Marluxia

Marluxia, the Graceful Assassin (優雅なる凶刃), is Rank XI within the original Organization XIII, the lord of Castle Oblivion, and the main antagonist of Sora's story in Kingdom Hearts: Chain of Memories. He controls flowers, and he uses this attribute to command flower-themed minions to shoot beams of destructive energy, as well as to bombard the opponent with flurries of petals. Scythes are his weapon of choice.

Originally discovered by senior Organization members Xigbar and Xaldin, Marluxia is the mastermind of an internal rebellion in the Organization against Xemnas, putting him at odds with fellow members Axel and Zexion. Marluxia makes an appearance in Kingdom Hearts 358/2 Days and is a playable character in Mission Mode.

Between Kingdom Hearts Birth by Sleep and Kingdom Hearts 358/2 Days
In an unknown world, Marluxia's Heartless was created, his strong will allowing his original persona to continue on as a Nobody, Marluxia. Marluxia was discovered by Xigbar and Xaldin and became the eleventh member of Organization XIII. When the twelfth member, Larxene, joined the ranks, she approached Marluxia and asked how he joined the Organization. He responded that it was no different from how she was first found, and they both shared their thoughts about how boring they find the castle. The discussion soon shifted to their roles in the Organization, including the importance of having hearts. When Larxene said that having a heart was painful and was comfortable as a Nobody, Marluxia concurred that they were better off not regaining their hearts.

As the two walked off together, they started formulating plans to overthrow Organization XIII.

Kingdom Hearts 358/2 Days
Like other members of the Organization, Marluxia aids Roxas in at least one mission, during which he is quite polite to Roxas. On the first, he teaches Roxas how to collect Hearts and teaches him about the Heartless. He explains the differences between Pureblood Heartless and Emblem Heartless and instructs him to only attack Emblem Heartless, because only they release Hearts. He also explains to Roxas that as he releases Hearts, they will come together to form Kingdom Hearts, and that Roxas is the first member of the Organization to be able to do so. This also shows his lust for the Keyblade. On the next mission, Marluxia helps Roxas fight some Dire Plants by The Old Mansion and a Zip Slasher in Twilight Town. Later, he is assigned to Castle Oblivion with the other members.

Before Axel leaves for Castle Oblivion, it is revealed that Saïx knew about Marluxia's plans to overthrow the Organization. That is why he sent them and the other "suspicious" members to the castle in the first place along with Axel, who was given orders to eliminate any of the members that planned to overthrow the Organization.

Kingdom Hearts: Chain of Memories
Marluxia, working with Larxene and Axel, plots to overthrow the Organization. They formulate a plan to use a young girl named Naminé, who has a mysterious power over memory, to deceive Sora into thinking he had sworn to protect her, and then have her use Sora to help them defeat the senior Organization members. This plot stems from a rivalry between some of the younger Organization members and the original six core members. Vexen, Larxene, and Axel all do their part to feed Sora with information and lure him further into the castle. Each of them fight him on their own, although none of them use their full strength and throw the fights. They also make use of Vexen's Riku Replica to compete with Sora for Naminé's loyalty.

Marluxia and Larxene eventually learn that Vexen has been reporting back to Lexaeus and Zexion regarding their revolt. After Vexen loses control of the Riku Replica, Marluxia pronounces his project a failure. Although Vexen arrogantly protests that Marluxia has no business speaking to him in such a manner, Marluxia claims that his mastery over Castle Oblivion gives him the authority to do so. Marluxia threatens to tell "the Superior" of Vexen's failure, but Vexen pleads with him not to do this. Marluxia agrees not to if Vexen eliminates Sora. Although confused by the order, Vexen agrees, and he leads Sora into Twilight Town. He fights Sora a second time, but he is again defeated. Before he can reveal Marluxia's plans to use Sora, however, Axel destroys him on Marluxia's orders, making Vexen the first Organization member to be eliminated.

Axel's assassination of Vexen allows him to gain Marluxia and Larxene's full trust. As Sora nears the top floors of the castle, Axel is left alone with Naminé to keep watch over her. Instead of keeping an eye on her, however, Axel allows her to escape, freeing her from Marluxia's control and ending her continued restructuring of Sora's memories, effectively ruining the plot to manipulate Sora into fighting the Organization. This prompts Larxene to attack Sora shortly after he defeats the Riku Replica for the final time, but she is eliminated in the struggle, leaving only Marluxia to carry out the plot.

Axel then confronts Marluxia, who is disgusted with Axel for betraying him, to which Axel replies that Marluxia is a traitor to the Organization, and that Larxene paid the price for her own disloyalty. He then threatens to annihilate Marluxia, but Marluxia seems unfazed by this, stating simply, "You can try." The two then engage in battle, with Marluxia displaying an eerie speed. Despite the strength behind their attacks, neither Nobody takes any actual damage and they appear to be equally matched.

Marluxia summons Naminé before him, apparently to act as a shield to prevent Axel from attacking him further, but Axel laughs it off, saying he's willing to go through Naminé to get to Marluxia. Marluxia, however, tells Sora (who has just appeared in the room, much to Axel's surprise) that Axel is willing to hurt her just to get to him and vanishes with a laugh, leaving Sora and Axel alone. Axel sneers at Sora for having become Marluxia's puppet after all, but Sora resolves to eliminate Marluxia right after he finishes Axel. The two fight, and Sora comes out the victor, but Axel escapes destruction and vanishes.

Sora pursues Marluxia into his inner chambers. Marluxia orders Naminé to completely erase Sora's memory and destroy his heart, hoping to rebuild him into something more to his liking afterward. However, Naminé, remembering Sora's kindness towards her, flat-out refuses the order, even when faced with elimination. Marluxia is perplexed when Sora orders Naminé to do so for her own safety, and even more so when the revived Riku Replica attacks. Confused and irritated that Sora and the replica would accept their memories of Naminé with the full knowledge that they are lies, Marluxia attacks them.

Sora destroys Marluxia, but he finds that the real Marluxia has been hiding in a back room and that his opponent had only been an imitation. Sora advances into the final room to confront the true Marluxia and defeats him in the final battle. Marluxia reaches out to Sora as he begins to fade back into darkness, but he soon vanishes in a flurry of flower petals, effectively making him the fourth member of Organization XIII to fall.

The manga version of these battles differs from the version depicted in Kingdom Hearts: Chain of Memories and Kingdom Hearts Re:Chain of Memories. In the manga, Marluxia does not assume multiple forms and is easily destroyed by Sora in the first battle. He is also surrounded by flowers and flower petals a majority of the time, sometimes even seen holding a rose.

Kingdom Hearts II
Marluxia is seen guiding Sora towards Castle Oblivion in the last of Roxas's dreams.

Sora also unlocks Marluxia's Journal entry after accessing Ansem's computer.

Marluxia's Absent Silhouette can be encountered and fought by Sora if he returns to Beast's Castle after eliminating Xaldin. A Data Replica of him can also be located and fought at the Garden of Assembledge if his Absent Silhouette has been defeated.

Appearance
A tall, elegant Nobody with feminine features, Marluxia wears the basic Organization uniform of a black cloak, black boots, and black gloves. His hair is shoulder-length and rose pink with ruffles, though in Kingdom Hearts: Chain of Memories, this color was more muted, appearing closer to light brown. Marluxia's eyes are blue and his lips are pale pink.

Marluxia is usually surrounded by cherry blossom petals, which symbolize the transient nature of life and death in Japanese culture. Marluxia drops these petals whenever hit during battle, and he fades back into darkness in a flurry of petals when he is destroyed.

Originally, Marluxia was planned to be a female, but this idea was scrapped during the creation of Kingdom Hearts: Chain of Memories so that both traitors weren't females.

Personality
Marluxia is quite deceptive in nature. He makes an attempt to rebel against the Organization by using Sora as a puppet to accomplish his goals. Personality-wise, he is often portrayed as very arrogant and vain. For example, when Axel confronted Marluxia regarding his betrayal to the Organization, he only taunts Axel and leaves Sora to fight the latter. Like Xemnas, Marluxia has a habit of being overly dramatic and giving long speeches. He also takes great pride in his appearance, flourishing his weapon after he strikes with it. It seems that from his tone of voice, which is dull and monotone, that Marluxia doesn't pretend to have emotions, making him similar to Xemnas or Saïx. However, he does smirk and laugh at some points.

Most importantly, Marluxia seems to have an obsession with his superiority over the other Organization members. As the lord of Castle Oblivion, Marluxia has the ability to keep many members of the Organization under his thumb. He even manipulates Vexen into fighting Sora by using Vexen's fear of Xemnas against him. Even though most of Marluxia's personality traits are negative, he does have a few positive aspects. Some of these include his devotion and persistence to succeed in his goals and continuing his plans to overthrow the Organization even after Axel's betrayal and the defeat of Larxene. He's a very adamant member of Organization XIII. Marluxia believes that he deserves more respect than he's given. All in all, Marluxia is a very egotistical, manipulative member of the Organization who would stop at nothing to overthrow the Organization and become superior.

Abilities
Marluxia fights using the attribute of Flower and wields a large, rose pink and dark green scythe. The petals he commands have the appearance of cherry blossoms in Kingdom Hearts: Chain of Memories, but they have been changed to resemble rose petals in the remake.

Marluxia has two forms in the original Kingdom Hearts: Chain of Memories, and three in Re:Chain of Memories. While in basic nobody form, he can attack normally with his scythe or use it to slash at an enemy from a distance using energy waves.

Despite his arrogant nature, Marluxia has proven to be quite powerful. With his command over flowers, he can create a full-body replica of himself made of petals, send a flurry of blossoms at his opponent, and in Kingdom Hearts Re:Chain of Memories, create a powerful shockwave by hitting the ground with his scythe. Like most Organization members from Kingdom Hearts: Chain of Memories, Marluxia moves by levitating. In the remake, he can also teleport freely. This is also the only form which he is constrained to the use of an actual deck.

In his first final form, Marluxia makes use of a mechsuit-like Nobody called the Specter to slash at Sora with its scythe-arms or charge him and cause massive damage upon impact. He can also summon three petals to fire pink beams of energy at Sora and send blasts of energy from the bottom of the contraption. In the remake, the Nobody is also capable of harnessing darkness, with which it can shroud the entire battlefield.

Marluxia's additional final form in Kingdom Hearts Re:Chain of Memories brings Marluxia and Sora into combat upon a larger version of the Specter from the previous battle floating in a starry-night environment surrounded by circulating rings. A large angelic Nobody stands behind Marluxia wielding a gigantic version of his Graceful Dahlia. Marluxia is held immobile during this fight by thornbeams and is, therefore, unable to dodge most attacks.

From his stationary position, Marluxia fights mainly by issuing commands to the angelic Nobody, who can create shockwaves, shoot a sweeping laser, blow gusts of wind that prevent Sora from moving forward, and create a whirlwind that scatters all of Sora's cards, including his reload card. Sora must then pick up the cards in order to reclaim them, including the reload card. During Marluxia's potentially most devastating sleight, he shoots thornbeams at Sora that trigger a countdown timer similar to the recurring Final Fantasy spell "Doom", in which, if the counter reaches zero, the fight is instantly lost. He can also trigger the one rotating ring around the battlefield, causing it to fire lasers from all directions in addition to reusing the ray-shooting rose petals.

In Kingdom Hearts II Final Mix, Marluxia returns in an optional battle with new tactics. He begins the battle by whispering in Sora's ear, which causes a countdown timer to appear above Sora's head based on his current level, similar to the hit point condition of the Titan Cup, and then spends most of the battle attacking Sora relentlessly with his scythe, with each hit depleting the timer by one, though causing no additional damage.

If the timer reaches zero, Sora loses the battle, but the timer can be increased by using the Reaction Command "Rob Count", in which Sora grabs Marluxia's scythe, knocks him into the air, and hurls the weapon at him, adding thirteen points to the counter. Marluxia also can conjure dark pools of energy which cover a majority of the battlefield and deal damage to Sora's HP, leaving the death timer unaffected. Marluxia can wheel around the battlefield swinging his scythe, and he also can hover above Sora, attacking him with his scythe while summoning pillars of energy from under the ground to damage to Sora.

In the original Kingdom Hearts: Chain of Memories, the real Marluxia is only fought once, unlike most of the main antagonists, such as Ansem and Xemnas, who must be fought and defeated multiple times before they are finally eliminated.

In Kingdom Hearts 358/2 Days, Marluxia's Limit Break, Bloom-Out, is composed of the Nobody charging an attack while a large black ring forms around him. Once the attack finishes charging and the black ring is completely formed, Marluxia swings his scythe multiple times over a large area on the black ring. During the initial portion of the Limit Break, with a perfectly timed button press, Marluxia will be surrounded in cherry blossoms and may instantly destroy any weaker enemy hit by the attack.

During Marluxia's Final Limit, Marluxia teleports before the attack, and his swing is much faster and covers a much larger area, followed by the release of a large, crescent-shaped projectile.

Weapon
True to his title, the Graceful Assassin, Marluxia wields a large, elegant-looking Scythe called the Graceful Dahlia in battle. The handle of the Scythe is pastel green in coloration, and the blade is a rose pink. This evokes the appearance of a plucked flower. The connection between the blade and handle is yellow and resembles pieces of the Nobody insignia. Marluxia attacks with wide slashes and spins. He can also turn himself and his Scythe into a lethal pinwheel and fly around the battlefield, causing heavy damage to anyone who cannot dodge the attack.

Trivia

 * All musical pieces used in the battles against Marluxia in Kingdom Hearts:Chain of Memories and Re:Chain of Memories are named after his overall concept. The first piece, "Graceful Assassin", is also his title. "Scythe of Petals" obviously refers to the weapon he wields. Finally, "Lord of the Castle" refers to his status in Castle Oblivion.
 * In Kingdom Hearts: Chain of Memories, Marluxia wields his scythe in his left hand in cutscenes and in his normal battle sprite. However, in Kingdom Hearts Re:Chain of Memories, Kingdom Hearts II Final Mix, and Kingdom Hearts 358/2 Days, he wields it in his right.

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