'Arika Yumemiya' (ユメミヤ アリカ Yumemiya Arika) is a fictional character and the protagonist of the Mai-Otome anime and manga series. She is first introduced in the first episode where she travels through the desert to Windbloom to find out more information about her mother, whom she was told was an Otome. After seeing the power of the 3rd Column, Shizuru, she decides to follow her mother and become an Otome. She is sometimes nicknamed Anty (Arinko-chan in Japanese) because her name, Arika, could be "蟻か" in Japanese, which means ant. The way her head turns into an ant's head is a way to show how she feels when someone calls her this nickname. She is voiced by Mika Kikuchi in Japanese and by Angie Beers in English. [1]
Mai-Otome
Arika was brought up by her grandmother and taught heavily about moral values. She'll often mention that her grandmother taught her what was right and what was wrong by saying "that's what grandma said/told me". At the beginning of the anime, she is seen in a desert traveling to Garderobe in order to become an Otome since her mother was one. She is determined to become an full fledged Otome and often admires how beautiful Shizuru is when materialized. Though cheerful and optimistic, she lacks the sophistication and "common sense" to deal with the royalty (due to her being a country bumpkin). She quickly gets acquainted with the other Corals and Pearls in Garderobe and becomes good friends with most of them, mainly Nina Wáng and Erstin Ho and quickly rises to the rank 2 Coral position.
Life at Garderobe
Attending Garderobe is expensive and Arika doesn't have the funds to pay. Luckily for for, a secret patronage was willing to pay all her tuition as long as she becomes a full fledged Otome. He writes to her that her mother had helped him greatly in the past and he had wanted to return the favor.
Much of the first half of the anime revolves around life at Garderobe. As time passed, Arika started losing her optimism in being an Otome as she learns more about the past, specifically the Dragon King War in which numerous Otomes, many who were friends with each other, were forced to fight each other as weapons of war. She eventually fears to use the powers of the Otome after the Erstin's death and conflict with Nina.
Invasion of Schwarz and Artai
During the Windbloom invasion coordinated by Artai and Schwarz, in order to ensure Mashiro's safety, Arika along with Erstin, Aoi, and Mikoto try to escort Mashiro to safety. Sergay eventually joins the party after protecting the former by shooting two Schwarz men. Shortly after, they come into contact with John Smith. Smith, orders Erstin Ho to fulfill her duties as a member of the Ho family and uses an Obsidian gem to summon forth a Slave. Nina and Nagi soon appear at the scene, and Smith orders Erstin to kill Arika. To prevent Arika from being fatally wounded, Sergay leaps in an the slash delivered by Erstin's Slave, revealing the handkerchief that Arika sewed for her benefactor. This in turn reveals that Sergay was Arika's benefactor the whole time. Realizing that Sergay has feelings for Arika, the Ultimate Black Diamond responds with Nina's emotions, and Nagi and her form a contract right away. Enraged and jealous at Arika, Nina launches an attack at Arika, but Erstin's Slave absorbs the attack and dies. Blaming Erstin's death on Nina, Arika and Nina launch devastating attacks at each other which leave the area filled with debris.
Aftermaths of the Windbloom Invasion
In the aftermath, Arika is found by the Aswad Knights in a doll-like state, continually questioning what Otomes are. The death of her friend Erstin and the fight between Nina has made her afraid of being an Otome. Nevertheless, after some talk with Mai and Midori about what Otome really are, Arika is determined once again to fulfill her dreams.
At the Black Valley, Arika asks Mikoto to train her how to fight and utilize her robe more efficiently.
True Identity
Although the palace maid (Mimi's grandmother) stated that the true queen of Windbloom is in possession of the Blue Sky Sapphire, Arika is not the queen of Windbloom. Rather, she is the daughter of Lena Sayers, the former Otome for the late King of Windhelm.
14 years prior to the main events in Mai-Otome, Schwarz and Aswad had planned an invasion on Windbloom. With the palace under attack, Lena had instructed a palace maid with Arika while Lena herself escaped with the true heiress to Windbloom. Lena did not give the Blue Sky Sapphire to Arika, but rather to future queen. The Blue Sky Sapphire would then later end up in the markets of Artai to be picked up by Miyu and given to future Arika.
Infant Arika next to the corpse of a palace maid.
Miyu would arrive to Windbloom in order to find Lena, but does not find her. Instead, she finds Arika next to the corpse of a palace maid and takes her to her grandmother.
When Miyu returns to the scene in later episodes, she confirms that Arika is Lena Sayers' daughter. Because she is the daughter of Lena, she is also a descendant of Alyssa, a person that Miyu holds very dearly.
The matter of who her father is is one that was never raised, at least in the anime, and is a subject of speculation. Since the release of Mai-Otome 0~S.ifr~ episode 2, people suggest that Shiro might be Arika’s father. Strong evidence support this claim, since Arika strongly resembles Shiro and both even share the common line "that's what grandma said/told me". In addition to this, before Rena's final battle with M-9, she pecks Shiro on the cheek. A romantic relationship being developed between Rena and Shrio is certainly seen in episode 2 of Mai-Otome 0~S.ifr~.
Mai-Otome Zwei
One year after the end of the TV series, the first episode of Mai-Otome Zwei sees Arika called to action as part of a team of Otome who destroy the asteroid Thron 1, which is heading for the planet, by deploying "Meteor Breakers" or explosive lances in an effort to fracture the asteroid enough so that the pieces will burn up in the atmosphere. When the meteor inexplicably changes course Arika goes after it and calls upon the second form of her robe by getting Mashiro's verbal approval and shouting "Soten!" in a transformation referred to as "Materialize Zwei" (Zwei being German for "two"). Using the Sword of Akatsuki, she gains enough strength to destroy the meteor, but as she celebrates a black-winged shadow appears behind her. However, the setting for the Blue Sky Sapphire is different as the one used in Mai-Otome during her status as Coral, the current setting is used by Meister Otome.
She awakens at the palace, at first believing it was a dream until Miss Maria shows her a newspaper proving otherwise (the headline of the newspaper reads "Arinko, Save US! Ms. Arika Yumemiya Make a GreatCoup"). Miss Maria also reminds Arika that she is still under her tutelage, since she does not have enough credits yet and promptly assigns Arika laps and reading transcriptions. Several fans have also noticed that Arika's bust has received an upgrade in the one-year hiatus of the story. The next scene features Arika writing "a letter from her heart" to the absent Nina; updating her friend on the events of the past year and Mashiro's growing leadership. She then sees a group of workers demanding higher wages and talks to them, much to Mashiro's annoyance; as she had been in negotiations trying to keep the economy stable. Throughout the episode, Mashiro and Arika butt heads several times on issues such as this, with Mashiro frustrated at Arika's naivete.
When a Slave appears at the Black Valley and Arika rushes to the scene to protect Mashiro and fight with Mai at her side, finally defeating the Slave after using the Zwei robe. After Arika reprimands Mashiro for ordering Natsuki Krueger to go to the Garderobe before saving innocents trapped by the destruction the Queen becomes frustrated enough to yell at Arika, breaking the connection required for the Zwei robe. The end of the first episode sees Mashiro disappear into the collapsing Black Valley with the black-winged figure from the beginning of the episode looking on from a distance, which at this point has turned Miyu, Shizuru and Miss Maria to stone and can seemingly imitate the powers and appearance of anyone it has had contact with.
In the second episode Arika travels to Aries with Mikoto the cat while trying to find Mashiro, but ends up being a hostage in a bus hijacking by terrorists. President Yukino Chyrsant eventually offers herself up as an exchange for the civilian hostages in order to buy Haruka and Chie time to come up with a plan. During this time Arika asks Yukino about her relationship with Haruka and how they get along despite their differences. They are eventually freed by a combined attack, at which point the Unknown Entity attacks and petrifies Haruka.
In the third episode Arika is with the other Otome at the SOLT in the bathhouse and attempts to sneak away before being stopped by a drunken Ahn Lu. At the conclusion of the episode the CHILDs around the world start to awaken.
In the fourth episode Arika continues to search for Mashiro and it informed by Gal that Midori wants to see her. She talks to the Boss and receives a letter that Mashiro has written earlier addressing that she is on the Black Valley. Arika is then confused on how to get to the island, but Mikoto the cat alerts a dophin with a similar earring to it. When Mashiro is attacked by Yuna in the form of Fumi Himeno, Arika comes and temporarily distracts Yuna. She transforms and fights with Yuna. Later when Yuna is about to kill Arika, Nina Wáng steps in and stops Yuna. Arika is happy and attempts to hug Nina, but Yuna swats her away. Arika and Mashiro have a heart to heart and slap each other in order to regain the true power of the Blue Sky Sapphire. Arika and Nina fight until Natsuki Krueger alerts them on how to stop Yuna. Yuna then sucks in Mashiro and takes a similar form to Fumi's Child, (see Mashiro Kazahana). Arika destroys Yuna with a Bolt from the Blue and rescues Mashiro. After, in the credits, Arika shows Mashiro what the world looks like from space.
Manga
Arika in the manga
In the Otome manga, Arika's role is somewhat reduced into that of a comedy sidekick, in favor of a different leading character. Her childishness and unawareness of things is nearly taken to a level of being mentally retarded - a topic which the school administration keeps bringing up from time to time. One manifestation of this was her ignorance of the uses of a hotel room[2]. On the other hand, she often displays remarkable talent in actual battle, leaving her fellow students far behind.
When she first appears in the manga, it is after Mashiro accidentally bumps into her. Arika is already an Otome, but ranked at the low position of No. 51. A stickler for grammatical accuracy, she takes it upon herself to correct Manshiro's various language-related gaffes.
She often sleeps in class. Lacking the sponsorship of Sergay that her anime version had, she h
as to take on multiple jobs to pay for her education, to the detriment of her results.
She was the first to respond to the attack on the Artai embassy by Schwarz, attempting to battle Lumen bare-handed.
Arika in the manga's Ultimate Blue Sky Sapphire Robe
Although Mashiro had made temporary contracts with her using the Blue Sky Sapphire before, it is not until Chapter 23 that she and Mashiro formally make their contract with the Blue Sky Sapphire, as opposed to the earlier Episode 7 in the anime. This was also at Lena's urging, instead of being accidental like in the anime.
Arika had always been in search of her parents and a Star Wars-esque revelation by Rad that he was her father caused her much concern. The Otome manga's version of Kazuya led her to go to the Black Valley in search of the truth, where she found Lena as well. Initially she refused to believe that Rad was her father, but she finally acknowledged him before he died.
When she was younger, her hometown was attacked and razed by mysterious assailants, a [repressed memory that was freed when she saw Kagutsuchi, leading to her going hysterical and speaking of dragons and calling for her mother and grandmother before fainting. She was left behind to go with Midori and the refugees, but wanted to go back and fight. At her insistence, Midori lent her the REM so she could Materialise. Although she lost her power once again due to the REM having reached the limit of its use time, she gained the Ultimate form of the Blue Sky Sapphire Robe by linking hands with Manshiro as Lena instructed. With this new power she beats off Mai and gains temporary victory, only to lose Lena to her sacrificial entry into the Shinso core.
Nevertheless, she continues aiding Manshiro in battle. When Mashiro trapped Mashiro in a projection within the Fuuka Academy and told her and Nina to battle it out in order to save him, she chose not to. Mai, renewed, obeys Mashiro's instruction to attack and Arika went to confront Mai and Kagutsuchi alone on the basis of what she believed was Manshiro's being her younger brother. As she was about to sacrifice herself to kill Mai, however, Mashiro saved her.
Her belief that she and Manshiro were siblings was shattered by Sergay's revelation that Manshiro had only been given into Lena's hands by Emperor Tate and Empress Mai. Shortly after, Fumi Materialized and she proved no match. However, the intervention of Erstin saved her and she lent her power to Manshiro to conduct the Trinity Lover Strike that destroyed Fumi and the revived HiMEs.
Blue Sky Sapphire
Arika carries the Blue Sky Sapphire (蒼天の青玉 Sōten no Seigyoku) as a necklace which was inherited from her mother, the previous Blue Sky Sapphire and Otome to the Windblooms. This Gem has been activated a few times in the series when Arika was in danger and by materializing a robe when she didn't have any nanomachines in order to keep her airborne and to blast a SLAVE away. When it was used against the SLAVE, it released two gems, one for Arika and one for Mashiro, which went into her ring. The two made a contract and
The Blue Sky's true form
defeated the SLAVE. Unable to remove the gems the two decide to keep this a secret from the Garderobe staff, but when Schwarz and Artai launch an attack on Windbloom, the Gem is brought back and Arika utilizes the robe though according to Miyu she has not tapped into its full potential and still requires training.
As it turns out, the Sapphire's true power is the robe, Ultimate Blue Sky, that her mother, Lena, wore when she was an Otome. This robe was instead blue with a green cape on the back. Miyu revealed that the power could only be unlocked once Arika accomplished one final goal, to kill/free her mother from Schwarz's capsule.
While in a Meister Robe, Arika wields a double bladed crystal lance as her Element; her primary attack is called "Bolt From the Blue." Her enhanced mode special Element is the Sword of Akatsuki (a reference to Gear Fighter Dendoh, which had a similar weapon). In addition, her hair turned gold like with her ancestor, Alyssa. Screenshots of the Mai-Otome Playstation 2 game "Otome Butou Shi" showed Lena using a Bolt from the Blue even larger than herself and suggested that Arika still has not achieved the full power of the Blue Sky Sapphire. [1] However, by the time of the OVA, Arika has mastered this power as well.
Robes
Throughout the anime, Arika went through a many robes as the plot progressed.
As a newly enrolled aspiring Otome in Garderobe, she was granted access to the Coral Robe. She first materialized her robe at Queen Mashiro's coronation ceremony, where 3rd Column Bewitching Smile Amethyst Meister Shizuru Viola authorized her for the combat that would decide her and Nina Wang's future at Garderobe. The robe is identical in every way to the robes her fellow Corals used. It is incapable of flight, depending on the two ribbons at the back for extended movement, which Arika is able to use to great effect in many occasions. It is also severely limited in power; wielding it, Coral Number One Nina Wang was unable to damage the old model Slave, and the Robe was overloaded to the point of destruction when Arika held up a large aircraft for an extended amount of time.
As the daughter of Lena Sayers, she inherited her mother's Blue Sky Sapphire. Her first "materialization" happened when Nina Wang touched her while rescueing her from a long fall. The effect was probably caused by the fact that Nina is the real queen of Windbloom and thus inherited the "Weaver" bloodline that has the ability to activate Earth-era technology (of which the Sapphire belonged). However, that materialization lasted only seconds before vanishing. As a full fledged Meister Gem robe, the Blue Sky Sapphire granted Arika many abilities such as enhanced strength, durability and speed, as well as flight and the materialization of an Element weapon, the Sapphire Fang. She also has access to Element Expansion, an ability that transforms her weapon into an enormous version of itself, which she can use in the robe's signature attack, the Bolt from the Blue, which accelerates the user to extreme speeds to pierce her opponent and transport it into what looks like a black hole.
The modified incomplete robe that Arika wields after unlocking Materialize Zwei in Mai Otome Zwei.
For most of the anime after a contract was formed with Queen Mashiro, Arika has access to an "incomplete" version of the Blue Sky Sapphire robe; its power, while significant, is not much more impressive than other Meister Robes. However, further down the plot when Arika frees her mother from the Schwarz's system, she gains access to a robe that is identical to when her mother wielded the Gem. This secondary form is widely considered to be the true form of Blue Sky Sapphire. According to the Gem itself in Mai-Otome Zwei, this form is a Super Meister Robe; it is accessed by Arika temporarily via a special sequence Materialize Zwei, and grants its wielder power and speed far above that of contemporary Meister Robes, as well as the ability to summon the Sword of Akatsuki. According to Natsuki Kruger, this special ability to form a secondary robe with a single Gem is unique to Meister Arika and is being studied by Garderobe. It is worth noting that Arika, even with the complete robe, never reaches the heights of power wielded by her mother Lena Sayers, and never uses the final form of the robe that her mother materializes with the help of her HiME Child Artemis.
The manga version of the Ultimate Blue Sky Sapphire uses a much smaller version of the peculiar weapon that anime Lena's Ultimate Blue Sky Sapphire uses instead of the Sword of Akatsuki, which is a different object in the manga.
Mai-HiME anime
Arika in the fake Mai-HiME movie trailer
Although Arika's real appearance in Mai-HiME was a 2-second cameo at the very end of the final episode, Arika has made three other appearances in the universe of Mai-HiME.
- In a joke trailer for a "Mai-HiME movie" (shipped as a Mai-Otome DVD extra), Arika was depicted as an antagonist and the second of Searrs's fake HiME. In fact, unlike Alyssa, Arika had the ability to summon an element and would therefore be the superior of the two fake HiME. Her Child was almost identical to Artemis, Alyssa's Child. This child was pink and had some resemblance to the color scheme of Arika's Meister Robe.
- Arika has also made an appearance in the PSP game "Mai-HiME Senretsu! Shin Fuka Gakuen Gekitou Shi!". Unlike the Mai-Otome Arika, the Mai-HiME Arika's name is written as 夢宮ありか (Yumemiya Arika) in kanji and hiragana as opposed to katakana.
- Arika is shown on the last few pages of chapter 44 the last chapter of the Mai-HiME manga. She is talking to Mashiro and Fumi and is apparently a new student at the academy as she says that coed schools must be great. She is depicted wearing the high school uniform and is thus older than in the anime, where she wore the junior high school uniform.
Name origins
Parts of Arika's name have meaning for her character as a whole. Arika (在り処 in kanji) means whereabouts or place and yume (夢 in kanji) means dream. Her entire goal in life was to find the place of her dreams, which was Garderobe.