger opponents than that. Lmao.

"B-but Void said she cannot beat Primate Murder in GO!"

You mean when she is a Servant, which would restrict her power? Who gives a shit? Normal Ryougi defeated God's Word and Araya Souren, who would both wipe their asses with Primate Fodder.

And that isn't even the worst part: Fate/Grand Order doesn’t even understand KnK's lore.

Void Shiki is completely out of character, reimagined as a generic “wise big sister” archetype who smiles, offers advice, wishes you happy birthday, and even claims to enjoy being “ordered around.” This directly contradicts the original portrayal of Void: a being of pure nihilism and emptiness, who found existence tedious precisely because she perceived all truths. She wasn’t warm, curious, or affectionate: she was cold, remote, and fundamentally detached from human emotion. That’s the core of her character.

This failure isn’t just a matter of tone, it breaks the lore at a fundamental level. In Kara no Kyoukai, an Origin is a cosmic truth that defines a being across all incarnations. It does not change, evolve, or “soften” over time. So if Void’s Origin is truly “Nothingness,” she cannot suddenly become sentimental or develop a sense of self. The very essence of her existence rejects that possibility.

And then there’s the Fount, arguably the most egregious misstep. Grand Order presents it as a physical space: a realm you can walk into, talk in, look around, and describe in simple terms. But this directly contradicts the source material. In the novels, when Ryougi Shiki accesses the Fount during her coma, it is described as a complete and total Void: a place where even light, darkness, gravity, language, and time do not exist. Even concepts like “falling” or “muttering” are impossible there. The Fount is the metaphysical source of all things, it cannot be named or localized without inherently reducing it.

Yet in Grand Order, Void says “this is a place with no boundaries, where things with names should not exist”, while literally standing in it, with a body, and speaking in language to another definable person standing with a physical body. It completely defeats the purpose of the Fount’s nature. And no, the “it was just a dream” excuse doesn’t work: dreams are subconscious reconstructions of known reality. You can’t dream about something truly incomprehensible like the Fount, which by definition has no form, no logic, and no boundaries. The moment it’s visualized or interacted with, it’s already a contradiction.

This is why Grand Order’s portrayal can’t be taken seriously. If the foundation of Void’s power is now a physical realm with set pieces and dialogue, how do you even explain the abstract, reality-warping feats performed by even lower-tier characters in the original novel? You can’t, because it fundamentally misunderstands what Kara no Kyoukai is.

Some morons point to Void’s landscape in her Melty Blood Last Arc as proof that the game respects KnK’s lore. But that’s a misunderstanding. Unlike Grand Order, Melty Blood never claims that summoned realms are the Fount itself. Instead, Void is simply warping reality around her, creating an illusion or reflection that captures the essence of the Fount, not the actual source.

This distinction matters greatly. Summoning a landscape within reality is fundamentally different from actually accessing the boundless, formless Fount that exists beyond all concepts. Melty Blood’s depiction is consistent with the original lore’s abstraction, unlike Grand Order’s physicalized, literal realm.

In short: Grand Order didn’t just nerf Shiki into a Servant (which would make it invalid on itself as a counterpoint). It outright demonstrates a lack of understanding of how Kara no Kyoukai works in the first place.

"Well, Nasu said that Arcueid is the strongest in a random interview!"

Oh really? Have you seen the countless of scans proving otherwise in this blog? Who do you think wrote those? Nasu supposedly. So why should I care? If a random interview statement is contradicted by the actual story, then it is invalid and no less valid than fanfiction. TM is literally the ONLY fanbase that doesn't seem to get this very simple concept. Canon is determined by narrative consistency, not what Nasu says while half-asleep in a Q&A.

Take, for example, when Nasu was asked why Shiki couldn’t kill words in KnK Chapter 6. He claimed that her Mystic Eyes of Death Perception can only kill things that "physically decay:"

Q: Seeing as how Shiki wasn't able to kill words, I'd like to know, how far does her capability to understand death actually extend? <The Red Loser Isn't a Loser!>

Nasu: Well, it's just a rule of thumb, but if it's the normal Shiki then she can kill everything that physically decays. The thing with words is that she doesn't regard their death as "decay" but rather "fading into oblivion".

Takeuchi: Ah, so it's a problem of recognition, then.

Nasu: Of course, that realm of recognition is already no problem at all for the inhuman Miss " ". -Kara no Kyoukai Movie Pamphlet Q&A Chapter 6 – "Oblivion Recorder"

This is an absurd statement, considering Chapter 5 explicitly establishes that MEoDP can kill intangible and formless concepts, hence why Shiki was able to escape Araya’s infinite void. If we were to take Nasu’s comment seriously, KnK would have ended at Chapter 5 because Shiki never would have escaped. No, scratch that, it would have ended at Chapter 3, since Asagami’s distortions were already non-physical. And this isn’t just a powerscaling issue; it’s a direct contradiction of the plot. This passage alone destroys this asinine assertion from Nasu:

Surrounded by walls that cannot be destroyed by any physical impact, this closed world is an inescapable cage. You sealed Shiki within there, and you found solace in that. Certainly, it is perfect. However, such things won't work against 'it.' Just as magic is omnipotent in civilized society, 'it' conflicts with beings like us who live by concepts. We pose a threat to common sense, but─── Shiki is the grim reaper to the unconventional, as you should have experienced."

An enclosed, infinite space with no exit was impenetrable to conventional means. Since it had no form, physical weapons could not touch it. But Ryougi Shiki's power was meant to target such intangible things.

But, Araya Souren, because you're a mage, you treated magic as absolute. Closing off a space doesn't matter. Something that abstract—she'd break through it with ease!" - Kara no Kyoukai Chapter 5

There's also a passage where Shiki corrects God's Word on her not being able to kill words, as they end like everything else:

The magus once said, "Even I cannot kill words." But still, they too will die someday.

Everything will fade, disappear, and die.

Otherwise, the boundary between past and future would blur. Because things can’t be retrieved once lost, we treasure them so they won’t disappear.

...But why is something called "not eternal" just because it vanishes?

Even if something fades away or is forgotten, its existence doesn’t change. The only thing that changes is our own minds, the way we perceive it.

I should have told him.

That’s why... there’s no point in seeking eternity in oblivion.

What is meant to be forgotten will naturally be forgotten, slipping into sleep without further distortion. The act of forgetting itself is one way to define eternity.

Now I understand why the boy named SHIKI, who once existed within me, chose to forget those days.

He treasured those memories by letting them rest, so that they wouldn’t alter the heart that lives on in the present.

Even if I can’t recall them, the fact that they existed will never change.

...That magus must have known this, yet he couldn’t accept it as an answer. Lacking a true self, he clung to words that wouldn’t die, craving eternity in something certain.

─── How unfulfilling.

An eternity that can be put into words is worthless. - Kara no Kyoukai Chapter 6

The argument Nasu presents in the Q&A, suggesting that Shiki lacks the ability to recognize the “death” of words because they don’t “decay” but “fade into oblivion”, is rendered meaningless when Shiki herself states that fading into oblivion is a form of death. The very fact that she acknowledges oblivion as part of the natural cycle of existence proves that it falls within her domain of mortality.

Nobody who has even an average IQ is going to buy that statement, because it breaks the story to the point it becomes impossible. But of course, fanboys don’t care. They don’t care about storytelling, they care about worshipping their headcanon at all costs.

And look at this too:

This is the most blatant statement that TM has retcons and that Nasu doesn’t care about finer details, on top of having help in managing information. The “10 years the river will flow” comment suggests that consistency isn’t the priority; as long as the current keeps moving, the river’s purpose is served.

So cut this crap.

Bonus, Aoko Aozaki blinks Archetype:

Aoko, by tapping into the Fifth Magic, outright defeated the universe itself when it attempted to suppress her, dismantling its own “order” in the process:

Notice it specifically says “Order has fallen,” with Order referring to the natural laws and fundamental rules sustaining the universe, protected by its sentient will. This means Aoko dominated the universe according to her own personal will. The only reason she limits herself to smaller-scale alterations and respects the laws of time, by carefully balancing energy through exchanging timeframes similar to those she “stole”, is simply because she does not want to destroy the universe earlier than necessary.

Naturally, the universe > Gaia and Arcueid. And this was Aoko going all out. Even when restricting herself to small-scale Fifth Magic use, she could still mimic the Second Magic; already a tool capable of defeating Type-Moon:

This shows that even Zelretch’s vast multiversal scope, a power that can defeat a Type-tier being, is ultimately subordinate to the true scope of Aoko’s Fifth Magic. That true scope is Entropy: the inevitable decay and disordering of every system, here applied to the universe itself. Touko herself noted that Aoko doesn’t bring outcomes from parallel worlds like Zelretch does; instead, she outright displaces events on her own single timeline:

“It was the death of Soujyuro Sizuki.

If she had brought him back five minutes to when he was still alive, where would those five minutes go?

Aoko’s Magic wasn’t using parallel worlds to change this one.

She had only rewound Soujyuro’s five minutes.

Then, logically, he’d return to being a corpse as soon as the Magic ended.

Time travel that didn’t change the world couldn’t change the past.

Therefore...

If she wanted to save him, she had to either truly resurrect him, or send those five minutes of reality somewhere far away without returning them!

‘Answer me, Aoko! What did you do with his time?!

How’re you going to balance all that heat?!’

‘How the hell should I know?! I tossed his time somewhere into the distant future!’”

— Mahoutsukai no Yoru Chapter 12

The term “heat” here is metaphorical, representing the flow of magical energy; the fundamental energetic balance that sustains creation and the unfolding of phenomena across the cosmos. This metaphor parallels the thermodynamic concept of heat and entropy, specifically the universe’s eventual “heat death,” when energy is maximally dispersed and order collapses into nothingness. Without properly balancing these abrupt changes in cosmic continuity, Aoko causes a rupture in the “heat” of creation, accelerating its end:

“Magical energy was required to bring things from somewhere else;

at the same time, losing something that exists here consumed an incredible amount of energy.

And what about the magical energy used for cooling?

If either fell out of equilibrium, it would mean total chaos.

The distortion caused by her Magic would come to affect this entire sector of space.

‘How... How in the HELL can you be so dumb?!

You’re going to pile that debt onto the dead end that humanity will reach? You’re going to lay it at the feet of the heat death of the universe?

That’s like hanging a world-ending meteor over the head of this planet!

Or are you planning on crushing the Earth under your own weight?!’

‘Wh...’

That last comment made Aoko’s eyes widen.

Her every step exerted such force it broke the floorboards beneath her feet.

‘I’ll worry about that later! Next time I’ll put the debt in the past! That better?!

Then only the past will be crushed by the distortion!’

‘That’s your master plan?!

Save the present by destroying the past?!

That saves us, but what about the heat problem, and the burden on the rest of the universe?!’

Exactly.

Even if the universe were closed, or the present were still expanding,

the absurd increase in heat consumption would become uncontrollable.

That which waits for the end of infinite expansion,

infinite consumption,

and infinite growth is a future without hope.

The nothingness before creation.

Eventually the universe would burn up.

‘Your—I mean, the Aozaki’s Magic only makes that conclusion more certain! And that’s on you!’

‘Don’t you think I know that already?!

I’ll figure it out! As long as I live, I’ll figure something out!’”

— Mahoutsukai no Yoru Chapter 12

Essentially, Aoko causes the universe to “burn up” faster by controlling how events unfold, when they unfold, or whether they can unfold at all.

Archetype Earth embodies a planet with self-contained laws, but those laws still require energy to function. Aoko’s Fifth Magic gives her complete control over all energy, including the abstract kind that makes reality operate. Because she can supply, redirect, or withhold that energy, she can override or sustain Archetype Earth’s laws at will.

So what is AE doing to Aoko? Nothing. Zelretch’s Second Magic, which can already overcome Types, is just a side effect of Aoko’s Fifth. She commands the universe itself to deny every outcome or progression related to Archetype Earth, or outright rejects the outcome from which she was conceived within the flow of time. Aoko restricts herself only because she does not want to destroy the universe, but in a neutral fight? Nothing would stop Archetype Earth's butt from getting spread wide open by Aoko.

Bonus, Roa in his Prime surpasses Archetype:

I have already made a separate thread regarding the original Roa, which you can find here.

To summarize: at his peak, Roa stole Arcueid’s power and fused it with his own numerology: the ability to decode and manipulate the fundamental numerical patterns behind all natural phenomena. This made him the most powerful vampire in the setting, explicitly surpassing even Crimson Moon. This is proven by his effortless defeat of Altrouge Brunestud and the fact that even the combined might of the 27 Dead Apostle Ancestors could not challenge him. After Altrouge’s humiliating failure to “put him in his place,” they ceased all attempts to oppose him.

What many overlook, however, is that Roa didn’t merely copy Arcueid’s power. As a vampire, he inherited her soul’s “information”, its essence, permanently integrating her foundational nature into his own. In other words, Roa became a distinct iteration of Arcueid’s primal structure: Archetype Earth. And this isn’t speculation. As shown through examples like Sion and Tatari, the Dead Apostle transformation permanently alters the soul to match the “condition” of the parent vampire, even when the parent is an abstract phenomenon. A vampire's soul is not just influenced but soiled, completely rewritten, by the parent’s essence.

This is crucial because Roa’s reincarnation system is not simple soul transfer: it’s an advanced metaphysical process that turns his soul into an abstract equation, one that automatically actualizes once the correct conditions manifest in reality. Such a system could only exist if Roa had access to the entire potential structure of Gaia, enabling him to calculate host availability regardless of how the world changes. That’s precisely what Archetype Earth represents: not just Gaia’s current form, but the complete set of possible states Gaia can assume. It is the very concept of Gaia as a self-contained, ever-shifting world.

In contrast, Crimson Moon, or a “pure” Arcueid before bloodlust, can alter the laws and determine which concepts are valid only within Gaia’s current configuration. While powerful, this control is limited to the present state and cannot extend to the infinite variations Gaia might take. Normal Arcueid and the Types shape the existing rules, but cannot encompass all potential realities.

Roa’s mastery, fueled by Archetype Earth’s essence and his numerological insight, lies in decoding this full spectrum of potentiality: the sea of formless possibilities Gaia could ever take. Without access to this complete potential, his soul could not adapt to changing conditions or reincarnate repeatedly. This boundless scope is essential for sustaining his existence across infinite fluctuations.

So, in his prime, Roa is essentially an enhanced version of Archetype Earth; able to wield her immense potential while also embodying the structured control and refinement characteristic of Numerology.

Bonus, Nanaya will also blink Archetype:

Nanaya’s Mystic Eyes of Death Perception actually function similarly to Ryougi’s, though her key advantage lies in her inherent nihilistic perspective, which allows her to perceive all things as ultimately meaningless. This perspective gives her an easier time identifying the intrinsic flaws in reality and concepts. Nanaya’s eyes operate on the same principle: both he and SHIKI acknowledge that he can perceive and potentially “kill” highly abstract concepts such as emotions, the sixth sense, and the very “meaning” behind things. His primary limitation was his perception capacity, as fully perceiving the end of such abstract concepts would overwhelm his mind due to intense mental strain.

The key point here is that, over time, Nanaya’s perception explicitly evolves. Initially, he could only physically kill, hence Nrvnqsr’s beasts could regenerate, and Arcueid could rebuild her body after exertion. Eventually, he gained the ability to conceptually erase opponents, as well as inanimate objects and spells. Later still, he was able to destroy the raw data composing the Tatari manifestation of Nrvnqsr, a fading, unstable rumor of existence. Sion even suggests Nanaya can kill concepts beyond human comprehension, and Riesbyfe notes he “cracks open” Dust of Osiris’ reality marble, demonstrating his capacity to dismantle entire realities.

Nanaya’s feat of killing Maiko Yamase in Dawn, an embodiment of True Chaos, is especially remarkable. True Chaos represents the flux of all undefined possibilities awaiting actualization, a state above even Types lacking a concept of death. Since True Chaos has no fixed form or definition unless imposed externally, Nanaya’s ability to kill Maiko illustrates how his eyes evolved to overcome even the most abstract entities. As Arcueid puts it, Nanaya kills the concept of “you,” echoing Ryougi’s power to erase the very fact of existence, regardless of defenses or properties.

In Tsukihime 2, Nanaya’s eyes reach a new level: his glasses can no longer suppress them, forcing him to seal them physically with a bandage. This is significant, as all previous feats occurred while the glasses still functioned. Their failure indicates that Death perception has become so internalized that he perceives it by default, without conscious effort, bringing him closer to Ryougi’s nihilistic view.

Additionally, Nanaya’s speed derives from his Origin of Death, which powers his MEoDP. Like Ryougi, whose Origin lets her move faster than reality warping, Tsukihime 2 Nanaya would erase phenomena or laws before they fully manifest and strike down entities like Archetype Earth before they can react. Even a weaker, less experienced Nanaya has speedblitzed and defeated foes on Red Arcueid’s level, confirming that no amount of scaling saves AE from a classic MEoDP speedblitz.

Some might contest this by pointing out how Tohno couldn’t kill Wallachia’s true form in Melty Blood, but that form isn’t a law created by a reality warper. Instead, Wallachia’s true state is a phenomenon in pure potential: something that doesn’t yet “exist” but could manifest if the right conditions align. MEoDP’s function is to return things to that potential state, where they no longer act or change. Wallachia starts there. Once he manifests, he can be erased by MEoDP. But before manifestation, he is essentially “nothing” and thus cannot be killed in the conventional sense. Only someone like Araya Souren, who can define and rewrite the very boundaries of potentiality, can directly destroy him in that state.

A reality warper takes potentiality and shapes it into actualized changes, abstract laws or conditions governing beings or spaces, that MEoDP can perceive and eliminate. Wallachia’s phenomenon may be manipulated by such warpers, but the raw potential behind it, the pure concept residing in the spiral of Origin itself, lies beyond MEoDP’s reach. MEoDP can erase specific manifestations or interpretations infinitely, but it cannot annihilate the pure potential that underpins all existence. 

So none of this is saving Archetype Earth. She draws her reality-warping from the same primordial potential, but every alteration she makes is an actualized interpretation of those raw concepts, a structure given form through her will. She always expresses her power through a physical vessel and a defined existence, which means her “laws” and “alterations” are named, shaped, and governed by the language of the Root. And anything given structure in this way is fair game for MEoDP to sever completely. So unlike Wallachia’s true phenomenon, Archetype Earth’s entire existence and power rely on constantly turning that pure potential into defined reality, and that’s precisely what makes her vulnerable.

Conclusion:

Anyways, this is it. Arcueid is absolutely not the strongest character at all. That title belongs to Shiki Ryougi, followed by Araya Souren, God's Word and Kirie. Even within her own setting, Roa in his prime, Nanaya Shiki and Aoko Aozaki are ultimately superior to her in power. And her non-Archetype Earth self still has a lot of competition, specifically in the form of Akiha, Nanaya Shiki and Kouma Kishima. I lost almost all interest in TM by now, so I just decided to make this final blog because nearly every single moron I had to deal with was somehow an Arcueid wanker. Just to stop her baseless hype for good.