Almaria Duffner

Almaria Duffner ( アルマリア・デュフナー, Arumaria Dufunaa) was a human Emnetwiht girl who lived at the same orphanage as Willem Kmetsch over 500 years ago. She is an supporting character in Suka Suka.

Background
Almaria Duffner was a human Emnetwiht girl who lived in the City of Gomag over 500 years ago. After losing her parents, she came to live at the same orphanage as Willem Kmetsch and came to view him like a father. Almaria later became one of the poor souls who had transformed into a Beast. She is the true form of Chanteuse: The First Beast Who Laments At The Moon.

Childhood
Almaria Duffner was a regular child who was born to loving parents in the City of Gomag. When she was 8 years old, she lost her parents and was taken to the local orphanage to be raised. There she met Willem Kmetsch who consoled her when she was crying one night and they later formed a father-daughter relationship.

War With The Visitors
During the war with the Visitors, Almaria took care of the other kids while Willem was away at war. On the night before the final battle, Almaria had a late-night dinner with Willem. Sitting down at the dining table, Almaria asked if Willem had anything interesting to say becuase it was night before the final battle. When Willem asked "Like what?,' Almaria responded with cheesy lines like "When I come back, I will get married and have lots of kids," as an example.

Willem though rejected that idea stating that it sounded like a bad omen and Almaria agreed. She then went into a talk about the absurdity of having your favourite characters die in a novel, just because of a decision by the author. Willem agreed. Getting back to main point, Almaria urged him to find a concrete inspirational reason to survive and come back home, otherwise she wouldn't be able to smile when she sent him off.

Thinking about it, Willem happily declared that he wanted one of Almaria's incredible extra-large butter cakes for his next birthday. Disappointed that his reason was butter cake, Almaria nevertheless agreed to it, promising that when he came back, she would give him so much butter cake that it'll give him heartburn. However, Willem wasn't able to keep his promise for he was petrified during the final battle and was officially declared as dead.

The Final Days of Humanity
One year after the Final Battle, the curse on the Emnetwihts that kept them human was broken and people started turning in Beasts. All attempts to prolong the curse including using Elq Hrqstn's corpse had failed.

One night, a depressed Almaria was longing to see Willem again when all the people around her started turning into beasts. Almaria then transformed into a beast herself, turning into Chanteuse: The First Beast Who Laments At the Moon, a solitary beast who continuously sings out lamentations for what she has lost. After turning into a beast, Almaria devoured all of the souls within Gomag including Elq's corpse into her dream world, where she continued to dream about the last days of humanity for the next 500 years.

As Chanteuse
As Chanteuse, Almaria continued waiting for Willem for over 500 years. Eventually, Willem did come back on board the airship 'Plantaginesta' to rescue the crew and passengers of the 'Saxiflaga,' a military salvager airship which had crash-landed in Gomag on the surface en-route back to Règles Aile. When the airship was attacked after Chtholly accidentally woke up Elq's corpse, Almaria did too. She then watched Chtholly's last stand from a distance.

Noticing the badly hurt Willem and Nephren Ruq Insania nearby, Almaria as Chanteuse sucked them into her dream world to save them. Inside her dream world, Almaria made Willem and Nephren live out the final days of humanity with the both of them as active participants, with Almaria pretending that Willem had just come back one year after the final battle. She also formed a close bond with Nephren during this time and made her promise to take care of Willem, if Willem were to ever go away again.

Death
Eventually, Willem and Nephren broke free from the dream world and came across the real Almaria who was encased in a black crystal pillar with her body posed like the figurehead from the front of a ship extending from the middle of it. Walking up to it, Willem who was in great pain remembered that she had never said "Welcome home" or mentioned the promise they made about the butter cake; Almaria then called out to him. Responding with a heart-filled apology for keeping her waiting for so long, Willem then used all of the thirty-five talismans in Lapidemsibilus as well as his own Babel language talisman, to send Lapidemsibilus into overheat mode.

Willem then stabbed the blade into the heart of the pillar, causing both the song to stop and making it crumble. As the pillar crumbled, a smile appeared on the Almaria's crystal face forgiving Willem for not keeping the promise. She then died with the face of a cheerful daughter who was spoiled by her father.

Appearance
Back when she was alive and human, Almaria was a young teenage girl with long brown hair wrapped in a pigtail and brown eyes. She wore a white and pink T-shirt with a long grey skirt that was covered by a brown apron.

When she was transformed into Chanteuse, Almaria took the form of a large clear black crystal pillar with Almaria's own crystallized body popping out from the middle of it, like a figurehead of a ship. The dead faces and souls of her victims are viewable through the crystal. The crystal itself vibrates to create a wailing song that can be used to lure people into it.

Personality
Almaria was generally a sweet, somewhat spoiled girl. She loved cooking and baking sweets and was often treated as an older sister of the group by the orphans at Gomag Orphanage. She deeply loved Willem both as a father and as a romantic interest and was willing to wait years for him, even after turning into a beast.

Almaria was also a bit of a pragmatist, as she didn't see the sense in killing off well-liked characters in a novel even if she did understand the reason behind it.

After transforming into Chanteuse, Almaria still had some semblance of her human awareness left. She was aware that she had transformed into a beast and could remember aspects of her human life, but she couldn't resist her bestial instinct to make Willem into a permanent part of her fake Gomag.

Almaria died as a very forgiving and apologetic girl, who still loved her father above all else.

Weapons
As an Emnetwiht, Almaria was not a fighter and didn't possess any weapons. However, as Chanteuse, her main weapon was her song which she used to suck the souls of people into her dream world recreation of Gomag.

Chanteuse's Song
As the First Beast: Chanteuse, Almaria's main weapon was her song which she used to suck the souls of thousands of people into her dream world recreation of Gomag. Once inside her dream world, Chanteuse would use its mental manipulation abilities to create a "Lotus-Eater' effect where all of the people who are sucked in gradually lose their memories and identities. As it devoured the energy from their bodies in the real world, their soul would be fully consumed by the illusion, resulting in the person's death.

Illusion Creation and Memory Manipulation
Almaria as Chanteuse had the ability to manipulate memories with her song, She could make people forget who they were and lull them into a false illusion.

Sand-Disintegration
Chanteuse also had the ability of turning lush green areas into a grey ashen desert. She was the one responsible for turning most of the world into a desert.

Trivia

 * There is currently a debate over the naming of Almaria's beast form. While the official translation of it should be 'Chanteuse' according to the title of Rhantolk's book in the last episode in Suka Suka, which means 'Female Singer' or 'Songstress' in French. Some fans prefer to go with fan translation of 'Shiantor.'