Takamachi Nanoha, Shiro no Akuma
Like Kha and Keroko, Nanoha has been one of the most prominent figures in everyone’s histories, a destiny set in motion ever since she picked up Raising Heart as a child. She saved Keroko and Fate from self-destruction, turned Arisa from her NEET destiny, gave Suzuka a voice, and even when she was crippled, Nanoha helped Kha regain his heart. And outside of her ever-widening circle of comrades, her reputation as the fiercesomely friendly
White Devil continues to shock and awe both friend and foe alike, sparing nothing and changing everything with her touch of magenta pink.
Nanoha has had her downs and outs, but with the support the friends she helped change for the better, a rather unforgettable slap from her strictest instructor Austin, the White Devil has grown to become a fine lady of balance between gentleness and outright beamspam.
In
Rebuilt of StrikerS, Nanoha is 19 years old and the primary Combat Instructor for the Lost Property Riot Force 6, a subsidarial experimental unit under Time-Space Administration Bureau's Special Management. The White Devil is also the commander of record for the "Stars" squad in the field. And Nanoha is a mild Psion, although more by accident than evolution.
Powers
Nanoha, despite her lack of experience, has demonstrated considerable magical talent. Many of her techniques are taught by Yūno or improvised from already learned abilities. She specializes in shooting skills, but has a balanced set of abilities, with variations in both her defensive and offensive powers. Although she isn't as fast as Fate, she has higher defensive power and guided projectiles. Her command phrase for her shooting abilities is "Shoot!".
When Kha helped Trace and repair Nanoha’s magic circuit after her accident, the boy wired Nanoha’s magical circuits to her nervous system, returning her some control over her magic. However, this unexpectedly caused Nanoha to be able to read emotions and intent by just being within range of a person, and that created more trouble than anyone expected, especially in crowded areas.
Nanoha recovered her magic circuit eventually, but Kha’s work was far from over. Several glial cell fixes, Kha’s discovery and installation of the Psychoframe in Raising Heart, and much self-training later, Nanoha’s never-say-die attitude finally saw her through, and the girl learnt to control her new skills better. Dubbed by Arisa as a
Psion, these new powers proved absolutely critical in the later part of her life at Gakutenoh Academy, and during
Nanoha/Cente Gravia.
Even till StrikerS, her Newtype skills allowed her to predict and intercept Dieci’s Enormous Cannon attack on Vice’s chopper, and repeatedly fight off the storms of resources Jail could throw at her.
Miscellaneous Abilities
Raising Heart Activation — Nanoha changes Raising Heart into Device Mode, and usually her Barrier Jacket is activated as well. The transformation was intended to be performed with a long passphrase, but Nanoha only uses this incantation in its entirety once before discarding it, replacing it with "Raising Heart onegai!" (Raising Heart, please!) or a loud shout of “SET UP!”.
Lyrical! Magical! — This is Nanoha's personal incantation for using Raising Heart. Although she calls this out to unlock abilities more complex than simple force fields (such as Raising Heart's Sealing Mode), once the ability is unlocked she seldom needs to use the incantation, except to seal Jewel Seeds. In A's she uses the phrase to kick off a training exercise.
Jewel Seed Seal — Used to seal the Jewel Seeds so they will not fuse with anything.
Area Search — This extends Nanoha's magical senses, helping her to find disturbances such as Jewel Seeds. These can also be manifested as floating pink balls that fall under Raising Heart’s AI control, allowing Nanoha to scan areas passively.
Restrict Lock — Although it is not named in the animation, this is Nanoha's binding-type magic, meaning that it is analogous to Fate's Lightning Bind ability.
Defensive Abilities
Barrier Jacket — Nanoha's Jacket is a blue and white school uniform-styled dress with a metal waist guard. Upon activation, she dons this costume, which is either shown as instantaneous or through a minute-long segment of stock footage. This Barrier Jacket is not just the flashy costume, but it also refers to an invisible defensive field generated by the costume, reducing or eliminating any serious injury from events such as an impact with a building.
Sacred Mode — An improved version of Nanoha's Barrier Jacket, including field generators on the shoulders, gloves, and other defensive enhancements. She can now use the Jacket with Raising Heart in Standby Mode.
Aggressor Mode — The new improvement of Nanoha's Barrier Jacket seen in Strikers, design changes include the replacement of the long skirt for a mini-skirt and a waist-attached cape and the inclusion long white socks and gems (probably field generators) on the shoes.
Exceed Mode — Debuted in the episode 12 of Strikers, Nanoha use this variation in set with the Raising Heart in Excelion Mode. Its design its more akin with the Sacred Mode, although bulkier.
Protection — Nanoha's first spell, and Raising Heart's auto-guard magic. It can guard in every direction, but can be penetrated relatively easily.
Protection Powered — A "harder" version of Protection, which Vita and Nanoha both discovered can resist an attack from a cartridge-enhanced Graf Eisen.
Round Shield — A powerful shield that can withstand a prolonged attack, such as from Bardiche's Arc Saber. Unlike other barrier-type magics such as Protection, it can only guard in one direction.
Flier Fin — Gives Nanoha the ability to fly, and increases her movement speed.
Accel Fin — This is the upgrade to Flier Fin. It grants even greater speed at the cost of some maneuverability.
Fin Funnel — This applies the Flyer Fin to individual Bits, increasing their movement speed and agility, as well as stress induction and mana consumption
Flash Move — Temporarily increases Nanoha's movement speed, similar to Fate's Blitz Action. If Nanoha uses this in conjunction with a melee attack, the resulting explosion is technically called a
Flash Impact.
Reactor Purge — This ability "detonates" Nanoha's outer Barrier Jacket to counteract an attack, similar in principle to reactive armor on modern tanks.
Bind Break — This attempts to deactivate a binding spell, and the time required to do this depends on the complexity of the target magic.
Active Guard — Similarly to the spells "Reactor Purge" and "Barrier Burst", this magic makes of the reactive armor's principle to repell another type of energy. Unlike the other two however, it can be casted upon an area away from the mage's location. In the episode 1 of StrikerS, it was used to decrease the kinetic force of Subaru's mad rush.
Holding Net — This creates a net that can catch almost anything. It was used in the first episode of StrikerS along with the Active Guard to prevent Subaru from crashing into a wall.
ACS Driver - ???
Offensive Abilities
Exalted Saver — Raising Heart releases one of her exhaust pipes and transforms it into a beam saber hilt, giving Nanoha an additional combat option at melee. And she isn’t very weak at close range, demonstrating reasonable mastery of her family’s style of swordsmanship. Nanoha admits that Kha’s Gotteliches Rapier was the inspiration behind Exalted Saver.
Light Saver — A spare beam saber stored inside the left cuff of Nanoha’s Barrier Jacket, which is detonated in order to release the Saver.
Divine Shooter — Nanoha's rapid-reaction attack magic, creating a small number of magical energy balls. The balls can be guided in the air, and sometimes Nanoha will use this magic to attack the target from the rear.
As they can be fired suddenly and without much mana needed, Nanoha has learnt to launch them blindly from her pigtails, creating a “Gundam Head Vulcan”-like attack and helps to push an opponent out of her deadzone.
Accel Shooter — This is the upgraded version of Divine Shooter, allowing Nanoha to guide about a dozen high-speed magic missiles. However, the additional mana makes them unsuitable
Snipe Shot - Seen in StrikerS, this is a variation on Accel Shooter, where Nanoha controls two missiles with great accuraccy.
Light Buster — A no-frills shot deployed straight from Raising Heart’s head like a beam rifle shot. Essentially a scaled-down medium damage shot, this and the homing Accel Shooters form the basis of Nanoha’s dogfights, and hence her deadly accuracy when coupled with her Psion abilities.
Divine Buster — Raising Heart's first attack. It can best be described as an anime-stereotypical particle beam shot.
Divine Buster Extension — As Divine Buster, but with a longer range and a targeting reticle/scope.
Excelion Buster — Available only in Raising Heart Excelion's less stable Excelion Mode, this is arguably Nanoha's most powerful ability to date, second only to the Starlight Breaker ex. Excelion Buster involves a few supporting magics, but is itself similar in principle to her Divine Buster with far more attack power. Unlike her Starlight Breaker ability, this does not require residual magic in the vicinity. The command phrase for Excelion Buster is "Break shoot!"
Force Burst — In this method that requires four cartridges, she fires the shot much like the Divine Buster. Two variations exist for Force Burst: she may fire all arms of the shot at once, or delay the last one until after the others weaken the target's defenses.
Barrel Shot — Nanoha may precede an attack in Excelion Mode with an invisible binding field to prevent the target from moving.
Accel Charge System (ACS) Mode — Nanoha combines the energy bayonet on the tip of Raising Heart along with a burst of speed from the energy wings on the device to penetrate the target's magic defenses. Then, she unleashes a massive burst of energy inside the defenses. Two cartridges are spent for the first phase, three for the second.
Starlight Breaker — Nanoha's own "variation" on Divine Buster and her ultimate attack, but in reality a very different magic. It involves the collection and reuse of the magical energy left over by previous attacks dispersed in the combat airspace for a new attack, creating the "light beam converging" effect seen in the anime. Two additional variants are recognized in the DVD booklets, but not explicitly named in the anime dialogue.
Starlight Breaker Plus — This variant simply extends the time spent collecting magical energy, thereby increasing the overall attack power. Nanoha used this (despite the damage to her Linker Core midway) to break the force field deployed by the Wolkenritter and alert the TSAB.
Starlight Breaker ex — This variant is used in Excelion Mode, and uses a full magazine of cartridges, thus meeting or exceeding the attack power of the "Plus" variant with less time.
Barrier Burst — This detonates an active barrier (such as Protection). This is useful for countering a melee attack.
Strike Flame — The energy bayonet that Nanoha produces from the tip of Raising Heart when in Excelion mode's ACS Mode.
Stardust Fall — Classified as an accelerated material type shooting magic, Nanoha uses her magic to lift many rocks into the air and send them crashing down onto her enemies. First used in chapter 1 of the StrikerS manga to physically break through a group of Gadget Drones' AMF. It is a variation of the Eta Priest’s most destructive racial ability, the venerable
Starfall.
Blaster System
In StrikerS, Nanoha utilizes power-up system named Blaster. The cyborg Quattro explains it is an experimental booster that far surpasses the physical limits of the user's body.
In actual specs, it harnesses Nanoha’s latent newtype talents and allows her to tap her psychic powers as mana on top of her usual mana pool, granting an all-round boost of capabilities, as well as grant access to all-range attacks. The guidance of the Blaster Bits themselves rely on Nanoha’s minds.
Because each Bit functions like an additional Raising Heart, Nanoha can fire additional Divine Busters, even Starlight Breakers, or even create extra round shields. This prompted Kha to comment that he has finally met another person worthy of the Eyes of God. Nanoha then replied that it's because Kha's lost Eyes were the inspiration behind Blaster, and that even though Kha used risky technology to help her, the design for Blaster was of her own.
Henceforth, the Blaster system greatly enhances Nanoha's offensive and defensive powers, however due to the additional strain the system applies to Nanoha’s magic circuit and nervous system, this boost comes pretty much at the cost of her and Raising Heart's bodies. After StrikerS, Nanoha's magical potential has been decreased by 8%.
Nanoha can launch up to 6 Blaster Bits comfortably, though more can be created at the expense of her own health.
It is revealed later that the technology that made Nanoha’s Psion control possible, the Psychoframe, was leaked by one of Jail’s sponsors so that Nanoha would eventually be more of a challenge to him and his forces.
There are 4 levels of Blaster:
Blaster One — Infuses the next attack with psychic energy for the next or the current attack, it gives Divine Buster enough power to break through walls in episode 1, or overcome Diece's S-class energy bullets with far less time it takes her IS: Enormous Cannon to charge up.
Blaster Two — Also known as Blaster Second. This creates a prism-shaped shield around Nanoha as a last-ditch defence, but can also be used to hold an enemy in place without hurting them.
Blaster Three — This command switches the Blaster Bits from defensive to offensive settings, increasing power available for spellfire. Nanoha then applies this boost via an attack spell that is multiplied with any number of Blaster Bits.
Full Blast Mode — Used along with all Blaster Bits, Nanoha goes into a near-suicidal frenzy of energy beams, raining Busters and Breakers at relentlessly terrifying velocity and frequency without missing a shot, or fired in all directions all at once. This allowed Nanoha to destroy an entire swarm of Sentokijin while leaving grunts that were still enmeshed in the 360 degree dogfight scared silly, but completely unscathed.