Ophelia

"Because there is something you have to protect, because there is a reason you can not die that enables you to live on, those are foolish fantasies of the weak."

- Rippling Ophelia

Ophelia is Claymore No. 4 of Clare's generation. She is first introduced as an antagonist but later becomes a supporting character, for a short time. Despite the Organization forbidding the killing of humans, Ophelia hints that she may have done so. In Japanese, she has the nickname 血塗られた凶戦士, Chinurareta Kyōsenshi, or Blood-Smeared Wicked Warrior.

Her self-invented nickname is "Rippling Ophelia" (漣のオフィーリア, Sazanami no Ofīria), after her trademark sword movement.

Etymology
"Ophelia" is a transliteration of the Japanese "Ofīria"(オフィーリア, pronounced "o-fi-ri-ah").

"Ophelia" derives from the Greek word for help, ὄφελος (óphelos), possibly referring to her need for mental and emotional aid.

It is the name of a character in Shakespeare's play Hamlet, who loses her sanity after her father is killed attempting to protect her and drowns. This alludes to the Claymore Ophelia's madness and the fact that Clare leaves her body floating in a lake after her death, mimicking in both the anime and manga Millais' famous painting of Ophelia's death in Hamlet. In both works it appears as though the death is a suicide.

"Ophelia" also sounds similar to the Greek word for snake "'ὄφις" (pronounced "o-phis"), which may allude to her technique and appearance as an Awakened Being.

Claymore
Ophelia has pale, silvery blond hair, which she wears in a long plait. Her hairline is a widow's peak. Her eyes are silver, like all Claymores and she wears the standard Claymore uniform. Similar to that of Irene, Queenie, and Cassandra she has elf-like ears.


 * Height: 175 cm (5 ft 8.89in).

Awakened Form
She has light green skin, golden eyes and greenish hair. Blades grow from her back and from the end of her hair and her elongated arms end in sharp claws. Her lower body is a long, scaled, snake's tail.

Personality
Ophelia initially comes across as being light-hearted and whimsical, but this only serves to mask her sadistic nature. She genuinely enjoys the thrill of battle and delights in mutilating her victims in the form of twisted "games." She has a fascination with blood, seemingly enjoying the taste of it as well, and it is hinted that she killed humans in order to satisfy her insatiable bloodlust. Her temper can be dangerously explosive, as shown when she attacked Irene for interrupting her "playing" with Clare, even though Irene was now a civilian. She also displays a certain level of vanity when she tells Clare that she's just "back-up" for their mission and that the Awakened Being would be well within her ability to defeat, despite the fact that she ended up being the one defeated. Ophelia is very much obsessed with Awakened Beings, due to traumatization after Priscilla killed her older brother. She insists on killing only Awakened Beings, while ignoring normal Yoma, thus, she would also try to force other claymores to awaken so she could fight them, such as in the cases of Clare, Miria, and Hilda. Ophelia seems to despise people who try to sacrifice themselves in order to protect others, particularly the weak. This seems to have stemmed from a misperception of her brother's sacrifice to save her life, possibly because the truth of it was too painful for her to accept.

Claymore
Ophelia shows not only remarkable speed and strength, but resilience as well. Despite the female Awakened Being twisting Ophelia's head 180 degrees around, Ophelia survives and later fixes her neck to make it comfortable. It is currently unknown whether or not other claymores are capable of this feat as well.

Rippling Sword
Ophelia invented a technique that involves swift undulation of her arm so her sword appears to be rippling. The optical illusion it creates and unusual movements of the blade makes blocking, countering and yoki "forecasting" extremely difficult. She's first seen using this technique against Clare, but this ability was not effective against Irene's Quicksword.

Organization Rating

 * Yoki: A
 * Agility: A
 * Muscular Strength: A
 * Spirit: C
 * Perception: B+
 * Leadership: C

Awakened Being
Ophelia uses her claws, tail and the retracting blades on her back as her main weapons. She can also relocate her vital "core" to any part on her being, as shown when she moved all of her "human parts" to the end of her tail.

Organization Rating

 * Yoki: SS
 * Agility: SSS
 * Strength: SS
 * Invulnerability: S (Special Level of Ability)
 * Intelligence: SS

Early life
Ophelia's parents are unknown, but her older brother was killed and devoured by Priscilla as he protected her. This began Ophelia's obsession with Awakened Beings. She vowed to "to kill the One-Horned Demon" (Priscilla).

Employment as a Claymore
Ophelia became very powerful and ascended to No. 4. She invented a move involving swift undulation of her sword arm so her sword has the appearance of rippling. Mocking the other Claymores with nicknames, she informs Clare she started calling herself "Rippling Ophelia." But adds that her self-proclaimed nickname is widely "unknown" because no one, or almost no one, who has seen it has lived.

During her time as a Claymore, she gained the reputation of being vicious and monsterous. She hints that she has killed humans in the past. She even claims that other Claymores who've killed humans and received their punishment are idiotic because they turned themselves in FOR the punishment.

She also displayed immoral tendencies toward other Claymores. When Hilda was about to awaken, she asked Ophelia to give her Black Card to Miria. However, Ophelia ripped it up, condemning Hilda to awaken. She was in the Awakened Being hunt that was sent to kill Hilda and so was Miria. When Miria discovered it was Hilda she had slain, Ophelia showed signs of interest when she began to Awaken from the shock, even going so far as to taunt Miria into awakening faster. This was the reason that spawned Miria's dislike of Ophelia.

Awakened Being Hunt with Clare
On meeting Clare, she proceeds to physically torment Clare, piercing Clare's skin with her fingers and musing about her interest in blood, until Raki intervenes. Ophelia cuts off Clare's legs and fights Raki in a game, seeing if Clare can reattach them before Raki is killed. The Awakened Being interrupts the scene.

Clare flees with Raki, as Ophelia fights the Awakened Being. Despite having her head turned 180 degrees, Ophelia kills the Awakened Being and pursues Clare. After cornering her on a cliff-face, she proceeds to battle her.

Ophelia has the upper-hand due to her Rippling Sword, which cuts off Clare's right arm. When Clare fell down the cliff, Ophelia follows her, suspicious that she kept a hold on her arm. When Clare attempts to reattach it, Ophelia cuts it to shreds, realizing that Clare is an offensive type warrior and thus preventing her from regenerating it. After another battle, Ophelia manages to cut off Clare's other hand and would have killed her while she was disarmed and helpless. Despite her own vow of vengeance, she mocks Clare for her resolve to live on.

Irene interrupts Clare's impeding execution. Angered, Ophelia attacks, but is defeated by the Quicksword.

Awakening and Death
After her defeat, she remains scared of what happened and begs for her older brother to save her. However, she spitefully rebukes herself for being weak and, in her rage at Irene, she unwittingly awakens. She soon comes across Clare and proceeds to battle her. Realizing that she is not good to devour, she tries drowning Clare in the lake. Ophelia only realizes she has awakened when seeing her reflection in the water.

Stricken and distraught at having become the very thing she hated, she strikes out at Clare. After Clare severs both her arms, she gathers her human core at the end of her tail. Ophelia then introduces another game: if Clare can cut past all the rest of her body up til her human part (her weak point), she wins, and Ophelia will submit obediently to her. If Clare awakens before she can get to Ophelia's human core, she loses.

Ophelia remembers her brother's sacrifice and only makes one attempt to stop Clare, but encourages Clare to continue on by saying:

"What the hell are you doing?! If you just die like this, what should the people you leave behind do?

In the end, Ophelia allows Clare to fight in her place and let Clare to euthanize her. She remembers her brother's last smile, that he was smiling because he made sure that she was safe. Her body is later discovered by the Organization.

Brother
Ophelia was close to her older brother, who protected her fatally from Priscilla. On his death, she vowed to avenge him by 'slaying the one-horned monster'. She also hates him at the same time for putting his life on the line, even though he had no chance against the one horned being. In the end, she realised that she hates him for leaving her alone, and not because of him getting killed so easily.

Hilda
Ophelia knew Hilda only briefly. She met Hilda in the woods having picked up on her yoki where she found Hilda somewhat blindly searching for Miria (as she was on the verge of awakening). Having a fondness of fighting awakened beings and looking for good sport - Ophelia took the card and tore it up defiantly. As a result of shredding up the Black Card Hilda gave her meant for Miria, she condemned Hilda to awaken.

Miria
Miria was sent on a hunt to slay Hilda and it was only after she was slain did Miria realize that it was her friend. In her shock, she began to Awaken. Ophelia showed interest when this happened and it is probable she prevented the Black Card reaching Miria simply for her to Awaken, so that she, herself, could fight another Awakened Being.

Clare
It is an open question why Clare is assigned to the Godal hunting party.

At their first meeting in Godal, Ophelia knows or knew that Clare is partially awakened. Clare is slated for death. Ophelia toys with Clare and Raki, until interrupted by an Awakened Being. After killing the Being, Ophelia pursues Clare. Clare loses her right arm and left hand in the ensuing fight, but Irene rescues Clare with the Quicksword. Ophelia is disabled. Later, Ophelia unknowingly awakes.

After Clare recovers, she meets Ophelia in the forest. They battle in a lake. When Ophelia realizes what has happened to herself, she allows Clare to kill her and "puts her resolve" to kill Priscilla in Clare's hands.

Behind the Scenes
In the anime, Ophelia's voice was potrayed by Luci Christian. Ophelia has a song sung by her voice actor on the Claymore Intimate Persona album released while the anime was being recorded. This song is called "Zouo", translated as "Hatred." Luci Christian also voiced similar looking characters (the Black Snake from Black Blood Brothers and Medusa from Soul Eater).

Anime and Manga differences
In the anime, Miria warns Clare and the others, especially not to meet Ophelia even if this means to make the Organization suspicious. In the manga we see in Chapter 31 Miria regretting not to have told them about Ophelia in more detail.